Charleston County election officials cautioned South Carolinians on Friday to steer clear of a fake letter that threatens the arrest of voters who have outstanding parking tickets or have failed to pay child support.
“I’m outraged,” said Jill Miller, director of the Charleston County Board of Election and Voter Registration. “This is so bogus.”
The one-page letter poses as a message from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
The Rev. Joe Darby, vice president of the state NAACP chapter, said he received the letter at his home in Charleston. It had Columbia postmark with no return address.
He said the letter was an attempt to scare minorities from voting Tuesday because the author of the message assumes black people are in trouble with the law.
“This is old South Carolina politics,” said Darby. “I don’t think anybody will fall for this.”
Unbelievable
According to a “new” translation of the bin Laden video that Fox News has come up with, bin Laden has taken sides and, yes, wants Kerry to win.
Halliburton
Just in case you missed this one:
WASHINGTON – The Army extended a Halliburton Co. troop support contract over the objections of a top contracting officer, even contending — and then withdrawing — a claim that U.S. forces faced an emergency if the company didn’t get the extra work.
“I wrote directly on the document the weaknesses … so that all could clearly see,” contracting official Bunnatine Greenhouse wrote a top general this month in questioning the extended troop support contract in the Balkans.
Greenhouse has had problems with the $2 billion contract at least since January 2002, when she wrote, “There is little or no incentive for the contractor to reduce or keep cost down.”
Family in town
So, probably no more posting today. Go read Atrios. He’s on a roll with the missing weapons story, among other things. And be sure to catch Jack Hitt’s voter suppression piece on This American Life this weekend (whenever it runs in your area).
Update: at least partly at the urging of your humble host, TAL has put Jack’s piece online earlier than usual. Click here, scroll down to the Jack Hitt story. Seriously, do this now. Especially if you are a Republican — listen, and ask yourself if this is really the sort of behavior with which you would like to be associated. (Not to mention this.)
Meanwhile, Bob informs us that the Bush/Cheney 2004 website is blocked to anyone attempting to access it from outside the United States. Fortress America, indeed…
Confused correspondent
I’m not sure why the author of the email below included me on the cc list (which otherwise consisted of partisan Republican bloggers, from what I could tell), but I’m happy to share it with you (in full). Always important to keep up with what the other side is thinking.
we are sending you this e-mail to ask for your support in breaking the story about joh kerry, being direcdted by hanoi, the msm is not covering it, and the american people need to be told about this before the elections, it will be a tradgety if kerry is elected, please do you best to break this story
Consider yourself, um, warned.
(…”msm”, for those of you not up on these things, is right wing goofball slang for “mainstream media,” i.e., any source of information other than Fox News, Rush Limbaugh, and the Republican blogs.)