Out of the Past

You're right, the US can't force Colombia to do anything. However, the US can cajole Colombia into doing the right thing with carrots and sticks. Namely, pass laws protecting labor leaders, get the free-trade agreement. Don't pass the laws, fuggetaboutit. Your comment makes it obvious that you haven't the slightest idea of the transformation in Colombia since Uribe took over. Given that suppoesedly Bush stole the last two elections do you think other countries should demand we fix our electoral system as conditions prior to entering agreements?

Congratulations to Fredi. In the summer of '07 I predicted he would get canned by May '08. I was wrong. I still don't like him.

I would measure patriotism by the definitions posted by legacyofCangelosi and would base it on what people do in their lives and not on what people say when they answer survey questions but with that said I found this interesting. http://article.nationalreview.com/print/?q...NWZjYWRjMTNjYzg= Sarah Palin Is Correct (Again) Patriotism runs higher in some areas than in others. By James G. Gimpel Joe Biden may be "tired, tired, tired, tired, tired!" of hearing that some places in the country are more patriotic than others, but Sarah Palin is right: Patriotic and pro-American sentiment run higher in some areas than in others. Naturally, how to measure patriotism is a matter of argument. One way is to look at differences in military involvement: Rural and small-town families are more likely to see their children go off into combat, and return in body bags. Or, we can turn to one of the few recent non-partisan surveys on the matter, the American National Election Study from the University of Michigan. It's produced every election year, and the most recent data is from 2004. This installment asked two pertinent questions: 1. How strong is your love for your country? . . . EXTREMELY strong, VERY strong, SOMEWHAT strong, or NOT VERY strong? 2. Is being an American EXTREMELY important, VERY important, SOMEWHAT important, NOT TOO important, or NOT AT ALL important to you personally? If we scrutinize the responses from large cities, suburbs, and small towns, the small towns are far more patriotic. Nearly three in every four (73.4 percent) respondents from counties of fewer than 25,000 people expressed that their love for their country was extremely strong, compared to only half of those in counties with more than 300,000 inhabitants. In the nation's largest population centers, those expressing "extremely strong" love for country stood at only 46 percent. And over two-thirds of respondents from small counties reported that it is "extremely important" to be American, compared to about half of big-city folk. It is certainly possible that factors other than simple geography are at work here. The populations in small towns are older, and older people are generally more expressive of pro-American values than younger people are, for example. Also, rural areas are more Republican, and the University of Michigan survey shows a significant partisan difference in patriotism. Democrats are considerably less likely to express strong love of country than Republicans are, and less likely to think being an American is important. Of those who claimed to be "Strong Democrats," only around half expressed extremely strong love of country, compared to three-fourths of the "Strong Republicans." A sizable share of (but by no means all) committed Democrats are apparently embarrassed about their country and about being American. Perhaps Governor Palin's comment is one of those truths that is better left unspoken. The McCain campaign seems to be treating it that way. But there is certainly no falsehood in her remarks, as Senator Biden suggested. ? James G. Gimpel is a professor of government at the University of Maryland, College Park.

I think an 87% decrease in murders among union members is a good thing.

well don't feel too bad Dodge. Just 44 percent of BBC viewers identified the prime minister correctly. I think those are BBC viewers in the US.

