Suicide Girls is working with award-winning journalist Greg Palast to promote his campaign to make sure your vote counts on Election Day. Palast and activist, attorney, broadcaster and writer Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. teamed up to investigate how those who would call themselves patriots have plotted to steal your vote, and have penned an adult comic/voter guide, entitled Steal Back Your Vote, to help combat the widespread vote suppression they found.

We spoke with Greg Palast (see Suicide Girls interview), who encourages readers to be proactive to make sure your votes aren't just cast, but are counted too. Like one in five Coloradans, if you do find your name missing from electoral roles, Palast gives the SG massive some excellent tips on how you can get your vote restored (and cautions against allowing yourself to be fobbed off with a "bouncing, bogus" provisional ballot).

"One thing I like about Suicide Girls...You're talking to a group of people who are like in your face. Women who don't want to eat shit and are proud of themselves. Well now let's extend that to voting," says Palast. "They don't want you to vote. You're a young new voter, they got all kinds of goddamn rules to make sure you don't vote. They don't like you. They don't want you there. OK, well get in their face. You gotta vote because they don't want you to. You got to vote early because they're trying to screw you and you gotta screw 'em back. So they steal your vote, you steal it back."

Click HERE to get a free downloadable copy of the Steal Back Your Vote comic.

Click HERE to read our interview with Greg Palast.

Click HERE to see Sash Suicide and Rigel Suicide on GregPalast.com.

Leave your questions and stories of your voting experiences in the comments section below. Palast has promised to check back in and respond. And look out for Palast's election night blogs here on the SG newswire.

Now that we are getting down to the final days of the campaign, it’s time to take a look at how Republicans will steal this election. Bush stole the 2000 election by purging voters from voter rolls in Florida. Tens of thousands of mostly black “felons” were removed from the voter rolls by Kathleen Harris and Bush won by a tiny number of votes. Then in 2004, the election was stolen in Ohio via several insane tactics, like removing the press from a building where votes where being counted due to “national security reasons.” Election officials in Ohio have been convicted of charges related to their handling of the recount. You’d have to be a fucking moron not to believe the election was stolen in that state in 2004.

So, now here we are, facing another theft as Republicans do everything they can to prevent Americans from voting. One of the big attempts to stop people from voting in Ohio was thwarted by the Supreme Court last week.

Republicans were attempting to force the Secretary of State of verify new registration cards of 200,000 voters. There simply wasn’t enough time to do so and it would have disqualified many voters for things like spelling errors. Remember Joe the plumber? His name on the registration rolls has an “o” where a “u” should be, which would mean he would not be able to vote if the Republicans got their way –– all because some election worker couldn’t read his writing. Because the vast majority of new voters are registering as Democrats, this would have had a big negative effect on Obama voters.

Nine million new voters have registered for this election. Those are the people the GOP is targeting. The ridiculous ACORN charges, which CNN said, “looks like a fraud perpetrated on ACORN, not by ACORN,” , are just a way of gumming up the works. In some states, voters can be challenged at the polls, causing delays for other voters and forcing the challenged voter to cast a provisional ballot. Provisional ballots are not treated in the same way; many are left uncounted, being tossed out for technical reasons and because of lawsuits. This is the main crux of the Republican attack: People will impersonate voters and vote illegally.

So, it's a lie, plain and simple. But reality won’t stop Republicans. They are filing lawsuits and investigating wherever they can, regardless of the facts.

Ooooo, a “variety of sources.” Well, then by all means, intimidate and disenfranchise voters. And don’t just do it in one part of Ohio, or it wouldn’t look like a planned effort.

And be sure to use the same excuse.

Ooooo, “telephone calls from concerned people.” Oh noes! I wonder who they are?

These are classic Republican tactics. They won’t actually steal the votes, they will do everything they can to prevent people from voting in the first place. The people they are targeting are mostly blacks and college students.

It is happening everywhere. Whatever they can do to stop people from voting.

And the focus seems to be on certain states. You’re not going to believe this, but they are the important ones.

