[Ninong]

Signs of the times:


The home of former Congressman and CIA director Porter Goss is listed for sale on D Street SE in Washington, DC, near the U.S. Capitol.



The now-for-sale homes of former Congressmen Mark Foley, left, and Chris Chocola, center, sit side-by-side on D Street SE in Washington, DC, near the U.S. Capitol.



One block of D Street SE in Washington, DC, holds the houses of five Republican representatives who were not re-elected last week and former CIA Director Porter Goss who has put his home up for sale. Among the homes are those of Mark Foley (#137, left,) Chris Chocola (#135), Clay Shaw (#131) and Nancy Johnson (#129).


Looks like the Washington, D.C. real estate agents are one happy bunch lately!

[Ninong]

DeLay's replacement says staff deleted records and files

HOUSTON - Just three days after being sworn in, U.S. Rep. Shelley Sekula-Gibbs wants Congress to investigate the destruction of files in her office by former staff members of her predecessor, Tom DeLay.
[...]
She prompted chuckles in The Washington Post and other national publications by telling reporters she planned to resolve such thorny issues as tax cuts, immigration reform and the Iraq war - all in less than two weeks of a lame-duck Congress. And then her staff walked out without warning.



P.S. -- No wonder she lost the election to the Democrat!

[Ninong]

“White rednecks” who “didn’t show up to vote for us” partly cost GOPers their congressional majorities, Rep. Adam Putnam (R-FL) told fellow Republicans today.

[Ninong]

This is the lady who was chosen by the Texas GOP as their best hope of winning Tom DeLay's heavily Republican district. She failed in that quest and now it appears she failed in her demand that both President Bush and Vice President Cheney be seated in the gallery to witness her special swearing-in.

This is what Robert Novak has to say about her:

The last remnants of the resigned Tom DeLay’s once powerful congressional staff on Tuesday walked out of the office of his temporary successor, Rep. Shelley Sekula-Gibbs, because of exasperation with her. Sekula-Gibbs, a Houston City Council member and physician, was elected to serve in the lame-duck session but was defeated in a write-in for a full term.

The last straw for the DeLay alumni was when they were instructed by Sekula-Gibbs to make sure President Bush and Vice President Cheney were seated in the gallery for her swearing-in. The word on Capitol Hill is that she must have been really obnoxious for staffers to give up two months of easy pay.

Sekula-Gibbs’s conduct raises doubts whether she will be the Republican nominee whose name will appear on the 2008 ballot in the strongly GOP Texas district.

[Ninong]

Justice Department Won't Investigate Flier Distribution

Nov 18th - 12:03pm

WASHINGTON - The Justice Department says it won't investigate misleading fliers that Republicans distributed in Maryland on Election Day.

The fliers promoted the candidacies of Governor Robert Ehrlich and Lieutenant Governor Michael Steele.

Acting Assistant Attorney General James Clinger says there's not enough legal basis to support such an investigation.

The fliers were authorized by the campaigns of Ehrlich, who lost his bid for a second term, and Steele, who was defeated by Congressman Ben Cardin in his bid for a Senate seat.

They implied that the two candidates had been endorsed by prominent black Democrats, including former NAACP leader Kweisi Mfume and Prince George's County Executive Jack Johnson.

Neither had endorsed the GOP candidates.

P.S. -- How can you be the so-called "values party" without having any actual, you know, values?

[Ninong]

First it was the conservatives who were attacking Bush because they said he had betrayed conservative principles, now the neo-conservatives are attacking him because they accuse him of being too stupid and incompetent to carry out their neo-conservative principles.

They created him, they supported him, they encouraged his overseas adventures and now that everything is a mess, they blame him for not being competent enough to execute their plans for world domination through enforced democracy.

We are fast approaching the point where only Laura and Barney will still be in his camp.

Already John McCain is running against the Bush Administration. That's his theme song. Bush ran against the Clinton Administration, remember? He was going to "restore honor and dignity to the White House." Now McCain is going to restore conservative principles to the White House. And like Eisenhower, he promises to extract us from the current overseas conflict.

[Ninong]

Certainly not Republicans!

[Ninong]

Republicans: What Went Wrong?

The California Republican Party is conducting an internal audit over why its unprecedented $20 million get-out-the-vote effort didn't produce wins for their candidates on election day. Only Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and insurance commissioner Steve Poizner captured statewide offices for the GOP, which also failed to pick up any new seats in the Legislature. One Republican incumbent, Secretary of State Bruce McPherson, was unseated.


