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I don't understand how it can be legal to register other people to vote. Throughout American history that's been a source of fraud, right back to the very earliest days of the Republic, when drunks would be rounded up at pubs and told how to vote in exchange for a drink.

None of this is new. I find it baffling that people are a) surprised and b) not likely to push for structural changes that would prevent it from happening in the first place.

Another thing: local electoral authorities? Idiotic. There should be once central bureau, with branch offices, administering elections. Leaving it up to local yahoos to decide which people should be struck from the rolls is insane.

Get rid of these major sources of shenanigans and the faud will plummet. I don't know that these practices are allowed in any other industrialized democracy; I know if anything that's likely to make people more devoted to the status quo, but Jesus, it's gotta be some kind of indication, you know?

[MA] Flying_Meat wrote:

resedit wrote:

Now, obviously the GOP is going to try and milk this for all it's worth because they're about out of options and most of their candidates have become quite vulnerable in recent weeks.

And obviously the Dems are going to downplay it because they enjoy accusing the Republicans of dirty tactics.

also because we're setting you up to get yer asses gerrymander into the stone age!

Heh,
Ya, seriously. If the Dems get the nationwide sweep it looks like they will the map is going to be altered with a smurfing vengeance.
Now that the Republicans have set the precedents for such practices. Crows coming home to roost and all that happy bullsmurf.

I think it'd be worth it just to see conservatives accuse someone else of hypocrisy.

There's a street in Marblehead named for him.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrymandering#Etymology

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&tab=wl

damn...

ok.

go to google maps and enter 'gerry street marblehead ma'

Moving district lines around for political benefit is unethical but isn't illegal.
Election fraud is both.

resedit wrote:

Moving district lines around for political benefit is unethical but isn't illegal.
Election fraud is both.

And it's effective too. Unlike noncentralized fraud.

Pariah wrote:

Farmerkev wrote:

I think they were both born yesterday if they actually believe the latest round of Rep gerrymandering was the first.

Yep.
Who ever gains power gets to morph the map to their advantage. It has always been that way.
The only difference is that in modern times the methods are more refined and recent court rulings have made crazy gerrymandering  even more defensible.
But..ya..nothing new.

Yah.

'activist judges'

'legislating from the bench'

http://www.campaignlegalcenter.org/redi … g-224.html

s. Because the Texas State Legislature failed to adopt a redistricting plan, a three-judge federal court drew the state's congressional districts, which governed elections in 2002. In October of 2003, following a protracted partisan battle, the Texas legislature passed a new districting plan that strongly favored the Republican Party. In December 2003, Attorney General John Ashcroft pre-cleared this new district plan under the Voting Rights Act. Several groups brought suit against Texas government officials in federal court, claiming the new plan violated federal law in numeous respects, including: (1) Texas may not re-redistrict mid-decade; (2) the plan is a product of unconstitutional racial gerrymandering; (3) the plan is an unconstitutional partisan gerrymander; and (4) various districts in the plan dilute the voting strength of minorities in violation of the Voting Rights Act. A three-judge district court rejected these claims, and upheld the redrawn plan -- clearing the way for the primary and general elections in 2004 which were held using the newly redrawn lines. Session v. Perry, 298 F. Supp. 2d 451 (E.D. Tex. 2004). Meanwhile, plaintiffs appealed the case to the Supreme Court. In the fall of 2004, the Supreme Court vacated the three-judge court's decision and remanded the case for reconsideration in light of Vieth v. Jubelirer. See Jackson v. Perry , 125 S. Ct. 351 (2004) .

The three judge court in Texas, on remand from the Supreme Court, again concluded that the 2003 Congressional redistricting plan did not violate the Constitution.

Click here to read the three-judge court decision in this case.

