Obama achieves historic U.S. presidential victory

[Lune]

To be fair, it does sound kind of like imposing or dictating when it comes to requiring middle and high school kids to do community service, especially when the common perception is that only those delinquents who have done something wrong do community service, although there are volunteers who indeed do it of their own accord.

Still, perhaps they should have make an exception for kids already involved in some school activity such as student government or school sports/intramurals or other activities like high school JROTC or Civil Air Patrol. 

I think his reasoning behind this is more to get intercity kids off the streets and back to school and off drugs and prevent them from getting involved in gangs and other ills of society at that age.

You do know that in Ontario high school students are required to have 40 hours of community service before they can graduate, right?

 

[CougarKing]

You do know that in Ontario high school students are required to have 40 hours of community service before they can graduate, right?

No I didn't. I live in BC, though I attended part of my high school years in California, where you also have to do 40 hours as well, IIRC.

 

[rw4th]

I think the selection of Palin as VP was a major cause of the Republican loss. The “base” she supposedly appealed to would vote Republican no matter what so I think that argument falls flat. She costs the Republicans the election by ostracizing the growing number of moderate voters who value both Conservative fiscal policies and Liberal social policies. In my opinion this group examined her far right conservative social and religious beliefs and decided not to vote Republican knowing that there was a very good chance she could be the one in charge at some point. This is what I am convinced was responsible for swinging several traditionally red states towards a narrow Democrat victory.

 

[GAP]

Palin energized the Republican ticket, all this finger pointing isn't going to change the fact that Obama ran a better campaign, especially when McCain had to overcome G W Bush.....

 

[Edward Campbell]

I think the selection of Palin as VP was a major cause of the Republican loss. The “base” she supposedly appealed to would vote Republican no matter what so I think that argument falls flat. She costs the Republicans the election by ostracizing the growing number of moderate voters who value both Conservative fiscal policies and Liberal social policies. In my opinion this group examined her far right conservative social and religious beliefs and decided not to vote Republican knowing that there was a very good chance she could be the one in charge at some point. This is what I am convinced was responsible for swinging several traditionally red states towards a narrow Democrat victory.

David Jones agrees with you in this opinion piece reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions (§29) of the Copyright Act from today’s Ottawa Citizen:

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/opinion/story.html?id=216fc310-5a41-4246-8c99-a9d3a0c771d4

Lessons for Republicans

David Jones, Citizen Special

Published: Friday, November 07, 2008

This was always the Democrats' year to win -- and they did.

To be fair, if Democrats had lost, they wouldn't qualify as a political party. They had a scare in September when the McCain-Palin personal legends provided a domestic Surge, but the Democrats opened their coffers and kept their cool while the media (and the economy) hammered the Republicans.

Frankly, with the history of two-term rotation, the most unpopular incumbent in living memory, a grinding and unnecessary Iraq war, and the worst economic crisis in two generations, not even a "Second Coming" endorsement could have saved the Republicans. (God would have been denounced for interfering in temporal affairs.)

That said, and appreciated, there are still lessons to be drawn for the Republicans.

First, Republicans are to blame. Get used to it. With partisan Democrats controlling the executive branch and Congress, Republicans are the goats to be scaped. For the indefinite future -- and certainly as long as Democrats can play the game -- every economic, political, social, environmental problem will be the fault of the (supply your expletive) Republicans. The Democrats ran against Hoover for more than 20 years; they will do the same to "Dubya."

It is possible that the current economic recession will persist, despite the wide array of financial tools being employed domestically and internationally and the brilliance of the tool handlers. But they thought they were so smart in 1929 -- and the Depression didn't really end until the Second World War. So as long as it continues, the Republicans will be blamed.

And, if the recession is relatively short and shallow, the Democrats will claim credit for "turning things around." And the spin will seek to prevent Republicans from regaining power to screw things up again.

The history books may share the blame more equitably; but history is a long time coming and Republicans can't count on it. So:

- No more old war heroes.

Three times in the past 20 years, the Republicans have run old war heroes. They all lost. To be sure Bush 41 (the youngest U.S. naval aviator in the Second World War) won Ronald Reagan's third term, but running on his own in 1992, he was defeated after orchestrating the expulsion of Iraqi forces from Kuwait. Then Robert Dole, a Second World War veteran handicapped by combat wounds, was defeated in 1996. And most recently, John McCain, whose personal heroism in a Vietnamese PoW camp and commitment to America are compelling, was beaten.

