The name of ACORN (the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) is familiar here in Washington.   While Nevada and other states are getting to know them and their fraudulent voter registration activities, we here in Washington already got our primer over a year ago¹:

King and Pierce County prosecutors filed felony charges today against seven people who allegedly committed the biggest voter-registration fraud in state history.

…

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is the worst case of voter-registration fraud in the history of the state of Washington. There has been nothing comparable to this,” state Secretary of State Sam Reed said at a news conference with Satterberg, King County Executive Ron Sims and Acting U.S. Attorney Jeff Sullivan.

ACORN President Maude Hurd said in a statement, “It appears that a handful of temporary workers were trying to get paid for work they hadn’t actually done. While we don’t think the intent or the result of their actions was to allow any ineligible person to vote, these employees defrauded ACORN and imposed a burden on the time and resources of registrars and law enforcement.”

Via Orb:¹

08/19/2008 22:00 PACIFIC

SEATTLE, WA - ORBUSMAX EXCLUSIVE

***** DID OBAMA SUPPORTER BREAK SCHOOL POLICY AND/OR ELECTION LAW ON MONDAY AND PRIMARY ELECTION TUESDAY (8/18-8/19)? *****

The Seattle Public school system may be finding itself in more hot water, following dustups over last fall’s “Myth Of Thanksgiving”, and last summer’s “Exploring White Privilege”. A reliable source has told ORBUSMAX that at least one Obama supporter was caught openly selling Obama for President t-shirts, “on Seattle Public School premises during an official School District Training” for teachers, yesterday and today, at the Aki Kurose Middle school.

The source says they overheard the Obama supporter being told by an attendee of the training on Monday that the table display was inappropriate and may be in violation of school policy, but nonetheless the Obama supporter returned on Tuesday and once again set up the display with the t-shirts for sale. It appears school officials made no attempt to stop or remove the display either day.

I blogged about this this morning, but the real scope of the ruling is just now being fleshed out, and a few things have occurred to me.

First of all, as I said earlier, this is a complete victory for common sense.  It just makes simple sense that if voting is the precious right and responsibility we think it is, it should be protected and cherished, and one facet of that is to ensure that only those eligible are allowed to vote, lest the franchise be corrupted by people who are not.

Some say that is exclusionary, but the fact is that voter criteria exists to protect the validity of the votes of all.   Protecting it by what seems to be the simplest method, checking ID, is a complete no brainer.

And yet there are the critics who decry this as unfair, as disenfranchising people, and targeted to eliminate minorities, also know as the race card.

Hog wash. 

They claim fraud is a myth, and that there is no compelling reason to protect against it.  Sure.  There is also no compelling reason your care will be stolen, so feel free to leave the keys in.

Told ya so.  Now, watch as the world comes unglued and the liberals implode that actual accountability is a part of voting.

 Via AP:

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Monday that states can require voters to produce photo identification without violating their constitutional rights, validating Republican-inspired voter ID laws.

In a splintered 6-3 ruling, the court upheld Indiana’s strict photo ID requirement, which Democrats and civil rights groups said would deter poor, older and minority voters from casting ballots. Its backers said it was needed to prevent fraud.

It was the most important voting rights case since the Bush v. Gore dispute that sealed the 2000 election for George W. Bush. But the voter ID ruling lacked the conservative-liberal split that marked the 2000 case.

The law “is amply justified by the valid interest in protecting ‘the integrity and reliability of the electoral process,’” Justice John Paul Stevens said in an opinion that was joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Anthony Kennedy. Stevens was a dissenter in Bush v. Gore in 2000.

I blogged this back in 2005 (reposted below) as it was happening, and now 2 years later the end is drawing near, but even as it is, nothing is settled, and the closure seems impossible.  How can you move on from something so horrific?

Joseph Duncan, the guy who commiitted this indescribly horrible crime pled guilty in state court previously, and has now pled guilty in Federal court.

