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NH named in computerized voting lawsuit

Lawsuit filed against New York, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Florida, Ohio, Illinois, Iowa, Texas, California and Oregon. It is connected with We the People Foundation.

"Ten states are being sued to prevent the use of computerized voting systems during the 2008 primary and general elections and beyond. The lawsuit seeks to halt the use of machine-based voting systems and vote counting procedures that hide the ballots and the counting of votes from the People.

The complaint challenges the constitutionality of current voting procedures in the states, claiming that they "heighten the possibility of confusion, deception, frustration, and fraud." It contends that the existing practices are constitutionally deficient and prevent open, verifiable, transparent voting, and that the use of discredited electronic voting machines and flawed vote counting procedures drastically increase the likelihood of error and election fraud. The lawsuit calls for a visible chain of ballot custody with paper ballots kept in full public view throughout the voting, counting, and tallying process.

The lawsuit asks the Court to prohibit the states from conducting elections that are not open, verifiable, transparent and machine and computer free.

The US Supreme Court has declared the meaning of the Right to vote, as guaranteed by the US Constitution. Individuals not only have the Right to cast a vote, they have the Right to cast an effective vote, meaning they have the Right to have their vote counted accurately.

"We need to bring transparency and accountability to the voting process throughout the states," said Bob Schulz, who wrote the brief and is spearheading the nationwide effort. "We need to reclaim our vote and ensure that our voices are heard and that our votes are accurately counted. The only sure way to do that is to have the People, in the light of day, observe, verify, and secure the votes cast on paper ballots and to count those ballots before the public by hand."

. . . .

We are in the process of serving the Complaint on each state.

Click here to read the Complaint.

The causes of action are for failure to provide the voters with a verifiable chain of custody, hand counting in full public view, before ever removed from public view, and no machine or computerized vote counting.

Specifically requested are - -

1) votes are to be cast on paper ballots

2) votes are never out of view of the public until results are publicly announced

3) each voted ballot put in a numbered, transparent container in clear public view, the numbers are to be at least 4 inches high

4) each candidate has right to a representative to inspect each container 10 minutes before voting begins

5) a rope shall surround vote station 6-10 feet from container, by which any person can stand to quietly observe and record by video recording device

6) each ballot box is on one of 6-8 foot long cafeteria-style tables at each voting station, where ballots are to be separated and hand counted

7) 2 representatives of the state defendants in the case and each candidate may participate in the vote counting process, and must agree on the allocation of votes to the candidates. Then the results are read aloud and certified, (copy of certified tally sheets kept at precinct)

8) paper ballots are returned to the containers, which are sealed and transported to a central warehouse

9) certified totals are given to central tabulation location where vote station totals are publicly announced and tabulated. Central location open to public

10) ID of voting station, container number, and results read aloud, entered in computer spreadsheet for live TV, automated totals signed by State Auditor, and preserved

11) final totals certified to state, publicly read and announced final election result, given candidate representatives, public and media. resulted securely stored, state post totals on websites

The lawsuit asserts that the states named intended voting procedures are a sham election without Constitution and state law controls.

Seeks permanent injunction against states having election, etc. unless open, verifiable, transparent, machine-free and computer free.
By ntobi at 09/22/2007 - 20:30 | Fair elections | login or register to post comments

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Who are those guys?

The NH Fair Elections Committee was never contacted by this group, nor does it appear that any other boots on the ground organizations in the other states named were contacted. http://www.wethepeoplefoundation.org/6700temp/Vote-COMPLAINT-final.pdf

This 10-state lawsuit is being lobbed by a heretofore unheard of group (at least unheard of to those of us involved in the election integrity movement), including one fellow involved in tax evasion issues and at least two known racists, including one (our NH plaintiff) who serves as both town moderator (chief election officer) and apparent cult leader.

In email correspondence with a known attorney in the election integrity movement, Plaintiff Bob Schulz admits they don't necessarily have the resources (financial or otherwise) even to fight the suit in each state.

This all begs the this question: is the lawsuit we want to have defining election law for us?

Are we being set up to take a fall from a badly organized, unfunded, questionable lawsuit?

NY Plaintiff Robert Schulz is already in trouble for peddling false tax advise:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_the_People_Foundation

I am not wasting time looking into the other plaintiffs, but I did want to know something about NH's fellow.

The Southern Poverty Law Center (you know, the original white-hats, the fearless KKK-busters), have this to say about NH plaintiff, Doug Bersaw:

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?pid=1385

'Rooted in Hatred'
Paul Anthony Melanson, a Catholic writer who lives in nearby Manchester, has been warning of the SBC's extremist rhetoric on his blog for years. In an interview with the Intelligence Report, Melanson said he first became aware of the SBC in 1990. What bothered him most, he said, was the SBC's wholehearted embrace of the thinking of the late Father Leonard Feeney, the founder of the Slaves. Melanson described Feeney as "a tremendously gifted writer and talented man, but also an individual who was on the verge of a nervous breakdown and began to say and do strange things."

