(NOTE: This entry guest blogged by Jaime)

The last three weeks have been saturated with Terri Schiavo / Pope's Death news. While the American Main Stream Media has been focused on these two stories an injustice to democracy is occuring on the other side of the world. Zimbabwe's "President" Robert Mugabe retained and strengthened his grip on power gaining 46 of 120 open parliamentary seats and appointing an additional 30.
His opposition rival, leaver of the Movement for Democratic Change, Morgan Tsvangirai called the election a "disgusting, massive fraud"

Despite international scrutiny over the outcome of this "election" Mugabe seemed unfazed by his critics, laying out the political plans his newly gained mandate will allow him to push through.

In a post 9-11 / Iraqi Freedom world such an event would not stand, could not stand, should not stand with George Dubya Bush. Yet Mr. Democracy himself has been oddly silent in regards to the apparent steady repeal of Democracy in Zimbabwe. Dubya could not be taken away this weekend from his vacation clearing brush and chasing Arma-dillas with Barney to comment...he'd already broken into his free time to attend to the Schiavo matter.

Bush has had time to applaud Victor Yushchenko's victory as he met with the newly minted Ukranian President today. He also poked his nose in Lebanese affairs .

Yet very, very, quiet on Mugabe's election swindling. Mugabe has used many of the same fear mongering tactics and demagoguery as Bush is known for. Their media was also not so independent in its coverage of the election.

Mugabe seems to ape Bush's style. Intimidation, media control, false mandates and vote rigging; a more brutal riff off the American election template. When our foreign policy has been rhetorically pushed to 'freedom when we want it, where we want it, how we want it" a Democratic injustice in an African nation isn't worth the attention of steroids in Major League Baseball. Bush is on vacation while the media is out to lunch. It now seems democracy in Zimbabwe has gone the way of Terri Schiavo, the Pope, and Mark McGwire's legacy, yet one wouldn't notice these days.

I will be working my way towards Nashville this week for the National Conference on Election Reform where I'll be speaking at several of the seminars on a number of topics, being trailed by documentarians, and (hopefully!) speaking with a lot of media in order to continue to get the word out on all of the below (meaning, the last 5 or 6 months or more of reporting/crime-fighting here on BRAD BLOG!)

Thanks, in no small part, to your generous donations to BRAD BLOG, I'm able to afford to make what I think will be a very important trip!

Of course, if you're in the vicinity, please come on by, say hello and join up for the 3-day conference! And, in case you need more of a reason than saying hello to me to show up, here's another 5 Great Reasons to Come on Down!

Don't know what kind of net access I'll have on the road throughout this week and over the weekend during the conference, so for the moment, please assume I'll be gone for the week, and therefore, I'm turning things over to Guest Bloggers Winter Patriot, Fin and Jaime to help keep things lively in my absense.

Be kind to them, and keeping making noise!

"First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." - Gandhi

The Open Voting Consortium (OVC), a non-partisan group with Republican, Democratic, Green Party and Libertarian Party support, has today become the first Election Software Developer to publicly endorse Velvet Revolution's "Divestiture for Democracy" campaign!

In an open letter sent today to VR by OVC President, Alan Dechert, the group announced their intentions of adopting the standards set forth in VR's February 21st letter to America's Voting Machine companies, calling on them to do the right thing for their country by --- amongst other things --- voluntarily opening hardware and software for inspection and certification to ensure transparency in our electoral system.

Dechert calls, in his letter, for the voting process to be "clear, transparent, fair, trustworthy, orderly, observable, and auditable." We couldn't agree more. Why so many seem to be frightened by such an idea, is beyond us. If you haven't already, please join the Revolution by sending an Email to America's Voting Machine companies stating your support! It'll take you 60 seconds!

OVC joins a growing list of supporters to the VR "DV4D" Campaign which, along with over 100 Voting Rights and Electoral Reform groups, also currently includes 23 U.S. House members, and 2004 Presidential Candidates David Cobb (Green) and Ralph Nader (Independent). All of these Americans are now calling for a trustworthy, auditable, transparent and verifiable voting system in the world's most important democracy!

The VR Press Release, with the full copy Dechert's letter of endorsement is available here.

On Thursday, USCountVotes.org, a Utah non-profit organization of statisticians and researchers, released a new scientific statistical analysis of the "2004 Presidential Exit Poll Discrepancies" [PDF]. Here is the executive summary of the report [PDF].

This study is a real one. A scientific one. Produced by a real group of non-partisan investigators, statisticians, university professors and mathmeticians --- unlike at least one phony GOP disinformation front group comprised of paid Bush/Cheney/RNC staff that we know of.

The USCountVotes.org report is in response to the one released by the Exit Pollsters, Edison/Mitofsky themselves who had tried, in their report, to explain away their own data as somehow being flawed. As explained in the USCountVote report's executive summary:

In describing the report, USCountVotes.org says that:

Here is just one graph from the report, of particular note to BRAD BLOG readers Velvet Revolution supporters and true advocates of Election Reform and Voting Rights (unlike other phony advocates of voting rights that we know of.)

Stephen Dyer of the Akron Beacon Journal has done a fine job of summing up some of the report's key points. As we've been too busy to do a thorough job of it ourselves (and likely will continue to be for the next several days at least), we associate ourselves with Dyer's summary. As well, we share the contemptable reactions to the report which he received from the office of the man responsible for ensuring fair elections in Ohio, Sec. of State (and Co-Chair of the Bush/Cheney Re-Election Comm.) J. Kenneth Blackwell via his spokesman, Carlo LoParo --- both of whom seem to continue to display an utter contempt for their country, its founding principles and its constitution...

Off on fools errands all day. TV appearances. Trouble making. No time for fooling around. Sorry...But you can. Open thread...