The reason this is “a new trend” is because of the Help America Vote Act of 2002. The law gave money to states to update the voting equipment and centralize their voter databases. Republicans are now using the centralizing of information to purge voters. If the name on your registration card does not match the name on your drivers license or Social Security number, you are tossed. So, people could be losing their right to vote because of a clerical error. Pretty great, huh?

The GOP is throwing every thing against the wall and seeing what sticks.

Thank God Republicans are looking out for fraud, or else some guy might vote when he shouldn’t –– and tens of thousands won’t be able to vote at all.

If we're talking about voter fraud, we are obligated to look at Florida.

That’s all great, because the Social Security Administration’s record for matching voter registrations is stellar.

And you’re not going to believe this, but the Florida Secretary of State is a Republican. Shocking, I know. Of course, it’s not as shocking as Republicans admitting they want to stop people who lost their homes from voting.

Across the country, early voters are already experiencing long lines.

Can’t wait to see how things zip along on election day, especially in areas with high African American populations and college voters. It is so blatant and obvious that when Republican Congressman Tom Davis was asked about it, he said the GOP would never engage in voter suppression –– as a joke.



Hee hee. We’re undermining democracy.

The attacks on ACORN are simply intended to create chaos at the polls on Election Day, in order to delay and discourage voters and lay the seeds for accusations of theft if Obama actually is able to overcome the current deficit he finds himself in. At least, that’s what the McCain camp
is saying.

Even though the right wing screams and loses their Borg-like mind over ACORN, the only person who has actually been arrested for voter fraud this year is a Republican.

Yesterday police arrested Mark Jacoby, the owner of Young Political Majors, a firm hired by Republicans to register voters. He is facing felony charges of voter registration fraud and perjury. Oh, and unlike ACORN, it’s a company actually committing voter fraud in different states

Doesn’t sound too bad, does it? People can still vote, right? Well, it actually is an effective tactic.

Unlike ACORN, this GOP voter fraud is actually serious.

I’m sure the right wing blather machine will jump all over this story. If you want to know what this scumbag has been up to, I suggest reading BradBlog.

Republicans are working hard to steal this election, while keeping Democrats on defense with the ACORN allegations. One only needs to look at Colorado to see what is going on. The state has significantly increased its population since 2004, but there are 100,000 fewer voters registered. Greg Palast believes the suppression tactics have led to 2.7 million registration being tossed out.

Republicans are doing everything they can to steal another one. If they succeed, expect them to point at two excuses. One is complacency, which was recently handed to them on a silver platter by Obama and other Democrats. The other is the “Bradley Effect,” a mythical election theory, which assumes voters tell pollsters they will vote for a black man, but when they are in the booth they can’t bring themselves to do it. It is named after former Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley and assumes he lost his two races for governor because of this theory. The Bradley Effect is a complete load of bullshit. It never happened.

But none of that matters. Republicans have the script, with the reasons why Obama suddenly lost, even though polls expected a crushing victory. If they do, Democracy in America is officially dead.

FearTheReaper is a writer, actor and stand up comedian. Check back each Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday for more from FearTheReaper and read his blog, Stop All Monsters.

In what may be the most pathetic villain campaign since the War on Christmas, Republicans have picked a new bad guy: the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now. You may know them as ACORN. As you can see in the name, they are community organizers, those horrible people Sarah Palin mocks for trying to help the poor. I’m sure Jesus would hate them, too. ACORN has been busy signing up new voters, which means they are largely poor, minority voters. That means Democrats. That means Republicans have to portray another group working to better our country via democracy as evil.

This recent hate barrage against ACORN started when the press began writing about the huge number of people the group was registering.

So, what to do? Accept that your party is quickly becoming the second fiddle of American politics and adapt to the situation by changing your platform, or attack the people taking part in democracy? Well, if you’re a Republican, the answer is obvious.



Yes, attack the community organizers! And tie in Obama, even though his connection is tenuous at best. So tenuous that it is not even worth discussing.

