[kj] ot - you may not vote

[Jiri]

Thank god we have a sound man like Ashcroft to enforce
the law and put a stop to these foul tactics...*sigh*

--- fluwdot at earthlink.net wrote:
> unless we say so
> ----------------------
> 
> 
> NAACP CHAIRMAN JULIAN BOND CALLS FOR
> ELECTION PROTECTION TO DEFEND VOTING RIGHTS ACT
>                                                     
>                      
> Julian Bond, Chairman of the Board, National
> Association for the
> Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), has called on
> Attorney General John Ashcroft to take steps to
> protect minority
> voters against practices meant to deceive or
> intimidate minority
> voters during the elections this fall.
> 
> Bond said a report on voter intimidation and
> suppression
> released by the NAACP and People for the American
> Way
> shows that deliberate efforts to deceive or
> intimidate voters into
> staying away from the polls continue to emerge in
> major
> elections.
> 
> The report, entitled, “The Long Shadow of Jim Crow:
> Voter
> Intimidation and Suppression in America,” documents
> several
> decades of race-based efforts to deter minority
> voters, including
> African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans from
> casting
> their votes.
> 
> Bond said: “We are calling on Attorney General John
> Ashcroft,
> state attorney generals, political parties and
> election officials
> everywhere to halt these tactics, to closely monitor
> groups in their
> communities with a history of voter suppression, and
> to send a
> clear message that America guarantees that every
> voter can cast
> his or her vote without running a gauntlet of
> hostile forces or dirty
> tricks, and that every vote will be fairly counted.”
> 
> Tactics cited in the report include; asking minority
> voters to vote
> on alternate days, demanding forms of identification
> not required
> by law to vote, the use of phony voter purge lists
> containing
> legitimate voters, and harassment of voters at the
> polls. “Minority
> voters bear the brunt of every form of
> disenfranchisement,
> including pernicious efforts to keep them away from
> the polls”,
> said Bond.
> 
> He said, “When the 1965 Voting Rights Act eliminated
> literacy
> tests and the poll tax, the enemies of democracy
> turned to other
> means.”  This year, with widespread predictions of a
> close
> national election, Bond said, “We are reminding
> voters, election
> officials, and the media about the kinds of dirty
> tricks that can be
> expected.  We must be prepared to confront and
> defeat them.”
> 
> The report said that in South Dakota's June 2004
> primary, Native
> American voters were prevented from voting after
> they were
> challenged to provide photo IDs, which were not
> required by state
> or federal law.
> 
> This summer, Michigan state Rep. John Pappageorge
> (R-Troy)
> was quoted in the Detroit Free Press as saying: "If
> we do not
> suppress the Detroit vote, we're going to have a
> tough time in this
> election. African Americans comprise 83% of
> Detroit's
> population.”
> 
> Most recently, armed plainclothes officers from the
> Florida
> Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) questioned
> elderly
> black voters in their homes as part of a state
> investigation of
> voting irregularities in the Orlando March 2003
> mayoral election.
> Critics have charged that the tactics used by the
> FDLE have
> intimidated black voters, which could suppress their
> turnout in this
> year's elections.
> 
> Founded in 1909, the National Association for the
> Advancement
> of Colored People (NAACP) is the nation’s oldest and
> largest
> civil rights organization. Its half-million adult
> and youth members
> throughout the United States and the world are the
> premier
> advocates for civil rights in their communities,
> conducting voter
> mobilization and monitoring equal opportunity in the
> public and
> private sectors.
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