BBV: Results of investigations so far (new material)

[BevHarris]

Yes, we know there's been a trashfest going on. We've been working, haven't had time to play in that sandbox.

As many of you know, we've embarked on a 14-state investigation. Yup, it's like a box of chocolates -- ya never know what you're gonna get. We've got several new pieces of information about the voting issue. I think some of them may foster discussion, so I'll post each within this thread as a mini-thread.

We have made many, many visits. Thanks, Bob Urosevich, who threatened Andy Stephenson by saying:

"If you don't back off, you're gonna get a visit!" (???)

That gave us the idea to make visits of our own -- to the Diebold programmers -- and it was during that trip, last December, that we found the five felons. Yes, tinfoilhatprogrammer will correct me -- actually it was four felons and a guy who was ordered to pay over $600,000 in restitution for defrauding investors. That may have been a civil judgement, not a felony.

At any rate, we now know: hardly any media outlets are providing the budget for any investigative reporter to go make visits. As you'll see, just 10 days' visits produce a surprising amount of information -- and so many new leads we haven't had time to scratch the surface.

We had hoped to meet many more of you in our travels, but were surprised at the richness of the information, and have often stayed longer to develop leads, so we haven't gotten to some of you yet.

We'll be writing up the information into a new book, "Black Box Shuffle" -- as before, posted free online chapter by chapter before going to trade paperback. All proceeds go to the nonprofit Black Box Voting -- the new consumer protection organization for voting.

Thanks,

Bev Harris and Andy Stephenson

[LittleApple81]

1. Thanks again Bev. n/t

[BevHarris]

43. THE SHORT VERSION OF 9 NEW STORIES

1. Lucky us. "The New Diebold" is being unveiled today.

2. Odd payments. Why would a voting company pay $144,000 to the Georgia Lottery? Why is the Republican Committee paying Diebold?

3. VoteHere expanding its tentacles -- with Diebold. It's already got Sequoia, and similar "vote verification" strategies are in Advance Voting Solutions and, now, TrueVote.

4. Diebold is struggling with its ability to manage the upcoming election -- labor dispute and a possible strike at the place printing all 12 million ballots

5. Getting rid of the pollbook is becoming a reality. It has been indicated now in California, Cleveland and Maryland.

6. Tippecanoe Indiana had some problem with Diebold that has caused them to refuse to pay $600,000. Diebold may have sold some used stuff from Canada as "new"

7. Thousands of temporary workers coming to run voting computers at an election near you this fall

8. Some employees contend that Diebold is firing them when they get an expensive diagnosis. Because it self insures, the risk management policies at this company may bear watching.

9. The first ever interview with Shawn Southworth -- and yes, it's on video. It will make a real impact on any remaining faith in certification.

We've got a lot of work to do. We're off again. We've been developing information on the money trail that is still being held close to the vest.

Our biggest concern -- and prediction: The American public is going to be provided with a "solution" which is a digital verification of the vote. This may be triggered by a meltdown with paper ballots. It may be endorsed by a number of prominent computer scientists.

Bev

[Eric J in MN]

80. California should use paper pollbooks because it' will only

California should use paper pollbooks because it will only allow electronic voting machines which print paper ballots to do so behind glass.

That means the machines can be programmed to print phony ballots (stuff the ballot box) and the electronic sign-in can be rigged to match the number of phony ballots.

[papau]

2. Lou Dobbs reported that one half of one percent of BBV will have paper

trails in the 2004 election!

This was followed by the BBV folks saying that it was too late to change anything for this election.

And that was followed by presentation that the only stop gap measure for 2004 was to get the states to allow paper ballot on request.

Is the above the actual situation?

Thanks

[BevHarris]

5. "The BBV folks" never said it was too late for this election

At one point Dr. Dill, Avi Rubin and so forth did but in the Voter Panel meeting in April their cohort, Cindy Cohn from EFF, demanded a paper "trail" by this November.

According to Dr. Dill, Cindy Cohn is on the board of directors of Verified Voting. According to Cindy Cohn, Dr. Dill and Avi Rubin are clients of EFF. Will Doherty from EFF took the position of executive director of Verified Voting. Also, Verified Voting has its office in EFF's office space. Therefore, I usually refer to these organizations as "Verified Voting / EFF"

Other Verified Voting board members include Dr. Dill and his wife, Dr. Barbara Simons, and Kevin Zeese of TrueVoteMD.org.

I think Dr. Dill has backed off from the "nothing can be done before November" theme but I think they are absolutely looking at technology solution rather than an audit and a paper ballot.

Black Box Voting (BBV) has always taken the position that we can and must get voter verified paper BALLOTS by November.

Bev

[Fud]

191. LoL geezus

First off you don't know anything it runs on fedora which is a redhat offshoot.You are calling bart a mole?What is your problem or mental malfuction?You don't even have a clue what linux is let alone anything to do with programming.

I was asked to post this here cause it was so demented.Since when does yada yada qualify for anything?

You said you were leaving but i doubt it really.And i doubt Fertik wants anything to with do with you anymore.

Glad you are leaving,try coast to coast they will gladly take you in with all the UFO cropcircle crowd.

Subject: Is bartcop a mole? Think about this...
Date: 08/13/2003 12:14 AM
From: Bev Harris <edit>
To: edit

The dept of Homeland Security warned of a worm this week. There is a
tinfoil thread on DU. I almost posted this morning, when they announced
immediately that Bartcop had a worm and to download certain stuff due to
the Windows flaw yada yada...I'll tell you why.

Bartcop is on linux. How do I know? I don't know for sure, but I'm
pretty sure. When I was told by Bob Fertik to send files to fud, he had
me send them there and he specifically said it took awhile to configure
the ftp because it was linux.

Just wondering...

Bev

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

3. Thank YOU

for having the courage to do this. You are true journalists.

[BevHarris]

4. 1. THE "NEW DIEBOLD" TO BE UNVEILED JULY 15

Thanks to documents provided to Black Box Voting:

According to the "New Diebold" Marketing Plan, a bit of a face lift is going on and will be announced tomorrow.

They are going to provide a new image. They want to brand this
"New DESI" with new products and -- drum roll -- the new "verifier component." (A VoteHere type thing?)

They are going to call the new touch screen software "Assure." (sounds like an adult incontinence product, but okay...)

They are considering calling it "VeriVote" or "VoteCheck"

They were planning to announce this July 11 -- we didn't hear anything, did you?

"The release of the new component will be matched up to DESI interpretation of the basic standards of the voter verification component. It would be offered as an option for those who feel the initial need for a backup while they gain comfort. And, due to Diebold's extraordinary innovations in continually perfecting touch screen technology, Diebold will evolve the verification component to display more languages and other imporvements as required by federal or state standards. We will, indeed, submit the component for qualification at the federal level in the near future."

They will market the "New DESI" at IACREOT and NASS.

Mark Radke is coordinating the packages. "In putting the conference exhibition together, we recommend a large, smkilikng and confident staff to dominate the conference."

They will demonstrate the Assure software -- "seeing is believing" they say.

- Change supervisor PIN number
- Change data encryption key
- Voter card key changed to show security.

"Photos, combined with inspirational narrative and music tracks, will create a sense of pride and respect for how eeply valued the right to vote is in the U.S."

================

Well, this is nice. But let's move on to the more interesting stuff. The "New DESI" -- has that I Love Lucy sound, doesn't it?

DESI: You gotta lotta 'splainin' to do.

More posted in next mini thread.

Bev Harris and Andy Stephenson

[alfredo]

9. good work.

I saw your image there in the Texas state house. The crowd there seemed to appreciate what you had to say.

[Elidor]

35. The sad thing is, a 1st-year student with Visual Basic could do better

But these guys are all about the marketing of an illusion. They're following the Gates business model.

[BevHarris]

42. A computer question for hardhead, or anyone else:

As I understand it, using Visual Basic scripts can be considered using an interpretive language (computer terminology, not linguistic terminology). Interpretive language in voting machines is specfically prohibited by FEC guidelines.

When I asked certifier Shawn Southworth about this, he seemed unsure as to whether Visual Basic scripts could be considered an interpretive language, and he was also unsure as to whether the FEC guidelines prohibit this.

I didn't ask follow up questions because I don't feel well schooled enough to know what constitutes an interpretive language in computer programming.

Bev

[GAspnes]

55. VB is a byte-code language

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;109382

ACC: Visual/Access Basic Is Both a Compiler and an Interpreter

Microsoft.com, "Visual Basic Interpreter" returns 3 articles discussing the nature of VB. It is important to note that there is "Visual Basic" and "Visual Basic for Applications (VBA)", the VB built in to Access, Word and Excel.

[AussieInCA]

56. Windows Script Component

VBScript are scripts that are interpretive (i.e. they are not compiled code such as C,C++)

From MS:
In your script component file, you define the properties, methods, and events you want to expose, and the Automation handler makes sure they are called correctly when the host application needs them.

Your script component file (an .wsc file). Script component files are XML (Extensible Markup Language) files that contain information about what type of COM component you want to create (that is, what interface handlers you want to use). Then, depending on what functionality the handler makes available, you write script in your script component to implement those interfaces.


They shouldn't be using scripts and should rewrite them as compiled code, otherwise a hacker can open scriptfile.wsc in notepad,change the values within it under a minute and corrupt the system.

[harmonyguy]

62. VB, VBScript, VBA, VB-winCE,

Here it is, (clear as mud), the definitive guide.....;)

Visual Basic version 5.0 and above
link1
"By default, applications created in Visual Basic are compiled as interpreted or p-code executables. At run time, the instructions in the executables are translated or interpreted by a run-time dynamic-link library (DLL). The Professional and Enterprise editions of Visual Basic include the option to compile a native code .exe. In many cases, compiling to native code can provide substantial gains in speed over the interpreted versions of the same application; however, this is not always the case."

VB-Script
link2
"An interpreted, object-based scripting language that is a subset of the Microsoft Visual Basic programming language."

Visual Basic for Windows CE
"Because a Visual Basic program for Windows CE is not an executable module (a .vb file is interpreted by the Pvbload.exe run-time engine), your .vb application file must be listed in the FILES section."
link3

Visual Basic for Applications (VBA)
no option for native code compilation - as best as I can tell, it uses pseudocode or pcode which is then interpreted at run time.

[althecat]

88. It is definitely an interpretative language..

It also happens to be the script language most commonly used for viruses, hacks and back doors.

[Joanne98]

152. I'd like to hear more about Shawn Southwood.

He was the only funny part of the story.

[foo_bar]

209. what are the FEC guidelines?

[nostamj]

6. hi guys!

the BBV PSA bossa nova *bit* in the revue got a big laugh (of recognition) last night....

people know about this issue!

rock on!

[BevHarris]

8. I'm hoping we MIGHT be able to catch your show in August

Hope that will work. Dying to see you again.

Bev

[nostamj]

11. me too! hope you can...

but, if things keep going well, we'll continue the run as long as we can draw audiences!

[BevHarris]

7. 2. A COUPLE INTERESTING PAYMENTS TO AND FROM DIEBOLD

I don't know what these are :shrug:

From the Diebold Open Payables Register:

Diebold is supposed to pay $144,000 to: Lottery Services of Georgia ES *h*

I called. The name I was given was "Georgia Lottery Corporation" at the state of Georgia. They said there was no other lottery related group. Perhaps he just didn't know.

Lottery Services of Georgia is not a state organization, but a "public private" organization. Am looking at this more.

================

Another interesting payment was a $1250 payment from the Republican Committee. I think this may be a monthly fee.

This is a payment from the Republican Committee to Diebold.

=================

There are many more leads here.

Diebold seems to be having a morale problem, and has told its employees not to talk to the press -- or to their friends -- or to their families -- or in public places -- but we were given referral after referral -- over 40 in total, and so far, not a single one has refused to talk to us. They willingly answer questions and, as they did in Canada, often invite us to the patio or dining room table.

Bev and Andy

[alfredo]

10. Sounds like they have issues with labor

If you treat your workers like crap, there is a greater chance of sabotage and theft. Their loss, our gain.

You are not going to rat out a boss that treats you well.

[Andy_Stephenson]

12. Here is some original documentation

the Georgia Payment can be found here.

What could it be??? :shrug:

Andy

[Joanne98]

161. This is not good

Lottery Services of Georgia is not a state organization, but a "public private" organization. Am looking at this more.

Nobody knows how evil the PPP's (public and private partnerships) are than the anti-globalization activists. They had spys in one of the G8's global meetings an got information on the 2005 GATTS agreement. We have GATT (global agreement on tariffs and trade) next year we get GATTS. The S stands for services. Example.(I made this one up myself) Say "the French" have a private security company and they want to bid on the contract to provide security for Los Angeles. The French want to replace the LA Sheriffs Department and run the jails. If LA has contracted any work out to US private companies. (example: Paid McDonalds to supply meals for small jails) and it amounted to more than 2% of their budget. Then "The French" could bid on the contract. If LA refuses than they can be SUED through the WTO. Now, I haven't been up on this issue for awhile. Because it's so depressing but I started 2 threads Wednesday on the DAMN Australian Trade deal being passed in Congress and not one person at DU posted on the thread.
Anyway this means ,to me, this is a BIGGER issue. If you want to give yourself nightmares type CUPE (Canada Union Public Employees) or something like that. They gone through HELL fighting the PPP's. In otherwords the PPP's are Trojan horses designed to be used to destroy all public jobs everywhere in the world, to be used after GATTS becomes law. Diebold could stall for another couple of years then get one of their friends to sue from another country then ZAP your in the WTO and your finished. I would suggest you set your google news alert to articles on the Australian trade deal just passed YESTERDAY in the Senate supported by the DLC. Thank you traitor Democrats. Common Dreams just put out a piece. I haven't read it yet because. It's too depressing. Good luck.

[vetwife]

218. I am looking at this too....State of Georgia is supposed to be

the only Lottery group recognized as a Raffle.Gamble that is legal in the State. If there is a private organization..they are doing it against the law. Not that Georgia has big law enforcement for people who want fair elections but, again what does one do when the 11th Circuit is r-winged and the only hope would be Thurbert Baker the Attorney General? He and Purdue are enemies. This organization falls under the Rico Act and this is a bigger discovery that one knows., if not State funded.

Cathy Cox? Who knows..I know McKinney through a liason has said that Cox was a sell out like Zell. Inform me...Please ..As I think the whole Macavelian thing is being orchestrated right here in Ga. Not tin foil hat thinking but logic. We had the Sea Island, We have all the bases, the biggest contributor and Ralph Reid ..Now we got the Diebold scheme being funded by an organization that may or may not exist. We have Zell setting up shop. We have Ollie down here all the time. We have people who should otherwise not have money, having money. I don't get it. but It sure bears investigating !

[BevHarris]

13. 3. VOTEHERE AND DIEBOLD AND MARYLAND AND OTHERS

We were given a number of communications between Diebold, LInda Lamone of Maryland, and VoteHere.

(By the way, while I was typing this my computer was shut down and had to reinstall software to get back online.)

1. Note to Linda Lamone from Jim Adler: "I received your letter dated May 20 to Diebold Election Systems President Bob Urosevich concerning
your request for VoteHere's VHTi integration into Diebold's Accuvote- TS for use in an upcoming pilot project. ... With the combined efforts of Maryland, Diebold and VoteHere, we can implement a successful plan to restore confidence to your voters.

"We clearly understand that time is short, and it is imperative to demonstrate alternatives to the voter-verified paper ballot."

2. A hand written note had a little bit of info on it -- Andy will post it online so you can view it. It says "Avi Rubin - maybe a convert / supporter" with a star next to it.

Bear in mind that this may just be a salesman blowing smoke.

It is dated 6/14.

[Andy_Stephenson]

14. But...but...but...

say it aint so Vote Here? Paper trails??? :shrug:

[Andy_Stephenson]

32. The link seems to be broken so......

Here

[Hubert Flottz]

15. It seems to me that if the GOP could put a hold on the election

in November because of a Terra-ist threat, then we could hold up the election until we are sure it will be fair!

[Andy_Stephenson]

20. Oh I almost forgot.....

Here is the letter from to Linda Lamone. :shrug:

[RedEagle]

36. Monopolistic control of the vote auditing system?

"VoteHere- in every machine in America, insuring your vote is audited the way WE want it, so that no physical evidence will ever exist, so you don't have to worry about it."

Oh yeh, I feel better.


http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2004-06-03-tenet_x.htm

Robert Gates, BOD of Vote Here, appointed CIA director by G. H.W. Bush, Nov. 6, 1991-Jan. 20, 1993


http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0206-10.htm

During his tenure at the CIA, Studeman was well respected among analysts. In contrast to a number of other senior officials, ''Studeman was an honest man'', said Goodman, whose public charges that former CIA chief Robert Gates had slanted assessments of Soviet power and intentions in the late 1980s created a sensation in Washington.


http://www.americanpolitics.com/20010220Iraqgate.html
The Teicher Affidavit

"Howard Teicher, who served on Reagan's National Security Council staff, offered an affidavit in the Teledyne case that declared that CIA director William J. Casey and his deputy, Robert M. Gates, 'authorized, approved and assisted' delivery of cluster bombs to Iraq through Cardoen (In These Times, 3/6/95)." Years earlier, during his 1991 confirmation hearings for Bush's CIA Director, "Gates denied under oath that he had played a role in Cardoen cluster bomb sales to Iraq, as arms dealers had charged. Teicher's affidavit provides new evidence that Gates misled the Senate." The government promptly sealed the Teicher affidavit as a "state secret".
(FAIR: "Iraqgate -- Confession and Cover-up")


Oh yeh, I want people of this caliber with the company that will tell you your vote was recorded just hunky-dory.

Not

[BevHarris]

16. 4. "CRITICAL ISSUES" -- POSSIBLE MELTDOWN OF 12 MILLION BALLOTS

It seems that Diebold will be printing all its optical scan ballots and all its absentee ballots in one location (plus two small ancillaries).

Well, this is 12 million ballots, a mission critical task, deadline driven, all the eggs in one main basket with no backup.

But check this out -- multiple sources confirmed: Labor issues with the printing plant have reached a very high level of tension. The employees are trying to unionize and may strike.

According to a document we were given by another source:

"approximately 12 million ballots to be printed for general election. Production to be done at Everett and 2 print extension partners. Details of printing plan still being worked.

- Central Valley presort extension partner legal issues
- Capacity at Paramount Miller
- Everett labor issues.

Organization experienced turmoil as a result of departure of John Elder.

- David Ashworth, Andy Henderson and team are the right people in the right roles.
- Organization will be first in DESI to implement 100% drug testing
- Organization has initiated background checks
- Management team is anticipating fallouts to occur and is prepared to handle

"We received notice from NLRB (National Labor Relations Board) that shop employees wanted to vote on joining with Teamsters Local 38.

