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Bob Fitrakis at Santa Monica Teach-In on Election Fraud And Other Things

From LA City Beat http://tinyurl.com/etxhr

Enter the Fraudbuster          

 

[Elections] Enter the Fraudbuster

When John Kerry conceded Ohio to George W. Bush in 2004, the mainstream media shrugged off all the strange questions about the elections there and the GOP got away with its most rigged federal election since, well, Florida in 2000. But Bob Fitrakis and the writers at Columbus, Ohio’s decades-old lefty news organization, The Free Press, started digging. The end result was a blistering series of articles, precinct-by-precinct poll results, and hard evidence showing how Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, who was also running Bush’s state campaign, used dirty tricks to keep as many as 350,000 Democrats from casting legal, counted votes in that election.

Fitrakis published that work as a fat, 772-page tome titled Did George W. Bush Steal America’s 2004 Election? A whole bunch of it then turned into an equally blistering congressional report by Rep. John Conyers (D-Mi), and was then reprised by Christopher Hitchens in Vanity Fair and in a June Rolling Stone story by Robert Kennedy, Jr., who managed to move it back into the mainstream in crystal clear detail.

Now Fitrakis, who is a political science professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences department at Columbus State Community College, is the Green Party candidate for governor in Ohio – if only so he has standing to sue his opponent, Ken Blackwell, if there’s any funny business.

“Our main function in the campaign has been about transparency in the elections and our pledge is to make sure every vote is counted,” Fitrakis says from a campaign stop in Detroit. “I fully intend to sue Mr. Blackwell if he attempts to steal another election in Ohio.”

Fitrakis makes a campaign stop here in Los Angeles this Saturday, first at an elections forum and then at a fundraising dinner hosted by Gore Vidal. But Fitrakis is taking the fight higher. In October, he’s making a formal request for U.N. election watchers to monitor the Ohio contest.

(This event happened Sat 16th Sept.)Election Protection Forum “If They Could Steal Ohio They Could Steal California,” with Gore Vidal, Debra Bowen, Maxine Waters, Brad Friedman, Mimi Kennedy, and Bob Fitrakis, Immanuel Presbyterian Church, 3300 Wilshire Blvd. Sat., 3-5 p.m. $10 requested donation. Info at Socalgrassroots.org. “The State of Our Democracy,” dinner discussion with Vidal, Fitrakis, and Ian Masters, 3717 Mountainview, Mar Vista. Sat., 7-9:30 p.m. $50, RSVP essential. Call Pat at (310) 390-8141 or Sheri at (310) 397-6011.

–Dean Kuipers

Also Here is a video of Dr. Fitrakis during the ongoing challenge of the 2004 Election investigation.

Now that the Doctor is back we will have more for you, so stay tuned!

Moderator

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If The President Is Spying On Americans

http://tinyurl.com/roa55

Blackwell Faces Green Challenger in Ohio Governor Race

By Matthew Cardinale, News Editor and National Correspondent
Atlanta Progressive News (September 16, 2006)

(APN) ATLANTA – “People need somebody running who can keep Blackwell from stealing an election. Democrats can’t say ‘Quit stealing,'” Bob Fitrakis, 50, told Atlanta Progressive News.

Fitrakis has won the Green Party Nomination for Governor of Ohio and this November he will be facing Republican Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell and Democrat Ted Strickland.

“There’s a socialization process in the media that ‘By god, you don’t challenge the results of the election.’ Because the corporate media would fry them,” Fitrakis said.

Fitrakis is running for many reasons, but one of these is to “give me some [legal] standing,” in case of elections integrity issues in the 2006 Gubernatorial Election in Ohio.

Fitrakis is an amazing person. In addition to running for Governor of Ohio, he is a Professor of Political Science at the Columbus State Community College, the Editor of the Columbus Free Press Newspaper, and an attorney.

Fitrakis’s Republican opponent Blackwell is pretty amazing too.

While apparently treating Blacks not-so-well as Secretary of State during the 2004 Presidential Election in Ohio, Blackwell was also the Co-Chair of the Bush/Cheney Reelection Committee in Ohio. Read more

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Doctor Robert Fitrakis Speaks On His Candidacy For Ohio Governor With Harvey Wasserman

Here is a recording of a show (via www.freepress.org/podcasts) done July 1, 2006 just after Dr. Fitrakis’ candidacy for governor petitions were accepted.

