Election Issues

COLUMBUS, OH I arrived at the Free Press office with two six-packs of Newcastle and a flask full of good bourbon whiskey, prepared for whatever ill assignments may be levied in my direction. Dr. Bob was hurrying off to school, declining the beer, but they sent me to the Sullivant Gardens to cover the polling. Today is March 4th and, by all counts, the most important day of the campaign since Super Tuesday. Perhaps it is even more important, because for those of us who were paying attention, the results of Super Tuesday were a foregone conclusion, but today all the weirdness really manifested itself and the race for the presidency is in full swing. If Hillary Clinton can hang on to any of these critical states, Texas, Ohio, Vermont or Rhode Island, than she will almost certainly press on until the final stupidity and those of us hungry for Political Entertainment will get a brokered convention.

COLUMBUS, OHIO 11:00AM -- Free Press reporters returned on Tuesday to the site of long lines and hours-long voting delays in the 2004 election and found low voter turnout, short waits and no major voting problems as Ohio's 2008 primary voting began on March 4th.

There were no reports of voter challenges of likely Barack Obama voters by apparent Hillary Clinton supporters. Ohio's primary is open, meaning people can cross party lines to pick a presidential nominee in any party.

At a dozen African-American majority precincts on the east side of Columbus, no more than 12 percent of the voters already cast ballots by Election Day, according to surveys by reporters. Typically, the lines were short, with the longest taking 15 minutes to vote. Compared to 2004 and 2006, there appeared to be twice as many voting machines and voters also were able to vote on a paper ballot if requested.

Discussion of Barack Obama's presidential campaign has mainly focused on the candidate's undeniable rhetorical skills and the obvious follow-up question: What, if any, substance lies behind them? He can talk the talk, but what's the walk, or is there a walk at all?

Conservatives like to point to his National Journal rating as the most liberal member of the US Senate, and considering another of its members -- Vermont's Bernie Sanders -- is an avowed socialist, that would be liberal, indeed. But many of the most hard-core liberals see in Obama just another bought-and-paid-for politician whose ability to mesmerize potential foot soldiers behind what they believe will ultimately prove to be a corporate agenda only diverts their energy and actually hurts the cause. And then there's a third camp of critics, who see just a gifted man with a large ego, uttering attractive but empty platitudes to advance the cause of nothing but the glory that is Barack Obama.

CINCINNATI, OH Senator Barack Obama attended a round-table discussion today at the Museum Center, a dialogue on the future of retirement in America. Five females joined him, all between the ages of 50 and 60, the concerned guard of the Baby Boomers. Like many of that generation, they are concerned that rising costs and a deflating Social Security fund will rob them of the foundation they have paid into for so many years.

Obama, however, was not too concerned about Social Security, which was fine until 2042, according to Obama.

Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner commissioned a test of the electronic voting machines in Ohio and here are the results! This Penn State professor is not an election rights advocate, but he's a computer expert and his results will convince any voter that using computers in the voting process -- from pollbooks to voting machines to tabulating machines -- is a very bad idea. Watch the video below and distribute to everyone you know.

http://www.vocabvideo.com/tvstation_viewer.html see and click on (SOS 2-21-08 Everest).

You need the latest version of Adobe Flash Player Plug-in version 9.0.115: http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/index.cgi? P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash

Thanks to the videography of Voices of Cleveland Video Productions LLC.

Good news, America. My constant barrage of kidney stones have finally carved a path through my friendly filters, a direct route to my urethra. Now, instead of crippling pain seizing me every time some jagged little ball of calcium decides to make the trek, I barely feel anything at all... until it hits my pecker. A quick burst of agony when I pee and then it's over. Stifled screams of pain in public urinals are far preferable to hours of moaning, rolling around on the floor of the bar or coffee house barking like a dog, swinging blindly at ankles as passerby attempt to stomp me like a cockroach.

I passed a kidney stone in the pisser of the Renaissance Hotel in Columbus where John McCain held his first Columbus event today in the tiny Hayes ballroom. He arrived in Columbus this morning from Wisconsin in time for a 'media availability' this afternoon. I missed that availability as I was desperately trying to sleep after an all night ride on the...Straight Talk Express...

Patrick McDaniel, Associate Professor of Computer Science and Engineering of Penn State University gives a must-see presentation on the perils of computer voting. Prof. McDaniel led the academic team that exposed vulnerabilities of the computer voting systems in Ohio as part of Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner's Everest Project. The Free Press highly recommends his presentation for all election protection advocates and anyone who wants the facts about how a voting machine is easily hacked.

Details of the event are below:

Thursday, Feb. 21
Strosacker Auditorium
Case Western Reserve University
2125 Adelbert Rd.
Cleveland, Ohio 44106
5 - 7 p.m.
1-800-SOS-OHIO or by email at everest@sos.state.oh.us.

I’ll admit it. I’m attracted to the candidacy of Barack Obama. I’m attracted to his fundamental message of inclusion, hope, and progressive change. He’s built a campaign on cross-cultural and multi-generation grassroots movements and community building, and I believe Obama personifies what this nation desperately needs after eight years of George W. Bush: a radical change in direction.

This election will be about how WE THE PEOPLE bring change. And, for the first time in American history, we’re seeing the possibility of an election that is about something different than political dynasties and rich white men. We’re seeing the possibility of an election that would reestablish the Horatio Alger-inspired idea that any American can grow up to be president.

 Less than 30% of conservative activists at the Conservative Political Action Conference “strongly support” him

(Manassas, VA, February 9) Richard A. Viguerie, chairman of ConservativeHQ.com, today released the results of a true random poll of 1,000 conservative activists attending the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington, D.C. CPAC is the nation’s largest annual gathering of conservatives, and was chosen by former Gov. Mitt Romney as the place where he announced his withdrewal from the GOP presidential race on Thursday.

The first question asked of the 1,000 conservative activists was: “In your opinion, is Senator John McCain a true conservative?”

The results:

Yes                 197      (19.7%)
No                   595      (59.5%)
Undecided    208      (20.8%)

In their focus on the electoral horse-race, the media have ignored a key difference between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- the positions of their foreign policy advisors on the Iraq war. As political scientist Stephen Zunes points out in Foreign Policy in Focus, Clinton's key advisors overwhelmingly supported it, while Obama's opposed it. The differences in their positions on whether to go to war mirror those of the two candidates. They also give a sense of how Clinton and Obama are likely to deal with the immensely difficult foreign policy challenges they'll face if elected, including dealing with Iraq.

From Zunes's revised version of his article:

The president makes the decisions, but who advises the president? We know Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz, and Richard Perle insisted to Bush that American forces would be treated as liberators if we went into Iraq. McCain has surrounded himself with people likely to encourage him to follow a similar disastrous path if he becomes president. But what about Obama and Clinton?