Wired Magazine: “Voter Database Glitches Could Disenfranchise Thousands”

Cross-posted to Project Vote’s blog Voting Matters.

By Nathan Henderson-James

Today Wired Magazine published an in-depth look at potential Election Day problems associated with voter registration data matching, list maintenance, provisional ballots, and shadowy interstate compacts through which member states cross-check their voter registration lists and purge supposedly duplicated voters. Titled “Voter Database Glitches Could Disenfranchise Thousands”, the piece, written by Kim Zetter, starts this way,

Electronic voting machines have been the focus of much controversy the last few years. But another election technology has received little scrutiny yet could create numerous problems and disenfranchise thousands of voters in November, election experts say.

This year marks the first time that new, statewide, centralized voter-registration databases will be used in a federal election in a number of states.

The article presents an in-depth discussion of the potential problems associated with the creation of the centralized databases and their potential to disenfranchise thousands of newly and currently registered voters in state after state.  

But election experts say the real concern is how states are conducting database matches of new voters under HAVA.

The law requires each voter to have a unique identifier. Since 2004, new registration applicants have had to provide a driver’s license number or the last four digits of a Social Security number to register (voters who don’t have them are assigned a unique number by the state). States are required to try to authenticate the numbers with motor vehicle records and the Social Security Administration database.

But databases are prone to errors such as misspellings and transposed numbers, and applicants are prone to make mistakes or write illegibly on applications. The Social Security Administration has acknowledged that matches between its database and voter-registration records have yielded a 28.5 percent error rate.

Disturbingly, despite these kinds of error rates, several states have joined secretive interstate compacts that allow them to share their registration databases with each other and purge voters who supposedly show up on more than one list.

[Project Vote Executive Director Michael] Slater cites another troubling trend emerging with the implementation of statewide databases.

Several states have begun comparing databases for duplicate records of existing voters, then purging voters they believe have moved and registered in another state. The problem, Slater says, is the methods used can yield false positives, and officials are deleting voters without contacting them to verify that they’ve moved, or waiting for two federal election cycles to pass, which are requirements under the National Voter Rights Acts of 1993.

In 2006, Kentucky’s attorney general successfully sued his state’s board of elections after officials compared their list to ones from South Carolina and Tennessee and purged about 8,000 voters who appeared to have registered in those states at a later date than their registration in Kentucky and were presumed to have moved.

Project Vote is investigating Kansas, Louisiana and South Dakota for similar activity. Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri and Nebraska have also been comparing lists.

"That is a trend that will accelerate, but there are inadequate safeguards, and I think it’s very, very dangerous," Slater says.

For more information, Project Vote has created materials on database matching, maintaining voting rolls, provisional ballots, and voter ID requirements.

Former LA Mayor Richard Riordan Endorses Obama

Former Los Angeles Mayor (and Republican) Dick Riordan attended a fundraiser for Democratic nominee Barack Obama for president. You can check the video here (h/t CA Faultline).

Riordan was the “post-partisan” Republican candidate of 2002, and he polled really well against incumbent Gov. Davis.  The Davis team reached into the Republican primary, and in the end Riordan was defeated for the nomination by Bill Simon. I’m sure the GOP voters in California will hardly be shocked after tagging him as a “RINO”.

However, this does speak to McCain’s loss of the moderate vote.  Riordan was able to win in LA, despite the strong Democratic tilt.  While LA itself won’t be at all determinative for the general election, the “independent” vote will be important. Sure, McCain did something to consolidate his base with the Palin pick, but now that the bloom is falling off that rose, where will he turn?

Why Is Andy Stern Helping John McCain?

Why Is Andy Stern Helping John McCain?

( Cross posted at Openleft.com )

With all the attention that SEIU has received over rampant corruption in its largest California local, 6434 formerly headed by the disgraced Tyrone Freeman, and Michigan’s largest healthcare Union also formerly headed by, yet again another disgraced leader (Rickman Jackson), and now most recently the resignation of one of Mr. Sterns newly elected top International Vice-Presidents, Anelle Grajeda, for diverting members dues to her former boy friend, one must ask the question: “who does Andy Stern really support for President?” At first glance at the current situation with SEIU Andy Stern’s pick as our next President may seem unrelated to the corruption within SEIU. That is, until you examine closely how Mr. Stern has acted upon the alleged corruption within SEIU.

