United Sovereign Americans, a nationwide group dedicated to fair and honest elections, has joined with Maryland Election Integrity, LLC, in filing a lawsuit in Maryland Federal Court against the Maryland State Board of Elections with Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher presiding.
“This action seeks declaratory and injunctive relief from deficient voter registration rolls leading to violations of Federal and state laws, the certification of results from a provably flawed, inaccurate, and obscure process outside the view of impartial witnesses or the public, including the use of voting systems in Maryland that are believed to have void EAC certifications in violation of federal law, and the refusal of the Maryland State Board of Elections to comply with Public Information Act (PIA) requests and Federally required transparency.”
The suit cites multiple federal laws regarding election conduct, including Article 1 Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, Sections 1 and 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment, the National Voter Registration Act, and the Help America Vote Act.
Maryland Election Integrity, LLC, a group of citizen volunteers in Maryland, is led by Kate Sullivan and David Morsberger. They recently filed a report detailing the results of their statewide voter canvass and their examination of Maryland voter rolls.
Their canvas found 58 inaccurate records, which was 15 % of the 383 records surveyed. The Baltimore County canvass found 61 inaccurate records -- 14% of the 418 individuals contacted.
Based on their results, they calculated that the canvass percentages would equate to 5,625 apparent fraudulent votes in the Maryland 2020 general election.
The team also analyzed Maryland voter rolls and found 79,349 current apparent registration violations, 62,075 voting violations in the 2020 general election, and 27,623 voting violations in the 2022 general election.
United Sovereign Americans was born out of New York Citizens Audit, which has produced similar reports about the voter rolls in New York state for 2020 and 2022. Co-founders Marly Hornik and Harry Haury formed United Sovereign Americans to share what they’ve learned about database investigations and legal strategies to ensure fair and honest elections for our country. They now have chapters in over 25 states doing research and preparing lawsuits.
Regarding the Maryland lawsuit, Hornik said “the Maryland action is the first of many lawsuits we will be participating in to force state boards of elections to comply with clearly-defined federal laws that ensure election validity. Without trustworthy elections, the American public will have no confidence in the announced results.”
Considering that Biden won Maryland by about a million votes, it doesn't seem likely there's enough fraud here to make a difference. But if Hogan really runs for Senate, it might matter.
In a small town less than 10 miles from Washington, D.C., dozens of residents in Cheverly, Maryland, braved the blistering cold and pouring rain to attend Wednesday’s town council meeting and provide testimony on whether the locality should allow individuals as young as 16 to vote in local elections.
“I haven’t heard a good reason for it. I can think of a number of reasons why not,” Fred Price Jr., a Marine Corps veteran and 50-year Cheverly resident, told The Federalist. “[But] I’d like it to go to a referendum, so I [can] have more time to think about it.”
Similar to other municipalities throughout the country, Cheverly’s minimum voting age is set at 18 years old, with Article V of the town’s charter furthermore requiring residents to have lived in Cheverly “at least thirty days prior to the day of any general or special election” in order to vote. Within the past few years, the town council adopted an amendment to Article V allowing non-U.S. citizens meeting such residency requirements to vote in local contests.
Like much of the country when it comes to election-related issues, attendees of Wednesday’s town hall appeared heavily divided on whether to open up the town’s electoral process to minors. Proponents of the initiative argued that lowering the voting age is logical because, as they opined, today’s teenagers are given more responsibilities than previous generations.
“I think teenagers today do bear a lot more responsibility, have a lot more knowledge, and are actually granted privileges that probably weren’t granted to younger people before,” Linda Cruz, who’s lived in Cheverly since 2001, told The Federalist. “I took my kids to get bank accounts and they’re [getting offered] a debit card at age 13. So, there’s a lot more rights and responsibilities happening [at] younger and younger [ages], so why not voting?”
How long will it take until the kids vote themselves free burgers and milkshakes?
In a
small town
less than 10 miles from Washington, D.C., dozens of residents in Cheverly,
Maryland, braved the blistering cold and pouring rain to attend Wednesday’s
town council meeting and provide testimony on whether the locality should
allow individuals as young as 16 to vote in local elections.
“I
haven’t heard a good reason for it. I can think of a number of reasons why
not,” Fred Price Jr., a Marine Corps veteran and 50-year Cheverly resident,
told The Federalist. “[But] I’d like it to go to a referendum, so I [can]
have more time to think about it.”
Similar to other
municipalities throughout the country, Cheverly’s minimum voting age is set
at 18 years old, with Article V of the town’s
charter
furthermore requiring residents to have lived in Cheverly “at least thirty
days prior to the day of any general or special election” in order to vote.
