Producer Jamil Smith contributed to this post.
Despite debates, deceptions, and divisions, Mitt Romney is still having a hard time catching up in Ohio. While this morning's new NBC News/Wall Street Journal/Marist poll shows the Republican presidential nominee keeping it airtight in Florida and surging to a slim lead in Virginia, Ohio remains a stronghold of Obama support. The President leads by six points there, a bit of a slimmer lead than before, but still very strong -- especially since my fellow Buckeyes have been able to vote since October 2.
Another thing we're seeing in Ohio? The Republican Secretary of State taking a series of L's on his efforts to restrict early voting. He's to the point now where he's appealing to the Supreme Court to reverse a court ruling keeping the polls open all the way through Election Day, whereas he wants to bar people from voting on the last three days beforehand.
As Trymaine Lee noted in the Huffington Post, that action alone is confusing matters:
Local election officials said they don't know how to inform their poll workers or voters. Ministers have stalled their Souls to the Polls campaigns. And Husted has raised the ante in the latest round between the state's Democrats and Republicans over expanding or limiting voter access. "The problem is we have no clue what's going on," said Tim Burke, a Democrat and chairman of the Hamilton County Board of Elections in Cincinnati. "I am absolutely convinced that this is part of an overall strategy."
We don't know if a crop of alarmist billboards warning against committing voter fraud have erected in black and Latino neighborhoods around Cleveland, Ohio are a formal part of that strategy, but local politicians and civil-rights groups believe that's the goal of whoever is paying for them. According to a map created by Eric Fischer (see below the jump), there are currently 10 billboards standing, a majority of which are prominently featured at the corner major intersections. Clear Channel, who was paid to display the ads, has declined to disclose who paid for them.
The only indication of authorship exists in a corner in fine print: "Paid for by a private family foundation."
What is the incentive behind placing billboards in poor, heavily democratic neighborhoods of color? Their strategic placement and aggressive content certainly suggests so. A Cleveland city councilwoman, Phyllis Cleveland, voiced her protest in a video on the Cleveland Plain Dealer site (see above):
"When you have the words 'felony,' 'voter,' and 'fine' all the the same message, and by placing it where it is, the only message that you are intending to send is that this is a threat to you if you vote... It's just a blatant attempt to keep people in this community, particularly black people and poor people, from voting."
The Plain Dealer also reports that Washington-based voting advocacy group, The Lawyers' Committee For Civil Rights, sent a letter this week to Clear Channel Outdoor's office in suburban Parma requesting they take down the signs.
The glut of voter-ID laws which could have disenfranchised as many as 21 million citizens have largely been struck down. But Ohio is a perhaps the swing state of swing states, the one upon which Romney's electoral hopes lie. With the Republican trailing in the state, and the Secretary of State doing everything but pulling a George Wallace in front of the polls, the rights of early voters in the state aren't served well by scary messages about a problem that never really existed.
See the aforementioned racial map of Cleveland, and the sites where the billboards are located. Below, you'll see a "PoliticsNation with Al Sharpton" report from Tuesday about these billboards -- and not just in Ohio.
Billboards are popping up in minority neighborhoods in Wisconsin, broadcasting "Voter fraud is a felony". Rev. Al Sharpton talks about voter intimidation and why it's important to fight back.
Mother Jones and Eric Fischer
red = Caucasians
blue = African Americans
orange = Latinos
green = Asians
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How about ads like these to remind urban voters of Mitt and company's insulting opinions of the president...
Mitt Romney claims that the Obama presidency will be a mere "footnote in history".
Tell Mitt that Obama is no "footnote"!
Make Governor Romney a "footnote in history" by voting for the President on Tuesday Nov 6th. He is counting on YOUR support.
OR
'Mitt says President Obama is "in over his head".
Tell Mitt that the man who got Bin Laden, ended the Iraq war, decimated the al Qaeda leadership, led an international effort that ousted Lybia's Qaddaffi, turned around an economy in free-fall, saved the US auto industry, and put us on the path of healthcare for all is NOT "in over his head"!
Prove Mitt wrong! President Obama needs YOU to vote on Tuesday Nov 6th.