Instead of aggressively pursuing all available remedies to rid the corruption within the aforementioned SEIU locals and getting back to the business of electing a pro-worker candidate he has instead chosen to expend the vast majority of SEIU’s resources in a personal vendetta against arguably one of SEIU’s most successful union locals, SEIU-UHW West.

Why? Because SEIU-UHW West dared to hold Stern and his “Team” accountable for the inherent promise that SEIU be of the members, by the members, and for the members.

SEIU-UHW West has engaged Stern for close to 3 years in an internal debate over union governance that has challenged the destructive direction Stern has moved SEIU towards. SEIU-UHW West attempted to sound the alarm during the recent SEIU convention in Puerto Rico by bringing to the floor measures that would have ensured and preserved member governance, oversight, and participation at the highest levels of SEIU.

Unfortunately, Stern and his “Team” choreographed a textbook campaign that vilified SEIU-UHW West’s platform as centric only to the needs of SEIU-UHW West and devoid of any conscience for the plight of unorganized workers. He stated that SEIU-UHW West was only interested “in polishing their apples”. Nothing was further from the truth. In fact the platform put forward by SEIU-UHW West expanded the powers of its members and was a threat to Stern’s lust for control, power, and centralization of decision making within SEIU.

Second only to 1199 NY in its COPE contributions (member voluntary political fund) to the International, the leader in California COPE dollars by double the states locals average, and the fastest growing local in SEIU, SEIU-UHW West, instead of being utilized by Stern to ensure that we elect a President sensitive to the needs of the working class, is instead under a vicious and completely baseless attack from Stern and his appointed henchmen and surrogates that includes a threatened trusteeship on false charges of financial mismanagement.

It is important to note that this is Stern’s second bite at this apple. The international recently had their proverbial heads handed to them in the highest court in California on this very issue. The court ruled that the International had no basis for their claims and dismissed all relevant claims made by SEIU with prejudice. Put simply, the court told Stern and his “Team” not to ever bring this frivolous matter before the court again. So now Stern wants to drag SEIU-UHW West thru the mud in an attempt to discredit them as well as distract attention away from the more serious previously mentioned malfeasance (and long known by Stern) of his handpicked appointees, Tyrone Freeman, Rickman Jackson, Annelle Grajeda.

With so much at stake in this years election one must wonder why a personal vendetta against SEIU-UHW West is the highest priority for Mr. Stern. At the SEIU convention in Puerto Rico this year, delegates endured wave after wave of self righteous indignation opposing SEIU-UHW West’s desire to debate internal jurisdictional issues. At stake was the very essence of what it meant to be a healthcare worker; the ability to advocate on behalf of patients, better staffing, improvements in working conditions, and the right to choose in a fair and democratic process what union local to be represented by.

Stern surrogates and appointees made statements calling SEIU-UHW’s arguments selfish and self-serving. One even stated, “People are dying right now as we waste time debating these issues. We have work to do! Let’s get to work!” Staffers from the SEIU continued to echo this same tired line at nausea throughout the debate process.

Certainly the work of electing a progressive pro-working class president falls into the category of “work to do”. And if it does why, with the incredible political fight before us, would Andy Stern sideline his second biggest political weapon against four more years of Bush’s failed policies in order to carry out a personal vendetta against SEIU-UHW West? Stern has time and again issued the battle cry against corporate greed, affirmed his commitment to lift workers out of poverty, and boldly stated that SEIU will lead the battle to get universal healthcare and pass perhaps one of the most ambitious pieces of legislation ensuring workers rights to organize (EFCA).

So it defies logic that at the most critical time in the election process, where so many peoples lives depend on the outcome, Mr. Stern would allow himself to be consumed with forcing a trusteeship upon a union local that has a long and proven history of, not only adhering to the values he claims to hold dearly but, excelling at those same values. And why would Mr. Stern schedule the Trusteeship hearing, not only during the most critical time of the general election but on the exact same dates (September 26-27) that the Obama campaign is attempting to mobilize California supporters to participate in a canvassing effort in neighboring “swing state” Nevada, where Obama trails McCain by 1 percentage point? It begs the question, who ultimately wins if Mr. Stern allows himself to take action against a union local who has the power to help end eight years of failed economic and foreign policies? And whose’ hopes ultimately die if we fail?

Andy Stern prides himself in being a leader in the progressive majority movement. However his current actions fly in the face of his alleged progressive values. He is jeopardizing real reform in our labor movement to fulfill a personal grudge. These are hardly the qualities of a true progressive and reformer and certainly not the qualities that will bring hope and “Justice For All”.

