Gabriel Gudding, a youngish poet, has posted this poem, by another poet, Eliot Weinberger, on his blog. It's an enormous, devastating, pointed, and terrifying collage of facts about and quotes from Republicans. It's a must compendium of Repug lunacy. The link is below, followed by a brief excerpt. This section is on Republicans and voting machines, but that's only one of many dozens of topics. Check it out here
Excerpt on Republicans and voting machines:
Republicans like electronic voting machines. In the 1980's, Bob and Todd Urosevich founded a voting machine company, eventually called American Information Systems (AIS), with money from the Ahmanson family of California. The Ahmansons are Christian Reconstructionists who want to establish a theocracy based on biblical law and under the "dominion" of Christians. They support the death penalty for homosexuals, adulterers, and alcoholics. They are members of the secretive Council for National Policy, which combines remnants of the John Birch Society with apocalyptic Christians and is considered by many to be the driving force of "hard right" ideology. The Ahmansons sold the company to the McCarthy Group, whose Chairman and co-owner was Chuck Hagel. The McCarthy Group bought another voting machine company, Cronus Industries, from the Hunt oil family in Texas, also Christian Reconstructionists, who had supplied the original money for the Council for National Policy. The two voting machine companies were merged and became Election Systems and Software (ES&S), with Hagel as CEO.
Republicans like electronic voting machines. ES&S counts 80% of the vote in the state of Nebraska. In 1996, Hagel resigned from ES&S to run for Senator from Nebraska. His victory was called a "stunning upset" by Nebraska newspapers: African-American districts that had never voted for a Republican voted for Hagel. In 1992, Hagel ran again and received 83% of the vote? 3% more than ES&S-tabulated votes and the largest election victory in the history of Nebraska. His Democratic opponent asked for a recount, but the Republican-dominated state legislature had passed a law that only ES&S could recount the votes. Hagel won the recount. No longer Chairman of the McCarthy Group, Hagel had been succeeded by Thomas McCarthy, who was his campaign treasurer.
Republicans like electronic voting machines. When Jeb Bush first ran for Governor of Florida, his first choice for Lieutenant Governor was Sandra Mortham, a lobbyist for ES&S, who was receiving commissions for every county that bought ES&S machines.