But he sounded super cool and collected when he did it so everything is cool and it doesn't matter. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1224459520....html#printMode Obama Is Wrong About Colombia Labor unions are much safer under Uribe. After the final debate between John McCain and Barack Obama last week, the media lost no time digging for dirt on Joe the Plumber. Too bad a similar level of scrutiny was not applied to the slanderous remarks Mr. Obama made against Colombia. Joe, in case you've been hiding under a rock, is the working-class, well, Joe, from Toledo, Ohio, who last week delivered a neat summation of the Obama economic plan: Increase taxes on successful risk-takers and use the money to expand the welfare rolls. Joe was practicing what I call the audacity of veracity. He made the Harvard-trained candidate look bad. For that the media decided he needed to be taken down a notch. Meanwhile, the fourth estate walked away from any serious discussion of Mr. Obama's slander of the finest U.S. ally in Latin America. To be fair, Mr. Obama probably did not set out on Wednesday night to insult millions of Colombians and revive the notion many U.S. neighbors have of the Ugly Gringo. But when Mr. McCain pointed out that opposing the U.S.-Colombia Free Trade Agreement doesn't make sense -- because the U.S. is already open to imports from Colombia and because the agreement will open new markets for U.S. exporters during rough economic times -- Mr. Obama was caught flat-footed. He reached into his memory bank for whatever he had been told to say about Colombia. He seems to have found his hard drive loaded with Big Labor talking points. Here's what it spit out: "The history in Colombia right now," he said, "is that labor leaders have been targeted for assassination, on a fairly consistent basis, and there have not been prosecutions." Mr. McCain should have blown the whistle right there because bearing false witness against your neighbor, who also happens to be a friend, is a foul. Labor killings in Colombia have gone down sharply in the past five years and convictions have gone up. Mr. Obama was wrong. Moreover, Mr. McCain missed an opportunity to ask Mr. Obama how he squares his antagonism toward Colombia -- whose president has an 80% approval rating -- with his promise to boost America's image abroad. An American politician ought to know better than to deliver a morality lecture to Colombia. American demand for cocaine, which funds Colombia's worst criminality -- including the bloodthirsty Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) -- has nearly wrecked that beautiful country. Colombians, who have bravely cooperated with the hapless U.S. "war on drugs," have paid a steep price. By the time President Alvaro Uribe took office in August 2002, Colombia was almost a failed state. That year there were 28,837 homicides nationwide, making it one of the most dangerous places on planet Earth. There were also 196 union members killed that year. Their deaths were not unrelated to the political violence sweeping the country. The dominant public-sector unions have their roots in a revolutionary ideology that they share with the FARC. This has put them on the left side of Colombia's violent politics for decades. On the other side have been those who took up arms to oppose guerrilla aggression. Mr. Uribe has worked to restore peace by strengthening the state. This has been bad for both sides. But as the rebels have been pushed back, FARC sympathizers have run to Washington to discredit Mr. Uribe. Democrats have welcomed them. Meanwhile the death toll has dropped dramatically, and union members have especially benefited from improved security. As a Journal editorial on Friday explained, from 2002 to 2007 the number of murdered Colombian union members dropped by almost 87%. By any fair standard that is progress, especially considering the pattern Mr. Uribe inherited. In 2000, 155 unionists were murdered and in 2001, 205 died. The numbers only started to come down when he took the helm. In October 2006, the president created a special investigative unit inside the attorney general's office to handle union murders. The unit began operations in February 2007, and it says that as of this August "some 855 cases have open investigations" and that "179 security preventive detention measures have been issued, 61 cases are ready to be referred to court for trial, and 115 suspects have been convicted in 75 sentences." It is far safer to be a union member today in Colombia than to be a member of the general population. This is a fact, and it would be interesting to know why Mr. Obama has repeatedly refused to acknowledge it. Is it because of his heavy reliance on campaign contributions from the antitrade AFL-CIO? Or perhaps, like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Mr. Obama has an ideological bias in favor of Colombia's hard left. If it's the latter, then it is worth asking whether an Obama presidency would change U.S. foreign policy to look more favorably on insurgents of the FARC variety.

The trend you note makes sense. You'll notice that, for the most part, the shows and publications with more "clueless" audiences as you say tend to attract a more generalist crowd (people that watch CNN do so for many reasons that have nothing to do with politics and more to do with general news). Also, I think these questions are not really all that substantive (except for the question about who controls Congress). Does it matter that you know that the name of the British PM is Gordon Brown? I think it's more relevant to test Americans' knowledge of the issues. Any fool can answer these questions if they happen to see something that day (like a title like British PM Gordon Brown") without knowing a thing about any of the issues. That's why I thought the random question Bush got in 2000 asking him if he knew the president of whatever country was unfair and irrelevant. I think supposedly more people get their political news from John Stewart's show than from the nightly news. I think I read or heard that somewhere. If that's the case you would hope that the The Daily Show crowd wouldn't be so clueless but from the very limited exposure I've had to that show (a clip here or there on youtube) I think it's a very dumb show so I'm not surprised the audience is so clueless.

Ranking from most informed to most clueless with the percentage answered correctly. 68.7% - Hannity & Colmes 67.3% - NPR 67.0% - The New Yorker/Atlantic 65.0% - Rush Limbaugh 62.3% - Colbert Report 57.0% - O'Reilly Factor 55.0% - NewsHour 52.3% - C-SPAN 49.7% - Daily Show 45.3% - CNN 41.3% - Letterman/Leno 32.7% - National Enquirer

Well, this is pretty much what happens when taxes are treated as the most evil thing in the world. Eventually politicians run on a platform devoted to not raising taxes, even when it is necessary. This happens when politicians use income taxes to buy votes.