Republican Voter Registration Fraud in San Bernardino Further Exposed

Note: Title edited as per a suggestion in the comments

To expand on the voter fraud in San Bernardino County that the CDP alerted us to yesterday, funded by would-be governor Steve Poizner, Carol Robb of the San Bernardino County Democratic Central Committee has provided more details, including Republican DA Mike Ramos’ unwillingness to even return Democrats’ calls:

Here’s what has happened:

·Immediately after the Labor Day weekend, we saw a large increase in San Bernardino County in Republican Registration, as compared to Democratic, for the first time in 14 months

·The office of the Registrar of Voters was alerted to this situation by Carol Robb.

·The Secretary of State’s office was also alerted by a phone call from Carol Robb.

·Knowing that voter registration fraud was taking place in Riverside County, Carol Robb got a list from the Registrar of Voters, containing new registrations and re-registrations between Aug. 18 and Sept. 3.  That file was used to identify over 400 voters whose registration changed from Democrat, or “declined to state,” to Republican.

·Calls were made to about 100 randomly selected voters from the 400+ on the list.  Because of incorrect phone numbers, only 33 interviews were completed.

·Phone interviews determined that 27, of the 33 voters reached had been “slammed”  — their party affiliation was improperly changed.

·The advice of the California Democratic Party was sought, and Bob Mulholland was designated to assist us.

·Carol Robb, Patrick Kahler, Sam Clauder, and Phil Robb (Carol’s husband, retired Deputy DA) met with Kari Verjil and her key staff on Friday, September 12.  The Registrar was given all information, including copies of our 33 telephone interview forms.

·Carol Robb also filed an on-line complaint with the DA’s Public Integrity Unit.

·Carol and Sam kept in close contact with Bob Mulholland, who constantly urged us to “go public.”

·When our calls to the DA’s office were unreturned Monday and again Tuesday morning, Mulholland took matters into his own hands, and sent out a press release from the state party linking San Bernardino’s situation to State Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner’s repeated press releases, about his personal funding of Republican voter registration bounty programs.

·In the meantime, the Registrar’s office has handed over all information to both the District Attorney and the Secretary of State, with her request for immediate investigation.

·Congressman Baca was asked to call DA Mike Ramos to urge immediate action.

·Supervisor Josie Gonzalez has pledged to contact the DA’s office and urge immediate action.

·A copy of our press release and other information has been shared with a representative of Assembly Speaker Karen Bass.  Karen Bass will be meeting with both Secretary of State Debra Bowen and Attorney General Jerry Brown in the next day or so, and will share our information directly with them.

SBD Republicans are trying to cast this as Democratic sour grapes but it’s clear that there is something worth investigating here. Democrats are holding a press conference at 11 AM today to explain the matter to local media and demand an investigation and accountability.

It’s worth keeping in mind that this isn’t just about the 2008 cycle – but that the involvement of Steve Poizner, a leading candidate for the GOP gubernatorial nomination in 2010, suggests this could be a long-term strategy for Republicans in California. Certainly the track record of YPM, the Republican firm at the center of the scandal and with many years of voter registration fraud dating back to at least 2004, suggests this to be the case.

CA-04: No Show Tom, Fake Schedule, Swiftboating, & Keystone Kops

Tuesday September 16 2008

No Show Tom, Fake Schedule, Swiftboating, & the Keystone Kops

Or how Termed- Out State Senator Tom McClintock (R, Anywhere for a per Diem), who is running against Charlie Brown (D, Roseville ) posts a fake schedule on his official campaign website while his campaign workers set up an assault on Brown’s field director  and the “press”  acts like the White House press corps.  

This was my day today.

1.  8 am Lincoln Area Chamber of Commerce  Government Affairs Committee , Holiday Express Inn, Ferrari Ranch Rd, Lincoln  

Tom McClintock, the guest speaker, is a NO SHOW.  Instead, an aide, Mark Spannagel, says that Tom can’t be there because they passed the budget last night (??)  After Spannagel’s spiel, and after the rest of the meeting, he comes up to me and says very sarcastically, “say hello to Todd.”   I ask him if Tom McClintock is going to be at any other scheduled events that were shown on his website, since he skipped this one.  He says he doesn’t know.  I ask him again (politely, in front of Jennifer Perreira )  if Tom McClintock was going to be at anything as shown on his site schedule. He says that they’re “going to roll with it” but that he didn’t know.