This isn’t new; Republicans have been after ACORN for years. It’s kind of like watching a CEO beat up a homeless woman. Expect the next month to be filled with attacks from sexual harasser Bill O’Reilly, drug addict Rush Limbaugh and anti-Semite Sean Hannity. Maybe when they are done, they can kick a nun in the face.

ACORN hires low-income people to register other low-income people. They get paid per registration, so you can see how the operation would be susceptible to scumbags looking to make a few bucks without doing any work. It’s the nature of the beast. But, here’s the exciting thing: Fraud such as this does not in anyway effect elections. Why? Because filling out a fake registration cards to make a few bucks does not mean that someone will be voting. It means that person does not exist and therefore cannot vote. You actually have to exist to vote. There have been zero instances of this type of “voter fraud” occurring. This is what the Attorney General scandal is about. The Bush Administration wanted US Attorneys to go after these people, but the prosecutors found zero evidence of fraud and those who refused to prosecute because of the lack of evidence were fired.

That being said, ACORN does everything it can to stop this type of criminal activity. The organization attempts to authenticate every registration submitted by workers but our laws force them to turn in every registration form, whether fraudulent or not. See a problem there? ACORN flags the registration forms they believe are fraudulent, but still, they must turn them in. Then Republicans scream their asses off like a bunch of douchebags, “ACORN is committing voter fraud! They've turned in thousands of fraudulent registration forms!”

John Curley is a douchebag. Deep down he knows that and it causes him internal pain. Hopefully he works that out before he dies. It’s really wretched stupidity and an affront to Democracy. Our system was set up to deal with these sorts of occurrences.

No shit? Who would have known? This is exactly what happened in Nevada this week. The Vegas chapter of ACORN was about to have a potluck dinner (elitists) to celebrate signing up 80,000 new voters, when they were raided.

Let’s see. Getting my calculator out here. 80,000, 300, uh…that’s .3%. Holy shit! Put them in jail! And ignore the fact that the system is set up to catch problems like this! And ignore the fact that 79,700 people were legally registered by this group. And ignore the fact that ACORN was forced to submit those forms BY LAW and flagged them as fraudulent!

Yes, raid a community organization that is cooperating with you. That’s some quality law enforcement. And, hey, as a by-product, there’s no good news in the papers about 80,000 new registrants. What a shock. But there are a few tidbits indicating law enforcement officials knew this was a case of individual fraud and not the entire organization.

Now, Republicans will explain this was not a partisan attack because the Nevada Secretary of State and Attorney General are Democrats. Uh huh.

The US Attorney’s Office –– here we are, back at the Republican machine and the root cause of the Attorney General Scandal. The scandal in which employees of the White House still refuse to honor Congressional subpoenas.

This vilifying of community organizations has led to heinous voter ID laws in states like Indiana and massive Republican intimidation at the polls. Republicans will use ACORN to cause chaos at the polls and challenge voters when they show up. Because what ACORN has done is reprehensible, while Republicans around the country do what is right.

Thank God they care, or those .003% of registration cards flagged by ACORN would have gotten through and people who lost their homes in Michigan would be able to vote.

FearTheReaper is a writer, actor and stand up comedian. Check back each Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday for more from FearTheReaper and read his blog, Stop All Monsters.

It was a big week for the United States Supreme Court - the Justices not only heard oral arguments in potentially landmark cases challenging the constitutionality of lethal injection and mandatory voter identification, but the Court building also served as the site of a massive demonstration calling for a shutdown of Guantanamo Bay.

The Court returned from a winter break on Monday and began the year by hearing Baze v. Rees, a case brought by two inmates on death row in Kentucky. They contend that the three-drug combination used in executions in all but one of the 36 states that still have the death penalty constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.

In 1977, when death by electric chair was the norm, the chief medical examiner in Oklahoma developed the drug cocktail in an attempt to make executions more "humane." It consists of a barbiturate to make the individual unconscious, pancuronium bromide to paralyze muscles and stop breathing, and potassium chloride to stop the heart. Essentially, this thirty-year-old dosage combination suffocates people to death, only the drug that is supposed to make the condemned unconscious often doesn’t work. So they are conscious of the suffocation as it comes on, but unable to move or speak to communicate about it.

