RIGGED!
By Eric Verlo
NOT MY TRIBE - 10/27/2008 10:19PM MDT - 5 Comments
COLORADO SPRINGS- I attended the Every Vote Matters town hall symposium and I can cut through the unselfconscious evasiveness for you. The El Paso County election is RIGGED. The Republicans in charge are already folding their arms smugly behind locked glass doors. Many of the major bureaucrats showed up today to be seen smiling about it.
County Commissioner Dennis Hisey introduced the event with this assurance on behalf of the agency: “All those eligible to vote will be able to do so.” Give Hisey credit for taking straight aim to muddy the chief point of contention. Both the State of Colorado and El Paso County have been caught hindering voter registration. Promising to respect voting rights reserved for eligible citizens is a sick joke.
El Paso County’s purposeful mishandling of voter registrations has already excluded thousands who Hisey may well consider now ineligible.
What else? Here’s what else:
1. No redress for voter participation already suppressed.
2. Many newly registered will not be notified of their eligibility.
3. More will be sidelined with provisional ballots.
4. No early voting facility for voters more likely Democrats.
5. No paper ballot alternative to Diebold for early voters.
6. No nonpartisan oversight of Republican data technicians.
Neither Clerk and Recorder Bob Balink nor Secretary of State Mike Coffman showed up to answer the current accusations. Instead two representatives from the election staff were put forward to offer attendees the same reassurances crafted for the county website. Every vote matters, regardless the election, partisanship aside, yada yada.
The two women were besieged by complaints and worries from public at large, and though they had no answers, they were applauded by the Republicans in the room, most of whom were men in suits, many of whom were county employees. So much for partisanship. You’ve never seen such smug assholes.
In fairness, I’d guess neither Liz Olsen nor Terry Sholdt know the partisan shenanigans being pulled by their bosses. Probably the two are fully qualified office managers who enforce the rules they are given. Without a hint of awareness of the big picture. “Anyone with concerns should feel free to call us anytime.” I’m paraphrasing Olsen. Their office is eager to resolve any issue, so long as it’s brought to their attention. Fortunately someone was on hand in the audience to tell them trying to reach their office by phone was often impossible.
And is that your understanding of a voter’s rights? So long as a voter knows to call the Office of the County Clerk and Recorder, or try, he needn’t feel disenfranchised.
NOTE: Mark Lewis provides some video of the meeting:
Posted: October 27th, 2008 under Local News.
Comments: 5
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Comments
Comment from Tony Logan
(IP: 75.70.6.31)
Time: October 28, 2008, 9:02 am
So you actually think that the Republicans are rigging the election against the po old Democrats, Eric, here in Colorado Springs? You make several assertions that this is being done but offer up no evidence of it.
Personally I know of one new American citizen who has had no problem registering and getting an early ballot, too. No problem there at all.
I think making unfounded allegations has become the hallmark of certain liberal Democrats who themselves refuse to acknowledge their own party’s complicity in the Republican regime of the last 8 years, and instead prefer to act as if the US has been turned into a fascist state by Republicans when this just makes them look stupid in the eyes of most citizens.
The Democrats themselves usually are out there trying to close The System off against others (any Third Parties) right there alongside of the Republicans, but with all the liberal DP voting Paranoids barking constantly about alleged ‘rigging’ of the vote all the time you guys hope to slide by without any attention given much to that. That’s right. These allegations are really a smoke scree for themselves to keep Democrat voters themselves from thinking about their own party’s rigging of the elections through the use of their own humongous amounts of corporate funding and other actions like rigging the laws to keep Third Parties off the ballot in most regions of the country.
Comment from Michael Slivka
(IP: 75.163.184.41)
Time: October 28, 2008, 10:09 am
Right on, Brother Tony! The bleeding hearts always seem to cry foul around elections, to mask their own shenanigans. ALL the politicians are at fault for the mess we’re in; no government can be trusted. The only proper function of government is to protect the rights of individuals (not special interest groups) and to attempt to prevent and redress the initiation of physical force against such sovereign individuals. They work for us, not the other way around.
Comment from jonah
(IP: 75.70.77.115)
Time: October 28, 2008, 3:42 pm
Voters aren’t “Special interest groups” .
The one single party attempting to disenfranchise voters is the Republicans.
And based on the premise that people who aren’t wealthy shouldn’t be allowed to vote.
The Attorney from Denver spreading the disinformation about how student’s parents would be penalized financially if they registered and voted is only one small facet.
Parents can claim their children and even claim completely unrelated persons, with no restriction of where that person or persons lives,
It’s a very simple fact and show up in the instructions for filing the 1040 series of tax returns.
The attorney, an officer of the court, committed perjury AND unlawful Voter Intimidation by disseminating that misinformation.
Perhaps you would care to act pro-bono and represent all the students at all the colleges as a class in filing suit against him?
Or even a Cease and Desist order.
That would be significantly more constructive than finger pointing.
Comment from Michael Slivka
(IP: 75.163.224.55)
Time: October 28, 2008, 5:41 pm
Sorry, dude, I work only for paying customers. “Give something back” only works where you’ve gotten something for nothing in the first place.
Comment from jonah
(IP: 75.70.77.115)
Time: October 28, 2008, 9:08 pm
like police protection and the military keeping the Viet-Cong from invading Colorado?
Oh, I forgot.
Send a list of subsidized utilities you can do without, and, in exchange for absolute proof that you never use them I’ll use my vast influence over the Powers that Be to make sure you don’t get the bills for them.
Some of them are, like, sneaky.
Railroads, for instance, if you don’t live on the coast they would be the only economically feasible option for getting foodstuffs and, really, any products not made in the US to your door or at least to the delivery dock of your favorite market.
And with the trade deficit being what it is, you can figure that’s about 90% of everything you use.
It would take you a while to work out which services you never use or have never received the benefits of.
I gotta warn you, though, if the Republicans steal the election, and really, they constantly steal just about anything they can, my influence probably wouldn’t be as vast.
Especially if they refuse to honor my right to vote.
That would suck for me, and for you as well…
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