Local GOP groups in certain swing counties in swing states around the country are reportedly organizing to obstruct and challenge eligible voters, using reprehensible but technically legal methods. Here are the actual links,
http://www.michiganmessenger.com/...
http://www.prnewswire.com/...
http://www.newsweek.com/... but first:
I tried to post my concerns exclusively to McCain's own website (as opposed to here), and I said so in my post, because I believe McCain does have some honor and would do the right thing by calling off the local thugs if presented with this information. In the entry, I asked the McCain campaign to call on these local groups to stand down. But unlike Obama's site, posts must be approved before being published. Well, not only did they not approve my post, but they apparently deleted my entire profile! What confidence and openness. So here I am back at DKos, telling all my friends:
According to one news items I've read, in a particularly repugnant move, one local GOP cabal in Michigan is using a list of recent home foreclosures to challenge, at their polling places, any voter whose name matches a name in the list. Owners of foreclosed homes are, in that area, mostly black. So as the news story puts it, "lose your house, lose your vote." Kudos, GOP, for trying to kick people when they're down in a particularly pre-Civil Rights kind of way--and hoping to net others also. Here are two links to that story: http://www.michiganmessenger.com/...
and
http://www.prnewswire.com/...
Their b.s. rationale is that if your home's been foreclosed, there's a chance you don't live at your registration address anymore. That reason for challenging a voter is both weak and cruel, both for a number of reasons, and its main objective is not actually to bar individual challenged voters (although they'd love that), but to make polling lines long, so that those with limited time might just leave without voting.
In the other example I saw, http://www.newsweek.com/... Jonathan Alter explains that various States and counties, the GOP is seeking to require voters to present photo IDs or other credentials. Again, in the areas in question, those most likely not to have such documents are often Black.
Folks, this is NOT about "voter fraud," one of the GOP's favorite straw-man enemies. The GOP groups in question are seeking to obstruct specifically ELIGIBLE voters.
I am surprised these stories haven't taken off more; maybe they've been scrutinized futher and haven't held up. But I wanted to get the word out, and, especially after the warm welcome I got at JohnMcCain.com, I'm now doing it here.