Let the government do your voting for you

Oregon: Voter Registration Made Automatic

Seventeen years after Oregon decided to become the first state to hold all elections with mail-in ballots, it took another pioneering step on Monday to broaden participation by automatically registering people to vote. Gov. Kate Brown, a Democrat, signed a bill that puts the burden of registration on the state instead of voters. Under the legislation, every adult citizen in Oregon who has had business with the Department of Motor Vehicles since 2013 but has not registered to vote will receive a ballot in the mail at least 20 days before the next statewide election. The measure is expected to add about 300,000 voters to the rolls. Some other states have considered such legislation, but none have gone as far as Oregon. Minnesota nearly instituted automatic voter registration in 2009 before it was vetoed by Gov. Tim Pawlenty, who said that “registering to vote should be a voluntary, intentional act.” Similar concerns were raised by Oregon’s minority Republicans.

How Progressive. What comes next, the government actually casts your vote for you? Oh, wait a minute, Oregon already does that.
     

The Rampant Voter Fraud that the Mainstream Media won't tell you about

The hits keep coming: Project Veritas exposes non-citizens, dead people registered to vote in NC — and so much more

Fraud? What voter fraud? While progressives continue to deny, deny, deny, investigative journalist James O’Keefe and Project Veritas continues to expose, expose, expose.

The latest target: North Carolina.

Project Veritas pulled up jury refusal forms and voter history documents to show that non-citizens and dead people there are registered to vote.

Watch as a man posing as a non-citizen with a passport is stubbornly encouraged by NC officials — who refuse to examine his ID — to vote. Listen to a conversation with election officials who joke about running over Supreme Court justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. Listen to the election judge who only wants to uphold certain parts of the state constitution. And witness a University of North Carolina official chuckling as a “student” brags about voting in two different states to infiltrate GOP primaries. [...]

Which is worse, the liars and cheats who fraudulently vote, or the public officials who look the other way or even encourage it?

I know that in many places ID is not required to vote, but this just shows why proper identification needs to be required. And what about the fraudulent voting that has been uncovered? Why are there no consequences?

Where is the integrity of our voting system? There are laws against voter fraud, so why aren't these people being prosecuted? What good are laws that aren't enforced? Where is the accountability of those whose job it is to enforce our laws?

     

A San Francisco Treat... But Not for Me

I'm not really surprised. One of the reasons I left SF, was because of the political corruption. This sort of thing seemed inevitable:

Voter Fraud Allegations Hit San Francisco Mayor’s Race

Shocking voter fraud allegations are rocking the mayor's race in San Francisco. District Attorney George Gascon has launched an investigation and demands are growing for federal authorities to move in.

One campaign official fears the election could be stolen if nothing is done.

Supporters of incumbent Mayor Ed Lee, who is running for a full four-year term next month, are accused of illegally handling vote-by-mail ballots.

Witnesses say workers for the group, SF Neighbor Alliance, set up a makeshift sidewalk voting site in the city's Chinatown and accuse it of illegally casting absentee ballots for elderly Chinese voters.

The witnesses claim cell-phone videos show workers telling voters to vote for Lee, filling out ballots for the voters and even using a stencil to hide the names of rival candidates so the voters could only chose one -- Lee.

They also say that the completed ballots were stuffed in plastic bags, which is prohibited by state election law.

"At first we thought they were just helping them understand what absentee ballots were," witness Malana Moberg told Fox News, saying that she saw a worker filling out a voter's ballot.

But she said, "It was pretty blatant."

"I noticed that someone who was working at that booth, who had an Ed Lee shirt on, fill in an absentee ballot on behalf of the voter, and I was immediately shocked and couldn't believe that someone would actually fill in the ballot. I thought it was probably illegal, and if not at the very least, unethical," Moberg said, adding that "someone filling out a ballot for somebody else seemed completely inappropriate."

One of videos was shot by Adam Keigwin, a campaign official for State Sen. Leland Yee, one of Lee's opponents.

"Individuals were marking ballots for elderly voters. They would literally mark the ballot, seal it, and put it in bags behind them. There are so many violations there, almost too numerous to mention," he said.

Keigwin told us the alleged ballot stuffing happened right out in the open, for anyone to see. [...]

At least they got caught. This time. But it does shake your confidence when it can even happen so blatantly.

I wish I could say that I'm more confident about Oregon's voting sytem. But I'm not, as I've posted about previously:

Who Elected Kitzhaber as Oregon's Governor?

I think Oregon's voting system is one of the worst there is:

Vote-by-mail's vulnerability to fraud

Oh well. Vigilance must never go out of style, if we're smart.
     

