EXTRA, EXTRA! Hedda Foil on Lou Dobbs! Get Your Transcript Here!

<http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0606/02/ldt.01.html>

Kitty Pilgrim reports.

KITTY PILGRIM, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): The use of some 19,000 electronic voting machines in the city of Chicago and Cook County primary on March 21st of this year is now under intense scrutiny. The U.S. company that makes the machine, Sequoia, was bought in 2005 by Smartmatic, a private company primarily owned by Venezuelan businessmen.

When Chicago had problems with the machines, a dozen Venezuelan employees were there to help with the election. Chicago officials are outraged.

EDWARD BURKE, CHICAGO CITY COUNCIL: Well, I think that American elections ought to be run by American companies and ought to be run by American citizens, not Venezuelan nationals.

PILGRIM: Smartmatic is technically based in Boca Raton, Florida, but the president of the company, Jack Blaine, testified to the Chicago City Council fewer than a dozen Smartmatic employee work in Florida. The majority of the workers are based in Venezuela.

Watchdog groups question why U.S. voting machines would be under the control of citizens of another country, especially a country whose own election process is highly suspect.

JOAN KRAWITZ, VOTE TRUST USA: We believe this is a national security issue. There is no way that companies belonging to non-U.S. corporations should have access to our elections.

-snip-

Some in Congress are demanding an investigation.

REP. CAROLYN MALONEY (D), NEW YORK: In the case of Smartmatic, there are a number of unanswered questions. That's why I wrote to the secretary of the Treasury and asked them to review the ownership. It's offshore, it's murky. No one seems to know who even owns it. Certainly our government should know.

PILGRIM: A potential risk to the democratic process.

-snip-

have access to our elections?

:wtf:

I think we can assume that when Jill gave the quote above she said other things that CNN recorded and did not air. CNN picked that quote. They set up the range of perspectives to be presented. It makes perfect sense to me that CNN would allow a shot to be taken at the idea of foreign corporations being involved with US elections, while simultaneously, subtly and implicitly reinforcing the okayness of US corporations being involved. This is a routine part of how we are controlled and manipulated, our truth manufactured and our realities artificially sweetened.

I don't know why I called her Jill in my post directly above.

down to 12 minutes on the final CNN segment.

I missed this airing (Hedda!! :yourock: ) But NO CORPORATIONS should own our right to vote. I don't care if they're Russian, or Chinese or American.


Why is Dobbs only going after the Co. "owned by Venezuela"?

What about Diabold?

Carter ruled Venezuela's elections valid...

snip>

Gaviria and I had another press conference early in the afternoon on Monday to confirm the legitimacy of the CNE returns. I called Secretary of State Colin Powell to report our authentication of results, and he promised to issue a statement from Washington endorsing our findings.

snip>

Although the country was peaceful, some opposition leaders were still in anguish, as indicated by Tuesday morning newspaper editorial headlines, "Catástrofe," "El Fraude Permanente," and "Serias Dudas." After meeting with Súmate and other opposition representatives who claimed there were differences between paper ballot backups and electronically transmitted results, we agreed to have a second audit process to double check the correlation. We made it clear to them and to the public that this did not imply any doubt by The Carter Center or OAS regarding the integrity of the electoral process or the accuracy of the reported results.

edit: oops! the link
http://www.cartercenter.org/doc1801.htm

But little faith in ANY corporate influence over the mechanics of elections.

specifically to make sure elections are run securely and accurately. They are more democratic than the U.S...by a longshot.

There's a lot of propaganda about Venezuela floating around because Huge Chavez doesn't speak kindly of the U.S. (and rightfully so).

Get the xenophobic wing nuts on our side about foreign companies and then move on to the domestic ones. Eventually, everyone will say there should be no privatized elections. At least that's the plan. It got the MSM interested in the issue at least. Maybe someone will ask about who the hell owns ES&S?

Maybe people will start to question.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2659744

it's everywhere!
dp

It's really exciting to see it in print.

Joan

the chicago city council hearing on this were great. finally an elected body that is jealous of their office, like the founding fathers counted on. the furor in chicago was really an age old pissing contest between the city and cook county, of which it is about half. it was a fun dog and pony show, not really likely to amount to anything, but the kind of thing that is supposed to happen in a democracy. putting things on the record. like the whole boco raton business. property tax records show that the whole family that owns smartmatic lives in a 2 bedroom house. haha.
i have no doubt that jack blaine (sp?) perjured himself in that hearing.
hedda :yourock:

the country watching you and emailing Lou Dobbs telling him its about time MSM paid attention to the voting machines that are stealing our votes!! And how terriffic you were and that they wanted to see you on further shows to discuss this further!!

great job!!

fly

because, among other things, it displaces public involvement in elections. They are OUR dang elections. Dang it!

That being said Lou Dobbs is continuing his long-time schtick of anti-business for its lack of loyalty to the US, while otherwise being very pro-business. So this story fits Dobb's other agendas and connects it up, while doing a story about the all american diebold company wouldn't do the same trick.

I'm ok with the angle, but only for Dobbs. I don't think anti-foreigner is a rule for all cases. But it may be good strategy to get on the Dobbs show and somebody should be asking these questions. I'm just saying it's not an approach to spend our resources on since it only hits one company, even though that company has a special place in my lawsuit's complaint, right before "Defendant"

Correcting the confusion on Dobbs' transcript. Smartmatic is a US corporation, but its shareholders are Venezuelan.

The Venezuela issue was a natural for Dobbs, which is why his producers jumped at it. The trick is going to be to move the ball from the problem of foreign ownership, to the total lack of oversight over ownership, security, accuracy, or methods of the entire voting machine industry -- and the fact that these companies RUN OUR ELECTIONS. I had a great soundbite that didn't make it into the piece, in which I said that people think our elections are run by local officials, but instead they're run by private companies with no accountability to the people. I have no idea whether any more of my interview will make it onto the air. That depends on where they decide to take the story -- but I really hope that one statement makes it on. We're going to continue to push that angle hard because that's the REAL story.

And it's amazing that you have to figure out the "angles" to get them to listen about an issue so fundamentally important to democracy, itself.

Salute to you, hedda.