Friday, June 09, 2006
BradBlog Bangs No Confidence Drum
With language familiar to readers of We Do Not Consent and its antecedent, GuvWurld Blog, ace investigative journalist Brad Friedman has gotten a serious lather on about the circumstances of Tuesday's election in San Diego. In particular, Friedman outlines the conditions of the equipment used to cast and "count" votes, and details the predictable litany of irregularities in the Busby/Bilbray race to fill the 50th District Congressional seat vacated by the recently convicted Randy "Duke" Cunningham.
Friedman states, "There is NO BASIS for Confidence in the Reported Election Results. Period." He then quotes a seemingly ordinary AP article that presents Bilbray as the conclusive winner, commenting, "Okay, AP. Prove it. I dare you. You can't."
No basis for confidence has been the position I've taken for more than two years now, most notably with the Voter Confidence Resolution adopted by Arcata, CA. There is also a strong connection with the media challenge I laid down at Tuesday's VCC press conference. Friedman creates yet another parallel by referring to the scientific certainty of his argument ("airtight"), a tremendous accolade offered by attorney Paul Lehto in the testimonials of my book We Do Not Consent.
What distinguishes this particular contest is Busby's premature concession. A significant letter writing campaign has begun to encourage Busby to fight for an investigation and complete hand count. Of course, I've also been calling for a hand count here in Humboldt too. Friday's Eureka Reporter describes some of our own election night mishaps, including failed memory cards and precincts unable to submit their optical scan data to the central tabulator. Friedman heavily emphasizes the security risks of San Diego having sent voting machines home with poll workers. Humboldt has the same can of worms though it is thus far unopened. So much for "it can't happen here."
Finally, since the VCC post-election day demonstration didn't really come off beyond about 10 of us questioning elections manager Lindsey McWilliams, I will end on this high note of media coverage. We have had some surprisingly receptive responses to Tuesday's press conference. Tom Sebourn at KGOE ran a two minute election special devoted entirely to our message (.mp3). Wednesday's Eureka Reporter had a decent article that saw some good play at Democratic Underground and which was just added at BuzzFlash. I'm also pretty pleased with how my first appearance on the Peter B. Collins show sounded. I should be able to get the excerpt in the GuvWurld News Archive pretty soon but for now you can download this .mp3 and forward in to exactly 2:23:00 to catch the start of the six minute chat.
Plus Mike Dronkers at KHUM just floored me on Wednesday. I mentioned previously that Dronkers seemed to have an epiphany during our election night interview when I suggested the media shouldn't broadcast or publish what it can't prove. He rebroadcast that clip the following day and then aired my call live when I dialed in to say thanks. Hopefully I'll have that audio soon too. More importantly, I think we have seen significant encouragement to continue pressing this button. I need to find time to seek out private sit downs with local newspaper editors. Coincidentally, I understand the Times-Standard editor, Charles Winkler, will begin holding coffee klatches, starting June 15 at 8am at Sacred Grounds in Arcata.
Read or Post a Comment
<< Home