20 AMAZING FACTS ABOUT VOTING IN THE USA

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Michael

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Posted: Dec 10, 2004 - 08:45 AM
Post subject: 20 AMAZING FACTS ABOUT VOTING IN THE USA

20 AMAZING FACTS ABOUT VOTING IN THE USA
By Alicia
Nightweed.com

http://nightweed.com/usavotefacts.html
http://miamedia.com/votergate/20facts.html

Did you know....

1. 80% of all votes in America are counted by only two companies:
Diebold
and ES&S.

http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html
http://en.{WeeKeePeeDeeYa DOT org}/wiki/Diebold

2. There is no federal agency with regulatory authority or oversight of
the
U.S. voting machine industry.

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0916-04.htm
http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html

3. The vice-president of Diebold and the president of ES&S are
brothers.

http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/private_company.html
http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html

4. The chairman and CEO of Diebold is a major Bush campaign organizer
and
donor who wrote in 2003 that he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver
its
electoral votes to the president next year."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/28/sunday/main632436.shtml
http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=1647886

5. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel used to be chairman of ES&S. He
became
Senator based on votes counted by ES&S machines.

http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/columns/2004/03/03_200.html
http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/031004Fitrakis/031004fitrakis.htm l

6. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel, long-connected with the Bush family,
was
recently caught lying about his ownership of ES&S by the Senate Ethics
Committee.

http://www.blackboxvoting.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=2 6
http://www.hillnews.com/news/012903/hagel.aspx
http://www.onlisareinsradar.com/archives/000896.php

7. Senator Chuck Hagel was on a short list of George W. Bush's
vice-presidential candidates.

http://www.businessweek.com/2000/00_28/b3689130.htm
http://theindependent.com/stories/052700/new_hagel27.html

8. ES&S is the largest voting machine manufacturer in the U.S. and
counts
almost 60% of all U.S. votes.

http://www.essvote.com/HTML/about/about.html
http://www.onlinejournal.com/evoting/042804Landes/042804landes.html

9. Diebold's new touch screen voting machines have no paper trail of
any
votes. In other words, there is no way to verify that the data coming
out of
the machine is the same as what was legitimately put in by voters.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0225-05.htm
http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/041020evotestates/pfindex.html

10. Diebold also makes ATMs, checkout scanners, and ticket machines,
all of
which log each transaction and can generate a paper trail.

http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0225-05.htm
http://www.diebold.com/solutions/default.htm

11. Diebold is based in Ohio.
http://www.diebold.com/aboutus/ataglance/default.htm

12. Diebold employed 5 convicted felons as senior managers and
developers to
help write the central compiler computer code that counted 50% of the
votes
in 30 states.

http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,61640,00.html
http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/10/301469.shtml

13. Jeff Dean, Diebold's Senior Vice-President and senior programmer on
Diebold's central compiler code, was convicted of 23 counts of felony
theft
in the first degree.

http://www.chuckherrin.com/HackthevoteFAQ.htm#how
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/bbv_chapter-8.pdf

14. Diebold Senior Vice-President Jeff Dean was convicted of planting
back
doors in his software and using a "high degree of sophistication" to
evade
detection over a period of 2 years.

http://www.chuckherrin.com/HackthevoteFAQ.htm#how
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/bbv_chapter-8.pdf

15. None of the international election observers were allowed in the
polls
in Ohio.

http://www.globalexchange.org/update/press/2638.html
http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/10/26/loc_elexoh.html

16. California banned the use of Diebold machines because the security
was
so bad. Despite Diebold's claims that the audit logs could not be
hacked, a
chimpanzee was able to do it. (See the movie here:
<http://blackboxvoting.org/baxter/baxterVPR.mov>)

http://wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,63298,00.html
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4874190

17. 30% of all U.S. votes are carried out on unverifiable touch screen
voting machines with no paper trail.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/28/sunday/main632436.shtml

18. All - not some - but all the voting machine errors detected and
reported in Florida went in favor of Bush or Republican candidates.

http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,65757,00.html
http://www.yuricareport.com/ElectionAftermath04/ThreeResearchStudiesBu shIsOu
t.htm
http://www.rise4news.net/extravotes.html
http://www.ilcaonline.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=articl e&sid=
950
http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0411/S00227.htm

19. The governor of the state of Florida, Jeb Bush, is the President's
brother.

http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/news/local/7628725.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A10544-2004Oct29.html

20. Serious voting anomalies in Florida - again always favoring Bush -
have
been mathematically demonstrated and experts are recommending further
investigation.

http://www.yuricareport.com/ElectionAftermath04/ThreeResearchStudiesBu shIsOu
t.htm
http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/policy/story/ 0,1080
1,97614,00.html
http://www.americanfreepress.net/html/tens_of_thousands.html
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1106-30.htm
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2004/110904.html
http://uscountvotes.org/

fukuman

Wonder Wit

Joined: Sep 18, 2003
Posts: 3699

Status: Offline

Posted: Dec 12, 2004 - 10:10 AM

man, this gets to me. peeps here preach about the CCP, but everything i read about the US makes me cringe. u guys gotta sort it out. take up arms, do whatever

nanheyangrouchuan

Newbie

Joined: Dec 13, 2004
Posts: 4

Status: Offline

Posted: Dec 13, 2004 - 08:17 AM

The moderator is reallly trying to appeal to his Party masters, don't forget to hit your head on the table 9 times Micheal. W's time is done in 2008 and it is pretty much a given that the Republicans won't do well in that election. They don't have anyone who can ride the line between the religious nuts, the corporate sell-outs and liberal republicans.