Special Guest, Richard Hayes Phillips, tries to explain 359 consecutive ballots cast for Mr. Bush in the precinct by precinct inspection of ballots and other things in the Ohio (Mexican?) election.

If you had doubts about Ohio election improprieties, doubt no more.

The Editor

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How The GOP Stole America’s 2004 Election And Is Rigging 2008

From the blog Editor:

We will present some recorded audio from time to time when Dr. Fitrakis is busy doing other things to enlighten us here in Ohio and the rest of the planet!..

You can go to www.freepress.org/podcasts for more audio.

The first is Dr. Fitrakis  live on Community Forum speaking about his and Harvey Wasserman’s book How the GOP stole America’s 2004 election and is rigging 2008, and the second a very short clip on Tom NOE the coin dealer, who was just sentenced to 17 months in prison with still more charges pending.

Thanks,

The Editor

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J. Katrina Blackwell

J. Katrina Blackwell hates the anniversary of the worst natural disaster in U.S. history. When you want to run the Bush Bantustan of Ohio and you’re counting on peeling black voters from the Republican Party, there’s nothing more disturbing than to recall black faces floating down the streets of New Orleans and desperate African Americans trapped on roofs. Once Ohio’s African American voters are reminded that Blackwell is a front for the Bush crime family, and he’s never really called their policies into question in New Orleans, his black vote evaporates. 

So, when you think of the anniversary of the greatest domestic policy failure in our nation’s history, remember that a vote for Ken Blackwell is a vote for Bush and his racist Katrina policy. 

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Save the Ballots!

We have one week to save the ballots from the 2004 presidential election in Ohio. Although many Democrats remain in denial, because John Kerry told them to shut up, the ballots are evidence of one of the worst crimes in American history.

Whether it’s the absurd claim that the last 359 voters in a Delaware precinct all voted for Bush, or that 36 straight people spoiled their ballots and had to use replacement ballots in Clermont County, or that people only double-punched ballots in urban heavy-Kerry precincts – Karl Rove, Ken Blackwell and a few of their technician friends and theocratic robots stole Ohio blind. The proof is in the ballots. They must be saved.

D-day, destruction of the ballots day, by law is September 3, 2006. The law does not REQUIRE the destruction of the ballots, but merely allows them to be destroyed at the “discretion” of the county boards of elections. When I visited Miami County’s Board of Elections, I found election records there dated back to the 1970’s. But, I’m not sure the boards of elections will keep those from the controversial 2004 election.

So here’s my call to action:
Call Ohio boards of elections and demand they save the ballots from the 2004 presidential election – for investigative and historical purposes. Suggest they turn them over for archiving at colleges, libraries or the Ohio Historical Society. It is important to let election officials know Ohio’s voters want the ballots to be saved!

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Tremendous Void In Columbus’ Black Community With The Loss Of WVKO

It was great to be back live on “Front Street”, the public affairs radio talk show that used to be on WVKO 1580AM here in Columbus – back with my old pal Charles Traylor.

For ten years I was the only white talk show host on a black-owned and operated radio station, thanks to the late and legendary Bill Moss. First, I was on WSMZ starting in 1996 until 2002 when I moved to WVKO, a black gospel station.

The station, like the Free Press was committed to Old Testament righteousness. Speaking truth directly to the powerful. Sadly, it went off the air on May 5, 2006. Convenient for Ken Blackwell, since it was the station that broadcast live the hearings we held in Columbus to hear testimony from voters about the 2004 election debacle.

There’s a tremendous void in Columbus’ black community with the loss of WVKO, and there’s a greater need than ever for alternative voices. That’s why I’ll continue to blog, stream and podcast my thoughts throughout this election. We must break the corporate for-profit oligarchy that controls the infotainment business.

All power to the people!

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War, Strickland And Dems Like WHIGs, Blackwell Ran Out Of Room

In their first joint press conference, Ted Strickland and Ken Blackwell upheld the tradition of Ohio politics by not going into great detail on the great moral issues of the day. Of course, Strickland is infinitely preferable to the opportunistic Bush family sycophant, J. Katrina Blackwell.

