I don't know what it is about this election but I'm becoming more and more enraged by the sham political parties are making of our democracy. And it seems to be getting worse by the day.
As discovered by Talking Points Memo the GOP have hired a company to register voters, but are only interested in those who registered as Republican. If people indicated an affiliation to the DNC their registration cards were destroyed — a violation of federal law!
"We caught her taking Democrats out of my pile, handed them to her assistant and he ripped them up right in front of us. I grabbed some of them out of the garbage and she tells her assisatnt to get those from me," said Eric Russell, former Voters Outreach employee.
Eric Russell managed to retrieve a pile of shredded paperwork including signed voter registration forms, all from Democrats. We took them to the Clark County Election Department and confirmed that they had not, in fact, been filed with the county as required by law.
In support of the former employees testimony is a companies job listing on Career Builder:
Voter's Outreach of America is hiring door-to-door canvassers asking people to register to vote. Must be at least 18 yrs of age, no felonies, registered to vote and have own transportation. Need good communication skills and professional appearance. Hours are 4pm to 8pm Monday-Friday and 8am to noon Saturday.
Call toll free 702-307-1320 for more information.
Paid for by the Republican National Committee. www.gop.com. Not authorized by any candidate or candidate's committee.
Now before the lot of you go off on the Good Old Party, know that Ralph Nader used the same company to amass the requisite signatures in Arizona. And just like this incident in Nevada, the methods used for Nader were questionable at best. I suspect the DNC is also engaged in similar activities but just hasn't been caught with their hand in the rigged vote cookie jar.
If you've been reading Airbag long enough you'll know that I consider voting to a top priority and important responsibility, but when I read about crap like this it makes me want to start large riots in the streets of Washington DC. With any luck we could burn down the party headquarters, lynch a few lobbyist and run off all the scum bag partisan politicians that are more interested in redrawing voting districts than having to compete to keep their job.
Burn baby burn!
Join the fray by reading through and commenting at the end.
The thread is they were registering Nader votes but were still getting paid by the RNC (on the logic that Nader voters hurt Kerry). Nice.
Ah, perhaps if that page had paragraphs I would have seen that. I still think they're all rat bastards.
WHAT THE HELL? Send'em to jail. Real jail, not a minimum security, 6 week deal with time off for public service. Real jail where they have to literally watch their ass. I don't care what party they're from. There is no excuse. I hope they follow the money trail and get the people in charge, whether they're Democrat, Republican, or Independent.
If I found out my registration was trashed by someone with an agenda I would beat him down. This rant may be the kind of knee-jerk reaction you don't want and I apologise if so, but screwing with a person's right to vote is wrong. I would rather see the Bush family win a decade long political dynasty of screw-up presidents than have Kerry win by 1 vote gained by this kind of criminal voter fraud.
Can one not register to vote on voting day? If I recall correctly.. here in the Great White North.. one can register to vote so long as they have ID and proof of residency (although I may be wrong)..
Anywho.. sorry for that tangent. Toss 'em in the hole for a month of two first.. then let them live with the general population in a max security big house.
It's just getting crazier and crazier everyday, you know that almost doesn't even suprise me that that occurs! Maybe it's because I'm in the middle of a real eye opening movie, unconstitutional. The stuff that has been occuring by the hand of this government since 9/11 is overwhelming, local counties extending the ever-increasing reach of the great constitutional violators known as the Bush administration (esp. Ashcroft) is just another piece of the puzzle.
Greg, you probably just got yourself on the Attorney General's watch list with that post. It's a mad world.
Chris: No, in most places you have to register ahead of time. Heck, even in places where you should be able to register day-of, the poll workers have been known to pull stunts with similar outcomes to Greg's original post.
For a complete Voter Info Guide:
http://www.kottke.org/plus/vote2004/
-j
Wow, this is quite amazing. I live in Las Vegas and heard a small blurb on the radio, but I hadn't caught the full story until now.
I'm glad to see that this company doesn't appear to be the same group that swarmed UNLV to get students registered to vote. Many of them were in classrooms, on the pathways, near bus stops and on busses.
They should take the 'party affiliation' check box off of registration forms.
They don't have one in Minnesota. It would save some trouble, though I'm sure republicans would still throw out minorities' forms instead.
hi,
just read your article and my jaw dropped even more than it already was, thinking about the elections. I'm from holland (that's somewere in europe) and there's quite a big difference in the way elections go between our countries. it's incredible to watch how both parties throw mud at each other, making commercials about Kerry not being a good vietnam veteran, etc etc...
And then this story about registrations. Correct me if I'm wrong: but doesn't just everyone in america receive some sort of form/letter which give him or her the possibility to go vote on election day??
Matthijs
That's disturbing to say the least. If that is really going on, and on a significant scale, it's difficult to call the country a democracy.
Why do you have to "register to vote" anyways? We don't have to do that over here, in Sweden; we just vote. Is it because we have a national identification system or something? Is it really necessary to have a system where you need to "register to vote"? Seems like an unnecessary hoop to have to jump thought, to be able to do something as important as to vote.
Why do you have to say which party you're going to vote for?
I can't believe what I just read! Something is going really really wrong. Here in Europe all possible voters recieve a letter which authorisizes them to vote, having to register to be able to vote just feels wrong in so many ways. it's like an invitation to manipulate the vote... I always thouhgt US to be demacratic but the more I read about it the less I believe so. You want to bring democracy to Iraq? Better start in your own country before 'rightening' others.