Within the past few years, the town council
adopted
an amendment to Article V allowing non-U.S. citizens meeting such residency
requirements to vote in local contests.
Like much of the country
when it comes to election-related issues, attendees of Wednesday’s town hall
appeared heavily divided on whether to open up the town’s electoral process
to minors. Proponents of the initiative argued that lowering the voting age
is logical because, as they opined, today’s teenagers are given more
responsibilities than previous generations.
“I think teenagers
today do bear a lot more responsibility, have a lot more knowledge, and are
actually granted privileges that probably weren’t granted to younger people
before,” Linda Cruz, who’s lived in Cheverly since 2001, told The
Federalist. “I took my kids to get bank accounts and they’re [getting
offered] a debit card at age 13. So, there’s a lot more rights and
responsibilities happening [at] younger and younger [ages], so why not
voting?”
Among those who testified in support of the proposition
were minors, including 17-year-old co-founder of the Cheverly Youth
Commission Zora Heneghan. During her
remarks,
Heneghan contended that teenage decision-making regarding issues of higher
education and work serves as justification for why the council should
approve the measure.
“We’re expected in a couple months to
sign our name on a dotted line committing either ourselves or our family to
up to $200,000 in [college student loan] debt. That’s a decision that we’re
allowed to make when we’re 17,” Heneghan said. “We’re allowed to work. I
mean half the people you see here today work for the Cheverly pool. … You
have literally put the lives of your children in their hands.”
As
described
on the town’s website, the Cheverly Youth Commission is an organization
“committed to promoting youth engagement” in the community that strives
towards “making sure teenagers are informed about town politics, volunteer
opportunities, and community gatherings in order to become better voters and
more active members of the town.” The group
proposed
the “Vote16” measure.
But not everyone in Cheverly is completely
sold on the idea of minors voting in town elections. During his testimony,
Navy veteran Mike Klauser
raised
numerous points contesting the idea that individuals as young as 16 are
equal to adults when it comes to “civic responsibility.”
We’ve
“heard the proponents talk about responsibilities [such as] lifeguarding.
I’m sure the lifeguard[s] here will recall having to get a youth work permit
that required [their] parents to … sign off on,” he said. Proponents also
“talked about indebting themselves for college. That would require a
parental co-signature if you’re under 18.”
While speaking
with The Federalist, resident Hugh Fike similarly expressed concerns about
how “the mechanics” of such a policy would work and its potential
consequences, especially as it relates to “legal rights” granted to
individuals once they turn 18.
“We preclude purchasing of tobacco
and alcohol in the county … [and] prevent people from going into contracts,
signing leases, [and] doing other things at a certain age. So, there are
some practical questions about whether or not this is a good idea,” Fike
said. “We rightly recognize that 18 to 21 years old [is] sort of when full
maturity happens, and we give them a certain number of legal rights and
responsibilities. So, I’m primarily concerned that we’re going to be
changing that … and we don’t really know the consequences.”
Since youth routinely feel liberal when young, before they start filing their own taxes, they're easy marks for Democrats.
A judge Friday rejected Maryland's state congressional district political map, saying the General Assembly-approved map was "a product of extreme partisan gerrymandering."
She said the congressional district map was drawn "with partisanship as a predominant intent."
Two Republican groups challenged the map and the judge's decision agreed that Republican voters and candidates "are substantially adversely impacted" by the map.
The judge urged Maryland lawmakers to come up with a new congressional district plan that abides by Maryland's constitution.
Fair Maps Maryland, an anti-gerrymandering group linked to GOP Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, was one of the challengers of the map.
"To call this a big deal would be the understatement of the century. Judge Battaglia's ruling confirms what we have all known for years -- Maryland is ground zero for gerrymandering, our districts and political reality reek of it, and there is abundant proof that it is occurring," Fair Maps Maryland spokesman Doug Mayer said in a statement.
The judge's decision could be appealed to Maryland's Court of Appeals.
The current Maryland gerrymandering is particularly vicious, and the Democrat plan goes a step farther by grafting a piece Annapolis onto the Eastern Shore in an attempt to eliminate the another Republican representative. You can see the various maps in contention at this old post.
I'm generally of the opinion that gerrymandering should be left to the legislatures, and not judges. Unfortunately, the way it tends to play out in court is that Democrat gerrymandering is permitted to stand as merely political, while Republican gerrymandering is overturned on racial grounds. It's good to see courts pushing back.
