Blogs and Online Opinion
 Faster than a stolen ballot. More powerful than a rich lobbyist. Able to leap over corrupt politicians in a single bound. Yes — it's Fraudbuster Bob, who, disguised as Bob Fitrakis, mild-mannered reporter for the Columbus Free Press, fights a never-ending battle for truth, justice, and the American way!  |
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Victoria Parks
October 29, 2006, VictoriaParks.com
Victoria Parks Sings "Bye Bye Blackwell"
Excerpt: "Every movement needs its balladeers. The African American-led social justice movements of the 1950s and 60s would not have been as successful without "We Shall Overcome." In 2006, the movement to save democracy in Ohio has found its balladeer: Victoria Parks, whose "My Vote Don't Don't Matter Anymore" and "Bye Bye Blackwell" have become instant classics."
October 18, 2006, Daily Kos
By KStreetProjector
By KStreetProjector
Did Blackwell Purge Voter Rolls on October 1st?
Excerpt: "His claim was that a new Diebold voter registry system had been installed over the last year. During the last week of July and the first week of August, a "test run" was made of the system's ability to purge ineligable voters. The purge generated names and test letters sent out to 1.2 million Ohio addresses with a focus on Universities, Apartment addresses with high turnover." 
October 18, 2006, Daily Kos
By Steven D
By Steven D
Former Head of U.S. Elec. Asst. Comm. Says US Elections At Risk
Excerpt: "Brad Blog has a copy of a partial transcript of an interview by a "major broadcast network" of the former head of the U.S. Elections Assistance Commission appointed by Bush, Rev. DeForest Soaries. In that unaired interview, the Rev. Soaries says that, in the wake of HAVA (Help America Vote Act), the United States voting system is "ripe for stealing elections."" 
October 17, 2006, Daily Kos
By Histopresto
By Histopresto
Election Official Confidential: A Scoop From Ohio
Excerpt: "In case you haven't noticed, the average age of a Precinct Election Official is 75, which means that a whole lot of our local septuagenarians are getting their very first exposure to computers this year. Of the 40 people who showed up for training with me, only a handful were under 60." 
October 15, 2006, Voting Rights Revival Conference
Adopt-a-Board of Elections Project
Excerpt: "We need YOU to be a partner on your local Board of Elections to ensure free and fair elections this November! Citizens' Alliance for Secure Elections (CASE) is currently seeking volunteers to participate in our "Adopt a County Board of Elections" program. The program is designed to provide oversight and input into your local Board of Elections (BOE) decisions in the individual counties." 
October 10, 2006, Baltimore Chronicle
By Mark Crispin Miller
By Mark Crispin Miller
Our Rigged Election: The Elephant in the Polling Booth
Excerpt: "A few months later, the House report was bolstered by a thick volume of evidence compiled by the investigators who had helped the Democrats conduct their research in Ohio: Bob Fitrakis, Harvey Wasserman and Steve Rosenfeld. Their book "How the GOP Stole America's 2004 Election and Is Rigging 2008" reconfirms the House report with rich documentation, and evidences further fraud as well. Although the book went largely unreviewed, its findings proved unassailable." 
October 5, 2006, BradBlog
By John Gideon
By John Gideon
CNN's Lou Dobbs Covers "We Count 2006" Event in Cleveland
Excerpt: "Yesterday Lou reported on the "We Count 2006" gathering in Cleveland, Ohio which featured Bev Harris, Bob Fitrakis and many others. Also reported is that the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections has asked for oversight of the complete election process from the Center for Election Integrity at Cleveland State University." 
September 7, 2006, Blogcritics.org
By Roberta Ferguson
By Roberta Ferguson
Bill Peirce and Bob Fritakis: Getting A Fair Shot
Excerpt: "Some of you may not know these names, primarily because the mainstream media has decided not to include them in their stories when referring to gubernatorial candidates in Ohio. Bill Peirce (pronounced "purse") is the Libertarian candidate for Governor, and Bob Fitrakis is the Green party candidate. The Democrats and Republicans of the state would lead you to believe that there are only two choices for Governor." 
