Free Press: As Blackwell Says, Ohio’s in 2004 was a National Model

[AtLiberty]

As Blackwell Says, Ohio’s in 2004 was a National Model

by Steve Rosenfeld, Bob Fitrakis, and Harvey Wasserman
March 24, 2005
The Free Press

Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell finally testified – something he had refused to do in the Moss v. Bush Ohio election challenge before the State Supreme Court and refused to do in Washington, D.C. His testimony proved so contentious that at one point Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones, D-OH, told him to “haul butt” if he was unwilling to answer questions about irregularities in the 2004 election.

Blackwell vigorously defended his role in last fall’s presidential election at a congressional hearing on Monday, March 21, at the Ohio Statehouse, claiming critics have smeared his state as if it were a “third world country” rather than the national model of election administration that Blackwell said it was. In December, Republican state senators blocked a similar Democrat-sponsored forum from using the Statehouse, forcing testimony to be taken at the Democrat-controlled Columbus City Council chambers. Meanwhile, hundreds of disenfranchised voters testified under oath in Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Toledo and Warren concerning their voting day hardships.

“We had a good election in the state of Ohio. Not a perfect election – elections are human endeavors,” Blackwell, a Republican gubernatorial candidate and co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign, told the House Committee on Administration in Columbus. In opening remarks, he also noted Ohio coped with a million new voters and tremendous efforts by both political parties to exploit legal tactics to their advantage.

“While much has been written by the conspiracy theorists, I would like to point out that there has only been one complaint filed by the HAVA process,” Blackwell said, referring to the Help America Vote Act, which was enacted by Congress after Florida’s 2000 election debacle. “I am interested in clean, fair and transparent elections.”

For full article, click:

http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/1208

[Wilms]

1. More

The Wednesday 3/23 Election Fraud, Reform, & Updates Thread has a bunch of articles about the recent events in Ohio.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x347767