2.  The Surprise Super Secret “Managed” Press Conference.  In Roseville, I call Todd.  Does he know where Tom McClintock is going to be today?  Yes.  Supposedly there is a press conference downtown in Sacramento, at the Hyatt Regency at 12th and L street to announce that the budget has been passed, to start the campaign. They’re also announcing “something.”   When is this?  In a half hour.  Do you want a camera there? Okay. On my way.   I know what the Hyatt looks like.  That’s where Dick Cheney comes to do photo opps.  It’s across from the state Capitol building where Crazy Tom had his big ” BUILD THE WALL, DEPORT THEM ALL”  sign up when he was calling for Federal funding to be cut off to San Franciso and Los Angeles during the budget impasse during the Minuteman “Get Your Hate on for Latinos” rally.    

about 40 minutes later……

I ask at the entry where the McClintock press conference is, and they tell me upstairs. Then they don’t let me in the room.  The room is being guarded by Mark Spannagel, (fancy that! he doesn’t look too thrilled to see me) and an unnamed male person I will have to call “SpannaCompanion”.   Spannegel whips out a camera and takes my picture “for the file.”  (“File?” They keep “files?” )  So I oblige and take his again for my notes.   Nick P , Brown’s field director,  is waiting outside the room.  He’s been thrown out.  Several other veterans have been thrown out. Where is Todd?  He’s in the room.  Can I go in the room?  No.  But I am supposed to be in there. No. Can I give my camera to somebody in the room who requested it. No. Who the hell IS in there?  Todd and the press.  Who else ?  McClintock’s people. Is McClintock in there? Nobody knows.  

What the heck.  Take video camera out and start interviewing Nick P.  What happened? McClintock’s campaign John Ruiz grabbed his arm suddenly and told him to leave? That he asked him to let go of his arm, and instead Ruiz started yelling at him, “Do you want to beat me up?”  Nick said this, incredulously, in the way that someone does who just witnessed bat-chit crazy, and then added that he does not hit people.  (Nick is a very mild mannered person. This is beyond ridiculous)  How does he feel about being kicked out of the room? He wishes Democracy was a more open process.  Pan around with the camera.  Ask the door pugs Spannagel and SpannaCompanion what their names are, who do they work for, why are they doing this, and they both say NOTHING, get a “deer in the headlights look” and freeze up.  After a while, the door opens and a few people go out and in.  I start towards the door again and more people place themselves directly in front of me and block the open door.  Holy crap.  What the hell are they doing in there?  I try to hold the camera up and TALLER PEOPLE come and put themselves in the doorway.  I am only of average height.  This one blonde woman must be at least 6 inches taller than I am.

Another Taller Male Person in a dark suit comes and puts his hand over the camera lens and tells me I am not allowed to film anything. I tell him I was asked by a person who is in the room to come. He tells me (hand still over my camera) that I am not allowed to film anything as this is private property, a private meeting, and that if I do not stop, I will be escorted out of the building. He also makes me identify myself but will not tell me who he is or who he works for. I ask him several times to please identify himself. He won’t. I take this to mean he must be private security or imitating it, and I’m not going anywhere with him if I can help it.  This is creepy.   What if I want to enter the room without filming? Are not other people in there taking notes?  I can’t do that unless I go down to the office and ask permission. I am not on the list.  I have to turn off the camera now.  He is emphatic. I must turn off the camera now or leave.  I press my thumb on the button and put my hand down.

I return to the opposite side of the hall with Nick and the veterans and wait for the room to open up.  Eventually the room does open up, and Todd and the reporters come out.  They interview Todd in the hall.  I can tell by the issues and topics that Todd is speaking on, that whatever went on in the room must be complete ****ing bullshit.    The one reporter for the SacBee also talks to one of the veterans and to Todd.  We go downstairs and I then tell Nick P that one of the original door guards was Mark Spannagel, and that he was at Lincoln subbing for McClintock and refused to say where McClintock was going to be today.  

3.  The Auburn Rotary  at the Elks Lodge, Pine Street, Auburn.  When I had left the house that morning, I had no idea that I was going to be doing anything other than running an errand down to Lincoln and back, and then maybe sending an email of my notes and writing something.  But now I’m all the way downtown, and it’s easier to get on the freeway and go straight up north to Auburn than to try to go home.  So I head back to the parking garage, call my spouse, ask him to check McClintock’s website schedule to see if the next event is still listed, ask him to look at a map and tell me which exit, and head out of downtown Sac, back north towards the mountains.  This is going to be a bit of a push, as I have about a half hour to try to get there by noon.

