Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.org
Hans von Spakovsky. A German industrialist? A compatriot of artist Hieronymus Bosch? No. He is an attorney who is presently the head of the Department of Justice Civil Rights Division Voting Section. He is a member of the right-wing Federalist Society, and joined other Bush cronies in the Florida recount battle in 2000, and he is President Bush’s newest recipient of a crony-nomination.
According to an article in today’s Washington Post, von Spakovsky was nominated to the Federal Election Commission on Friday.
The nomination of von Spakovsky, a Republican, has already raised the hackles of some Democrats. According to WaPo:
WaPo added this:
Before working in the Justice Department, von Spakovsky was the Republican Party chairman in Fulton County, Ga., and served on the board of the Voter Integrity Project, which advocated regular purging of voter roles to prevent felons from casting ballots.
It is clear that von Spakovsky had the ear of another “crony nomination” recipient, Alberto Gonzales, when it came to making decisions on the Georgia Voter ID issue and Texas redistricting, both of which had been recommended against by the Justice Departments’ career professionals in the Voting Rights Division, but were given acceptance by the DoJ anyway.
The Georgia law has since been found unconstitutional as a “Jim Crow-era Poll Tax” by two Federal courts, and the Texas redistricting, concerning which former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay now faces indictments, has just been agreed to be looked at by the United States Supreme Court.
One other very notable point here. A Democrat, Robert D. Lenhard, has also been nominated to the FEC by Bush. As pointed out by Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake: “He’s the husband of [Time Magazine reporter] Viveca Novak, whose testimony now provides the foundation for Karl Rove’s defense in the CIA leak case.”
As well, Lenhard was “quite helpful to the 1600 Crew as part of the legal team that challenged the constitutionality of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law,” according to Jane.
Neither point, as Jane noted, was in either the White House Press Release or the WaPo‘s stenographic reporting of same.
Additional reporting on this story by Brad Friedman
CORRECTION: Our originally posted version of this story had reported von Spakovsky, instead of Lenhard, as the husband of TIME reporter, Vivica Novak. The BRAD BLOG regrets the error.
The damage being done by voting machine wrongs is challenged by gerrymandering.
Which is in first place … I mean which does the most damage?
Wow! Look at that little convenient fact, once again about Diebold. SCOTTFROMCA was probably being sarcastic, or just typically really stupid to say a cross-dressing neanderthal is more important than our democracy….
I chalk it up to the latter. And speaking of Diebold and ES&S its almost time for round two!!!
But I got a question here for the experts,
"E) Bev Harris and Kathleen Wynne personally raided dumpsters to collect evidence of everything from forged ballots and poll tapes to financial documents that show unreported payments to lobbyists."
For Bev or Catherine, I read this and am very interested in the results. For these reported "payments to lobbyists" has it been mentioned who was actually paid what? And has this been handed over to attornies yet?
Further was any of them named Jack Abramoff by any chance for some reason?
Any insight is appreciated, it would be great if "Dieb-throught" could come out in public and turn over proof of his fellow employees patching the machine and paying checks to lobbyists.
Doug E.
DON’T PANIC Herr von Spakovsky will do a "heck of a job".
ps.Why does everybody forget "Triad" ,who posted "cheap sheets" during the 2004 fake Ohio re-count ?
oops "Cheat sheets"
Just more evidence of this culture of corrupt cronyism.
Bush Must Step Down, and Take His Program With Him!
http://www.worldcantwait.org/
Triad is an extension of Diebold…..I heard all of them have family members as directors and workers.
All of em are crooks and all of them are in the same boat, just convict them all.
Doug E.
Go reread firedoglake, Robert D. Lenhard is Viveca Novak’s husband, he is a Democratic appointee to the FEC. You might want to correct your post with that information.
The WaPo article had a couple of strong paragraphs, reproduced here, that criticize the picks so I’m not sure "stenography" is a fair jab. And it even noted opposition to Lenhard.
I don’t get how Lenhard being Novak’s husband is a political pay-off since Viveca’s account is at odd with Luskin’s. If she changes her mind and agrees that it happened in February then maybe there will be something to it.
Brad: Please don’t link every "von" to Germany. That title was also used in Austria. An with a last name like "Spakovsky" i would consider it likely that this was the case here (KuK monarcy with links to the balkans, you get my drift?).
Yes, i know, to anybody outside Europe it makes little difference. But for us Europeans, burdend by history and the knowledge thereof, it does…
Martin (from Germany, of course 😉
Donna #7 – Thank you for finding the mistake. The article is now corrected.
