Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

On Thursday The BRAD BLOG posted an article in which I offered the legal underpinnings supporting the case for the impeachment of U.S. District Court Judge Martin Feldman in light of his failure to recuse himself due to conflicts-of-interest in Hornbeck Offshore Services vs. Salazar [PDF].

The case for unseating the federal judge has grown still stronger at week's end, with new disclosures of his investments in the off shore oil drilling industry and what appears to be a very conscious decision to remain on the case despite them.

New evidence now suggests that the actions of Judge Feldman, at the very outset of the moratorium case, are particularly damning. Those new revelations support not only a case for impeachment against the Reagan-appointee who, as has also come to light, is reportedly a very close friend of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, but they also reveal a lifetime appointee to the federal bench who is simply unfit to remain in office...

On Tuesday, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published an OpEd by Cynthia Richards and Phillip Michaels of the non-partisan election integrity organization Missourians For Honest Elections.

We don't normally do this, but since the entirety of the piece was so tremendously good; and, since it's so rare to see such an on-target OpEd on this topic in any major corporate news outlet; and, since St. Louis is our old hometown; and, since we've met with the MoHonest folks on a number of very pleasant occasions; and, since St. Louis County, the largest in MO, still shamefully uses 100% unverifiable Direct Recording Electronic (DRE, usually touch-screen) voting systems made by the oft-failed ES&S outfit in no small part because of this blog and this blogger's father; and, since the City of St. Louis still shamefully uses 100% unverifiable DRE systems made by Diebold; and, since much of the rest of the important "swing state" still shamefully uses similarly 100% unverifiable voting systems; and, since both fake "voting rights advocate" (really, top GOP vote suppression scam artist) Thor Hearne, and Bush's horrific U.S. Election Assistance Commission chair (now, Internet Voting huckster) Paul DeGregorio both live there and don't give a damn that voters in the state use such oft-failed, easily-manipulated, fully-unverfiable voting systems; and, since more people are likely to read the full article here than at the the Post; rather than just linking to the editorial, or quoting a few grafs, we're gonna run it in full below.

Please read it, and consider writing similar for your major newspaper in your hometown (and then watch them not publish it)...

Me, wisecracking at the very end of our Thursday morning Green News Report: "...Follow us on 'the Twitters'."

Obama, not wisecracking during his Thursday afternoon joint presser with Medvedev: "...He visited the headquarter of Twitters".

Spooky! Am I amazingly prescient or what?! (Or is Obama just a misled listener of the Green News Report?)

For the record, our user name on Twitter (singular!): @TheBradBlog and/or @GreenNewsReport.

Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

U.S. District Court Judge Martin Feldman, a 1983 Reagan appointee to the federal bench, issued what, on its face, would have to be regarded as an astounding decision [PDF] in which he blocked a six month moratorium on deep water off shore drilling, ruling that the Department of the Interior had erroneously assumed that because one rig failed, there was an imminent danger of others failing as well.

A perplexed Justice Department promptly announced that it intends to seek an immediate stay of Judge Feldman's preliminary injunction pending an appeal.

Setting aside what appears to be an inappropriate judicial intrusion by a Federalist Society-connected jurist into the prerogatives of the Executive branch in protecting public health, safety and the environment, setting aside the misguided notion that the burden rests with the government rather than the oil companies when it comes to demonstrating whether deep water drilling procedures are safe, Judge Feldman's decision --- and his failure to recuse himself despite conflict-of-interest concerns --- raises a significant question as to whether he should be impeached...

Good for him. Now, at some point, he needs to hold his own "news" channel accountable for all the damage they've done as well...

Eric Boehlert at Media Matters has some related thoughts on whether the BP disaster will turn out to be Fox's "tipping point".

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: The cap comes off, but is now back on; The moratorium is off, but may soon be back on; Fox you, Charles Krauthammer... PLUS: Asian Invasion in the Great Lakes! --- Asian Carp, that is ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): Supreme Court lifts ban on planting GM alfalfa; Murdoch UK newspaper apologizes to climate scientist; What goes into (and comes out of) a barrel of tar sands oil; Four BP-style extreme energy nightmares to come; Coal industry costs W.Va. state budget millions more than it generates ...PLUS: America's magical thinking on energy ...

Yesterday, both Greta Van Susteren on Fox "News" and Ed Schultz on MSNBC asked the very same viewer poll question during their shows:

"Should President Obama fire Gen. McChrystal?"
Results from viewers as of last night...

YES: 3% - NO: 97% Total Votes (via website): 7,410

YES: 94% - NO: 6% Total Votes (via text msg): "Over 22,000"

Two Americas.

Yesterday, the White House denied a claim made by Arizona's Republican Sen. Jon Kyl that he was told personally by President Obama that he would not work to secure the Mexican border unless it was part of comprehensive immigration legislation.

"The president didn't say that and Senator Kyl knows it," White House Communication Director Dan Pfeiffer told POLITICO yesterday in their story which includes video of Kyl's claims being made to supporters in Phoenix.

Today, Media Matters has a long list detailing Kyl's well-documented history of blatantly false claims.

But we had our own run in with Kyl --- and his proclivity to just pull stuff out of his hind-quarters when speaking to the press --- during the 2008 Democratic Convention, both outside, and then inside the Pepsi Center.

Remember this BRAD BLOG exclusive from August 28, 2008? When we seemed to be the only member of the media willing to press Kyl on his bullshit?...

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IN TODAY'S RADIO REPORT: Breaking: Moratorium struck down by judge, White House to appeal; Now it's 100,000 barrels of oil per day; More whaling?; Wildfires, floods and mudslides, oh my;...PLUS: Praying the Spill away ... All that and more in today's Green News Report!