You may not know this, but the most gerrymandered congressional map in America is in Maryland right now, drawn to give Democrats 88% of the congressional delegation in a state where Democrats win at most 66% of the vote.
A nonpartisan redistricting commission came up with a new map, which is compact, sensible, and based on communities of interest and county lines. Democratic legislators in Annapolis, led by gerrymandering enthusiast Eric Luedtke, have just passed out of committee a map designed to give Democrats all eight congressional seats.
Luedtke correctly points out that his map is less absurd in some ways than the partisan gerrymander Democrats created 10 years ago, but no honest person would ever say this map is anything other than a naked power grab that flouts all notions of representative government and good governance.
The current congressional map pictured just below ties the Appalachia part of Maryland into the same district as Bethesda, a wealthy, liberal, country-club-packed neighborhood, in order to carve up the rural (conservative) vote in Western Maryland into three different districts.
Sadly, from the Democrats point of view, the map leaves the Eastern Shore, a traditionally conservative area, in the hands of Republican Andy Harris.
Here’s how we described Maryland’s congressional map a few years ago.
"The 3rd District is technically all contiguous, but some parts of it can only connect to other parts of it by boat.
"There’s an area just outside the Beltway where you can cross through four congressional districts during a 20-minute walk. At that point, a wart on the back of the 8th District sticks into the tail of the Baltimore-based 7th District, alongside a narrow isthmus connecting the two totally separate parts of the 4th District, right next to the northern proboscis of the 5th District, which in turn stretches two hours south to the mouth of the Potomac."
Since then, the state organized a Citizens Redistricting Commission, which included Republicans, Democrats, and independents. That commission created an eminently sensible map, pictured here:
This map has everything going for it. It splits only seven of the state's 24 counties. The districts are compact. And you can name the districts. There’s a Western Maryland District, an Eastern Shore District, a Southern Maryland District, a Baltimore District, a Montgomery County District, a Prince George’s County District, a Baltimore City District, a Baltimore County District, and a Central Maryland suburban district. That is, each of these districts roughly approximates an intelligible community of interest.
Oh My God! The Eastern Shore, the Western Maryland panhandle, and Southern MD all might go conservative, leaving the urban core to the Democrats.
Now, look at Luedtke’s ridiculous partisan gerrymander.
Once again, you have three lower-Montgomery County-to-the-Pennsylvania-border districts, including that lovely Bethesda-to-Appalachia 6th District. The 5th District has a horn, the 4th is two balls connected by a thread, the 7th and 3rd look like they’re melting, and most egregiously, the Eastern Shore district reaches across the Chesapeake Bay into Annapolis, in order to give a fighting chance to lobbyist Heather Mizeur, who is trying to unseat the only Republican representative from Maryland, Andy Harris.
Based on current population data from the Census Bureau and voting data from
previous elections, Just Facts has conducted a study to estimate the number
of votes illegally cast by non-citizens in the battleground states of the
2020 election. The results—documented in
this spreadsheet—show that such fraudulent activities have netted Joe Biden the following
extra votes in these tightly contested states:
Arizona: 51,081 ± 17,689
Georgia: 54,950 ± 19,025
Michigan: 22,585 ± 7,842
Nevada: 22,021 ± 7,717
North Carolina: 46,218 ± 16,001
Pennsylvania: 32,706 ± 11,332
Wisconsin: 5,010 ± 1,774
If the lower end of these illegal vote estimates were removed from the vote
tallies as of November 8, 2020, 2:00 AM EST, Donald Trump would be leading
in states that have a total of 259 electoral votes, or 11 shy of the 270
needed to win the presidency. If the upper end of the illegal vote estimates
were removed, Trump would be leading in states that have 285 electoral
votes, or 15 more than needed to win the presidency.
"They have done it in every way imaginable, from having dead people vote in
massive numbers, to absolutely fraudulently creating ballots that exist only
voting for Biden," Powell told Fox's Maria Bartiromo. We've identified
identified at least 450,000 ballots in the key states that miraculously only
have a mark for Joe Biden and no other candidate."
Powell pointed
to Floria, "where things were done right," noting that that's "how the rest
of the country should have gone."
Powell maintains that malicious
actors "used an algorithm to calculate the votes they would need to flip,
and they used computers to flip those votes from...Trump to Biden, and from
other candidates to their competitors also."
Indeed, the cheating Democrats used secret CIA election rigging software
called HAMMER and SCORECARD to skew the vote. Air Force Gen. McInerney
discusses this with Steve Bannon in his War Room podcast. Mary Fannin writes
about it on TheAmericanReportDotCom website. The Democrats also used it to
cheat Bernie out of the nomination. This election is NOT OVER, and Donald
Trump is still our President.
