For more on GOP robocalls that leave the impression with call-saturated voters that the call is from the Democratic candidate, take a look at this post by Paul Kiel earlier in the week over at TPMMuckraker.
TPM Reader RS smells the coffee …
Hi Josh,
I like to think of myself as not easily surprised when it comes to the GOP’s dirty tricks, but the onslaught of robo-call incidents you’ve mentioned in your latest posts somehow jarred me out of my comfortable cynicism. I think it’s useful to take a step back and examine, in the simplest terms, what the Republicans are doing here: they are attempting to sabotage the American democratic process because it’s inconvenient for their candidates.
Of course these robo-calls are only one manifestation of a consistent theme, but when I approach the calls without the cynicism of a political news junkie, I find them breathtakingly despicable. The people behind this aren’t schoolyard bullies, or even college kids. These are adults with years of political experience and a comprehensive understanding of what exactly their acts amount to. The NRCC simply does not believe that Americans should be able to make informed choices about their representatives in the voting booth. They are perfectly willing to dismantle the democratic process, which cannot function properly when voters are harassed (or even worse, harassed under false pretenses). I think it’s fair to say that their behavior in this instance is “profoundly immoral and malevolent,” which is how the Oxford English Dictionary describes “evil.” Despite our desensitization to these types of transgressions, we cannot afford to take them lightly.
– RS
Need proof that our election system is broken?
San Diego ran out of absentee ballots and was forced to mail out photocopies of the actual ballot.
If that wasn’t bad enough, when the photocopied ballots are filled out and returned, the Registrar of Voters staff will copy the votes by hand onto the actual ballot, which can then be run through an optical scanner.
Here are the numbers on the final Pew poll. The big number is the congressional generic. The poll shows a thin 4% margin for the Democrats among likely voters.
That’s two polls out today showing momentum for the Republicans in the final days.
More from NY-19 on the robo-calls from TPM Reader VO …
I was handing out leaflets for John Hall yesterday at a grocery store. There were two tables, a democratic one and a Republican one.
When I was handing out palm cards, several people said to me something like, “I WAS going to vote for John Hall, until I got all those phone calls. I got seven or eight, right at dinner time.”
The guy from the Republican table, who was a local district leader– friendly and chatty, actually came over to me and said, “You know, most of those are coming from Sue’s office, but don’t tell anybody.”
I don’t know how high his connections are to the Kelly campaign, but that’s the information he volunteered.
The wisdom of Cokie Roberts, from ABCnews.com …
“It’s been difficult to govern, really, since 2000,” says ABC News’ Cokie Roberts, a long-time observer of Congress. “The country has been split down the middle and the Congress has been split down the middle. There’s no reason to believe that that will really change after Tuesday unless there’s a huge Democratic wave.”
This is really classic stuff. ‘Difficult to govern.’ That is, during a period of six years of unified Republican rule in Washington and unprecedented levels of party discipline in the Republican caucuses in both houses of Congress.
Late Update: As TPM Reader ME rightly points out, the six year period in unified does include the 18 months of Democratic control of the senate from mid-2001 through the 2002 election.
More of the scam calls from the NRCC, from TPM Reader PS …
I was canvassing in Stamford, CT for Lamont and Farrel yesterday… some of the canvassers were talking about a nasty robocall hit on Farrell, which they said people at the doors had talked about. I didn’t hear that at the door personally, but I wasn’t focusing on the congressional race – i was talking about Lamont primarily.
Apparently the call starts with something along the lines of “Diane Farrell has some information for you,” then pauses, waiting for annoyed people to hang up, and then delivers a negative message about Farrell. The canvassers say the call has hit some people as much as 6 times, and at 5 – 6am as well. Presumably, the intent is to annoy people and stick Farrell with the negative name ID as somebody who keeps robo-calling them.
We won’t be able to get to the bottom of this operation until after Tuesday, which is the point. They’ll happily pay the fines for breaking the federal regs on misidentifying calls.
A number of readers have written in to ask what if any effective response there is to these robocalls we’ve been writing about.
First, let’s address our definitions. Automated political campaign calls are a staple of modern politics. Both sides put in millions of them every election year. That’s because they’re very cheap, fairly effective and they get less scrutiny than ‘public’ ads on tv and radio.
To the extent that’s what we’re talking about, there’s nothing ‘to do’ about them any more than there is anything to do about nasty or unfair 30 second tv spots.
What we’re talking about is something a bit different. What we’re seeing is an apparent coordinated effort from the NRCC — the House GOP committee — to place calls that appear to be from the local Democratic candidate and then automatically call the same number back as many as seven or eight times each time the caller hang-ups. If the caller listens to the whole message it goes on to bash the Democratic candidate. But if the caller hangs up prematurely, the computer calls right back. Hang-ups are the achilles heal of robo-calls. So this seems to be an attempt to cover for that weakness by making those who hang up think the Democratic candidate is basically harassing them with phone calls. The GOP wins either way.
What is there to do about it. As described, the calls appear to be in violation of federal regulations which mandate that these calls clearly identify their origin. The repetitive call back may also be a violation in different states. The New Hampshire AG apparently just intervened to force the NRCC to stop the calls in that state. But frankly, none of that matters. Because the folks placing the calls factor in the price of whatever fines might be meted out after the election when the damage is already done.
Truthfully, I don’t think there’s really much to do but publicize it and then get out and vote.
A lot of these races remain inside the MOE, the margin of error. And that means the MOT, the margin of theft. If Dems want to pick up seats on Tuesday they’ll have to get a lot of these races out of the MOT. Because as long as they’re inside, the Republicans can still grab them with a mix of voter suppression, dirty tricks and election fraud.
In the post I just did, I said I didn’t know what there was to do about these ‘false flag’ harassing robocalls. But a friend points out that’s not the case. There definitely is something you can do. If you’ve gotten one of these calls, write down as much information about it as you can (time, phone number, etc.) and call the ‘metro desk’ of your local paper.
They’re looking for political stories in the final days. And this is a good one.
Again, what we’re talking about here are calls which purport to be from candidate A when in fact they’re from candidate B and which call back repeatedly if you hang up before the call is finished. They’re intentionally harassing calls — meant to stick the blame on the other candidate.
You can help get the word out if you act now.
A few basic pointers, which are basically common sense: Be polite. Just give the facts. And just say what you yourself have experienced.
This is a form of election sabotage that everyone should know about — not three weeks from now, but now, when voters are still making up their minds.
Late Update: Here’s a message from a Dem candidate in Kansas, who’s apparently been on the receiving end of this scam. The word really needs to get out on this. And remember, it all appears to be coming from these guys.