Americans respect their military and their veterans -- but these old men made them uncomfortable in an era where foreign challenge is ambiguous. The Democrats have learned this lesson; they haven't run a winning warrior since JFK.

- Recruit more women and minorities.

It was embarrassing to see the 2008 array of Republican presidential candidates: an assortment of white-bread males with nary a female (not even of the token Libby Dole type) to be seen. There were attractive and personable female senators (Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine; Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas) and governors (Linda Lingle of Hawaii and Jodi Rell of Connecticut). The invisibility of visible minorities could be alleviated by Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.

None of these are likely to crack the Democrats' strangle-hold on African- or Hispanic-Americans; however, they will demonstrate that minority and female Republicans are not incipient suicides.

- But Sarah Palin is not the answer.

Unfortunately for Republicans, Ms. Palin leads back into the Goldwater ghetto of small tent, angry conservatives. It is possible Republicans will conclude that Mr. Obama is unbeatable in 2012 and run Ms. Palin as a "forlorn hope" if only to pound it home to axiomatic fundamentalists that Republicans must move beyond guns and God if they wish to govern again. Or wait 20 years for the Democrats to comprehensively foul their nests.

- And clean up their act.

Republicans controlled Congress for more than a decade before 2006. Unfortunately, the increasing impression was that they had both feet in the trough with trousers unzipped. Senator Ted Stevens, recently convicted of ethics violations, was just the last plank in a bridge to oblivion. Even appreciating the reality of "gotcha" journalism and that politicians are human, Republicans badly need a clean-as-a-hound's-tooth image.

Still there is comfort that in a democracy, the day of victory is the first on the path to defeat. And the day of defeat is the first on the road to victory.

David Jones, co-author of Uneasy Neighbo(u)rs: Canada, the USA and the Dynamics of State, Industry and Culture, is a former U.S. diplomat who served in Ottawa. He now lives in Arlington, Virginia.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2008​

While I agree that the Republican base was not gong to vote Democrat it was, I believe quite prepared to sit on its hands and let McCain lose big time because he is, most surely, not ‘one of them.’ Palin energized them and brought them and their money into the campaign. I think she deserves some credit for keeping the popular vote margin as low as it was.

 

[Old Sweat]

Edward,

I think you are correct here. There had been a litany of calls during the primary season for Republicans to sit this one out. Some went so far as to claim that a financial catastrophe was nigh and the best approach was to let the Democrats wear it. Many still turned out to vote for the GOP ticket, and perhaps Governor Palin's presence saved the day for the Senate split.

 

[muskrat89]

Maybe it's because I'm in Goldwater country but again, my conversations indicate that most people I talk to are dissatisfied because the Republicans have lost their conservative ways. God and guns? I dunno. But seriously, I am talking about my specific, varied circle of acquaintances in my life:relatives, friends, co-workers, customers, vendors, etc. I would say 75% or more say the same types of things. They were very uncomfortable with McCain, until Palin was chosen; they yearn for a Reagan-esque return to values. These are not Limbaugh-zombie Bible-thumpers, these are "regular people"...

Anyway, lest some of you think I am drunk on the Palin Kool-Aid, I did enjoy Krauthammer's take on it:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/06/AR2008110602570.html?sub=AR

The Campaign Autopsy

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, November 7, 2008; Page A19

In my previous life, I witnessed far more difficult postmortems. This one is easy. The patient was fatally stricken on Sept. 15 -- caught in the rubble when the roof fell in (at Lehman Brothers, according to the police report) -- although he did linger until his final, rather quiet demise on Nov. 4.

In the excitement and decisiveness of Barack Obama's victory, we forget that in the first weeks of September, John McCain was actually ahead. Then Lehman collapsed, and the financial system went off a cliff.

This was not just a meltdown but a panic. For an agonizing few days, there was a collapse of faith in the entire financial system -- a run on banks, panicky money-market withdrawals, flights to safety, the impulse to hide one's savings under a mattress.