One thing they could agree upon was excluding the Libertarian and Green Party gubernatorial candidates. Apparently, they were massively afraid that a real debate might perhaps break out and democracy might flourish. Indeed, there’s nothing more subversive than a marketplace of ideas. When asked by Bill Cohen, of Ohio Public Radio, what he thought about the two “minor” party candidates being left out of the event, Blackwell looked uncomfortable and mumbled, “Keep working,” and then ran. Literally ran out of the room. The video will be on the website soon.

I’ve thought long and hard about the bizarre nit-picking debate on the internet blogs over my exact words on how I would handle the Ohio National Guard situation. So let me be as frank as possible. If they would have let me in the debate, here’s what I would have said: I will do everything humanly possible to end the unjust and criminal war being illegally waged in Iraq. I will issue every order possible to block the deployment of the Ohio National Guard. I will give sanctuary to every soldier who seeks to disobey the illegal orders of the president of the United States. I will convene a committee of noted human rights scholars like Professor John Quigley at Ohio State to see whether the president should be tried as a war criminal.

Now my pragmatic friends, what’s Ted Strickland’s position on the war? Or, J. Kenneth Blackwell? The Democratic Party risks going the way of the Whigs, who refused to take a stand on the moral issue of its day – slavery. On basic principles of human rights, we cannot compromise on torture, illegal spying and criminal illegal wars. What defines us as Americans is not how much ass we can kiss with the powers that be, but that long tradition of direct dissent against the powers that be. Is my position clear enough?

Is my position clear enough?

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Full Transparency

So Diebold gets blasted on the front page of the Metro section of the Columbus Dispatch on Wednesday. Maybe the legendary blind men feeling up an elephant at the Big D’s editorial board are close to grasping the obvious: private, partisan, nontransparent e-voting machines with proprietary software are unreliable and undermine democracy.

The Diebold machines in Cuyahoga County, according to the recent Election Science Institute (ESI) study fail to perform in any acceptable way. ESI found that nearly 10% of Cuyahoga County’s voters’ ballots during the May 2 primary were “destroyed, blank, illegible, missing, taped together or otherwise compromised,” according to the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s coverage. 

Let’s see. Ten percent in Cleveland, the state’s key Democratic stronghold, another ten percent here, ten percent there. Pretty soon Blackwell’s 27% support among voters becomes a majority after he and his buddies at Diebold systematically disenfranchise urban voters. 

Of the course the idea for these machines not only came from Blackwell, but the epically corrupt Congressman Bob Ney, who brought us the HAVA bill and the rigged e-voting machines after the Bush boys stole Florida with punch cards in the 2000 election. 

My demand as a gubernatorial candidate is to hold the November vote on the only technology that is transparent: pencil and paper. Let us raise the demand and the slogan: No Voting Machines in November! Hand Counted Paper Ballots Only. 

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Pragmatism Is Another Word For Cowardice

In the middle of an illegal war in Iraq, which has branded him a war criminal in the eyes of the vast majority of people on earth, George W. Bush has made another attempt to turn America into an authoritarian nation. The Republican Congress wants to give the Fuhrer Bush control of the state National Guard forces. But luckily, as James Madison intended in that famous phrase “Ambition must be made to check ambition,” the governors have stood up as one for the principles of federalism.

At last weeks National Governor’ Association, the governors reminded Bush that “This provision was drafted without consultation or input from governors and represents an unprecedented shift in authority from governors as commander and chief of the guard, to the federal government.”

Help me stand up to George W. Bush. As governor of Ohio I will issue an executive order as commander in chief of the Ohio National Guard to prohibit the further deployment of Ohioans to Iraq. I’ve been criticized on the web by so-called pragmatic Democrats. A better word for them is unprincipled. The Democratic Party, John Kerry and Hillary Clinton are equally responsible for the illegal war and the deaths of 100,000 citizens in Iraq. If Democrats would be more principled, and less pragmatic, 100,000 innocent Iraqis would be alive and the United States would not be hated throughout the Middle East.

Pragmatism is another word for cowardice.

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