nanheyangrouchuan

Newbie

Joined: Dec 13, 2004
Posts: 4

Status: Offline

Posted: Dec 13, 2004 - 08:19 AM

Have you ever wondered what other reasons that so many foreign companies come to your country to do business? It's not just the "potential" of the Chinese and Indian markets, that potential will take decades to realize. It's not just the low wages of your white collar workers or your numerous countrymen employed in sweatshops.
It is the lack of enforcement of environmental and labor laws.

Some of you have been to Europe, N. America and Australia. Ever wondered how we made our countries so clean? Why our workers use so much company-provided protective gear? It is because of tough labor and environmental laws that are actually enforced.

Only 35 years ago the US experienced the "Love Canal" event in Love Canal, NY. I won't go into details , search for it on Google.
Europe has had similar experiences. At that time there were few or no laws concerning environmental protection on either continent. In 2004 we have, collectively, the cleanest air and water on the planet.
These laws are very irritating to many famous corporations, coming to China and India not only represents access to alot of cheap labor, but the ability to "do business" without having to properly dispose of waste, efficiently use fuel or make safe, high quality products.

With regards to labor laws, in Europe and N. America, especially the US, factory workers, farmers and miners fought actual wars with guns against company security guards, the police, and even the Army to get such rights as:
1. being paid on time and in the full amount
2. not having large amounts of money deducted by the company for "expenses".
3. safety
4. being able to complain about management without being attacked by security guards.
5. death and injury benefits for workers and their families.
6. form independent unions to handle contract negotiations and protect workers' human and citizen rights.

Someday Chinese and Indian workers can enjoy these rights, but not until they stand up and fight for them. Blood will be shed, people will die, but if it wasn't for past generations in western countries making the same sacrifices we would be in the same boat.

It is time for all of you to make those foriegn companies fall into line. Stop putting up with this abuse. Opium sales in china forced the Boxer Rebellion, don't you think it is time to rise up against abuse, oppression and poisoning of your land, water and bodies by foreigners looking to exploit your under-developed legal and regulatory system?

Only you can make a difference.

An American friend of the developing world.

www.chinastudygroup.org
www.forum.blogchina.com
http://www.du.edu/gsis/china/conferences.html

