Last month, we reported how the George W. Bush administration has effectively gutted the beloved, 40-year old Voting Rights Act. He has done so by allowing political appointees in the Department of Justice to override the recommendations of career attorneys in the Voting Rights division who had recommended against the Georgia Photo ID Requirement Law and Tom Delay’s Texas Congressional Redistricting Scheme.
In both cases, the career attorneys at DoJ had written lengthy memos opposing the new laws — 4 out of 5 of them in the GA case, 8 out of 8 in the TX case — only to be overruled by Bush’s political cronies. Dan Eggen of The Washington Post broke both of those stories, with some exemplary reporting, after obtaining the leaked memos.
Later, the DoJ mandated that no such written opinions would be allowed in the future.
Eggen, on Page A1 of Monday’s WaPo, now has more on the fallout and allegations of politics being played with the VRA within DoJ, as Bush continues to dismantle as many American Values as he can before leaving office…Here’s some highlights (or lowlights, as the case may be)…
Many current and former lawyers in the section charge that senior officials have exerted undue political influence in many of the sensitive voting-rights cases the unit handles. Most of the department’s major voting-related actions over the past five years have been beneficial to the GOP, they say, including two in Georgia, one in Mississippi and a Texas redistricting plan orchestrated by Rep. Tom DeLay (R) in 2003.
The section also has lost about a third of its three dozen lawyers over the past nine months. Those who remain have been barred from offering recommendations in major voting-rights cases and have little input in the section’s decisions on hiring and policy.
“If the Department of Justice and the Civil Rights Division is viewed as political, there is no doubt that credibility is lost,” former voting-section chief Joe Rich said at a recent panel discussion in Washington. He added: “The voting section is always subject to political pressure and tension. But I never thought it would come to this.”
The Georgia case was eventually found to be unconstitutional by two federal courts who deemed the law a “Jim Crow-era poll tax”. But not before it was approved by Hans von Spakovsky, who was recently recess appointed to the Federal Election Commission just after New Years.
But higher-ranking officials disagreed, and approved the plan later that day. They said that as many as 200,000 of those without ID cards were felons and illegal immigrants and that they would not be eligible to vote anyway.
One of the officials involved in the decision was Hans von Spakovsky, a former head of the Fulton County GOP in Atlanta, who had long advocated a voter-identification law for the state and oversaw many voting issues at Justice. Justice spokesman Eric W. Holland said von Spakovsky’s previous activities did not require a recusal and had no impact on his actions in the Georgia case.
Holland denied a request to interview von Spakovsky, saying that department policy “does not authorize the media to conduct interviews with staff attorneys.” Von Spakovsky has since been named to the Federal Election Commission in a recess appointment by President Bush.
The Bush Administration, Eggen continues, has apparently been dismal in their efforts to uphold the VRA’s important Section 2:
By comparison, department records show, 14 Section 2 lawsuits were filed during the last two years of Bill Clinton’s presidency alone.
And finally, Eggen reveals yet another case, this one in Mississippi, also previously unreported (at least as far as we know), in which the DoJ failed to uphold the spirit of the VRA, which mandates that states with a history of disenfranchising minority voters must receive pre-approval from the DoJ for any new election laws that might effect such voters:
The division has also issued unusually detailed legal opinions favoring Republicans in at least two states, contrary to what former staff members describe as a dictum to avoid unnecessary involvement in partisan disputes. The practice embarrassed the department in Arizona in 2005, when Justice officials had to rescind a letter that wrongly endorsed the legality of a GOP bill limiting provisional ballots.
VRA RIP.
Well, finally more reporters are talking about Bob Ney and HAVA
"When he landed a chairmanship in 2001, it was on the House Administration Committee, a relatively obscure post that gave him control of congressional office budgets and the unofficial title "mayor of Capitol Hill."
"In the pursuit of power, there may be different routes," said Ross K. Baker, a Rutgers University political scientist who has studied Congress for 30 years. "His is a more insider track."
In 2001, Ney wrote a popular bill to provide states with billions of dollars to modernize voting systems. He also was a prominent opponent of legislation at the time to overhaul campaign finance.
But until the Abramoff scandal broke, Ney’s news-making zenith came when he led efforts to rename House cafeteria French fries "freedom fries" to protest French criticism of Bush administration policy leading to the war in Iraq.
Otherwise, Ney largely stayed out of the headlines, slipping easily into Washington’s familiar world of lobbying and legislating.
Ney and his staff regularly enjoyed complimentary meals and drinks at Abramoff’s upscale Pennsylvania Avenue restaurant and free tickets to local concerts and sporting events, according to Abramoff’s Jan. 3 plea agreement."
Kansas Tribune reports on Bob Ney, voting, Distefano
Doug E.
Doug, I’m tellin ya something, the shit is going to hit the
fan soon, the print media is grooming their readers as so it won’t be such a shock when the news comes out
So far, the Fascist TV media looks like it is going to go down kicking and screaming though
#2 you may be right. What we have known (courtesy of our own patriot Brad) for years, the population is beginning to be informed. Well, better late than never!! I still don’t trust them!
