No good men left

iVillage Member
Registered: 08-20-2008
No good men left
6
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:10pm

David Iglesias is the role model of the movie A Few Good Men who later became the US Attorney for New Mexico during the Bush Administration and was fired for not pursuing frivolous voter fraud cases against Democrats around election time. David Iglesias knows something about the manipulation of justice and trumped up voter fraud charges, to say the least.

And he is putting the lie to the Republican tactics on this issue, again!

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/10/iglesias_im_astounded_by_dojs.php

"David Iglesias says he's shocked by the news, leaked today to the Associated Press, that the FBI is pursuing a voter-fraud investigation into ACORN just weeks before the election.

"I'm astounded that this issue is being trotted out again," Iglesias told TPMmuckraker. "Based on what I saw in 2004 and 2006, it's a scare tactic." In 2006, Iglesias was fired as U.S. attorney thanks partly to his reluctance to pursue voter-fraud cases as aggressively as DOJ wanted -- one of several U.S. attorneys fired for inappropriate political reasons, according to a recently released report by DOJ's Office of the Inspector General.

Iglesias, who has been the most outspoken of the fired U.S. attorneys, went on to say that the FBI's investigation seemed designed to inappropriately create a "boogeyman" out of voter fraud.

And he added that it "stands to reason" that the investigation was launched in response to GOP complaints. In recent weeks, national Republican figures -- including John McCain at last night's debate -- have sought to make an issue out of ACORN's voter-registration activities.

As we noted earlier, last year, Sen. Dianne Feinstein publicly highlighted changes made to DOJ's election crimes manual, which lowered the bar for voter-fraud prosecutions, and made it easier to bring vote-fraud cases close to the election.

Speaking today to TPMmuckraker, Iglesias called such changes "extremely problematic."

The way in which the news was revealed today -- Associated Press sourced its report to two "senior law enforcement officials" who "spoke on condition of anonymity because Justice Department regulations forbid discussing ongoing investigations particularly so close to an election" -- is also raising eyebrows.

Both Iglesias and Bud Cummins -- another of the U.S. attorneys who, according to the IG report, was also fired for political reasons -- told TPMmuckraker that DOJ guidelines do allow US attorneys to speak publicly about an investigation, even before bringing an indictment, if it's to allay public concern over an issue.

But that certainly wouldn't cover anonymous leaks. "If you can't say it with your name on it, it's fair to say you should not be saying it," Cummins told TPMmuckraker.

Earlier this afternoon, House Judiciary Chair John Conyers (D-MI) released a letter he sent to Attorney General Michael Mukasey and FBI director Robert Mueller, which connected today's news to the U.S. attorney firings, and to recent GOP efforts to stoke fears over voter fraud."

Iglesias is not the one. Here is the ex Department of Justice Voting Rights Head who has worked with McCain in the past yet is disgusted by the Republicans' disgraceful tactics.

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/10/ex_doj_voting_rights_chief_its.php

"A former top Department of Justice voting rights official -- who once worked with John McCain in defense of the senator's campaign-finance reform bill -- has added his name to the growing chorus that is denouncing the department's investigation of ACORN as a shameful and inappropriate politicization of Justice along the lines of the US attorney firings."

There will be no justice under the Republicans. They have made their case on that for sure.

iVillage Member
Registered: 10-25-2006
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:24pm

This is getting ridiculous. Here's an article that appeared in today's paper:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/17/AR2008101703360.html

"Thousands of voters across the country must reestablish their eligibility in the next three weeks in order for their votes to count on Nov. 4, a result of new state registration systems that are incorrectly rejecting them.

Tens of thousands of voters could be affected in Wisconsin. Officials there admit that their database is wrong one out of five times when it flags voters, sometimes for data discrepancies as small as a middle initial or a typo in a birth date. When the six members of the state elections board -- all retired judges -- ran their registrations through the system, four were incorrectly rejected because of mismatches.

By federal law, anyone whose name is flagged must be notified and given a chance to prove his or her eligibility. But voting rights experts say voters are not always alerted, and even if they are, some may decide to simply skip the election. If questions about eligibility remain on Election Day, those voters are entitled to cast a "provisional" ballot. But which of those ballots are ultimately counted depends on local and state rules."

That last sentence is really scary. Are there some counties that will simply reject all provisional ballots if they are known to be cast by voters who are likely to be Democrats?

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http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/october/meet_the_new_health_.php

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQTBYQlQ7yM

iVillage Member
Registered: 09-26-2008
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:31pm
Your darn tootin' they will...
iVillage Member
Registered: 09-08-2008
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:32pm

(((((There will be no justice under the Republicans. They have made their case on that for sure.))))


iVillage Member
Registered: 07-03-2008
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:34pm
If the Republicans try and pull some malarkey like they did in 2000 and 2004, I think there will be such an uproar, it will make their heads spin.
iVillage Member
Registered: 08-20-2008
Sat, 10-18-2008 - 9:40pm
I am so angry that I paid for these atrocities. It's not like it was a random bad act. There were too many. Despite all the fall guys the Republicans took down along the way, it is too way easy to connect the dots to the top. We paid a government that was rotten to spend our money on the most apocryphal acts - and these Republicans call themselves religious.
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-25-2006
Sun, 10-19-2008 - 12:47am

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I always find that to be amusing, too!

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http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/october/meet_the_new_health_.php

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQTBYQlQ7yM