Once I find the Elks Lodge, I take a picture of the parking lot full of cars, and then walk uphill, and there’s Spannagel again, probably on lookout point. I take his picture in the doorway quickly as he’s trying to duck back out of the viewfinder.   I enter the foyer.   A person asks if he can help me, and I say I’m looking for Tom McClintock and ask if he’s going to be here today….. and the man says he thinks he might be here.  Aha !  I peek in the doorway, and there’s Tom McClintock in the front of the room chock full of male Elks eating salads.  The entire building smells like cooking lunch.  I’m almost queasy after my previous encounter with “Friends” of Tom McClintock.  The man asks if I wish to come in and sit down.  Mindful of what happened the last time,  I tell him I am following McClintock as a volunteer for the Brown campaign today, based on McClintock’s published schedule,  tell him that McClintock was a no- show in Lincoln, and wouldn’t let me into a press conference in Sacramento,  and ask if there is somebody to ask for permission.   He goes and asks another person sitting in the room, who he identifies as an Elks official, and comes back and says very politely that perhaps it would be a good idea if I didn’t come in today, but I should come back next month when Charlie Brown is speaking, as today is “McClintock’s day.”  This person was wearing a name tag and trying to be very diplomatic. I told him I was thinking of maybe waiting out on the sidewalk on public property a bit, IF that was okay with him, and he said it was.   I did stay for the pledge of allegiance and the prayer, and I went ahead and snapped a photo from the doorway of McClintock sitting there in front of the roomful of Elks, having lunch, just after his campaign officials had used the Move America Forward people who specialize in Swiftboating pull up one of Rep. John Doolittle’s (R, not indicted yet)  old fabricated dirty work and try to rumormonger a bunch of paid reporters in Sacramento.  And had his flunkies refusing to say where he was going to appear.  At least I had the damned camera there if they had tried to mug a veteran.

Hey, it’s a living for some people, right ?  McClintock votes against veterans interests,  and then pays people to stop bloggers who figured out who’s paying for their smear tactics against his opponent the veteran.

I then go to the Auburn office of Brown for Congress and update them on who’s in town and the other stuff his campaign has been doing today.

I go and eat some late lunch.  I call my spouse, and tell him what’s up. He check McClintock’s site again.

4.  And then I get back on the road and head up to the last stop, the alleged 4pm Lions Club meeting in Foresthill.  That’s going to be about another half hour of mountain driving.  At least it’s a beautiful drive and I know where I’m going, thanks to the Auburn office.   I go to the Veterans Memorial Hall, a lovely big log lodge type building next to a park, where the Lions club meets, and there’s almost nobody there.  Once in a while a vehicle comes in, but leaves soon.  I take some pictures of the empty parking lot and park, and get back in the car.  It’s time to go home.  I stop at Wharton’s on the way back out, and other people stop as I rest,  and admire the view of the Canyon.  And then I drive the hour and 15 minutes home.  My car had nearly 200 miles on it today.

People, my experience today is going to be just like a McClintock term in Congress.  He’s beyond Doolittlesque.

____________________

cross posted at dailykos in a version I can’t edit right now.  crossposted at progressive blue.  photos by author.

this will start the photos, I will re arrange and add later

9/16/08McCSp

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Mark Spannagel (McClintock aide) at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in downtown Sacramento Tuesday 9/16    Look how he thinks it’s funny that they’ve locked veterans out of the room and Brown campaign staff and volunteers , and he’s lied about the whereabouts of his boss

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9/16/8McCAub

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Tom McClintock in Auburn at the Elks Lodge eating lunch.  That is one of the Holmes brothers next to him.  (Auburn local government)  His staff had just held a private press conference at the downtown Hyatt hotel, and thrown Brown campaign staff and volunteers and veterans out of the room.  He also had hotel security prevent me from filming or assisting campaign staff while he had a known Swiftboating group passing out smears about Brown to the press.  

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McClintock

This person bears a very close resemblance to the other McClintock aide who was there, and he was guarding the door with him.  This was taken July 4 in Lincoln.  On the float, Mr and Mrs McClintock, somebody else’s children, 4 flags, US, Christian, CA State Flag and GOP.  

