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The real reason Obama is not making much progress

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

The Independent - By Johann Hari - Nov. 20 (Opinion) - So far, Obama has tried to co-opt the corporations into his agenda by ensuring they will profit from any changes, but this inevitably waters down the proposals, often to the point of uselessness. The Cap and Trade legislation before Congress, for example, will barely limit carbon emissions at all because it has been gutted to please the polluters.

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A call for Obama officials to improve Native voting rights

Mon, 12 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

indiancountrytoday.com - By Rob Capriccioso - Oct. 12 (News Report) - Voter rights advocates are calling on the Obama administration’s Justice Department to improve the system for Native Americans.

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Tom Coburn picks on political science

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Foreign Policy - By Daniel W. Drezner - Oct. 08 (Comment) - OK, dear readers, I want you to close your eyes and imagine a world in which your entire knowledge of political behavior emanated only from CNN, pollsters, pundits, historians, candidates, and political parties.

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Sandra Day O'Connor: Stop Electing Judges

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Gene Johnson - Sep. 14 (News Report) - Multimillion-dollar judicial campaigns make it difficult to know whether a judge is deciding a case based on the merits or on concerns about reelection, she said. She noted that the founders of the country believed it crucially important that federal judges have the freedom to make unpopular decisions without worrying about poll numbers. It was only after President Andrew Jackson's election in 1828 that he persuaded states to begin adopting elections for judges.

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The Trial of John Roberts

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Jeffrey Rosen - Sep. 13 (Opinion) - A campaign finance case in the Supreme Court could tell us if Chief Justice Roberts will be remembered as the next John Marshall or Earl Warren.

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A Threat to Fair Elections

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - Sep. 08 (Editorial) - The Supreme Court has upheld the limitations on corporate campaign expenditures in the past. If they open the floodgates now, corporations will have a huge say in who wins federal elections.

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Who cashed in during 2008?

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The Politico - By Kenneth P. Vogel - Sep. 04 (News Report) - The analysis... found at least 73 staffers were paid more than $150,000 during the 2008 election cycle, a two-year period spanning 2007 and 2008. CQ’s analysis didn’t include salaries paid to Senate campaign staffers, because those campaigns are not required to report their finances to the FEC electronically, making their records much more difficult to access and search.

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Afghan Election Marred by Fraud, Intimidation, Violence, Low Turnout

Tue, 25 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By Sharif Abdel Kouddous, Amy Goodman, Jonathan Landay - Aug. 25 (News Report) - In Afghanistan, election authorities are preparing to publish the first partial results from last week’s presidential election, but the small sample of ten percent may do little to resolve a dispute over the outcome. The August 20th election was marred by fraud, intimidation, violence and low turnout in many areas. The Electoral Complaints Commission says it is looking into at least 250 allegations of misconduct.

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Diebold Quietly Patches Security Flaw in Vote Counting Software

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Wired - By Kim Zetter - Aug. 12 (News) - Premier Election Solutions, formerly Diebold, has patched a serious security weakness in its election tabulation software used in the majority of states, according to a lab that tested the new version and a federal commission that certified it.

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FBI Attempts to Block Edmonds Testimony in OH Election Case

Sun, 09 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Brad Blog - Aug. 09 (Special Report) - The BRAD BLOG has obtained both the FBI's response to FBI translator-turned-whistleblower Sibel Edmonds' notice of her intention to give a deposition this Saturday in response to a subpoena she received in a case before the Ohio Elections Commission (OEC). We've also been given exclusive access to her attorneys' response in turn, which is to be officially released later this afternoon.

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Health-Care Firms Have Supported Lawmakers Debating Reform

Tue, 21 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Dan Eggen - Jul. 21 (News Report) - As liberal protesters marched outside, Sen. Max Baucus sat down inside a San Francisco mansion for a dinner of chicken cordon bleu and a discussion of landmark health-care legislation under consideration by his Senate Finance Committee.

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Looking Abroad For Answers On Voter Registration

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

National Journal - By Eliza Newlin Carney - Jul. 20 (News Report) - Unlike the United States, which puts the onus for registering entirely on the voter, many Western democracies put government officials in charge of adding voters to the rolls, according to a recent study by New York University School of Law's Brennan Center for Justice. These include Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Peru and Sweden.

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How To Win the Presidency

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Weekly Standard - By Tara Ross - Jul. 17 (Special Report) - Electoral College opponents may be nearly halfway to their goal of eliminating America's unique presidential election system. But you won't hear anything about it from the media that are understandably obsessed with health-care reform, cap and trade, and the troubled economy. And you certainly won't hear anti-Electoral College activists brag about it. The "National Popular Vote" website proclaims, more modestly, that NPV has achieved 23 percent of the votes that it needs to succeed.