Duncan pleads guilty to all counts (emphasis mine)

 Joseph Duncan this morning pleaded guilty to all 10 counts in the federal indictiment against him for kidnapping and molesting two North Idaho children and killing one in 2005.

“I just wanted to say that since my arrest I have never attempted to deny responsibility,” Duncan told the court.

The convicted killer faces a possible death sentence for kidnapping Dylan and Shasta Groene in 2005 and for killing Dylan at a remote Montana camp site.

 Possible?  Good God, if ever there was a poster child for the death penalty, this is it.

Today was a bittersweet day.  Before work, I went down to the Issaquah Police Station today.  No, I didn’t post bail. 

I voted.  What made it bittersweet to me, is that I voted for what is likely the last time.

No, my commitment to civic responsibility is still intact, so it is not that.  King County, where I live, is moving with most of my state to an all mail in ballot system.

And I hate it.

My opposition to mail in ballots is not absolute, for some people it is a necessary process.  They have situations that demand an absentee process.  But I think for the average person, the ‘burden’ of driving to a local polling station, signing your name and taking you ballot to a semi private voting table to fill in the ovals, or connect the arrows or whatever, is not such a huge burden.

The people at the polling stations are friendly and utterly committed to the democratic process.  In Issaquah, I have yet to see a non smiling face.  The attitude is almost festive and the appreciation you feel for being there and being part of the process is very warming.

Seems an incredible slap in the face, but its true.  8 of the 19 Hijackers had used phoney documents or loopholes in the state law to obtain drivers licenses, and under the Motor Voter act had also been allowed to register to vote.

Makes you feel real secure in our system, doesn’t it?  Because nowit is easier then ever before to do both.

Eight 9-11 Hijaacckers Were Registereed to Vote: Will MSM ‘Drive’ Story?

The fact has been out there for some time, but never garnered much media attention. Now, in the context of the current debate over the granting of driver’s licenses to illegal immigrants, will there be renewed focus on this chilling reality? Could this be the factoid that changes a presidential election? As John Fund wrote in his Wall Street Journal column today and discussed during his “Morning Joe” appearance:

After 9/11, the Justice Department found that eight of the 19 hijackers were registered to vote.

View video of Fund’s “Morning Joe” appearance here.

And what made it so simple for them to register? As Fund explains:

The County should thanks her for exposing the loopholes that make fraud in King County so easy to commit but instead they are punishing her.

Instead of dealing with the law’s obvious flaws, they will bully her with threats and intimidation.  This is senseless prosecution and retribution for poking the sleeping giant in the eye.  Period.

Woman registers her dog to vote; prosecutors growl

Jane Balogh had a pretty good idea who was calling when the phone rang and the caller asked for Duncan M. MacDonald.

Duncan is the dog Balogh registered as a voter seven months before the November 2006 election.

Duncan’s absentee-ballot envelope was signed with a picture of a paw print.

That is the only thing that gave it away, isn’t that ironic?  Had she scrawled a signature they would have accepted it.

“You can’t sign with a paw print,” the election worker told Balogh on Nov. 9.

“I said, ‘he can if he’s a dog,’ ” answered Balogh, a 66-year-old grandmother and Army veteran who lives in Federal Way.

The news seems grim, that the Bush Administration and the DOJ purged 8 US Attorney’s including the one from Seattle.

The foes, including Hillary, charge the firings are political.

Of course they are, the position is a political appointee, like the president’s Cabinet.

And Hillary should know that intimately:  Her husband and his AG Janet Reno fired 93 in one swoop.  But apparently that is vastly different.   Once again the Democrats leap on a non issue for partisan gain.

Hillary Clinton Calls for Gonzales’ Resignation

In an exclusive interview to air Wednesday morning, March 14, on “Good Morning America,” Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination, for the first time called for the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

“The buck should stop somewhere,” Clinton told ABC News senior political correspondent Jake Tapper, “and the attorney general — who still seems to confuse his prior role as the president’s personal attorney with his duty to the system of justice and to the entire country — should resign.