I'm not surprised CNN, Letterman, The National Enquirer and The Daily Show have the most clueless audience. http://www.livescience.com/culture/081015-...tical-news.html Americans Flunk Simple 3-Question Political Survey By LiveScience Staff Some news audiences are more politically savvy than others, according to a new poll, with readers of The New Yorker and similar high-brow magazines being the most knowledgeable. The survey, conducted between April 30 and June 1 by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, measured the political knowledge of 3,612 U.S. adults. Participants were asked to name the controlling party of the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. secretary of state and Great Britain's prime minister. Overall, just 18 percent of participants answered all three questions correctly. More than 50 percent of Americans knew that the Democrats have a majority in the House, while 42 percent could identify the secretary of state (Condoleezza Rice). Less than 30 percent could name the prime minister of Great Britain (Gordon Brown). Perfect scores The best-informed news audiences crossed the ideological spectrum. Nearly half of regular readers of The New Yorker, The Atlantic and Harper's Magazine answered all three political knowledge questions correctly. A perfect score was obtained by 44 percent of regular listeners of National Public Radio (NPR), 43 percent of regular viewers of MSNBC's "Hardball with Chris Matthews" and 42 percent of the Fox News Channel's "Hannity & Colmes" audience. Thirty-four percent of "The Colbert Report" audience and 30 percent of "The Daily Show" audience got all three questions correct. While most news audiences knew that Democrats have a majority in the House, participants struggled to correctly name the current British prime minister. Just four news audiences had a majority who correctly identified Brown, including regular readers of The New Yorker and similar magazines such as The Atlantic, regular NPR listeners, regular readers of political magazines, such as The Weekly Standard and The New Republic, and regular viewers of "Hardball." Just 44 percent of BBC viewers identified the prime minister correctly. Here's a detailed breakdown of the percentage of individuals answering each of the three questions correctly from the different news audiences: The New Yorker/Atlantic: 71 percent (correctly identified Democrats as the majority in the House), 71 percent (correctly identified Condoleezza Rice), 59 percent (correctly identified Gordon Brown) NPR: 73 percent, 72 percent, 57percent Hannity & Colmes: 84 percent, 73 percent, 49 percent Rush Limbaugh: 83 percent, 71 percent, 41 percent Colbert Report: 73 percent, 65 percent, 49 percent Daily Show: 65 percent, 48 percent, 36 percent NewsHour: 66 percent, 52 percent, 47 percent O'Reilly Factor: 70 percent, 60 percent, 41 percent C-SPAN: 63 percent, 59 percent, 35 percent Letterman/Leno: 51 percent, 42 percent, 31 percent CNN: 59 percent, 48 percent, 29 percent National Enquirer: 44 percent, 32 percent, 22 percent Education factor In general, well-educated news audiences scored high on political knowledge. For instance, 54 percent of the regular readers of publications such as The New Yorker, The Atlantic and Harper's Magazine are college graduates, as are 54 percent of regular NPR listeners. However, several news audiences with relatively low proportions of college graduates also scored well on the news quiz. Just 31 percent of regular "Hannity & Colmes" viewers are college graduates. Even still, 42 percent Hannity viewers got perfect scores on the political knowledge quiz, compared with 44 percent of NPR listeners. Nearly 40 percent of the regular audience of the news parody "The Colbert Report" are college graduates, compared with 30 percent of "The Daily Show" viewers. Both shows have younger audiences than other TV news sources, with less than a quarter of Colbert and Daily Show viewers over the age of 50, compared with more than half of "Hardball" and "Hannity & Colmes" viewers being 50 and older.

