Tennessee Wants Secure and Verifiable Elections

Comment

Comment by Marvin Lee Cranfield II on July 16, 2010 at 5:40am

We need this law now, the state needs to comply with Federal standars and Tennesseans deserve non-rigged elections.

Comment by Susan Acito on January 20, 2010 at 6:04pm

http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2010010320/poll-shouts-message-...
Check out the exit poll at the above site. The real message that was sent.

Comment by Kim Troup on January 20, 2010 at 12:52pm

Everyone has contributed some very important points to this discussion. I go back to how do we get our elected representatives, the president and our party leadership to be strong and do what is right for the American people? I am worried that they will learn the wrong lesson from MA and retreat.

Comment by Jesse Mclevain on January 20, 2010 at 12:27pm

There seems to be truth in the comment by Lenny as endorsed by Kim and a lot of the same essence in "pale carbon copies of the opposition".
I submit that the Mass. result reflects things such as the failure of President Obama to really get "out in front" of health care reform (and that it should be done because it's the right thing to do for the American PEOPLE), the "bail out" of financial institutions without the "strings" to assure the protection of the interests of the American People, and generally allowing "business as usual" ("back room" deals, failing to confront the opposition when gross misrepresentations were made, failing to publicly speak out when those in the democratic caucus were obstructing progress or fishing for a "deal", etc.).

It seems that Barack Obama was elected with the hope that he would become the transformational leader much needed in Washington. Hopefully, the President and those in Congress who really have the best interest of the country as priority number one will take this "wake up call" to heart and get about governing with concern only with what is best for the Country and the people therein.

I fear that most Republicans and too many Democrats have lost focus on this concept. My hope is that this is false fear and that some sort of collective wisdom will rise from the ashes of Massachusetts.

Comment by Susan Acito on January 20, 2010 at 11:23am

Good article at Air America

As Republican strategist Lee Atwater famously put it, "if you’re explaining, you’re losing" -- in other words, the best defense is a good offensive. Since the rhetoric of the Right has always sounded appealing -- for faith and flag, against big fat government -- Democratic candidates need to change the narrative to future-past and up-down rather than stale left-right. With Democrats in charge during an awful economy, abstract ideological arguments or standing pat are not enough to convince swing independent voters.

Here’s the better frame: "Do you really want to go back to a GOP that brought us economic collapse, Enron, Katrina and Iraq?" This is both rhetorical and empirical...since it’s true. The fact is that Bushonomics dug us into this hole and the growth rate under Democrat presidents since FDR has been more than double the growth rate of Republicans. And it’s pretty hard for Republican candidates to defend an administration that produced no net new jobs in their eight years. Zero.

While Democrats are a 21st Century party trying to fix health care, global warming and education, the Republican Party has some of the finest minds of the 19th Century. Recall how Bush 43 tried to have Social Security funds invested in the stock market.

Is this merely “the blame game,” as Karen Hughes gamely argued over the weekend? It’s called accountability -- and it would be political negligence for Democrats to avoid making this case.
Read more at the link

Comment by Susan Acito on January 20, 2010 at 11:12am

Amen, Mary. Dems tend to get scared and run away from their base when confronted, forgetting that it's the base and the campaign promises that got them elected in the first place. If we wanted Republicans in office, they would have been elected in the first place. We are constantly being told to wait for the majority, then when we have it it's frittered away.
Oh, and a commitment based on Ted Kennedy not dying? Robert Byrd is very ill, and his visits to the Senate floor have been by wheelchair and only to vote on important issues. We can only hope he lives a very long life.
But, what to do? A third party really is not viable. Nader really blew that in 2000 when he refused to bow out, knowing that he couldn't possibly win, and allowed Bush to be appointed by the Supreme Court. That being said, remember it was Fox News that came out and declared Bush the winner, and a recount of Florida by independent agents found out that Gore was the winner.
I know as a pollworker, that we had not even delivered the results to Blountville in 2008, in either the primaries or the general, when winners were declared by the media. So how do they declare winners when the eastern most county hasn't brought counts in?
We can be sure that Republicans almost never break ranks, never criticize each other, and always vote Republican - even if they hate the candidate - and work for it. In Sullivan Co, Nathan Vaughn was too complacent and while Shipley signs were everywhere, Nathan said it "wasn't time". He didn't go out knocking on doors, and didn't run a good campaign. Therefore a very bad candidate won.
They have to campaign if they want to win.

Comment by Susan Acito on January 20, 2010 at 9:46am

That link is http://www.blackboxvoting.org

Comment by Susan Acito on January 20, 2010 at 9:44am

Read today's Black Box voting post. . Coakley won the hand counts, and the Diebold results came in AFTER hand counts, and "All in all, a total of 170,594 Diebold votes took a long time to stumble in the door, These votes -- surprise! -- favored Coakley. She got 86,214 of them, for 50.54%, and Brown got 82,911 tardy Diebold votes, for 48.60%, putting Coakley on the plus side of the late arrivers by a 1.94% margin, for a net gain of 3,303 slow-moving votes.

They'd called the election by the time the 170,594 tardy Diebold votes showed up. Coakley had conceded. And of course, there are many ways to look at this if you don't trust voting machines, and why should you? It's hard to know who was fooling around, or if anybody was. "

NEVER take anything for granted.

Comment by Kim Troup on January 20, 2010 at 9:27am

I could not agree with Lenny more. Now is the time for the Democratic majority to push harder and be stronger, not back off. How we get our elected officials and party leaders to see that is another story.

Comment by Lenny Sharlet on January 20, 2010 at 2:39am

Susan, I don't think that we can pin this on any conspiracy theories or media bias. We had a bad candidate who ran a terrible campaign in a moment when the winds are blowing against us, and she was beaten by a very well run campaign with a base energized like we've never seen. Now's not the time to grasp at straws, it is the time to buckle down, take a long hard look in the mirror, come up with a real message and light a fire under party leaders and elected officials. That or continue to lose, and lose badly.

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