I have to agree with Tomas that it is silly that we have to register. And yes, it is probably because you have a national ID and we do not.
Hey maybe when we get that national health care system, we'll have a national ID and we won't have to vote!
/me stops kidding myself
Registering is important as it prevents a person from voting twice, and also checks the eligibility of voters. In the past, lax voter registration enforcement has allowed corrupt political machines to count the votes of dead people and children. When applied fairly, voter registration helps protect the electoral process.
Party affiliation allows you access to vote in Party Primaries, as some states do not allow non-party members to vote in the Primaries.
I don't have a problem with fair rules about registering to vote, and you can always leave the party checkbox blank. I have a problem with the criminals who think their candidate and the money they're getting is more important than our democracy and freedom. Those people are a real threat to our national security (and my blood pressure).
The GOP (that's Grand, not Good) has no monopoly on the Nader strategy—which is the tried and true approach of giving money and aid to your opponent's other opponent if you are not going to be effected by it. Democrat Gray Davis got elected Governor of California (remember him?) when big money Dem's scuttled the candidacy of the moderate and popular LA mayor Richard Riordan by pouring money into the campaign of his Republican primary opponent, wingnut idiot Bill Simon—who the Davis camp knew would be a much easier to beat opponent in the general election. This is exactly what's going on with Nader this time around—his candidacy is pretty much being bankrolled by the Republicans because they know a strong Nader showing hurts Kerry. As proved last time every vote counts (if it's actually counted).
There are already those who predict we're headed for another Supreme Court debacle, as activities in the battleground states in these final weeks get sketchier and sketchier. There seems, unfortunately, little that some will stop at (on both sides of the aisle) to get their man to Washington. Does anyone really believe that Jeb Bush won't be bending the rules again to deliver Florida for his big bro? If he doesn't both their political careers are over.
It's unfortunate that this sort of thing is as common as it is, but I think under the current administration it's become much more brazen.
And while I don't think the Dems are comprised entirely of Boy Scouts either, the GOP has been caught doing this sort of thing plenty of times - just google "voter intimidation" and see how many instances of the GOP trying to suppress African-American voters turn up.
-Shameless- is the word that comes to mind.
I'm only surprised the GOP didn't require a loyalty oath before taking the voters registration. Truly we need some changes in our democracy; changes far beyond just the presidency.
The fact is that both parties are becoming more alike and they are basically lackeys working for the same corporate masters. This isn’t just regurgitation of Nader or Chomsky: I need only look around and see this is true. For example, the company I work for (a large technology corporation whose nickname has the past tense of the word "blow" in it) has given equal amounts of money to the Kerry and Bush campaigns, sends its minions to both conventions (complete with “hospitality suitesâ€: can you say ‘hos and booze?), and employs employs full-time Republican and Democrat lobbyists.
This approach is common in the corporate world. Corporations are betting on both sides of the game, because no matter who wins, they win. The corporations know something that we refuse to face: the “two-party system†is a joke. I am not comfortable with the only choices in an election being propped up, funded, and endorsed by corporate interests, because the interests of nations and their citizens always take a back seat to corporate interests.
We need to start thinking outside of the two-party system, and the one way to do that is to think and act honestly when Republicans or Democrats do the wrong thing. The other is to not vote for candidates of major parties; if even 5% of the electorate did this, the media -- and the parties -- might wake up and try to figure out why. This would be a step in the right direction. Voting status quo means more of the same.
Political affiliation aside - I'm getting fed up with the blatant lies and distortions on BOTH sides. It takes all of 5 minutes to go to factcheck or spinsanity to see where both of them have lied, repeatedly.
Watch a debate - check the list of lies - repeat....
Sad.
Similar issues I've seen in the past -- but they seem more prominent this time, as the vote seems more middle class vs. corporatism.
When I was an editor in Illinois and writing for the Trib and the Libertarians -- we were not allowed on the ballot without a minimum of 5,000 to 20,000 signatures of registered voters. That was accomplished rather easily, and within six months of the elections in Illinois. The Elections committee challenged the validity of the signatures of the ballots with a court case that lasted until one week prior to the election, and then promptly dropped the case... Leaving third party candidates off of the ballot.
That was when I realized how corrupt it can be -- that both parties bear little differences from each other, and string out the public to their bi-partisan needs. It is not just the voting system that is corrupt (and to answer the above question, registration for US voters must be received by October 18th to be allowed to vote), it is the whole election system in general, and I'm interested to see how this electronic voting pans out to add even more corruption.
Though I agree it's good to validate voters, so as to protect corruption... it doesn't work, we're well aware of continued invalid votes or even of Election boards blocking valid US votes (*cough, Florida -- 1million votes denied due to their 'questionable' criminal background, which is questionable in itself).
I would still pull for a United Western States of America, United Eastern States of America, United Miwestern States of America, United Southern States of America -- and then texas. All then nice little countries based on demographics, and then I have no worries about uninformed soccer moms in the midwest casting their votes out of 'fear of terrorism in the suburbs' and then scurring with the family to the local Wal-Mart.
Or, we just bring destruction Tenacious D style, and be our own hypocrites.
I don't recall anything approaching this bad happening here in the UK, but given the bizarre relationship of Blair and Bush, if Bush were to win, we may start getting some pretty bad stuff as Tone goes for his third term as PM.
A little off topic, but there are some great questions and answers from bush, kerry and nader over at slashdot.
http://politics.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/13/1657237&tid=226&tid=225&tid=224&tid=11