Husted, Blackwell: Doubling down on 'voter fraud'

Secretary of State Jon Husted will find an audience that will believe him when he appears  at the True the Vote and Ohio Voter Protection summit conference on Saturday in Worthington, Oh.  The mission will be to "discuss election integrity  within the  state," the sponsors say.  And to reassure eveyone that the event will stay on message Husted will join former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell as one of the conferees.

Well, now.   We all know that nobody screwed up the election process more than Blackwell in 2004, from lack of voting machines to challenging the weight of the paper ballots.  I doubt that Husted will want to write home about his noble role at the meeting, particularly now that he is being challenged to show that his new restricted hours policy for early voters is bearing heavily on black voters.  .

Among other speakers will be Anita MonCrief, identified as"ACORN Whistleblower and publisher of something called ''Emerging Corruption'" and a few other self-important defenders of the ballot - as they know it - even though they will have an enduring reputation as elephants in the chicken coop.

Catherine Engelbrecht, the founder and president of True the Vote,  reassuringly tells us that that one must "make sure that every vote is counted," She says she's excited that  the panel of speakers  "will provide us with thoughts about the challenges related  to voter fraud in Ohio". Isn't that  how Dubya used to warn us about all those non-existent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq?

 By the way, reporters  can't crash this love-in unless they  have, it says here, media credentials and  "photo ID".   It's a start.

PS:  My column on the anemia of the Republican Party  with candidates like Josh Mandel and Todd Akin has been posted with a (few words about the Summit County GOP) on Plunderbund.Com.