Got comments, tips, love letters, hate mail? Drop us a line at GreenNews@BradBlog.com or right here at the comments link below. All GNRs are always archived at GreenNews.BradBlog.com.

IN 'GREEN NEWS EXTRA' (see links below): U.S. Chamber of Commerce should support climate bill, based on its own methodology; Twilight of the Coal Era?; USDA proposes antitrust rule on meat industry; Report: Food prices to rise by up to 40% over next decade; Malaria in Brazil linked to forest clearing; FERC to issue new rules upgrading nation's electicity transmission grid ...PLUS: Experts Warn Climate Change Is Beginning to Disrupt Agriculture ...

Canadian-based Dominion Voting Systems has quietly announced its second acquisition of a major U.S. voting machine company in as many months and, right out of the gate, they've lied about it. Not an auspicious beginning for the company which may now, virtually overnight, have become the dominant private e-voting machine company in this country.

In our recent breaking coverage detailing the SEC's fraud lawsuits filed against Diebold and a number of their top executives --- including their former Chief Financial Officer who, as we reported exclusively back in 2007, was the top earner from an apparent insider sell-off at the company just days before its stock would plummet from its all-time high on the announcement of spinning off their troubled election division to a "new" company renamed Premier --- we noted that Diebold/Premier's assets had recently been purchased by a small Canadian firm by the name of Dominion Voting. But Dominion hasn't stopped there.

Their purchase of Diebold/Premier's assets was actually made from ES&S, the world's largest voting machine company, who was forced to divest of the assets they'd purchased from Diebold (previously, the second largest voting machine company in the country) for $5 million last year, as part of an anti-trust suit settlement with the DoJ.

In our coverage, we noted the comment of Dominion CEO John Poulos who, in the company's press release [PDF] announcing the Diebold/Premier asset acquisition, stated ominously: "We are extremely pleased to conclude this transaction, which...will allow Dominion to expand its capabilities and operational footprint to every corner of the United States."

Indeed, the DoJ-scuttled ES&S merger with Diebold/Premier had been legally challenged since, among other reasons, the merger of the largest e-voting company with the country's second largest would have given a single company control of at least 70% of all votes cast in the nation.

What we had replaced for length, however, with the ellipses in Poulos' quote above, was this [emphasis added]: "We are extremely pleased to conclude this transaction, which will restore much-needed competition to the American voting systems market and will allow Dominion to expand its capabilities and operational footprint to every corner of the United States."

How much is Poulos actually interested in "restor[ing] much-needed competition" for "the American voting systems market"? Apparently not so much, as according to a company press release [PDF] quietly issued late in the afternoon on Friday, June 4th, Dominion has now also acquired what had previously been the third largest voting machine company in the U.S., Sequoia Voting Systems.

Not surprisingly, that late Friday announcement didn't say anything at all about "competition".

Worse, as The BRAD BLOG has confirmed, the new press release from Dominion simply lied about what the company has and hasn't purchased from Sequoia, a company which had lied themselves, for years, about the real ownership of its proprietary voting systems...

Tale of @TheBradBlog's tweets from this morning...

11:23am PT:

11:23am PT:

11:25am PT:

11:25am PT:

11:26am PT:

11:26am PT:

11:29am PT:

And now, some of the replies from the "conservatives" who quickly responded to the above --- kept below the fold since their responses are so very "conservative" and classy!...

More disturbing news for voters who are forced to rely on the historically dreadful ES&S electronic voting system, this time in Alabama, on the paper-ballot system in Autauga County which uses a computer to tally votes:

[Hat-tip Joyce McCloy of Voting News.]

On Thursday's Green News Report, I defended BP...sorta. It played on radio stations around the country, but nobody complained. I even gave an email address for hate mail! Didn't get a one.

What did I do wrong?

Here was my defense of the corporation...

Okay. Now let me have it!

Judge Vic Rawl just released a public statement on the heels of the SC Democratic Party Executive Board's insane rejection yesterday of his protest to the 100% unverifiable ES&S iVotronic touch-screen system's announced "victory" of Alvin Greene to be the state's Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate. Rawl's statement reads in part:

Rawl's comments follow on both his own impromptu remarks after yesterday's protest was rejected, and his Campaign Manager Walter Ludwig's barely-contained on-the-record comments following the hearing: "We're certainly disappointed, but the unique circumstances of this election gave us an opportunity to put the specter of voting machines in front of the national public in the strongest way since Bush v. Gore."

As we'll be guest hosting the Mike Malloy Show again for the first week of July, hopefully Rawl and/or Ludwig will be able to join us to explain what the hell happened, what they intend to do about it, and what the hell is wrong with SC's shameful, apparently democracy-hating, Democratic Party Executive Board. (See yesterday's report & live blog of the hearings for all the insane details.)

Previously related at The BRAD BLOG:

• 'Experts' Eye 100% Unverifiable E-Vote System in 'Win' of SC's Mystery U.S. Senate Nominee
• UPDATE: More Statisticians Focus on 'Tampering, Malfunction' of E-Vote System in SC Primary
• BREAKING: U.S. Senate Candidate Files Challenge to SC's 'Unreliable, Unverifiable' E-Vote Results
• SC Election Commission Hoodwinks Local Media
• Clyburn: SC's E-Vote Computers May Have Been 'Hacked'; Rawl: 'Systemic Problem in Software'
• 'Luddite' at Computer Mag 'Network World' Decries E-Voting in SC, Calls for Paper, Pencil Elections
• 'Arti-factual' Election Results in SC; And a Brief History of Recent ES&S E-Vote Failure in Advance of Thursday's Democratic Primary Protest Hearing
• BREAKING: SC DEM PARTY EXEC BOARD UPHOLDS NOMINATION OF ALVIN GREENE FOR U.S. SENATE

[Hat-tip Climate Progress, via @GreenNewsReport.]