Peter Coyote on voter fraud
Fair Use Statement
<-- Return To Voting Fraud
See also:
- If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines
- Jim Crow revived in cyberspace
- Worrisome Move To Remove Presidential Term Limit from Constitution
Dear Friends,
I'm including a copy of a
letter I sent to
Barbara Boxer and my other representatives with
the evidence accumulated
of a potential 'November surprise'-- the rigging
of the next
Presidential vote by private, inaccessible,
untransparent voting
machines that leave no paper trail. For a fuller
discussion of the issue
and links, please go to: CommonDreams.org
Published on Friday, January
31, 2003.
I consider this a critical issue
and if you agree, urge
you to disseminate this widely and write a
personal letter to your
representatives: NOT AN E-MAIL. If you need their
address go to:
http://www.house.gov/writerep/ and for the Senate
go to:
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/
senators_cfm.cfm
Thank you very much,
Peter Coyote
----------------------------
Senator Barbara Boxer
112 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Dear Barbara,
I'm writing to you about a situation of
the greatest urgency.
Last year, I narrated a film called
"Unprecedented" by American
journalist Greg Palast (currently writing for the
London Guardian). This
film documents the illegal expunging of 54,000
black and overwhelmingly
Democratic voters from the Florida rolls just
before the presidential
election. We interviewed the computer company that
did the work, filmed
their explanations of the instructions they
received and their
admissions that they knew that their instructions
would produce massive
error. That figure has now been revised to 91,000.
Jeb Bush was sued, and was supposed to have
returned these
voters to the rolls, and
did not, which explains his last re-election. The
Republicans have
something far worse in mind for the next
presidential election and
Democrats need to be prepared.
The recent elections of Nebraska Republican
Chuck Hagel, the
loss in Georgia of Max Cleland, wildly popular
Vietnam vet, and the
victory of Alabama Governor Bob Riley,
along with a handful of other Republican
victories, (all predicted to
have been losers by straw polls which our nation
has refined to a
high-art) points to an ominous source:
corporate-programmed,
computer-controlled, modem-capable voting
machines, recording and
tabulating ballots.
You'd think in an open democracy that the
government---answerable to all its citizens,
rather than a handful of
corporate officers and stockholders---would
program, repair, and
control
the voting machines.
You'd think the computers
that handle our cherished
ballots would be open and their software and
programming available for
public scrutiny.
You'd think there would be a
paper trail of the vote,
which could be followed and audited if a there was
evidence of voting
fraud or if exit polls disagreed with computerized
vote counts. You'd be wrong.
The Washington, DC publication The Hill
(www.thehill.com/news/012903/hagel.aspx) has
confirmed that former
conservative radio talk-show host and now
Republican U.S. Senator
Chuck
Hagel was the head of, and continues to own part
interest in, the
company that owns the company that installed,
programmed, and largely
ran the voting machines that were used by most of
the citizens of
Nebraska.
When Democrat Charlie Matulka requested
a hand count of the
vote in the election he lost to Hagel, his request
was denied because
Nebraska had a just-passed law that prohibits
government-employee
election workers from looking at the ballots, even
in a recount.
The
only machines permitted to count votes in
Nebraska, he said, are those
made and programmed by the corporation formerly
run by Hagel.
When Bev
Harris and The Hill's Alexander Bolton pressed the
Chief Counsel and
Director of the Senate Ethics Committee, (the man
responsible for
ensuring that FEC disclosures are complete),
asking him why he'd not
questioned Hagel's 1995, 1996, and 2001 failures
to disclose the details
of his ownership in the company that owned the
voting machine company
when he ran for the Senate, the Director
reportedly met with Hagel's
office on Friday, January 25, 2003 and Monday,
January 27, 2003.
After
the second meeting, on the afternoon of January
27th, the Director of
the Senate Ethics Committee resigned his job.
Hagel's surprise victory is a trial-run for
the presidential
election. Election 'reform'
laws are now prohibiting paper ballots (no trail)
and exit polls,
effectively removing all trace and record of
votes, making prosecution
of voter fraud virtually impossible.
For whatever reasons, the Democrats decided
not to pursue the
issue of fraudulence in the last
Presidential election. The three Supreme Court
Justices who should
have recused themselves (Scalia, Thomas, and
O'Connor) were allowed
to stand unchallenged and pass a bizarre
one-time-only ruling. That
they were in place long before the election,
demonstrates how clearly
the end-game of
such moves was thought out.
Unless the issue of voter fraud is elevated
to an issue of
national importance, not only is it highly
probable that Democrats will lose again and again,
but eventually voters
will "sense" even if they cannot prove, that
elections are rigged, and
the current 50% of those boycotting elections will
swell to the
majority.
Privatization of the vote is
tantamount to turning over the
control of democracy to the corporate sector. I
urge you to use your
considerable powers and influence to address this
issue.
See also:
- If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines
- Jim Crow revived in cyberspace
- Worrisome Move To Remove Presidential Term Limit from Constitution
<-- Return To Voting Fraud
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