This did not just have the obvious effect of turning people against the incumbent party, however great or tenuous its responsibility for the crisis. It had the more profound effect of making people seek shelter in government.
ad_icon

After all, if even Goldman Sachs was getting government protection, why not you? And offering the comfort and safety of government is the Democratic Party's vocation. With a Republican White House having partially nationalized the banks and just about everything else, McCain's final anti-Obama maneuver -- Joe the Plumber spread-the-wealth charges of socialism -- became almost comical.

We don't yet appreciate how unprecedented were the events of September and October. We have never had a full-fledged financial panic in the middle of a presidential campaign. Consider. If the S&P 500 were to close at the end of the year where it did on Election Day, it will have suffered this year its steepest drop since 1937. That is 71 years.

At the same time, the economy had suffered nine consecutive months of job losses. Considering the carnage to both capital and labor (which covers just about everybody), even a Ronald Reagan could not have survived. The fact that John McCain got 46 percent of the electorate when 75 percent said the country was going in the wrong direction is quite remarkable.

However crushing the external events, McCain did make two significant unforced errors. His suspension of the campaign during the economic meltdown was a long shot that not only failed, it created the McCain-the-erratic meme that deeply undermined his huge advantage over Obama in perception of leadership.

The choice of Sarah Palin was also a mistake. I'm talking here about its political effects, not the sideshow psychodrama of feminist rage and elite loathing that had little to do with politics and everything to do with cultural prejudices, resentments and affectations.

Palin was a mistake (" near suicidal," I wrote on the day of her selection) because she completely undercut McCain's principal case against Obama: his inexperience and unreadiness to lead. And her nomination not only intellectually undermined the readiness argument. It also changed the election dynamic by shifting attention, for days on end, to Palin's preparedness, fitness and experience -- and away from Obama's.

McCain thought he could steal from Obama the "change" issue by running a Two Mavericks campaign. A fool's errand from the very beginning. It defied logic for the incumbent-party candidate to try to take "change" away from the opposition. Election Day exit polls bore that out with a vengeance. Voters seeking the "change candidate" went 89 to 9 for Obama.

Which is not to say that Obama did not run a brilliant general election campaign. He did. In its tactically perfect minimalism, it was as well conceived and well executed as the electrifying, highflying, magic carpet ride of his primary victory. By the time of his Denver convention, Obama understood that he had to dispense with the magic and make himself kitchen-table real, accessible and, above all, reassuring. He did that. And when the economic tsunami hit, he understood that all he had to do was get out of the way. He did that too.

With him we get a president with the political intelligence of a Bill Clinton harnessed to the steely self-discipline of a Vladimir Putin. (I say this admiringly.) With these qualities, Obama will now bestride the political stage as largely as did Reagan.

But before our old soldier fades away, it is worth acknowledging that McCain ran a valiant race against impossible odds. He will be -- he should be -- remembered as the most worthy presidential nominee ever to be denied the prize.

 

[tomahawk6]

I do agree Muskrat that republicans want a return to traditional values - conservative values.McCain represented the moderate/lib side of the house and it clearly failed.The base didnt trust McCain and really didnt like McCain bashing the GOP as if he werent part of it.McCain might have won if he opposed the bailout and stood up for the voters - sort of a populist approach. He didnt and lost. You dont beat liberal democrats by being one of them. Lately you cant tell the difference between the democrats and republicans. The first step to regaining power will be who wins the title of Chairman RNC.Newt has thrown his hat in the ring and could help provide the leadership needed. Unfortunately Newt has drunk the global warming coolaid which is a non-starter.

 

[Edward Campbell]

I do agree Muskrat that republicans want a return to traditional values - conservative values.McCain represented the moderate/lib side of the house and it clearly failed.The base didnt trust McCain and really didnt like McCain bashing the GOP as if he werent part of it.McCain might have won if he opposed the bailout and stood up for the voters - sort of a populist approach. He didnt and lost. You dont beat liberal democrats by being one of them. Lately you cant tell the difference between the democrats and republicans. The first step to regaining power will be who wins the title of Chairman RNC.Newt has thrown his hat in the ring and could help provide the leadership needed. Unfortunately Newt has drunk the global warming coolaid which is a non-starter.

And see this report that shows that tomahawk6 is not alone in his views.

 

[Kirkhill]

This report from The Gateway Pundit is really interesting.

It shows clearly the Urban/Rural split in the US with the Dems clearly being the Urban Choice and the Republicans being the Rural Choice.

