BREAKING: SC DEM PARTY EXEC BOARD UPHOLDS NOMINATION OF ALVIN GREENE FOR U.S. SENATE

[BradBlog]

Source: BRAD BLOG

BREAKING: SC DEM PARTY EXEC BOARD UPHOLDS NOMINATION OF ALVIN GREENE FOR U.S. SENATE
Rejects Judge Vic Rawl's protest in 5 hour hearing...

BREAKING: The South Carolina Democratic Party Exec Board rejects Judge Vic Rawl's protest to the U.S. Senate primary results, despite NO evidence presented that the results were accurate, and despite Alvin Greene having not even shown up to the protest hearing.
Alvin Greene's election as the Democratic party nominee for the U.S. Senate to run against incumbent Republican Sen. Jim DeMint stands….

FULL STORY: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7900


Read more: http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7900

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

1. If this doesn't wake the pols up to BBV NOTHING will.

A blessing in disguise? :rofl:

[patrice]

5. Pardon, BBV? nt

[madrchsod]

9. black box voting

http://www.blackboxvoting.org/

[patrice]

10. Tks. One bright thing about ALL of this; some folks are having their eyes opened., now

what will they do about it?

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

17. Thanks. I shoulda posted that link myself.

:headbang:

[L. Coyote]

11. WRONG This is Republicans crossing parties in a primary to MoFo the Dems

That is not to say Black Box Voting is a good thing, it is simply the fact of this case.

[Shrek]

13. I doubt the Republicans crossed over

They had some important races in their own primary, so it's doubtful they'd give up the chance to participate just to vote for Alvin Greene.

[John Kerry VonErich]

61. It was attempted in Ohio

to get rid of Kucinich early.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

16. My point.

It's unverifiable (unless someone talks and provides documented proof). You may or may not be correct- can you prove it in court? Rawl couldn't... :shrug:

[BradBlog]

28. You have NO evidence of that, and...

...all the evidence that does exist to that end, shows that cross-over voting was NOT the case.

Sorry, but your case is NOT based on facts. The case that the e-voting system failed *is*.

[L. Coyote]

51. So, where are YOUR FACTS that e-voting failed in this SC race?

Did it fail in every race in SC?
Just this one?
Just this election?

If you have evidence, why wasn't it presented?

How is lack of evidence sufficient evidence to convince you?

I worked in politics with an open primary. This is an old tactic.
It was very easy to defeat Republicans in a Red state by cross-voting in their primary for a Dufus candidate.

[Ignis]

60. Reliable audit trails would answer that question, wouldn't they?

And yet our (D) congresscritters' response has been an underwhelming :boring:.

[burnsei sensei]

32. I just don't understand how SC Democrats could be

so vacuous.
Either this is Republican manipulation, or the Democrats are vacuous.

[rzemanfl]

2. If I lived in South Carolina I would vote for the spaced out

possible felon before I'd vote for DeMint.

[Webster Green]

3. Oh, hell yeah!

He would get my vote for sure.

Where do I send money?

[bluestateguy]

4. Congratulations on winning a worthless nomination!

Maybe he can call in Walter Mondale, George McGovern and Michael Dukakis to join him at a campaign rally.

[Imajika]

6. Despite no evidence presented that the results were accurate?

"The South Carolina Democratic Party Exec Board rejects Judge Vic Rawl's protest to the U.S. Senate primary results, despite NO evidence presented that the results were accurate"

Why on earth does the winning candidate have to prove the results were accurate?

The SC Dem Party simply has no grounds whatsoever to overturn the primary results.

Vic Rawl and the SC Democratic Party simply blew this. It is embarrassing as hell, but the winning candidate does not have to prove his winning results were accurate. What this means is Rawl presented absolutely no credible evidence that the result was due to tampering, defective or manipulated machines, etc.

The best hope is to find a way to persuade Greene to pull out of the race. There simply is nothing else that can be done. Either way, we aren't going to defeat DeMint in November anyway.

edited for spelling

[customerserviceguy]

23. Did anyone present any evidence that the results were inaccurate?

It would seem to me that the burden of proof lay with those who wanted to challenge the official result.