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Brown08

Locked Out.  Afterwards, a SacBee reporter talks to some veterans and Todd Stenhouse of the Brown campaign

 

US Fed Bails out AIG to the tune of $85 Billion

$85 Billion dollars later, we are witnessing yet another McBillion bailout- billions served to American International Group, Incorporated (AIG).  This after the government stepped in to seize Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac with a cost that will be told at nearly $100 billion of taxpayer money.

When will this end?  Will we see more bank and insurance company failures in the next few days or has the hemmorrhaging stopped?

There is a new American model for our economy these days- Privatized Profiteering and Socialized Losses.

What’s your take?  Are our economic fundamentals sound?  

CDP To Poizner: Stop Funding Voter Registration Fraud

(The man who would be Governor… – promoted by jsw)

Title updated.

When Republican State Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner announced with California Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring on August 28, 2008 that he would contribute enough money to pay $5 for every new Republican voter registration, no one expected a voter registration card “slamming” program.  

In San Bernardino County the California Republican Party with their local Republican affiliates hired a firm from outside California called YPM – Young Political Majors, owned by a man named Mark Jacoby and run out of Florida and Arizona – to commit the same voter fraud that got YPM run out of other states.

(more on the flip)

Moreover, this isn’t something new. YPM has a bad track record stretching back years and years.  For example, the following story comes from an article written in 2004:


Young Political Majors LLC, or YPM, is a company registered by Mark Jacoby at a Town ‘N Country residence.

Jacoby appeared this summer at the election office in Gainesville with a box of about 1,200 voter registration cards. Of those, about 510 voters had switched to the GOP.

Elections Supervisor Beverly Hill spoke with Jacoby and grew suspicious. She randomly called the Republicans to verify they wanted to switch. All of them said, “Absolutely not,” Hill said. “They didn’t even know they had signed a registration form,” Hill said.

Here’s how YPM does it: their paid signature gatherers ask registered Democratic voters to sign a claimed legitimate petition (in this case a petition to “stop sexual predators from getting out of jail”). Then, depending on the circumstances, they tell the voter that the petition is not legal unless they re-register as a Republican, or they have the voter sign in two places – one of which is the bottom of a Republican voter registration card.

It is simply unacceptable for this type of activity to go on here in California.

“This insidious and fraudulent practice is called ‘slamming,’ and Insurance Commissioner Poizner must put an immediate stop to funding this conspiracy to commit fraud,” said Senator Art Torres (Ret.), Chairman of the California Democratic Party (see letter below letter).      

The San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters, Kari Verjil, has allowed the slamming to continue for weeks.  The California Democratic Party is calling on the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s office, the Secretary of State and the State Attorney General’s office to investigate and prosecute those who are knowingly committing fraud.  

The same situation is known to have occurred in Riverside County. This past August the Registrar of Voters, Barbara Dunmore, referred that fraud to the Riverside County District Attorney.

American voters should not be treated this way.

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Here is a copy of the letter Chairman Art Torres sent to the San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters.

September 16, 2008

Via Facsimile (909) 387-2022

Ms. Kari Verjil        

San Bernardino County Registrar of Voters

Dear Registrar of Voters Verjil:

Our offices have received numerous calls about the California Republican Party’s use of “slamming” — illegally re-registering Democrats as Republicans — in your county.

I would like to know the status of your investigation of the Republican slamming.  A few thousand voter registration cards are being turned in each week to your office and it appears your office has not stopped this fraudulent practice.  

In calls to a random sampling of 100 of these voters, we found one-third of the phone numbers were either disconnected or the wrong number.

When phone slamming happened several years ago, the federal government, as well as state and local officials put a stop to it.  

You must stop this illegal practice whereby American citizens who have registered as Democrats, whether earlier this year or several years ago, are being changed to Republicans with your county voter registration cards by organizations authorized by you to do voter registration.

Sincerely,

Senator Art Torres (Ret.)

Chairman of the California Democratic Party

cc: Secretary of State Debra Bowen

    Attorney General Jerry Brown

    San Bernardino County District Attorney Michael Ramos

Schwarzenegger Vetoes Budget

This was kind of a no-brainer for the Governor.  While his popularity has stumbled during the budget crisis, the legislature is worse, and the early reviews of the budget are very negative.  By vetoing it, Arnold sets himself apart from the failed budget process and gets to say that “I did all I could” when he is inevitably overridden.  