During the campaign, Schwarzenegger made several visits to GOP call centers, such as the one seen at right [above] in photo. But Sundheim said a Democratic wave on the weekend before the election sunk candidates in the end.

P.S. -- Who was in charge of recruiting the call center volunteers, Mark Foley?

[Ninong]

The Orlando Sentinel newspaper has reviewed records of all 17,846 touch-screen ballots that included no vote in the 13th District congressional race and found that those voters heavily favored Democratic candidates in other races where their votes actually registered. Who would have thunk it?

It's no surprise that 15% of all ballots in Sarasota County, one of four counties in the 13th District, failed to record a vote for Congress if you consider that Sarasota Country was the Democratic candidate's stronghold. That undervote was six times the rate in all of the other counties in the District. And it was more than six times the undervote in paper ballots in Sarasota County. The electronic voting machines have no paper backup and there is no way to audit them other than simply recounting the votes that registered. The GOP says it's obvious that a lot of the voters in Sarasota County chose NOT to vote for either candidate for Congress and they did so at a rate six times higher than any of the other counties where the GOP candidate is stronger.

The Republican candidate was declared the winner by the state Republican officials Monday. His margin of victory was 369 votes. The Democratic candidate carried Sarasota County by 53%-47%. Even if you take that margin and adjust the undervote to equal the undervote in the other counties, that would give the Democratic candidate an additional 2,250 votes. However, the Orlando Sentinel is reporting that it's more lopsided than that because somehow or other most of the ballots that didn't register a vote for Congress were cast by Democrats who voted for Democratic candidates in the other races. Not just 53%, MOST of the ballots examined!

What a coincidence? Odd that this is Katherine Harris' old seat. That's another coincidence.

So the Republicans bought the electronic voting machines and the Republicans benefited from the "malfunctioning" of those machines. And there is no way to go back and determine what went wrong.

The only fair thing to do is to call a new election. We will have to wait to see if the judge agrees. He just gave the Republican election officials 15 days to look at the machines and report back to the court.

[SPasse]

George,

Were these Diebold voting machines?

In any case, as an electronic engineer (hardware) with a modest programming background as well, I can think of several ways to make any electronic voting machine come up with any result that you desire.

These would include subroutines that were triggered by specific time/date related parameters. I.E. the machine would pass "dry run" tests ahead of the actual election time/date and then "weight" the votes as desired during the time interval of the actual election.

I remember that at the time of the 2004 election, Diebold was challenged to produce the "source code" for their machines but protested/refused due to "intellectual property" issues. Well that is total BS because this kind of issue is "solved" all the time by setting up neutral, 3rd party examiners to make sure that no "intellectual property" is publicly divulged.

I don't remember how this played out.

In any case, electronic voting machines that don't create a paper printout are unacceptable.

Regards,

Scott

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by SPasse

George,

Were these Diebold voting machines?

They don't identify the manufacturer in that article. They just say "touch-screen" machines.

In any case, as an electronic engineer (hardware) with a modest programming background as well, I can think of several ways to make any electronic voting machine come up with any result that you desire.

Yes, this has already been demonstrated. Or, as we would say in Latin "Q.E.D." -- quod erat demonstrandum.

I remember that at the time of the 2004 election, Diebold was challenged to produce the "source code" for their machines but protested/refused due to "intellectual property" issues. Well that is total BS because this kind of issue is "solved" all the time by setting up neutral, 3rd party examiners to make sure that no "intellectual property" is publicly divulged.

I don't remember how this played out.

I happen to know all about how it's been playing out.

Diebold has sued former employees and employees of firms who were sub-contractors to Diebold.

BradBlog.com has been following Diebold for the past couple of years now. They have a lot of inside stuff on them. Their latest entry was just a day or so ago:

EXCLUSIVE: Whistleblower Stephen Heller Says 'Diebold Cannot be Trusted to Run Elections in America'

Plea Deal for 'Wobbly Felony' Conviction, 3-Years Probation, May be Reduced to Misdemeanor after One Year of Good Behavior

Here -- just scroll down a little till you get to the above headline.

There has been extensive testing in California and Florida, too, and those stories have been all over the news, including the MSM.

[SPasse]

A quote from whistleblower Stephen Heller:

"I urge all Americans to insist Congress enact Federal legislation requiring that all voting machines must have a voter verifiable paper ballot, be run on open source software code, be subject to inspection by independent computer experts, and that each election have a random sample ballot recount. Only then will we have a chance of restoring true integrity to American elections."

How can anybody reasonably argue with that!