[BradBlog]

31. Yes. They did. Read my live blog coverage (nt)

[heliarc]

65. Ever look at Five Thirty Eight.com?

There are quite a few academy statisticians calling foul at the SC Primary...

And Clybourn says two other races were suspicious with candidates running who had expensive media slots and no fundraising.

The primary evidence has its feet in the total count being way off from the votes cast per candidate...

Also... the discrepancy between Rawl's performance among absentee voters and his performance in the vote collected on voting day is very wide. MUCH wider than all of the other primary races.

[customerserviceguy]

70. The absentee thing has a plausible explanation

Which group is more likely to do the advance planning to get an absentee ballot, the African-American voters who would favor Greene, or the Caucasian voters who might favor Rawl?

[BradBlog]

30. That's correct.

There is absolutely ZERO evidence to show that Alvin Greene won the election. Had he presented a case, he might have been able to show such evidence (though none exists), but he didn't even bother.

Moreover, not even the SC State Election Commission can prove that Greene won, given the voting systems they use. It's absolutely insane. That you don't believe there should be evidence to prove that someone "won" an election is remarkable.

[Imajika]

39. The burden of proof is on those claiming election fraud...

Why on earth would the winner have to prove he won? The election system is in place, the results showed Greene won, end of story as far as Greene is concerned.

What you are suggesting is we go with a "guilty until proven innocent" approach. Thankfully, the system just doesn't work that way.

Greene has to do absolutely nothing. Those contesting the election have the burden of proof squarely on their shoulders - and they simply do not have enough credible evidence that Greene didn't win fair and square.

I am quite certain that South Carolina Democratic Party Executive Board would have loved to see real evidence of election fraud. The entire Democratic establishment would like Greene to just go away, but they were not given any actual evidence that Greene didn't win under the rules in place.

Your argument that Greene has to prove he won is downright silly.

[BradBlog]

40. You didn't watch & don't seem to understand elections

The board was required to determine, based on the evidence presented in that room at the protest, whether the election results were true and accurate. And based on the evidence, the election results were not true and accurate.

Beyond that, that you you seem to have no concern about an American election being provable, is remarkable.

Sleep well tonight.

[Imajika]

47. And yet...

...the South Carolina Democratic Party Executive Board overwhelmingly disagrees with you - a board that has all the incentive in the world to reverse this election if they could.

Ever consider this is because what you are saying is nonsense?

[totodeinhere]

55. No, they had to determine if there was any evidence that the results were not true and accurate.

And they found no such evidence. That doesn't mean that the election was fair. It simply means that they were unable to prove otherwise. So the results stand.

[rayofreason]

41. ZERO evidence...

...except the vote count.

[L. Coyote]

52. The vote results prove Alvin Greee won the election. Geeeeze!!!

Since when is 60% of the vote "absolutely ZERO evidence" of victory?
Until it is proven otherwise, there is absolute evidence he won.
The burden of proving otherwise rests on anyone complaining.

[heliarc]

66. Consider that the total vote count...

did not match the votes cast in this race...

Also, the discrepancy between Absentee voters who clearly supported Rawl, and walk-in voters who supported Greene was a wider discrepancy than in any other race in the SC primary, and you have a very suspicious election indeed. That evidence might be circumstantial, but it's evidence.

[Hugabear]

69. Do you believe that Bush won in both 2000 and in 2004?

Both of those elections were stolen. The GOP has a history of tampering with elections.

[polichick]

7. Why would they do that? nt

[madrchsod]

8. where in the hell was the national party on this issue?

the democratic party in south carolina just conceded the election

[burnsei sensei]

33. Good question.

nt

[Freddie Stubbs]

48. I'm sure that they will come in and overrule the state party

[crim son]

12. This makes no sense whatsoever.

Have you heard Greene speak? This can't be an oversight - somebody is up to something.

[LisaL]

14. They didn't take that into consideration.

Basically, Rawl had to prove that election was compromised and they decided he couldn't prove it.
Of course since the voting machines don't have paper track, it would be very hard to prove anything.

