Obama leads Clinton by far on the issue of ELECTION Reform--Does this matter to you?

[FrenchieCat]

Every Four years, for the last Eight Years, we here at DU cry about election reform and the need for it. We usually do it after the fact, and once it is too late.

I believe that with Barack Obama as President, we will get meaningful Election reforms passed through the Congress, and it is my opinion that this issue is just if not more important than the rest of the issues being offered during this election.

Barack as a Constitutional Law Expert and an advocate for Civil Rights is the leader that will get this done for us.

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OBAMA'S US SENATE RECORD:

S.1975 : A bill to prohibit deceptive practices in Federal elections.

Sponsor: Sen Obama, Barack (introduced 11/8/2005) Cosponsors (4)
Committees: Senate Rules and Administration
Latest Major Action: 11/8/2005 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.

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S.4102 : A bill to amend the Communications Act of 1934 to prohibit the use of telecommunications devices for the purposes of preventing or obstructing the broadcast or exchange of election-related information.

Sponsor: Sen Obama, Barack (introduced 12/7/2006) Cosponsors (None) Committees: Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Latest Major Action: 12/7/2006 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.
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S.4069 : A bill to prohibit deceptive practices in Federal elections.

Sponsor: Sen Obama, Barack (introduced 11/16/2006) Cosponsors (4)
Committees: Senate Rules and Administration
Latest Major Action: 11/16/2006 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.
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Obama's Rewards

13,000 a year, plus $2,000 for a car--a beat-up blue Honda Civic, which Obama drove for the next three years organizing more than twenty congregations to change their neighborhoods.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070416/moberg

Obama's organizing history may give few clues about what policies he would pursue as President, but Obama the presidential candidate still shows his roots--a faith in ordinary citizens, a quest for common ground and a pragmatic inclination toward defining issues in winnable ways.

Even when Obama was an organizer, Augustine-Herron told him he would be the nation's first black President. Now the Rev. Alvin Love, whom Obama recruited to DCP, looks at his candidacy and says, "Everything I see reflects that community organizing experience. I see the consensus-building, his connection to people and listening to their needs and trying to find common ground. I think at his heart Barack is a community organizer. I think what he's doing now is that. It's just a larger community to be organized."
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070416/moberg

What Obama has done in the past, not including what he has done thus far during the primaries; bringing new voters into the frey.


Vote of Confidence
A huge black turnout in November 1992 altered Chicago's electoral landscape—and raised a new political star: a 31-year-old lawyer named Barack Obama.

In the final, climactic buildup to November's general election, with George Bush gaining ground on Bill Clinton in Illinois and the once-unstoppable campaign of senatorial candidate Carol Moseley Braun embroiled in allegations about her mother's Medicare liability, one of the most important local stories managed to go virtually unreported: The number of new voter registrations before the election hit an all-time high. And the majority of those new voters were black. More than 150,000 new African-American voters were added to the city's rolls. In fact, for the first time in Chicago's history-including the heyday of Harold Washington-voter registrations in the 19 predominantly black wards outnumbered those in the city's 19 predominantly white ethnic wards, 676,000 to 526,000.

None of this, of course, was accidental. The most effective minority voter registration drive in memory was the result of careful handiwork by Project Vote!, the local chapter of a not-for-profit national organization.

"It was the most efficient campaign I have seen in my 20 years in politics," says Sam Burrell, alderman of the West Side's 29th Ward and a veteran of many registration drives.

At the head of this effort was a little-known 31-year-old African-American lawyer, community organizer, and writer: Barack Obama.

To understand the full implications of Obama's effort, you first need to understand how voter registration often has worked in Chicago. The Regular Democratic Party spearheaded most drives, doing so using one primary motivator: money. The party would offer bounties to registrars for every new voter they signed up (typically a dollar per registration).

The campaigns did produce new voters. "But bounty systems don't really promote participation," says David Orr, the Cook County clerk, whose office is responsible for voter registration efforts in the Cook County suburbs. "When the money dries up, the voters drop out." Nor did the Democratic Party always vigorously push registration among minorities, Orr says. "It's not that they discouraged it. They just never worked hard to ensure it would happen."
http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/January-1993/Vote-of-Confidence

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Project Vote is the voter-mobilization arm of ACORN. It is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose professed purpose is to carry out "non-partisan" voter registration drives; to counsel voters on their rights; and to litigate on behalf of voting rights -- focusing on the rights of the poor and the "disenfranchised."