The number of Americans getting a free ride will get out of control under either candidate. I hate our no questions asked welfare system but hate it even more when it's done through the tax code. http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/printer/23631.html ==================== Both Candidates' Tax Plans Will Reduce Millions of Taxpayers' Liability to Zero (or Less) by Scott A. Hodge Almost Half of Tax Returns Could Reclaim Every Dollar Withheld During the Year Fiscal Fact No. 146 One of the biggest challenges facing both John McCain and Barack Obama in their commitment to provide tax relief to working-class Americans is the simple fact that millions of them already pay no personal income taxes. According to the most recent IRS statistics for 2006, some 45.6 million tax filersone-third of all filershave no tax liability after taking their credits and deductions. For good or ill, this is a dramatic 57 percent increase since 2000 in the number of Americans who pay no personal income taxes. Tax Foundation estimates show that if all of the Obama tax provisions were enacted in 2009, the number of these "nonpayers" would rise by about 16 million, to 63 million overall. If all of the McCain tax proposals were enacted in 2009, the number of nonpayers would rise by about 15 million, to a total of 62 million overall. The tax code has always contained provisions that reduce the income tax burden for low-income workers, such as the standard deduction, personal exemption, and dependent exemption. Between 1950 and 1990, the percentage of tax filers whose entire tax liability was wiped out by these provisions averaged 21 percent. Since then, lawmakers have expanded creditssuch as the earned income tax credit (EITC)while creating a plethora of new credits, including the child tax credit, the HOPE credit, lifetime learning credit, and the credit for adoption expenses. Most tax credits can only reduce a taxpayer's amount due to zero, but the EITC and the child tax credit were also made refundable, meaning that taxpayers are eligible to receive a check even if they have paid no income tax during the year. Those tax returns have become, in effect, a claim form for a subsidy delivered through the tax system rather than a direct payment from a traditional government program like welfare or farm supports. As shown in Table 1 below, the Tax Foundation estimates that there will be 47 million tax returns with zero income tax liability in 2009 under current law. That's one-third of all tax returns, and those 47 million tax returns represent 96 million individuals. Both the McCain and Obama plans would increase this number by expanding existing tax benefits or creating new ones. Senator McCain is proposing one expanded provisionthe dependent exemptionand one new credit, a $5,000 refundable health care tax credit. The Obama plan contains seven new provisions, including a new "Making Work Pay Credit," a "Universal Mortgage Credit," and a plan to eliminate income taxes for seniors earning under $50,000.1 Taken together, the Tax Foundation estimates the McCain proposals would increase the number of nonpayers by about 15 million, bringing the total number of taxpayers who pay no personal income taxes to 62 million, roughly 43 percent of all tax filers. Almost all of this is due to McCain's health care credit, which dramatically realigns health care incentives and gives people a powerful motive to buy health insurance. This tax provision has a bigger impact on cutting people's taxes than any single proposal from either party.2 Obama uses a longer list of smaller tax credit ideas to reduce a similar number of taxpayers' liability to zero. About 16 million people who are currently paying at least a little income tax would see their liability zeroed out, bringing the total to 63 million, or 44 percent of all tax returns. Table 1. Impact of Candidates' Tax Plans on the Number of Nonpayers Number of Filers with Zero Tax Liability in 2009 (Millions) Percentage of All Filers with No Liability Current Law 47 33% Obama Plan 63 44% McCain Plan 62 43% The chart below shows that major structural tax changes enacted during the 1980s contributed greatly to the doubling of nonpayers. Perhaps the most significant was indexing the tax brackets in 1985 to prevent inflation from pushing people into higher tax brackets. Also, the Tax Reform Act of 1986 nearly doubled the personal exemption and replaced the zero-bracket with the basic standard deduction for nonitemizers. Since the early 1990s, however, lawmakers have increasingly used the tax code instead of government spending programs to funnel money to groups of people they want to reward. Credits have been enacted to subsidize families with children, college students, and purchasers of hybrid cars, just to name a few of the most well known. In terms of tax revenue, the most significant of these socially targeted credits was the $500 per-child tax credit enacted in 1997. The 2001 and 2003 tax bills doubled the value of the credit to $1,000 and added a refundable component. Quite aside from the fact that these refundable credits remove millions from the roster of Americans who support the government by paying the income tax, these credits have some undesirable effects. Added complexity. The explosion of tax credits has added a tremendous amount of complexity to the tax code, especially for low-income Americans who are the supposed beneficiaries of the programs. The EITC is so complicated that more than three-quarters of those claiming it pay a tax preparer to complete their forms.3 Punitive marginal tax rates. To withhold the benefit of these credits from "rich people," the definition of which changes from law to law, each of these credits has a phase-out rangethat is, a range of income where the taxpayer has to pay back the credit that he no longer qualifies for. As a result, taxpayers in the phase-out range face unexpectedly high effective marginal tax rates, in effect a severe tax penalty for every new dollar of income they earn. The President's Tax Reform Panel found that taxpayers in the phase-out range of the EITC face a higher effective marginal tax rate than even the most affluent Americans. Narrowing the tax base makes revenue volatile. Expanding existing credits or adding new ones pushes people who used to pay taxes into the nonpayer range, shrinking the tax base and requiring higher taxes on everyone else. Undesirable volatility in federal revenue is the likely result, as the incomes of higher-income taxpayers include more business, dividend, and capital gains income which fluctuate much more wildly than wages. California has been a case study of this rollercoaster budget problem. The state receives 84 percent of its income tax revenue from taxpayers earning more than $100,000 annually, and its 66 percent drop in income from stock options and capital gains between 2000 and 2002 contributed to a $10 billion-plus budget gap.4 Expanding the role of the IRS. By most accounts, the task of the Internal Revenue Service is to administer the nation's tax code and collect the expected amount of taxes the system is supposed to raise to fund government programs. Should the IRS also be required to administer all the subsidies that Congress enacts? Collectively, these credits have made the tax code impenetrable for taxpayers and far more difficult for the IRS to administer. Conclusion Over the past two decades, lawmakers have increasingly turned to the tax system rather than direct spending programs to funnel money to targeted groups of Americans, furthering some social or political goal. As a result, millions of Americans have been effectively removed from the income tax payment system while the tax code has been made more complicated to comply with and more difficult to administer. The tax plans of both the presidential candidates would exacerbate this situation greatly. It is time for a serious public discussion of whether it is desirable to have so many Americans disconnected from the cost of government and what the consequences are of using the tax system as a vehicle for social policy.

