The Caging of the American Voter

Igor Writes-

Over the last few weeks, you have probably heard the term "caging". As of yet, I haven't heard a good explanation on any network news stations of what caging is and WHY IT CAN BRING DOWN KARL ROVE AND THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION.

Background...

The latest scandal in the Bush administration is the myriad missing e-mails lying around in cyberspace. By law, administration members are required to archive all mail sent and received. Lately, however, tens of thousands of e-mails related to the firing of the 8 white house attorneys in the Alberto Gonzalez (remember him?) case have gone missing, which is just terribly convenient.

Can I just add here that there is no way for an e-mail to truly disappear. It is well known that once an e-mail is sent, it passes through so many servers that it can always be found. Why haven't they been found, then?

Anyway, investigators within the Justice Department dropped in of the office of Dick Cheney, demanding to inspect his records, to see is his office complied with e-mail archive regulations.

Cheney had the investigators removed, claiming that since he is not part of the executive branch, he cannot be investigated.

Let me repeat that. Cheney claims that he is not a member of the executive branch! How fucking convenient is that?

You can only be a member of one of three branches. Since he is not a judge, a lawyer, or a legislator, how can he not be part of the executive branch?? He's second in line to the head of the branch!

After hearing that the Oversight Investigative Committee had balked over Cheney's actions, he then threatened to dismantle the committee. The irony here is that if Cheney isn't part of the executive branch, he has no authority to dismantle any committee!

Whoops...

Meanwhile, the owner of a website called RNCHQ.ORG, which is suspiciously similar to the domain of the Republican National Committee's Headquarters website, claimed that he received thousands of e-mails from the office of Karl Rove, meant for the real
RNC. Whoops.

Of course, he published the now infamous e-mails on his website, and passed them on to a BBC reporter named Greg Palast.

Palast, while reading through these e-mails, found something really interesting. This is where the story gets twisted.

A set of e-mails sent from Karl Rove's deputy Tim Griffin to what he thought was the RNC in 2004 mentioned caging.

Caging?

What the hell is caging, you ask?

Caging is a form of voter suppresion in which mass mailings are sent to registered voters marked "Do Not Forward, Return to Sender if Undeliverable". If a voter is not home, or the letter cannot be delivered, it is sent back to, in this case, the RNC, which then challenges the registration of that voter on the basis that they falsified their address. When that voter shows up at the polls, they vote normally, but their vote doesn't count and they are never told about it.

This is 2004, mind you. I believe there was some sort of election going on?

This, as it will become clear, it completely predatory, and used to keep Democratic voters away from the polls.

The real kicker is, the RNC sent thousands of these to African American soldiers stationed in Iraq. Except they sent the letters to their American homes. Which means that thousands of black soldiers were disenfranchised in the 2004 election. Moreover, other targeted groups included the homeless and students away from home, both of which overwhelmingly vote Democrat. The worst thing is, these disenfranchised voters are walking around our town and serving in Iraq even to this day not knowing that their votes weren't counted.

Needless to say, caging is a felony. And not one of those wishy-washy "oops, I didn't use enough stamps" felonies, but voter fraud. These e-mails, one of which was titled "RE: Caging List" with a 51-page Excel spreadsheet called "caging" with a file name "caginglist.xl1s", are not subtle in any way.

This is concrete proof. Not speculation, not inference, but hard, digital proof.

The day after Palast wrote this article for the BBC, Tim Griffin, sender of the e-mails and deputy in the office of Karl Rove, resigned.

If the e-mails aren't enough proof, you can also take the word of Monica Goodling, former Department of Justice liaison to the White House, who was recently granted immunity for her testimony against Alberto Gonzalez. If you recall, Gonzalez tried to blame his deputy, Paul McNulty, for the entire scandal. Well apparently, according to Goodling, McNulty knew all about voter caging in 2004, but said nothing in order to keep his job.

What now?

So why is no one talking about this? Why isn't this a headline on every major news station and newspaper?

Probobly because it could bring down the entire Bush administration, or at least the entire office of Karl Rove and Bush's election campaign staff.

What can you do about it? Make it news. Write your papers, your news stations, Digg the hell out of the story, petition Google News. There are ways.

Who knows, maybe Kerry won the election after all.

Links

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/3956129.stm
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/kerry_won.php
http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_greg_pal_070620_medical_alert_3a__wash.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caging