Project Vote’s major program areas include the following:

Voter Participation Program: “, Project Vote has helped more than 4 million Americans in low-income and minority neighborhoods register to vote, including 1.1 million in 2003-04. In the same period, Project Vote reached more than 2.3 million low-income and minority voters to educate them about the importance of voting. Our methodology is based on face-to-face contact between voters and trusted community messengers, generally a representative of a local community organization.”

Election Administration Program: “ encompasses every aspect of election implementation, from voter registration application design to voting booth placement to vote counting and everything in between. Working in neighborhoods nationwide, Project Vote documents voting problems and works closely with elections officials, secretaries of state, and state legislators to enact proactive, pragmatic solutions. A central component of our work is the inclusion of low-income and minority voters through the involvement of our community partners.”

NVRA Implementation Project: “ partnership between Project Vote, ACORN and Demos aims to improve voter registration services at public assistance agencies. Section 7 of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 requires states to offer voter registration to public assistance clients upon application, recertification or renewal, and change of addresses. The Project ... offers technical assistance.” The National Voting Rights Institute and the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law have recently become co-administrators of this initiative.

The stated purpose of Project Vote is to work within the system, using conventional voter mobilization drives and litigation to secure the rights of minority and low-income voters under the U.S. Constitution. However, the organization's actions indicate that its true agenda is to overwhelm, paralyze, and discredit the voting system through fraud, protests, propaganda and vexatious litigation. In this respect, Project Vote is following the so-called "crisis strategy" or Cloward-Piven Strategy pioneered during the Sixties by Columbia University political scientists Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven.
http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/groupProfile.asp?grpid=6966

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, or ACORN, is the nation's oldest and largest grassroots organization of low and moderate income people with over 200,000 members in over 90 cities. For 35 years, ACORN members have been organizing in their neighborhoods across the country around local issues such as affordable housing, safety, education, improved city services, and have taken the lead nationally on issues of affordable housing, tenant organizing, fighting banking and insurance discrimination, organizing workfare workers, and winning jobs and living wages.

Over the last decade, ACORN chapters have been involved in over fifteen living wage campaigns in our own cities, leading coalitions that have won living wage or minimum wage ordinances in St. Louis, St. Paul, Minneapolis, Boston, Oakland, Denver, Chicago, Cook County, New Orleans, Detroit, New York City, Long Island, Sacramento and San Francisco.

In addition, we have led coalitions to win statewide minimum wage increases in five states - including the huge 71% ballot victory in Florida in November 2004 - which delivered a raise to an estimated 850,000 workers. ACORN is following up that exciting victory by promoting a National Campaign to Raise the Minimum Wage through states and cities. This campaign includes cutting edge efforts to win citywide minimum wage increases - as well as ambitious statewide minimum wage ballot initiatives in the battleground states of OH, MO, AZ and CO for November 2006.

In 1998, ACORN established the Living Wage Resource Center to track the living wage movement and provide materials and strategies to living wage organizers all over the country.
http://www.livingwagecampaign.org /

THINGS WE THOUGHT NEVER COULD, CAN CHANGE!
....AND ELECTION REFORM IS ONLY ONE OF THEM!


WE CAN DO THIS IF WE WANT TO!

[caledesi]

1. Fired up! Ready to go! nt

[FrenchieCat]

2. In addition.......

in the book he's extremely modest about his role and accomplishments, much as he was as an organizer when he refused fellow organizers' suggestions that he embellish the group's achievements. "There was no campaign without Barack," Kellman says. "He was there to get people to organize when they wouldn't organize at all." Hazel Johnson, a longtime Altgeld Gardens environmental activist, says, "Yeah, he's a good organizer. I've got to give it to him."

But Obama grew restless and eventually went to Harvard Law School. "He said you can only go so far in organizing. You help people get some solutions, but it's never as big as wiping away problems," says Michael Evans, a DCP organizer after Obama left. "It wasn't end-all. He wanted to be part of the end-all, to get things done."
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070416/moberg

[FrenchieCat]

3. Election Reform Activists for Obama

operates as an information provider regarding security issues inherent to current election systems. We object to the lack of oversight the current administration has exhibited towards election security. We advocate the mandated usage of lawful paper ballots in conjunction with transparent open source vote counting systems. We support Senator Obama in his fight to protect the voting rights of the citizens of the United States
http://my.barackobama.com/page/group/ElectionReformActivistsforObama

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Obama Introduces Resolution Opposing Photo ID Requirement for Voting
Tuesday, September 20, 2005
Printable FormatFOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Washington Contact: Robert Gibbs or Tommy Vietor, [phone]
Illinois Contact: Julian Green, [phone]
Date: September 20, 2005

Obama Introduces Resolution Opposing Photo ID Requirement for Voting

WASHINGTON - U.S. Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) today, along with Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) and Congressman John Lewis (D-GA), introduced a resolution opposing a recommendation released yesterday by the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform that would require all Americans to show photo identification before voting.