Risk reduction plan being developed in case of employee strike

================

"Morale is very low across the organization and company.
- press issues
- headcount reductions
- work load
- stress

"may jeopardize our effectiveness to execute through November

==============

(nevertheless, they seem to be taking on something new....ES&S was denied the South Carolina contract bid it had won, and two senators recommended criminal prosecution of the state's HAVA board over this. Now Diebold hopes to sell to SC:

"South Carolina
-Will be an extremely fast track implementation if we are successful in the bid process
- will strain limited SME resource pool
will require strong PMO support from Sogeti for PHase 1
- Will be a tremendous challenge

===========

"Capacity for general election is a concern is a concern. HOwever, we did increase staff by one in late 2003"

[AP]

44. I hope governments using Diebold optical scan ballots are reading this.

[Joanne98]

163. Is all the work being done in the US?

Or is it outsourced.

[BevHarris]

17. #5. Maryland contract -- is this truth in packaging?

We met with many sources who have a high level of access. One was intimately familiar with the Maryland contract deal.

"Bobby" (Bob Urosevich) reportedly has been jonesing to get rid of the pollbook (the sign in sheets that are compared to see that the # of voters matches the # of votes cast). We learned, in a transcript from Cleveland, that it is Diebold's desire to digitalize the poll book that caused the machines to melt down in California -- when they replaced voter card encoders with the new ones, designed to eliminate the poll book (did they tell this to elections officials? Who knew this? When?) -- well, those new units malfunctioned.

In Maryland, Diebold apparently also wants to get rid of the pollbook. Here, they sold electronic pollbooks under the term "inventory control modules" or some such term. The contract leaves a wide open gate for purchase of thousands of these.

Bev and Andy

[BevHarris]

18. #6. TIPPECANOE AND BBV TOO? AND -- SELLING USED UNITS AS NEW?

Andy will be posting links to a couple memos given to us regarding problems ...


Apparently Tippecanoe IN has refused to pay Diebold due to problems, and a bunch of units sent back to Diebold from -- what was it, Canada-- seem to have been resold as new.

Bev Harris

[Andy_Stephenson]

24. Those silly Canadians....

Cant tell the new from the

Why won't pay? :shrug:

[harmonyguy]

70. Silly Canadians???????

Harumph, harumph, harumph !!!!!!

At least we still know how to use a pencil and a ballot.

:eyes:

[Andy_Stephenson]

82. Not you Harmony Guy

those in particular in Vancouver.

:yourock:

[BevHarris]

19. #7: THOUSANDS OF TEMPS TO BE HIRED -- INSIDE ACCESS?

There is considerable controversy amongst Diebold employees about this. First, some are angry that Diebold has let go qualified, skilled, and trained people to hire new temps. Others are concerned about quality control, calling the temporary contractors "those idiots." Some in management are having problems getting basic information on who the hell these people are. No one seems to know if they've ever been background checked.

Various sources put the influx of temps planned for this fall at 1,000, 5,000 or 10,000 -- some based on knowledge of budget and hiring plans, others based on past experience.

Our question: Is turning over computer access to thousands of temps a really great idea? Who even knows the names of these people?

Bev and Andy

[AP]

45. Trojan Horse.

This reminds me of the way that one company had all their secrets released on the www and then tried to get people arrested.

My theory at that time was that they might have put it on the web intentionally so that they could plausibly deny a connection with whomever might use their operating software/hardward to hijack elections. They could always say, "hey, they must have stolen the info they needed from the internet."

[Joanne98]

164. Your worrying about the WRONG Trojan Horse

What she really has to worry about is the connection to a PPP. (public and private partnership) This could throw her lawsuit into INTERNATIONAL TRADE LAW. Where as of the last time I checked, no human has ever won against a corporation. Now I know why TFHP is so CONFIDENT.

[Joanne98]

165. Have they outsourced?

I know the state of CA has outsourced goverment jobs. Ah-nold is getting Hell for this right now. I wonder if the goverment agency's dealing with elections have outsourced ANYTHING. Remember just 2% of the budget and that uncludes outsourcing in the US. PPP warning.

[BevHarris]

21. DIEBOLD SELF INSURES. HOW AGGRESSIVELY DOES IT CUT RISKS?

We were surprised to run across two Diebold employees in one week who said they had been cut immediately after a devastating (and very expensive) diagnosis. This was really sad. They felt that they were terminated because their health insurance coverage was too expensive -- at first, I did not find this credible -- but then we discovered that Diebold apparently self insures and employs its own risk managers.

Of course, it is illegal to control health insurance benefits by terminating people who get sick. The last several people we asked did not know of anyone this happened to. We happened to hit two people almost right in a row that had this experience, though.

Bev

[GOPisEvil]

22. If you get the chance to see Bev and Andy, do it!!!

You won't be sorry!

It was great meeting you both! Thanks for coming to Texas! :thumbsup:

[greatauntoftriplets]

23. Thanks guys for all your work!!

Are you singing Willie Nelson's classic "On the Road Again"?

[Andy_Stephenson]

26. Indeeed we are...

n/t

[oasis]

25. Your efforts have helped turn the national spotlight on this issue.Thanks

[BevHarris]

27. #9: AN INTERVIEW WITH SHAWN SOUTHWORTH

Yes, folks, this is the guy who certifies our central tabulator. He has refused so far to provide his credentials, answers on what he does, or much of any information at all to the press.

We obtained two face to face interviews with him -- that is, until he caught Andy snapping photos inside Ciber lab and bodily threw him out. I wanted to snap a 35mm shot of Andy's bruise, but didn't get the shot and now the bruise is yellow.

Okay, here is a snippet from Shawn's first interview -- over an hour, the second was one-half hour:

Interview with Shawn Southworth
Ciber Inc.
July 2 2004

BBV: I'm looking for Shawn Southworth...That's you? Hi, I've just got a couple questions I'd like to find out, I've just read that ... you apparently said that you're the one that should be doing this and that it's probably not a good idea for other labs to start certifying voting machines because you know what you are doing and my question is, could we get any kind of a resume or any kind of information on what you do to test them...because you're the only one who can do it?

SS: (chuckles). Ah, that's probably company policy I don't know. You'd like my resume?

BBV: We'd like your credentials to do this for the United States.

SS: You'd like my resume?

BBV: Yeah. That'd be great, that would be great. We'd like your resume.

SS: It's not me that does it. It's Ciber, Ciber's the one in control. That's who you guys want...

BBV: No, no it's actually you. You're name is on all the documents and having talked to the -- and actually it's right here in Huntsville is it not?

SS: Well, yeah, but that's because I work here.

BBV: You don't certify them?

SS: unintelligible

BBV: I know, I mean NASED. You don't test them and write the report?

SS: Yeah, I do that.

BBV: The SAIC report which has the 328 flaws, 26 deemed critical, how did they get by you?

SS: The SAIC, the report that they put out, it was done before we did the testing.

BBV: The testing on...?

SS: The Diebold software that they reviewed

BBV: Oh, so they looked at it before you looked at it? What version was it?

SS: How would I know what version, because I never saw it?

BBV: Well I don't understand how you would know it's before you looked at it because you had actually passed some Diebold things through already by then.

SS: No.

BBV: You did not pass GEMS 1.17.17?

SS: Yes.

BBV: So how do you know they didn't look at GEMS 1.17.17?

SS: Impossible.

BBV: Why?

SS: Because I certified it.

...

===============

we are literally running from morning until midnight, and when we get our breath we'll publish the entire transcript. One of my favorite parts was when he said "the vendors don't like it" when he puts anything negative in the report -- a response to a question about how he could certify a system that accepts negative votes. There's quite a bit of material here.

Even the New York Times was unable to get him to talk to them -- but in we walked, right before 4th of July weekend when no receptionist was there to buffer.

Thanks folks, and I'm going to bed. Been up for 36 hours -- also did the July 13th paper ballot rally with Common Cause, True Majority, Verified Voting etc and did a wonderful fund raiser (thanks!!!!! -- we've got our next leg funded!) and a CNN-fn interview this morning.

Best to you all,

Bev Harris

[Andy_Stephenson]

28. Kick...

and the hits keep on coming.

[grasswire]

29. drum roll........

....for Bev and Andy -- American heroes.

[BevHarris]

30. Nope. We meet the American heroes every day

We're toting one American hero around with us on this trip -- because both Andy and I tend to be recognized, we need an incognito.

I can hardly wait to break the news of who she is. You'll LOVE her. She has really earned her stripes on this trip, not to mention making us laugh ourselves silly.

And the American heroes who come to us to tell us what is really going on, at the risk of losing their jobs -- obviously, the documents referenced in this thread have much to do with real Americans who don't want their democracy to evaporate.

Andy does what I call "Johnny Applevoter." He talks the BBV issue to everyone he meets -- gas station employees. The guy cleaning out the closet at the motel. The desk clerk. The waiter. The windshield repairman.

Andy was eloquent yesterday in Austin.

American heroes are all over the place. It's the assholes who want to remove all transparency (the minority) who motivate the heroes.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT:

Andy and I have been talking about this. Many signs indicate that there will be efforts to cause a paper ballot fiasco, to pave the way for VoteHere and nontransparent solutions. But we couldn't figure out how.

He just called me. Hmmm...create such shit conditions for your employees that you have the people in your (single) ballot printing plant for the whole USA go on strike. We need to let the U.S. know about this so the media can embarrass Diebold into having a Plan B ballot printer.

Andy's another American hero.

Bev

[hunter]

31. Sandbox???

Yes, we know there's been a trashfest going on. We've been working, haven't had time to play in that sandbox.

Is that the way adults talk? (Well, maybe in the Bush Administration, but we all know they are not adults.)

Nevertheless Bev, why didn't you simply say something like: "We know there's been a huge controversy about the qui tam announcement, but we've been very busy and haven't had time to address those issues here yet."

You, with your excellent verbal skills, could probably come up with something even better than that!

Go for it.

[BevHarris]

34. Yes. Sandbox.

We are talking about people who are all bluster and no delivery.

David Allen -- if he is honest, here you go: David, post your sales reports (the ones I haven't gotten nor has the board of directors for Black Box Voting). Post 'em anywhere. Show us your sales.

Post the payments you have made to me and/or the nonprofit.

Folks, this guy talks a good game and sobs a sad story. But he never typeset the book (I did); he didn't send it to print (until I sent my own version to print, forcing his hand); he didn't fulfill his Amazon.com orders, and after I'd done the PR for seven articles in the New York Times, a Time Magazine article, and much more, to get public awareness of the issue, he sold only 18 books on Amazon -- not because there were no orders, but because he did not fulfill.

He sent no sales reports (required in the contract every month) for three months -- after receiving a demand letter from my attorney, he sent one set of reports, which proved to be erroneous, and omitted two out of every three people from Democratic Underground who were kind enough to let me know they'd bought from him.

He sent no royalty checks (required by the contract).

To date the only accounting from David Allen has been Jan-Feb-Mar (and only after a lawyer's demand). We still do not have April, May, June or July. Since I turned all revenues over to the nonprofit, which I do not control, he is cheating the nonprofit, not me.

I think the board would agree that we would be delighted to have David Allen publicly post his sales reports for Black Box Voting -- anywhere. He's been pocketing the money, folks. We have yet to receive a single monthly royalty check (required by the contract) and it has now been SEVEN MONTHS.

David Allen did not write three chapters. He wrote 11 pages of a 256 page book. Part of that I did not want (the "David Allen" solution") but he threw a tantrum when I told him that, so to keep the peace, I left the dumb thing in. I'd be delighted to eliminate it.

He did not typeset the book. That is the publisher's job. It can't go to print until it is typeset. I had to do that. He never reimbursed me.

He did not print the book in a timely manner. Finally, I borrowed money and printed my own version, and then he printed his book.

He did not distribute the book. It takes 48 hours to list it on Amazon.com but he took 3 months. Then, when he got Amazon orders, he did not fulfill them. After four months, he had fulfilled only 18 books on Amazon.com (I have screen shots of the Amazon report of delinquency).

He did not send any accounting of his sales.

When he received a letter from my lawyer, he omitted a large percentage of his sales on his report.

He still did not pay.

I turned his revenues over to the nonprofit and he still has not sent any accounting or payment to the board.

As for the Qui Tam: Reading comprehension is a good thing, folks.

We had the opportunity, thanks to brilliant lawyering by Lowell Finley, to file for restitution on behalf of the California taxpayers. IF it prevails an extra bonus will fund the nonprofit organization, which I do not control.

I refused to keep the information in the case secret. We do know that other Qui Tams have been filed, and we do know that other activists suddenly went silent, and we do know that because of a number of things, including the lawyers notes from Diebold's own attorneys, which reference legal actions in Texas, Florida, Georgia and elsewhere.

Hell yes, I'll take a crap shoot and fund a nonprofit with the proceeds. Diebold has to FIRST reimburse the taxpayer and then pay a bounty, and for those who read the press release, it said that if we prevail it WILL fund the nonprofit.

I do not control the nonprofit. I do not receive the funds. The nonprofit has a very lean infrastructure and applies its revenues towards direct action.

Now, as to all those allegations that I accused "Lynn Landes" and "Rebecca Mercuri" "Denis Wright" etc of Qui Tam -- show me. Show anyone. YOu can't back that up. It's bullshit, as much of the "sandbox" was. Never happened. Go pull that stuff, if you claim it happened. Show me a quote that accuses any of the above or shut up.

What we have here is a publisher who doesn't send sales reports, desperately wants people to believe he is a key researcher, stuffs his pockets with the proceeds, then whines about it when his failure to pay is exposed. We then have a couple activists who were unable to produce results in Georgia fussing because I did get results.

Let me tell you who is instrumental: Andy Stephenson.

Where is David Allen's research? Nowhere.

Andy and I have broken story after story, and somehow, not a damn thing came from David Allen after I got fed up and left the guy. Look at results, not words.

Andy and I spent a grand total of nine hours in Georgia and interviewed a key Diebold employee who described the specifics of the kickbacks and the slush fund accounting, and the contract manueverings. And we got a strange specific payment of $144,000 to the Georgia lottery.

Nine hours. Please, tell me what has been exposed (publicly) in NINE MONTHS by some of the people who are complaining the loudest.

I am not going to waste my time going into the archives, but anyone who does will find that my position has been consistent from the get-go: I find Qui Tam to be abhorrent if people gag the evidence because it is a way for corporations to bribe people into silence. Anyone -- in any state, not just California -- can file a Qui Tam and refuse to gag. Why don't they? Why do they accept the gag order, even though it is contrary to public interest? Because they want to maximize their chances of recovery. Whether or not they gag, the taxpayer still recovers.

My attorney, Lowell Finley, found a way to do this without the gag. This is a bonus to whistleblowers everywhere. I chose, though I sure didn't have to, to donate any proceeds from the Qui Tam to the nonprofit, which I DO NOT CONTROL.

So what we have in a nutshell:

1) Allegations that I have "made accusations" that no one has substantiated. Find them. Show me these. I keep seeing these bizarre lists of names. People are making things up. I can't get away with that in my research, and I won't tolerate it here. Put up or shut up. You can't, because it's bullshit.

2) A former publisher who claims he wrote parts of the book that he didn't, who doesn't comply with his contract, doesn't send sales reports, has not sent a single monthly royalty check, and keeps pretending he did all this stuff he never did. If he's so great, WHERE IS HIS CURRENT RESEARCH? IN 10 days Andy and I have produced more than he did in two years. What's he bellyaching about? By my calculations he's made $50,000 out of the book. David Allen: Give an accounting of your payments (hah!). Show what I, the author and the real researcher made (2,000) vs what you made. It's a joke and frankly, disgusting.

3) You've got a bunch of people who distort the facts. I'm not spending two minutes more on this.

For those of you who actually read the sandbox, and stood up for me, I am so very grateful.

I'm not apologizing for some mythical statements that I never made. I'm not apologizing for making (true) statements about indications of Qui Tam in Texas and elsewhere, where people accepted gag orders in conflict with public interest merely to maximize personal gain. I'm not apologizing for taking a crapshoot -- which is all it is -- in order to fund a consumer protection agency that is already kicking ass.

Okay. End of rant. We've got an issue that brings out the best in people, and we will win this fight. I will respond to any specific questions privately, but some of the public posts here are pure bullshit, and those who are inciting this mess know that full well.

By the way, Hunter -- I believe you were saying that YOU (or your associates) found the Diebold files and that you somehow set them there for me to find. What the hell is that?

Keep an open mind, folks. I am working the issue until after the election is over. It makes no sense for me to waste a month going to North Carolina to sue David Allen, nor does it make any sense to waste two minutes calculating some hypothetical amount I MIGHT earn on a Qui Tam. I threw the hat in the ring. It would be simply dumb not to do so. But there is no way the Qui Tam is going to help in the upcoming election, so I'm ignoring it altogether right now.

Who's out there doing stuff RIGHT NOW and who's sitting there yapping? That should give you all the answers you need.

Keep the faith.

Bev

[hunter]

37. Sorry I didn't get back sooner.

I went out for dinner with my wife. It was good to get away from this mess. It is a mess.

You have done a lot of wonderful work Bev and Andy, and yes, you have entirley disrupted your own lives to push this issue out into the sunlight. I deeply respect and admire you for that, and it's good to see you on television and in the newspapers. "There she is!" I tell my family. I've got copies of Vanity Fair and everything.

Most people here, myself included, were not willing to put themselves out like you did. You charged fearlessly up out of the trenches and took a lot of hard hits doing so.... So yeah, I'm sitting here in my little sandbox at home, drinking a glass of Merlot all by myself, while my wife is at work, and my kids are asleep upstairs.

But I'm not going to be delicate with you, Bev. Once again you expose one of your weaknesses. I threw a little tiny pebble into your pond, simply pointing out your name-calling, and I get a huge blast of verbage back, and it's all about you defending yourself.

You don't need to do that--you can wade through stuff you regard as sewage with an easy stride, and do your best not to splash. Every little insult, implied or otherwise, doesn't need to become a mud wrestling match.

You especially don't want to give your real opponents that opportunity. This very minute the DRE makers and their supporters are paying people very good money to figure out how to drag you into a fight and push you under.

I am not your opponent, and a lot of the people you've banged heads with along the way are not your opponents.

I think here on DU especially you don't want any potential supporters thinking this is all a bunch of hot air and noise... That comment by ZombyWoof in the long thread-we-won't-mention was very cutting. These disagreements and flameouts really do make us all look like a damned cult. Generally, people who are in control of a serious situation don't scream at one another like that.

I notice in your blast to me there is one small paragraph about hunter. I assure you I am not trying to steal anything, or trying to claim a single iota of glory or money in this fight. But so far as I know that "banana peel on the dance floor" I was talking about in my letter, way back when, remains a problem. You have another problem if you know who stole the Diebold memos. Maybe somebody else has already told you exactly how these things "happened," and I sort of hope they have. Leaks are good. Maybe you are getting along with the leakers very well, just as you seem to get along with Jim March. If not, you should probably add them to the list of potential allies and supporters you've cast away in your brave quest. They are probably out partying with Marc Perkel.