Hammer and Scorecard, you ask. This
is from
Jo Nova
Hammer and Scorecard are the names of the two programs designed
by the CIA to interfere in foreign elections and now allegedly being used in
the USA itself.
The General [Lt. Gen. McInerney] described “Hammer” and “Scorecard,”
a pair of programs initially designed for the CIA before being privatized by
Deep State players from the Obama administration. We explained how they work
in an article last week, but the gist is this: “Hammer” or “THE HAMMER” is a
counter-intelligence surveillance program used to spy on activities on
protected networks (like voting machines) without detection while
“Scorecard” is a vote-manipulation application that changes votes during
transfer. It’s the least detectable form of election manipulation because it
works during data transfer between voting stations and data storage hubs.
Unless both sides are looking for irregularities, it’s impossible to catch.
If nefarious forces had people on one side or the other (or both) during
data transfer, it cannot be exposed…. CIA program known as “Scorecard”
allows its users to change voting outcomes by hacking into the transfer
between local reporting stations and state or national data centers.
According to McInerney, it’s a small amount, under 3%, to keep it from
triggering any alarms. He would know. He served in top military positions
under the Secretary of Defense and the Vice President of the United States.
After Crossfire Hurricane, you have to at least accept the
possibility.
I'd like to see some clear-headed analysis of whether Trump's holding out
and fighting will help or hurt the Republicans in the Georgia runoffs. Axios
— which obviously wants Trump to concede — is pushing the assumption that a
concession will boost the Georgia GOP candidates. And I can see that. It's
not just how much money is available but how important it is to keep the
Senate. But you could say that Trump's diehard fighting is about the
importance of keeping the liberals out of power, and if you really believe
that, then if Trump fails in his effort, he will leave conservatives pumped
up and that will fuel the fight for the Georgia Senate seats.
Hey guys, this thing is not only not over; it is scary for Biden. I mean
really scary, and most of all, the media know it. Thus, the rush to get
everyone in line with the narrative that a 78-year-old, early-dementia
former V.P., who could not draw a crowd larger than a dozen, just beat D.J.
in a fair election.
Process that for a moment.
Start
with Pennsylvania. Biden, as of this writing, is at 290 electoral votes.
Pennsylvania is 20.
I read the Justice Alito opinion, and it is
pretty clear that he wants the after election night at 8:00 P.M. votes
separated for a reason. Biden is going to lose at the Supreme Court, and
they know it. Four justices already said the Pennsylvania Supreme Court
cannot adjust voting rules. A new arrival, Justice Barrett, says she is
there to apply the rules in the Constitution. OK, wanna bet she does?
Remove
the after 8:00 P.M. ballots, and Biden loses Pennsylvania. Biden 270.
Let's
visit Nevada. I have lots of friends in California who have condos in Nevada
to evade state taxes. There are not a couple of people doing this; there are
tens of thousands. Everyone knows it, and California seeks them out.
Our
old pal Harry Reid knows it as well, and he apparently has them voting in
droves in this election. Probably not a big D.J. constituency. Within 72
hours of the election, the Trump team found, validated over 3,500 of them. I
do not suspect that Trump's people stopped counting.
Every one of
these is a ballot reduction for Biden
Nevada, as of now, is well
within reach for DJ and the Trump team — particularly when the California
crowd is reduced. And a few of them may testify since a false vote is a very
bad thing, with jail time if convicted. Maybe a bigger story here.
Remember
where we are, people. Biden is at 270 after a highly probable Supreme Court
decision (read Alito and concurring opinions).
Lose Nevada, lose
the election.
But wait: it gets better.
Let's visit
Wisconsin. Right now, it is 20,000 votes in Uncle Joe's direction. Lots of
stories out there, well below the Google fold, that there are way more
Wisconsin votes than there are registered voters. OK, maybe the dead can
vote up there — probably a Midwest thing.
Well, last night, we
found that Wisconsin election clerks were told, and followed the direction,
to modify mail-in ballots and fill in the blanks where witnesses left out
critical info.
I am sure it was just a good customer service
thing and they meant no harm. The problem is every such ballot is
now toast.
Scott Adams of Dilbert Fame thinks Trump is going to pull it out, too, and
details why he thinks so, ane why the Democrats seemed to have pulled out
all the stops on cheating this year in his podcast:
It's long, so here's my summary of his argument, if you don't have the time.