Obama commended many of the Commission's recommendations, such as voter-verified paper trails.

However, he strongly objected to the Commission's recommendation for a national voter photo identification requirement, noting the Commission's own acknowledgment that there is "no evidence of extensive fraud in U.S. elections or of multiple voting."

"Yesterday, the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform released its recommendations for improving the electoral process," said Obama. "While many of these are good ideas worthy of consideration, its report also recommends the implementation of a national voter identification requirement - a requirement so incredibly restrictive that you couldn't even prove your identity with a U.S. military photo ID card. This is a mistake, and you only have to look to the state of Georgia to see why."

"Georgia's new photo ID requirement is a poll tax for the 21st century. It's a law that requires some of the poorest among us - those who probably don't have access to transportation - to possibly travel great distances and pay up to $35 just to exercise their right to be heard."

.....In the last election, many Americans stood for hours and hours just to exercise their Constitutional right to vote," said Obama. "We should be making this easier, not more difficult. And we should be figuring it out how to make it easier for all Americans - not just those with a car, or the extra cash to pay for voter ID card."

Obama also suggested that the strong endorsement of this resolution in the Senate reflects a conviction that the mere fear of voter fraud does not justify making it harder for eligible citizens to exercise their right to vote.

http://obama.senate.gov/press/050920-obama_introdu/

[FrenchieCat]

4. Clinton Bots don't care about Election reform issues......

Which is why we will lose in November if Clinton is the nominee.

[TexasObserver]

5. K&R. Yes it matters to me. Hillary doesn't want election reform.

By their methods you shall know them.

[FrenchieCat]

6. Amen!

[TexasObserver]

9. In California, the Clinton stronghold of LA disappeared 100,000 ballots

In New Mexico, they literally stole ballot boxes, and assumedly stuffed them all night.

In Louisiana, they made sure that many blacks were disenfranchised by being removed from the voting rolls.

Do we want Bush Lite in the White House? Hell no.

[FrenchieCat]

10. Yes.......Obama really does believe strongly in Integrity in our elections.....

which is why I say a prayer every day to make him President.

[TexasObserver]

11. I thank Thor, too.

[Zodiak]

7. Transparency in government is one of Obama's strong assets

Unfortunately, the DLC wing of the Democratic party likes their smoke-filled rooms and will fight him tooth and nail over these issues.

I really hope Obama wins and a tornado of contempt sweeps the DLC out of Washington.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

8. She loaned herself $5 million.

Of course he leads.

[sandnsea]

12. We need someone committed to change

with the proven track record of implementing change.

[FrenchieCat]

17. Yeah-Uh!

[WHAT]

13. kick

goal

:P

[Peace Patriot]

14. The only thing that I wholeheartedly agree with, in this thread, re: Obama and

election reform, is that, yes, I think election reform will be made more feasible with Obama in the White House. He has clearly taken positions--and actions--that would make it difficult for him not to support the one reform that is not covered by other existing laws, such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965, and that addresses the most lethal problem in the election system: electronic voting machines, run on 'trade secret,' proprietary programming code, owned and controlled by rightwing Bushite corporations, which has made vote counting all over the country easily riggable, invisibly, on a massive scale, with both forms of it--the paperless touchcreens and the supposed reform model, the opticans with paper ballots (the latter is only just slightly less riggable than the first, without strong audit/recount controls--and there are none of those anywhere in the country).

I've said this about Hillary vs. any Republican: She, in fact, voted against the horrible "Help America Vote Act" that started all this with a $3.9 billion e-voting boondoggle (Oct '02--same month as the Iraq War Resolution). I don't for a minute think that she voted against it for good reasons. But it puts her on record, and her need to maintain a progressive facade could be used to at least keep a Clinton administration from stopping our efforts to reform this key lethal aspect of the election system.