Here are some of your own words, from your own web site, that are quite telling:

NOTE: A similarly named site (BlackBoxVoting.com) is owned by someone else. That is a commercial site not affiliated in any way with the nonprofit Black Box Voting organization, nor with the founder, investigative journalist Bev Harris.

Okay, I can understand the dispute between you and David Allen, and even the reasons, legal and otherwise, for this little notice. But it's my opinion that in all the nasty breakups you go through you do not think enough about the children. You may have carried this BBV book to term, and you may have kicked David Allen out of the house, but it's still his name on the birth certificate of Black Box Voting. (And yes, mine are the Talion Publishing editions, so you got your money from me...) This is not something you can deny in a little notice on your website. All of us here on DU witnessed the courtship, saw the sonagrams, and received the birth announcements.

The little touches go a long ways -- like saying something nice about your allies even when you are thinking to yourself they are lazy vindictive parasites. Nobody has to be in this fight with you. Some of your allies, if you call them names and sneer at them, will throw their sticks back into your spokes.

That's not my intention here. It would be cool if my own county had these Black Box voting machines, than I could be a great BBV warrior, but they don't. My county's problems are pretty mundane. They lose stuff at the post office, they are understaffed, some of the temps they hire are spooky pod people, etc., etc., but that doesn't stop me from writing letters to Kevin Shelley and my reps, and it's always cool when I make them hammer out some new boilerplate to cover something fresh I came up with.

Peace,

Hunter

(edited for html booboo, etc.)

[yowzayowzayowza]

38. Bravo.

May be a cliche but, attitude is indeed everything.

[BevHarris]

40. Hunter: You've got it wrong.

You've also got it right, in that I shouldn't have responded when so sleep-deprived.

However, it is well known in PR that using the "ignore" strategy on certain types of critics will backfire and cause real damage. There is actually a big body of research on this. Ignoring that unmentionable thread, which is what I did, caused a bunch of DUers to actually believe the factual inaccuracies, which were pretty egregious. Fighting back would have been better, but to do it right, you have to invest a lot of time, which I don't have right now for a DU flame war.

You've bought into some factual inaccuracies yourself, Hunter. I will correct them in a more polite way, but watch: There is no way to correct factual inaccuracies without sounding petty. Yet, the details are what make things true or false.

1. The disclaimer on the .org web site is because we were unable to persuade the other site to properly identify its relationship, and the media keeps calling the .com site "Bev Harris's" site. This happens about twice a week. Also, the commentary there doesn't always mesh with our own position, but because of the way that site is designed, people often think that David's commentary is my own.

2. David Allen did not come up with the idea for the book. The book was suggested to me by Roger Rapoport of RDR Publishing, a long time client who publishes quite a bit of political material. I was also discussing the book with Steven Hertzberg for awhile, and had we struck up a deal it probably would have been published by "The Nation" magazine, but I signed on with David Allen because that deal was taking too long. The book certainly would have happened regardless of whether it was with Plan Nine, RDR, The Nation, or some other publisher.

If I had the thing to do over again, I'd have gone with RDR -- though the Nation and Hertzberg had a lot to bring to the table. That's because I've seen the quality of RDR's work and it's a good solid company that's easy to work with. I was intrigued by David because he has a more irreverant style; had I done the book with RDR there would have been a lot more lawyering, making it more toned down.

The best strategy is probably to leave DU, since it does have flame wars that I don't want to invest the time in fighting.

I thought perhaps another strategy would be to give ya'll a tipoff on what's coming up, by providing new information and documents. I discussed it with the board, and said "let's just do a constructive thread" -- but then I went and read the unmentionable thread and let the emotions and fatigue win, giving a nasty post. Sorry.

I also noticed that no one seems particularly interested in this post.

I'm going to recap it in one post below, because maybe it's too dispersed. If there is no interest then, we'll just focus on mainstream media from here on out.

Bev

[hunter]

49. Thanks.

I wouldn't leave DU because of the flame wars. Those can mostly be avoided (well at least I like to think they can!) and you have generated a lot of interest and activism in the DRE issue here, probably more so than on any of the other political sites. I myself am spread too thin to follow it all, so seeing your posts here on DU is a great convenience to me. My primary interests have always been environmental and energy policy (with occassional religious debates on the side...) which is why I was here on DU. It was the BBV posts on DU that got me involved in DRE voting machine issue. I already knew the DRE machines were bad, but it hadn't yet occured to me just how bad they actually were -- they were very much worse than I had imagined...

I still have some points I'd like to argue (and some matches I'd like to light!) but I know we don't have time for that. I do know that November's election will be an utter disaster if Kerry doesn't win by a landslide. If things go as wrong as I think they might, it will make Florida 2000 look like a scuffle between kids in a kindergarten sandbox.

[yowzayowzayowza]

50. Bev, with all due respect...

You are missing the pattern:

"...but then I went and {BLANK} and let the emotions and fatigue win, giving a nasty {BLANK}. Sorry."

At least you apologized on the spot THIS time.

[Kelvin Mace]

51. Just got back on-line

and it will take a long time to address all of these rehashing of old fabrications and half-truth.

I'll jump on this one though:

1. The disclaimer on the .org web site is because we were unable to persuade the other site to properly identify its relationship, and the media keeps calling the .com site "Bev Harris's" site. This happens about twice a week. Also, the commentary there doesn't always mesh with our own position, but because of the way that site is designed, people often think that David's commentary is my own.

Given that I my name appears at the bottom of every post, I find it hard to imagine people think you wrote it. Also, I avoided disclaimers since I have been trying to avoid making our dispute public and hurting the movement. Now that it is obvious you are looking to cash in, I will be posting a disclaimer as I do not want to be associated with people looking to make a buck off this.

2. David Allen did not come up with the idea for the book. The book was suggested to me by Roger Rapoport of RDR Publishing, a long time client who publishes quite a bit of political material. I was also discussing the book with Steven Hertzberg for awhile, and had we struck up a deal it probably would have been published by "The Nation" magazine, but I signed on with David Allen because that deal was taking too long. The book certainly would have happened regardless of whether it was with Plan Nine, RDR, The Nation, or some other publisher.

This may be true, but when I asked whether you had considered doing a book, you said you had thought about it, but no one you talked to seemed to understand the problem and you were excited at the possibility of having a tech engineer publisher. I told you that if you had no objection being published by a comics publisher, I be happy to publish the book. At the time you said it didn't matter. Of course, that changed over time and you made numerous disparaging remarks about what I published and how it would "damage" your credibility. I offered on at least two occasions to release you from the contract and allow you to take the book elsewhere. I offered at least three times to remove my name from the book when you went on a tirade about proper credit.

I will be posting more evidence as I get the chance.

That aside, one question:

Now that it is proven beyond doubt that NO ONE you accused of filing a 'qui tam' did in fact file such a suit, WHEN WILL YOU APOLOGIZE TO THEM?

Simple question, I and others await a simple answer.

[althecat]

83. This is not an apology.. it looks like one but it is not....

Bev...

I thought perhaps another strategy would be to give ya'll a tipoff on what's coming up, by providing new information and documents. I discussed it with the board, and said "let's just do a constructive thread" -- but then I went and read the unmentionable thread and let the emotions and fatigue win, giving a nasty post. Sorry.

I guess you have checked out now... but the above is not an apology. It may be one to Hunter.. it may even be one to DU for being nasty. But it is not one to David.

You of all people should realise that accusing people of theft is very serious. The post above repeats all the allegations made earlier and seeks a response from those you accuse.

This is much more than a flame war. You have repeatedly made allegations against David. Here and elsewhere.

I think the point Hunter was making was that it is time for this messy public divorce to be resolved in such a way that the children do not end up suffering from Parental Alienation Syndrome.

al

[DWright]

48. What, exactly, is the bullshit?

Bev, you said: "Now, as to all those allegations that I accused "Lynn Landes" and "Rebecca Mercuri" "Denis Wright" etc of Qui Tam -- show me. Show anyone. YOu can't back that up. It's bullshit, as much of the "sandbox" was. Never happened. Go pull that stuff, if you claim it happened. Show me a quote that accuses any of the above or shut up."

I can't "show" you, but I can play it for you. I don't post much on DU, so I can't dig up a post on this forum showing the accusations.

But I recorded one of our long phone conversations, Bev. I still have the tape. Remember that one? It's the one where you accused me and other Georgia activists of filing Qui Tam. That was also the phone conversation, you might recall, where you falsely accused Roxanne of stealing your files from Bev Conover's server...

So, YES, I can prove you falsely accused me and others of filing Qui Tam, and now you are LYING about it. I can ALSO prove that you LIED about Roxanne yanking the files from Bev Conover's server. If you don't stop LYING about it I might be forced to post Bev Conover's statements to me about the situation.

You've also told proveable LIES about both Will Dougherty and Cindy Cohen. Both good activists that you've alienated and slandered through your incredibly paranoia and tendency to fabricate nonsense.

Look, I don't make much fuss on public forums about this stuff because, like it or not, you are wed to this issue in the public eye now, and I don't want to damage the cause. But your blatant LIES about good people must not go unchallenged. It's, frankly, despicable behavior. I wish you'd just stop.

Denis Wright

http://countthevote.org

[hunter]

52. This all has been eating my gut for weeks now...

Last week, when I saw accusations of Bev and Andy's "grandstanding" in an AP article about the California qui tam, I knew this was going to blow up.

Here's the problem--

There's a time bomb set to go off in November. We're the bomb squad.

[redqueen]

54. That's a big problem

Too bad some are more concerned with grinding their axes than they are about the big problem.

[Kelvin Mace]

57. Again,

I don't see anybody dropping the issue to "grind axes".

[redqueen]

58. True

But now the axe-grinding is being played up in the media. Do you think that hurts the cause? I'm not positive... are you?

[yowzayowzayowza]

59. Itz just an immaterial smear.

If not this, they'd work with some other detail.

[redqueen]

60. You're right of course

However handing them ammo seems counterproductive. These differences could be worked out more discretely, no? Or is public shaming a primary goal?

[yowzayowzayowza]

61. My interest is...

..in ending the behavior before it causes some real damage.

[althecat]

75. Too late now... and it is not going to do any real damage...

.. it is more interesting than that. As Trumad says it is like a soap opera... only at a literary level involving the biggest collectively broken news story of all time...

[yowzayowzayowza]

185. I hope your ...

crystal ball is right. One more disgusted...
:kick:

[Kelvin Mace]

66. Tried to work it out quietly

I said absolutely nothing about this on DU or anywhere until Bev went on DU and started trashing me and my company.

[Eloriel]

89. Eggsackly

Bev made MANY of her accusations public.

And on the other thread I outlined what would have been a PR-savvy way for her to reveal this startling qui tam news: privately contact all those she wrongly accused of filing qui tams a day or two before making her press release public, apologize for her false accusations, and mention the wonderful lawyer who found a way to get around the gag rule, and divulge the news of her own qui tam suit.

No, not everyone would have gone for it. However, making amends (by sincerely apologizing goes a long way. Many of us who were wrongly accused don't actually mind the suit (IF if doesn't harm the goals, and that's by no means assured at this point), what we mind is -- well, hell, she hasn't backed off her false accusations YET. Forget an "apology" -- she just wants to keep on keeping on. Pffft.

And now there are some DUers who are suggesting that those of us wronged (and truthfully, I was probably "least" wronged of the bunch) should just shut the fuck up because "it might damage the movement."

WHO is damaging the movement? Those who make scurrilous, irresponsible, hurtful, thoroughly inaccurate and baseless accusations -- and do it PUBLICLY, no less, AND patently refusing to apologize, or those who stand up that shit?

You know what else? I'd like to know why Andy isn't running for SoS any longer. I'd like to know that whole story. I'd also like to know if he's leaving the D half of the ticket empty when by bowing out or if Washington Dems still have anyone who can and will run? (Sure am glad I didn't contribute more than I did - I think I sent $20 early on.)

[ConsAreLiars]

108. Andy was running in the Dem primary - he had an opponent.

Your assumption that he was the only Dem candidate is unfounded and could have been easily checked out before suggesting that withdrawing from the race might leave the Dem side empty.

You should do a little fact checking before making false accusations phrased as questions.

It was clear from the beginning that Andy saw his campaign as an activist's was of bringing attention to BBV issues. He was exceptionally effective in doing so, and I'm glad to have contributed in a small way. He decided he could act still more effectively through participation in bbv-org work, and I think he is right. But even if I disagreed, this is his choice.

As for all the demands for apologies, I don't get it. It doesn't seem like a particularly conciliatory or effective approach to settling whatever feuds are in play here. There is apparently a contract dispute which will presumably settled in or out of court, not by a vote in some chat room. Others claim to have been insulted in private or in a chat room. Arguments sometimes get out of hand, and it is rare that only one side feels hurt. The choice is between continuing to focus on interpersonal issues or working to push forward with the common cause.

[Eloriel]

110. It WAS a question

not an accusation. If I'd have wanted to take my time doing the research, I wouldn't have posed the question. And I THOROUGHLY resent YOUR accusation.

It was clear from the beginning that Andy saw his campaign as an activist's was of bringing attention to BBV issues.

It wasn't all that clear to ME (and I'm betting others) that this was his only goal.

was exceptionally effective in doing so...

Yes, all the more reason I'm disappointed -- and I'm imagining there are a lot of people (judging from his posts on DU about the reception and SUPPORT he received around the state) who have to be surprised if not disappointed as well.

He decided he could act still more effectively through participation in bbv-org work, and I think he is right. But even if I disagreed, this is his choice.

Sure it's his right. No one said otherwise. But when you get people supporting you, a good explanation (preferrably a credible one) is in order.

As for all the demands for apologies, I don't get it.

And frankly I don't care.

[ConsAreLiars]

119. It was more than a question - it was an unjustifiable smear

You know how to use google. If through some strange reasoning process you decided that Andy's withdrawal from the primary race meant there would be zero Dems on the SoS ballot in November, you surely are competent enough to check it out before posting. The fact that you made the accusation (in the oh-so-polite form of a question) here without first doing a minimum of fact-checking is revealing. And, if you have been following this issue closely you would have recalled several comments Andy made regarding his campaign and his Dem opponent (although I realize that reading "everything" on DU is impossible.)

You may want to suggest that this "question" was being asked on DU because you lacked the time or talent to determine on your own that their was no merit to the accusation, but I think you are more competent than that.

I see your groundless accusation (question) about Andy as being more indicative of subjective bias than honest inquiry.

[Eloriel]

144. I'm certainly more competent than that

I didn't want to take the fucking TIME -- as I said.

You're certainly being ultra-defensive about this. And, in truth, we still don't know the whole story, do we?

I think it's very revealing when someone finds a mere question -- whether innocently posed or not -- to be a smear. Very revealing indeed.

Andy certainly has the right to bow out, at any time and for any reason. But I (and no doubt others) have the right to feel just a little jerked around about the whole thing. That's why I'd like to know the whole story. I'd prefer to think better of Andy (again) than I currently do.

[Kelvin Mace]

123. Who writes these people's material?

You should do a little fact checking before making false accusations phrased as questions.

She asked a question. Why do you wish to twist her words and infer something she didn't say?

The choice is between continuing to focus on interpersonal issues or working to push forward with the common cause.

Is there some rule or law I am missing that says we can't do both? Something which prohibits seeking to clear one's name while pursuing activist agendas?

[Kelvin Mace]

122. Andy's not running any more????!!!

When did that happen?

[althecat]

131. Andy's decision was announced when BBV the NGO was set up...

And to be fair to Andy. He was getting the distinct impression that he had a snowball's chance.. even with packed meetings on electronic voting. In statewide primaries the party rarely gets beaten by an outsider with enthusiasm.

[Kelvin Mace]

136. I missed it

but then reading Bev announcements has been very hard in the last few months.

[Kelvin Mace]

64. I haven't spoken to a single reporter

on this matter. Bev has, however, called reporters up that I spoke to on local BBV issues and trashed me. If the issue of BBV is important above all else, why must Bev call up a reporter and try to discredit me?

She has also trashed me to Rachel Konrad at AP.

D.

[Kelvin Mace]

65. Dupe

dupe

[althecat]

76. With respect... if there has been any axe grinding it is being done

...by bev...

Only her axe is so sharp that she has literally cut david's head off several times I have seen several of the occasions.. there are probably others.....

Now today she specifically asks David to put up his evidence.. what else should he do?

And who has the axe?

Finally.. I agree it is a damn shame... this is a fantastic thread she started... and I am thinking of posting its guts on Scoop like I have always done with Bev's fantastic work. Bev is an awesome researcher.

However... while she is on a high. Why does she continue to dump on David. Not to mention Eloriel, David Wright and Roxanne.

[Kelvin Mace]

79. Evidence provided.

Now today she specifically asks David to put up his evidence.. what else should he do?

And I have posted the evidence. Bev's own words saying what she said she never said.

[DWright]

85. Time bomb

hunter said: "There's a time bomb set to go off in November. We're the bomb squad."

I agree.

Getting these machines STOPPED, or at least held accountable, has been my ONLY goal all along. I don't give a rats a** who gets the credit, OR the money.

I don't see Bev as "the Enemy"... But since Bev, for better or worse, is our most public face on this issue, I hate to see her demonizing and lying about other activists. And that is exactly what she has been doing. Bev asked for proof that she'd falsely accused others of doing what she herself has just done and I chimed in to say that I could provide it.

BTW, I did not tape the phone call with Bev for any nefarious reason: I was trying to play "Peacemaker" between Bev and Rox and wanted to be sure to have my facts straight. But for Bev to claim (falsely) that she has not accused me and others of secretly filing Qui Tam was an outrageous lie that had to be corrected. (And, I notice, no reply from Bev since her bluff has been called...)

And it saddens... and infuriates me... to see Bev online, in a public forum, trashing some of the very people who helped her with this issue from the beginning.

I believe that is terribly wrong.

That's one reason I rarely post on DU. Too much "dirty laundry".

Bottom line: We're fighting a multi-billion dollar hydra, and to alienate your allies is just plain stupid. STOP it, Bev! Please! This is not The Bev and Andy Show. It's much bigger than that.

Bev: Stop trashing good activists online. It hurts the cause.

Period.

[althecat]

90. Dwright I agree with you completely....

And I think you have expressed yourself very well.

Till now I have held back from this flame war for the obvious reasons.

But I too find it terribly sad that the quid pro quo for having you around here Bev seems to be that we are expected to let you vent off at David and others who are working very hard for the cause to which we are all committed.

It is indeed time for all of this to stop... to that end I will be posting some threads below for us all to go back over the events that brought us to this pretty pass. I suspect that especially for those who have decided to take sides in this argument it will be somewhat illuminating. Hopefully for those involved - including you bev - a recap of this ground will be cathartic.

