Garvey's Ghost: Black Talk

Palast, Ohio and the Real Court Case Part II

Now lets look at this graphic showing how Democrats and republicans did in Franklin County:



note that there is a good amount of Franklin county where Kerry did less than 60% and a whole lot of Franklin County where Bush did over 60%. So remembering that Kerry would have to get 80% of the provisional and spoiled ballots to just break even, this doesn't look good for Kerry at all. Even so, looking at this map and looking at the spread of ballots across the counties, one can see that the provisional ballots in mostly white areas outnumber those in areas with large black populations, hence making Kerry's odds even slimmer. But all this is conjecture, with Ohio now having to recount their ballots including provisionals, spoiled and absentee (why weren't those counted already since they had them?) we will know the real numbers soon enough.

Let's look at what we know can sink the Republicans should a group with enough balls and money does it:


"In Franklin County, where Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder is also the former Executive Director of the county�s Republican Party, the county Board of Elections building looked like a bunker. Scores of city buses blocked parking spaces on the street outside, numerous concrete barricades surrounded the parking lot, and a metal detector was stationed at the only entrance. A phalanx of armed deputy sheriffs swarmed the only site where provisional voters could cast a guaranteed ballot. The Columbus Dispatch confirmed an Election Day Free Press story that far fewer voting machines were present in predominantly black Democratic inner-city voting wards than in the recent primary election and the 2000 presidential election, with their lighter turnouts. The reduced number of machines caused voters to wait up to seven hours and wait an average of approximately three hours. One Republican Central Committee member told the Free Press that Damschroder held back as many as 2000 machines and dispersed many of the other machines to affluent suburbs in Franklin County."--free press.org article



This, my friends is a smoking gun. Matt Damschroder should be deposed as well as the person who reported this action. I believe there is enough evidence to charge Mr. Damschroder and "black"well with voter disenfranchisement through the purposeful depopulating of voting machines in areas with projected high turnouts. I hope someone or some organization takes this challenge up.