Obama seems more genuinely progressive and committed to change, and has personally worked to help enfranchise the disenfranchised. So it would be near impossible for him to appear obstructive about this reform--that is, full audits and transparency, and kicking private corporations and their culture of secrecy out of our election system entirely. That's what's needed. Obama could not easily oppose it. But, let me tell you, there is hardly a politician in this country who is not more beholden to these election theft corporations than to the voters. Hardly a member of Congress, for instance, can prove that he or she was actually elected. The system is egregiously non-transparent and extremely riggable--especially by corporate insiders.

So, what these corporations are doing--Diebold, ES&S and Sequoia--is (s)electing office holders who protect their interests--both their billion dollar contracts, and their power to easily rig our elections. Don't count any of them out of this corruption or fear--not Obama, not anybody. These are extremely powerful corporations, with direct lines to the Bush Junta and the global corporate predators who rule over us.

Election reform cannot be accomplished at the federal level--not in current circumstances, and not for the foreseeable future. The whole thing is much too corrupt--and, for instance, involves the war (and how to shove an unjust corporate oil war down the throats of the American people). But it can be accomplished at the local/state level, where all election reform energies should focused, and where this burgeoning movement has been the most successful. And the question is, how far will the Feds go to try to stop this local/state grass roots movement. That's where a Democrat in the White House--who cannot afford to be perceived as against such reforms--will come in handy.

Obama has not been clear on corporate control of, and rigging of, elections. This system is egregiously bad--not just a little bad, but totally and obviously bad. In fact, it's simply mind-boggling that our Democratic leadership has gone along with it, and did not burn down Washington DC to get it changed. They should be shouting it from the rooftops. And they have been....DEAD SILENT.

Another thing that worries me about Obama is his working with Christopher Dodd on one of these minor tinkerings with the system (mentioned above). Dodd is the snake-in-the-grass who engineered HAVA, with his compadres, the biggest crooks in the Anthrax Congress, Tom Delay and Bob Ney. The bill that totally fucked over our election system. I know that Senators--especially junior senators--are forced to work with jerks, and also, that it's difficult to get anything done in a Diebold-rigged Congress. So this is not necessarily a negative for Obama. (And he had not part in HAVA--he wasn't a Senator then.) But it does raise a bit of a red flag to me. To what extent is Obama aware of the fascist/corporate coup that took place in Oct 2002--with HAVA--and to what extent is his silence about it agreement, or fear, or, possibly, smarts (biding his time)?

I find it interesting that he's done so well in the caucus states, where the votes are not tallied by Diebold, ES&S or Sequoia. (Last time I looked, he'd won 11 of 12 caucuses, and only 9 of 21 primaries--which are tallied by the 'trade secret' code.) On the other hand, he's won in states like South Carolina, with the most riggable system in the country (all ES&S, all touchscreen, no paper trail, no audit or recount even possible).

So, on that basis, I don't think we have a clear indication of what the fascist plan is, or who they want our candidate to be. I suspect that it's Hillary. I'm not sure. And it may be that both of them are bought and paid for, and all this is just kabuki theater. Who knows, these days? It's difficult to penetrate the thick clouds of corporate media delusion. Obama's biggest plus for me is that Sen. Ted Kennedy endorsed him. Kennedy's been through the fire, and knows what's what. I think he really does have our country's best interests at heart--unlike most in Washington DC. He's my touchstone on a lot of matters. (But even he has been silent about the rigged machines!)

All I'm saying here is, don't mistake campaign rhetoric for reality. Obama is not going to reform our election system--at least as to its most lethal feature: its non-transparency. That's up to you and me. But his activation of so many young people, and so many ordinary citizens from that amazing 70% anti-war majority in the country--will help get it done. That's for sure. Whoever the candidate may be, it's clear who his supporters are, and what they want. And that is good news.

[troubleinwinter]

15. "Every Four years... we here at DU cry about election reform..." WTF?! Hahahah!

Actually, some DUers "cry about" and study and discuss and analise and WORK toward election reform EVERY SINGLE DAY. Not "every four years", EVERY DAY! Volunteer DUers post a collection listing of current news items related to election issues EVERY SINGLE DAY!

We discuss such things as disenfranchisement, caging, paper ballots, hand counting, optical scanning, touch-screen machines, voter ID, ballot design, voter registration, local, state and federal legislation, election officials, and tons more.

Do join in! Election Reform Forum: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topics&forum=203

[FrenchieCat]

16. I'm not talking about those who actual take it seriously........

as much as those who don't want to support a candidate who does as well.