And hopefully at the end of this discussion we can all get along a bit better.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

157. good point, maybe DU stands for

dirty underwear?

good one, well said.
thanks, I couldn't get it out.

We all need help. North Carolina is really hurting.
Our Election Officials are under the influence of "The Election Center".

How do you fight that when the Chief Election Official of your state sits on the Board of "The Election Center"?

[BevHarris]

86. I wasn't to mentioned in the AP article

I don't think so what grandstanding?

BTW this is Andy on Bev's login.

[Kelvin Mace]

87. Not sure of what you are saying

or what you are responding to,

however...

please log in under your own name. I do not want confusion about who is saying what. I don't want anyone disavowing a statement at a later date claim "someone else logged in with my name."

[Zhade]

229. You should find a way to upload that audio.

I, and others, want the TRUTH about all this.

[Boredtodeath]

230. If he/she has any sense

They'll deliver that audio tape to the first lawyer they can find. Keep it safe and secure until the libel/slander trials start.

[Kelvin Mace]

231. If you like

I can forward Bev's email where she makes the accusation with all the headers intact.

[Kelvin Mace]

63. The evidence you requested...

Now, as to all those allegations that I accused "Lynn Landes" and "Rebecca Mercuri" "Denis Wright" etc of Qui Tam -- show me. Show anyone. YOu can't back that up. It's bullshit, as much of the "sandbox" was. Never happened. Go pull that stuff, if you claim it happened. Show me a quote that accuses any of the above or shut up.

from your 10/1/03 email to me:

-------------------------------------------------------

Re: Heroic work today

Well, it all makes sense now. It only took me a week to figure it out.

Hope you got EVERYTHING on that web site for the .org site.

Okay, first, I'm not going qui tam. Nothing in my gut feeling about that has changed; it's not the path for me. I will talk to the lawyer tomorrow, because a lot of the activists have gone that way now, and I want to know a lot about it so I can more easily recognize the symptoms. Do you realize how many people they'll shut up this way?

The reason Rox thought it was "unethical" that I outed the ISP for confiscating our FTP server is that she and EFF were probably behind it in some way. The hint was MGKrebs, who wanted to know the latest thing we have in our book. If it appears in our book, you see, they can't use it for qui tam. If we have a copy of our own forum, you see, they can't use it for qui tam. That's why Rox kept emphasizing that SHE has a copy. A redacted copy, just for us.

So far, Dill, Rubin, Rox, Eloriel, and several others have gone that route, and though I'm not supposed to say, I expect Jim March to do so shortly. Quite soon, the computer experts available as activists will be few and far between.

I have kind of a delightful strategy, now that I understand what's going on.

Okay, I'm happier now. And David, we'll prosper. This is just a thing where you do the right thing, in the cleverest and most effective way you can think of, and let God take care of the rest.

You did a yeoman's job today. Tomorrow, I'm getting you 3, 4, and 5 -- While you work on finalizing those, I'll try to get 7 done. I'm thinking, as we discussed -- 7-8 go up Friday night after the lawyers go home.

I'll shoot emails to everyone I can to get a specific number of people to mirror Chapter 8, hopefully, at least 100.

Get some rest.

Bev

----------------------------------------------------------------
Clarification: While Denis, Rebecca and Lynn are not mentioned in this email, Bev does mention "and several others". Since Bev mentioned them to me frequently in phone conversations, I can only tell you that she meant these people, plus BartCop, Cindy Cohen and later on, even me. (She never accused me of this directly, it came to me from other sources.)

Please note she mentioned Jim March, which was actually true. Findley had approached him first (Anybody know the term used to describe lawyers who solicit clients? Of course you do!) and then they persuaded Bev. When Bev and I discussed 'qui tam' I made it quite clear I would never go that route. This would explain why I was not told about the suit when Jim March recruited her.

There you have it, proof in Bev's own words, as she requested.

In anticipation of the next dodge, anyone who wishes may email me and I will forward the whole email, with headers, for you to read.

[Eloriel]

91. Oh, boy

MGKrebs accused TOO? Unbelievable.

Well, having (delusionally) convinced herself of all these people filing qui tams without her, and using her material to boot, sure as hell gave her some sort of "moral permission" (or appropriate equivalency) to go for it herself, didn't it?

[MGKrebs]

115. I know nothing of any qui tam lawsuits

other than the one Bev herself has mentioned (and I know nothing about that one other than what I have read here).

And since this is kind of a "when did you stop beating your wife' kind of deal in that I'm not clear about how I could prove that I am NOT part of a lawsuit, I doubt I can add anything else to the conversation.

I do feel a little sad right now.

[Name removed]

68. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[althecat]

74. JUST IN CASE YOU ARE LOOKING FOR GUTS.... <---- THE POST CAUSING TROUBLE

[althecat]

92. IN THE INTERESTS OF STOPPING THE YAPPING - REMEMBRANCES...

here is my promised suggestion of some structure to this debate... reading above it is easy to miss the salient posts and the information contained therein.... lest people get the story wrong lets all try to remember whatreally happened.

I propose the following headings for threads...

Bartcop...
Fredda Weinberg....
First Discussions of Qui Tam (as I recall I raised it and got shot down) .....
Roxanne & the schism (the sad and unredeeming tale of BBV.org)..
Eloriel.. ...
David Dill...
Lynn Landes ...
EFF
The true circumstances around book publication (i.e. bev in hiding...)
DAVID ALLEN....


I don't think this list is exaustive yet.. I will post some brief introductions to each topic and I invite others to recall what they remember.

althecat

P.S. this is posted as a subthread as it is in essence a response to the parent post by Bev headed "yes sandbox"

[althecat]

93. Bartcop...

The simplest of the many tales.. but since it has been badly told before in various threads we need some clarity.

When the big GEMS story was about to break in July 2003 a Bartcop forum thread ridiculed Bev as being paranoid and over the top...

Later when BBV.org went down Bartcop offered to host it. Bev refused partly I expect due to the earlier contretemps...

Someone might like to dig out the Bartcop thread and link to it...

This is not the full story of the bartcop relationship but the simplest way to describe it is that it got off to a bad start.

[althecat]

94. Fredda Weinberg...

Literary Publicist... famous for being credited in Greg Palast's book on Florida voting matters.

Former member of this forum and former publicist of William Rivers Pitt.. (who was not particularly happy with her services..)

Fredda decided early on that she hated Bev and made it very clear here and elsewhere. In the early days she made a habit of emailing any member of the mainstream press who dared write a story on the subject of BBV and badmouthing bev.

Back in the good old days it was everybody vs Fredda.

Back then DWright, Eloriel, Rox, Bev, David, Bev Connover, Mark Crispin Miller and myself were all on the same side.

Nothing more really needs to be said about Fredda.. But people's remembrances will be welcome.

[hang a left]

97. Yes I remember.

I have witnessed this great movement since it's inception. However I have not an activist. And it USED to be everyone against Fredda, and TFHP.


I have been surprized and saddened at the fighting and name calling. BBV is way bigger than that. I am also one that could care less who gains or earns money off of BBV exposing.

[Kelvin Mace]

124. Fredda was a strange case

She started out on our side, then almost overnight shifted gears. Bev believed her to be an "infiltrator". I wondered about that but became distracted by other things.

[althecat]

95. First Discussions of Qui Tam (as I recall I raised it and got shot down) .

Shortly after July 8th 2002 when Scoop helped Bev break the GEMS story and the NYT stepped in and opened the door on this issue the subject of Qui Tam started coming up in threads.

Someone might like to find the original threads in which it was discussed for research and remembrance. Bev was staunchly against the idea from the start principally because of the gagging provisions.

[althecat]

98. Roxanne.. aka DemActivist

Roxanne Jekot....

About here is where the story starts getting really nasty.

Roxanne worked very closely with Bev in the early stages of the Diebold files research. As I understand it - and please correct me if I am wrong - she was one of the key brains behind the description of the GEMs hack in the July 8th story.

Back then Rox and Bev were thick as theives.. in the midst of all the excitement in July Bev introduced me to Rox and we spoke by phone about all the fun in GA.

Rox also set up the original BlackBoxVoting.org website. She did so to provide a secure forum for people to discuss BBV matters.... and it was used extensively.

I forget exactly when the schism occurred.. but I suspect it must have been September 2002 (please correct me if I am wrong). BBV.org went down as Liebold was engaged in its C&D warfare.... the circumstances of all this are related with commentary in another post in this thread which I will link here...

Again the short version of the story is - Bev decided Roxanne was filing Qui Tam and that she had sabotaged BBV.org deliberately...

Bev attacked Rox numerous times in these forums. Eventually it came to a huge barny.. a thread was posted that took it over the top (and then deleted) and Bev and Rox were both tombstoned.

There is a great deal more to this story... but others probably can tell it better than I.

Roxanne has said she has not filed Qui Tam and I beleive her.

al

[hang a left]

102. I remember that the fight started over the retainment of counsel

and fight Diebold over the cease and desist. That is when the two parted ways. I remember in the beginning their was no explanation other than they had differences on how to fight the cease and desist.

[Eloriel]

107. IMO, the reason for the blow-up is unimportant

I had patched up ONE blow-up between them, and others may have been involved in smoothing over or patching up previous issues. When the last one came, I recognized it was "the end," and didn't even try.

What I DID try to do, was to not take sides afterwards so I could continue to be involved -- and fortunately (and to her credit) Roxanne didn't require it -- but there came a point (i.e., her absurd and wrongful public accusations) where I had to end even the minor relationship I had with Bev as well. I think it's safe to speak for Roxanne in saying neither she nor I have ever regretted our decisions. I only regret they were necessary.

Edited to add: the reason I think it's unimportant to go into is two-fold. One, it doesn't add anything to the discussion at hand and two, I don't like discussing people who aren't involved in the discussion. Roxanne was banned from DU (along with Bev) over that accusations thread, and Rox never did the penance required for returning.

[althecat]

116. Here is a link to the thread of david's that deals with this in detail

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=1993788&mesg_id=2000755&page=

[Kelvin Mace]

125. Here is a chronology of the events

provided by Bev herself with my comments providing rebuttal to Bev's claims.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=1993788&mesg_id=2000755&page=

[althecat]

99. Eloriel.. ...

Eloriel is a valued DU member and like Roxanne was involved with Bev and I from the early stages of all this.

When the great schism occurred one of the saddest things in my mind was the loss of Eloriel's talents in research in these forums. Basically she decided to take her talents elswhere - i.e. away from Bev.

Based in GA she is a friend of Roxanne and was involved in the breakdown... she now hangs out out with rox at Countthevote.org.

[Eloriel]

104. Actually, Al

I'm not involved with the BBV issue at all and haven't been for a number of months, except occasional posts on the subject when it comes up on this or, VERY occasionally, other forums.

Also, I really contributed virtually nothing to any research. I'm just a loud mouth. Sometimes I was a sounding board. Not much else.

[althecat]

106. Eloriel.. you did some fantastic research back on BBV.org

With all due respect... you underplay your hand a bit there. You may not be involved now but you were back then. I distinctly recall reading through research threads in which your postings contained many diverse and intensely shining gems...

That said... people are entitled to tell their own stories.. so sorry if I got a bit wrong (and sorry to everybody else too.. this is a rushed piece of work).

[Eloriel]

111. You know

I forgot about those. Okay, a teensy, weensy bit of research. ;-)

Thanks.

I also discovered Britain William's personal site -- tho others surely would have, wherein we discovered the various GA certification procedures.

[althecat]

100. David Dill...

GregD can probably tell this story the best. David Dill was involved in work against E-Voting before any of the recent revelations came to light.

He ran Verifiedvoting.org.

He was slandered a few times around here and occasionally came onscreen to defend himself.

What has now happened to Verifiedvoting.org is a bit of a shame and possibly a result of some of the backstabbing politics that seems to have been played around this issue.

In short I suspect he got fed up with some aspects of the BS and so split.

[Eloriel]

113. In all honesty

I have never yet reconciled some of Dill's actions. Another one I don't particularly want to say much about since he's not here, but I will say two things:

1. He never (to my knowlege) accepted or explained why he wouldn't accept the "voter verified paper TRAIL" terminology (as opposed to BALLOT, and

2. He was also way too cozy for my comfort with both the concept of adding more technology (e.g., the VoteHere "solution") and the company VoteHere as well -- agreeing to host (later turned into link to, obviously less objectionable) VoteHere's material.

Maybe I misread all that then, but I've never seen anything that would make me more comfortable with either. Of course, as I said, I've not kept up.

Edited to add: I'm not making any accusations -- I'm just pointing out things that I've never been comfortable with and for which I've never seen suitable (or any) explanations.

[Kelvin Mace]

126. My view

The geek opinion, he has much more faith in the technology that we do. Some geeks think technology solves everything.

[JohnGideon]

205. As I, Until Very Recently, Was On VV.org staff

let me respond to both ATC and Eloriel.

1. David Dill is completely honest about the things that he does. He told Bev, and anyone else who would listen, that he did not file a Qui Tam. In fact, Stanford University would not let him do it anyway. Any accusations, and I heard them from some parties, were completely baseless.

2. VerifiedVoting.org's only problem is that they felt the need to find funding in amounts above just a donation here and there. When they did that, and hired a full-time executive director, they lost more than they gained. Besides losing GregD and EllenT, and eventually, me; they lost the feeling of being a grass-roots group. They are doing great work though so they may have taken the correct course.

3. David and I talked, discussed and argued paper ballot vs. paper trail. Actually, he finally came around when we decided that the best system was not DREs but was an AutoMark type system or a ballot generator. When we got to that level we agreed that paper ballot was the correct terminology. However, I don't really give a damn what it is called as long as it is described as a voter verified piece of paper (card stock) that has a true and correct representation of the ballot that is shown on the monitor or something like that. These symantics arguments only take away from the real issue and are a complete waste of time. But that's my opinion.

4. On the Vote Here issue. I always took exception with VH having any space on the vv.org web site. Just as soon as I had the ability I removed any mention of them, including in the forum. David was naive and accepted the word of people at Vote Here that they would open their source code to inspection and they would do it via the vv.org website. Well, they lied about that and it never happened. He was not happy about that.

I hope that helps to explain a little.

[Kelvin Mace]

239. Thanks for the clarification

I have never had a problem with you guys. Bev was the one who thought David Dill consorted with the Devil.

[althecat]

246. What are you up to now John...

I still see GregD around the place hustling up his cosponsors.. but you seem to have gone fairly quiet of late.

Are you still an integral part of BBV.org? As I recall you used to be part of the welcoming committee?

And what do you think of all this?

al

[althecat]

103. Lynn Landes ...

Now here's a funny one.. but illustrative a bit of the effect that Bev sometimes has on people.

Lynn you may recall is always credited as setting Bev off on this crusade in the first place. She like Bev has had her stuff published on Scoop.co.nz.

Sometime in August 2003 Bev rang me close to tears. Lynne had decided to run an investigation of her own into Bev.. she had even hinted at this on her website... ecotalk... and Bev was fearful that this could undermine her reputation at a critical time.

I rang Lynn for Bev and assured her - lynn - that bev was not working for the bad guys. She took some convincing but she eventually dropped her inquiries into Bev.. I never knew what aroused them in the first place.

[Kelvin Mace]

127. Part of it was

she suspected there was no book.

You may recall that it was promised next week for sure, then didn't show up.

The original deadline for the book was Dec 15th, 2002. It was extended many times:

Jan 31st
April 15th
May 31st
July 4th
July 17th
Sep 1st
and Oct 15th

I was cool, though frustrated with the delays. Things kept happening. All delays after 10/15 were not okay and the final version of the book didn't get to me until January 2004.

(Bev, before you make another foolish demand, KNOW that I have your emails to back this up.)

[althecat]

105. EFF and Cindy Cohn

The Electronic Frontier Foundation...

This is a saga that was played out in detail here in DU and so previous threads can illuminate the detail.

When BBV.org went offline Bev sought some advice from Cindy. Cindy offered to help Bev but only if she would do some things that Bev felt were risky, unnnecessary and wrong. Specifically use an ISP that Cindy reccommended.

And so EFF and Bev fell out.

Since then there have been lots of stuff.. but underlying it all the inference from Bev that EFF and Cindy were behind a Qui Tam.

Now for all I know this may be true. Cindy doesn't post here.

[Eloriel]

140. No, it's not true

Certainly not the qui tam part. And IMO to have ever suspected Cindy Cohen (I think it is) of filing a qui tam is -- well, ridiculous and insulting.

As I recall --

Cindy recommended two sites to Bev, one of which is owned by one of Electronic Frontier Foundation's board members and the other was Bartcop's. Personally, I'm not a Bartcop fan so that wouldn't have been palatable to me either were I making those decisions. OTOH, Bartcop had apparently demonstrated strength in the face of such types of legal challenges in the past, and EFF trusted him.

The purpose for this suggested move was to ensure the site would NOT be subject to the vagaries of some site owner getting spooked about legal challenges such as DMCA.

As I've posted elsewhere, it was very clear to me at the time that Bev simply didn't understand what was going on, and wasn't listening to anyone, nor was she about to listen.

Let's be clear. There WERE good reasons for some of the activists heavily involved in this issue at that time to be a little paranoid. Three mysterious house break-ins all in one week, break lines cut another week, etc. And I can also say from personal experience that when you have to go into distrust mode, sometimes it's difficult to sort out who to be distrustful of and who not. I personally had to pull myself back from the brink of unreasonable distrustfulness a couple of times. So I could understand the instinct Bev had to go into severe distrust mode over what was happening -- what I found much more difficult to understand was blaming responsible and credible people (e.g., Cindy Cohen -- who is an attorney, btw) for attempting to undermine her, including people who had been working with her for months, not to mention refusing to listen to those same people in any way. As I said elsewhere, she was pretty much "unreachable" at that point.

[neverborn]

208. What?!

Three mysterious house break-ins all in one week, break lines cut another week, etc.

!??!

[althecat]

109. The true circumstances around book publication (i.e. bev in hiding...)

Which brings us to the period when the book was finally published..

Originally the book was due out in early 2003.. the diebold stash delayed that and delayed it.

Fredda, TFHP and Cocoa had been riding Bev for some time about publication date.... and after the Roxanne schism Bev was at her wits end and close to giving up altogether.

There had also been several threats to people involved including paranoidpat, Roxanne and others so things were not altogether hunky dory.

At about this time I sent Bev an email pledging her undying allegiance (which I am upholding BTW.. just in my own way...). Bev after consulting with David decided to go into hiding and to publish the book as a serial online...

This of course seriously diminished David Allen's ability to make money out of the venture but he supported Bev down the line.

So Bev went off to an undisclosed location and sent out the PDFs of the book to David and Me and we posted them. The first chapter was published on October 1st and publication proceeded through the month..