Also interesting is this factoid:

Turnout-- As of Saturday at 1 PM CST approximately 124,200,000 Americans voted in this election.
In 2004, 122.3 million voted.
So, although there are still votes being counted(?), this year saw only a slightly larger turnout.

George Bush collected 62,040,606 votes in 2004.
John McCain collected 57,358,053 votes (so far) this year.
That's a difference of 4,682,000 votes.

Despite all the talk about the Democrat ground game and getting out the young, black and hispanic votes the overall turnout (to date) is only slightly ahead of the 2004 vote.  The real story seems to be the republicans that didn't vote for McCain (sat on their hands?).

 

[tomahawk6]

Yep I think there was an 86% republican turnout for McCain. Obama changed his web site to make community service optional not mandatory.

 

[Kirkhill]

There's a bit of good news.

Maybe this character'll turn out to be a President like any other.....

 

[tomahawk6]

The House is seriously looking at confiscating all 401k/IRA's which is illegal and will be the end of this new administration.Not to mention the impact taking $2 trillion out of the stock market and draining corporations of capital and the effect on the economy.

http://www.carolinajournal.com/articles/display_story.html?id=5081

Dems Target Private Retirement Accounts
Democratic leaders in the U.S. House discuss confiscating 401(k)s, IRAs

By Karen McMahan
November 04, 2008

RALEIGH — Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts — including 401(k)s and IRAs — and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration.

Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly.

The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.

Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor, in prepared remarks for the hearing on “The Impact of the Financial Crisis on Workers’ Retirement Security,” blamed Wall Street for the financial crisis and said his committee will “strengthen and protect Americans’ 401(k)s, pensions, and other retirement plans” and the “Democratic Congress will continue to conduct this much-needed oversight on behalf of the American people.”

Currently, 401(k) plans allow Americans to invest pretax money and their employers match up to a defined percentage, which not only increases workers’ retirement savings but also reduces their annual income tax. The balances are fully inheritable, subject to income tax, meaning workers pass on their wealth to their heirs, unlike Social Security. Even when they leave an employer and go to one that doesn’t offer a 401(k) or pension, workers can transfer their balances to a qualified IRA.

Mandating Equality

Ghilarducci’s plan first appeared in a paper for the Economic Policy Institute: Agenda for Shared Prosperity on Nov. 20, 2007, in which she said GRAs will rescue the flawed American retirement income system (www.sharedprosperity.org/bp204/bp204.pdf).

The current retirement system, Ghilarducci said, “exacerbates income and wealth inequalities” because tax breaks for voluntary retirement accounts are “skewed to the wealthy because it is easier for them to save, and because they receive bigger tax breaks when they do.”

Lauding GRAs as a way to effectively increase retirement savings, Ghilarducci wrote that savings incentives are unequal for rich and poor families because tax deferrals “provide a much larger ‘carrot’ to wealthy families than to middle-class families — and none whatsoever for families too poor to owe taxes.”

GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants.

In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading — spreading the wealth.”

All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.

Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions.

Another justification for Ghilarducci’s plan is to eliminate investment risk. In her testimony, Ghilarducci said, “humans often lack the foresight, discipline, and investing skills required to sustain a savings plan.” She cited the 2004 HSBC global survey on the Future of Retirement, in which she claimed that “a third of Americans wanted the government to force them to save more for retirement.”

What the survey actually reported was that 33 percent of Americans wanted the government to “enforce additional private savings,” a vastly different meaning than mandatory government-run savings. Of the four potential sources of retirement support, which were government, employer, family, and self, the majority of Americans said “self” was the most important contributor, followed by “government.” When broken out by family income, low-income U.S. households said the “government” was the most important retirement support, whereas high-income families ranked “government” last and “self” first (www.hsbc.com/retirement).

On Oct. 22, The Wall Street Journal reported that the Argentinean government had seized all private pension and retirement accounts to fund government programs and to address a ballooning deficit. Fearing an economic collapse, foreign investors quickly pulled out, forcing the Argentinean stock market to shut down several times. More than 10 years ago, nationalization of private savings sent Argentina’s economy into a long-term downward spiral.

Income and Wealth Redistribution

The majority of witness testimony during recent hearings before the House Committee on Education and Labor showed that congressional Democrats intend to address income and wealth inequality through redistribution.

