A nice problem to have

Amidst all the buffoonery that characterizes elections in Palm Beach County, there's good election-related news, too: the state Division of Elections is getting so many applications for newly registered voters, they are asking counties to help them manage them all.

The state is being swamped by third-party groups gathering applications, such as the National Rifle Association and even Barack Obama's campaign, which aims to register 500,000 new voters before Oct. 6.

State officials say they have a backlog of 32,000 applications - including 25,000 received on Tuesday alone - awaiting entry, Palmer wrote. They've processed 30,308 since June. And they don't know how many more they'll get before Oct. 6.

Despite hiring 25 temporary employees working 12- to 16-hour shifts, the division can't keep up, Palmer wrote, and will need to send the applications back to local officials for data entry and scanning.

State officials say they are still able to verify the voter's identification after the forms are entered under the "no match, no vote" law implemented two weeks ago. The law requires that a voter's Social Security or driver license number match federal or state databases.

"They haven't properly planned for the voter registration applications. That was perfectly foreseeable. ... I didn't plan on doing the work of the Division of Elections in 2008," said Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho.

[...]

The volume of applications raises the specter that all of the new applications may not be entered into the system by the Oct. 19 deadline, the day before early voting begins.

"That's not going to happen. Either we will get it done, or they (the counties) will get it done," Department of State spokeswoman Jennifer Krell Davis said.

If voters show up on Election Day or for early voting and they are not on the rolls, they will have to cast a provisional ballot. But provisional ballots have a much higher chance of being tossed out, according to elections experts.

The Washington-based Advancement Project released a report Wednesday outlining problems with provisional ballots. Of the 14,550 provisional ballots cast in Florida's 2006 general election, 3,857, or nearly 27 percent, were rejected, the report found.

Yes, the risk of many provisional ballots being cast remains high and, given the Florida GOP's attempts to disenfranchise as many voters as possible, we still might face problems on November 4.

However, the vast majority of the new voters are Democrats, and that bodes extremely well for our hopes of kicking the rat-bastard Republicans out on their asses -- a fate they so richly deserve.

So, here's to more whining from the poor, overworked Division of Elections. You may need help with registrations, but the country needs help to overcome the problems the Republicans have created in recent years.

Palm Beach County: where elections, like New Yorkers, go to die

Hard though it may be to believe, after eight years, we still can't get an election right in Palm Beach County. I've told you before about some of the recent problems, ranging from thousands of lost ballots to inadequate training of election personnel and more miscounted votes. And who can forget the "butterfly ballot" fiasco in 2000?

Well, as Ron Popeil might say, "But wait -- there's more!"

We've had a disputed and highly confrontational campaign and primary election here for circuit court. Normally, not national news, I know. But the ups and downs of this particular election have national implications, because the myriad problems encountered thus far do not give one confidence that November's national election will run smoothly.

County Commissioner Mary McCarty, who sits on the county elections canvassing board, said the situation is unfortunate but understandable.

"When you're dealing with this amount of paper and what they have to do to keep track of it all, I'm not surprised," she said. "It sounds like a simple matter, but as I've learned, it's much more complicated than people would imagine."

All agreed on one thing: Things don't look good for the upcoming presidential election.

With polls showing Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain in a dead heat, it is likely a recount will be triggered somewhere in the state. That could once again thrust Florida - and possibly the county - into the national limelight, as it was during the 2000 election debacle.

Instead of slightly more than 100,000 voters [in the August primary], on Nov. 4 elections officials expect 600,000 to flock to the polls. Further, the ballot will be two pages instead of one.

"More than 1 million pieces of paper?" said J. Reeve Bright, who is representing [circuit court challenger William] Abramson and also was involved in the litigation that swirled around the 2000 election. "We could not do a recount in the allotted time. I'm absolutely convinced of that."

This weekend's machine recount, for instance, was expected to be completed Saturday morning. However, what was expected to be a 90-minute final push dragged into six hours because of minor machine malfunctions and the necessity of running ballots back through machines to make sure counts were right.

The manual recount moved quickly. That's because the vast majority of ballots not read by the tabulators are either undervotes, people skipping the race, or overvotes, people voting for both candidates. Out of 9,000 reviewed by 10 teams of two people, fewer than two dozen went to the canvassing board. And of those, only seven produced votes.