Actually, I think you guys are too trusting that the other shoe is going to drop. The crimes by the Bush administration are too severe for the whole truth to ever be brought to light. They have stolen 2 national elections in a row, as well as illegally taking us to war and shredding the Bill of Rights. They can’t let the truth come out. Before 2008, expect a large terrorist attack or disease outbreak, anything to allow Bushco to enact FEMA/Homeland security department powers to declare martial law.
For Mike: The wild card is found in the court system. The mainstream media can cooperate with the Bush administration, and it has done so with regard to WMD, torture, election fraud, spying, and the outing of Valerie Plame (an incomplete list).
But when class-action suits are admitted to the docket against Diebold, the discovery process will mean that Karl Rove and The New York Times lose dominion over the news flow. When the ACLU sues the Bush adminstration over illegal spying, they force Gonzales’ hand.
I can imagine a Bush-packed Supreme Court backing Gonzales on anything the ACLU contends. But would the Supremes intrude on civil court suits BEFORE THE FACT? It seems to me Diebold could appeal any adverse ruling to them, but as far as their reputation and the truth about the 2004 election were concerned, it wouldn’t matter. The damage would be done. That’s why I think the class-action suits are the key to Americans knowing the truth…Diebold has to either settle, a tacit admission of conspiracy to commit election fraud, or fight the suits, which will give discovery a chance to function.
In my humble opinion this is a damn brilliant idea, and thanks, Mr. Pitt…
Please read, copy, & send to your senator/congressman TODAY:
Democrats: Get Up and Walk Out
By William Rivers Pitt
t r u t h o u t Perspective
Sunday 22 January 2006
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/012206A.shtml
From the article…
"…What I am talking about is political theater on a grand scale. No opposition party in American history has ever turned their backs on a President and walked out of a State of the Union address. No opposition party has faced the degree of potential extermination the Democrats face today. The stakes have never been higher. You are dealing with a President who wants to make his Executive powers absolute, and with a Republican party that has been usurped from soup to nuts by extremists that would be cartoonish if they were not so very real.
Abramoff won’t help you. The fear factor will subsume you. You can sit there and take it, clapping politely as the ram rolls towards you, or you can stand up and make yourselves relevant again. To walk out of the speech would be a huge statement, bold and potentially dangerous. But if you don’t do something bold, something grand and unprecedented, something to take back the initiative, you will join the Whigs in the dustbin of history…"
Politically I like it. But, legally they are pretty well bound to receiving the President’s statement. So, it would look like an affront to the office of the Presidency and that’s not good.
About the boldest statement they could make is to do the bare minimum by showing up, but also not applauding.
Totally off topic but important to readers.
I just recieved two emails supposedly from bradblog. Both contained attachments that I did not open. This is the header. MIME-Version: 1.0
Received: from pragati-0cfb476 ([202.65.150.195]) by bay0-mc5-f18.bay0.hotmail.com with Microsoft SMTPSVC(6.0.3790.211); Mon, 23 Jan 2006 00:00:03 -0800
X-Message-Info: JGTYoYF78jEHjJx36Oi8+Z3TmmkSEdPtrlmEYVPG0ec=
Return-Path: TheBradBlog@cville.com
X-OriginalArrivalTime: 23 Jan 2006 08:00:04.0079 (UTC) FILETIME=[049167F0:01C61FF3]
Perhaps someone with more skill than I can track this down.
The subject line in one is just re: on the other it is fw: sexy Both contain a .13mb attachment
Mike at whatreallyhappened.com had a go with people spoofing his blog as the sender of a virus so be alert.
With all the lackeys Bush has put on the court,I can only hope the truth will be known.Case in point,Sibel Edmond. They wouldn’t even let her or her lawyers in the court to hear what was going on.
Number 8 Barry
Don’t open it period!!!!! They are viruses from Israel, Pakistan mostly
Do not open the damn things they are neocon viruses…..And trust me, these neocons are out of control.
Back to work!!!! Bringing the voting machines down one pillar at a time…
Doug Eldritch
I’d favor showing up, but placing a paper bag over my head and paying no attention to anything Bush says. At the end of the speech, remove the paper bag, get up, and walk out silently.
Robert,
I think everyone would favor that at this point, aside from the psychotic lady from purgatory Laura Bush. 🙂
Ok, well maybe even she would favor it…
Doug
Doug, I’m bothered by the recurring thought that Laura Bush would like to start her life over from the beginning.
Get a job as a librarian, marry some sane guy who reads books and can carry on an intelligent conversation with her, and only go to Africa to see antelopes and wildebeest on the Serengeti Plain.
The more I read, the more terrified and discouraged I become. So this "comment" will cover a lot of ground.
