African-American Voters Scrubbed by Secret GOP Hit List

[Totally Committed]

Massacre of the Buffalo Soldiers
by Greg Palast
As reported for Democracy Now!

Palast, who first reported this story for BBC Television Newsnight (UK) and Democracy Now! (USA), is author of the New York Times bestseller, Armed Madhouse. The Republican National Committee has a special offer for African-American soldiers: Go to Baghdad, lose your vote. A confidential campaign directed by GOP party chiefs in October 2004 sought to challenge the ballots of tens of thousands of voters in the last presidential election, virtually all of them cast by residents of Black-majority precincts.

Files from the secret vote-blocking campaign were obtained by BBC Television Newsnight, London. They were attached to emails accidentally sent by Republican operatives to a non-party website.

One group of voters wrongly identified by the Republicans as registering to vote from false addresses: servicemen and women sent overseas.

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For Greg Palast’s discussion with broadcaster Amy Goodman on the Black soldier purge of 2004, go to http://gregpalast.com/armedmadhouse/palastDN6-14-06.mp3

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Here’s how the scheme worked: The RNC mailed these voters letters in envelopes marked, “Do not forward”, to be returned to the sender. These letters were mailed to servicemen and women, some stationed overseas, to their US home addresses. The letters then returned to the Bush-Cheney campaign as “undeliverable.”

The lists of soldiers of “undeliverable” letters were transmitted from state headquarters, in this case Florida, to the RNC in Washington. The party could then challenge the voters’ registration and thereby prevent their absentee ballots being counted.

One target list was comprised exclusively of voters registered at the Jacksonville, Florida, Naval Air Station. Jacksonville is third largest naval installation in the US, best known as home of the Blue Angels fighting squandron.

http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=160156893&context=set-72157594155273706&size=o >

Our team contacted the homes of several on the caging list, such as Randall Prausa, a serviceman, whose wife said he had been ordered overseas.

A soldier returning home in time to vote in November 2004 could also be challenged on the basis of the returned envelope. Soldiers challenged would be required to vote by “provisional” ballot.

Over one million provisional ballots cast in the 2004 race were never counted; over half a million absentee ballots were also rejected. The extraordinary rise in the number of rejected ballots was the result of the widespread multi-state voter challenge campaign by the Republican Party. The operation, of which the purge of Black soldiers was a small part, was the first mass challenge to voting America had seen in two decades.

The rest of the article:

http://www.gregpalast.com/massacre-of-the-buffalo-soldiers

TC

[MissWaverly]

1. Dems Support the Troops: GOP steal their votes

The hypocrisy of this is simply appalling.

[Totally Committed]

2. Kick for the afternoon crowd

:kick:

This is important... this is also fraud!

TC

[Mountainman]

3. Why do we let this happen? Who lets a political party control an

election? Why are we not protecting the votes? Why don't we have inside information about this before the election? Why does the right have such genius when it comes to stealing elections? Isn't there something the left can do to protect the vote? The key is to find states with repukes in charge of elections such as Ohio and FL and work with local people to protect the vote. A scheme as massive as the one described should have been detected before the election. People should be fore warned that there will be methods put in play to take away their right to vote and to report anything suspicious. The Black churches could play a large part in this. We don't seem to be able to do anything even though we have gone through 3 election cycles of the same kind of bull shit. I feel strongly that it will happen again this year are we doing anything about it?

[itzamirakul]

4. What do you think the black churches can do about this?

If the huge masses of white democrats along with blacks, did not rise up in pure outrage when the election was stolen and the SCOTUS was complicit in aiding and abetting the crime in 2000 and then the election was stolen again in 2004 with no major outrage again then it proves that white Democrats do not care about losing the election if winning it means that they have to defend the black man's right to vote.

It was from studying the tactics of Democratic leaders who addressed black voters in the churches during Kennedy's reign and after that the Republicans got the idea of strengthening the white church going base and feeding them the hatred and cruelty that they express. Now, the Dems need some powerful speakers to go into those black churches and tell people the TRUTH. And they ARE NOT DOING THIS. The Dem leaders are still speaking out of both sides of their mealy mouths, so in some instances, what the Repubs preach makes more sense. No one is helping either black nor white churchgoer to see the filthy truth that underlies the Republican message and the issues they espouse.

White Democrats like those in DLC and DCCC seem to prefer fighting for the "swing vote" rather than defending the vote they can depend on.

On other threads at other times it has been mentioned and rightly so,that there were black slaveowners as well as white. Well, just one look at Ohio's Blackwell will show you that that kind of mindset has not died. I get the feeling that Blackwell would sell his own mother down the river for the right amount of cash.

Edit: typo

[Totally Committed]

5. "White Democrats like those in DLC and DCCC....

seem to prefer fighting for the "swing vote" rather than defending the vote they can depend on."

RIGHT ON! --- I have been saying this for years! Very astute, very astute.

TC

[Mountainman]

6. fighting for the "swing vote" rather than defending the vote they can depe

You hit the nail on the head there. So many DUers are willing to throw gays and women to the wolves in some convoluted idea that that will get them more votes in return. edited to add, Hispanics and Blacks and other immigrants.

[Totally Committed]

7. Kick because this is important

:kick:

TC