OR
Romney says of our commander-in-chief: "if you do not want America to be the strongest nation on earth, I am not your President. You have that President today"!
What's that Mitt? President Obama got Bin Laden, etc (same as for prev item)
OR
Mitt Romney's wife Ann speculates that maybe "it's time for the grown-up" to move into the White House.
Tell the Romneys that the guy who saved GM and got Bin Laden is a "grown-up", not a boy.
Don't let them get away with disrespecting the office and our president.
Be sure to vote on Nov 6th. President Obama and America needs YOU to vote.
OR
Josh Romney on why his dad did well against Obama: "As a father, he learned how to debate an obstinate child." (same response as prev item)
From the Constitution of the United States of America:
AMENDMENT 15
[1.] The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
[2.] The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
After - if not before - the election of 2012, the Department of Justice needs to address these infringements on the RIGHTS of Americans, by states which have illegally imposed these vote suppression tactics. This is supposed to be a NATIONAL law, not a state "position".
The Dept of Justice IS dealing with various infringements on the right to vote and the recent ruling on preclearance of SC voter id included a discussion on how such pressure clearly changed how harsh the law would have been w/o it and national voting rights laws.
Watching your poor me, racism everywhere show, it occured to me, you and your like have many traits in common with narcisssts:
React to criticism with rage, shame, or humiliation
Have excessive feelings of self-importance
Need constant attention and admiration
Disregard the feelings of others, and have little ability to feel empathy
Have obsessive self-interest
Pursue mainly selfish goals
Melissa is one of my heroes. She is bringing light to the "voter fraud" illusion being perpetrated as a method of voter intimidation, by the now desperate neo-con/tea party bribed and cultist republicans. Pease, everyone take note. vote vote vote vote, there is no voter fraud, if you are thinking about "NOT" voting because of the hassle with the new id laws, paperwork, proof of this that and the other, do not fret, go and vote no matter what, go and vote, go and vote, if you feel funny or uncomfortable, go and vote anyway. If the polls look crowded busy and overwhelming, GO AND VOTE ANYWAY....there is no laws, current or otherwise that say you may not vote, there is nothing in the way of your voting. if some dude with an attitiude is giving you the stink eye at a polling station, tell someone, security, or a poll worker. go in groups and vote vote vote. .....VOTE VOTE VOTE.....IT IS YOUR RIGHT AS A CITIZEN, AND IT IS OUR RESPONSIBILITY TO STAND UP STAND UP, STAND UP FOR YOUR RIGHTS..... seriously, vote vote go out and vote...., great show MHP....Love Antony
Money - Money! All the discussions here have to do with MONEY. Now that the majority of Americans have very little individual spare change, every decision or controversy is centered on maximizing some corporation's profit. Name it and it is only a small jump to financial interests. Even voter suppression is a profit - driven scheme. Notice the outsourcing (therefore PAID) voter cshemes around the nation. ALEC is a money making scheme.
Then your segment on Mental Illness is rife with decisions made based on profits. The treatment for PTSD and for Bi-Polar and for ADHD are all now entirely Pharmaceutical treatments. The Physicians who COULD make progress - The MDs the Psychologists, the MSWs no longer are the method because the profit there goes to the workers. Pharmaceuticals require only one 15 minute and very cheap billing for a 30-60-90- Day "treatment" and the profits are sent directly to an industry not a person.
Yet the treatment modality for all of these is counseling 2 - 5 times a week. That works far better than pills and everyone knows that. Insurance (the profit scheme) prevents that as a treatment choice because Insurance has ONE goal - take money in... not Pay Money OUT!
why don't people in these areas, especially all the minority owned businesses, pool their money and put up a few (not many) of the 1950's and 60s photos of people bloody and beaten while trying to register to vote? You only have to pay for one month and splitting the cost means this is possible.
Remind both sides in graphic detail on what our parents and grand parents had to go through just to register.
Don't just sit there intimidated and complaining about the GOP despicable tactics--DO SOMETHING!!
Do what they are doing and shame them with women and kids facing dogs and water hoses.