Dismantling the Voters Right Act, padding the judicial system is just another avenue Bush is using to layer himself and the neo-con agenda with every kind of protection they can. It is already several levels deep and it is doubtful we have even scratched the surface of what has been done at any level. Unfortunately, the more they are allowed to do this, the less chance we can ever get back to running the country under the Constitution. I seriously doubt we can do it now, using convential methods.
There IS something under all this, that for some reason I think is one way to get at the belly —–Abramoff.
There is much more going on here then meets the eye and needs much deeper examination. Bush behaves with what appears to be more fear about connections to Abramoff then even the challenges to his usurping of the Constitution.
There have been some pretty strange links between Abramoff and one of the biggest legal firms in the US – Greenberg Traurig LLP
Both were involved in the scandal in Guam in which Bush (after Abramoff effected an ongoing connection to Rove) called off an investigation into Abramoff and others.
There are some really fishy things around the Marianas, with Delay right in the middle of it. You remember him? – he’s the guy with the Bull-whip hanging on his office wall.
In spite of everything "Bush does not know him." See the USA Today, article at:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2005-05-06-abramoff-bush_x.htm.
There are tons more things linking him to Bush.
Abramoff has been in and out of Greenberg as seemed to be called for, but their support of Bush goes on and on.
They were involved with the recount in Florida, as legal eagles on the side of Bush, and they never even tried to collect on their bill for services rendered, effectly making a direct $ payment to Bush.
I believe, I recently read that Bush has also employed them personally.
And I just saw a post on one of the Bradblogs that clearly demonstrates they act as the money behind Diebold. I do not know how to post this as a hyperlink so forgive me, but you really need to look at this site. It was apparently provided by a blogger on the blackboxvoting site.
http://www.nyc.gov/lobbyistsearch/search?client=Diebold+Election+Systems%2C+Inc
I think we need to do a LOT more investigation into the Bush-Abramoff-Greenberg connections.
It’s really good that some of this stuff is being brought out, but I think by the time the 2008 election rolls around, they won’t need any of this to keep themselves in power permanently.
It is after all the intent behind the neo-cons Project for a New American Century to empower the government to allow our country to become "A National Security State." (look this up on Google) And one method to help this come to pass is the call to produce something like another Pearl Harbour to rally the people behind such a government take over.
All of which seems to be happening, including yet another timely message from their friend Osama, who also, coincidently, appeared just before the 2004 election. One might think this guy WANTS George to stay in power so he can murder his people – whats up with that?
There are just too many people in the US that seem to be worried about their safety and they simply don’t care what happens as long as the Government can be seen to be keeping them safe from "those people".
Well I am concerned that if the Osama tape doesn’t help the neo-cons through the 2006 election, they can always find a way to bring Iran into it. If that fails we may well see another 9-11 episode.
Americans need to stop trying to "manage" the problems Bush has put in place using any form of conventional channels. Bush and his cabal have already got all of them covered and they just love it when the "people" try to manage "them" using this method. I can see them now – doing the "wave." They can stall and lie just long enough to make sure we can never again be a Republic.
I take the comment #9 from Laura and make my own comment here.
The only way to beat this is for people like Sibel Edmond to take all the information she has and send it everywhere, to everyone, including the what and whos of everyone she has contacted so far, and exactly what those people have done with the information she originally provided to them.
She might end up in jail, but once it is out there for examination, it is unlikely. Plus, it just might help others with information to do the same thing.
I think we are in so much trouble, it is time for people to take a stand. Start to "walk the walk" or before we know it it will all be over.
Never forget, the internment camps have already been built – some estimated to house up to one million people. The jews didn’t believe this could possibly happen (under Hitler) even when it was actually happening.
Take a lesson – the ideology of "superior beings" was the basis behind another document that the "Project for a New American Century" was developed from known as: "Manifest Destiny" which posited that the USA is "destined" to rule the planet.
This was an ideology from the 1830s which (hidden in the text) stresses that ‘freedom" and "development" of the USA are possible only when capital is concentrated in the hands of "elites." This totally falls into line with Hitler’s belief in the "superiority of race" and he managed quite well NOT with a co-operative, well paid labour base, but with "slave labour."
So does anyone see any parallels here? Or connections to what has already happened?
Lest we forget that the Bushes and extended family supported the ideology of the 3rd Reich, both here in the US, and in Germany. Many of the companies in business today provided their voluntary help as well. IBM, for instance, who helped provide the system of numbers for prisoners in the work and concentration camps. As well there are a number of high profile pharmaceutical and chemical companies in the US that are "spin-off" German companies which were provided with US financing to help with the development of the gases used for extermination camps. Etc, etc, etc, ……….
Perhaps, the 3rd Reich and all of it’s ideology is still alive and well in the US, but we just don’t call it that anymore.
Even if it is not, the basic ideology certainly is. And too many of the methods used by the 3rd Reich are already well in place today.
Much of what I have outlined here was once the sole area of "conspiracy theorists." But, consider how much of what these so called "nuts" were warning us about has already come true.
I am very interested this theme, with attention I will read following informations.