On July 31, 2008, Robert Greenstein, executive director of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, testified before the subcommittee on workforce protections that “from the standpoint of equal treatment of people with different incomes, there is a fundamental flaw” in tax code incentives because they are “provided in the form of deductions, exemptions, and exclusions rather than in the form of refundable tax credits.”

Even people who don’t pay taxes should get money from the government, paid for by higher-income Americans, he said. “There is no obvious reason why lower-income taxpayers or people who do not file income taxes should get smaller incentives (or no tax incentives at all),” Greenstein said.

“Moving to refundable tax credits for promoting socially worthwhile activities would be an important step toward enhancing progressivity in the tax code in a way that would improve economic efficiency and performance at the same time,” Greenstein said, and “reducing barriers to labor organizing, preserving the real value of the minimum wage, and the other workforce security concerns . . . would contribute to an economy with less glaring and sharply widening inequality.”

When asked whether committee members seriously were considering Ghilarducci’s proposal for GSAs, Aaron Albright, press secretary for the Committee on Education and Labor, said Miller and other members were listening to all ideas.

Miller’s biggest priority has been on legislation aimed at greater transparency in 401(k)s and other retirement plan administration, specifically regarding fees, Albright said, and he sent a link to a Fox News interview of Miller on Oct. 24, 2008, to show that the congressman had not made a decision.

After repeated questions asked by Neil Cavuto of Fox News, Miller said he would not be in favor of “killing the 401(k)” or of “killing the tax advantages for 401(k)s.”

Arguing against liberal prescriptions, William Beach, director of the Center for Data Analysis at the Heritage Foundation, testified on Oct. 24 that the “roots of the current crisis are firmly planted in public policy mistakes” by the Federal Reserve and Congress. He cautioned Congress against raising taxes, increasing burdensome regulations, or withdrawing from international product or capital markets. “Congress can ill afford to repeat the awesome errors of its predecessor in the early days of the Great Depression,” Beach said.

Instead, Beach said, Congress could best address the financial crisis by making the tax reductions of 2001 and 2003 permanent, stopping dependence on demand-side stimulus, lowering the corporate profits tax, and reducing or eliminating taxes on capital gains and dividends.

Testifying before the same committee in early October, Jerry Bramlett, president and CEO of BenefitStreet, Inc., an independent 401(k) plan administrator, said one of the best ways to ensure retirement security would be to have the U.S. Department of Labor develop educational materials for workers so they could make better investment decisions, not exchange equity investments in retirement accounts for Treasury bills, as proposed in the GSAs.

Should Sen. Barack Obama win the presidency, congressional Democrats might have stronger support for their “spreading the wealth” agenda. On Oct. 27, the American Thinker posted a video of an interview with Obama on public radio station WBEZ-FM from 2001.

In the interview, Obama said, “The Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society.” The Constitution says only what “the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you,” and Obama added that the Warren Court wasn’t that radical.

Although in 2001 Obama said he was not “optimistic about bringing major redistributive change through the courts,” as president, he would likely have the opportunity to appoint one or more Supreme Court justices.

“The real tragedy of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused that I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change,” Obama said.

Karen McMahan is a contributing editor of Carolina Journal.

 

[a_majoor]

Sadly, antics like this will taint the election and cause people to question the legitimacy of the President elect's mandate (although, by the rules enforced by the MSM and left wing  bloggers since 2000, 53% of the popular vote "isn't a mandate"). Election reform to make registration transparent, correctly identify voters and properly tabulate results is needed.

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2008/11/022028.php

WHAT'S HAPPENING IN MINNESOTA? PART 2
Share Post  PrintNovember 8, 2008 Posted by Scott at 8:41 AM

Yesterday John Hinderaker explored "What's going on in Minnesota?" with the late arriving-votes that have reduced Norm Coleman's lead over Al Franken from 726 votes with 100 percent of precincts reporting on Wednesday morning to 221 votes as of this morning.

The election seems to be in the process of being stolen, and the media are either bemused or, as in this incredibly stupid AP story by Brian Bakst, preparing the battlefield for the theft. Yesterday the Coleman campaign released a statement on what's happening in Minnesota:

As improbable and statistically dubious chunks of votes appear and disappear, overwhelmingly benefiting Al Franken, the Coleman for Senate campaign today filed a data practices request with county auditors and the Secretary of State requesting data related to Election Night results, records related to ballot security and information relating to all revisions made to the results since being reported on Election Night.