A budget veto would be a first for California, but legislative leaders in both parties said early this morning that it is likely the Legislature would override it.

“I’m pretty confident we are not going to have any difficulty” overriding a veto, said Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles). “We would do it in rapid fire.”

The last bill override was in 1979, when Jerry Brown was governor (the bills concerned state employees and insurance).

That last bit of information should tell you all you need to know about the dysfunctional state political system.  No veto overrides in 30 years?  What a farce.

Now, the flip side to this political move by the Governor is that he will be shown to have essentially no power in Sacramento.  He’s been completely divorced from the Yacht Party, having no ability to move them on any significant issue.  And now the budget will be passed over his veto (I’m guessing this eliminates his ability to blue-pencil anything out of it, too).  Schwarzenegger’s power is at its lowest ebb now.

But he’s playing a post-partisan game, and he’ll hope to regain some of that relevancy with the presumed March ’09 special election.  Wherein there will be no talk of the slashing of the vehicle license fee which contributed mightily to this mess, of course….

…adding, there’s one other wrinkle to this, and that’s this:

If lawmakers vote to override the veto, Schwarzenegger said, he will veto all the bills awaiting action on his desk.

This gives a measure of leverage to the Governor, but it looks to me like he’s learned from his Republican friends how to hijack… amazingly, at his press conference he immediately backed off this “tough guy” tactic when challenged on it, revising that he would “look closely” at those bills which involved spending, and veto an unspecified number of them.  In other words, what he does every year.  What a girlie-man.

UPDATE: Karen Bass’ statement is here.

They were only some of the victims of a chronic budget problem in California that has been going on for decades. Over the past few months it became clear that California’s chronic budget problems couldn’t be resolved in a single session of the legislature. Not when we have a 2/3 requirement to pass a budget and raise revenues – a disastrous tyranny of the minority that other states have sensibly avoided. Not when we have a revenue system based on what made sense in the 1930s – a system that careens from year to year with no long term stability.”

If the people of California are the victims in the chronic budget crisis, the 2/3 vote and the outdated revenue system are the villains. Because of the two thirds vote requirement when legislative Democrats made cuts and supported taxes– and when the governor made cuts and supported taxes-a small Republican minority was still able to hold the budget hostage for almost three months.”

If Governor Schwarzenegger had been able to convince even a handful of legislators from his party to support a budget – AS EVERY OTHER GOVERNOR IN HISTORY HAS BEEN ABLE TO DO – we wouldn’t be in this situation. But Governor Schwarzenegger was not able to produce a single vote — and the people of California were hurting — so we stepped in to pass a compromise budget that, while ugly in many aspects, at least buys us time to make progress on the real reforms we need.

I think she’s interested in changing the 2/3 requirement.

UPDATE by RobertGaramendi supports the budget veto:

The Governor is correct to veto the proposed budget as it does not meet the minimum investment that California must make to maintain its economic competitiveness. All levels of education remain on a starvation diet that is sapping the strength of tomorrow’s workforce and leaving California employers with insufficient skilled workers, ill-prepared to compete in the world’s economy. Furthermore the most vulnerable in our society, the poor, the aged, the blind and the disabled are denied the basic needs that they deserve. We are the sixth wealthiest economy in the world – we can and we must do better – for our future and our children’s future.

This budget “kicks the can down the road” because it does nothing to solve the structural deficit, nothing to fund or to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our poorly performing education system, the prison system or address the need for affordable health care. It uses accounting gimmicks and borrowing to plug the hole, a hole that is guaranteed to be only bigger and deeper next fiscal year.

It’s time for Californians to take a stand together. We must modernize our economy, stabilize our budget, reform and fully fund our education programs, establish a universal health care system, address the threat of climate change and adapt our water and transportation systems to the reality of the new and changing environment.

We must reestablish the successful California tradition of investing in both the public and the private sectors. We cannot allow a continuation of the gridlock caused by the Republicans’ refusal to adequately fund those investments that create economic growth and social advancement. The two-thirds vote requirement must end along with the ideology that we can continue to cut essential services and education and end up with a vibrant economy and a peaceful society.

The Legislature should return to serious daily negotiations and adopt a budget that invests in California’s future. The Republican’s have already agreed to a tax hike for every Californian who receives a pay check and for every California Corporation. A 10% increase in tax withholding is nothing more than a tax increase. This flawed budget affects those least able to put food on the table. California’s working families deserve real solutions and vital investments which ensure a better tomorrow.”