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So read between their lines. Always.
This article seems more carefully written than some I've read on Shelley. For instance, they distinguish between the case against Julie Lee, and Shelley's actions. Shelley was driven from office on FALSE charges of corruption--charges that were never substantiated and which the A.G. refused to pursue.
It was a "swift-boating" if I ever saw one--and just about the ugliest thing I've ever seen happen in California politics. And the reason was that Shelley was onto Diebold. Shelley sued Diebold for their lies about the security of their machines, demanded to see their source code, and decertified the worst of their machines (the touchscreens), prior to the 2004 election. He thus deprived Karl Rove of the easiest tool for stealing votes from Kerry and giving them to Bush, to help pad Bush's manufactured national popular vote total. Shelley also earned the ire of a number of corrupt county election officials who had sold their souls--and our right to vote--to these Bushite election theft corporations. He withheld the "Help America Vote Act" funds from these officials, for purchase of the decertified Diebold machines--and this became one of the phony charges--termed "misuse of HAVA funds"--that were leveled against him in the corporate news monopoly press. One of those corrupt officials--Connie McCormack of Los Angeles, the leader of the gang of mostly Republican election officials who hated Shelley--testified to a CA legislative committee that she wanted to "bulldoze the Secretary of State's office" to get that money. (McCormack is an advocate of paperless voting and a Diebold shill--who does sales brochures for Diebold, and whose best friend was Diebold's chief salesperson for California.)
The worst part of this story is the corruption and cowardice of the state Democratic Party leadership--who colluded with Bushites, Diebold, Schwarzenegger and these corrupt election officials--to drive Shelley from office, while other better Democrats hid under their desks. It was appalling.
With the entire force of the Evil Empire coming down on his head, and Democrats stabbing him in the back, Shelley resigned, in Feb. '05. He resigned for two reasons, as I understand it: 1) He had no money for lawyers (he's POOR--tells you something about Shelley), and the Bushite federal "Election Assistance Commission" (an extremely corrupt body) was threatening a "deep" investigation (tying him up, like they tied up Bill Clinton, with an endless, debilitating witch-hunt), and 2) He couldn't do his job under these circumstances.
With the collusion of the Democratic leadership in the state legislature, Schwarzenegger then APPOINTED a REPUBLICAN and a Diebold shill, Bruce McPherson, to be our Secretary of State. (Shelley was an elected Democrat--elected in '02.) McPherson then RE-certified Diebold touchscreens (--one of the means used to steal the CA-50 special election, Bilbray/Busby), and proceeded to undo all of Shelley's reforms.
It was something of a miracle that Debra Bowen could get elected under these circumstances--and toss McPherson out of office. I have little doubt she won by a landslide (more than the secretly tabulated Diebold/ES&S total). In her case, and I'm sure in others across the country, it looks like the voters overwhelmed the machines. (TIA has now shown that Rove likely based the fraudulent e-voting programming code on the wrong polls--too early--and also that the code likely has to be pre-programmed and is not so easy to change on election day, to meet changing circumstances. (The Repubs took a nosedive in opinion polls close to the election.) In other words, the big Democratic win was a miscalculation, pointing to the need for the bad guys to pre-program the fraud. Also, TIA maintains that the midterms were indeed hacked, and he estimates that the Democrats should have won 40 to 50 seats in Congress, rather than 30. It should have been a landslide. See: www.TruthIsAll.net.)
I would say, in judging Debra Bowen's actions now, to be acutely aware of this history. She is walking a minefield. And, although the political climate has certainly changed--on election reform and all other issues--we need to watch this woman's back, and we need to provide her with strong public support. She is just about the ONLY politician/election official in the country for whom I would cut any slack on this issue. If she starts with the optiscan compromise*, fine. I'll go with that. I want her career to be a long and successful one, and I want her to stay in office.
Yes, this is giving in to bullying and corruption, to some extent. In her case--given the danger she is in, and her courageous candidacy--I think we must go with incremental change--if that's how she wants to proceed. On the Democratic Party as a whole--no. The Party--in California and nationally--needs to do an about-face on this issue. NO "secret code" anywhere in our election system! HAND-COUNT paper ballots, and post the results locally BEFORE any electronics are used. They can keep the machines, temporarily, and use them merely for double-checking the handcount, and for storage/reporting of data. Or go with open source code. But the voting process and the counting of the votes must be done in a way that EVERYONE can understand and monitor. That should be the official Democratic Party position--providing strength in numbers, bolstering election reform, and providing protection for honest election officials around the country.
It is BECAUSE of the cowardice and corruption of the Democratic Party that the Shelley was driven from office. The Party needs to make amends, and recover its own reputation as the party of the people and of good government. (And some day it needs to explain how Bushite corporations "counting" all our votes with "trade secret" programming benefited Democrats and the American people.)
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*(Touchscreens, bad. Optiscans, good. Reward the criminals at Diebold and ES&S with more multi-million dollar contracts. Keep "trade secret" programming (in voting machines and central tabulators), and corporate control of election results, with a solid paper ballot backup, so we can (maybe) catch them when they steal our elections. This seems to be the Democratic Party's position. It is the "safe" position, vis a vis the Corporate Rulers. Bowen, however, should be urged to hedge this position round with much stronger safeguards--and she is likely to be responsive to the public and to good government arguments. A much stronger automatic audit. (100% would be good.) Make recounts easier. Enforce the voters' right to a paper ballot option. Handcounting of Absentee Ballot and other paper ballot votes. Escrow the "trade secret" programming in every election (so that it's available for investigation.) Etc. Also, she held hearings on open source code, and should be encouraged to pursue it.)
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