"Minnesota has a history of fair and clean elections, and we are committed to ensuring that this election is no different. That is why it is so troubling to us that instead of the normal slight changes in vote totals one would expect during this process, we are now seeing huge chunks of votes appearing and disappearing - statistically dubious and improbable shifts that are overwhelmingly accruing to the benefit of Al Franken. And, as many of these unexplained and improbably vote swings are taking place on the Iron Range, we're asking that local and state election officials provide us with the necessary data to reassure the public that the canvassing process has not been tainted," said Cullen Sheehan, campaign manager.

It has been reported that during the night, 100 new ballots were reported to the Secretary of State's office from the Mountain Iron area. These previously unreported ballots contained 100 votes for President-elect Barack Obama and DFL candidate Al Franken.

We have received messages from knowledgeable Minnesota readers who served as election judges. Their observations are for more helpful (and troubling) than anything that has appeared in the media. In the interest of supporting a continuing inquiring into what's happening in Minnesota, even if we can't answer the questions they raise, these messages should be aired.

One reader writes:

I've been an election judge for something like four election cycles. I live in Minneapolis and am a registered Republican, which once made me a hot commodity. I think it still does if I understand the rules correctly.

This year, for the second time, I was a judge in Ward 11, Precinct 3. This precinct is managed by Democrats and is a majority Democrat precinct, as are all in Minneapolis, I think.

It's impossible to overstate the care with which our managing judge (a Democrat) constantly verified that the number of ballots cast matched those that were supposed to be cast. We had one "logged" incident that I was involved such that the "ticket" that gave the voter a ballot was faulty. It became apparent immediately and was fixed. The point is the system worked. All was constantly checked in detail. "Exhaustion" is worthless as an excuse.

The checks throughout the day, by multiple judges, guaranteed the transparency of the issue. Furthermore, voter "intent" as an issue is utter nonsense. If the machine could note discern "intent" the ballot was REJECTED! The voter was then given the opportunity to revote with a replacement ballot so "intent" would manifest, or the voter could state that it wasn't that vital, and the machine would read those races where intent was clear.

While I was there we had half a dozen rejected ballots. One lady was obviously casting her first vote in her life and had hers rejected two times before she correctly filled out a replacement ballot.

The point is there simply can't be any "ballots" to "find." If what is happening in Mountain Iron (and apparently elsewhere) is allowed to stand it will show that Minnesota is as corrupt as Chicago, Albuquerque and Boston.

Another reader writes concerning Hennepin County (MInneapolis and inner ring suburbs):

I am a Minnesota election judge. Last Tuesday I worked the election in Plymouth at Wayazta High School. While not a head judge I was a "Machine Judge" which required me to set up and close out the machine. I was trained specifically for the tasks you outlined in your "What's happening?" post. These are optical scanners and perform as you described, HOWEVER....

This election we were unable to transmit our results. The results were not uploaded electronically. The night before the election (Monday) the head judge I worked with advised me that there was a problem with the way ALL the Hennepin County machines were configured. There would be no way to transmit the results to the State. Instead....at the end of the election day since we were unable to transmit, we were instructed to pull the card out of the machine and carry it to City Hall for processing.

I was informed this was not the case for just our precinct, but for all of Hennepin County. I can tell you I did not transmit the info and the head judge left with the card, the ballots, and the official tape in her car on the way to City Hall all by herself (I trust her, but others may not be so trusting).

I was told there was something wrong with the IP address coded in all the machines and there was no way for the info to be transmitted via electronic means. I found this concerning, but did not think it a problem until all the fallout with the recount. Given how close this election is and the group involved in the recount, I felt it was critical this issue be brought to light, and those responsible forced to address why normal procedures were not in place and followed during this election.

Instapundit reader Joshua Dixon wrote Glenn Reynolds yesterday to comment on John's post:

I am a small town newspaper editor in a purplish part of Minnesota. Based on what I've read and observed, the Coleman/Franken election recount fails the smell test many times over.

With Minnesota election rules and the optical scanning system, each ballot must be checked, rechecked, accounted for and re-accounted for by a number of election judges. Each judge's tally must match the others', and with the scanning machine's tape produced the night of the election. The machine prints out three copies of each ward's results on a single tape, which has to be signed in triplicate by the judges, and sent to the county seat. A day or so later, each town or township gets back a third of the tape it sent in on election night for convassing at an open meeting.