Colorado General Assembly v. Salazar

As a result of the 2000 census, Colorado gained an additional congressional seat. Because the Colorado General Assembly failed to agree upon a congressional redistricting plan in time for the 2002 elections, a Colorado state court drew a map. In 2003, the Republican-controlled General Assembly pushed through a new districting map in the closing days of the legislative session. The map was challenged, and the Colorado Supreme Court held that the new plan was unconstitutional because under Colorado's constitution, congressional boundaries could only be drawn once in a decade -- immediately following the federal decennial census. People ex rel. Salazar v. Davidson , 79 P.3d 1221 ( Col. 2003). The Supreme Court denied the State application for certiorari. Justices Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas dissented in the denial, arguing that under Article I, Section 4, Clause 1 of the Constitution, the state General Assembly has the ultimate authority to draw congressional district boundaries. Colo. Gen. Assembly v. Salazar , 124 S. Ct. 2228 (2004).

[more]

btyb: RovingDeLays (Counsel: Dewey, Cheatham and Howe)

Democratic-Republican > Democratic

Democratic-Republican & Federalist > National Republican > Whig > Free Soil Party, Know-Nothing Party, & Republican > Republican

When you're a quasi-criminal organization you tend to assume everyone else is I guess.

STOP ALLOWING THIRD-PARTY VOTER REGISTRATIONS.

Jesus, it's absurd. I can't believe how careless you people are about something so important.

I voted today. I went in and put an ex on a piece of paper. Everything was very clearly marked, there was no margin for error. No touchscreens, no goddamned dimpled chads. You show ID to vote. In my case it was a credit card bill to prove my address and my driver's license to prove my identity.

And no local yahoos are in a position to decide who does and does not get to vote.

IT'S NOT FRIGGING COMPLICATED

ShnickyShnack wrote:

STOP ALLOWING THIRD-PARTY VOTER REGISTRATIONS.

Jesus, it's absurd. I can't believe how careless you people are about something so important.

I voted today. I went in and put an ex on a piece of paper. Everything was very clearly marked, there was no margin for error. No touchscreens, no goddamned dimpled chads. You show ID to vote. In my case it was a credit card bill to prove my address and my driver's license to prove my identity.

And no local yahoos are in a position to decide who does and does not get to vote.

IT'S NOT FRIGGING COMPLICATED

It's too hard to rig simple elections. You have to make them complicated so that the individual fixes are too small to notice.

Activist judges:

Federal court: Ohio must check voter registrations

By PHILIP ELLIOTT – 5 hours ago

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — A federal appeals court ordered Ohio's top elections official to set up a system by Friday to verify the eligibility of newly registered voters and make the information available to the state's 88 county election boards.

The full 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati on Tuesday upheld a lower court ruling that Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner must use other government records to check thousands of new voters for registration fraud.

A three-judge panel of the 6th Circuit had disagreed last week. The full court's ruling, in which nine of 16 judges concurred, overturns that decision.

Ohio Republicans had sued Brunner, a Democrat. Her spokesman had no immediate comment Tuesday.

About 666,000 Ohioans have registered to vote since January, with many doing so before the contested Democratic presidential primary election last March between Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. The presidential election is Nov. 4.

Since the primary, Ohio Republicans have filed a series of challenges to the registrations and Brunner's administration of election rules. They have helped voters file lawsuits against local boards of election over registration rules, absentee ballot requests and a weeklong period that allowed registration and voting on the same day.

Brunner previously said sufficient systems exist to verify new voter registrations and there was no way to set up the court-ordered system with such speed.

Last week, the three-judge panel of the 6th Circuit had sided with Brunner, but the full panel sided with the GOP and U.S. District Judge George C. Smith in Columbus after hearing an appeal. Smith had ordered Brunner to develop a way to verify voter registration information and make it available to local election boards.

This is the SoS who straightened out the finagling by Blackwell et al. I think got rid of the machines; maybe added polls to urban districts to avoid lines and shared the JFK Profile in Courage Award(s) for 2008.
http://www.jfklibrary.org/JFK+Library+a … rmer+M.htm