http://www.walb.com/global/story.asp?s=917...tType=Printable Mentally challenged man says his vote wasn't right By Jennifer Emert ALBANY, GA (WALB) - There are allegations of voter fraud, as a Dougherty County family claims the vote of a mentally challenged relative was stolen. They say the adult day rehab program where Jack Justice attends took him to vote, without the family's permission. What's worse is Justice says the person helping him wouldn't cast the ballot for his choice for President. Jack Justice has been voting since he turned 18. Typically his family takes him to their neighborhood precinct. This time Primus Industries, his adult day rehab program, took him to vote. His family was shocked, but what shocked them more was that Jack claims that his aide commandeered his vote. "They told me to vote for Obama, I said no I wanted to vote for McCain," said Jack Justice, a voter. Jack Justice says the person helping him, selected Obama's name. His sister says the family is often asked to sign a permission slips for trips, but for this they were never notified. "No permission slips, no nothing, he just came home and said he had gone," said Nancy Justice, Jack's sister. We questioned election officials about the procedure, who say they recall the group coming in to vote and an aide was helping the individuals, but they must sign an oath that they'll cast the ballot however the voter prefers. "So it plainly says the person should tell the person how they want to vote and then they help them mark it," said Carolyn Hatcher, Dougherty County Elections Supervisor. Election officials say they can't follow people into the booth to see what happens. We contacted the Albany Area Community Service Board who oversees Primus Industries. They say they do their best to protect the safety, treatment, and care of the individuals in their programs. They also said they'll look into the allegations and conduct an internal investigation if necessary. Nancy Justice is just upset the incident happened. "For me it was kind of pushing it to the limit there to get him to vote for someone in particular who they wanted him to vote for," said Nancy Justice. Election officials say the family's only option is to file a challenge to the election results. The Justice's are considering their options. Advance voting will begin this Monday at the Riverfront Resource Center on Pine Avenue. Advance voted will run through October 31st. No one will be able to vote the Monday prior to election day.

Why do you misrepresent what she said? She said she loves to visit the pro america areas of the country. By mentioning "areas" rather than "states" she's clearly excluding areas that she considers not to be pro america but is clearly not excluding entire states. My guess is Wright's church and Ayer's home and Rezko's office are probably areas she considers not to be pro america. My guess is you would fit right in in those areas.

Funny story. My fiance registered to vote at her college. The guy gave her the voters registration info etc. He told her "just fill out your name and w/e. I'll fill out the rest." She noticed he was wearing an obama pin, so she was like nahhh thats ok I'll do the rest myself. She marked down republican for party affiliation. She gets her card later on and guess what? The guy switched her party affiliation to democrat. Typical... I'm not surprised at all.

I still don't get why felons who have served their time (whether that be in prison or on probation) shouldn't be allowed to vote. I fail to see any kind of logic there. I know many Republicans would like to exclude felons from voting because they don't want black people to vote in large numbers, but I think that's totally unfair. I think you forget that until the past 10+ years Florida has being a state run by the Democrats and currently with the GOP controlling the governorship and both houses of congress felons have more voting rights tahtn they ever have had. Just compare felon voting rights now with what they had under Graham and the democratic congress. I don';t agree with restoring their rights but the factb is under GOP control their rights have being restored while the Democrats did not lift a finger to restore them during the decades they were in control.