Most Democrats think Trump is literally Hitler, and think that any effort to
remove Hitler from power is justified. Democrats have been cheating in
elections for years, and not facing significant consequences. So why would
not some groups of Democrats not cheat? But he thinks they've overreached
on the scale, and are likely to be caught out this time. What would (will,
hopefully) happen when the evidence clearly show that Democrats in key
battleground states cheated on large enough scale to tip the election to
Trump? Would they concede graciously? History doesn't suggest that's likely.
It is tempting to lash out and agitate for the most aggressive and
combative reactions to what is almost certainly a concerted effort to
subvert the rule of law and steal the votes of millions of Americans. It is
ironic that the Left in America has accused the Republican party of
disenfranchisement for two generations, yet they have demonstrated that
exact thing over the last week.
Because that is what has
happened. Flooding the count with huge numbers of fraudulent ballots,
undercounting Trump strongholds and overcounting Biden-supporting areas are
functionally identical to voter intimidation, poll taxes, literacy tests and
all of the things that traditionally are considered illegal impediments to
free and fair elections.
With the addition of a hostile Fourth
Estate that is almost unanimous in its hatred of Trump and support for the
Democrat Party and its machinations, and a corporate social media complex
that reminds one of Nazi Germany's captive industrial base, it is tempting
to throw up one's hands and surrender, or agitate for more direct and
violent action.
That is not the topic today; giving up is not an
option when American Exceptionalism still lives...however attenuated it may
be. And violence is absolutely the last option; I doubt anyone wants to
revisit the Civil War.
But there are things we can do. Support
President Trump with your voice, and your wallet if necessary. Write
letters, call representatives, attend rallies, create more formal groups of
like-minded Americans, rather than the traditional loose-knit groups that
conservatives tend toward. We are individuals, and organizing is not our
first nature...but now it needs to be!
Supporting alternative
media sources is vital. OANN,
NewsMax, and the various conservative
websites and blogs provide a voice for those who have been marginalized by
the traditional media.
One of the significant barriers to
repairing the obvious structural advantages of the Democrat Party is the
natural inclination of Democrats to work in government, and the equally
natural disinclination of conservatives to seek employment in the most
dysfunctional and least efficient segments of our economy. But that is where
the power to manipulate elections resides. Government clerks and
functionaries who manage the voting process are overwhelmingly Democrat, and
until that changes we are at a significant disadvantage. How to change that
is something that we need to examine, but at the very least, a robust
presence of Republicans and conservatives at the polls to counter, at least
a little bit, the overwhelming numbers of Democrats embedded in the
structure of our election process is the minimum.
On paper, the day dawns with the
Presidential race still unsettled, but the prospects for Trump winning a clear victory somewhat diminished.
All the states still uncertain yesterday (AK, NV, AZ, GA, NC and PA), but
additional counts from "mail in ballots" in have brought Georgia into the
Biden leaning side by an extremely thin margin, about 1000 votes. Similarly,
the Trump lead in Pennsylvania has narrowed to 19,000 from an original 600,000
vote margin. To win a clear victory, Trump needs all his "leaners" (AK, NC and
PA) and Georgia plus something else. Trump is still looking first at
Arizona for that something else (Wow! Even CNN & MSNBC Admit That Trump Appears to Be on Track to Win
Arizona) but the margin looks rather beefy to me, unless Maricopa County is a Trump
gold mine.
I would like to point out that in every contested state except NC, the
Libertarian candidate, Jo Jorgenson has more votes than the margin between
Trump and Biden! Republicans need to look at that result as a sign that they
need to court the Libertarian movement, which I feel is a better fit with
Republicans than Democrats, although to be honest, Trump is not the best
spokesman there, despite his fantastic work on deregulation.
Why is it that rural counties with comparatively few resources can manage to
count all their votes on Election Night, while America’s major cities still
haven’t finalized their totals by Thursday?
Democrats should be
asked that question, because it says an awful lot about what’s wrong with the
Democratic Party, which governs all the places where they haven’t finished
counting votes yet — Detroit, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Milwaukee, etc. If there
were no other issue to divide the American people, the gross incompetence of
Democrat-controlled governments would be sufficient to justify GOP opposition.
. . .
Before I became a novelist I was an accountant. In auditing you look for red
flags. That’s weird bits in the data that suggest something shifty is going
on. You flag those weird things so you can delve into them further. One flag
doesn’t necessarily mean there’s fraud. Weird things happen. A few flags
mean stupidity or dishonesty. But a giant pile of red flags means that
there’s bad shit going on and people should be in jail. . . .