August 05, 2006, DailyKos.com
By PatGinSD
By PatGinSD
Save the 2004 Ohio Election Ballots!
Excerpt: "Please help save the 2004 Ohio Ballots! They are set to be destroyed within days, in September or as being threatened, before September. This will constitute destruction of evidence of the stolen election." 
July 22, 2006, OpEedNews.com
By Jeanne Norris Weinberg
By Jeanne Norris Weinberg
Awakened from an Unsound Sleep by the 2004 Election
Excerpt: "One average citizen's account of her unsettling experience video-taping on Election Day 2004, attending the public hearings afterward and then serving as an Official Witness for the Ohio Vote Recount." June 18, 2006, Daily Kos
By Steven D
By Steven D
Why I Woke Up to the Reality Of Stolen Elections
Excerpt: "What we have is a broken electoral process. No, more than just broken, our elections have been corrupted. They are a sham and a mockery, and its past time to be talking about that fact if we ever want to return a modicum sanity, honesty and common sense to our politics. Because at present we are at the mercy of a silent coup." 
June 16, 2006, Huffington Post
By Mark Crispin Miller
By Mark Crispin Miller
Some Might Call It Treason: An Open Letter to Salon
Excerpt: "I write because Manjoo's view has paralyzed the whole political establishment, the press included. If, as you say, you want to see the system fixed, you must admit that it needs fixing now. It is past time to take that step, for there is every indication that the Republicans are readier than ever to subvert the process once more on this next Election Day." 
June 13, 2006, Daily Kos
By theyrereal
By theyrereal
NYT op ed: Kerry "almost certainly would have won Ohio"
Excerpt: "In the 2004 presidential election, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) "almost certainly would have won Ohio if all of his votes had been counted, and if all of the eligible voters who tried to vote for him had been allowed to cast their ballots," writes columnist Bob Herbert for Monday's edition of The New York Times. Here are more snippets from the column, which I culled from this link at RawStory.com." June 10, 2006, Daily Kos
By Smintheus
By Smintheus
GAO report on Election 2004: Huge...yawn
Excerpt: "Smintheus explores the tepid efforts of the GAO in its final report on the 2004 election, and commenter Psyche asks a question worth considering . . . what has changed at the GAO since it published the comparatively hard-hitting report in September 2005?" Bradblog
May 3, 2006, The Bradblog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
Diebold Disaster: Company Gets An "F"
Excerpt: "The meltdown continues. Cuyahoga County Election Director (and former Diebold proponent), Michael Vu, described Diebold's performance yesterday as "unacceptable" after problems were revealed all across the county in the state's Primary Election." 
April 9, 2006, AndrewWarner.org
By Andrew Warner
By Andrew Warner
A Beautiful Day for Politicking at Findlay Market
Excerpt: "People are ready for a candidate like Bob Fitrakis. After years of corruption, his fraudbuster message is really sinking in with people. People are frustrated with the elections process and the way their votes aren't even getting counted with crooks like Blackwell in charge." 
April 7, 2006, Case Western Reserve U. Observer
By Doug Pepple (Letter to the Editor)
By Doug Pepple (Letter to the Editor)
Blackwell Wrong Candidate for Ohio Governor
Excerpt: "Kenneth Blackwell is the ultimate political chameleon, with a long history of changing his political stripes (and even his political party!) to suit his own self-advancement. To quote The Free Press columnist Bob Fitrakis, "[Blackwell has] metamorphed from a charter reform Democrat, into a Carter Democrat, then a New Democrat, then an Independent, then a moderate Republican, then a conservative Republican, and is now the state's leading reactionary right-wing Republican." If such a licentious candidate is willing to say anything and do anything to get into office, who's to say what he will do when he gets there?" 