Registration fraud is fraud and you shouldn't blow-it off as if it's unimportant just because not every single fraudulent registrant will turn into a fraudulent vote. Also, by flooding the system with fraudulent applications you overwhelm election officials and prevent them from cleaning up otherwise illegal voters. In Florida, for example, we have over 100,000 felons that should be removed from the voting rolls but were not removed due to lack of resources. If we have a close election, say McCain up by 0.25%, the felons that remained in the rolls would likely turn the election in Obama's favor. What are the elements of fraud? (1) Defendant made a false statement regarding a material fact; (2) Defendant knew or should have known the representation was false; (3) Defendant intended that the representation induce plaintiff to act on it; and (4) Plaintiff suffered damages in justifiable reliance on the representation. Unless your little story there can show that these people intentionally misrepresented something here, your claims are meritless. It's not enough to simply turn in something that is incorrect. You can't accuse me of fraud if I turned in a voter registration form that has my new address that doesn't match the records because I haven't changed my address on my driver's license or because I forgot to include my middle name or middle initial. That's not fraud. That's a mistake. Don't confuse the two. Plus, I hope you are aware of this, but felons can vote in the state of Florida. That's a new law. It's agaisnt the law to provide false information in voter registration forms. I'm sure some in the 200k in Ohio were honest mistakes but I'm sure many of them were not and those should be prosecuted. Regarding the new felon law in Florida, some felons can vote and some felons cannot vote.. the rights were only restored to certain felons, not to all felons. How do you define false? Was it against the law for me to provide my new address when I hadn't changed my address on my driver's license? Was it against the law to not include my middle name? These "mismatches" the article and you speak of would include the scenarios I just outlined. Are you going to report me? You're the lawyer so maybe you can report back on what the law defines as "false" as far as voter registration is concerned. Also, you might want to read up on the felon law passed by Crist as you don't seem to understand it given that you're under the impression rights were restored to all felons.

Registration fraud is fraud and you shouldn't blow-it off as if it's unimportant just because not every single fraudulent registrant will turn into a fraudulent vote. Also, by flooding the system with fraudulent applications you overwhelm election officials and prevent them from cleaning up otherwise illegal voters. In Florida, for example, we have over 100,000 felons that should be removed from the voting rolls but were not removed due to lack of resources. If we have a close election, say McCain up by 0.25%, the felons that remained in the rolls would likely turn the election in Obama's favor. What are the elements of fraud? (1) Defendant made a false statement regarding a material fact; (2) Defendant knew or should have known the representation was false; (3) Defendant intended that the representation induce plaintiff to act on it; and (4) Plaintiff suffered damages in justifiable reliance on the representation. Unless your little story there can show that these people intentionally misrepresented something here, your claims are meritless. It's not enough to simply turn in something that is incorrect. You can't accuse me of fraud if I turned in a voter registration form that has my new address that doesn't match the records because I haven't changed my address on my driver's license or because I forgot to include my middle name or middle initial. That's not fraud. That's a mistake. Don't confuse the two. Plus, I hope you are aware of this, but felons can vote in the state of Florida. That's a new law. It's agaisnt the law to provide false information in voter registration forms. I'm sure some in the 200k in Ohio were honest mistakes but I'm sure many of them were not and those should be prosecuted. Regarding the new felon law in Florida, some felons can vote and some felons cannot vote.. the rights were only restored to certain felons, not to all felons.

Registration fraud is fraud and you shouldn't blow-it off as if it's unimportant just because not every single fraudulent registrant will turn into a fraudulent vote. Also, by flooding the system with fraudulent applications you overwhelm election officials and prevent them from cleaning up otherwise illegal voters. In Florida, for example, we have over 100,000 felons that should be removed from the voting rolls but were not removed due to lack of resources. If we have a close election, say McCain up by 0.25%, the felons that remained in the rolls would likely turn the election in Obama's favor.

