Takin' it easy today (at least as far as you know) after a brutally exhausting and often dispiriting week. Whether or not that led to a different mood today during my weekly guest appearance on the Peter B. Collins Show I can't tell you.

Either way, as Guest Hosted today by our friend Tony Trupiano, we covered a few things I haven't gotten to speak much about lately, and also received an important good news update from caller "Chris in Salinas." Turns out action taken by Chris over the past week, after finding something troubling in a recent special election in Monterey County, CA, has led to a happy conclusion that will effect all voters in Monterey, and perhaps across this entire state.

That story --- and much else of what we chatted about on the show --- again, underscores the need for citizens to take control of their democracy because it will not be either the media or the government who restores our country. It will be you.

Enjoy...

-- Brad on PBC (Guest Host Tony Trupiano), 5/25/07 [MP3, appx 50 mins]

UPDATE: "Chris from Salinas" writes in to comments below with more details on precisely what happened in Monterey County, the action he took, and the changes that were made because of. Useful if you haven't been able to listen to the audio above (which I still recommend, in any case).

UPDATE: We have now sold out of copies of signed FOOLED AGAIN books, but hope to offer more such premiums to BRAD BLOG readers in the near future! Of course, we still welcome your donations to help us continue our work here. Thanks to all for your support!

Congratulations to Mark Crispin Miller, whose FOOLED AGAIN: The Real Case for Electoral Reform will be released in an all-new, updated paperback edition next week!

Mark's added a monster 100 page update to bring things up to date since the 2006 election and tells me that he's drawn heavily from The BRAD BLOG's reporting in the new chapter. Haven't seen it yet, but I'm told one is on the way and I'm looking forward to it.

(UPDATE: My copy just arrived, and a quick thumbing through the new chapter, "Afterword: State of Denial" reveals all manner of cool stuff, like the Clint Curtis/Tom Feeney story, San Diego's Busby/Bilbray voting machine "sleepover" debacle, the ACVR, the Holt Bill, RFK Jr. entering the issue, and more, much of which has never made it into print until now! More thoughts on it all after I get to read the new stuff in full.)

To help launch next week's new release, he and his publishers have made a number of personally signed copies available as premiums for BRAD BLOG contributors! As usual, it's first come, first served, so please act now to get your own signed, updated copy of this landmark book while helping out one of your favorite blogs (that would be us!) at the same time!

To get your own signed copy as soon as they're available, choose one of the options below...

1) All new Monthly Subscribers of $20 or more (use the blue form at right to sign up quickly), or;
2) A One-Time $50 or more Online Donation (click here), or;
3) A One-Time $50 or more Snail Mail donation (send to: Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594, Los Angeles, CA 90028 - Please specify "Fooled Again" on check or note)

Thanks in advance! As well, a huge thanks to Mark and his publishers for their generous support of The BRAD BLOG!

On the second day of a heat spell that's gripped Los Angeles, and The BRAD BLOG World News Headquarters, fire has once again erupted in the nearby bone dry Hollywood Hills. This one appears to be much bigger --- and the weather conditions much worse --- than the blaze we noticed out our window last month which threatened the Hollywood Sign.

That's a photo of the Griffith Observatory which is very near the current fire tonight. It has recently re-opened after a multi-million dollar renovation. You may recognize it as the location of Sal Mineo's death in Rebel Without a Cause. It's currently a mere quarter mile from the fire line.

The nearby threatened area also includes the Los Angeles Zoo, which was evacuated earlier of people, if not animals, Griffith Park's legendary Greek Theater, and yes, the Hollywood Sign. Mandatory evacuations have been ordered for nearby homes. As of 6:30pm PT the fire was growing, had covered 200 acres, was being battled by 500 fire fighters, and was just 25% contained. For a better idea of how large this fire is see another photo of the Observatory below.

Local TV affiliate coverage and video, etc. available here, here and here.