Who Elected Kitzhaber as Oregon's Governor?

After the election, Oregon Republicans are at a loss, their dreams dashed in Multnomah County

For the third time in the past decade, Oregon Republicans went to bed on election night thinking they might have finally ended Democratic dominance of statewide races.

But like a recurring bad dream, they awoke Wednesday to see the ballots from heavily Democratic Multnomah County seal a close victory for Democrat John Kitzhaber over Republican Chris Dudley in the governor's race.

"No matter who the Republican is, there is going to be a huge spread there," Bob Repp, a West Linn attorney and Republican volunteer, said with a sigh. "There just seems to be a real rigid dogmatism that has set in in Multnomah County." [...]

It goes into a bunch of reasons to explain "why". I read elsewhere, that the largest employer in Multnomah county is government jobs. Unionized government employees could explain the vote, too.

Portland, not Oregon, elected Kitzhaber

Kitzhaber was elected by a plurality, not a majority, of Oregon's voters.

He received approximately 49% of the ballots cast. Approximately 51% of Oregon's voters supported the Republican candidate (49%), the Constitution Party candidate (1%) or the Libertarian Candidate (1%).

Only seven of Oregon's thirty-six counties were carried by Kitzhaber. The other 29 counties voted for Mr. Chris Dudley.

Kitzhaber was elected by a minority of Oregon's voters. His support was concentrated in Portland and his campaign's funding came primarily from government employee unions.

Will Kitzhaber prove that he is something other than Portland's governor and the agent of the government employee unions? [...]

I have to wonder too, about the potential for voter fraud, especially in pivotal Multnomah county. I've posted about vote-by-mail's vulnerability to fraud.

The whole of Oregon votes by mail. It seems that the main safeguard against fraud is checking the signature on the ballot envelope with a signature on file with the voter registrar. How reliable is that?

When I was a bank teller, I once had customer, a sweet little old lady, who wanted to cash her social security check. Most folks want to deposit those, but she wanted hers all in cash.

Because of the large amount, I had to get my supervisors approval. The sweet LOL gave me her valid photo ID, and I had her sign the check in front of me. I then pulled the customer's signature card from the banks files, and it looked good.

I brought all three items to my supervisor, Helen. She saw the woman at my window, looked at her I.D., verified that the customer had signed the check in my presence, then looked at the signature card. Everything seemed in order, so she approved it.

A few days later, Helen comes to me with some paperwork from the main office. It turned out that the check had been stolen, and we cashed it for the thieves.

Helen told me: "Neither you nor I are in trouble for this, because we did follow all the bank procedures. I just wanted you to see it, as a reminder of why we do all this checking. But it's all too easy for some people to forge signatures".

A signature can look good, and still be fraudulent. Vote-by-mail makes it even easier; the fraudster doesn't even need to be a good forgerer. Signatures can be collected on petitions, and then "traced" onto ballot envelopes. Of course they would then match the signature card. And the fraudster never has to risk being caught by appearing in front of another human being to cast a vote, making it easier for the fraudster to cast multiple fraudulent ballots.

A computer scan is supposed to check for repeated names. But in a close election in a heavily Democrat county dominated by unionized government employees, what guarantee do we have that the scanning was done? The fox is in charge of the hen house.

And lets not forget the votes from the graveyard, which Democrats are famous for. Apparently many years go by without updating the lists of deceased voters. And even if they lists get updated, how do we know they were even checked against the ballots, especially in a close election?

If a Republican won, I'm sure they would be checking everything. But when a Democrat wins, nobody even asks these questions. Why not? Who checks the checkers?

     

Democrat Kitzhaber is Oregon Governor

The counting isn't done, but they've made it official anyway:
Kitzhaber wins Oregon governor’s race.

Republican Dudley was ahead, but then they slowed down the counting and found 90,000 "last minute" ballots from strongly Democrat districts, and Kitzhaber pulled ahead by one percentage point. How convenient.

Did you know that voting by mail, which is what Oregon does, is the most susceptible system to voter fraud? I'm sure there won't be an investigation though; they only do that when a Republican wins. Still, I have to wonder what the final tally would be, if you subtract all the votes from dead people, and all the votes from illegal aliens with drivers licenses?

And lets not forget to thank the Libertarian and Constitution parties. They each took one percent of the vote. If they had voted Republican... well, they didn't. A perfect example of why I don't support 3rd parties. They are merely vote spoilers. Thanks guys... for NOTHING.