McCarty, who has described the ballot counting fiasco as "embarrassing, humiliating and frustrating," said it also has been educational. But looking forward to the presidential election, she said she sees trouble.

"We're ready for November, but if there's a recount there's not a county in the state that will make the statutory deadline if they're doing it right."

It's true that the long-sought (by Democrats, anyway) "paper trail" will assist in the accuracy of future elections. However, the issue now really is two-fold: first, how can we guarantee the safety and "chain of custody" of the written ballots, and second, if there's not enough time to conduct a full and fair recount, do we face déjà vu all over again -- that is, a repeat of 2000?

This is no laughing matter -- Palm Beach County threatens to be another electoral battleground in November. And we're not ready. I'm sure the Republicans already have their Legal Assault Teams in place. Can the Democrats counter? And, more importantly, will they?

GOP strategy: when you can't win, steal

We knew that as the Republican smear machine cranked up and, predictably, had no results, and as the Huggy Bear campaign became the laughing stock of the political world, they'd get desperate, right? Well, in Florida, GOP desperation is showing.

America's Wang™ is still a critical swing state, even though most polls show Huggy with a modest lead here. But, of course, it's early, and with seven weeks to go, the Florida GOP stealing machine is cranking up. Last week, there were thousands of lost ballots in Palm Beach County ... now, a new state law is in place, thanks to a Republican legislature and a Republican secretary of state, that threatens to disenfranchise many voters in the state, by targeting new voters in a year of record new registrations, particularly of minorities and young people.

Secretary of State Kurt Browning put the state's 2005 "no match, no vote" law into effect Monday, less than a month before the Oct. 6 deadline to register to vote in the Nov. 4 general election.

That means the voter registration information for anyone who signed up Monday or later must match identification information in other government databases. If the state can't make the match or the person can't prove that the registration information is correct with a driver license or Social Security card before Nov. 4, the voter will get only a provisional ballot on Election Day.

And that's even if the voter shows up with the proper ID at the polls.

Then, the voter will have two days after Election Day to prove his or her case, or the provisional vote won't count.

Yep, you read that right. The Republican secretary of state "activated" a dormant, three-year-old state law just three weeks before the registration deadline for November's election.

Of course, Browning himself has a ready explanation for why he waited to implement the law, which had been in court battles until this past July:

Browning, a former Pasco County supervisor of elections who was appointed to his state position by Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, said he delayed implementation of the law until after the primary to give supervisors time to make changes to their computer systems and because registration had closed by the time the court order became final.

He also acknowledged that the court case prompted state legislators to make changes this year to the law, which originally was passed to prevent voter fraud, and said he gets "steamed up" by complaints.

"Folks ... continue to stir this up, and they think it's wrong simply because they don't like it. That's it in a nutshell," he said. "They don't like it, therefore it's wrong. I'm telling you it's not wrong. You've had a district court and an appellate court and the United States Department of Justice that have signed off on that. It's good. It's valid.

"They want to keep the hysteria moved up. They want to keep everybody agitated. They want to make sure that nobody has confidence in their systems."

But if the system doesn't work, elections experts say it could especially affect Democrats. Presidential candidate Barack Obama has made bringing new voters to the polls one of his campaign strategies, and many of the voters he has encouraged to sign up are minorities.

Of the 400,000 new voters registered in Florida this year, about two-thirds are Democrats.

You're steamed up, Kurt? I'm fucking pissed.

The law may be "valid," but you're citing the Bush crime syndicate's own Department of Justice, led by a series of political hacks like Alberto Gonzalez and Michael Mukasey, as proof that it's "good?" Just because Drunky McStagger says something's valid doesn't mean it's "good" -- in fact, it's a pretty good indicator that it's quite the opposite.

This is more than just controversial -- it's a potential disaster for Democratic hopes, at least on the presidential level, in November. There can be no doubt that the law's implementation was timed to cause maximum electoral damage to Democrats in Florida, and I have no doubt that the Republicans knew exactly what they were doing when they had Browning act in this instance. Just as they knew that moving the primaries back to January 29 would cause huge problems for the Democrats, so too are they plotting and scheming to try whatever they can do to hold onto power in the face of daunting national opposition and recognition that the Republican plan to maintain the status quo is asinine.