[customerserviceguy]

25. They have an electronic track that records every move

that a voter makes on the touchscreen:

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/06/17/politics/main6591495.shtml?tag=mncol;lst;9

There's a move afoot to preserve the chips that keep those records. This all comes down to Greene's filing fee, if it is indeed from small amounts over a long period of time, this becomes moot, even if it means that some prosecutor will be able to add a charge that he falsely pled poverty to get a free lawyer to his obscenity charge.

[BradBlog]

34. You're uninformed...again...

If by "electronic track that records every move", you are referring to the audit logs on these systems, it's already been found in the state of CA and elsehwhere that a) the audit logs can be changed and b) good luck getting at those audit logs for examination!

The Rawl campaign was not allowed to examine the hardware or software (or audit logs) from the voting systems. These are 100% unverifiable election results. Period. And the case that Rawl put on to show as much -- and to show that voters had much trouble voting, was very impressive.

Most of the board members who spoke against overturning the results said they recognized the problems with the machines, but didn't want to open a can of worms by overturning an election (and then have to answer why they allowed all the other ones to stand).

Whether Greene was a "plant" or not, has nothing to do with how he managed to get 59% of the vote. There is NO reasonable explanation for that, other than computer malfunction or tampering.

[customerserviceguy]

36. There have been reasonable explanations

The most satisfying to me is the identity politics angle on this. Also, add to that the uninformed nature of voters in this country, and you have the chance of oddball results in inconsequential races like this happening every once in awhile.

But I do hope that someone audits the logs from the voting systems. When people here talk about voting machine fraud, they remind me of the birthers.

[Overseas]

58. K&R. Very sad that the party was afraid to address electronic voting issues.

Thom Hartmann talked about that in today's show.

He speculated that the Greene election could have been a small test case on whether Democrats would have the guts to bring up electronic voting problems.

As long as the Right includes some splashy distracting talking points like putting Greene in as a plant, the buzz will focus on that, rather than the thorny issue of electronic manipulation of votes.

[MissDeeds]

15. Yes, someone is up to something

This is beyond bizarre. What the hell has the election process come to?

[totodeinhere]

20. Have you ever heard Sarah Palin speak? She isn't any better.

I have an idea. Maybe we could have a bipartisan Palin/Greene ticket in 2012.

:sarcasm:

[crim son]

27. But Palin is "hot."

Greene... not so much.

[Jane Eyre]

18. I'm not surprised

Go ahead and flame me if you want, but the grounds upon which the challenge were filed were pretty flimsy. It was all anecdotal information. Did anyone take a picture or video of a malfunctioning voting machine? Did anyone call over a witness to show them what was happening when they tried to vote? Was there any hard evidence at all that this took place? Did a programmer step forward to describe specifically how the machines were hacked? Frankly, without a paper trail there is no way that these votes can be validated one way or another. All you have is a bunch of stories about what might have happened.

If there was an effort to get people to vote for Greene over Rawl, perhaps an effort by right-wing groups to encourage crossover voting or promoting Greene's candidacy among his most-likely voters, it would seem that this would have come out by now. People talk. People in small SC towns talk especially, but ain't nobody talked about how this effort might have been mounted. I'm starting to think that it was merely a case of Mr. Greene being first on the ballot and having a more pleasant sounding name than Mr. Rawl.

The real issue is where did he get the money to file. And it is possible that he got the money legitimately. I mean, the fact that Mr. Greene now believes he should be Time's Man of the Year may be indicative of some long-standing psychological need to be important at all costs even if his desires don't square with reality.

[salib]

22. That is the point, is it not?

It is not a "result" unless one can verify. There is not verification.

Personally, I think the onus should be on the Party to PROVE who won, not the other way around. That is the point of a recount. Since "The committee felt there was not sufficient evidence", they should be held accountable for certifying the result.

[BradBlog]

26. You didn't watch the protest hearing...

Yes, voters testified to their problems voting. Campaign workers testified to all the trouble throughout the day. The computer experts testified that machines were hooked up to the Internet. No, the case was not "flimsy".

The only "flimsy" case here is that Greene won, a case that had no evidence whatsoever presented during today's hearing as Greene didn't show up.

The only evidence proffered was that the election was not accurate, and it was a good case. The Exec Board had to vote on the evidence given to them. They didn't.

