ELECTION FRAUD VS VOTER FRAUD

OK – now that the election is behind us and all of the ads have gone away and our guy got in, we can now talk about some of the rhetoric that plagued this campaign season. There is no doubt in my mind that much of what I heard regarding voter fraud was designed to keep people of color from voting as well as the elderly. Voter ID is a disgrace. How many 85 year olds still have their licenses? OK – too many! But so many others of that age let their licenses expire because they stopped driving. With no ID – no vote! In California that is not the case, the land of fruits and nuts, we have not gone nuts over voter ID. If you are registered you vote!

I have been voting for exactly 50 years. In that time I have never missed a vote. My philosophy is if you don’t vote you can’t complain. Over the years I complained a lot – about local politics, statewide elections and national elections. My guy didn’t always win. Even if he or she did win, I could still complain because I would do it better, whatever it was.

What I am complaining about now is the notion of voter fraud. I believe this became an issue to deflect form the real problem – election fraud. Creating dumb ideas like voter ID – that is a way to disenfranchise voters. Putting people at polling places that look like authority but have none and asking potential voters for information they don’t have and don’t need to have is election fraud – it is happening now. These pseudo figures of authority threaten the potential vote with arrest if they don’t comply. If the voter knew that if they did call the police the voter would be protected, they would ask this poll watcher to call them.

Early voting in some states make it easier for people to vote. However, biased governors in some states will not allow for extra hours to vote. They need the extra hours because of the demand. For many years I heard the cry of how we as Americans, do not exercise our right to vote – we stay home. Now that we want to vote we are often deprived of that obligation. There is an axiom that says poor people, people of color and old people are more in tune with the left than the right. So, by preventing these people I n those specific demographics from voting, the candidates on the right will create an advantage for themselves.

Poll watchers are a good thing. But they have no authority to approach any citizen. They can do what I did – call the registrar with a complaint. I got a call within an hour of my sending the e-mail regarding a poll worker that appeared to be unfamiliar with the alphabet and was causing a long line while voting booths were unoccupied. They told me that someone was on the way to correct the situation and reassign that poll worker. I am not a poll watcher – I am a citizen and I care.

We have seen the movie regarding the hanging chads in Florida. We have seen the butterfly ballot that had people voting for someone they would not go across the street for. That is election fraud – by design. Unfortunately, even the Supreme Court participated in election fraud.

The cry is that illegals or undocumented people could vote. Where and how? There are two lists at the polling place with the names of registered voters. The registrations are vetted at the registrar’s office before they get on the list and how many people are willing to go to jail for casting a phony ballot? It just doesn’t happen. The law in Florida states "A person who commits or attempts to commit any fraud in connection with voting, votes a fraudulent ballot, or votes more than once in an election can be convicted of a felony of the third degree and fined up to $5,000 and/or imprisoned for up to 5 years."

Even if all of the so called 11 million illegals voted, and they all voted for the same candidate, spread over 50 states, could they swing an election? I guess if they were ALL in Montana they could swing that state – but they are not all in one state and they probably would not all have the same preference. Once again, voter fraud is the deflection away from the larger issue and real issue – election fraud.

Even John McCain’s campaign manager said: “I think that all of this stuff that has transpired over the last two years is in search of a solution to a problem, voting fraud, that doesn’t really exist when you look deeply at the question. It’s part of the mythology now in the Republican Party that there’s widespread voter fraud across the country.”

But election fraud is not a myth. Google Kenneth Blackwell and see his history with Diebold voting machines, rulings on provisional ballots and more.

The purpose of this blog is to inform about difference between voter frauds, which hardly exists, and election fraud which could be rampant.

That is my take, you decide.