According to the city clerk I talked to just a few minutes ago, the election night tape is considered public record, and anyone who wants to can walk in and ask to examine the tapes. When I asked if I could take a photo of the relevant part of this town's results of the Coleman/Franken contest, she not only allowed it, she straightened the tapes (Ward 1 and Ward 2) so I could get a better picture (attached).

The Power Line story brings up some legitimate questions. Here are a few more: How can St. Louis County deny being able to produce the genuine tape from election night? They were provided with one tape containing three copies of the results, one of which was required to be sent back to the town of Mountain Iron for canvassing. Did they send Mountain Iron its copy of the tape for convassing at an open meeting? If so, why not just provide the town's copy of the tape instead of the county's? Were the county and city's copies of the tape treated as public record? If not, why not?

In short: the explanations for Franken's new votes just don't work.

And the head GOP election judge of Wyanett Township in Isanti County adds a footnote:

Not all precincts have upload capability to the Secretary of State -- we are one of them. We turn our signed tapes into the County Auditor office within a reasonable time frame after poll closing. The tapes have to be in the constant contact with at least two judges from different political parties until they are turned over to two individuals at the County Auditor's. We retain a copy signed by all of our election judges.

There is much more to be said, but it is important that these messages see the light of day this morning while the election hangs in the balance. Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritichie (who is a story in himself) should know that he is being watched and will be held to account.

To comment on this post, go here.

 

[tomahawk6]

The Republican governor could step in and insure the counties are playing fair but so far he hasnt done squat.

 

[tyrone120]

Congatulations Mr president elect, You did what was thought to be impossible. Good luck with the job ahead of you.

 

[a_majoor]

Peter Hitchens has a different view:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1084111/PETER-HITCHENS-The-night-waved-goodbye-America--best-hope-Earth.html#

The night we waved goodbye to America... our last best hope on Earth
Last updated at 5:57 PM on 10th November 2008

Anyone would think we had just elected a hip, skinny and youthful replacement for God, with a plan to modernise Heaven and Hell – or that at the very least John Lennon had come back from the dead.

The swooning frenzy over the choice of Barack Obama as President of the United States must be one of the most absurd waves of self-deception and swirling fantasy ever to sweep through an advanced civilisation. At least Mandela-worship – its nearest equivalent – is focused on a man who actually did something.

I really don’t see how the Obama devotees can ever in future mock the Moonies, the Scientologists or people who claim to have been abducted in flying saucers. This is a cult like the one which grew up around Princess Diana, bereft of reason and hostile to facts.

It already has all the signs of such a thing. The newspapers which recorded Obama’s victory have become valuable relics. You may buy Obama picture books and Obama calendars and if there isn’t yet a children’s picture version of his story, there soon will be.

Proper books, recording his sordid associates, his cowardly voting record, his astonishingly militant commitment to unrestricted abortion and his blundering trip to Africa, are little-read and hard to find.

If you can believe that this undistinguished and conventionally Left-wing machine politician is a sort of secular saviour, then you can believe anything. He plainly doesn’t believe it himself. His cliche-stuffed, PC clunker of an acceptance speech suffered badly from nerves.  It was what you would expect from someone who knew he’d promised too much and that from now on the easy bit was over.

He needn’t worry too much. From now on, the rough boys and girls of America’s Democratic Party apparatus, many recycled from Bill Clinton’s stained and crumpled entourage, will crowd round him, to collect the rich spoils of his victory and also tell him what to do, which is what he is used to.

Just look at his sermon by the shores of Lake Michigan. He really did talk about a ‘new dawn’, and a ‘timeless creed’ (which was ‘yes, we can’). He proclaimed that ‘change has come’. He revealed that, despite having edited the Harvard Law Review, he doesn’t know what ‘enormity’ means. He reached depths of oratorical drivel never even plumbed by our own Mr Blair, burbling about putting our hands on the arc of history (or was it the ark of history?) and bending it once more toward the hope of a better day (Don’t try this at home).

I am not making this up. No wonder that awful old hack Jesse Jackson sobbed as he watched. How he must wish he, too, could get away with this sort of stuff.