[Phoebe Loosinhouse]

35. He got more votes than ballots cast. Isn't that prima facie of error/fraud?

Can his opponent appeal to any higher authority? I would be FURIOUS if I were a SC voter. I'm furious on their behalf and also furious in anticipation of the same flawed/fraudulent process being used in the future in a national election.

[Beacool]

19. Well, like Mark Levin said, DeMint is the luckiest politician in the country.

I heard Greene's interview and it was painful. I felt embarrassed for the poor guy.

:(

[MrSlayer]

21. Alvin Greene would be a better senator than DeMint.

Regardless of his lack of credentials, this dude would be far superior. I'd love for him to win.

[Mz Pip]

29. My thought exactly

I look at the lame brained GOP senators and think :wtf: I'd vote for Greene over DeMint or Sucksby Chambliss or David Vitter or that dweebie twit Sessions from Alabama any day of the week.

[Stevepol]

24. This is just a joke, in the same way that our election system is a joke.

If the vote is counted in total secrecy without verification IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO HAVE A DEMOCRACY.

The Dems in SC evidently think the way to preserve the present non-democracy is to not stir things up too much.

Why? Because there's no evidence that Greene was not elected.

But that's the whole point. THERE IS NO EVIDENCE PERIOD. It's impossible to have certain knowledge of any election result in SC. It all depends on who programs or hacks into the machines. So instead of a democracy we have a kleptocracy.

Actually there was a ton of circumstantial evidence, so much in fact that any reasonable person knows Greene did not win this election: (1) the difference between the paper votes and the machine read-outs, (2) the fact that Greene is a total idiot, (3) the fact that he doesn't have a penny to his name and has no way of raising any money and yet he raised the $10,000 filing fee, (4) the fact that he didn't even campaign, (4) the fact that nobody in the state knows him from Adam, (5) the fat that he's facing charges of displaying pornographic material to minors, etc. etc. etc. etc.

This kind of idiotic decision by the Dem party in SC is exactly the reason we don't have a democracy in the US.

Somebody asked Frederick Douglass what he should do politically, and he said, "Agitate, agitate, agitate." That's how freedom came to African-Americans, and that's the only way we can ever have democracy in the US.

[Iowa]

37. Well said.

[Jane Eyre]

43. No paper trail = no evidence

I absolutely agree with you that votes can't be trusted that are counted in secret. South Carolina uses Diebold touch screen voting with no paper trail. The Democratic Party there should challenge that system and challenge it strongly, but they need to do it a different way.

Throwing out an election based upon the fact that Democratic voters may or may not have elected a "total idiot" who has no money or name recognition and who is facing a felony charge that voters did not know about isn't a good basis for an argument. None of the circumstantial evidence that you cite is a valid reason to throw out the results of election. There are plenty of idiots who are elected in perfectly legitimate elections. And there is nothing in the constitution that prevents a convicted felon (which Mr. Greene is not) from serving in the US Senate.

The South Carolina Democratic Party Executive Committee arrived at the only possible reasonable conclusion after painstakingly hearing and considering all the evidence: that there is not enough evidence to throw out the election. That doesn't mean that electoral fraud didn't happen, but you have to have a system in place to be able to prove the results and their state doesn't have that. Had they voted to throw out the results of this election, then the results of every other election in the state would be in question including those where Democrats won.

And don't forget that Alvin Greene is the first black US Senate candidate in the state since Reconstruction in a state where the Democratic Party membership is overwhelmingly African American. Had the SC Dems voted to throw out the results of the election won by the black guy, but not any others, based on a finding that the machines used statewide in every election don't work properly....well, I can only begin to imagine the fallout from that decision. I'm glad that the SC Democratic Party reached the only reasonable conclusion and I hope that they will step up the fight for verifiable paper trails for future elections.

[Stevepol]

45. I appreciate your thoughts but just a few points in response.

You say, "Had they voted to throw out the results of this election, then the results of every other election in the state would be in question including those where Democrats won."

But "the results of every other election in the state" are ALREADY in question. The elections in which Democrats win are no more valid in SC or almost anywhere else in the US than the ones that Republicans win.