I mention all this as it was immediately after this that Bev apparently filed for Qui Tam with Jim March and his fantastic attorney.

This is important so far as David Allen is concerned as at this time... well before the print version was published... Bev and David were still working closely. And importantly they were also both working for nothing....

[Kelvin Mace]

128. As posted earlier

This of course seriously diminished David Allen's ability to make money out of the venture but he supported Bev down the line.

The idea to give the book away free was my idea, suggested to Bev as a way to deflect critics who claimed we were in it for the money. Since we are being meticulous in our documentation here, let me cite Bev's email again:

He (David) and I were so tired of being called names, and having our motives questioned, that he said "let's just give the book away." God bless him. He is an amazing, amazing man of great character. I agreed immediately and we announced it in an interview I did with Buzzflash Sunday morning.

Bev Harris
10/26/03

[althecat]

112. DAVID ALLEN....

Which brings us to the topic D'jour... David Allen. Another good and valued member of the DU community.

Bev has been slagging David off for months now in these forums. David has done his best to defend himself but Bev has a louder voice and a snappier turn of phrase.

If all this was about was simply whether or not Bev was lying about Qui Tam I would probably not have bothered with all this.

But by any measure I can think of David has been sorely wronged.

Bev downplays his contributions, accuses him of theft, accuses him of grandstanding and then ignores him when he responds with clear evidence of his innocence.

Here is some evidence of his contribution.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0308/S00175.htm

The famous incident when david phoned into the Liebold ITAA conference call and hung around to here Harris Miller make a complete pillock of himself.

This was done working closely with Bev and I and is an indication of how close Bev and David were.

And then earlier this year David approached me when Bev started going septic on me accusing him of stealing her book.

I counselled him as best I could... remain calm... respond assertively. And I kept my head down in the hope that eventually Bev would come to her senses...

David sent me copies of his printing invoices which showed that he could not have possibly sold the number of copies that Bev accused him of selling.

But by this stage I did not altogether see a need to him to prove his case to me....

Because....

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

148. David Allen helping North Carolina Activists, important

To Bev Harris:

Perhaps you will read this.


The N.C. Coalition for Verified Voting found David Allen several months ago.
He is a valuable assett to our group as a speaker and
also in meetings with election officials.

Our group greatly appreciates the time that David has given us in
speaking publicly.

David presents the issues very concisely and matter of factly, without a lot of emotional harranging.

Our group runs on $0.00 funds, a yahoo message board
(for communication purposes) and a website (bargain basement with web-
builder).

I myself have spent hours every day on this subject since mid
January of this year when I found that there was no group for North
Carolina.

Unfortunately, Bev's public war against David is hurting our cause in North Carolina.

Bev, would you please consider either putting this issue to rest, or

keeping it private? Finish it.

We need David - he is the best speaker
we can possibly get for our state.

NORTH CAROLINA IS IN A CRISIS SITUATION!
1. We already have DREs in 40 of 100 counties
2. State law bans punch cards and levers effective Jan 2006
3. Our Executive Director of the NC SBOE is a board member for
"The Election Center"
4. Many of the county election directors are members of "The Election Center".
5. The NC SBOE refuses to certify any new machines,
so we have no chance of a snowflake in *#$&@ of getting VVPB DREs.

So at the risk of being the subject of your anger and fury,
I ask you to settle your disagreements privately and with dignity and grace.

So far, Verified Voting was the first organization to help us.

Then, Voters Unite helped us, and all states.

Finally, the July 13th Computer Ate My Vote Rally kicked in,
and help was on the way for all of us.

Common Cause NC has joined us,
and their NC Co-Chair has been a great assett.

But the fact is, we have no speaker near the caliber of David Allen.

So, keep your personal or legal problems private.
It hurts us all, and I would rather see you helping my state,
which has 7,363 paperless DREs,
than spending your time posting on the Democratic Underground.

I can only imagine how different things would be for my state if the
energy you spent posting on DU was spent instead on helping North Carolina.

Now, Bev, you may not want to help North Carolina, but so be it.
We are drowning here anyway, and your attacks against David have hurt our cause. Our state is heading to 100% paperless DREs,
because we need alot of help.

I guess if a person apologized for slandering someone,
that might put them at risk of lawsuit, I dont know or care.

Just please do things the right way.
David is not hoarding great wealth of stolen moneys.
He is an every day guy with extraordinary talent
but living an every day life.

Spare us all the further embarrassment of a public harangue.

If you wont help us, quit hurting us.

[althecat]

114. .. because Bev even accused me of filing Qui Tam

... and it was then that my eyes were finally opened.

I can probably dig out the email if necessary. But the important point is that it must have come in December 2002... by which time Bev's Qui Tam was under seal.

Apart from the obvious - how does someone in NZ file Qui Tam in the US - I was shocked because I had always been completely straight with Bev.

She had helped Scoop with her fantastic work and I had assisted her when she requested. Though she was a long way away I counted her as a friend.. indeed if she can see past this series of posts and bring all this siliness to an end I would like to continue to be her friend.

& to be fair while not withdrawing the allegation Bev did in the end let me keep hanging around and even eventually involved me in the launch of a new scoop - the Sequoia voting source code.

But that said.. by the time David came to me with his story about what was happening over the book I was far quicker to believe him.

And so I found myself between a rock and a hard place... On the one hand Bev - to whom I had pledged allegiance - and David with whom I had worked too, a colleague who did not deserve to be treated like shit.

And so I hoped that eventually it would all go away.. Bev would stop being nasty and enable the book to be properly distributed without requiring David to not only swallow all her abuse, but also forego all his interest in it.

I hoped that I would be able to stay out of it all..

But then seeing this post - the sandbox one - today I realised that eventually I would have to stand up in public for David. And so I am.

Yours apologetically
Althecat

[Eloriel]

118. I remember hearing about that

and even now, forgive me, but I can only giggle, because after all:

how does someone in NZ file Qui Tam in the US

I mean it was just so LUDICROUS -- Sorry, I'm still giggling about it, I just can't help myself -- just as ludicrous as her accusations of others.

I also remember that there came a point when it seemed there was no one left who could "get through" to Bev about anything. Roxanne was able to up to a certin point in time, David was able to up to a certain point in time, Al was able to. And then, finally, there was no one (that we knew of) -- and some of us no longer cared.

[althecat]

120. edit.. December 2003 not 2002

[Kelvin Mace]

129. Still waiting on a reply

You asked for proof, I provided it. Others have confirmed my proof as well. I am quite prepared to rebut all your other claims, but first I want to see how you explain the glaring contradiction provided from your own hand.

[Kelvin Mace]

138. The mechanics of character assassination

Just thought I would put out this little guide on how it's done.

Bev uses a shotgun approach. She makes LOTS of allegations, then when you calmly debunk one or more, she ignores being proven wrong on those issues and hammers on one's you haven't responded to or raises new ones.

Bev: Allegations a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i j, k, and l.

Opponent: Rebuts a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, pauses for comment from Bev.

Bev: Ignores rebuttals. Allegations i, j, k, and l!!! Why do you refuse to address allegations i, j, k, and l?? What are you hiding? How come you never will answer allegations i, j, k, and l?

Opponent: Rebuts allegations i, j, k, and l.

Bev: Never addresses any rebuttals, issues allegations m, n, o , p and q.

Bev then stops answering entirely. At some future date the whole process repeats as if Bev's allegations were never addressed.

[ConsAreLiars]

33. Thanks for the updates

The first discussions revolved around the "what" and "how" of the BBV tech, and the "who" and "where" and "why" of the implementation. This level seems to be looking more at the influence peddling that created this situation. This is harder in some ways, since the dealing is done covertly, while the machines operate in the open, even if their inner workings are kept secret. I look forward to the book.

[dusty64]

39. Kick!

:kick:

[BevHarris]

41. delete, dup

.

[nofurylike]

46. many thanks, as always, BevHarris (and Andy S)! kick! n/t

[SheepyMcSheepster]

47. Thanks bev, kick!

[redqueen]

53. THANKS BEV & ANDY!!!!

And anyone else getting results!

:yourock:

on edit: I find it interesting that accusations of withholding funds and fudging (or ABSENCE OF!) sales reports are left to stand, but disclaimers and 'hurt feelings' are addressed.

[ursacorwin]

67. Bev and Andy deserve the Medal of Freedom

thank you so much!

FWIW: i've been reading bev's stuff here at DU and elsewhere for several years (sorry i'm so poor bev, when i have $ you will) and one thing is interesting to me. actually, a couple of things.

first off: IIRC, so far bev (and andy and others working with them on this issue) has been subjected to dozens of computer crashes, phone tapping, and being followed around by odd people and the authorities, to the point of being questioned. no one else on DU can make this claim, not that anyone would want to, but it sure is intersting.

second: every BBV post bev and andy put up, a whole mess of people start jumping in an throwing around a lot of personal and petty complaints, and nitpicking bev's details. every single thread, someone tries to redirect the conversation towards personal issues that don't matter.

putting these two observations together, in conjunction with what i know about dirty tricks and BushCo in general, and i come to one conclusion:

bev is right.

this is really the only issue that matters in the fall, folks. all our work here and elsewhere is for naught if we can't get enough people to understand that fair voting is about to go the way of the dinosaur in this country. and the crooks in charge will do anything to stop us.
including disrupt us here at DU.

i hope everyone keeps that in mind when perusing the whole of the BBV threads.

[althecat]

130. You are right that this is important...

But wrong that all of this is nitpicking... TFHP is nitpicking...

David Allen has been accused of theft.... and a whole bunch of others have also been accused of things they are innocent of. This is not nitpicking.

It is my intention in some of the above to illuminate what this is all about in order to enable the real work to be got on with without this clouding people's judgment and enthusiasm.

Yes Bev and Andy deserve a medal.. but so also do David, Roxanne and others that for reasons unfathomable Bev insists on continuing to accuse of malpractice. If Bev stops making accusations then all this stops....

[Kelvin Mace]

135. Sorry, I disagree

first off: IIRC, so far bev (and andy and others working with them on this issue) has been subjected to dozens of computer crashes, phone tapping, and being followed around by odd people and the authorities, to the point of being questioned. no one else on DU can make this claim, not that anyone would want to, but it sure is interesting.

Since when is a Windows computer crashing evidence of "enemy action"? If it is, the entire country is being attacked.

Bev claiming that her computer crashed is not in any way proof that folks are "out to get her".

What proof is there that her phone is, or was, tapped?

No else can make this claim on DU because no one else is this paranoid.

second: every BBV post bev and andy put up, a whole mess of people start jumping in an throwing around a lot of personal and petty complaints, and nitpicking bev's details. every single thread, someone tries to redirect the conversation towards personal issues that don't matter.

You seem to be missing the point that: a) People who worked with her and supported her are among the critics. b) She has turned on numerous allies and attacked them. c) She asked for proof that she ever accused people of filing 'qui tam' law suits and proof has been provided from multiple quarters. d) Even Alistair of Scoop News Zealand, Bev first ally in the media, the man chiefly responsible for putting the BBV story on the media map, is chastising Bev for her actions.

Since Bev is not answering the very proof she demanded, would you care to take a stab at explaining away the proof provided?

[yowzayowzayowza]

69. Chirp... Chirp... Chirp.

Are we preparing to set yet another bridge ablaze?
... or ... Does our ego take one for the team?

[Boredtodeath]

71. Yep, it's a pattern

Bev comes out and calls everyone a liar, then proof is offered that she is lying and she disappears.

Oh, and isn't Ms. Harris an "accounting investigator" or something like that? Cause you would think she would understand that OPEN PAYABLES means those bills haven't been paid.

[Kelvin Mace]

81. The silence is deafening

Folks ask for evidence, evidence is provided and then they have nothing to say.

I am waiting along with many other to hear from Bev and her defenders about the evidence that she said EXACTLY what we claimed.

[Kelvin Mace]

72. Another small mountain of evidence to examine

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=568934&mesg_id=571440&page=

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=555538
----------------------------------------------------------------------

------- Original Message --------
Subject: The news of your lawsuit is going to break in two hours.
Date: Thu, 16 Oct 2003 07:54:13 -0700
From: "bev" <[e-mail]>
To: <redacted Eloriel's email>
CC: <[e-mail]>

If there is a problem with this, call me and give me straight answers.

425-xxx-xxxx
----------------------------------------------------------------------

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Just learned -- four words: Dill. Qui tam. EFF
Date: Fri, 26 Oct 2003 18:08:04 -0700 (PDT)
From: Bev Harris <[e-mail]>
To: [e-mail]

What really happened to BlackBoxVoting.org

Edited on Sun Oct-19-03 01:35 AM by BevHarris
Here is your weird bedtime story of the weekend. It's a mystery story. Maybe you guys can figure this out. For the life of me, I can't.

1) BlackBoxVoting.org is a site domain that I own. I felt it was important to have my own site, rather than being dependent at all times on a site owned by my publisher. As it turns out, thank goodness we both have had sites!

2) DemActivist volunteered to set it up. I had no idea this requires programming (shows how old-school I am with HTML, and also why my web pages are so ugly and hard to update). She did a brilliant job.

3) In mid-September, the ISP Tiger Tech shut my site down with no advance notice, right before the close of business day on a Friday. The reason was that they said I sent a press release which violates their spam policy. I've been in the PR business for a decade or more, and all PR firms send press releases, and we use a pricey opt-in list that requires a subscription of around $2500 a year. Such a policy is unheard of, since the press gets their material from press releases and they request being on the lists. The only time you get a complaint is if you send a press release about, say, baking cookies, to an automotive editor. Then they just tell you to pick the right editor next time.

No matter. Shut down, and I had to move. I was working on moving the site to Bookzone, which does a wonderful job, but Demactivist found a reseller named Gator Graphics, run by Bev Conover, who in turn leases from AIT Inc. Conover, bless her heart, was willing to help us get the site up over the weekend. Apparently the configuration was troublesome, because DemActivist had to work quite hard to get it changed over, and I appreciated that, and told her so.

4) Around the third week of September, I posted the same article Alastair (Scoop Media) did, about the Ken Clark memo, which included the memo. We got a cease and desist from Diebold. James Baker, the attorney for AIT Inc, the ISP who was served, stood firm and told them to go back to the drawing boards and write a better complaint. By the time they did, we took the page down and just put a link to it. To this day, the page is still up at Alastair's Scoop Media. Thus, when the new cease & desist arrived, it was pointless.

5) During the last week of September, a participant at our forum posted a link to a page with links to memos. There was a lively discussion at DU about the memos, and bpilgrim created the handiest tool ever for research with them, a search engine. Both bpilgrim's site and BlackBoxVoting.org got cease & desists. bpilgrim's site took the search engine down. Here's where it got strange.

Tuesday morning: Cease & Desist. Site still up. AIT (the ISP) attorney James Baker says he's trying to look up the law to know whether he has to comply with a DMCA pulldown on a link to a link.

Tuesday morning: Demactivist talks to Cindy Cohn at EFF.
Tuesday afternoon: James Baker still hasn't decided what to do. He's told to wait for a call from Cindy Cohn at EFF, who has the expertise to advise him.

Tuesday afternoon: Cindy Cohn from EFF calls James Baker. The content of the discussion is currently in some dispute. I have gotten two stories from Cindy Cohn about this, and they do not match. (This is not "trashing her" -- I'm just reporting my conversations. And as you know, I take pretty good notes.)

Tuesday afternoon: Within an hour after James Baker talked to Cindy Cohn of EFF, our site was taken down. Instead of just taking down the page, all 300 pages were down, a clear case of overreaching.

Tuesday afternoon: I called EFF. I spoke with Cindy Cohn. She told me she was sorry that she had to inform James Baker they had liability if they keep the site up. I asked if they had to take the whole thing down. She said they are within their rights to do so. I asked if EFF could help me or Black Box Voting. She said the EFF has no time to help me or Black Box Voting. She said that a case she is working on with Dr. David Dill and Avi Rubin is taking a tremendous amount of time.

Tuesday evening I read on DU that there was a message about a dispute with Diebold on BBV.org, so I went to look at the message on my site. I could only see a page for Gator Graphics. I called Demactivist, who told me that she and Bev Conover could go there, but my ISP address had been blocked from visiting my site. I thought this was strange. First, why block my ISP from visiting my own take-down page. Next, why are they telling DemActivist about it, not me? Third, if they are communicating with her because she's the webmaster, why not block her access from it if they are blocking mine? And fourth, I wasn't even at my normal computer or on my normal service. I was using someone else's AOL account. How did they know to block that?

Comment: Here Bev is displaying a woeful misunderstanding of how all this works. The block was set to block the domain blackboxvoting.org. Since DemActivist worked on the site extensively she would have access and was probably getting in using the IP address. A quick way to take a site down is simply to change the DNS entry pointing to the correct IP. If you don't block the IP as well, you can still get in using the IP address, but the domain name will not work. Also, changes to the DNS entry propagate slowly across the net and can take 1-3 days to affect the entire net. Thus, it would be entirely possible for Bev to use someone else's account and not get in, but use another (non-AOL) account and get access.

As to why DemActivist and/or Bev C. would be told info about the domain, if they are listed as tech contacts this would be entirely appropriate.

Tuesday evening Demactivist told what I had to do: keep the link up and fight them legally. I told her I'm so broke I can't pay my mortgage, much less a lawyer. She hung up on me.

Comment: If I were a betting man, I would put money down that Bev was screaming abuse prior to being hung up on. I know, I had it happen to me several times.

Next call: I asked who got at the page to publish the statement about Diebold. She said Bev Conover. I asked if I could upload something. Demactivist said no, she could but I was prohibited from access. I asked if she would upload something for me. She said no, that would get Bev Conover in trouble.

Comment: Not sure what's going on in this exchange. Key information is missing.

By this time it was 10 p.m. east coast, nothing could be done until morning anyway. I said I didn't see the point of making a decision until morning. Exploring options, I said it would be kind of funny to take the link down and put the cease and desist letter in its place, since the letter had the link in it four times. She became angry and said no, you CAN'T take the link down.

She hung up on me and emailed her resignation as webmaster. I found that a bit baffling; why not discuss options? At any rate, since the lawsuit would be filed against me personally, never Demactivist, and EFF had said they would not represent me, I wanted the night to think it over. I wasn't sure it was worth shutting the whole site down over a link that could be found elsewhere.

Comment: DemA quit because she was told that it wasn't her site and Bev had no intention of following her advice. Her advice being (as I understand it) Stop claiming the site was "confiscated", it wasn't. Leave the links up and move the site to one of two sites suggested by Cindy Cohn at EFF. Cindy couldn't defend Bev if the ISP was going to cave to the C&D. EFF WOULD defend Bev if the site was moved to an ISP who would ignore the C&D. In essence, contrary to what Bev has claimed about EFF, they were quite willing to defend her and were spoiling for a fight. But the fight had to be fought on their turf so they would have legal standing.