I feel like ranting, but I don't have the words at the moment. I'm just too angry. All I can do is tell you that if you're not registered to vote, do it now -- today -- or as soon as you can. And be prepared to go through a ridiculous bureaucratic process when you register ... but please, be patient and do it. Every vote counts, and we've got to win by a large enough margin to keep the Republicans from stealing yet another election.

Oh, and in conclusion, I'd like to invite Kurt Browning to go fuck himself. Thanks in advance.

UPDATE (10:25 pm 9/11/08): Crap. I just discovered I inadvertently omitted the link to the article I quoted! I'm a dumbass. Anyway, it's fixed now. Sorry.

(cross-posted at FPC Blog)

Here we go again: more election problems in Palm Beach County

I'm running out of clever blog post titles to describe the mess that is Palm Beach County when it comes to elections.

We thought we were out of the woods when the Legislature approved paper ballots to replace those horrendous touchscreen systems (granted, in the same bill that created a shitstorm when Florida's primaries were moved to January 29), but obviously that's not the case. At least, it's not when someone manages to lose 3,500 ballots in a race for county circuit court. That amounts to 3% of all ballots cast.

During the recount, election workers who weren't necessarily computer-savvy entered the ballots into the machines. [County commissioner and canvassing board member Mary] McCarty acknowledges there were problems.

"We don't believe anyone stole (the missing ballots), but I believe they might have gotten mixed up, maybe some boxes were mixed up. The machine recount was going really fast, all the machines were going, guys pulling boxes off the shelf, putting boxes back on the shelf. I just don't know what happened.

"One thing's for sure: 3,000 ballots didn't walk out of one precinct. We have different ballot counts in many precincts in the county. There's something in the system that needs to be fixed."

Phil Foster, a Sequoia Voting Systems executive, said proper checks and balances weren't in place to track the ballots.

"Just what I've seen today, it's quite confusing," he said.

Sequoia sent a crew late last week to re-create the election in hopes of figuring out what went wrong.

McCarty said it will take weeks to unravel.

"We will get to the bottom of this," she said. "And then find out what people to point fingers at and whose fault it was."

I guess we should be grateful Diebold isn't involved. But whether it's malfeasance or incompetence, something's gotta give. One time, maybe even two times, sure -- human error or machine malfunction, I get that. However, we're developing a pattern here -- a very dangerous pattern of mistakes as we approach the most important federal election of our lifetimes.

Heckuva job, Palm Beach County elections officials. Heckuva job.

More trouble with voting in Palm Beach County

Hard to believe, I know ... but Palm Beach County is having difficulty implementing their new voting system for the early voting period that began yesterday.

Martin and St. Lucie counties reported a smooth day at the polls, but voters at Palm Beach County's eight early-voting sites experienced delays ranging from a few minutes to 30 minutes or longer. Much of the wait occurred while poll workers verified voters' identities and precinct information, using laptop computers to connect to the state's database.

"I don't know how this is going to work when there's a lot of people here," voter Erica Nichols said after waiting for her ballot at Wellington Village Hall.

"I'm hoping it was Day One jitters," said Barbara Cheives of West Palm Beach after it took her about 20 minutes to get a ballot at the county's main elections office. Problems with her mother's ballot meant that the whole voting experience took 55 minutes even though few voters had shown up, Cheives said.

Besides the state's database glitch, some voters also reported problems with the county's new instant-ballot printers, along with a cumbersome process meant to ensure voters get the correct ballot.

Palm Beach County Elections Supervisor Arthur Anderson said he was "extremely disappointed" with the delays caused by the state's database, "but it is something that is fully outside of our control."

Walton County in the Panhandle caused the problem with the 10.6-million-voter database, said Jennifer Krell Davis, a spokeswoman for Florida Secretary of State Kurt Browning. She said Walton's system kept continuously reconciling its data instead of stopping when the updates were complete, thereby taking up an inordinate amount of memory in the state system.

Okay, fine, so we can blame Walton County for the database problem. Fair enough. But then why were things so smooth in Martin and St. Lucie counties?

Most counties avoided delays by using their own electronic records to check in voters at early voting sites, Davis said.

But Palm Beach County's voter database is set up so that elections officials must go through the state's voter registration system before getting access to the county's voter file, Davis said. She said it's the only county in the state with such a system.