It appears Bush believes he’s above the law. Gee wilikers, maybe he is.
Gee, we thought we closed that spying gap in 1978 under Carter. Darn, our bad.
We didn’t want to embarrass the White House at the time. (by launching an untimely oversight hearing) Good call….can’t have that….
We’ve already lost our country. All the sheep are doing is bleating. And quietly at that.
BTW…….To Bush and his minion of fascist enablers across the country:
I have a brother I email in Australia, assholes. And if I find out you’ve been unlawfully reading my emails, there are going to be teeth on the sidewalk, as Clinton once said of this arrogant crew. Count on it.
John Conley #11
It is very likely that your emails and phone conversations filter thru vast scanning systems the government has, such as Echelon (link here).
The NSA, which controls Echelon, is the agency Bush has been using to do personal spying on thousands of Americans without legal authority to do so.
They try to disinform and deceive by saying that it is only when "terrorists" contact someone in the USA that they monitor the communications.
That is not true, nor does it matter because it is the NSA that gets to decide who is a "terrorist" without any oversight. They can even make up "terrorist" communications themselves, then follow their own communications to the targeted person.
The targeted person thinks it is spam or a strange communication, but meanwhile the NSA is searching and seizing communications and then goes even further into library, medical, financial, and other records of the target.
There is no oversight by the courts or by congress over these fishing and spying misadventures. It is the worst case scenario.
In ’06 we gotta put the teeth of the neoCons on the sidewalk, switch the leading party in congress from Republican to Democrat and Independent, then kick ass on these fascists.
The corporate media covered the Iraqi elections with a vengeance. Not a single word about the latest about Diebold or the FEC. Not one.
Jesse’s Blog – TvNewsLIES
Brad and John Gideon,
Great catch, good story, important stuff. I remember going round with trying to get the FEC involved back when I was wet behind the ears. What a joke this organization is.
They want to go after P. Diddy about what airplane he flew on during "get out the vote" actions but they couldn’t care less about voting machine vendors that repeatedly violate their standards.
As for the question above, about lobbying fees paid by Diebold, none mentioned Jack Abramoff by name.
I am preparing a fat packet for the class action lawyers. We have time on that one; they will be piling on for awhile now collecting plaintiffs. I don’t think they need the piles of evidence until they have the piles of plaintiffs and have sorted out who is handling what and who the lead firm(s) will be.
There is one item that is consistent with the kind of entry you’d see when a firm is paying out on blackmail or investing in the more unsavory kinds of damage control. It’s the reason I haven’t made my favorite document public yet. I’m hoping it will be used in discovery to go after what the hell that line entry was.
Reg: I, too, noticed that voting in Iraq was being covered in favor of the much more important stories of the stockholders suit and the Leon County hack. I’ve been doing some thinking recently about how the truth getting out on this issue would be likely to influence foreign policy. From what I can discern, there are two countries (besides the U.S.) who would especially prefer not to see the U.S. voting system discredited: Israel and China. Israel doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out. I was more confused about China — that has to do with financial investments China holds that would be negatively impacted by election uncertainty.
Just food for thought. There are many competing agendas here, when it comes to suppression of the story.
Yep that all fits…..Especially when you look at the fact Israel is home of the Zionist Neocons…I don’t know if anybody remembers this but Howard Ahmanson happens to own all the voting companies (And Todd/Bob Urosovich)and while the Urosovich’s are obviously russian or something Ahmanson is a Zionist neocon from Israel.
Eh, either way it seems to be an issue of "blackout" the news that is unfavorable to certain media…….
I want to know why Jeb Bush is acting concerned all of a sudden.
Doug E.
My question exactly, when I read the article about Jeb Bush….what’s up with that. Well, I believe when you begin to ASK the answers will come. We live in such interesting times.
I am beginning to understand a little about Neocon Zionism. This seems to be a very big story I am finding. I am beginning to see that the USA neo’s are a small part of the puzzle. The big question I am now asking is who is really running this show. I am beginning to believe the cabal in D.C. is a Puppet to a greater Master. Have begun to research International Banking, their history for the last two centuries, the influence of the Bankers in our history, etc. Many here are probably very familiar with much of what I am finding out. (Federal Reserve..isn’t Federal, old news)
I have known for years that the same players have been involved for 200+ years (USA), through their bloodlines, etc. My seeking has given me an overview of the corruption….now I am focusing on how those in the shadows have been manipulating and rearranging the World for some 2000 years. So much to learn, so little time. M4 (I apologize for going OT, but suppose it is all relevant)