Bev had three options: 1) Move the site to EFF turf and be defended by them. The site would be back up as soon as they could move the files. AIT would not have stopped a transfer (I have this from my talks with their lawyer). She would have been down 2-3 days and we would have humiliated Diebold in court. 2) Leave the site where it was and file a "Safe Harbor" letter telling the ISP she disputed Diebold's claim. The site would stay down for ten days from the delivery of the letter, but then would be restored and Diebold would have to go to court and prove infringement, something they couldn't do. 3) Take the links off and the site could go back immediately. Bev chose option #3 because she was convinvced EFF, DemA et all were trying to "steal" her files in order to file a 'qui tam' and because she was convinced Diebold would be able to put her in jail.

Wednesday morning Eloriel called to tell me that Demactivist wanted to let me know they'd have to distance themselves from me, and that she sounded really upbeat, really excited about something. I asked what was up, why would someone "need to distance themselves?" I got no explanation whatsoever -- haven't to this day, and I must tell you that this has been very, very painful. I have racked my brain for this terrible thing I must have done to make people have to "distance themselves." Anyone who has seen the book chapters can see the quality of my work. Anyone who's worked directly with me knows I have integrity. Why the sudden leprosy?

Comment: As I see it, they were distancing themselves from three things: 1) Bev abusive behavior. 2) Bev's hyping the C&D as a "confiscation". 3) Bev's increasing paranoia about people filing 'qui tams'

Wednesday My DU email kept getting new messages, but told me I was forbidden to have access whenever I tried to get it. I couldn't get to it for several days. Figured it was a glitch.

Wednesday I got two more emails from EFF urging me to switch BlackBoxVoting.org to Marc Perkel. I got one from Marc Perkel. I said thanks but no thanks. All in all, over the next few days, I got no less than EIGHT increasingly urgent requests to switch to Marc Perkel as a new ISP. I was supposed to switch, but EFF still would not help me. WTF?

Question: How about posting these email so we can examine the context and wording?

Wednesday Bev Conover called and said access to the FTP site was taken away for some reason, and she couldn't get an answer about what was going on with the site. 48 hours later, she said she still couldn't get any answers. I tried calling James Baker. No return call.

Comment: At this point, as I understand it, Bev had been screaming at them about "unauthorized" access to the site, telling them that no one should be permitted to have access. That said, they simply "locked" the site. The ISP's refusal to call back Bev H. probably was that they had no further desire to be screamed at and threatened.

Friday morning I decided something had to be done. I sent a press release about the confiscation of our FTP files -- DemActivist emailed David Allen to say they weren't confiscated (how did she know?) and that I'd put people in danger by sending that release. All I can say is WTF?

Comment: Ah, there's that word "confiscated". If I confiscate your car, I take it away from you and place it in my possession. What they did was the equivalent to booting a car. No one could drive it, but you still have physical possesion of it.

Friday afternoon Thanks to a former DUer who found a lawyer to help me, I had a great conversation with an attorney from the Samuelson Center at UC Berkeley. She requested copies of everything and called me back, said they'd decided to help BBV. A couple hours later, she called back to tell me she'd discovered a conflict of interest. I asked her what conflict it could be, and why she didn't know of it that morning. She said that her firm does work with Cindy Cohn of EFF, and that Cindy had a case that this would conflict with. "There are other cases afoot," she said. What? Can someone fill me in?

Comment: There is nothing sinister about this. Depending on the size of the law firm, a given lawyer is not going to know every other case the firm is involved with. Also, they would not be at liberty to explain the nature of a conflict other than to say there was one.

I became upset at this point. I explained to her the importance of what we are doing, and asked if she could do just one more thing: pick up the phone, recommend to a colleague somewhere -- anywhere -- that I needed help, and let me try to find someone else. She said "sorry, can't help." She said Cindy Cohn had an ISP she recommended that I switch to...

Comment: Again, having been on the phone with Bev when she is "upset" I can understand why the person on the other end might become less than helpful.

Friday My publisher, David Allen, called and schmoozed tech to tech with the ISP, AIT Inc. The techs there told him that the password had been changed, but they decided to let him get the FTP files, so they gave him access. He spent Friday night downloading files (This is much appreciated, but also a bit strange. He does not own the site, I do. They let someone else get the files, but not me???)

Comment: Not at all strange. All they did was unlock the site. No one would be able to access the site without the username and password, both of which I had gotten from Bev C. after Bev H. sent her an email to okay it.

Friday David posted to DU that he'd gotten hold of the files. He then received an e-mail from Demactivist telling him he'd better not use those files, that she owned the program, it was licensed to her, she owned the programming. So this was our first roadblock to moving the site.

Comment: The forum software that DemA used was one she licensed and paid for. We would just have to buy another license and install it, which would require someone with expertise in the program.

I called Angka from DU, who looked up the pricing on the license. Not too bad. I figured, I can just buy the license. But apparently the programming is so specialized I have to find a programmer to help me move the site.

Saturday I was by myself, in an "undisclosed location," wondering where the hell my friends were and why David and I had just been cut from the herd. Cooties? A special surprise party? What the hell? He and I were so tired of being called names, and having our motives questioned, that he said "let's just give the book away." God bless him. He is an amazing, amazing man of great character.I agreed immediately and we announced it in an interview I did with Buzzflash Sunday morning.

Comment: No comment!

October 3 I tried to move my BlackBoxVoting.org domain to a new ISP, the one that's stood up to the BFEE on the AWOL documents. The tech there tried to move the domain, and called me back.

"There's a flag on your domain name from the registrar. Says it can't be moved."

Comment: This is a common precaution taken by tech savy folks to keep their domain from being "poached" by another registrar.

I contacted Tucows, the registrar, who said it can't be moved until Oct 9 (coincidentally, the day after the California recall). I asked them to send me something in writing as to whose authority did this, and what the reason was. They said I had to go back to the original reseller, Tiger Tech.

"If I do that, and Tiger Tech says it can be moved, then we can move it, right?"

"No."

Geez. I went to Tiger Tech, who told me there is a flag on the domain name and I can't move it. I asked for this in writing. They sent an email that said that no .org site registered with tucows could be moved for about a week, due to "maintenance." WTF?

Comment: No clue about this.

I contacted another tech, who checked to see if he could move his .org registered with tucows. There was nothing that said he couldn't.

Comment: But then, since he didn't try to move a domain, we can't be sure. It wouldn't be the first time that a registrar failed to keep people apprised of issues affecting them.

Okay, forget this mess, skip forward to yesterday, when I was asked to be on the radio with EFF as they proudly announced they were helping IndyMedia fight Diebold. They told me, on the air, that I was doing important work and was a great patriot. "Then why won't you help me?" I asked. He had no answer.

Comment: Either 1)He didn't know about the situation, or 2) He didn't want to embarrass Bev on the air by discussing it.

I called Cindy Cohn back, and said good, now that you're helping IndyMedia (who was told to pull down a link) could you revisit the idea of helping me, because not only was the link pulled, the whole 300-page site was pulled, we were denied access to our FTP, and denied the ability to move the domain. She said no, they have to choose who they can help.

Then she said "and you never switched to the ISP we told you to." I said, "If I had done that, would you have helped?"

Of course. "No."

She had another ISP to refer me to, but they still wouldn't help. She said the reason they couldn't help is because when she offered to help with AIT, they didn't want help. (that's funny, that day she apologized to me for telling me, and James Baker, she could not help).

She said she has another ISP for me to switch to. "Will you help then?"

"No."

Comment: IndyMedia cooperated, Bev didn't. This last part about them saying they wouldn't have helped even if Bev had cooperated is at odds with the recollection of other principles. I think they were refusing to help by this time because they knew getting involved with her would be a bad thing.

Cindy Cohn told me I could write the safe harbor letter and get reinstated in 10 days; actually, I've had that letter for awhile, Jim March helped me write it, but it requires that I provide a physical location for my whereabouts, so I need to wait until the book is out the gate.

Comment: Here we see paranoia that people were out to arrest or harm her. This is a recurring theme.

I asked her what someone does when there are safety issues. I'm only a two-hour drive from the programmers in Vancouver, and don't feel secure handing out physical location. She said she couldn't help with that, but I should send the letter.

Comment: The ISP actually has an on-line form you can use to file "Safe Harbor" letters. Bev could have used my address or I could have filed it since I had standing as her publisher and co-writer.

I asked her what someone does when there are safety issues. I'm only a two-hour drive from the programmers in Vancouver, and don't feel secure handing out physical location. She said she couldn't help with that, but I should send the letter.

I asked if it was overreaching to shut down all 300 pages of the whole site over a link. She said Yes. (But earlier she told me that was within their rights).

I asked if it was overreaching to block my access to my FTP. She said yes.

I asked if it was overreaching to block me from moving my domain. She said yes.

Comment: All of these questions are dependent on wording and proper understanding of context. As I have explained, Bev had neither.

We then had a conversation about the ownership of the site. She was surprised that Demactivist (Roxanne) wasn't the owner. I asked if Roxanne can own the programming after volunteering to help me set up the site, preventing me from reinstating it. She said maybe. I asked if Roxanne has the right to keep files on her computer, especially things like RedEagle's legislative letter templates and Paranoid Pat's "Take Back the Vote Tool Kit" -- wouldn't those belong to BlackBoxVoting.org or to RedEagle and ParanoidPat? She said she didn't think those would belong to Roxanne.

Comment: See above comment.

Oct 17: I interviewed Rob (rob-georgia.) Rob is a straight arrow. I trust his word. He said that Roxanne asked him to go to an attorney named James Penland to give a videotaped deposition. Penland asked Rob to give him his emails from Diebold; he refused. He did provide his notes from a session with Diebold's Greg Loe. Penland then asked to interview another of my sources, James Rellinger (that interview has been up on BBV since February).

I wrote to Dem and to Eloriel and said if there was any reason it would be a problem to break the news that a lawsuit was afoot, to contact me immediately. I did not want to mess up any legitimate pursuit. I received this in return:

"I have no knowledge of any lawsuit being filed, contemplating being filed, discussed being filed or anticipated being filed. Public statements being made alleging so, will be dealt with swiftly."

Comment: It's called gathering evidence for future use. Also, a person willing to give a deposition is making a commitment to their story.

XXXXXEDITNAMEXXXXX

If you can make sense of all this, you are doing better than me.

I have work to do, and am focused on two things: getting Chapter 10 to David by tonight, Chapter 11 tomorrow, 12-13-14 the following day.

Then, launching the activism planning sessions with the 425 activists who signed up.

That's what I'm focusing on.

- The shutdown of BlackBoxVoting.org removed a critical communication forum for activists nationwide, and many of them lost their work when it became inaccessible.

- The library, in particular, was quite a loss. I had archived most of the articles for the footnotes in the book there, and had to re-find every article for the book. A DUer named Phoebe spent dozens of hours archiving everything into it. She is very saddened by its loss. A New York Times reporter emailed me, said "when will it be back up? We need it!"

Comment: Nothing was lost. It was all there when the site came back on line.

- The private forums were highly valued by many activists, and if we have to completely reprogram to get them back up, we will. This will be an effort, and next time, I'll make sure the programming can't walk away with a volunteer, shutting down our ability to use our own forums.

- The actual work living on the BBV.org site, which included template letters to legislators, talking points, a "Take Back the Vote Toolkit" created by ParanoidPat, and others, may not be recoverable very easily if we have to reprogram the whole thing.

I have to wait until the book is done to tackle that. I appreciate all of you who have volunteered to help. If you have been advised to "distance yourselves" please do me, or at least David Allen, the courtesy of explaining why.

Comment: The only person who wound up "distancing" themselves was Bev. She filed a 'qui tam' behind my back.

Whatever is afoot, it would have been compassionate to let us know how we can help, or at least, not get in the way.

Weird story, huh?

Comment: "Weird" is an understatement.

Not going in the book or anywhere else.

Comment: Obviously, "anywhere else" didn't include posting it to a public forum.

Bev Harris
Black Box Voting

[Eloriel]

101. Confirming

I wasn't directly involved, but I was in close, daily or several times a day contact with DEMActivist during this whole period, and my recollection (and understanding) of what went on tracks with David's exposition.

Not going in the book or anywhere else.

No, but she did use cutesy (passive-aggressively insulting) alternate screen names for quoting some of these people from DU in her book.

Edited to add: I was particularly bewildered and shocked at her suspicions and brush off of the help EFF tried to give her. I KNOW she misunderstood what was going on -- but the sad part is that she wouldn't listen to those (DEMActivist and David) who could have helped her sort out the technical issues well enough to see that there was no threat there.

[Fud]

158. Wants to move to Perkel?

I don't know if Marc knows all the details over the last year but i will do what i have to do to not let her on the server.

He offered help for progressive sites not backstabbers.EFF is close with him and i would rather not see it soiled with the bevborg.

[Kelvin Mace]

162. Well, not now

This was last Fall that the issue came up.

Speaking of progressive sites, this is another thing burns my bacon. As I just learned here about Bev's anti-Clinton money grubbing and apathy to voting, I am incensed that she and her followers question my rep.

I have long established liberal creditials. On-line, thoughtcrimes.org has contributed to BartCop and several other liberal sites. My writing defending liberal thinking goes back almost two decades.

It was VERY upsetting to learn Bev is a faux liberal.

[althecat]

73. Firstly...... What we should do now...

To Skinner. Moderators. David Allen and Bev.

Firstly......

... is not devide into factional groups. Bev and Andy vs David David Rox and Pat... etc.

Secondly

....is not take too much offence. We have chosen a hard road... lets discuss this civilisedly... and that particularly means David and Bev... so far you have been good. Keep it up/

Thirdly

....& to the moderators

I know that these discussions are difficult to countenance. But for the long term interests of harmony, in the intersts of Natural Justice (David Allen's specifically) and indeed in the public intersts of the BBV movement to allow them now would be a good idea.

I know Skinner is aware that I attempted to mediate between Rox and Bev at the time of a previous great schism. It was futile I agree... and at that stage the decision to ban discussion of these sort of matters was a good one.

I specifically sought to have them reinstated and even paid a donation on Bev's behalf.

Now however the BBV movement is mainstream.

This spat probably won't damage it... it is really the equivalent of some nasty internal office politics. It may even become a matter of discussion in literati... "spat among Net blakc box voting activists" - by Christopher Hitchens.

The thing is - And Bev's book acknowledges this - that in this instance DEMOCRATIC UNDERGROUND.. and specifically this forum always was the office of this movement. There have been other offices too... Bev and Rox's sites are there now.. but they have split.

Now we have a situation in which Bev has repeatedly and publicly made a series of allegations against other long-standing and worthy members of this forum - & David in particular most greivously.

This is by no means the end of this discussion... it will get heated and I think moderators should keep an eye on things and remove profanity abuse etc... all the usual rules.

But as for the presentation of evidence on the issues being discussed here... it is in everybody's interests. And most significantly David Allen who has been sorely accused that this matter is resolved. All the witnesses are here.

So lets nut this one out....


Yours sincerely
Alastair Thompson
Althecat
Scoop.co.nz

[trumad]

77. Excellent post

[althecat]

78. Thanks.. I must confess to be being mildly inspired...

By your recent earlier effort.

[bpilgrim]

84. i agree

BTW: excellent site http://Scoop.co.nz 1 of my favorites :toast:

peace

[althecat]

133. And yours is pretty good too Bpilgrim

peace out...

time for bed

[Eloriel]

96. Well said, Al. I'd like to point out that

I had absolutely no interest in revisiting this issue in any way. Not publicly, not even privately. It's ancient history.

HOWEVER, when someone comes along and rubs your nose in an old wound (to mix metaphors just a bit), and also has the gall to continue the false allegations, that just can't stand.

I wasn't even going to participate in this thread, until Bev's shocking re-affirmation of her wrongful accusations.

[Pobeka]

121. Why I care.

Last summer, I started to get interested in the BBV issues. I am not a good public speaker, but I have system admin and quantitative analysis skills I was willing to donate to the cause. (I did some mathematical analysis of the 18,181 vote totals appearing 3 times).

In early September I started working with Roxanne, only doing literally a couple of things to help out on the bbv.org site.

Then the C&D letters hit, and everything blew up. Roxanne made it very clear the website data had not been lost, and had been backing it up.

There were some very intense messages flying around, and I chalked it up to a tense situation. We were starting to work on setting up the new site, but Roxanne bailed out, and continued on to fight the BBV issue in Georgia. She did not say much to me about it, other than she and Bev had a significant difference of opinion and could not work with Bev anymore.

I chalked that up as well to tense times and Bev perhaps not knowing how to handle volunteers.

And then Bev made this post on the BBV site shut down thread:
-----
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=410311&mesg_id=414309&page=


187. Indeed the files were confiscated
Edited on Fri Sep-26-03 07:30 PM by BevHarris


The ISP blocked access to the FTP site to download. I demand, and will get, the full access log to all Black Box Voting files from the time the notice was received until now.

The issue is compromising the information -- I own the site -- and I have an absolute right to know who accessed it while it's been off line.

The other thing we're going to ramp up now is investigation into the activists who jumped ship to file qui tam. Reporters don't have a gag order, they can nose out all the info they want.
-----

Go read it for yourself. It's not a mythical statement.

I silently left the BBV movement with that post. "Not a good way to garner support of the activists", was my thought. Bev had to me, splintered a whole movement by making it a turf issue, and more importantly, if others had filed a Qui Tam, so what?

And she is consistent -- in post #34 Bev in this very thread Bev once again claims others were filing Qui Tam's. And then only 3 paragraphs down says no one can find proof of her accusing other activists of filing Qui Tam's.

So for all I know since last fall, Bev is dead set against Qui Tam's, to the point of launching investigations of who is filing them. And, to date, who else has filed a Qui Tam?

It's not that Bev filed a Qui Tam that caused me to speak (and I do hope it can succeed, the way it's been described), it's the treatment of all these other people.

--
I have spent some time serious time thinking about this whole situation, I was very sorry to see the splintering that occurred last fall. I could not, and still do not see any motivation for why Roxanne, Eloriel, David, Althecat would have for lying.

And that leaves me in the position of having to tell my view of events, because for me it is a matter of my personal conscience.

--
Bev says that proceeds will go to BBV orgs, but the news release says a "significant portion". Perhaps this is a mis-statement in the press release, but significant is in the eye of the beholder. Some clarification of that would be nice.

[althecat]

132. thanks for speaking up Pobeka... keep that catharsis coming...

As you can see quite a few of the early BBVers are participating in this thread. And that is what is needed here... people testifying to their own reactions to these events.

Few of us have ever met in person and it is amazing what a community there is here.

Lets be a self-healing community too...

[Zomby Woof]

117. well, you built the sandbox

But what's a few dozen backstabbings among friends?

[trumad]

137. Not sure what you mean by that Zomby????

But if it walks like a duck..welllllll....