Anderson said his system is set up that way because the state provides the most up-to-date information on voters who may have moved from one county to another.

Aha. Right. We're the only county that goes through the state system to check records. Wonderful.

Um, don't you think, Arthur, that rather than rely on a state system that might be glitchy or slow, we could be like every other county in the state and have our own system? I find it difficult to believe that we gain so much by our linkage to the state when no other county does that ...

Meanwhile, we're already having problems with the new instant-ballot printers and the optical scan machines? Having a paper trail was supposed to help election accuracy, not bog it down!

Look, Palm Beach County has been the laughingstock of elections since 2000. Haven't we had enough time to get it right? It's embarrassing, it's ridiculous, and if it screws up the fall election again, there's going to be hell to pay.

Like a complete unknown

Electoral shenanigans continue in Palm Beach County ... and the question arises, is the GOP responsible again?

Five people suddenly and mysteriously filed for Green Party candidacy right at the deadline in several area legislative races -- and no one seems to know who they are.

All changed their affiliations, and some their addresses, before or shortly after qualifying in June.

"I'm shocked and I'm suspicious," said Echo Steiner of Lake Worth, the state co-chair of the Green Party.

Party officials have sent certified letters, e-mails and even tried knocking on doors so they can vet the candidates and officially endorse them. The candidates have until July 21 to fill out a questionnaire.

Democrats, who often lose votes to third-party candidates in competitive races, are accusing Republicans of being responsible.

"If it's true, this will be the first time in history that a state party has had a coordinated effort to put sham candidates on a ballot to manipulate an election," said [state Sen. Dave] Aronberg, D-Greenacres.

Republicans say they have no idea what the candidates are up to.

"These folks obviously are playing games here, but they certainly are not coming from us," said Republican Party of Florida spokeswoman Erin Van Sickle. "I've never heard of any of them."

Meanwhile, Florida Greens are scratching their heads.

"We're being used," said Julia Aires, Green Party of Florida spokeswoman. "Simple as that. This is the first time this has happened to us in Florida."

Green Party candidates have traditionally used petition signatures to qualify for elections, costing them little or nothing, Aires said.

Not so this time.

The five unknowns each paid the $1,915.92 fee to qualify for three House races and two Senate races.

Of the five (all of whom are in their 20s with only one older than 23), two recently changed their voter registration from Unaffiliated to Green, one each from Republican and Democrat to Green, and one from an even more minor party. There's no pattern in the races they've entered, either -- there are Republican incumbents, Democratic incumbents (including Aronberg), and open seats involved.

So, while it's easy to point fingers at the Republicans because third party candidates, especially from the Green Party, usually draw votes from Democratic candidates, it's just too early to say for sure that it's a GOP dirty trick. Even the Green Party doesn't seem to know what's going on. Then again, I wouldn't put it past Republicans to ... bend the rules a bit.

Can't anyone here run an election?

I've asked that question before but, of course, it's a common question in Palm Beach County.

This time, in a city commission election in West Palm Beach this past week, some 700 votes originally weren't counted, and were added into the results only after an audit to test the accuracy and reliability of the new optical-scan voting system. The election was considered a key test of the new system.

[Runner-up Gregg] Weiss said he is considering asking for a public inspection of all 4,792 ballots but will first try to talk with Supervisor of Elections Arthur Anderson about the issue. As of Friday evening, he hadn't received a return phone call, he said.

"Woo-hoo. I'm going to have to go out and celebrate tonight, I guess," he said, referring to his new second-place finish. "Are they sure they got them all?"

During the audit in the two days after the election, three cartridges containing vote totals were labeled "suspended," meaning their votes hadn't been counted on election night when all the cartridges were brought to a tabulation center to be "read" by vote-counting machines, said elections office spokeswoman Kathy Adams.

After the audit, they were read and the votes were added to the totals. The cartridges were secure and accounted for at all times, Adams said.

In the end, the system worked the way it was supposed to, she said. The results posted on the elections office Web site and on the county's cable TV channel are unofficial until after the audit, she noted.

"That's why it's marked unofficial, because when they do the audit, they find out if anything was not included," Adams said.

She said the office didn't know why the cartridges weren't read properly the first time. She said it was possible that one reader wasn't working properly and that all three cartridges were read by that reader.