And it was interesting how the President-elect failed to lift his admiring audience by repeated – but rather hesitant – invocations of the brainless slogan he was forced by his minders to adopt against his will – ‘Yes, we can’. They were supposed to thunder ‘Yes, we can!’ back at him, but they just wouldn’t join in.  No wonder. Yes we can what exactly? Go home and keep a close eye on the tax rate, is my advice. He’d have been better off bursting into ‘I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony’ which contains roughly the same message and might have attracted some valuable commercial sponsorship.

Perhaps, being a Chicago crowd, they knew some of the things that 52.5 per cent of America prefers not to know. They know Obama is the obedient servant of one of the most squalid and unshakeable political machines in America. They know that one of his alarmingly close associates, a state-subsidised slum landlord called Tony Rezko, has been convicted on fraud and corruption charges.

They also know the US is just as segregated as it was before Martin Luther King – in schools, streets, neighbourhoods, holidays, even in its TV-watching habits and its choice of fast-food joint. The difference is that it is now done by unspoken agreement rather than by law.

If Mr Obama’s election had threatened any of that, his feel-good white supporters would have scuttled off and voted for John McCain, or practically anyone. But it doesn’t. Mr Obama, thanks mainly to the now-departed grandmother he alternately praised as a saint and denounced as a racial bigot, has the huge advantages of an expensive private education. He did not have to grow up in the badlands of useless schools, shattered families and gangs which are the lot of so many young black men of his generation.

If the nonsensical claims made for this election were true, then every positive discrimination programme aimed at helping black people into jobs they otherwise wouldn’t get should be abandoned forthwith. Nothing of the kind will happen. On the contrary, there will probably be more of them.

And if those who voted for Obama were all proving their anti-racist nobility, that presumably means that those many millions who didn’t vote for him were proving themselves to be hopeless bigots. This is obviously untrue.

Yes we can what?: Barack Obama ran on the ticket of change

I was in Washington DC the night of the election. America’s beautiful capital has a sad secret. It is perhaps the most racially divided city in the world, with 15th Street – which runs due north from the White House – the unofficial frontier between black and white. But, like so much of America, it also now has a new division, and one which is in many ways much more important. I had attended an election-night party in a smart and liberal white area, but was staying the night less than a mile away on the edge of a suburb where Spanish is spoken as much as English, plus a smattering of tongues from such places as Ethiopia, Somalia and Afghanistan.

As I walked, I crossed another of Washington’s secret frontiers. There had been a few white people blowing car horns and shouting, as the result became clear. But among the Mexicans, Salvadorans and the other Third World nationalities, there was something like ecstasy.

They grasped the real significance of this moment. They knew it meant that America had finally switched sides in a global cultural war. Forget the Cold War, or even the Iraq War. The United States, having for the most part a deeply conservative people, had until now just about stood out against many of the mistakes which have ruined so much of the rest of the world.

Suspicious of welfare addiction, feeble justice and high taxes, totally committed to preserving its own national sovereignty, unabashedly Christian in a world part secular and part Muslim, suspicious of the Great Global Warming panic, it was unique.

These strengths had been fading for some time, mainly due to poorly controlled mass immigration and to the march of political correctness. They had also been weakened by the failure of America’s conservative party – the Republicans – to fight on the cultural and moral fronts.

They preferred to posture on the world stage. Scared of confronting Left-wing teachers and sexual revolutionaries at home, they could order soldiers to be brave on their behalf in far-off deserts. And now the US, like Britain before it, has begun the long slow descent into the Third World. How sad. Where now is our last best hope on Earth?

 

[brave little soldier]

:-*

The American Elections were far more interesting than our federal and Quebec's provincial elections... My vote goes to Obama... Oups... can't vote for him ???  :-\

Go go Obama ! Go go Obama !

 

[Loachman]

Yes, and the sooner he goes, the better off everybody will be, except for those that leech off of governments.

 

[Kirkhill]

Just finished talking to a buddy in the States.  Apparently Obama is as good for business as Bill Clinton was.  At least in one economic sector.

My buddy just decided now was the time to go out and buy the M1911 that he had been thinking about.  Before that 500% excise tax kicks in and the $500 item becomes a $3000 item.  The customers were lined up 12 deep at the counter.

By the way, buddy has also postponed his retirement.....