By Jay Nordlinger

Losing the New China: A Story of American Commerce, Desire and Betrayal by Ethan Gutmann (Encounter, 253 pp., $25.95)
Every once in a while comes a book to stir your slumber, and this is one. It is about the New China, and just how new it is — how deccent or promising. Ethan Gutmann set out to work in Beijing full of enthusiasm. (This was in the late 1990s.) He was a believer in "the power of free enterprise to transform societies," and, besides, he had "the China bug." He was not a naÃ¯f, mind you. He disregarded the "China optimists," who "pointed to the incremental evolution of the ruling Communist Party as if this justified unrestrained engagement," and also the "exiled Chinese dissidents," who "held that the system was near collapse and needed a good, hard shove, not economic props." He would look for a third way. Ha.
To put it mildly, the sadder, wiser Gutmann is a China skeptic — and with many good reeasons.
Gutmann worked for a few years in Beijing, then did something extraordinarily useful: namely, this book. He has reported, clear-eyed, what he found in China, burning his bridges, spilling all the secrets. Secrets of whom? Mainly of the Americans who form sort of a permanent colony there. These Americans cooperate with the Chinese government to sustain the illusion of proper capitalism and progress. Gutmann is like some mammoth sociological, political whistleblower. And he blows it in irresistible style.
You can smell his Beijing. He is unvarnished about the Chinese, and unvarnished about the Americans. He offers a thousand insights, and a hundred character studies. The Chinese government — which lies as normal people breathe ââ€” helped stir the Chinese people into a hateful frenzy after the U.S. military's accidental bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. The next day, Gutmann's office mates (Chinese) demanded that his air conditioning be turned off. That is a tiny story to remember.
The author details how the Chinese government manipulates American politicians, American policymakers, and American businessmen, and how the Beijing Americans freely abet this manipulation. The Americans internalize the Party line, calling fah1on g0ng "a bunch of nuts," for example. Never mind the torture and murder. Gutmann's illustrations of American kowtowing are amazing. Our agents there mouth the mantra that "American business is the long-term catalyst for better human rights in China," and, despite what they know, they do this "with a straight face." They are also happy to do the Chinese government's work of blackballing peskily inquiring American journalists. The Washington Times's Bill Gertz, for instance, is not welcome in China, or in the American colony.
The chapter called "Visiting Day" is one of Gutmann's best. It describes the Potemkin tours given U.S. congressmen, CEOs, and others, all in a game of "fool the foreigner." So a Gov. Jesse Ventura is moved to say, "I know when I've come face to face with the future."
From time to time, the Chinese government will do something really, really gross, and the conscience of an expat may prick. But the Americans tend to find ways to overcome this. At one point, our author "started slipping, sometimes blurting out 'police state' in discussions of China," as if he had "expat Tourette's syndrome." But he learned to control his tongue. So too, every American "strays into the Other China at some point," separate from the Beijing prepared for foreign eyes. But Americans duly shove this Other China from their minds. Many permanent colonists seem to have banished a sense of right and wrong as an inconvenient luxury. They are contemptible.
As our businesses in China can be. They practice not so much capitalism as bribery and deception (especially self-deception). One wag came up with a hilarious description of such businesses: "American companies with Chinese characteristics." The roll of dishonor includes Cisco, Motorola, and Microsoft. And special shame belongs to Nortel (a Canadian firm), which presented an Internet surveillance mechanism "specifically designed 'to catch fah1on g0ng.'"
Possibly worse, North American business is unable to make much money in China! In Gutmann's experience, "few corporate leaders in Beijing would assert in private that China was a profitable market." But this truth could not leak out, and the "feel-good reports" kept issuing from the U.S. embassy. Companies stay in — when they stayy in — not because they are making money, but for complicated reasonss of their own.
No one wanting to believe the best of modern China should read this book. The New China is a place where you have to burn books, lest you be caught with them. It is a place where innocents vanish in the middle of the night (or day). Gutmann spills the beans spellbindingly, and even a chapter on sex — a key ingredient of the American way in Beijing ââ€” is as revealing as it is salacious.
Peter Hays Gries is no Ethan Gutmann. An assistant professor of political science at the University of Colorado, Boulder, he does not like criticism of China. Virtually any criticism is "bashing." And this bashing serves only to "demonize" China — which is "dangerous," because China reacts badly to criticism. "Daangerous" is one of Gries's favorite words; he would regard Gutmann's book as very dangerous indeed.
His own book, China's New Nationalism: Pride, Politics, and Diplomacy (University of California, 215 pp., $24.95), has much useful information in it. Chinese nationalism is a subject of momentous importance. But Gries is one of those specialists in moral equivalence, decrying "hardliners on both sides." Ah, yes, the hardliners-on-both-sides dodge. We know this trick from the Cold War, and from the ongoing Arab–Israeli conflict. In fact, Gries takes up that conflict, noting that "Palestinians depict Zionism as 'racism,' while Israelis label the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) as 'terrorist.'" Imagine that â€” the PLO as terrorist!
The patient reader will mine this thickly written and often silly book for worthwhile ore. Here is a nugget: When the computer program known as "Deep Blue" defeated chess champion Garry Kasparov, the cover of Beijing Youth Weekly blared, "Chinese Defeat Kasparov." Why? Because two members — two — of the six-man IBM team that dt designed Deep Blue happened to be Chinese-Americans — not even Chinesse, mind you, but Chinese-Americans. That is interesting.
But in Gries's book, questions arise and go unanswered. Many Chinese seem to spend their lives nursing historical grievances: over the opium wars, over the Japanese invasion, and over other horrors inflicted by foreigners. Do these people ever turn their thoughts to the millions whom the Communist party has murdered, tortured, and starved? Prof. Bernard Lewis has pointed out that Arabs vent their fury at the West — particularly the American government â€€” because they are denied the right to criticize their own (invariably corrupt and undemocratic, and often pernicious) governments. Might this same point apply to China? Three Chinese died in the Belgrade embassy bombing, and one Chinese died when a U.S. spy plane collided with a Chinese jet fighter. These four deaths loom enormously large in China's New Nationalism. According to The Black Book of Communism, 65 million were killed under Mao's rule.
And we have, commemorating that rule, a book of stunning power, Gang of One: Memoirs of a Red Guard, by Fan Shen (University of Nebraska, 294 pp., $24.95). Shen now teaches English at Rochester Community and Technical College in Minnesota. But long ago he was a preteen Red Guard in Beijing, the son of "revolutionary" parents. It was "agonizing" for him to write this book, in part because the book had the potential to make those parents "regret that they had ever given birth to me." Shen turned his back on his revolutionary heritage; in doing so, he performed a service for us all.
As a boy, Shen had a "Red heart," gleefully shouting "Long Live the Red Terror!" and ransacking the homes of "bourgeois" (who would then meet the ghastliest fates). Slowly, however, he lost that Red heart, as his fundamental goodness poked through. He went from the Big Courtyard in Beijing, to a country village, to an aircraft factory, to college, and finally, with a miraculous passport, to the United States. Along the way, he had many close calls, and encounters with many fascinating people. This book is full of death, and worse, as mass sadism took hold of an entire country (the world's biggest). But it is also full of humanity, and, at times, funny as hell. (You should listen to "Comrade Thus," so named because of his propensity to use the word "thus.") There is even, shockingly, a love story toward the end of the book. It is as shocking and beautiful as that in 1984.
Hypnotically rendered, Gang of One is a high literary achievement, documenting an even greater achievement, by which I mean the life of this awe-inspiring man, Fan Shen.