Regards,

Scott

[Ninong]

Remember back in 2004 when Alaska refused to release the voting database and then after they finally released it following a court order, it contained hundreds of edits that had been made after the election? Well, they're now refusing to release the 2006 results in spite of a court order.

I guess they need more time to edit the results first. Back in 2004, they couldn't get anything to match actual results. Statewide totals were much higher than individual precinct totals and some jurisdictions reported voter turnout of more than 200%!!! Alaska uses Diebold machines!

BradBlog has the story.

And in FL-13, they're still auditing the touch-screen voting machines. They're hoping to figure out why so many Democrats didn't vote in the Congressional race even though they voted in all of the other races -- for Democrats! They're planning on buying new machines equipped with paper trails before the 2008 elections. They hope to sell their old machines to Georgia! Seriously! I did not make that up.

[Ninong]

What a slave driver! Nancy Pelosi has announced plans to force the People's House to actually do the People's Business five days a week instead of the current two or three days a week instituted by Coach Hastert. This has caused some good Christian Republican congressmembers to accuse her of being anti-family:

"Keeping us up here eats away at families," said Rep. Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), who typically flies home on Thursdays and returns to Washington on Tuesdays. "Marriages suffer. The Democrats could care less about families -- that's what this says."

You can read all about the abolition of the two-day workweek here.

Here is a typical response from a blog reader to Rep. Kingston: "As an active duty military member I’m pretty offended by members of congress crying about working a 5 day work week. And for Rep Kingston’s comments about families, give me a break! How about the thousands of military marriages that have ended because of husbands and wives being deployed for a year multiple times?"

[schrocat]

I can't believe that quote...and I assure it you will come back to harm more than just the fool who uttered it.

What's up with these guys?

Do they wan't to be the minority party for life?

[Ninong]

From Rep. Jack Kingston's official House website:

Known as an effective communicator and a conservative voice, Congressman Kingston was elected by his Republican colleagues in 2004 as Vice Chairman of the House Republican Conference and has served as the Chairman of the Theme Team since 1997.

His conservative track record has won him recognition and awards from many non-partisan citizens’ groups and media outlets. In fact, in 2005 Congressman Kingston was rated as the "most conservative member of the House" by National Journal for his voting record the previous year. Further, he has been named each term as a “Taxpayer’s Hero," and “A Guardian of Small Business.” Congressman Kingston was also awarded the “Watchdog of the Treasury Award,” and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s “Spirit of Enterprise” Award.

Congressman Kingston’s district encompasses 29 counties in South Georgia stretching from Savannah to St. Marys, west to Moultrie and north to Warner Robins and includes five major military installations and the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Brunswick.

Congressman Kingston lives in Savannah. He is married and has four children and two dogs.

__________________________________________________ ________

Not from his official website:

Kingston is a pro-life conservative who opposes stem cell research. He supports the death penalty and he has sponsored resolutions calling for the Ten Commandments to be displayed in the House and Senate Chambers.

USA Today named Kingston "one of the most partisan Republicans in the House," having been one of 19 co-sponsors of the 1997 resolution asking for an impeachment inquiry of President Clinton.

In 2002, Americans for Democratic Action gave him a rating of zero, and the American Conservative Union gave him a rating of 96. In 2004, the National Journal claimed that Kingston was the most conservative member of the House of Representatives on economic issues, social issues, and foreign issues, judging solely by his voting record. According to the National Journal, he falls to the right of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. In fact, in 2005 Congressman Kingston was rated as the "most conservative member of the House" by National Journal for his voting record the previous year.

Since 2003, Kingston has served as vice-chairman of the House Republican Conference, ranking him fifth in the Republican leadership.

As you can see, Congressman Kingston is a very well respected conservative Republican who is a leader of his party. When Congressman Kingston speaks, people listen.

It is positively obscene that Speaker-elect Pelosi is forcing her "San Francisco values" on this conservative Christian family man, forcing him to spend more time away from his wife, four children and two dogs to work on such irresponsible legislation as raising the minimum wage.

[schrocat]

I just can't help but wonder if the below average conservative armchair pundit knew that Coach Hastert had whittled down the Congressional work week to two days.



Hey did you see where that evil Pelosi ogre-lady wants to extend some benefits to soon to be ousted GOP staffers? Even though the GOP refused to do so for Dem staffers in 94?
San Fran values again...

[Ninong]

Originally Posted by schrocat

I just can't help but wonder if the below average conservative armchair pundit knew that Coach Hastert had whittled down the Congressional work week to two days.