J. Kennety Blackwell
April 6, 2006, FraudBusterBob.com
By Bob Fitrakis
By Bob Fitrakis
Blackwell's Letter from Franklin County Jail
Excerpt: "All along, J. Kenneth Blackwell has been engaging in criminal activity. He's responsible for the purging of over 300,000 voters in Ohio between the 2000 and 2004 election, telling voters they were registered on the wrong paper weight, not counting votes cast in the wrong precinct after he had the precincts switched, and stealing the election in Ohio." 
Friday, March 10, 2006, Online Journal
By Bev Connover
By Bev Connover
Let's Get Real About Our Rigged Voting System
Excerpt: "Writer after writer keeps talking about how we are just going to march into the polls come November and vote the monsters out. If only that were true. The system is rigged, folks. Just like oil and water, computers and voting don't mix. And that includes touch screens, optically-scanned ballots, even punch cards that are tabulated by computers. Worse, the voting equipment is in the hands of partisan private firms and they deny you the right to see the code, claiming it is proprietary information." 
Friday, March 10, 2006, The Brad Blog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
ES&S Improves in Ohio! E-Voting Machines Fail Only 10 Percent of the Time!
Excerpt: "Summit County, Ohio is testing the memory cards for their new ES&S optical scan machines. Unfortunately their first test revealed that 30% of those cards failed, and as replacements were brought in, the cards continued failing. Today, the Akron Beacon Journal reported that a new batch of cards was supplied by ES&S to Summit County for the tests. And they are failing less often! Now only 10% of the time!" Thursday, March 9, 2006, The Brad Blog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
E-Voting System Adds 100,000+ Votes in One Texas County During Tuesday's Primary
Excerpt: "Questions about possible problems were raised by election staff late Tuesday night, as it became apparent to some that the county would far exceed the 76,000 votes cast in the 2002 primary elections. But elections officials did not look into the discrepancies that night because they were dealing with a new system, new procedures and some new equipment, said Gayle Hamilton, Tarrant County's interim elections administrator. 'We didn't think there was a problem,' Hamilton said. 'We should have stopped right then. But we didn't question it at that time.'" 
Bob Fitrakis
Friday, March 3, 2006, Andrew Warner Blog
Democrats Agree with Fitrakis, but Will They Vote for Him?
Excerpt: "No one in the room seemed to know what to expect from Fitrakis. He seemed like a smiley, friendly guy with the fashion sense of someone who has spent their life in academia. He wore a sports jacket and khaki's to match a pair of Reebok's. When the time keeper held up her finger to indicate the time to perform his routine he dropped the smiles, harnessed the energy in the room, and spoke about the frustration that all progressive activists feel. He said the things these loyal Democrats wished their own candidates would say, and he said it with conviction. The crowd would applaud, say "amen" or yes" at each and every turn of his speech ..." Tuesday, February 28, 2006, DailyKos.com
By Nobby
By Nobby
What Happened to Me in Clay County, Florida, on Election Day, 2004
Excerpt: "I have no doubt whatsoever that fraud happened in that precinct in that county, and that the Supervisor of Elections was either willingly complicit in it or getting her arm twisted until she cooperated. That is my opinion, based on the evidence, and it is firm. It is not an accusation, because an accusation requires proof, and to get proof, an investigation of these events was needed. It never happened." Monday, February 27, 2006, Huffington Post
By Peter Soby, Jr.
By Peter Soby, Jr.
Whistleblower Charged With Three Felonies for Exposing Diebold's Crimes
Excerpt: "Let's help defend a whistleblower from Diebold and their attorneys! A whistleblower in Los Angeles is in legal trouble and needs our help. Stephen Heller is alleged to have exposed documents in Jan. & Feb. 2004 which provided smoking gun evidence that Diebold was using illegal, uncertified software in California voting machines. The docs also showed that Diebold's California attorneys (the powerful international law firm Jones Day) had told them they were in breach of the law for using uncertified software, but Diebold continued to use the uncertified software anyway." Thursday, February 23, 2006, DailyKos.com
By Bev Harris
By Bev Harris
Palm Beach 2004 Votes Time-Stamped Middle of the Night, Date-Stamped 2 Weeks Early
Excerpt: "The internal logs of at least 40 Sequoia touch-screen voting machines reveal that votes were time and date-stamped as cast two weeks before the election, sometimes in the middle of the night... Another disturbing find was several dozen voting machines with votes for the Nov. 2, 2004 election cast on dates like Oct. 16, 15, 19, 13, 25, 28 2004 and one tape dated in 2010. These machines did not contain any votes date-stamped on Nov. 2, 2004." 
