Posted on 03/23/2008 5:58:43 PM PDT by Behind Liberal Lines
As Ohio election officials investigate illegal crossover voting in the 2008 primary, questions arise on Rush Limbaugh's role.
Limbaugh, the nation's top-rated talk radio host, was urging Republicans in Texas and Ohio to skip their party's primary on March 4 and instead cast a vote for Hillary Clinton in order to prolong the fight between her and Barack Obama.
What Limbaugh encouraged Republican voters to do in Ohio was a fifth-degree felony in that state, punishable with a $2,500 fine and six to 12 months in jail.
On Thursday, March 20, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that the "Cuyahoga County Board of Election has launched an investigation that could lead to criminal charges against voters who maliciously switched parties for the March 4 presidential primary."
In 2008, 2.22 million Ohioans voted in the Democratic primary, compared to 1.27 million in 2000, according to unofficial results released by Brunner's office. In contrast, 1.01 million Ohioans voted in the 2008 Republican primary, compared to nearly 918,000 people in 2004.
Michael Slater of Project Vote, a nonpartisan group that designs voter registration drives for low-income people, said GOP meddling in the Ohio Democratic Primary was a clear-cut example of fraudulent voting, which is how Republicans have defined the issue in recent years, as GOP advocates have urged state legislatures and Congress to adopt anti-fraud measures such as tougher voter ID laws.
"Here we have a real instance of spurring people on to engage in illegal election activities with a real intent to affect the outcome," Slater said. "That is voter fraud. People were encouraged to break the law. They had to declare allegiance to a political party and sign a document under penalty of perjury. Intent is what matters in voter fraud."
Rush has been saying that as long as I can remember. It's not a secret.
I think it's some kind of stream-of-consciousness free-association thing....
If you stop and think about it for a minute you should come to the realization that rush has very little impact on the democratic primaries
I agree, I think some people took Rush up on the idea and voted for Hillary, but most did not. Many people thought of doing it that don’t listen to Rush. Obama is one scary dude.
Ok. Why did you start your post off with “sorry”? I am not against OC. I am in support of it too. But not because I think it’s actually making a difference in the election. I support it because it is driving the dems nuts. Operation chaos is creating chaos. But not the way people think it is.
didn’t that shrimp from Daily Kos do the same in Michigan with the Republican primary???
I don’t know. He despises McCain so much, I wouldn’t be surprised if he would rather see Hillary than McCain as President. And he, like so many other conservatives, seems to believe that Obama is more of a liberal than Hillary is, a mistaken belief in my opinion. I believe they are both screaming liberals and either would do great harm to this country.
It's only a felony if it's fraud. If the laws in Ohio allow late changing in voter Party registration, or are a like Texas' law which doesn't require registration by party at all. The only restriction is that one is not allowed to vote in more than one party's primary, there is no fraud. There would only be fraud if folks were registered R and voted D, or perhaps is one is required to swear fealty to the party one is registering for, but that seems highly unlikely.
He's probably still paying off Roy Black over what happened to his medical records.
Nothing like an assault on Free Speech.
Thank you for saying that. I really really really don’t enjoy the Clinton slime and falseface. It’s upsetting. To see this guy help in a big way revive their hopes is upsetting. It’s much worse than seeing your Thompson or Romney fall by the wayside. These people are wired from 8 years of ass kissing with the media and there is just so much money and power that will continue to flow that it’s just overwhelm the right. That’s our fear anyway. And to be honest a guy like Obama if he somehow did become elected it would only be because he wasn’t going to be able to do much at home. There’s too much cross aisle activity and everything is issue not party driven in the important domestic stuff. So he would be the guy to help the Christians stop the Muslims from taking more and more of resource rich Africa.
Rush Limbaugh is a frickin' prophet, the conservatives Bob Marley, and you're lucky to be a part of an era where such patriots exist.
But he’ll never make it so we won’t have to worry.
yep...I was right about the owner of Daily Kooks...
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/01/markos-urges-mi.html
Make no doubt about it, El Zibo wants to defeat McCain and hence want Hillary Clinton the democrat nominee and elected as President. They will not put El Zibo in jail for asking people to vote for Hillary Clinton in Ohio and Texas because it is not illegal to do say such as thing or for Republicans to do such a thing. However if Hillary Clinton is elected she will impose the “Fairness Doctrine” as a first step and then find a way to take El Zibo and conservative talk radio out.
I heard it read from some news article examining the number of crossovers.
I don’t know the source (I believe it was antional publication), but thought I’d give you a heads up before you went too far out on a limb.
Well gee. It’s not rocket science. Even I thought of it before rush started talking about it. Heck, there’s no longer any point in voting in the republican primaries. Anyone can figure that out. So why not cross over?
But you know for every republican that thinks obama is a scary dude, there’s another that thinks hillary is worse. I think the republican crossovers are pretty evenly split between the two.
You miss my point. I agree that Dems use the courts to fight elections processes and outcomes. Only a fool would think otherwise. Therefore, Rush is being foolish not to consider the possibility-especially given the shellacking he got in Florida over his medical records-that the Dems will go after him on this.
He doesn't get my sympathy because he got screwed once, should have seen this coming, and may be about to get screwed again...and all in the service of the most reprehensible woman in the history of American politics.
Betting this funride hits 200 posts in the first hour ... minutes to go .. tick, tick.
Criminal or not (and I think not), I was disappointed when I heard that Rush was encouraging Republicans to cross over and vote in the rat election. That’s just disingenuous. When the rats do it, we rightly call it a dirty trick, and two wrongs don’t make a right.
These open primaries need to end. And no one should be allowed to switch parties during a primary season or even for several months before it starts.
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