Under GOP control, the House didn't take up anything until late Tuesday morning and they usually stopped doing anything early Thursday afternoon. Many members flew into town early Tuesday morning and flew out sometime late Thursday afternoon.

This isn't the way it worked when I was a kid. They stayed put in D.C. and only came home by train when Congress was not in session. Oh, wait a minute! I almost forgot something. Things were under Democratic control then.

Hey did you see where that evil Pelosi ogre-lady wants to extend some benefits to soon to be ousted GOP staffers? Even though the GOP refused to do so for Dem staffers in 94?
San Fran values again...

She's just bringing the House in line with what has been standard policy in the Senate.

[Ninong]

Back in October, the GOP ran out two of their best liars to run damage control on the Mark Foley affair, Rep. Jack Kingston (R-GA) and Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-NC).

They tried to convince Chris Matthews on Hardball that the only people who were interested in the Foley affair were the D.C. press corps and that the only question that remains is what did Nancy Pelosi know and when did she know it.

You have to see this to believe it. Go ahead, it's not very long: Crooks and Liars.

[Ninong]

The House Ethics Committee finally released their report on the Mark Foley affair. They did not find that the GOP leadership violated any specific rules but they discovered a pattern of conduct among many "to remain willfully ignorant of the potential consequences" of Foley's conduct.

The report also found that Hastert was likely told about Foley's e-mails by two Republican leaders last spring.

You can read the full 91-page report here.

P.S. -- In the report you will see that Mark Foley exercised his Fifth Amendment right and refused to testify. Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-AZ) also exercised his Fifth Amendment right and refused to answer any questions concerning accusations made against him as those matter are presently under criminal investigation in Arizona.
Kolbe insists that he does not remember the specifics of an email he received from one of his former pages back in October 2001 telling him that he had received an inappropriate instant message from Mark Foley asking him about the size of his little soldier. The former page, who was 21 years old at the time, testified that he sent Foley's inappropriate IM as an attachment to his email to Kolbe telling Kolbe that he was uncomfortable with the contents of the attached IM he received from Foley. He testified that several days later he received an email apology from Foley to the effect that he was sorry that he had made him feel uncomfortable. Kolbe's testimony is that he doesn't remember opening the attachment to read the IM that Foley sent that made the former page feel uncomfortable, he merely asked Foley to stop sending emails or IMs to the former page since they were making him "feel uncomfortable."

This same former Kolbe page called Kolbe on Sept. 29, 2006, the day that Foley resigned, to ask Kolbe's advice on what he should say if contacted by the media. According to the former page, Kolbe told him to forget about it, that "the man has already resigned." Kolbe's testimony was that the page decided to forget about it on his own.

The committee found that on at least two occasions, Foley showed up after hours at the page dorm, possibly intoxicated. These visits were known to several people, including the House Clerk and he reported them to the Speaker's staff. The committee also concluded that in spite of the testimony of the Speaker and the Speaker's Chief of Staff, Scott Palmer, both men had been informed of Foley's behavior with pages and both had been informed by Shimkus and Reynolds about the emails to Alexander's former page.

In fact, the House Clerk informed Ted Van Der Meid, the counsel to the Speaker, on several occasions about problems with Foley and the pages. The House Clerk and Foley's former Chief of Staff confronted Foley on at least ten occasions over the past ten years about his overly familiar behavior with male pages. Foley was elected in November 1994 and took office in January 1995. The overly friendly behavior was noticed and discussed with Foley since mid-1995. According to the House Clerk, Foley was not as big a problem in this regard as Jim Kolbe, who was openly gay since 1996. And the committee concluded that Foley's former Chief of Staff did speak to Scott Palmer, Hastert's Chief of Staff, and ask his help in getting through to Foley. Palmer insisted that he has no memory of that ever happening but at least three people testified that it did in fact happen. In fact, the House Clerk, was surprised that the meeting between Foley's former Chief of Staff and Scott Palmer took place without him participating because he was expecting to be included in the meeting. He remembers being surprised when Scott Palmer informed him that he had talked to Foley and taken care of "the problem" and that the Speaker was informed.

The bottom line is that the committee did not find that any member of the House or any employee of the House was ever aware of sexually explicit emails or instant messages before they were published. All of the people who were aware of Foley's "problem" considered him a "nuisance" and were concerned that as a known closeted gay man he should be more careful to avoid an appearance of inappropriate behavior with the male pages. They testified to the committee that they were concerned that Congressman Foley was risking a politically embarrassing situation should his sexual orientation become known publicly.

The committee concluded that no one ever suspected that Foley was actually soliciting pages or former pages.