The MacIver Institute found that nearly 200,000 voters marked themselves as
indefinitely confined ahead of Wisconsin’s presidential primary and an
additional 49,769 did so in the six months since. So 250K people in WI
required no Voter ID. Unbelievable!!
Would Biden even want to be president knowing he’ll have to negotiate with
Mitch McConnell — and Kevin McCarthy? If those remaining districts flip red
and the GOP gets to 218, he might as well walk out today and say, “Trump’s
right, I cheated. He won. I’m going to go play golf.”
An assistant professor of urban planning at UCLA argues in the far-left magazine The Nation that California is doomed as long as people keep owning homes. “If we want to keep cities safe in the face of climate change, we need to seriously question the ideal of private homeownership,” says Kian Goh, who researches urban ecological design, “spatial politics” and social mobilization “in the context of climate change and global urbanization.”
Goh considers it “news” rather than fevered speculation that “we may only have a dozen years to contain global warming,” as shown by destructive California wildfires in recent months and “precautionary power shutoffs” by utility companies.
Proposed solutions, including a public takeover of Pacific Gas & Electric, are missing one of the most important factors in climate change-driven destruction, Goh warns: “economic development, aspirations of home ownership, and belief in the importance of private property.”
To prevent catastrophe, Americans must reconsider their ideas about “success, comfort, home, and family,” particularly the single-family homes that followed in the wake of the Homestead Act of 1862 and federally backed mortgage insurance, the professor argues.
These policies benefited white middle-class families and “became synonymous with freedom and self-sufficiency” even though they represented “[e]xpansionist, individualist, and exclusionary patterns of housing.”
You can’t support poorer people if you continue to insist that home ownership is a core American value, according to Goh, who fumes that even the state’s progressive governor Gavin Newsom is only talking about “hardening” structures against fire: “Any suggestion that we might discourage rebuilding on privately owned land is promptly tamped down.”
Two things are clear to the professor: “Cheap energy is untenable in the face of climate emergency. And individual homeownership should be seriously questioned.”
I was once in a huge project meeting with a bunch of scientists, including some state managers, and one of them got up and told us we had to break the idea that people owned their own shore line property.
Another green attack on Democracy; According to the Financial Times, giving ordinary people a say over public policy impedes climate action, because we don’t care enough about other people’s problems.
Democracies are ill-suited to deal with climate change
It is tempting to say the problem is too abstract but the focus should be on the economy
EDWARD LUCE…
Harrowing images of Australian bushfires and Californian wildfires should be blowing a hole in such complacency. But they also crystallise how hard it is for democracies to mobilise public action. If images of Sydney enshrouded in smoke, or Napa Valley in flames, cannot arouse the voter’s imagination, what will? Those hoping the world’s wealthiest countries will take more of a lead on climate change must confront three hard truths.
The first is that politicians struggle to look beyond the electoral cycle. It is hard enough for a government to invest in education, which can take years to show results. It is that much more difficult to take unpopular actions to reduce carbon dioxide output that might take generations to bear fruit, and even then go unrecognised.
…
I’m glad a climate action advocate has finally gotten the message the Greta effect only works on people who already believe. When this message filters through to the top, we might see less of her.
Enironmental watermelons, green on the outside, red on the inside.
Those Democrats who keep telling us that vote fraud is rare and insignificant fight like hell to make sure that the evidence remains buried. Even when there are obvious danger signs such exist in Montgomery County, Maryland, where there are more registered voters than resident citizens.
You might think that officials would be anxious to find out why that is, and would be eager to clean up their voter rolls. Certainly, any officials that cared about the integrity of the vote would want to ensure that malefactors would not be able to pick-up ballots and vote them (as the practice of “vote harvesting” permits). But for reasons only they can explain, Maryland officials fought in federal court to prevent Judicial Watch from obtaining voter data lists.
Judicial Watch announced today that a federal court has ordered the State of Maryland to produce voter list data for Montgomery County, the state’s biggest county. The court ruling comes in the Judicial Watch lawsuit filed July 18, 2017, against Montgomery County and the Maryland State Boards of Elections under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 (NVRA).
The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, Baltimore Division (Judicial Watch vs. Linda H. Lamone, et al. (No. 1:17-cv-02006)). The decision follows NVRA-related Judicial Watch successes in California and Kentucky that could lead to removal of up to 1.85 million inactive voters from voter registration lists. The NVRA requires states to take reasonable steps to clean up its voting rolls and to make documents about its voter list maintenance practices available to anyone who asks.
