Fun_People Archive
1 Dec
and the beat goes on... the London Observer on Katherine Harris

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Fri,  1 Dec 100 10:56:27 -0800
To: Fun_People
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Subject: and the beat goes on...  the London Observer on Katherine Harris

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Forwarded-by: David Fox <David@electriceggplant.com>

What follows is a letter and article from a friend in Europe, forwarding
a story from the London Observer that states that Katherine Harris, Secty
of State in Florida, hired a Republican contributor to review voter rolls
and disqualified 12,000 black voters on various, largely erroneous grounds.
If true it is criminal and should have been reported. If anyone has
information about this either way, it should be rebutted, or widely
proliferated.
	peter coyote

(the article is reproduced in part after the letter that follows and you
can read it directly on the Observer site, as part of the longer artcle on
the business page.
please do what you can, Judy and Susan


Dear Cyberbees,

>Could you please check out the following story. It ran in Sunday's Observer
>in the United Kingdom.  The last portion of the story details how Katherine
>Harris, the Florida Secretary of State, hired Database Technologies to
>examine the Florida voter rolls.  This examination resulted in 12,000 mostly
>African-Americans being disqualified as voters for allegedly having criminal
>records.  This information was in error in the vast majority of cases and
>resulted in more than enough people being disqualified to tip the election
>into this recount and contest phase.
>
>The parent company for Database Technologies allegedly made a six figure
>soft money contribution to the Republicans.  If these facts are even
>in part true they need to be public and Katherine Harris needs to be
>investigated for prejudice in her official duties.
>
>Please review the pertinent parts of the article and let me know what you
>think.  The American people have a right to know if the Florida Secretary of
>State was using a company with ties to the Republican party to disqualify
>voters who should not have been purged from the rolls.
>
>The author's email address appears at the end of the article.  A hyperlink
>and web address directly to the Observer precede the article.
>
>Check it out.  I think we would all like the truth
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4096508,00.html

>28.11.2000
>Blackout in Florida
>
>Vice-President Al Gore would have strolled to victory in Florida if the
>state
>hadn't kicked 12,000 citizens off the voters' registers five month ago as
>former felons.
>
>In fact, only a fraction were ex-cons. Most were simply guilty of being
>African-American. While 8,000 of those disenfranchised went through the
>legal rigmarole of getting on to the voting list, the rest - enough to
>have won the state for Gore - did not.
>
>A top-placed election official (not a Democrat) told me that the government
>had conducted a quiet review and found - surprise! - that the listing
>included far more African-Americans than would statistically have been
>expected, even accounting for the grievous gap between the conviction
>rates of blacks and whites in the US.
>
>The source of this poisonous blacklist: Database Technologies, a division of
>ChoicePoint, and hired by Governor Jeb Bush's frothingly partisan Secretary
>of State, Katherine Harris. My thanks to investigator Solomon Hughes for
>informing me that DBT is a division of ChoicePoint. Under fire for mis-use
>of personal data in state computers, ChoicePoint founder Rick Rozar made a
>strategic six-figure soft cash donation to the Republican Party.
>
>  Email: Gregory.Palast@observer.co.uk

© 2000 Peter Langston