"That's one of the things that they're researching now," she said. "That was the fortunate part of being able to have an election like this, before the primary."

Well, yes, there's always an audit. But in a place like Palm Beach County, where election results are scrutinized carefully because of, um, past history, isn't it doubly important to have a system that works the first time? Doesn't exactly give one confidence going into the August primary and November general election, does it?

Florida voter suppression law remains valid, says federal judge

Even in its revised version, the law still sucks. But a federal court upheld it yesterday.

I'm referring to the Florida Legislature's latest attempt to keep undesirables (read: Democrats) from voting by requiring onerous identity checks at the polls. Naturally, the people most affected by the law will be lower-income people and minorities, both of whom tend to vote Democratic.

A federal judge has refused to block a new version of a Florida voter registration law that critics say could keep thousands of people from casting ballots this year.

U.S. District Judge Stephan Mickle issued the ruling Tuesday in Gainesville. Last year, he granted a preliminary injunction against an earlier version of the law. He was reversed on appeal and the Legislature modified the law.

Both versions require elections officials to match Social Security, state identification or driver license numbers listed on voter registration applications with numbers in government databases.

"This ruling puts thousands of real Florida citizens at risk this November based on bureaucratic typos," lawyer Justin Levitt said Wednesday.

Levitt represents the Florida Conference of the National Association of Colored People and other groups challenging the law.

Under the new version, if the state is unable to match a number, an applicant can still register by providing verification of either his or her driver license, identity card or Social Security number regardless of which one was entered on the application.

Let's not kid ourselves. This bill was narrowly tailored for one reason: to provide a constitutionally valid way to limit access to the polls. You know, if the Repukes can't have their poll taxes or literacy tests, they'll take the next best thing.

This is heinous, it's craven, and it's a shame that Judge Mickle has decided to let it stand. I applauded him for rejecting the earlier version of the law, but the right to vote is perhaps the most dear -- basically, it's what makes us Americans. And limiting that right for specious reasons, as here, therefore is a greater assault on American liberty.

Call me breathless, say I'm overreacting ... but come back to this post in November and remember how Our Legislature found a way to skew the election long before then.

Is the 2008 election already stolen?

According to the BBC's Greg Palast, yes, it is:

The BBC journalist who uncovered possible voter fraud in the 2000 and 2004 U.S. presidential elections told a South Florida crowd Sunday those same forces that led to President Bush's victories will not "steal" this year's election.

"They've already stolen it," Greg Palast told a crowd at the Palm Beach Democratic Club on Sunday. "But, you can steal it back."

Speaking before a crowd of more than 400 at the Kravis Center, Palast outlined what he said were Republicans erasing black, homeless and military voters from voter registration rolls, possibly preventing millions from casting votes in razor-thin races.

The latest example came in 2004, he said, in a method known as vote caging.

There, voters' registrations were challenged after registered letters with "do not forward" instructions addressed to, for instance, black college students on summer vacation or naval officers on active duty overseas were returned as undeliverable.

"Go to Baghdad. Lose your vote. Mission Accomplished," Palast quipped.

In Florida's 2000 presidential contest, nearly 100,000 voters, many incorrectly identified as felons, were expunged from voter rolls, Palast added.

This is why voter turnout and large margins are so critical this year. Somehow, some way, we've got to make this election fraud-proof.

Then again, is there such a thing as a fraud-proof election anymore?

Join the club, Pennsylvania

CNN just reported that there have been widespread problems with today's primary election in Pennsylvania. In particular, the League of Women Voters says that hundreds have called to complain that they weren't permitted to vote. Evidently they had a record number of Republicans switch their registration to Democratic in order to vote in this closed primary, and many of those went to the polls to discover that they were shown as unaffiliated or still Republican, and they were turned away without being permitted to cast a provisional ballot.

According to CNN's Jessica Yellin (whom you may remember from Tampa's WTVT and Orlando's Central Florida 13), a record number of registered Republicans switched sides. One wonders whether they truly wanted to be Democrats or if they just wanted to vote in this primary ...

At least now we can say that Florida's not the only state that has no idea how to run an election.

Election snafus: synonymous with south Florida

Here we go again.

Apparently some South Miami residents have received postcards telling them they aren't eligible to vote on Tuesday in municipal elections. As you probably have guessed already, they are.