Judicial Watch had sought the Maryland voter list data after discovering that there were more registered voters in Montgomery County than citizens over the age of 18 who could register. U.S. District Court Judge Ellen Lipton Hollander rejected Maryland’s objections to providing the voter list information under Section 8(i) of the National Voter Registration Act:
If Judicial Watch had submitted requests for voter registration data, corresponding to the thousands of Montgomery County voters, the State would have been required to produce each record, pursuant to Section 8(i). Instead, Judicial Watch merely submitted a single request for a voter list containing and compiling the same information about the thousands of voters in Montgomery County. Although both scenarios seek the same information, defendants believe that the NVRA would require compliance with only one of them. Rejecting Judicial Watch’s request based on semantics would be tantamount to requiring Judicial Watch to make thousands of separate requests. Neither the NVRA, the Court, nor common sense can abide such a purposeless obstruction.
****
Organizations such as Judicial Watch have the resources and expertise that few individuals can marshal. By excluding these organizations from access to voter registration lists, the State law undermines Section 8(i)’s efficacy. Accordingly, [Maryland election law] is an obstacle to the accomplishment of the NVRA’s purposes. It follows that the State law is preempted in so far as it allows only Maryland registered voters to access voter registration lists.
The dispute over the voter registration list arose from an April 11, 2017, notice letter sent to Maryland election officials, in which Judicial Watch explained Montgomery County had an impossibly high registration rate. The letter threatened a lawsuit if the problems with Montgomery County’s voter rolls were not fixed. The letter also requested access to Montgomery County voter registration lists in order to evaluate the efficacy of any “programs and activities conducted for the purpose of ensuring the accuracy and currency of Maryland’s official eligible voter lists during the past 2 years.”
Democrat Maryland officials, in response, attacked and smeared Judicial Watch by suggesting it was an agent of Russia.
No, Judicial Watch is not an agent of Russia. That is a despicable charge .
Having more registered voters than actual voting age population isn't a sure sign of corruption; it's probably just a lazy reluctance to clean up voter roles as people move out or die. But having a large reservoir of registered voters who aren't likely to complain that they went to the polls and found they had already voted certainly provides the scope for manufacturing votes as needed.
At about 4 a.m. on Aug. 23, federal agents rousted Jose Solano-Rodriguez from his bed in the suburbs of Raleigh. A couple of hours later, three agents knocked on Hyo Suk George’s door as she fed her rabbits and chickens in rural Columbus County. Jose Ramiro-Torres was at his job at a fencing company near the Outer Banks when his girlfriend called to tell him to come home, where federal agents were waiting.
In all, 20 immigrants — two still in pajamas — were rounded up over several days, many of them handcuffed and shackled, and charged with voting illegally in the 2016 presidential election. The sweep across eastern North Carolina was one of the most aggressive voting-fraud crackdowns by a Trump-appointed prosecutor — and also a deliberate choice that demonstrates where the administration’s priorities stand.
You would think the Washington Post would be happy to have Federal prosecutors looking into foreigners trying to influence our elections, but no:
At the time of the arrests, an organized ballot-tampering effort that state officials had repeatedly warned about was allegedly gearing up in the same part of North Carolina. The operation burst into public view after Election Day in November when the state elections board, citing irregularities in the mail-in vote, refused to certify the results of the 9th Congressional District race. That seat remains unfilled while state officials investigate.
The decision by U.S. Attorney Robert Higdon Jr. to focus his office’s resources on the prosecution of noncitizens rather than the ballot-tampering allegations in Bladen County comes amid a broad push by President Trump and other Republicans to portray illegal voting as a widespread phenomenon that threatens the integrity of American elections.
Maybe that's because illegal voting by non citizens is a threat to elections throughout the nation, while the vote harvesting scheme uncovered in North Carolina is strictly a state problem, being perfectly legal is such lawless places as California.
With Election Day at hand, we know one thing for sure: Voter turnout is huge. In fact, it looks like we will have the highest midterm turnout since 1966. The rationale for a gigantic blue wave that would represent a repudiation of the 2016 election has been that millions of Americans are so turned off by President Trump and his agenda that they will come out en masse and hand Congress to Democrats with large majorities, proving what has been an article of faith among Trump-haters, that his election was an anomaly and that American politics would quickly revert to the mean.
But that’s not going to happen — because it relies on a false premise. Republicans don’t want to go back to the Bush-McCain-Romney era any more than Democrats want to go back to Clintonism. And since the Kavanaugh hearings, Republicans are just as energized and united as Democrats. That means everything is up for grabs. This election, in other words, is part of a process in which the electorate is working toward a new political dispensation that will replace the one that prevailed from the end of World War II until sometime during the Obama administration . . .
