At the link, the latest report from the Department of Defense and the Federal Voting Assistance Office (FVAP) reports that that almost half of all local election officials (44%) missed the 45 day deadline required under federal law. 

FVAP’s report offers one possible reason for that: 44 percent of local election officials missed the federal deadline, which requires them to send out military absentee ballots at least 45 days prior to election day. But based on post-election surveys, the number of troops who requested military absentee ballots but never got them increased dramatically. The Pentagon’s Federal Voter Assistance Program (FVAP) estimates 29 percent of active duty military voters — roughly 120,000 troops — never got their ballots

This unfortunate finding proves the failure of DOJ and the Voting Section to protect these voters in 2010.  It is just not a priority with this Department of Justice.  This wholesale lack of implementation and enforcement of MOVE is more evidence that DOJ did not adequately prepare jurisdictions across the country with an understanding of the requirements of the law or address hints of non-compliance earlier enough in the process to prevent this widespead lack of compliance. 

It also begs the next question – What is DOJ doing to prevent the looming problem in 2012?  The federal presidential primaries are right around the corner and ballots could be going out as early as late November.

Is DOJ ready or will they stumble around waiting for the media to do its job? 

@ the link:  A Defense Department report has found more than a quarter of military voters who requested absentee ballots for the 2010 election never got them. DoD is trying to figure out why and what to do about

tweeted from @lacountyrrcc in Los Angeles County, California.  See link

at the link.  

Georgia, Florida and Alabama.

The state of Georgia and its voters are being subjected to the continued extraordinary intrusion into its constitutional sovereignty through Section 5 and its outdated preclearance formula based upon discriminatory conditions that existed more than 47 years ago but have long since been remedied,” the state says in its filing.

Attorney General Sam Olens said the state’s argument against the Voting Rights Act is simple: “we’re no longer in 1964, there’s no longer poll taxes, there’s no longer cases where less than 50 percent of the minority population is voting.” Of Georgia’s 5.7 million registered voters about one-third are minorities.

Georgia may want to add this footnote.  The President and the current leader for the Republican nomination are both black Americans. 

Imagine arguing the constitutionality of Section 5 with Obama, Biden v. Cain, Rubio race as the backdrop.  Perhaps Justice Thomas would get the nod from the rest of the court. 

 Here.  Looks like Tennessee is going above and beyond. 

JSOnline @ the Link:   A key Republican senator said Wednesday she favors using new legislative maps for the next round of recall elections – a change that she said would prevent logistical headaches in conducting elections.

The change would also give Republicans a better chance at protecting their majority in the Legislature in the next batch of recall elections.

This is the headline:  Race and redistricting: Unholy alliance starting to fray and the first paragraph of a recent article in the Washington Post: 

Since the 1990s, black Democrats and Republicans have been in an “unholy alliance” when it comes to redistricting. While it still holds in some cases, that alliance may be ending as ma­nipu­la­tion of majority-minority districts threatens Democrats chances of retaking the House majority

To be fair, while the headline is probably the work of some idiot headline editor, the Post is actually quoting a white left-wing redistricting partisan Michael McDonald. 

In the 1990s, all of the [electoral] cases were favoring this unholy alliance,” said redistricting expert Michael McDonald. “ Those conditions have dramatically shifted. More often we’re finding situations where it’s not in the black community’s interest to side with Republicans.”

This characterization is quite offensive yet apparently reflective of what many white liberals think of any alliance or compromise between Blacks and Republicans who may engage in the supposed horse-trading of negotiating political lines (yes, a compromise) that everyone claims to be utopia and that may actually increase black representation overall.  This begs the question, who or what is actually engaged in an unholy alliance?  

At the link. 

According to Goins, the state of Tennessee is teaming up with the AARP to help protect the rights of the most vulnerable voters.

Out of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, this report:

The Milwaukee County DA’s office says they are looking into claims that allegedly three people voted illegally in the Spring 2011 elections, including an “Occupy Milwaukee” protester arrested outside a bank last week.

The conservative advocacy group “Media Trackers” claims that Austin Thompson and two other people used a Glendale hotel address to register and vote in Wisconsin.