The elections department sent the postcards out Feb. 7 to about 2,800 voters after realizing that some voters who do not live in South Miami mistakenly received a previous notice, reminding them to show up to South Miami City Hall to vote for the municipal election instead of their normal polling sites.

But the second postcard may have mistakenly reached some South Miami residents -- possibly keeping some of these voters away from the polls.

Can't anyone here run an election? Seriously? Is it that difficult?

Just another day in paradise ...

What do south Florida elections have in common with the '62 Mets?

Here we are, less than three weeks before the Florida primary (months from the general election, of course), and there already are problems with the absentee voting procedure in at least two south Florida counties:

Thanks to the current state of postage prices, postal rules and envelope sizes, returning an absentee ballot in Broward or Palm Beach counties requires such an odd amount of postage - 97 cents in most cases - that people will have to stand on line at the Post Office.

Either that or put extra stamps with too much postage on the envelope.

The first batches of absentee ballots - about 8,600 in Broward and 4,000 to 5,000 in Palm Beach County - went out without any indication of how much extra postage is required.

At some point, we have to get beyond the "whoops, we messed up" mentality and realize that the entire country is watching us. Palm Beach County in particular has been synonymous with election foul-ups since 2000, and this sort of thing doesn't help.

No, he wasn't talking about elections, but New York Mets manager Casey Stengel (right) might just as well have been referring to them when he lamented, "Can't anybody here play this game?" Clearly and unfortunately, when it comes to elections in America's Glans™, the answer continues to be a resounding "NO."

Paper ballots for Broward

The good news is that Broward County (which includes Fort Lauderdale, Hollywood, and environs) will be getting paper ballots in 2008.

The bad news is that the county has contracted with ES&S, notorious for past election foul-ups, including the mess in Sarasota County where 18,000 missing votes may have contributed to the "victory" by Republican Vern Buchanan over Democrat Christine Jennings in the 2006 congressional election.

In a no-bid contract, Broward commissioners agreed earlier this year to buy the equipment from Election Systems & Software -- the same company that in 2002 provided the touch-screen voting machines that are now being replaced in both Miami-Dade and Broward. Broward still owes about $8 million of the $20 million those machines cost.

Election activist Ellen Brodsky asked commissioners why they were willing to pay $5.4 million to a company whose equipment had been inadequate in the past.

Commissioners said the contract made financial sense. "It would be extremely expensive for us to use anyone other than ES&S," Commissioner Ken Keechl said.

The optical-scan machines will be used in the August primary and in the November 2008 presidential election. Voters will fill in ovals on paper ballots, then feed them into machines.

The new equipment will have a paper record that election experts can consult if a recount is needed, said Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes. As of January, her will start random audits of the equipment.

Yep, we have to save money, so if we have to get machines from a company whose record is spotty at best, well, so be it. That's the Florida way. Hell, I think that's the American way.

But, looking at the bright side, this is certainly a step in the right direction. A paper trail doesn't make election fraud impossible, but it makes it less likely, and that's probably the best we can hope for in 2008.

Your concern has been noted

The "liberal media," a/k/a the concern trolls, are at it again, this time with a classic hand-wringing, pearl-clutching article by David Alexander of Reuters:

Failure to end the Iraq war has so divided Democrats it could jeopardize their chances of consolidating power in U.S. elections in November 2008, analysts said.

Nearly a year since the party parlayed discontent over the unpopular war into a majority in Congress, liberal Democrats, prodded by influential Internet bloggers, are pressing harder than ever for action to bring U.S. troops home.

Centrists, concerned about alienating conservative voters in swing districts, are wary of moving too precipitously, the analysts say.

The bottom line for Democrats was that they won a majority by picking up seats in marginal or nominally Republican districts, said Ethan Siegal, an analyst for The Washington Exchange, which monitors Congress for institutional investors.

"If the Democrats want to keep control of the House in the 2008 elections, they can't force those members to take certain Iraq votes, he said.

Why not? Poll after poll shows that the majority of Americans want us out of Iraq. Were moderate Republicans concerned about alienating liberal voters in swing districts in the last few elections? Of course not. Why should the Left back down? More accurately, why do the so-called Democrats (I'm looking right at you, Harry and Nancy) back down because of fear of alienating conservative voters?