What ever happens, it will be interesting.
UPDATE: We voted this afternoon after coming home on the commuter bus from a meeting with our financial/retirement adviser in DC. The good news is that I can continue to bring you regurgitated news bits with occasional insights, beach, dog and fishing pictures, and morning cuties without asking for a raise.
It's raining here is slower Maryland, and in the middle of the day, the polls were active, but not so much as to have more than minimal lines. In and out in less than 15 minutes.
This seems like one of the dumber questions ever asked in a poll in recent memory, but the results are rather remarkable. (Well… remarkable as in a totally dismal, dystopian future sort of way.) The New York Post is reporting on a new survey conducted by LendEDU (so consider the source) which indicates that a shocking number of Americans would be willing to trade away their right to vote for the rest of their lives. And some of them were willing to give that right up pretty cheaply.
More than a third of surveyed American workers (34.98 percent) say they would give up their right to vote in all elections for life in exchange for an immediate pay increase, according to a new LendEDU survey released Tuesday. This backs a recent Credible report that found half of millennials said they would give up their right to vote if it would mean their student loan debts were forgiven. LendEDU proposed 16 scenarios to 1,238 employed Americans where giving up something would result in an instant 10 percent annual bump in salary. And people will go to some extreme lengths for that extra cash, such as sacrificing their health care and putting in some serious overtime, the survey found.
Half of all millennials would be willing to give up their right to vote if their student loans were paid off? Um… can we get that in writing? Because I’m normally something of a hawk for people taking responsibility for their debt choices, but if they think so little of their right to vote, perhaps they could find better things to do on election day anyway.
Should we start a GoFundMe campaign? We could offer to sell it back to them for double later.
Sidestepping sex scandals, serial gaffes and legal woes, Silvio Berlusconi's astonishing return to frontline politics rolled on Sunday at a party gathering where adoring supporters feted the billionaire mogul as Italy's next kingmaker.
Berlusconi, dressed in black with oiled-back hair and a dayglo smile, spoke for more than two hours at the event in Milan, beguiling the audience just a week before general elections with his trademark mix of populist rhetoric and baudy humour.
Trump before Trump thought of running.
"He's an exceptional man," said Elga Morati, a 70-year-old retired nurse. "He's a real pillar of Italy, someone blessed by the gods."
Although barred from public office owing to a tax fraud conviction, Berlusconi is hoping to position himself as a key dealmaker in the next government if his coalition wins a majority in parliament on March 4.
Former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi has been surprised by a topless activist while casting his vote in the Italian elections today.
The woman, who had the words 'Berlusconi, you've expired' written in black marker on her chest, jumped onto the table at the Milan polling station as Berlusconi was voting.
I don't see Femen's problem with Silvio. It's not like he doesn't like women!
Photographers in the room jostled for position amid the chaos while Berlusconi, 81, was escorted out.
Far-right and populist parties are expected to make major gains and Berlusconi is set to play a leading role.
While he cannot hold office himself because he was convicted of tax fraud, he is backing another nominee.
Polling stations opened at 6am GMT and will close at 10pm, with initial results expected tomorrow morning.
I'm pretty sure there's nothing there he hasn't seen before.
She speaks of wanting to vote for Oprah, and Jimmy Kimmel breaks in with "Are you allowed to vote here in the United States?" Her "I don't know actually..." feels utterly disingenuous. "I'm not a resident here..." as if being a resident would be enough.
But she's a great actress and could easily play disingenuous.
In a similar vein, she is beautifully made up to look as though she is wearing absolutely no makeup.
By they way, I love her as an actress and I strongly encourage the no-makeup look. It's especially refreshing to see the absence of eye makeup.
However, according to Wikipedia, she was born in the Bronx, making her a natural born citizen by anyone's reckoning.
Republican David Yancey won a hotly contested Virginia House of Delegates race after his name was drawn from a bowl on Thursday. Last month, a recount put Democrat Shelly Simonds ahead of Yancey by just one vote, but the contest was later ruled a tie. With Yancey's victory, Republicans retain their majority in the chamber. Simonds has indicated she may challenge the result.
It's interesting that control of the House of Delegates came to depend on a single disputed ballot, which was ultimately counted for the Republican, giving the tie. I'm quite confident in Terry McAuliffe's Virginia that no illegal aliens or ineligible felons voted for the Democrat. /sarc off
It's also amusing that after all the cries of "count every vote," Democrats really aren't very happy with this one.