Still, perhaps in an odd way, this outcome might be for the best. If Dudley had got in, he would have been treated like Arnold was in California; blamed for things Democrats have done. As Oregon continues to self-destruct, let the blame fall on Kitzhaber, since much of the trouble we are in came from his previous two terms anyway. Let the Democrats be in charge, and take the blame when the sh*t hits the fan. They've earned it.

If there is a sliver lining to this cloud, perhaps it's this:

Oregon may end up with a tied Legislature next year

Ties all around? The Oregon House could see 30-30 next year, and the Oregon Senate 15-15.

In the Senate, Democrats have already lost two seats, and could lose one more in Clackamas County. In Senate District 3, Sen. Alan Bates, D-Ashland, has lost to Republican challenger Dave Dotterrer. And in Senate District 26, Chuck Thomsen beat Democrat Brent Barton for the seat being vacated by Rick Metsger, D-Welches.

In Senate District 20, Sen. Martha Schrader was trailing Alan Olsen by 300 votes.

In the House, Democrats look to have lost six seats. The race to watch here is House District 37 in Clackamas County, where Republican Julie Parrish leads Democrat Will Rasmussen by 500 votes. Outgoing Rep. Scott Bruun holds the seat, and Republicans need to keep it in order to tie the chamber.

NEW: House Republicans are claiming the race for Parrish, and will put out a statement soon reflecting on a 30-30 House.

In 2003, Democrats gained enough seats to tie the Senate 15-15. But we can't recall a time when both chambers were split at the same time. [...]

After the last term Kitzhaber served as Governor, he declared that Oregon was ungovernable. Lets see how much fun he will have this time, with the new legislature.

As for voter fraud by mail... what's wrong with it? Why is it so easy to do? Let's count the ways:

'VOTE BY MAIL' A FORMULA FOR FRAUD

Quick and easy works for a lot of things. Voting is not one of them.

Making it convenient for citizens to cast their ballots is a good thing, generally, but not if the convenience undermines the integrity of the entire election process.

I live in Oregon, the state that pioneered vote-by-mail. Here, we don’t go to the polls on election day. Instead, the elections division mails our ballots directly to our homes two to three weeks before the election. We mark or punch our ballots at our leisure sitting at the kitchen table and then simply drop them in the mail.

No braving the elements on election day. No fear of an ice storm suppressing voter turn-out. No more waiting in line at the polls or being forced to hurry our decisions because of the long lines behind us. That’s why most Oregonians love vote by mail. It’s quick and easy, the ultimate in voting convenience. But, at what price?

Truth is, vote by mail is a formula for election fraud. The flaw is obvious: From beginning to end, no real human ever has to see the voter’s face. No real person determines that you are who you say you are, or that the person you say you are even exists.

Unscrupulous people can easily mark someone else’s ballot and not get caught. Have any fictitious names you want to vote under? It’s easy. Who’s going to know?Some voter's ballots are mailed to a P.O. Box. The person picking up his mail throws the ballot in the trash if he or she doesn't want to vote on a particular issue. Anyone can retrieve those ballots out of the trash.

In Oregon, anyone who wants to, can have three or four additional ballots mailed to their home. Why vote just once when you can vote early and often? And what about your dog? Shouldn’t he have a say regarding who will represent him in the next legislature? You registered him with the county, why not with the elections division?

Under the old system it was hard to sneak an extra ballot past those ever-attentive little old ladies down at the voting precinct. Unless you were a master of disguises, more likely than not, those gals would recognize you from your earlier trip that same day.

Not so with vote-by-mail. No one has to see your mug in person. Not ever. If you’re a cheat, here’s all you have to do to vote three or four times in the next election: Next time you stop by the local post office or the Department of Motor Vehicles, pick up a handful of voter registration cards. They’re free and there’s no limit on how many you can take. Using your own address, fill in the names of relatives in other states, or easier yet, just make up any names you like. Names that have a minority ring to them are best. With the government’s commitment to political correctness, minority names are less likely to be challenged.

You don’t need to show identification of any kind. You don’t have to demonstrate residency. After all, that would discriminate against the homeless. You don’t have to demonstrate citizenship, either. That would be an attack on minorities and immigrants. All you need is a name, address or a P.O. Box to which the elections division can mail all those official ballots.

When I said you could vote three or four extra times, that was because the folks at the elections division might get suspicious, if you have ten or twenty ballots sent to your little, two bedroom house. If, however, you are the manager of a large apartment complex, the sky’s the limit. You might be able to decide a local election single-handedly. Heck, 500 votes or so in Florida decided the presidency of the United States. Think big!

