Each day passes with Obama's lead seeming more solid.
And each day we see new desperation gimmicks from the McCain campaign.
We know that a significant part of GOP electoral manipulation involves voter suppression- tricks used to keep eligible voters from voting on election day.
All evidence points to the GOP and McCain campaign gearing up for massive vote suppression efforts on election day.
A month ago, McCain surrogates sent a letter to the Obama campaign begging for help keeping MICKEY MOUSE from voting.
Obama spokesman David Plouffe wrote back a strong letter, basically telling the GOP to stick it. The letter also points out that it is the GOP which has a longstanding history of voter suppression and vote fraud.
For one month, anyone forced to watch Fox News has been met with a story about ACORN and "Vote Fraud".
Even Greta Van Susteren!, who used to be restricted to fluff pieces about missing blond teenage girls is now nonstop ACORN. We also have more ACORN paranoia in the WSJ today.
According to Fox and the GOP, ACORN is planning to drag dirty homeless people to the polls eight, nine, or ten times to cast ballots for Barack Obama on Election Day. Never mind that this type of vote fraud has NEVER HAPPENED in any meaningful way in all US presidential election history. The McCain campaign needs the narrative to try to de-legitimize an Obama Victory and prep the nation for what will probably be a nightmare of dirty GOP tricks at the polls next month.
At the end of September, the McCain camp put together an anti-ACORN group and sent Obama a letter to try to get him to denounce ACORN. Well, the Obama campaign was having none of that bullshit.
This letter is so kickass, it deserves to be quoted in full:
Obama Campaign's Response to McCain's ACORN Letter
September 23, 2008
Honorable John C. Danforth
Honorable Warren B. Rudman
McCain-Palin 2008
P.O. Box 16118
Arlington , VA 22215
Dear Senator Danforth and Senator Rudman:
We have received your letter of September 15, 2008, informing us of the formation of what you call the "Honest and Open Election Committee" by the McCain-Palin Campaign.
However attractively labeled, this seems a starkly political maneuver to deflect attention from the reality of the suppression strategies pursued by national,state and Republican party committees. This has been the shameful history of the party from the Goldwater "Operation Eagle Eye" program to the present day—a history replete with instances of systematically planned and executed programs to block access to the vote for targeted communities of voters.
In 2004, the Republican Party, on the eve of the general election, mounted challenges to tens of thousands of voters in Nevada, Ohio and Wisconsin based on "caging lists," that is, lists of returned mailers or based on similar information providing no legitimate grounds whatsoever for such challenges. None of these challenges, to our knowledge, was upheld and accusations of voter fraud by national Republican Party leaders were proven utterly baseless.
Now,in 2008, the Republican Party again appears determined to engage in tactics and strategies to deny the right to vote to qualified citizens:
· In Michigan, the chairman of Macomb County Republican Party has threatened to use lists of persons whose homes have been foreclosed to challenge those persons at the polls. Only after public exposure, did he deny that this was the plan for Macomb County, and this matter is now before the federal district court for the Eastern District of Michigan.
· In Florida, the RNC has mailed non-forwardable letters to Democratic voters asking them to "confirm" their party affiliation as Republican—thereby raising doubts about their registration status and creating the basis for possible challenge lists. Even top Republican election officials in Florida, including the Secretary of State,have publicly condemned this tactic.
· In Wisconsin, the Republican Attorney General, who serves as co-chair of the McCain-Palin campaign in the state, has filed suit challenging the refusal of the state’s own election administration authorities to throw thousands of voters off the rolls based on dubious and impractical matches of identifying information.
· In Ohio, Republicans are challenging the decision of the Secretary of State to allow first-time voters to obtain an absentee ballot at the time they register even though the law clearly affords this right.
Manifestly, the confusion,uncertainty, deprivations of rights and interference with efficient election administration created by these tactics, and similar ones that the Republican Party has used in recent election cycles, cannot be effectively addressed by the creation late in the day of "committees" with gloriously self-serving names. Rather, the best way to address them is for responsible Republican leaders like both of you to speak out, loudly and forcefully, to condemn these tactics, to insist that they be shut down once and for all and then to make sure that they are.
This is what we would hope that you could accomplish. If your concern truly lies with 'Honest and Open Elections", then your work is properly and effectively begins at home--with the Republican operatives who are planning and running these suppressive programs and who are being directed in these activities by the same national McCain and party leadership that recruited you to this "Committee".
Sincerely yours,
David Plouffe,
Campaign Manager, Obama for America
This Vote Fraud meme being pushed by the GOP is a stupid disgrace. The Obama Campaign and Josh Marshall have it exactly right:
Let's be clear about what this is. These are random stories about fake vote registrations. The Drudges and Fox scoundrels of the world seem to think that if someone fills out a voter registration card for Mickey Mouse, that Mickey Mouse might show up and cast a vote they're not entitled to cast. It doesn't and there is zero evidence of any voter fraud or anything that would make voter fraud more likely. The level of lying, bad faith or at best ignorance of the people making these claims is really beyond imagining. This isn't vote fraud. There's no evidence of vote fraud. Nothing. This is an effort of a losing political party to a) lay the groundwork for challenging their defeat at the polls b) lay the groundwork to pass laws to make it harder for poor people and minorities to vote.
So thankfully, Obama is standing up against the GOP "Vote Fraud" Bullshit. The planned GOP poll disruption on November 4 should be called what it is: vote suppression. The McCain campaign alone will be responsible for any "Nightmare Scenario" they are planning.
UPDATE:
The Obama Campaign makes it easy for YOU to sign up and help make sure that the Republican Vote Suppression tactics are stopped. Hit the link and stop the Thugs.