-Caveat Lector- from: http://thenewamerican.com/tna//1996/vo12no24/vo12no24_editor.htm <A HREF="http://thenewamerican.com/tna//1996/vo12no24/vo12no24_editor.htm">The New American - Letters to the Editor - Nove </A> ----- Both Collier Brothers have passed on. Interesting JBS arguing against a conspiracy . . . they're(Collier brothers) just a bunch of hippes what do they know? Om K ----- Vol. 12, No. 24 November 25, 1996 Table of Contents Letters to the Editor Brickbats from Votescam Author I�m sure the intent of the article by Robert W. Lee (October 14th issue, �Does Your Vote Really Count?�) was to destroy the credibility of my book Votescam: The Stealing of America. Based on the feedback I have received, he has failed miserably. Most knowledgeable people feel that Lee�s article was merely a dreadful bit of bad reporting and purposeful distortion. Let�s start with Lee�s assertion that people such as Pat Robertson and Mike Wallace did not report on the book due to its lack of credibility. Votescam clearly states that Gaeton Fonzi, one of the top investigators in the country, and Brian Ross, NBC�s chief investigative reporter, quoted Wallace as saying: �Votescam is a scandal of major proportions.� In 1994 I personally handed Wallace the Votescam book and he said: �Jim, as far as this book is concerned, I have permanent Alzheimer�s.� Pat Roberston paid $2,500 to show the Votescam video shot in Miami (showing the League of Women Voters using pencils to punch holes in the computer vote card) just once on his 700 Club. ABC�s Supreme Court correspondent, Tim O�Brien, was prepared to air the tape nationally when he was stopped by his bosses. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, when she served on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, ruled that our evidence was worth a full hearing. All of that is in the book. How could Robert Lee have possibly missed it? Lee also excuses Elvera Radford, former Election Supervisor of Cincinnati, for officially issuing 98 cent tweezers to the League of Women Voters. We videotaped them plucking out a slate of candidates on the computer-ballot card. Lee said that nobody was prosecuted, thereby assuming that it was an honest way of handling the votes. He reports: �... merely tapping a card loosens the chad, but in some instances tweezers are necessary.� The videotape we shot shows blistered vote cards, not hanging chad that could be whisked away. Mr. Lee should ask himself why the Elections Division presupposed hanging chad, then hired a contingent of women (at taxpayers� expense) and issued them tweezers where a flick of the finger would have been sufficient. In fact, the act of issuing pencils (as they did in Miami) or tweezers in Cincinnati, or hors d�oeuvres sticks in California, is illegal. To allow a private group of people to determine voter intent is a third-degree felony. He continues that it is �truly remarkable, if the videotape actually �documented� the illegalities they allege, that no prosecution followed.� I cannot believe Mr. Lee is so naive as to assume that the District Attorney of Cincinnati or then-State Attorney in Miami, Janet Reno, would automatically order prosecution in politically controlled cities. As detailed in Votescam, when Attorney Ellis Rubin, appointed by the Miami Circuit Court, brought our evidence of vote fraud to Janet Reno in Dade County, she told Rubin that prosecution would bring down too many people, including judges and news media heads. Mr. Lee claims there is no hard evidence of vote fraud in the Arizona primary, when in fact the Maricopa County Elections Department printed 60,000 extra vote cards and issued them to privileged voters so that they could vote twice. I have documented this evidence and Pat Buchanan is aware of it. However, Mr. Lee alibies for the duplicate cards, saying �there is no credible evidence the duplicate cards resulted in multiple voting.� There is indeed credible evidence they were voted twice. I interviewed the election chief of Maricopa County and was told that ten people were hired after the election to punch 219,000 seven-digit numbers into a computer. The seven-digit number was an identification number on the ballot card. When a voter registers in a precinct, the card is punched so it cannot be voted twice, and the seven-digit number is recorded in the precinct. The elections chief said the ten worked for 34 hours after the election punching approximately 1.5 million digits (219,000 voters times seven-digit ID numbers) into computers. It would have meant punching one digit per second into the computer, without a break, for 12 hours. She said only two numbers came up twice out of 60,000. I asked for the names of those ten people. She refused to give them. I asked for the readouts which showed the 219,000 numbers punched in. She again refused. To this date, no citizen in Maricopa County has been able to obtain names of those supposed ten people who surely must be suffering from Carpel Tunnel Syndrome. One last point: Mr. Lee states, �The Colliers helped raise funds for these [referring to Tom Hayden, Jerry Rubin, and Abbie Hoffman] revolutionaries.