Of course, I’m not recommending that you actually do this. That would be dishonest, and certainly, there are penalties if you get caught. The chances of getting caught, however, are minimal.

In fact, the only real safeguard in the system is that each ballot has to be signed. All that means, though, is if you’re going to sign lots of different ballots personally, you need to sign each one differently and keep a sample of each signature so you can sign the same in future elections. You can even trace the signatures, so they look identical. (Note: To open a bank account you need two sets of I.D.'s to prove your identity. To cash a check, some banks require thumb prints. Not so with voting.)

There was a case in Oregon recently where a woman traced a dozen or so signatures on a petition. Each signature was examined by a clerk at the elections division and compared to the original signature on the person’s voter’s voter registration card. Every signature was certified as genuine. They weren’t. They were all fraudulent. The woman had traced them from another document, and they only looked genuine. The elections division missed every one of them.

Not too long ago, some renters moved out of a house I own and left the state. Sure enough, a few weeks before the next election, a half dozen official ballots showed up in the mailbox. I could have traced my ex-renters signatures off the rental agreement and onto their ballots and mailed them to the elections division marked any way I chose. Except for God and me, who would have known?

It would have been easy, and the chances that I would have been caught, close to zero. Why? Because there’s simply no way the local elections office can carefully check the signatures on hundreds of thousands of ballots in a short period of time. If the signatures were traced, they probably wouldn’t catch the forgeries anyway, even if they looked carefully at each one.

That’s the problem. Vote by mail is a system designed for honest people. It is predicated on the notion that people are basically good and won’t cheat. Here in Oregon, we hold our elections as if we don’t have dishonest people. Voter fraud happens in Chicago, we say, not here.

Pretty foolish, huh? A pretty naïve way to decide who will be the next president, governor, or mayor and decide the laws the rest of us must live under. I’m sure the founding fathers, with their more realistic view of fallen human nature, would have scoffed at such a system. They designed our entire government to provide checks and balances on man's basic tendency towards corruption.

So, how much voter fraud goes on with Oregon’s vote by mail system? Truth is, God only knows. Literally. [...]

There's more. Read the whole thing... and weep. The question is, what to do about it?

And YES, I am aware that the article is written by Bill Sizemore, who is a controversial figure, to say the least. I'm not endorsing him here. But if anything, his checkered past may actually add credibility to his arguments about voter fraud by mail.

My question is, what reliable safe-guards do we have against the kind of voter fraud he outlines in his article? And who enforces them? This isn't the first time I've seen, where the counting is speeding along, a Republican is winning by a small percentage, then the counting slows down, more ballots are found, then the Republican loses. No investigation, no questions. Am I the only one who thinks it sounds a bit "Chicago style"?

     

Iran: "Lioness" kicks policemen, gets beaten

Blogger Azarmehr posted this video, of a woman he describes as a "lioness":

The Fear is Gone

Look at this brave Iranian lioness, first she swing kicks and then she side kicks the neanderthal truncheon wielding riot guard! She gets a few baton strikes but this is the price for freedom and she cares not.

Blessed is our motherland Iran, for having such daughters.

The fear is gone and the momentum continues. [...]

The poor woman gets hit with truncheons from two men, and shortly after, she collapses. But her bravery is not for nothing. Azarmehr says the marchers now have reached 2 million!

Azarmehr also has video of his interview with the BBC.

Be sure and see his recent post with many photos and videos. I warn you, some of the photos show the bodies of people the Iranian government have murdered in the streets.
     

Obama campaign attacks ACORN prosecutors

Obama has not been able to distance himself from ACORN. Not only does he have a history of working with ACORN intimately as a community organizer, but more recently his campaign gave ACORN $800,000 to spend on voter registration. We can all see what they've been doing with it. Since he can't stop the information from coming out, he's shifting his focus on investigators. From Tammy Bruce:

Obamathugs Panic: Want Investigation of ACORN Investigators

Barky's team of thugs now want to prosecute, literally, those who are investigating ACORN fraud. Obama's socialism isn't limited to his economic policies, it's also reflected in his attempt to punish and destroy those who dare to ask questions and investigate wrong-doing. So now we know Barky's focus: prosecute those who dare discuss, expose and investigate crime. Obviously his socialistic policies extend to more than just economics, they also control his plan for society in general. [...]

This aspect of Barack Obama is the thing I find the most disturbing; the way he wields force to try to silence his critics or anyone who would dish the dirt on him.