Feeney founded the Slaves in Cambridge, Mass., in 1949, long before the Vatican sought to begin a reconciliation with Jews in the 1960s, during the liberalizing Vatican II reforms. He became known for the Jew-bashing sermons he delivered regularly on the Boston Common, like this 1953 rant: "Every Protestant hates the Jews. Harvard loathes Jews. That is why they got a new president — to keep the Jews away! I don't hate Jews for the reason he hates them. I hate them because they hate Jesus. They hate Jesus because they are Jews!"

Feeney was excommunicated that same year, and although he reconciled with the church shortly before his 1979 death, the Diocese of Manchester states that it "has no relationship" with the current Saint Benedict Center (neither does the official Roman Catholic Church). "Therefore," a diocesan official said recently, "faithful Roman Catholics are urged to not participate."

Yet the Slaves hotly defend Feeney and his beliefs from any criticism, echoing the anti-Semitism of their founder as they do.

In 2004, SBC prior Louis Villarrubia, who goes by the name of Brother Andre Marie, put it like this: "If anti-Semitism means opposing the Jews on religious matters, opposing the Zionist state in Palestine (as St. Pius X did), or opposing the Jewish tendency to undermine public morals (widely acknowledged by Catholic writers before the present age of PC [political correctness]), then we could rightly be considered such."

That same year, The Boston Globe quoted Brother Anthony Mary, whose real name is Douglas Bersaw, blaming the Jews for the murder of Christ and denying the World War II Holocaust: "There's a lot of controversy among people who study the so-called Holocaust. There's a misperception that Hitler had a position to kill all the Jews. It's all a fraud. Six million people… it didn't occur."

In 2005, at a radical conference hosted by a group called St. Joseph's Forum, Bersaw added that "the perpetual enemy of Christ is the Jewish nation" and said Jews should be dealt with using "blood and terror if it's required."

Today, Douglas Bersaw is Richmond's town moderator.

To Melanson, that is frightening. "The Saint Benedict Center cult is a house built on sand," he said. "Its philosophy is rooted in hatred. And this hate, which is anything but holy, will eventually consume those who embrace it." Melanson says he has visited the SBC compound several times over the years. On one such visit about a year and a half ago, he says he was told that SBC members were training in the use of firearms and Tae Kwon Do. "The fact that a religious community would be training in martial arts and weapons struck me as odd," he said, adding that he worries even more now as the situation heats up.

In a recent blog posting, the writer referred to his ultimate fear. "I just hope that we don't have to experience another Waco," he said, referring to the 1993 Texas standoff that left some 80 people dead, "before most people come to realize that something is radically wrong in Richmond, N.H."

Here's what else I learned about the NH plaintiff, founder of the Saint Benedict Center, in Richmond, NH, where Mr. Bersaw resides:

"The center's founder, Douglas Bersaw, said: "Were the Jews at that time responsible for our Lord's death? Of course." Asked whether Jews are cursed, Bersaw said, "It's a curse not to have the faith.

"There's a lot of controversy among people who study the so-called Holocaust," he said. "There's a misperception that Hitler had a position to kill all the Jews. It's all a fraud. Six million people -- it didn't occur."

Bersaw also describes Pope John Paul II as "the worst pope we ever had," because he has prayed with non-Christians at Assisi. If he were present at the prayer session, Bersaw said, "I would have done what Mel Gibson did in `Braveheart.' "

Or how about this (Mr. Bersaw also goes by the name Brother Anthony Mary):

"In a recent speech, movement leader Brother Anthony Mary declared that 'the perpetual enemy of Christ is the Jewish nation' and went on to say Jews aim to 'destroy all Christian nations'. He concluded with a chilling statement-'Jews are the synagogue of Satan,' a phrase that is also part of the neo-Nazi Aryan Nations.

" Brother Anthony Mary;s movement is perhaps the largest anti-Semitic force in the United States today, with at least 100,000 followers and tens of millions of dollars in assets."

the whole text can be found at:
www.splcenter.org/donate/giftplan/article.jsp?aid=78
Comments posted to the website ( http://sbcwatch.blogspot.com/2007/06/sbc-founder-brother-anthony-marys-aka.html ) where the above piece was written include the following:

Live Free or Die said...

It is hard to reconcile the polite, competent Town Moderator Doug Bersaw with the demented Brother Anthony Mary. Doug Bersaw must be a very angry, bitter, and disturbed little man deeply in need of psychological help.

June 14, 2007 5:44 AM

a local belligerent said...

Anonymous, most of the people in Richmond DO NOT want this divisive hate-filled (i.e. Villarubia, Dilalla, Boscarino, etc.) cult in their town. They are a cancer and a blight on the town.

June 14, 2007 6:15 AM

By ntobi at Mon, 09/24/2007 - 11:40am | login or register to post comments