Greene is an embarrassment to SC and to blacks as well as whites. Most black people, those that have any awareness of what has happened, are not proud that a black guy is the candidate just because he's black. They know he's a plant and that the election was manipulated through the machines. He's already a stain on the honor of blacks in the state with his criminal case forthcoming. It certainly is not a point of pride for anybody. It will provide endless fodder for the talking heads at Fox to illustrate the stupidity of Dems and (by assn) blacks and will likely move many voters to reject Dems in future elections.

In one's personal life, it's often far wiser and better to accept a defeat rather than cause more trouble for others and for self by protesting. But in politics, in external life, nothing ever changes when those who are obviously right do not protest that wrong. God doesn't give brownie points for false humility. It's possible to act impersonally or without attachment and this is all the more possible when the cause is a just one.

BTW, SC uses ES&S I believe rather than Diebold.

[Jane Eyre]

46. I agree with you, but there is still no evidence

Alvin Greene is indeed a terrible candidate and an embarrassment to the South Carolina Democratic Party. The use of electronic voting machines without a verifiable paper trail means that there is no hard evidence either way as to whether or not an election was valid. The SC Democratic Executive Committee did not decide that this was undoubtedly a valid election only that there was insufficient evidence to prove that it was not, therefore the election result stands. As fas as I know, Mr. Rawl had not advocated for verifiable paper trails prior to losing this election. Hopefully he will continue to do so now.

But all is not lost. It is still not a sure thing that Mr. Greene will be on the ballot come November. If he is convicted of a felony, then the SC Democratic Party Executive Committee can meet again and decide how to proceed from there. There is also the issue of where he got the filing fee, which is under investigation by the FEC. In 1990, a Republican consultant in SC recruited a black candidate to run in a Congressional primary in order to boost white turnout for different election on the same ballot. The consultant was found guilty of violating election laws. I think that there is a good chance that Mr. Greene was recruited by a Republican operative, but we'll see when the money trail is revealed.

[totodeinhere]

56. They cannot know "that the election was manipulated through the machines."

They can have a very strong suspicion that it was, but having a strong suspicion is not the same as certainty. There simply is no way to prove at this point that the machines were manipulated.

[go west young man]

38. I blame the democratic Party as a whole for this fuck up.

The first thing we should have done when gaining power was to fix the voting problems and provide a verifiable paper trail on all machines. Brad you have been on this issue forever but they never listened to ya. Then they half ass campaigned for a Senate seat there in SC and now they are crying foul. They fucked up. We all know republicans cheat. To continue down this path is stupid. Fix the system when you have a chance. Now it's too late once again. I blame us.

[Jane Eyre]

44. Absolutely! You get it!

Throwing out this election because you can't verify the results is like locking the barn door after the horse gets out. Rawl didn't take his opposition seriously enough and voters knew virtually nothing about either candidate. Alvin Greene's name was first on the ballot, so voters most likely went with that.

The South Carolina Dems need to start pushing for a verifiable paper trail on their voting machines, but throwing out this particular election was certainly not the way to do it.

[Stevepol]

64. I don't believe being first on the ballot is much of an explanation.

Greene was first on the ballot on the absentee ballots also and Rawl won the absentee ballots handily. In Lancaster County, Rawl won in the absentee ballots 84% to 16% but in the election, on the voting machines, Greene won by 17 points over Rawl. The voters who voted absentee evidently knew a lot about Rawl. He ran a considerable campaign, contrary to some reports. He spent a lot of money on the campaign.

Why look for unbelievable explanations? The easiest explanation, the most obvious, is also almost certainly the right answer, namely, that the machines were tampered with, probably the tabulators rather than the individual voting machines, though that would be possible as well. As Steven Freeman says, the machines are "trivially easy" to manipulate and there's essentially no way to catch the fraud if there's no paper.

Just knowledge of human nature should tell you that if somebody who is prone to cheat to begin with is presented w/ a situation in which he knows he can change (or have somebody change) the results of an election and there's no way he can be caught, as long as nobody rats on him, he's going to do it. In fact, you can just about put it in the bank that it's going to happen. To think otherwise is just silly.