Remember in the third debate, where Obama claimed that the McCain campaign was %100 percent negative? %100 percent? Translation: NO ONE is supposed to criticize THE ONE. He simply can't tolerate it. And I doubt he'd tolerate it as president, either. I think he would use every power and method at his disposal to silence his critics. Whatever he could get away with.


Here is a 3 minute video about Obama's Ties To ACORN:




Here is an 8 minute video about what ACORN has been doing:



The election process is being subverted here, folks. If we lose it to fraud and corruption, we may never get it back.


Related Links:

Obama, ACORN, Wright & Ayers all tie together

Obama, ACORN, and the attempted cover-up

Barack Obama; the larger, complete picture
     

Voter registration fraud and the Democrat Activists who work and lie to perpetuate it

I've been hearing "fraudulent voter registration isn't the same as voter fraud". Oh, so that makes it ok? What's the POINT of fraudulent registration, if not to let people vote illegally, thereby committing voter fraud? The Democrats have been doing this kind of crap for a long time. How about a close-up look at some of the people doing it? From Michelle Malkin:

Voter fraud alert: Houseful of out-of-state Obama activists registered as Ohio voters, received absentee ballots

[...] My friends at Palestra.net, a network of young reporters who have been doing the voter and registration fraud reporting that the MSM has been slow to do, have a breaking investigative report on how several members of the Democrat Vote From Home team — all Rhodes, Marshall, Fulbright, and Truman Scholars studying abroad — are turning up on Franklin County voter rolls despite having no bona fide residence in Ohio and admittedly having little to no knowledge about the state before descending on it in August to sign up other new voters in a rush to put 10,000 Obama supporters on the rolls. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Follow the link and have a look at these cheaters. These "Scholars". Clearly there are Democrats who believe rules don't apply to them.

The MSM is being very slow to report on this. If Republicans were committing these crimes, they would be all over it. But they protect their own.
     

Obama, ACORN, and the attempted cover-up

So what is the story with Obama and ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now)? That he would have ties to a group involved in massive voter fraud is appalling to me, but probably won't make any difference to many of his supporters. And the Democrats have been doing this sort of thing for quite a while now, but they are getting more bold.

So what are the essential facts we should know? From Neal Boortz:

MCCAIN FINALLY HITS ON OBAMA AND ACORN

Too little too late? You betcha. But the McCain campaign is finally trying to hit on Barack Obama's relationship with this corrupt, voter fraud organization ACORN. On Friday, McCain's campaign released a memo saying that Obama's affiliations with ACORN "raise serious questions about his judgment and ability to lead this nation." We know, we know ... this is a racist statement because Republicans are referring to Obama's days as community organizer. The McCain campaign has also posted a video which points to the connections between ACORN and the current mortgage crisis – the fact that ACORN, with the blessing of our own government, bullied banks into giving loans to people who they know could not pay for them. Question ... where was all of this information in the last debate? Why has John McCain waited until now to make these connections?

Naturally, the Obama campaign responds with my favorite line ... these attacks from the McCain campaign attempt to "'turn the page from the issues that matter to American families." So there you go. The people don't want to talk about this, they want to talk about the economy! Hey, Barack, how about explaining the fact that an organization you worked for and have hired to get out the vote for your campaign is partly responsible for the current economy, thanks to the mortgage meltdown. Here's a picture of Our Savior at an ACORN meeting! Look at the picture and remember that some Obama mouthpieces say that he wasn't involved with ACORN. Yeah ... we're buying that.

Oh and the other response from Democrats ... the only reason the McCain campaign is hitting on ACORN is because McCain and Republicans are "hostile to the group's political agenda." Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. says, "They're scared of too many poor people preparing to vote this year." So now the McCain campaign is engaged in class warfare and the only reason they are attacking ACORN is because they don't want poor people to vote. That is the logic of a Democrat.

OH AND BY THE WAY

Speaking of Barack Obama and ACORN, take a look at this little video from December 2007 where Obama says that ACORN and other community organizations are going to be shaping policies for his presidency. Remember that Obama is now denying any past affiliations with ACORN.

(bold emphasis mine) So why hasn't the McCain campaign been more hard-hitting on this topic? Michelle Malkin thinks she knows why. But giving a speech for a group isn't the same as being one of it's organizers, or financing one of it's subsidiaries with 800,000 of your campaign dollars. Obama has a lot to explain... or at least he would, if anyone in the media would bother to ask him.

The articles linked to below give more information about Obama'a affiliation with ACORN, and the attempted cover-up of the facts (and why the cover-up failed).


Related Links:

ACORN gives GOP new line of attack

Barack Obama's Involvement with ACORN Unearthed, Missing Article Recovered