Jim March.... Jim March and Jim March. Bragging that he's gonna be a millionaire. I'm guessing that most of his proceeds won't be going to BBV? Jim March and his cowardly posts regarding David and the Commies at DU. AND then Bev backing up his statements..... There are so many things wrong with the way this has turned out and I am deeply disappointed.... Paranoia and money corrupts the mind and soul. To the activist who feel betrayed, your Karma is intact and so is your rep... at least with me....

[Zomby Woof]

203. thanks trumad

And yes, that duck goes 'quack'. :-)

[Boredtodeath]

134. Kick

For response from Ms. Harris.

[BevHarris]

139. This will not be resolved on this discussion board.

I will be happy to meet face to face in a more appropriate venue to resolve these issues. In the morass of replies above, I see two issues:

1. The issue of whether David Allen / Plan Nine failed to perform (typeset, fulfill Amazon orders, send monthly sales reports, send monthly royalty checks as required by the contract).

2. Hurt feelings about back-and-forth over Qui Tam allegations.

On Point #1, David Allen responds by changing the subject to point two. It is an easily resolvable issue (just post the monthly sales reports and cancelled checks, if they actually exist). The best place to resolve it will be in a more formal setting.

Point two is more complex. I need the full set of answers. Those answers will not come from debate on a forum. Tracking down the answers is not a good use of our limited time and resources while the clock is running down just prior to an election.

We need to keep our eye on the ball and get results, day after day, in order to get proper auditing in place for the election -- and that does NOT mean electronic verification. While some people here spent the day digging up old threads, we were on the road from 9 a.m. to 2:30 a.m. working on uncovering what's needed to protect the fall election.

There's a time and place to resolve the above. Now isn't the time, and DU isn't the place.

Because the important issues (nine new stories with more to come) are getting buried in conflict, in order to avoid further distraction, we will not be posting any more stories on DU.

Bev Harris

[trumad]

141. Fine Bev....

But keeping your eye on the ball doesn't mean keeping your head in the sand. I think we all agree that this is a major major issue. BUT for god sakes Bev, why make it harder than it already is.... SO I guess you're asking me and others to overlook the slanderous remarks by your new partner (March) towards the activists and DU'ers who have been there for you from the beginning? Commies, crooks...etc? And you sit by quietly but expect us to keep our eye on the ball? Er..Ok Bev, you da Boss!

[Kelvin Mace]

146. She is now abandoning DU

She will no longer post here. I guess we are now being punished for our disloyalty.

[Kelvin Mace]

142. Bev dodges the question

On Point #1, David Allen responds by changing the subject to point two. It is an easily resolvable issue (just post the monthly sales reports and canceled checks, if they actually exist). The best place to resolve it will be in a more formal setting.

Oh, please. Even when you pretend to be taking the high road, you can't avoid a smear. "if they actually exist"?? You know damn well they exist. I am not getting drawn into this argument though until you deal with the proof already provided.

You, meaning Bev Harris, demanded proof you made the accusations in questions. Proof was provided. You now come up with all sorts of reasons to avoid admitting this simple truth:

You lied when you claimed to have never smeared anyone over 'qui tam' You said you NEVER accused anyone and demanded proof you did.

PROOF WAS PROVIDED. IRREFUTABLE, IRON-CLAD PROOF.

You options are:

1) Admit you lied and apologize.

2) Pretend the proof wasn't offered.

Honorable people take option #1. Diebold routinely takes option #2.

The time and place is here and now. I am quite prepared to rebut every charge you have made, here or in court. But I am not going to move on to the next charge until this one disposed with.

Answer ONE question: WHY DID YOU LIE ABOUT ACCUSING PEOPLE OF FILING 'QUI TAM' LAWSUITS?

Nothing is getting buried in the conflict, I, you and everyone else is still pursuing the fight

This is a cop out. You've been caught, just like we caught Diebold. Take responsibility for your actions!

Point #2 is NOT complex. You made your false allegation PUBLICLY, we have proven the allegations untrue publicly. You then denied making the allegations PUBLICLY and we have proven you did PUBLICLY. It is a little late to seek to solve the problem privately when it is you who made the issue public.

The problem you have is that you have now been red-handed in a lie. You are now refusing to own up to the lie. It only gets worse from here, Bev.

You are fleeing DU because you know you are losing credibility. Do you think the issue will stay here? It will follow you.

Jeez, you are now adopting the BushCo playbook:

If you criticize Bush (Bev), you are helping the terrorists (Diebold).

[TrustingDog]

149. plan9_pub, you seem like an...

intelligent nice guy, but could you shut your cakehole about all this already?

I came here to see what Bev has to report and I get all this soap operatic crap...

[Boredtodeath]

150. Perhaps

you might have asked the same of Ms. Harris many months ago when she dragged activists publicly through the mud?

[Kelvin Mace]

151. I see...

Bev is permitted to libel and slander, but when we repsond you get upset.

[TrustingDog]

153. She's got enough on her plate...

can't imagine the incredible pressure she's under - she's playing with the nastiest big dogs after all and is in the forefront of the biggest bloody story in american history.

If you want to bash Bev, please start a new thread titled such so I won't bother reading it. I clicked on this one to see what Bev has to say, not what the gnarling gossipers are whining about.

[yowzayowzayowza]

155. She's got her own site....

with forums. Skeedaddle on over there.

[Kelvin Mace]

156. Ah, the "poor Bev" defense

Many of us here have worked just as hard, have taken the same amount of risks.

Bev asked for proof she made the statements in question. Proof was provided. Now she doesn't want to talk about it any more.

A lie has been told, and yet people continue to defend the lie.

[Kerry_da_man]

188. Oh Knock it off

Oh quit acting like a bunch of cannibalistic piranhas. Only one entity stands to benefit from this feud. So if you want to help diebold , keep up the crap, as I’m certain they have people here grinning from ear to ear watching our movement crumble under the weight of our own bickering.

[Kelvin Mace]

189. You need to read this post

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=1993788#2007623

Again, I and others are supposed to keep taking abuse from Bev, but we are not permitted to defend ourselves?

[MGKrebs]

225. Our "movement" is not crumbling. or at least,

just because it is "decentralizing" doesn't mean the work isn't getting done.

[TrustingDog]

235. exactly... dirty laundry

shouldn't be so exposed. bet the freepers are having a hey day with this. nice work. ; P

[Kelvin Mace]

237. If Bev didn't want her dirty laundry exposed

she should have kept the matter private and between us. Instead, she attacked me publicly on numerous occasions. When she was called on her actions, she declared:

Now, as to all those allegations that I accused "Lynn Landes" and "Rebecca Mercuri" "Denis Wright" etc of Qui Tam -- show me. Show anyone. YOu can't back that up. It's bullshit, as much of the "sandbox" was. Never happened. Go pull that stuff, if you claim it happened. Show me a quote that accuses any of the above or shut up.

We obliged her demand.

Let's put the blame where it belongs, shall we?


EDIT: typo

[redqueen]

154. Just wanted to say thanks, and sorry.

Thanks for backing up your statements. Proof was asked for and you provided it. And sorry for my snarky comments. A more 'professional' attitude on the Bev's part would have nipped this in the bud.

Sad sad stuff. :(

[Kelvin Mace]

159. Very sad

And contrary to what Bev or her defenders, I am very unhappy about this. When we were ALL working together, we were a HELL of a team. DemA, Eloriel, et al were kicking ass and taking names.

Pressure can be blamed to an extent, but the more corrosive ingredient seemed to be fame. Bev got very concerned about credit and about calling the shots. Eventually, people she had listened to, people who would question her strategies, were discarded with people who wouldn't question her.

WIth this post, you have demostrated what integrity means. Other people still disagree with us, but many of them have still been polite in their disagreement. You apologized, something Bev WILL NOT do. Following someone who refuses to admit error is a very dangerous thing. DU is full of daily outrages from an administration that does the very same thing.

The refrain is, "we must not be distracted by disloyal critics in our fight against Diebold. If we destroy our own supporters in the fight, this is perfectly okay, the ends justify the means.

Am I alone in seeing parallels here to BushCo on Iraq.

[redqueen]

160. No, you're not alone

In fact, I almost included something along those lines in my post, but took them out.

Glad you cared to take the time to sort this out.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

166. I have a question for you...

You proved that Bev Harris accused people of filing lawsuits. Not that I needed it, cause I was here when it happened.

The question is, have you proved that none of these people have filed lawsuits?

One of the reasons I ask, is because I saw that Eloriel said she basically gave up working on BBV altogether, and even has said she didn't do anything to begin with. Yet this is exactly the kind of thing that a gag order was supposed to cause.

So, while I do lean towards your side of the story, there is just a small hint of doubt as to whether some or all of Bev's accusations may not be so false. If you could alleviate that small doubt then I would be behind you 100%

[Kelvin Mace]

173. I can tell you categorically

that I am not invloved in any such thing. Never have been, never will be.

I got a note from Roxanne asking me to post this:

I, Roxanne Jekot, have not filed a Qui Tam lawsuit regarding electronic voting machines nor do I intend to do so anytime in the future. Not only have I not contemplated it, the single attorney who suggested we file a Georgia suit under Qui Tam was summarily dismissed by all the activists in Georgia.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

210. Cool - that all I needed to hear...

I haven't followed the arguments closely, so perhaps this has all been hashed out before, but over the last couple of days major threads did not have anything like this - a straight up, no nonsense, denial.

Thanks.

[Boredtodeath]

143. Hurt feelings?

I don't know, sounds more like libel and slander to me.

[yowzayowzayowza]

147. Expected better Bev.

Because the important issues (nine new stories with more to come) are getting buried in conflict, in order to avoid further distraction, we will not be posting any more stories on DU.

Another bridge goes up in smoke. Best of luck in the future. fin.

[Joanne98]

167. Good

You should really quit fighting with ex-partners because you have bigger problems.

[althecat]

174. Bev, this is a terrible shame....

I hope you will find time to reconsider this decision.

"There's a time and place to resolve the above. Now isn't the time, and DU isn't the place."

DU was the place that the events occurred... and DU was the place that you made the accusations. Apparently it is not a good enough place to retract them.

As for timing.. this has dragged out for nearly 8-9 months... when will the time be?

Running away is seldom the answer.

[americanstranger]

198. Oy freakin' vey.

Bye. 10 bucks says you'll be back when you figure the ruckus has died down.

-as

[Briarius]

145. Looks like they're going ahead with the plan to replace the voter rolls

Just had a look around the Diebold job site. http://diebold.recruitsoft.com/servlets/CareerSection?art_ip_action=FlowDispatcher&flowTypeNo=13&pageSeq=2&jobOfferNo=29547&csNo=2&art_servlet_language=en&selected_language=en&JServSessionIddiebold=2cykgwhfs6hl67061.RJS2_47_1">Check this one out. Thanks for all the hard work Bev, we all owe you!

[Devils Advocate NZ]

168. I have some questions for David Allen et al..

If, as you say, Bev Harris has said all these libellous things about you, and damaged your reputation, why do you not sue her?

Now one answer I anticipate is that you don't want to hinder the BBV movement, to which my reply is, so why continue bringing this stuff up over and over again?

It seems to me, that although all these accusations are thrown at Bev, not a lot of evidence that what she said was false has EVER been presented, if any.

If she DID lie about Qui Tam lawsuits, then why not sue her? It just doesn't make sense to me that you would do all this, but not the one thing gauranteed to get a result.

[Pastiche423]

170. Not everyone is sue happy

Sheesh.

:eyes:

[althecat]

176. From one kiwi to another...

From one kiwi to another...

If, as you say, Bev Harris has said all these libellous things about you, and damaged your reputation, why do you not sue her?

**********

lawsuits about accusations on bulletin boards are expensive and wasteful.....

**********

Now one answer I anticipate is that you don't want to hinder the BBV movement, to which my reply is, so why continue bringing this stuff up over and over again?

**********

David didn't keep bringing it up Bev did.. everytime David raised his head and posted an innocuous comment Bev would accuse him of stealing her book.... as for the rest she announced to the world that she has a qui tam suit.... after railing against numerous people for 8 months. What do you expect.

**********

It seems to me, that although all these accusations are thrown at Bev, not a lot of evidence that what she said was false has EVER been presented, if any.

**********

How do you prove a negative... what is clear is that there is a pattern here. Not of allegations about bev but of allegations by bev about others. And more significantly of allegations by beve about others that have gone out of their way to help her.

**********

If she DID lie about Qui Tam lawsuits, then why not sue her? It just doesn't make sense to me that you would do all this, but not the one thing gauranteed to get a result.

**********

It's not her lying that is so infuriating - though her selective memory in some areas is a bit on the nose. In her mind I am sure she is not lying. What has got people's goat is that in the face of a mountain of evidence that she has a lawsuit and nobody else has... why can't she simply say sorry. Plus a lawsuit would not get a result it would just result in a lot of unnecessary expense, time and effort and bitterness...


al

[Devils Advocate NZ]

211. I got what I was really after further up the thread.

A categorical, no diversions, no nonsense denial.

That was all I needed, and I hadn't seen one on these latest threads.

[Kelvin Mace]

179. Why are you resurrecting the smear?

If, as you say, Bev Harris has said all these libellous things about you, and damaged your reputation, why do you not sue her?

Two very simple reasons at the moment:

1) Suing Bev would bring lots of negative publicity to the movement, not here, but in the press. I brought these issues up because Bev launched a very public attack against me on several occasions. To not answer this would be to allow her lies to stand.

2) Suing Bev will involve an expenditure of $50-$100K dollars to undertake. My wife and I have discussed mortgaging the house to do this. Bev has a lawyer working free for her efforts (including harassing me). My lawyer has to be paid. As Bev has no assets, no lawyer will take this on contingency. This would be dumping a huge amount of money on the already huge amount Bev has cost me by her actions.

It seems to me, that although all these accusations are thrown at Bev, not a lot of evidence that what she said was false has EVER been presented, if any.

Have you been paying attention? She denied making the allegations and demanded we prove she did. We did just that. Now you are trying to re-establish the same smear, that people here filed 'qui tam' suits. As it has been almost a year now and no suit has come to light (except Bev's) the baselessness of the allegation is self-proving. Also, none of the principles accused have really "gone quiet" in the past year.

Now one answer I anticipate is that you don't want to hinder the BBV movement, to which my reply is, so why continue bringing this stuff up over and over again?

Bev has attacked me publicly on multiple occasions. She has also been doing so in person to other activists and to reporters. Am I supposed to just sit by and watch?

This is a matter of accountability for one's actions. Bev flunked.

If she DID lie about Qui Tam lawsuits

There is no "if" about it. What part of Bev's own words would you like me to clarify?

So far, Dill, Rubin, Rox, Eloriel, and several others have gone that route, and though I'm not supposed to say, I expect Jim March to do so shortly. Quite soon, the computer experts available as activists will be few and far between.

Please, explain to me what is ambigous about her words.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

212. I got what I wanted, but...

Re: suing for libel - fair enough. I can understand that. I was just trying to force an answer in regards to her accusations, an answer that I had not seen.

Have you been paying attention? She denied making the allegations and demanded we prove she did. We did just that. Now you are trying to re-establish the same smear, that people here filed 'qui tam' suits. As it has been almost a year now and no suit has come to light (except Bev's) the baselessness of the allegation is self-proving. Also, none of the principles accused have really "gone quiet" in the past year.

Now wait a second - Eloriel posted on these threads that she had nothing to do with BBV, and even denied that she had done much of anything in the past except post on DU about it.

It was someone else that bought up her involvement, to which she replied that she basically forgot about that. That was suspicious to me as that was exactly the kind of thing a Qui Tam lawsuit was supposed to cause.

You posted a denial from her that she had filed such a suit, and that is enough for me. However, like I said, there was this small doubt based on some of Eloriel's posts on these threads, so I felt I had to get a straight answer, rather than diversions such as reframing the debate as to whether Bev had accused people or not. I just wanted to hear the principles say they had not filed a suit.

Please, explain to me what is ambigous about her words.

There is nothing ambiguos about her words, what was ambiguos was your and Eloriel's responses. I had not seen a DENIAL that you or Eloriel had filed such a suit. That is what I asked for, and that is what I finally got above.

Like I said to althecat, I am happy now to 100% support you, and it is a shame that Bev wanted to risk the "cause" by playing games with other activists.

I assume her accusations were a means of forcing other activists to back off, therefore keeping the Qui Tam option for herself and March.

[DWright]

214. Denial

"There is nothing ambiguos about her words, what was ambiguos was your and Eloriel's responses. I had not seen a DENIAL that you or Eloriel had filed such a suit. That is what I asked for, and that is what I finally got above."

I, Denis Wright, state categorically that I have not, nor have I ever even CONSIDERED filing a Qui Tam lawsuit (despite being accused of such by Bev Harris) nor have I ever heard ANY Georgia activist considering filing a Qui Tam.

It took BEV, the lying accuser, to file such a suit. The hypocracy is breathtaking.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

215. Thank you.

I appreciate what this whole saga has done to you and the others involved.

Like I said above, I just wanted to hear a denial from the horse's mouth, so to speak, and this clinches it.

Hopefully, the "cause" will survive Bev's actions, both past and present, and I hope she does not do any future damage.

Sad.

[DWright]

221. The Cause

The cause WILL survive Bev's cynical and disgusting manipulations.

See, that's the problem for Bev. She seems to think it's all about HER.

But it's not.

You can't stop a train by wishing... or by lying. And this train is rolling down the tracks as we speak.

I defended Bev Harris LONG after I should have known better. Those days are over. But the fight will continue, that's for sure. Hopefully by REAL activists and not psuedos like Bev.

Hey Bev, still got any Klintoon Cigars? No, I'm not buying.... I hope you lost money on that one.

[Kelvin Mace]

217. My feelings and view on 'qui tam'

have been public knowledge for some time. Also, at no time did I ever "go quiet" in the last year. I continued to post, gave interviews and speeches before numerous forums in NC and VA. Hardly something I would be able to do if I had filed a 'qui tam'

There is nothing ambiguous about her words, what was ambiguous was your and Eloriel's responses. I had not seen a DENIAL that you or Eloriel had filed such a suit. That is what I asked for, and that is what I finally got above.

I assume her accusations were a means of forcing other activists to back off, therefore keeping the Qui Tam option for herself and March.

That's my view.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

220. One final thought - even if you or anyone else HAD filed Qui Tam lawsuits

it would have been VERY LOW for Bev to have publically abused you or anyone else for doing the same damn thing as she was planning to do.

So, I would still have been pissed about that, even if you had said YES :-)

I hope Bev leaves you alone now, but I wouldn't count on it.

[Joanne98]

169. Warning (cussing involved)

It really doesn't matter anymore because Bev has all ready lost her lawsuit. (Hi Jim March) I CAN'T BELIEVE nobody took International Trade Law into consideration. For instance, does the GATT Agreement supersede a Qui Tam lawsuit? There is nothing, NOTHING more complicated or BORING than the GATT agreement. I love this part.