"Remote-control"
voting?
voting?
Wednesday, February 22, 2006, The Brag Blog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
Why Do Diebold's Touch-Screen Voting Machines Have Built-In Wireless Infrared Data Transfer Ports?
Excerpt: "Perhaps some of you have additional thoughts on this matter. Like why such a port would be needed, or even present, on a touch-screen voting machine at all. And why the existence of such a port — to our knowledge — has hardly been discussed at all in conjuction with these machines. Especially in light of the now-infamous Leon County, FL "hack test" proving that executable code can be added to Diebold's memory cards resulting in a completely flipped election...as we've said...without a trace being left behind." Sunday, February 19, 2006, The Brad Bog
By John Gideon (of VoteTrustUSA)
By John Gideon (of VoteTrustUSA)
Daily Voting News: Top 5 Stories of the Week
Excerpt: "... on Friday afternoon just before a holiday weekend, the Secretary of State announced that he was going to conditionally certify two Diebold voting systems; the Accuvote OS and Accuvote TSx. This surprise certification was met with amazement from some in the activist community and with questioning comments from Sen. Bowen. Why was the announcement made late on a Friday afternoon? Why did the SoS see fit to send a letter to Diebold, the Independent Test Authorities, the National Association of Secretaries of State, and the National Association of State Elections Directors but not to the Election Assistance Commission?" Wednesday, February 15, 2006, Guerilla News Network
By Anthony Lappé
By Anthony Lappé
In His New Book, Mark Crispin Miller Argues Bush Stole the White House, Twice
Excerpt: "In all Ohio’s heavily populated areas – college towns as well as cities – the Bush machine, supervised by Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, cut the anti-Bush vote, first, by cutting back the Democratic registration rate, through a broad range of legal/bureaucratic tricks, and then by scaring countless voters off through statewide use of various disinformation and intimidation tactics. African-American voters, or would-be voters, were the major targets of such efforts, which included telling Democrats to cast their votes the day after Election Day (Nov. 3), giving out wrong addresses for many polling places, and warning folks that anyone with an outstanding parking ticket, or anyone owing child-support payments, or anyone who’d ever been in prison, or who had a relative who’d been in prison, would be arrested if they dared show up to vote. There were also people roaming through black neighborhoods, helpfully offering to hand-deliver people’s absentee ballots to the proper place." 
Saturday, February 11, 2006, DailyKos.com
By GrainofSand
By GrainofSand
Diebold on the Ropes: Let's Deliver a Knockout Punch
Excerpt: "Monday, February 13, a key motion in a class action securities fraud case is going to be filed against Diebold and some of its officers and directors in the Northern District of Ohio. The complaint alleges that defendants violated securities laws, causing artificial inflation of the Diebold's stock price. Also alleged are false and misleading statements about internal company problems, and over $2.7 million in insider trading proceeds." Friday, February 10, 2006, DailyKos.com
By aybayb
By aybayb
Democrats Push Bill That Would Bar Third Parties in Races for Congress
Excerpt: "Green Party leaders called on Congress to reject a House bill that combines public funding of congressional campaigns with a scheme to ban third party and independents from such races." February 10, 2006, The Brad Blog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
Constitutionality of All Electronic Voting Machines in New Jersey Now in Question!
Excerpt: "In a [February 9, 2006] press release, the Constitutional Litigation Clinic at Rutgers School of Law in Newark, NJ has announced that all electronic voting machines used in New Jersey may violate New Jersey's Constitution and election laws." 