� That�s either purposeful bad reporting or intentionally trying to use liberal names to damage our case. In fact, we never raised a nickel for anybody; we merely reported that the �Chicago Seven� had no funds for legal defense. That story was picked up by newspapers around the country. This only scratches the surface of the massive distortions in Mr. Lee�s reporting on Votescam: The Stealing of America. James Collier New York City Robert W. Lee Responds My article asserted, correctly, that the Colliers �helped raise funds� for Hayden, Rubin, Hoffman, and the rest of the so-called �Chicago Seven.� Mr. Collier creates a straw man by claiming that �we never raised a nickel for anybody,� since helping to raise funds, and raising funds, are two disparate activities. On pages 54-55 of Votescam, the Colliers describe how they became owners of an underground newspaper which they named The Daily Planet. �One of our first Planet stories,� they write, �was about Tom Hayden. Hayden was another buddy of our youth in Royal Oak, Michigan....� After Hayden told the Colliers �that nobody but [folk singer] Joan Baez had given a nickel to the Seven�s defense fund, we headlined it in the Planet. The Underground Press Service picked up the story and distributed it to every other underground paper in the nation, including the college press. The Seven�s defense fund swelled mightily soon after.� That, by any reasonable standard, is helping to raise funds. Mr. Collier quotes 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace as saying that �Votescam is a scandal of major proportions,� but in Votescam Wallace is merely paraphrased (not quoted) by the Colliers� source. An article by Gaeton Fonzi in the July 1974 issue of Miami Magazine states merely that Wallace was looking �into what he had been told might be the most shocking vote fraud scandal ever to rock the nation.� Whatever Wallace found, 60 Minutes did not air the story. Regarding this year�s presidential primary in Arizona, Mr. Collier claims that 60,000 extra vote cards were printed and issued �to privileged voters so that they could vote twice.� The incident occurred in Maricopa County. A post-election report by the Maricopa County Recorder and Elections Director acknowledged, �During the mailing of the voter I.D. cards, 60,000 duplicate cards were sent. A thorough review of the situation reveals error on our part and that of the vendor.... All voter registration cards, including duplicates for an individual, carry the same voter I.D. number, which does not change even if the individual changes political party, residence, address, mailing address, or other names. Additionally, voters can request a duplicate voter registration card by mail or by phone.� (Emphasis added.) Mr. Collier states that the �election chief� claimed that �only two numbers came up twice out of 60,000,� which is hardly what one would expect if the 60,000 duplicate cards were intended to allow �privileged voters� to vote twice. Mr. Collier asserts that, based on what he was told by the �elections chief,� the search for duplicate votes by ten workers would have entailed �punching one digit per second into the computer, without a break for 12 hours.� His implication is that punching one digit per second is a virtually impossible task. Yet someone who types a mere 60 words per minute �punches� approximately five times as many �digits� each second. One digit per second is equivalent to a snails-pace 12 words per minute! Clearly, Mr. Collier�s assumptions and calculations do not jibe with his implication. Mr. Collier, understandably, does not attempt to refute our account of Votescam�s demonstrably inaccurate portrayal of the 1988 GOP presidential primary in New Hampshire. Nor is he apparently prepared to apologize to Elvera Radford, elections supervisor in Cincinnati in 1985, for Votescam�s blatantly unjustified attempt to tarnish her reputation. All that aside, there is no doubt, as I indicated in my article, that �vote fraud, especially when computer-oriented, can be very difficult to detect�; that the �potential for electoral hanky-panky� is all too real; and that �a major overhaul of our electoral procedures is imperative....� But the needed effort to fraud-proof the franchise should be based on facts, not overstatements or downright misinformation. � Copyright 1999 American Opinion Publishing Incorporated ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End Kris DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion and informational exchange list. Proselyzting propagandic screeds are not allowed. Substance�not soapboxing! 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