Opponents of the death penalty were hopeful when the Court agreed to hear the case challenging this method last fall – they essentially halted all executions in the country by granting stays to any prisoner that appealed to them. Some saw this is a hint that perhaps they would strike down this method and, for all intents and purposes, stop the death penalty for the foreseeable future. But a lot of those hopes were dashed by the reactions of the Justices during oral argument.

Justices Scalia and Roberts expressed expected opposition, but the usually liberal Justice Breyer was unexpectedly skeptical, expressing doubt that any other method of execution would be any less painful or less prone to human error. And even Justice Stevens, the Court’s most liberal Justice, conceded that the state should probably win if the issue was how well it administered the current protocol, leaving open the question about whether the constitutionality of the method itself was really being examined at all.

You can read the entire transcript of the arguments here, or download them and hear them for yourself here.

The Justices also expressed skepticism at a challenge to an Indiana law requiring all voters present valid, government-issued IDs at the polls in order to cast a vote. The challengers – the ACLU and the Indiana Democratic Party – contend that the ID requirement is an undue burden on the right to vote because the justification of voter fraud is not enough of a problem to need such a drastic solution. They claim that it will disproportionately affect poor and minority voters (who usually vote for the Democratic Party) who are less likely than more affluent white voters to have drivers’ licenses and passports.

The Justices seemed dismissive not only of this argument, but of the entire case in general. Courts are only supposed to hear cases brought by parties who are actually harmed, but this suit was brought before the law could ever be implemented. So, technically, no one has ever been harmed by it. The issue is a deeply partisan one, of course, but the Justices apparently managed to ignore this fact.

And finally, the week rounded out with a massive protest, both inside and outside the Court, against the torture of prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. Police arrested 80 people without incident.

Ironically, the protest overshadowed the fact that the Court ruled on that very day that the Guantanamo detainees could not sue Pentagon officers and military officials for torturing them.

This shouldn’t be too shocking, really. I mean, remember that little report on global warming that the administration didn’t like? Why not change it? After all, that's why pencils have erasers! Well, now comes word that a report on voter fraud has also received the ol’ red line treatment.

This all ties in, of course, to the fired US Attorneys, some of whom were dumped because apparently they weren’t aggressive enough in investigating claims of voter fraud. You know, that same voter fraud which isn’t really happening. The report also concluded that a more prevalent threat isn’t fraud by voters, but intimidation of voters by other groups. This same panel refused to release a report last month which concluded that the new identification laws can and will reduce voter turnout.

Huh, I don’t remember anyone saying anything about that eight years ago, do you? Didn’t think so. Anyway, who are you going to believe, team intimidation or those sneaky, sneaky voters? Even some who never even voted have been prosecuted, jailed, or deported.

Early election voting has begun and so has the cheating. As has become a tradition in voting since we began using electronic voting machines, voters attempt to select a Democrat only to have their vote switched to a Republican. The process is so prevalent it has earned a name: Vote flipping. In nearly every case reported the flipping goes in favor of Republicans.

So far flipping reports have popped up in Miami, Tampa, St. Louis, Virginia, Arkansas, Dallas, and San Antonio. The reports are typical of what has been reported since Bush stole the election in 2000.

But technology can be checked with technology. Different groups are organizing voters to use the text and video capabilities of cell phones to monitor polls. Video the Vote was created by independent filmmaker Jim Ennis and elections activist James Rucker. So far the site has been viewed over 100,000 times. It is a combination of citizen journalism and a flash mob. Volunteers will receive text messages of irregularities on election day. They will then rush to polling places and document the cheating on video. The video will then be uploaded online for the world to see. Rucker says the project was motivated by lack of media coverage in recent years.



Another site partaking in citizen video monitoring is Veek The Vote. Cell phone users can email their videos into a searchable database on the site that will serve as a source for election footage.

Aside from HBO’s new film, "Hacking Democracy," the media has decided not to cover the glaring problems in our election system. This could be a devastating response. Hundreds of videos online could totally undermine what is left of plummeting voter confidence.