The fraud in this election just is rampant.. about 1 in 3 new voter looks funny. http://www.ohio.com/news/break_news/31101144.html Ohio elections chief appeals court ruling By Associated Press POSTED: 08:58 a.m. EDT, Oct 16, 2008 COLUMBUS: Ohio's top elections chief has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in a dispute over whether the state is required to do more to help counties verify voter eligibility, a spokesman for her office said Thursday. Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, filed an appeal the high court late Wednesday, said spokesman Jeff Ortega. On Tuesday, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati sided with the Ohio Republican Party and ordered Brunner to set up a system that provides names of newly registered voters whose driver's license numbers or Social Security numbers don't match records in other government databases. The GOP contends the information for counties will help prevent fraud. At least 200,000 newly registered voters have mismatched data, according to an initial review by Brunner's office. Brunner's office said Wednesday that she would comply with the lower court's ruling. Ortega said the office would release a statement later Thursday on why she chose to file an appeal. Brunner has called the issue a veiled attempt at disenfranchising voters and said other checks exist to help determine eligibility. Ohio Republicans issued a statement calling the situation a shameful mess and criticized her for initially saying she would comply with the earlier court ruling. About 666,000 Ohioans have registered to vote since January, with many doing so before the contested Democratic presidential primary election between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton in March. COLUMBUS: Ohio's top elections chief has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in a dispute over whether the state is required to do more to help counties verify voter eligibility, a spokesman for her office said Thursday. Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, filed an appeal the high court late Wednesday, said spokesman Jeff Ortega. On Tuesday, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati sided with the Ohio Republican Party and ordered Brunner to set up a system that provides names of newly registered voters whose driver's license numbers or Social Security numbers don't match records in other government databases. The GOP contends the information for counties will help prevent fraud. At least 200,000 newly registered voters have mismatched data, according to an initial review by Brunner's office. Brunner's office said Wednesday that she would comply with the lower court's ruling. Ortega said the office would release a statement later Thursday on why she chose to file an appeal. Brunner has called the issue a veiled attempt at disenfranchising voters and said other checks exist to help determine eligibility. Ohio Republicans issued a statement calling the situation a shameful mess and criticized her for initially saying she would comply with the earlier court ruling. About 666,000 Ohioans have registered to vote since January, with many doing so before the contested Democratic presidential primary election between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton in March.

WASHINGTON ? As the economy worsens and Election Day approaches, a conservative campaign that blames the global financial crisis on a government push to make housing more affordable to lower-class Americans has taken off on talk radio and e-mail. Commentators say that's what triggered the stock market meltdown and the freeze on credit. They've specifically targeted the mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which the federal government seized on Sept. 6, contending that lending to poor and minority Americans caused Fannie's and Freddie's financial problems. Federal housing data reveal that the charges aren't true, and that the private sector, not the government or government-backed companies, was behind the soaring subprime lending at the core of the crisis. What the writer of the article and you don't understand is that Fannie and Freddie get blame because by purchasing the deadbeat loans from the banks they freed up more money for the banks to make more even more deadbeat loans. The banks from top executives making strategic decisions to the loan processors looking the other way on fraudulent applications all get blame but Fannie and Freddie are at the top of the blame heap.

Again, instead of denying the undeinable in an effort to stall until election day, Obama should just say that he is dissapointed with ACORN. Say that they are betraying the spirit of community organizing... He's best off ignoring it. His fans on the left have no problem with the fraud. People on the right wouldn't vote for him one way or the other. People in the middle don't really know what's going on because the mainstream media pretty much ignores the fraud. There hasn't been fraud. The Gonzales Justice Department spent a TON of time investigating ACORN, and came up empty. David Iglesias, one of the attorneys that was fired for political reasons, was fired even after he investigated 100 claims of voter fraud that was supposed to have involved ACORN. He has said that none of those 100 claims had anything to them. When he refused to push the issue further, he was fired. I think we have different standards of what qualifies as fraud. To be honest I'm not at all surprised you approve or seem to approve of ACORN submitting thousands if not hundreds of thousands bogus voter registration applications. I say you seem to approve of their actions because you seem to think they have done nothing wrong.

They should match votes with SS# to prevent voting fraud.