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WPost's 'Select Few' Dine on Health Bill

Sat, 11 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Consortium News - By Bill Moyers, Michael Winship - Jul. 11 (News Analysis) - What really happens - the serious business of Washington - happens in the shadows, out of sight, off the record. Only occasionally - and usually only because someone high up stumbles -- do we get a glimpse of just how pervasive the corruption has become.

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Why do we allow the US to act like a failed state on climate change

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The Guardian - By George Monbiot - Jun. 26 (Opinion) - There are mind-boggling concessions to the biofuels industry, including a promise not to investigate its wider environmental impacts. There's a provision to allow industry to use 2bn tonnes of carbon offsets a year, which include highly unstable carbon sinks like crop residues left in the soil (another concession won by the powerful farm lobby). These offsets are so generous that if all of them are used, US industry will have to make no carbon cuts at all until 2026.

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Iran: Ballots Exceeded Voters by Millions

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Wired - By Kim Zetter - Jun. 23 (News Report) - Officials found that a total of 3 million more ballots were cast in these cities than there were eligible voters, according to the New York Times. Nonetheless, the council insists that the election results are valid and says the 3 million discrepancy would not affect the results of the election.

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Iran election: The global view

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

GlobalPost - Jun. 18 (Special Report) - As unrest in Iran continues, our correspondents have been weighing in with the local reaction from their countries. Here are links to their reports and some excerpts.

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Protests Continue in Iran; Government Cracks Down on Foreign Media

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Democracy Now - By JUAN GONZALEZ, Amy Goodman, Arang Keshavarzian - Jun. 17 (News Report) - Over a hundred university professors have reportedly resigned in protest over the deaths of students. And Iran’s leading dissident cleric, Ayatollah Hossain Ali Montazeri, also called for three days of mourning for the dead. His public letter on the election reads, quote, “No one in his sane mind can accept these results.” Meanwhile, the Supreme Leader met with representatives of all four presidential candidates and called for national unity but didn’t address the question of a new election.

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Recount Set as Iran Seethes

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Wall Street Journal - By Farnaz Fassihi - Jun. 17 (News Report) - Pro-government and opposition demonstrators poured into the streets of Iran's capital Tuesday for a fourth day of sometimes-violent rallies, as the country's religious leaders agreed to a partial recount of Friday's disputed presidential vote.

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Why the official Iranian election results are suspect

Tue, 16 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

McClatchy - By Warren P. Strobel - Jun. 16 (News Analysis) - In American politics, it would be as if President George W. Bush won re-election over Sen. John Kerry in 2004 by taking Kerry's home state of Massachusetts, doing surprisingly well in liberal New York City and besting his 2000 vote totals by 40 percent.

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Politics Done Right: Iran Does Have Some Fishy Numbers

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

FiveThirtyEight - By Renard Sexton - Jun. 15 (Investigative Report) - Again, as we have mentioned on several occasions, the numbers still do not prove any wrongdoing, as large scale changes in public opinion do happen regularly around the world. However, given the polling data in the run-up to the balloting, and the historical trend away from electoral domination in the first round by one candidate, this very fishy regional data tends to strongly support that which the canceled Mousavi protest was meant to express.

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Voter Turnout High in Polarized Iran, Rivals Claim Victory

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Thomas Erdbrink, William Branigin - Jun. 12 (Breaking News) - Rival claims of victory roiled Iran's hotly contested presidential election Friday amid heavy turnout, as crowds of voters waited to cast their ballots long after the polls were supposed to close.

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Court: Coleman must pay Franken $95,000 in court costs

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Minneapolis Star Tribune - By Associated Press PAT DOYLE - Jun. 11 (News Report) - A three-judge panel today required Republican Norm Coleman to pay Democrat Al Franken $94,783 to cover court costs in the seven-week U.S. Senate trial. The ruling, by the panel that heard the trial, approves an administrative decision last month by the Ramsey County clerk's office. Franken's team had sought $161,510, but a deputy county clerk rejected a request that Coleman pay Franken for his cost of obtaining public records that made up many of the exhibits in the trial and some other expenses.

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Voting Machine Company Agrees to Hand Over Source Code

Mon, 08 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Wired - By Kim Zetter - Jun. 08 (News Report) - During the city’s primary election last September, Sequoia’s optical-scan machines added about 1,500 ‘phantom’ votes to races on ballots cast in one precinct. Sequoia blamed the problem on “static discharge” or human error.

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Voting machine expert criticizes "clueless" industry report

Mon, 20 Apr 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Ars Technica - By Ryan Paul - Apr. 20 (News Report) - The Election Technology Council (ETC), a trade group comprised of the most prominent electronic voting machine vendors, has published a paper that argues against mandating source disclosure for electronic voting machine systems. The paper (PDF), which broadly conflates source disclosure and open source software licensing, dubiously contends that enabling public scrutiny of voting technology would lead to compromised security.

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