For those concerned, BRAD BLOG World News Headquarters is currently at a safe enough distance. We think. We'll let you know if that changes.

Please take this BRAD BLOG reader survey!

It'll help us to serve you better (and also allow us to spy on you, steal your identity, buy things on your credit and much more!) Okay...Just kidding about that part. But, seriously, it will definitely help us out on a number of levels and is a fun survey to boot. You can quit at any time if you get tired of answering questions.

Thanks! Click here!

The Young Turks' Cenk Uyger, with our buddy RJ Eskow from Huff Po co-hosting yesterday morning, invoked The BRAD BLOG, calling on us to get to the bottom of Sanjaya's removal from American Idol. We're on it.

Guest Blogged by Stephen Heller

The truest act of patriotism is to protect the public from a corrupt and wasteful government.
-- TheFirstWhistleblower.org

The United States government and American corporations are counting on you to keep your mouth shut.

According to Transparency International's Peter Eigen, the World Bank estimates that every year corruption costs one trillion dollars. Here in the United States, billions of our tax dollars are stolen every year due to corruption, bribery, fraud, willful malfeasance and misfeasance, and plain old greed. And if you come across evidence of this fraud and corruption, you are expected to keep quiet about it.

The government and the corporations want you to shut up. Stay asleep, people. Nothing to see here, just move along. Go to work, earn your pay, watch TV so you'll know what products you should be buying, then go to the mall and buy them. Don't worry about what your government is doing, don't think about what the corporations are doing, just trust us and be good little "sheeple." Just. Shut. Up.

To hell with 'em.

Don't shut up. Don't let the bastards win. When you see something, say something. Take a deep breath, and blow that whistle HARD!

You should know that you'll probably get hammered for it. You'll likely lose your job, get harassed and threatened, you might even be charged with a crime.

I know whereof I speak...

*** Blogged by BRAD BLOG D.C. Correspondent Margie Burns

On Tuesday, April 3, 2007 the Washington Post finally got around to publishing a front-page article, “How Bogus Letter Became a Case for War,” on the bogus Niger/uranium/Iraq story underlying those infamous “16 words” in Bush’s 2003 State of the Union speech.

The Post subtitle is “Intelligence Failures Surrounded Inquiry on Iraq-Niger Uranium Claim.” A more accurate subtitle would have read, “Intelligence Community Caved to Bush-Cheney Pressure.”

{Ed Note: We might suggest "Mainstream Media Failure to do Job, Scrutinize Admin's Iraq-Niger Claim, Led to Endless War" - BF}

I, among others, am familiar with the chronology because I wrote about it almost a full three years ago...

Since Brit Hume of Fox "News" has never quoted us (rather, me, Brad Friedman) by name as far as I know, I thought it would be worth elevating the following update from our piece over the weekend which was critical of Obama, to note the once-credible Hume having done so today, in order to smash up a Democrat, of course. Oh, the irony never stops.

The original BRAD BLOG article from which Hume quotes us (me) was critical of Obama for reportedly telling AP over the weekend that Senate Dems would cave by sending an Iraq spending bill to the White House without troop withdrawal timelines, if Bush vetoes the current one as promised.

Hume failed to mention, of course, that we also noted the dubious provenance of the report: The Associated Press. Neither did he mention the ensuing updates and discussions about whether AP had the story right or not. Though, in fact, Obama has not gone out of his way to correct the record, or call out AP for being inaccurate, save for this middling response in the Union Leader today. Markos at DailyKos --- who is infamously singled out along with us (happy to tarnish his reputation) in Hume's piece --- has thoughts on Obama's response with which we will also associate ourselves in a rare meeting of minds.

So for infamy's sake, the video of former newsman Hume using us to slime Obama ("Liberal Bloggers Turn on Barack Obama") is at left. We'll presume he means "turns back on" versus the sexual connotation. Either way, we're happy to serve. Video courtesy of the indispensable NewsHounds.us and the indefatigable Alan Breslauer.