In Clay County KY it took about a decade of manipulated elections (I think using the ES&S machines as well) before the whole Republican conspiracy was discovered and the perps, a couple of them, escorted to the slammer. That's probably about how long it will take before this one gets unmasked, if it does. If the Dems don't want to do anything, that's their prerogative, but to make up arguments that are flimsy at best, doesn't help much.

[jotsy]

42. What a revolting development!

You must be terribly disappointed and seen your worries for democracy deepened as a result of this decision. I know that's how the news strikes me, so maybe I'm just projecting.

[Javaman]

49. Lee Mercer demands a recount. All three! nt

[Brother Buzz]

57. Oh my, the road scholar from the United States Navy/United States Marine Corp at West Point.

I wonder if he ever resolved his stalled police debriefing with the Houston Police Department waiting for him to sue to complete the debriefing for his background biography with them in the United States Army Military Intelligence Academy Camp Bullis San Antonio, Texas The University of Texas ROTC to West Point Military Academy U.S. Navy doctorate degree in Police Science.

:crazy:

[Javaman]

59. ahhhhh

that hurt my brain!

[KamaAina]

62. Come to think of it, have you ever seen Greene and Mercer in the same place at the same time?

:tinfoilhat:

[BeFree]

50. Thanks Brad

As you can see, the Democratic party is not interested in fair elections.

All the evidence presented over the years, and even with the outright banning of these machines from several states, the party still loves their Diebolds.

Why? Because they use Diebold to keep power.
Diebold has been very, very good to them and they'll not bite the hand that feeds them.

Besides, the very idea that we may not actually have a democracy (we don't) is too scary.
So that HAS to be kept a secret, at all costs, even going so far as letting Green win.

[Gin]

53. wouldn't it be something if Greene would win by some fluke?

I personally think the machines were rigged....this was meant to embarrass the dems...and it worked.

[BeFree]

54. It sure did work

The pubbies knew that the dems would never object to Diebold.

So they did this and the pundits had a field day making fun of the dems.

And the dumbass dems played along.

[Devil_Fish]

63. Brad, I am with you on this, but the same thing happened with Bush in 2004.

They said "Prove Bush didn't win" I said "Prove he did"

because the vote is counted in secret, who ever controls the central tabulator can make the vote say what ever they want. I'm glad that Green won because maybe just maybe a light will finally shine on this BBV Sham. To borrow a line from Avatar, There just pissing on us now with out even the courtesy of calling it rain. Who ever controls the central tabulators is just flanting it now.

All they have to do is make it not close enough to trigger a recount (because you can't recount somthing that never existed in the first place) and it's a done deal.

There are now 3 distinct classes of voters in this country:
1.The sucker voters, the ones who vote on touch screens, can never have their vote recounted because their vote dosn't really exist.

2. The absentee voters who can have their vote recounted because it is on paper.

3. The Super voter, the one person who controls the central tabulator. This one person can change the vote of the sucker voters to what ever he wants, and there is no way to prove any of it.

I assert that the sucker voters don't mater except to give the super voter a number to play with. the absentee voters don't matter unless their number far exceeds the number of sucker voters, which it never will.

This BBV Shit is what gave us Bush both times. Keep up the good work Brad.

[Odin2005]

67. F***ING vote-riggers!!!

:grr:

[Hugabear]

68. Congratulations. They just handed the Repukes the November elections.

This was their test-case. I don't think they really expected him to actually win. Getting a complete unknown, with no political experience whatsoever, with absolutely no campaigning, getting such a candidate to show up even in double digits would have been a victory, proof that they could hack and tamper with the election. Greene winning the primary was just icing on the cake.

[alp227]

71. When was the last time a Dem was a US Senator in SC?

Hmm.

Class 2: last Democrat = Thomas Wofford (a few months in 1956 before dreaded ol' racist Strom Thurmond took over)
Class 3: last Democrat = Ernst Hollings (1966-2005)

Way to go SC Democratic Party! I think that either the prosecutors of Alvin Greene's porno case need to get him to jail fast or the SCDP should expel Greene. This is political suicide right here. Some investigative reporter needs to reveal a hacked voting machine real soon!