Tuesday, February 7, 2006, The Brad Blog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
Diebold Capitulates in Alaska. . .Sorta
Excerpt: "Alaska admits that they "modem in results"? But didn't Diebold spokesman David Bear tell us that wasn't possible, just a few months ago? . . . More troubling, however, is the admission that the data may be "manipulated" in consultation with Diebold before it's released. Such a "manipulation of data" would seem to defeat the entire purpose of looking at the data files in the first place to help discover why Alaska's November 2004 election results reportedly show some cases of more than 200% voter turnout and other such anomalies." Monday, February 6, 2006, DailyKos.com
By Nordic
By Nordic
Revote In Ohio: More Votes Than Voters Recorded on Diebold Machines
Excerpt: "As reported in yesterday's Middletown Journal, a special "re-vote" will be held tomorrow in Montgomery county, OH on an issue where last November's election results were set aside due to more votes being cast on Diebold's AccuVote TSX touch-screen voting machines than there were actually registered voters who voted." 
Hear Bob Fitrakis
speak out on
election fraud
speak out on
election fraud
Monday, January 30, 2006, Democracy for Metro Detroit
Bob Fitrakis Audio Files from Ann Arbor Talk on the Web
Excerpt: "Listen online to the audio of Bob Fitrakis' January 8, 2006 talk in Ann Arbor: "Is Michigan Next? Election Fraud in Ohio and the Diebold Debacle." Carl Weiler, one of the Michigan Area Co-Ordinators for MoveOn.org, is also a producer for Community Media Network in southeastern Michigan. Carl recorded and edited the January 8 Ann Arbor event with Bob Fitrakis and has arranged for his video production to air as a 2-part series, each segment running 30 minutes, on Community Media Network TV." January 23, 2006, DailyKos.com
By beerm
By beerm
Great answer by Diebold
Excerpt: "In the end, some may believe that stories of vote manipulation in past elections may be conspiracy theories not worth pursuing. In test after test though it has been demonstrated that vote manipulation is easily possible. Continuing to believe that vote manipulation will not happen is wishful thinking, not reasoning." 
Tuesday, January 17, 2006, DemocraticTalkRadio.com
By Stephen Crockett
By Stephen Crockett
Senate and Citizens: Save Our Constitution
Excerpt: "Major newspapers and magazines should be doing serious investigative journalism on voting rights and voting machines. Why are Democrats in the United States Senate not holding public hearings on the voting machine issue? No issue is more important than voting and free, honest elections to American Democracy and freedom. . . Citizens must demand a return to a working Constitutional Democracy with a working "checks and balances system" that includes a real independent Supreme Court and a free, honest, open voting system of fair elections. We must demand all elected officeholders, especially members of the U.S. Senate, work tirelessly and vigorously to achieve these goals." 
January 15, 2006, MyLeftWing.com
By Renee in Ohio
By Renee in Ohio
George Bush and His "Spy Powers"
Excerpt: "There's an article in the current issue of the Columbus Free Press that I recommend checking out, and passing along if you agree that it raises some questions that are worth asking. I should point out that it was a Free Press article by Bob Fitrakis, Diebold, electronic voting, and the vast right-wing conspiracy that first made me aware of the real dangers that Diebold-style vote counting pose to the future of any sort of representative government in the United States. Occasionally I see Bob around campus at the local community college, and when I saw him a couple months ago I commented about how frustrating it is that we can't seem to get any traction on this issue. If you can't verify that your vote is counted correctly, what do any of the other political discussions we have matter? As he says in his most recent article: What part of the headline in the Columbus Dispatch: "Diebold vote machine can be hacked, test finds" don't people understand?" January 13, 2006, Bradblog
By Brad Friedman
By Brad Friedman
House Leadership Forcing Bob Ney Out of Chairmanship
Excerpt: "The powerful Ohio Congressman who, while gambling at a London casino on a lobbyist paid vacation, got "lucky" and won $34,000 on a $100 bet (just in time to pay off a $30,000 credit card debt) may be seeing his luck finally run out." 