Please note: Unlike the Fox "News" website print version of Hume's "Political Grapevine" (see the update from the original article below), Hume referred to us as "popular" in the video version. We shall add it to our CV right away...

HOLLYWOOD - While on the phone, during yet another exasperating conversation with a Congressional office, I noticed the sky above BRAD BLOG World News Headquarters begin turning oddly orange. It turns out a large brush fire, just over the hill near the Universal and Warner Bros. Studios, was burning out of control. In a potential disaster for the entire nation, indeed the world, the "Hollywood Sign" itself sits nearby.

With our photography staff (Desi) away on assignment (lunch in Santa Monica), we'll have to rely on photos from the media....

(Courtesy NBC11.com)

(Courtesy TMZ.com)

As the wind seems to have changed directions moments ago, the orange sky over our corporate headquarters has begun to turn blue again. So it seems that all staff members will likely be spared, this afternoon at least, from an horribly tragic apocalyptic ending. We'll let you know if the situation changes.

LIVE VIDEO COVERAGE here...

{Ed Note: All of the signed DVD premiums we had available have now been spoken for. They will soon be on their way to the folks who got in in time. Thanks to all for the support!}

The tremendous, if extraordinarily disturbing, HBO documentary Hacking Democracy is finally being released on DVD this week. I reviewed the film for ComputerWorld, just before its premier in the days prior to the November 2006 election --and just after Diebold's inane and embarrassing attempt to try and force HBO into not letting America see it. (Sorry Diebold, you lost, get over it, move on, fix your shitty voting machines, then throw 'em out, we don't want 'em.)

If you've been living in a cave, or in San Diego, the landmark film is the harrowing detective tale of Election Integrity advocates around the country, including the crew at BlackBoxVoting.org, which eventually leads to the now-landmark Harri Hursti hack of a Diebold system in Leon County, FL, in December of 2005. The hack heard round the world completely flipped a mock election without a trace being left behind. All told in before-your-very-eyes documentary footage as the sometimes hilarious, always terrifying (at least to Democracy-lovers) events unravel.

With the release of the DVD version, the filmmakers Simon Ardizzone, Robert Carrillo Cohen, and Russell Michaels, have been kind enough to hand sign a limited number of copies for premiums to BRAD BLOG supporters! For a donation of $50 or more, we'll ship one out to you ASAP! First come, first served, so click fast (and I'll update this item when we've run out).

The NY Times' review of Hacking Democracy called it "disturbing stuff," and went on to say, "it's not shocked-shocked you feel watching this; it's genuine shock." Well, little wonder they were shocked. They ignored the issue for years on end, referring to it as "the conspiracy theories of leftwing bloggers" until the story showed up on their doorstep in movie form. But don't get me started.

No doubt the still-largely-clueless Times would be shocked again by some of the DVD Extras footage including scenes deleted from the original airing. Never-before-seen segments on the DVD include...

If you missed our coverage of the concerns about the positions on Election Reform by People for the American Way (PFAW), including their advocacy of dangerous touch-screen DRE voting systems which originally ran here a couple of days ago, you've got another chance. AlterNet is now running the article from their front page today under the title "An Opposing View on the Progressive Voting Machines Debate."

As with the original, it includes the links to the audio and transcripts of both PFAW Executive Director Ralph Neas's and my appearances on Ring of Fire with RFK Jr. and Mike Papantonio, so you can decide what's going on here for yourself.

And if it wasn't 100% clear in the article originally, PFAW does not have the same position as some of the other groups (like Common Cause, VoteTrustUSA, MoveOn, etc.), who are generally opposed to DRE use, but have been afraid (for political reasons, legitimately or not) to support a ban.

PFAW, to the contrary, is actually advocating the use of DREs in their position and arguments to back it up.