Lottery Services of Georgia is not a state organization, but a "public private" organization. Am looking at this more.

I didn't know that the state lottery's were ppp's. HA That clears up alot. I was wondering about the WIERD fights over GAMING.

Like the story Hanzel and Gretel the bad witch (Diebold) is dropping crumbs for Bev to follow which lead to INTERNATIONAL TRADE LAW. OOPS.
(sigh)
DMCA cease and desist order should have been a sign.
What they've done is PRIVATIZE our right to vote.
In order to get that back we have to fight with the WTO over US soverity rights. Even the State of California couldn't win that one.
THIS SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!
I can't believe this. There's only won thing let to do. Get some sledge hammers and SMASH THE MOTHER FUCKERS AND GO TO JAIL.

[redqueen]

171. Would you mind starting a new topic on this?

ARe WE COMPLETELY CHENEYED?!

[Joanne98]

175. Here

http://www.cupe.ca/

Warning you are now entering the descent into HELL. They have archives going back years. Back to 1994 when they started getting fucked by the NAFTA agreement. I guess I could post threads. I have to think about it. Tonight I'm getting drunk. I don't know if I can take thinking about this again. It's one of those slit your wrists, get into the bathtub and shoot yourself in the head subjects.
I did post two threads the other day about the Australian Trade Agreement that has now been passed by a BI-PARTISAN vote in both houses.
Because it was supported by the DEMOCRATIC TRAITOR LEADERSHIP COUNSEL.
Nobody responsed. I don't even know if DUer's are up on this subject.
If they're not they should be.

[redqueen]

178. Thank you

Wish I could help you personally in some way. Thank you sincerely for exposing yourself to this depth of anguish.

I would post the hug icon, but the smile seems horribly and tragically inappropriate.

My thoughts and prayers are with you.

oh, and on edit:

FUCK YOU, DLC!

:puke:

[trumad]

182. Hey Joanne98... I'm getting drunk toooooo...

Have fun....

[Joanne98]

187. Hey Trumad

I'm not drunk yet. Looking up Satanic WTO rulings. YUK :)

[Joanne98]

172. This issue is dead

I'm getting the same reaction I always get when bringing up the WTO.
Silence. You have just entered the Twilight zone. I hope we win BUT since as far as I know nobody EVER has, well.........
Maybe someone should get ahold of Dennis Kuchinich. Isn't he still running for president. He can't be censored by law. He was on the floor bashing the Australian trade agreement. The DLC SUPPORTED IT. Thanks Bill Clinton.

[redqueen]

177. Will try.

Thanks for the info.

:(

[Joanne98]

180. Your welcome

Maybe it won't have the same effect on you it had on me. I haven't looked (too scared) for a couple of years so maybe they have some good news I don't know about. If I were Bev I would start a research thread on the subject, "Can anyone find an instance where a national, state or person has won a lawsuit against a corporation in the WTO"?
Maybe somebody has won one.

[Kelvin Mace]

181. Not that it's not important,

Joanne, it is VERY important. But personally, I can only handle one threat to democracy at a time. <s>

I wish Dennis K was the nominee.

[Kelvin Mace]

183. A question for the "Hey David! Take one for the team" crowd

A number of you have asked why I don't put the destruction of my reputation, damage to my business and massive betrayal behind me in order to not distract from the "real" fight.

Here's my question back:

Why doesn't Bev swallow her pride and admit error? Simply apologize for what she said and put aside her ego in order to bring helpful allies back into the fold to help with the "real fight"?

[Pobeka]

193. Kind of quiet around here...

You asked a reasonable question.

This is the whole point behind why we are fighting for legitimate elections -- so the process of electing our government officials is built on an open process -- not tainted. If we did not believe that we'd be sneaking around trying to figure out how to steal the vote, because we'd be "ends justifies the means" sort of people.

The hypocrisy is staggering here.

[RedEagle]

206. Since this question wasn't answered last time....

David, in a previous thread, you said you contributed three chapters to Bev's book. Which three were they? I'm still waiting to make that notation in my book.

And for clarification, who contractually has the right to sell the book to bookstores?

[Kelvin Mace]

226. I answered your question

in a previous post, and no I didn't memorize the chapters.

If Bev wants to post her contract, she may do so. I have no intention of giving her more ammunition to attack me by discussing or posting confidential details of a legal document.

You have no desire to note anything in your book, your desire is to cast aspersions on my reputation.

Let me 'splain something to you I can discuss.

Last October when Bev didn't want to appear on the John Gibson show (she was afraid of it being an "ambush", which given that it was Fox News, was a valid concern) she told the producer, "I don't do TV, but you can call my co-author, he might." She then called me to warn me of the of situation.

With very little notice, I went on the show, was interviewed, and got high praise from Bev after the show. The title under me (which I didn't know until AFTER the broadcast when I saw it on tape) read:

David Allen
co-author, Black Box Voting

When I saw it I was mortified because Bev was touchy about credit. I asked if it could be removed before the repeat broadcast and a correction issued. The producer then recounted the conversation above.

When I got back in the car to return home I called Bev and started by asking, "So, I'm a co-author now?" Bev laughed and said, "Yep! You take TV, I'll handle radio and print."

So, Bev herself called me her co-author, which I thinks speaks volumes about her views on my contribution to the book. Of course, her views have changed. You have but to go back and re-read the posts from that time to see Bev's opinion.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=532971#533599

I know you really want to believe I am a horrible person who's trying to cheat Bev out of her credit. But I have tried to do NO such thing. Bev did a tremendous amount of work and deserves high praise, but by her own admission (even if recanted now) with my and other people's help.

My contribution while not as important as the research done by the people here (also now disavowed by Bev), was still significant.

Will it be necessary to post video of Bev's comments on my contributions in order to convince you? I am guessing so.

I grow tired of proving myself on these types of questions, especially when Bev has been proven to have lied and still refuses to apologize.

[RedEagle]

232. No, you didn't answer my question

Here's your reply:

"Away from the office right now
so, I don't have the book handy. I wrote about the phone conference, the argument against internet voting, and the one on technical solutions (this was added to several others solutions from other sources). Lex Alexander, a newspaper editor with "Greensboro News & Record", edited the book (Bev's claims to the contrary not withstanding). Though his editing was severely limited by Bev's refusal to allow him to change anything more than spelling and grammar editing, as she "didn't trust his agenda". In fact, I was the only person who could get away with re-writing some of Bev's stuff for clarity."


You said you "contributed three chapters." That is quoted in a post above, from what you said in another thread. I have asked you which ones. What you posted does not answer that question. If it does, then you did not write the three chapters you claimed. Which is it?

The only other question I have asked is who has rights, contractually, to sell to bookstores? I don't need or want the whole contract, just your answer to that question. You've posted a lot of material irrelevant to those questions.

I'm not asking what Bev did or did not say about your contribution. I'm asking you to confirm what you claimed about writing three chapters, by telling me which chapters you wrote.

We have all helped her in her work writing the book. Very few books would get published without help of one sort or another. Authors use material from other people all the time, from research to life histories. Credit is given and Bev has done that. But you claim to have written three chapters and I want to know which ones. Not what she said or FOX said or you said about getting credit. Which chapters David?

Two questions, which only require two simple, direct answers.

[Pobeka]

233. And what if he answers?

Then someone else can say "did not".

"did so",

"did not",

... ad infinitum.

It's not that your question is unreasonable -- wanting to give Dave proper credit, it's just a question that's not likely to get a conclusive answer on this forum, because the writing of the book has not happened in full public view, and none of us (in the context of this forum) could determine the truth.

What has happened, in full public view, is Bev has lied about accusing others of filing a Qui Tam, and is not taking responsibility for splintering the BBV movement because of those accusations. And now the only thing left to believe is she wanted to scare off the possibility of any other Qui Tam's so she and Jim March could have the whole pot to themselves, or at least get there first.

On edit: changed "likely to get conclusive question" to "likely to get conclusive answer"

[Zhade]

240. This is exactly how I view it now.

What has happened, in full public view, is Bev has lied about accusing others of filing a Qui Tam, and is not taking responsibility for splintering the BBV movement because of those accusations. And now the only thing left to believe is she wanted to scare off the possibility of any other Qui Tam's so she and Jim March could have the whole pot to themselves, or at least get there first.

Sadly, even if this wasn't true, it LOOKS like what happened. This reflects poorly on Bev and, by extension, the clean voting movement - which was never her movement, but which now is widely associated with her in the media.

Even if Bev had never lied about others doing exactly what she did (Qui Tam) and had the purest intentions, this has the appearance of opportunism and deceit.

I was willing to get sued, way back when, for the cause. Now I've learned I'll have to be very, very careful with my trust.

It's like the DLC - they betrayed We The People one too many times with their corporate whoring, and now there is nothing they can do to make me trust them again. Once a liar, always a liar.

[Kelvin Mace]

243. Her refusal to answer

and her withdrawal from DU pretty much amounts to admission of guilt.

[Kelvin Mace]

234. I've answered the questions

I see no reason to repeat my self for Bev's surrogate. The purpose of your questions is to try and cast doubt on my contribution to the book. What I posted was quite relevant in that it shows that Bev, in her own words, considered my contribution to the book much more significant than she now claims.

If it becomes necessary, I am prepared to prove my contributions in court. As to rights, I state again, let Bev post her contract if she wishes. It would be unethical for me to divulge terms of the contract.

I have asked ONE simple question and Bev bailed off DU rather than answer it.

I told you the contents of the chapters. Try opening the book and reading.

Since we asking questions, why don't you tell me your opinion of why Bev lied about attacking people over 'qui tam'? This is an established fact which cannot be denied.

The next lie I will disprove is the one where Bev claimed to have not been paid any money for the book. When I get back to the office I will be posting a GIF of the canceled check she cashed.

She whines about having typeset the book. I will be posting email from Bev where it will be shown that this was HER idea.

She claims she edited the book by herself. I will be posting email from her where she discusses edits with me and with her editor, Lex Alexander.

She claims she delivered the book in November. I will post emails showing she was re-writing and submitting chapters well into late January.

None of this will prove anything as far as you are concerned, but it will certainly show the punters how Bev has been less than candid with them.

Bev should have quit while she was ahead and never demanded proof she was lying.

[althecat]

242. Back in the old days Red.. we were strait with each other...

Can you please dignify us with some strait answers here...

On book sales in shops my understanding was that these were not part of the CT with David. But I could be wrong.. I do not understand the relevance. The question though is a bit odd since you have a close relationship with Bev and she has a copy of the contract too I am sure you can answer it for yourself.

On the writing... I think that reading between the lines David is saying that he did not make a huge contribution but he did make a contribution. Moreover he is saying that Bev used to appreciate that contribution and now seems to have forgotten her appreciation.

Now your merely repeating your questions is not reflecting well on you.

As David says the book allegations are part of two threads of argument in this discussion..

What are your views on the Qui Tam and Bev's allegations against others? Do you have a view? Or are you too scared of Bev to talk for yourself?

al

[Kelvin Mace]

244. Once again, silence....

No answer to the crucial question. Bev and her supporters demand answers to multiple questions but refuse to answer a single on themselves.

Rest assured, answers are coming to Bev other's questions/accusations and she will like them even less than the answer she got about 'qui tam'. I will be addressing them with proof from Bev's own email later today.

[Kelvin Mace]

184. kick

[Joanne98]

186. big problems

http://www.monetary-reform.on.ca/archives/1c.shtml

This is a good example of how you can't fight the trade aggreements.
Of course it's a Canadian case, (they've gone thru HELL) It about MMT the fuel additive. It's what the State of California sued over. The people of Canada and the State of California LOST because it involve the NAFTA and GATT trade agreements. (insert the word FUCKING) The WTO supersedes all US law including the congress and the Supreme Court. There is no transparency in the WTO in fact, we don't even have the legal right to know the names of the judges who RULE OUR LIVES. People need to read every word Greg Palast has wrote on this subject. If Diebold STEERS this CA lawsuit into the "Alice and Wonderland World" of the WTO then, get your sledge hammers ready it's time to bust the e-voting machines into little pieces.

[RedEagle]

222. Third Time....

David, in a previous thread, you said you contributed three chapters to Bev's book. Which three were they? I'm still waiting to make that notation in my book, for I certainly want to have correct information.

And for clarification, who contractually has the right to sell the book to bookstores?

[Boredtodeath]

223. Perhaps?

You, as a board member of the 501(c) corporation can answer some of the questions posed in this thread by many supporters?

It is telling that you want to harangue David for answers to questions, while refusing to address the larger question.

You first.

[RedEagle]

224. For Clarification David, here's your post from another thread:

"(The tiny amount I contributed was three of sixteen chapters, not to mention tons of other work she now describes as "minimal")."

"...was THREE of sixteen chapters...."

If I had written three chapters of the book, been as involved as you were, especially as publisher, I'd have those chapter numbers memorized by heart.

I do want to note those chapters in my book.

[yowzayowzayowza]

227. In the searing light of evidence presented here,

we may need to review a definition:

Main Entry: pet·ty
Pronunciation: 'pe-tE
Function: adjective
Inflected Form(s): pet·ti·er; -est
Etymology: Middle English pety small, minor, alteration of petit
1 : having secondary rank or importance : MINOR, SUBORDINATE
2 : having little or no importance or significance
3 : marked by or reflective of narrow interests and sympathies : SMALL-MINDED

[Kelvin Mace]

228. As I mentioned earlier in a previous post

They will keep changing the subject, trying to focus on something they think they can win.

Bev has now retreated to bbv.org where she controls the forum and all will accept here word without question. If anyone questions her "truth", they will be tombstoned without ceremony.

This is one of the reasons she was so desparate to get bbv.com from me. As long as I control it, her word on the issue is not absolute.

Very sad.

[althecat]

241. This is why I love forums... posts like this....

:)

[Joanne98]

190. Total evil is never more clear than in the plan to privatize the world's

WATER.

http://www.monetary-reform.on.ca/archives/1c.shtml

New Zealand fighting the plan...... Isn't somebody here from NZ?
Al the CAT

[Joanne98]

192. BTW this is in reference to the 2005 GATTS agreement

S as in services, if anybody has any doubts that it really exists. This has to do with water. They actually have a World Water Summit each year. They're developing plans to privatize water and ship it around the world in oil tankers and float it in plastic floating barges. What does this have to do with e-voting, everything. They're privatizing not just our right to vote but everybody's. That throws this into a global court. Diebold might not be covered under the current GATT agreement but you can bet your life they will be covered under GATTS. They are providing a service.

[Kerry_da_man]

194. Bev Bombshell!!!!!!!!!!

I just received information that, if true, will derail our whole movement.

I have to check with my lawyer before I post the details, but this is shocking stuff, and doesn't bode well for our hopes in defeating Diebold.

[Joanne98]

195. Who da Hell are you?

You must be part of a split personality?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2008640

My thread on the Australian Trade Deal. Nobody's interested. The trade agreements are BORING. Kinda like the Interstate Commence Laws
which alot of people seem to be intensely interested in although I can't figure out why. I'm sure when I do it will give me chills.
I guess I have to figure out a way to SEX UP this subject.

[Kerry_da_man]

196. Who am I

I am a private investigator by trade who dabbles in political activism.

I’ve had my eye on this issue for over a year now. I only recently decided to add my two cents because of the infighting that has reached a destructive crescendo that threatens to undo all that has been accomplished.

Now, as for the recent information that I referred to, I just received it not long ago. But if it turns out to be accurate, Bev is cooked, and Diebold might get off the hook.

[Boredtodeath]

197. Divert, divert, divert

Bev to Andy: Well, hell, the WTO diversion didn't work. Send in the PI with an explosive new discovery.......

[Kerry_da_man]

199. Quislings are everywhere

Things are not as they seem. Those who you believe to be friends may actually be working for the other side.

What better way can you think of to derail a movement?

Payoffs and betrayal abound.

[americanstranger]

200. Okay, I'll bite.

Who's the Quisling? I have my own theory, but i'd like to hear yours.

-as

[Kerry_da_man]

201. Not just one

The evidence suggests that there are three, and all three are linked to the same conspiracy.

Qui Tam is just a diversion, don’t be fooled.

Ask these questions:

1. Who has held secret negotiation with top Diebold officials.

2. Who, after holding secret negotiations, made substantial bank deposits in excess of 10,000.

3. Who stands to gain if Diebold loses the Qui Tam.

4. What single person could provide the most damaging information about Diebold’s inside operations, and how is that person linked to persons involved in Qui Tam?


I know the answers to those questions, and you will too, soon.

[Boredtodeath]

202. Take your meds and call us in the morning

Bwahahahahahahahahahahaha!

[Kerry_da_man]

204. Stay Tuned

You'll be shocked.

[thebigidea]

207. the owls are not what they seem. I repeat: the owls are not what they seem

What a bezerk thread, it really needs to be turned into a teevee miniseries. Love and betrayal against a backdrop of electronic voting. Gary Coleman as the hooker with the heart of gold. Torrid passions and torn egos.

Coming this fall on UPN!

[Kelvin Mace]

216. Here's a guy with 7 posts to his credit

who now tells us that someone is working for Diebold to betray Bev.

Why do I smell a new smear coming?

[Pobeka]

219. Kerry_da_man is not very convincing

First, he makes this post #188:
--------------

Kerry_da_man (7 posts) Fri Jul-16-04 04:55 PM
Response to Reply #156
188. Oh Knock it off



Oh quit acting like a bunch of cannibalistic piranhas. Only one entity stands to benefit from this feud. So if you want to help diebold , keep up the crap, as I’m certain they have people here grinning from ear to ear watching our movement crumble under the weight of our own bickering.

---------------

And then, ONLY 1 HOUR LATER, he's a PI, and is going to take Bev down himself, and the movement with her.

Kerry_da_man has blown his own credibility in a single thread at DU, in under 7 posts.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

213. Trust me, we in New Zealand know how bad the WTO is...

In fact one of the recent past presidents of the WTO (Mike Moore) was involved in the raping of New Zealand by corporations in the 90's.

We KNOW what they are about, and we are trying to fight them.

[loudsue]

236. This is the first I've ever heard about cases being thrown into the

International Courts due to NAFTA and GATT(S). I'm speechless, as my brain tries to grasp the implications here.

Joanne...and others who are knowledgeable about this.....please start posting more about this on various threads. I read MOST threads whenever I log-on to DU, but I totally missed anything about this.

:kick::kick::kick:

[Kelvin Mace]

238. But please create a new post

as it has nothing to do with what is being discussed here.

Thanks!

[althecat]

Lest we forget... David's rebuttal thread...

... and this one is getting too long anyway.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=2021230&mesg_id=2021230&page=

[althecat]

245. Lest we forget... David's rebuttal thread...

... and this one is getting too long anyway.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=2021230&mesg_id=2021230&page=