Acorn answers voter-fraud allegations.
Wherein the embattled community organization points out:
"In nearly every case that has been reported, it was ACORN that discovered the bad forms and called them to the attention of election authorities, putting the forms in a package that identified them in writing as suspicious, encouraging election officials to investigate, and offering to help with prosecutions."
In other words, the only reason anybody even knows about the alleged registration fraud (a misdemeanor, as distinct from vote fraud, a felony) that is, in the hyperbolic words of John McCain “destroying the fabric of democracy,” is because ACORN itself reported suspicious registrations, as required by law.
My favorite Republican alarmist, explaining why Ohio Republicans are working so hard to throw out 200,000 new voter registrations because of the possibility that a tiny portion of them might be illegitimate? Ken Blackwell, Ohio's Secretary of State during the 2004 election cycle. Take it away, Ken:
"Election Day this year may bring the kind of chaos you expect from a category-five hurricane - with radical groups sending the nation into a protracted legal battle even worse than the mess back in 2000."
Mr. Blackwell, it must be noted, knows all about lawsuits and has good reason to fear the "legal mess" that might be caused by citizens challenging a suspicious election. It is perhaps telling that the "chaos" he is worried about comes in the form not of a stolen election but of a legal battle over an alleged stolen election. Considering that he is now on the side claiming to be concerned that voter fraud is destroying the fabric of democracy, one wonders why his warning isn't more focused on the threat of widespread fraud that the voter purges are purported to address than the threat posed by challenges to suspect electoral outcomes.
Posted by flamingbanjo at October 31, 2008 12:16 PM