I'm happy to run a response from Ralph or PFAW if they'd like to contact me in order to clarify anything they feel I've misrepresented. That was not my purpose. Similarly, my purpose was not to attack them, but to discuss openly what I see as a very troubling position that I spent much time trying to figure out --- and work out --- privately, before Ralph's public interview on RoF made it necessary for me to respond in kind to help clarify what seems to be going on here...

The Saturday before last I was interviewed on Air America's Ring of Fire with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Mike Papantonio concerning my call for the Election Reform Bill (HR811) by Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ) to be amended to include a full ban on Direct Recording Electronic (DRE, usually touch-screen) voting systems.

The interview was pre-taped, and an edited-for-time version was aired. The complete, unedited version of that 15 minute interview, along with a text-transcript is now posted here.

This past Saturday, Ralph Neas, the president of People for the American Way (PFAW), one of the groups supporting the Holt Bill as is, and fighting against a ban on DRE voting systems, was interviewed on Ring of Fire. I had been critical of PFAW's unwaivering support of the bill during my interview the week before (as I have been in many articles here and elsewhere), so Bobby Kennedy asked Neas, a number of times, to answer directly to some of my criticisms.

The audio of that interview as well as a text-transcript, is also now posted here.

Now before I get to a huge number of concerns about the Neas interview and what I see as the dangerous PFAW position, and not to stack the deck (but I will anyway), Papantonio concluded his interview with me as follows, which I then promised to quote on the blog, so here it is...

AlterNet's front page today is featuring a fresh version of my story from last week on the false dichotomies being forwarded by Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ) and the supporters of his Election Reform bill, HR 811 [PDF], as written. It outlines the unsupported talking points and disingenuous arguments being made to prop up the failings of the bill (most notably, its failure to ban DREs) by Holt's office as well as his public-advocacy group supporters like PFAW, Common Cause, MoveOn, VoteTrustUSA, etc...

The original BRAD BLOG version was here. The updated Alternet version (including a bit more background on the brouhaha for newbies is here: "False Choices in the Debate on Voting Technology"

I've also now set up a new "Special Coverage" page for the Holt Bill Debate here: www.BradBlog.com/Holt. It includes the most notable BRAD BLOG stories since the bill dropped, as well as essential articles and calls to action elsewhere. I hope it'll be a useful source. It's also always available from the red "Special Coverage" box in the right sidebar.

Also related...A new "Anti-DRE Talking Points" document from VotersUnite.org (HTML version with links & grafs..., 2-Page PDF version...) features simple bullet-points on why DRE/touch-screen voting systems must be banned and the urgent need to reform the Holt bill to ensure it. Both versions of that doc are also linked from the new Holt Special Coverage page.

Here's why...and how you can do it in 60 seconds...

(And thanks mightily to those of you who have already answered the call!)

Please donate online via PayPal or credit card, or use the blue form at right to sign up for a monthly subscription, or contribute via snail mail.
===

Finally back at the anchor desk of The BRAD BLOG World News Headquarters after three (unexpected) weeks taking my dog and pony show on the road. Upon my return: a total of two cash dollars in the Snail Mail PO Box --- for which I am eternally grateful.

But even during the time I was away, we managed to bring you first-hand exclusive eyewitness reporting from the courtroom of the Scooter Libby/CIA Leak Trial in DC by Margie Burns, an important continuing investigative series you'll find nowhere else on the disastrously compromised EAC by Michael Richardson, the latest daily developments in our crumbling Electoral System saga as brought to you by John Gideon, insightful Video Snippets on a number of broader topics by Alan Breslauer, Guest Blogs from important newsmakers, and yes, I did my best to keep up, managing to edit, file my own exclusives, and work behind the scenes on all of the above even while making public appearances around Arizona and California, Guest Hosting radio broadcasts and working the phones endlessly to both dig and try to move mountains while barreling down the highways and byways at 80 mph.

We'll continue the work here, come hell or high water, but as the water continues to get higher, and the hell more hellier, I am again forced to ask for your help...