Even the article's headline slams the Left: Democrat split on Iraq may hurt '08 chances: analysts ... Yep, "Democrat" as an apparent adjective ... no "Democratic," no "Democrats' " ...

The bedwetting centrists can join the batshit crazy wingnuts in a special circle of hell as far as I'm concerned. No one since Hitler has alienated more people worldwide than George W. Bush. If the Democrats are concerned about alienating the centrists, then we simply need more and better Democrats. Real Democrats. The centrists used to be moderate ... the centrists used to be truly center. Today's centrists would have been right-wing extremists in the 1960s and '70s. I'm fucking sick to death of the triangulating and posturing and kowtowing to the Bush crime syndicate. And it might get worse before it gets better.

Democratic divisions may grow after Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, reports to Congress in September on the results of President George W. Bush's policy of building up troops as a way to stabilize Iraq.

Even a positive report is unlikely to sway the anti-war liberal Democrats, but it will make it difficult for centrist Democrats from more conservative districts to support pulling out troops, the analysts said.

Democrats who had hesitated to vote for timetables and various withdrawal schemes "are going to be even more hesitant now," Siegal said.

"It will be the Democratic left, which is probably immune to any news of success in Iraq, against the middle-of-the-road America," said Matthew Woessner, a political expert at Pennsylvania State University.

"A nightmare scenario for any party is when the pressure, the sum total of the pressures from their constituency groups, are out of step with mainstream America. That's a prescription for electoral disaster," he added.

Fuck you, Matthew Woessner. Are you saying that the Democrats are "out of step with mainstream America" while the Republicans aren't?? I want some of what you're smoking, pal. Once again, take a look at "mainstream America." Even though the center has moved so far to the right that it's falling off the edge, all the reputable polls today show that people agree far more with the Democratic, or dare I say the liberal side of things, than they do with Republicans. How are you and the other "experts" going to analyze and rationalize the inevitable Democratic landslide in 2008? Can't wait to see that one ...

The success of liberal Democrats in prodding the party to the left has begun to draw expressions of concern from centrists.

"Some liberals are so confident about Democratic prospects that they contend the centrism that vaulted Democrats to victory in the 1990s no longer matters," former Rep. Harold Ford Jr. of Tennessee, the head of centrist Democratic Leadership Council, and Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley wrote in The Washington Post.

And, finally, a very special Blast Off! FUCK YOU to Harold Ford and Martin O'Malley and the entire DLC. You are the reason we're in this mess. You are the enablers, and you have the blood and bodies of Iraq and Katrina and all the other Bush-led disasters on your hands. It's your fault, and you're losing control of the Democratic Party as a result.

The people are taking over the Party, just as the founders intended. So get with the program or get the fuck out of the way.

Florida certifies Diebold for elections

Hurricanes aren't the biggest threat to America's Wang™. Florida is facing a bigger menace ... from the infamous, nefarious, GOP-controlled Diebold. From BradBlog (note: all links in excerpt are PDF files):

On July 27, the Florida State University Security and Assurance in Information Technology Laboratory (SAIT) issued a report on the results of a review of the source code for the Diebold voting system that was in the state of Florida certification process. This report was commissioned by the Secretary of State, Kurt Browning.

On July 31, Browning sent a letter to Diebold to tell them that the system would not be certified as it was presented to the state and that the company had until August 17 to fix the problems or the certification process would be stopped. Included in that letter were three pages of required software repairs.

On August 10, Browning sent a congratulatory letter to Diebold to let them know all of the code fixes were successfully inspected by the SAIT Lab. and the state and that the Diebold optical-scan system and AutoMark were to be certified for use by the state.

That's less than two weeks from report of numerous problems to repairs to the source code to reinspection to issuance of certification.

How did this happen so fast?

UPDATE August 12 It appears that the changes that were made to the code had already been made in a newer version of the code that is in the federal testing process. The Independent Test Authority sent that code to Florida State and that is what was inspected and passed. I am being told that the report by the SAIT will be published early in the week.

Truth be told, I'm not even all that concerned about the speed with which the certification occurred. What really bothers me is that a wingnut Secretary of State certified a wingnut voting machine manufacturer.

We need to keep a wary eye on Diebold. Florida isn't exactly known for its accurate elections, you know? Diebold certainly won't improve the situation.

(Thanks to Ripley for the tip.)