Again, instead of denying the undeinable in an effort to stall until election day, Obama should just say that he is dissapointed with ACORN. Say that they are betraying the spirit of community organizing... He's best off ignoring it. His fans on the left have no problem with the fraud. People on the right wouldn't vote for him one way or the other. People in the middle don't really know what's going on because the mainstream media pretty much ignores the fraud.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1223940510..._main#printMode Obama and Acorn Community organizers, phony voters, and your tax dollars. At the recent Emmy Awards, historian Laura Linney averred that America's Founders had been "community organizers" -- like Barack Obama. Too bad they aren't like that any more. Mr. Obama's kind of organizers work at Acorn, the militant advocacy group that is turning up in reports about voter fraud across the country. APAcorn -- the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now -- has been around since 1970 and boasts 350,000 members. We've written about them for years, but Acorn is now getting more attention as John McCain's campaign makes an issue of the fraud reports and Acorn's ties to Mr. Obama. It's about time someone exposed this shady outfit that uses government dollars to lobby for larger government. Acorn uses various affiliated groups to agitate for "a living wage," for "affordable housing," for "tax justice" and union and environmental goals, as well as against school choice and welfare reform. It was a major contributor to the subprime meltdown by pushing lenders to make home loans on easy terms, conducting "strikes" against banks so they'd lower credit standards. But the organization's real genius is getting American taxpayers to foot the bill. According to a 2006 report from the Employment Policies Institute (EPI), Acorn has been on the federal take since 1977. For instance, Acorn's American Institute for Social Justice claimed $240,000 in tax money between fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Its American Environmental Justice Project received 100% of its revenue from government grants in the same years. EPI estimates the Acorn Housing Corporation alone received some $16 million in federal dollars from 1997-2007. Only recently, Democrats tried and failed to stuff an "affordable housing" provision into the $700 billion bank rescue package that would have let politicians give even more to Acorn. All this money gives Acorn the ability to pursue its other great hobby: electing liberals. Acorn is spending $16 million this year to register new Democrats and is already boasting it has put 1.3 million new voters on the rolls. The big question is how many of these registrations are real. The Michigan Secretary of State told the press in September that Acorn had submitted "a sizeable number of duplicate and fraudulent applications." Earlier this month, Nevada's Democratic Secretary of State Ross Miller requested a raid on Acorn's offices, following complaints of false names and fictional addresses (including the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys). Nevada's Clark County Registrar of Voters Admin Lomax said he saw rampant fraud in 2,000 to 3,000 applications Acorn submitted weekly. Officials in Ohio are investigating voter fraud connected with Acorn, and Florida's Seminole County is withholding Acorn registrations that appear fraudulent. New Mexico, North Carolina and Missouri are looking into hundreds of dubious Acorn registrations. Wisconsin is investigating Acorn employees for, according to an election official, "making people up or registering people that were still in prison." Then there's Lake County, Indiana, which has already found more than 2,100 bogus applications among the 5,000 Acorn dumped right before the deadline. "All the signatures looked exactly the same," said Ruthann Hoagland, of the county election board. Bridgeport, Connecticut estimates about 20% of Acorn's registrations were faulty. As of July, the city of Houston had rejected or put on hold about 40% of the 27,000 registration cards submitted by Acorn. That's just this year. In 2004, four Acorn employees were indicted in Ohio for submitting false voter registrations. In 2005, two Colorado Acorn workers were found to have submitted false registrations. Four Acorn Missouri employees were indicted in 2006; five were found guilty in Washington state in 2007 for filling out registration forms with names from a phone book. Which brings us to Mr. Obama, who got his start as a Chicago "community organizer" at Acorn's side. In 1992 he led voter registration efforts as the director of Project Vote, which included Acorn. This past November, he lauded Acorn's leaders for being "smack dab in the middle" of that effort. Mr. Obama also served as a lawyer for Acorn in 1995, in a case against Illinois to increase access to the polls. During his tenure on the board of Chicago's Woods Fund, that body funneled more than $200,000 to Acorn. More recently, the Obama campaign paid $832,000 to an Acorn affiliate. The campaign initially told the Federal Election Commission this money was for "staging, sound, lighting." It later admitted the cash was to get out the vote. The Obama campaign is now distancing itself from Acorn, claiming Mr. Obama never organized with it and has nothing to do with illegal voter registration. Yet it's disingenuous to channel cash into an operation with a history of fraud and then claim you're shocked to discover reports of fraud. As with Rev. Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers, Mr. Obama was happy to associate with Acorn when it suited his purposes. But now that he's on the brink of the Presidency, he wants to disavow his ties. The Justice Department needs to treat these fraud reports as something larger than a few local violators. The question is whether Acorn is systematically subverting U.S. election law -- on the taxpayer's dime.

ACORN bribes people to register muiltiple times and people still defend them. Amazing. They even tried to register Mickey Mouse! http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/....xml&coll=2