Posts from — December 2004

History Made Today: Electors From Five States Call For A Congressional Investigation Of Voting Violations During November 2 Election: “

Electors speaking out like this is absolutely unprecedented.

Electors from five different states are saying the system sucks, and they don’t feel good about casting their electoral votes at this time.

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Electors Call for National Voting Reforms
By Greg Guma for The Vermont Guardian.
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In California, one elector cast his ballot provisional upon ‘all votes being counted – provisional, absentee, under- and over-votes, computerized without paper ballots, even getting valid votes from those turned away illegally, intimidated, discouraged by incredibly long waits, etc.’

This is an attempt to get the message read on the floor of Congress prior to certification on Jan. 6, when the ballots are opened.

‘Never has such a vote been cast by an elector,’ said Grace Ross, an organizer of the national effort to support electors to take action, and a member of Truth in Elections. ‘And without a parliamentarian to rule it in or out at the Electoral College level, we await whether Congress will acknowledge this type of provisional vote and address the issues this elector sought to raise, or whether they, too, will ignore provisional votes.’

In North Carolina, Democratic electors and activists talked about local problems while Republicans voted inside. Elector Mary Roe mentioned problems she witnessed as an election observer in her own county. State officials admit that 4,500 votes disappeared in a computerized voting machine crash.

“

(Via On Lisa Rein’s Radar.)

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yep, count the votes people… disenfranchinsing people is wrong and unamerican.

this is the one where small gifts count, tolerance, smiles, and the present of good naturedness is highly prized.

Bush Cuts Financial Aid For Up to 90,000 Students: “The Bush Administration has decided on a new formula for calculating student aid–a formula which will eliminate Pell Grants and cause a loss of student aid for up to 90,000 low-income students. Bush administration officials said the new formula —…”

(Via TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime.)

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i think they are really trying to increase poverty.

Letters to Walken: “”

(Via .)

sometimes, it’s good to have a santa.

BreakingNews.ie: Police order cover up of naked gnome: “‘Using their discretion a police officer spoke to the owner who agreed a suitable course of action in dressing the gnomes more appropriately on the grounds of decency.’”

(Via .)

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gnome freedom!

Metafilter | Community Weblog: “Well, the folks at NASA have given it an unprecedented Torino Impact Hazard rating of 4, with chances of impact currently at around 1 in 63, although this will no doubt change as calculations are made. Happy Holidays! “

(Via .)

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas an impeachable offense

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Again, there is no smoking gun, just lots of interesting questions. We should not prejudge what the President did nor did not do until there is further proof. But my view can be stated fairly simply: If the President did authorize inhumane treatment of prisoners, whether or not his lawyers could claim that this was not technically in violation of various international agreements to which the United States made numerous reservations, these acts are morally unconscionable. He has shamed the country and should be removed from office.

“

(Via Balkinization.)

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i think if it exists, it should mean impeachment. it currently merits an independent investigation or bipartisan congressional investigation.

Eprints 2.3.7 released: “Eprints, the open-source software for open-access, OAI-compliant archives, has released version 2.3.7. The new version makes better use of style sheets (see the demo) and adds an XSLT style sheet to make the OAI interface human-readable through a browser (see the example). More from today’s announcement: ‘This release adds the option to make required file formats depend on the type of eprint, rather than have one setting for the entire archive. This means that in one archive an eprint about a book may not require any formats at all, one about a presentation may require powerpoint, and a normal article require PDF. Version 2.3.0 to 2.3.6 of EPrints required the ‘libapreq’ library, this library proved difficult for some users to install, so in response to our users comments, from 2.3.7 is no longer used.’”

(Via Open Access News.)

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great news!

Subpoenas Served On The Shrub, Cheney, Rove, and Blackwell: “

Jesse Jackson reminds us to stay focused over the holidays, because
critical developments are taking place, now, in Ohio.

A lawsuit challenging Ohio’s election result has been filed successfully
(Moss v. Bush).

Bush, Cheney, Rove, and Blackwell have all been subpoenaed.

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The election challenge suit was filed Dec. 17. Blackwell, the Bush-Cheney campaign, and Ohio�s Republican electors have 10 days to respond. Then, according to court procedural rules, each side has 20 days to do discovery � or additional evidence gathering, with those bringing the suit going first. With January 6 being the date Congress accepts the Electoral College vote, and January 20 being the inauguration, the GOP seems determined to make the recount drag on as long as possible.

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(Via On Lisa Rein’s Radar.)

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every vote should be counted….

Bush the Grinch Pardons Few: “Yesterday we criticized New York Governor George Pataki for his grinch-link approach to pardons. Today, Law Prof Doug Berman of Sentencing Law and Policy and Orin Kerr of Volokh Conspiracy take Bush to task for his meager handouts. Update: Glenn…”

(Via TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime.)

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wouldn’t this make sense for someone who believes in heaven and a just god?