WND Asks: 'Is Harry Potter In Cahoots With Hell?' Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily has attacked Harry Potter off and on over the years for its supposedly evil witchcraft, usually whenever a new book or movie came out. Well, a new movie is out, so it must be time for some more Harry-bashing. Which WND does, in spades.
"Is Harry Potter in cahoots with hell?" is the headline on a Nov. 29 article by Drew Zahn, who claims that "the wild success of 'Pottermania' has also brought back critics of the franchise who question – or even outright condemn – the movies' spiritual ramifications."
This time around, Zahn brings in "practicing exorcist" Thomas J. Euteneuers, who asserts that "the wild popularity of the Potter films encourages children and teens to be curious, even to dabble in occult activity, trying their own hands at magic spells, tarot cards, Ouji [sic] boards and the like. And once kids start 'playing around' with the occult, he says, it 'opens a window' for Satan and his minions."
Zahn goes on to tout the Harry-bashing opinions of "filmmaker and occult expert Caryl Matrisciana," who just happens to have made a video on the subject that WND sells.
Zahn conlcudes:
With only one movie left to be released in the 8-film franchise, a movie in which – spoiler alert! – young Harry will follow a path very similar to the one followed by Jesus of Nazareth nearly 2,000 years ago, the debate over Harry Potter's religious ramifications is apparently far from over.
If the Harry Potter series turns into the Chronicles of Narnia, why all the faux outrage?
AIM, WND Use Manning to Claim Gays Shouldn't Be In Military Topic: Accuracy in Media
With the latest WikiLeaks release comes a renewal of the homophobic argument -- led, as it was last time, but Accuracy in Media's Clliff Kincaid -- that because suspected leaker Bradley Manning is gay, gays cannot be trusted to serve in the military.
Kincaid reiterates his argument in his Nov. 29 AIM column, complaining that media coverage "ignored the homosexual orientation and anti-American motivation of" Manning, huffing that "Manning was an open homosexual who flaunted the Pentagon’s homosexual exclusion policy without being punished for his behavior and conduct." Kincaid went on to cite the pseudonymous coward Jonah Knox as evidence that "rather than repeal the Pentagon’s homosexual exclusion policy, the WikiLeaks scandal demonstrates that the policy and regulations need to be tightened up."
AIM also gave space to Alan Caruba to claim that Manning is "a sexually confused young man drawn to the Lesbian Bisexual Gay and Transgender movement and yet granted a security status sufficient to have given him access to secret information."
The boys at AIM were joined by WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah, who wrote:
One of those facing charges is Pfc. Bradley Manning – a young man who should not have been in the Army because he was a homosexual. Yet, he was not only permitted to serve, he was provided access to top national-security secrets, hundreds of thousands of classified documents, which he released to WikiLeaks.org.
This was a kid who, according to the New York Times, was defined by his homosexuality from a young age. His friends in the Army knew he was a homosexual. But nobody asked and nobody told.
They aren't exactly subtle, are they?
UPDATE: Kincaid piles on in a Dec. 1 AIM column, claiming that because Defense Secretary Robert Gates didn't "enforce the law" and kick out Manning who had "flaunt[ed] his homosexuality in the military," Gates had "given Manning the opportunity to spend his time downloading sensitive documents and passing them on to Julian Assange at WikiLeaks."
CNS Gets Its Pound of Gay-Bashing Flesh; Jeffrey Plays Art Critic Topic: CNSNews.com
Penny Starr's fit of manufactured outrage over gay-related art at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery has had its desired effect: She reports that the gallery "will remove from one of its exhibitions a video that includes images of ants swarming over Jesus Christ on a crucifix."
But not as much effect as she wanted; she laments that the gallery "will keep in place images of naked brothers kissing, men in chains, Ellen DeGeneres grabbing her breasts, a painting of a male nude that the Smithsonian itelf describes as "homoerotic," and a painting made with nail polish and the cremated ashes of a man with AIDS who committed suicide."
Meanwhile, hammering home the anti-gay agenda behind Starr's attack is her immediate supervisor, CNS editor in chief Terry Jeffrey, who confirms the anti-gay motivation behind Starr's crusade in his Dec. 1 column, in which he plays art critic by insisting that the art Starr targeted can't possibly be good because it doesn't look anything at all like Michelangelo:
The National Portrait Gallery, part of the federally funded Smithsonian Institution, is presenting an exhibition that does exactly the opposite of what true art does.
When I studied English at Princeton, I had the good fortune to be taught by a series of scholars who in their lectures and precepts drove home the point that art, whether it be in literary or other form, must ultimately be measured by its capacity to make better human beings.
A work of art—or alleged work of art—can do only one of three things to a person’s character: It can hurt it, improve it or have no impact at all.
[...]
Is the Smithsonian Institution trying to move Americans to virtue through this exhibit? No. It is trying to mainstream vice and perversion. The National Portrait Gallery’s “Hide/Seek” exhibition does not celebrate art, it murders it.
Jeffrey somehow manages to avoid using the term "degenerate art," though it appears that's what he was thinking.
In his Nov. 30 column, WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah writes:
Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., calls the so-called WikiLeaks scandal "worse than a military attack."
If that's true, it has given us an idea of how Barack Obama's administration might respond in the event of an actual military attack.
Attorney General Eric Holder has ordered a criminal investigation.
That's just what Bill Clinton did when Muslim terrorists first attacked the World Trade Center in 1993. He treated it like it was a random street crime. And the result of that massive error was the destruction of the World Trade Center and 3,000 lives eight years later in the worst attack ever perpetrated on the U.S.
But this mistake is bigger and in many ways worse that Clinton's. Because these leaks are a symptom of a national-security nightmare of Obama's own making.
Farah might have come off more sincere in denouncing the WikiLeaks leak if he wasn't paying his reporters to come through the leaked documents.
Instead of cynically bashing Obama -- after all, if he was really opposed to the release of the WikiLeaks docs, Klein wouldn't be pawing through them for the benefit of WND -- Farah should be jumping for joy. Otherwise, Klein would be sitting in Jerusalem twiddling his thumbs and dreaming up new ways to falsely smear the president.
AIM Ignores Own Advice on Dumping Expired Political Titles Topic: Accuracy in Media
In a Nov. 27 Accuracy in Media post, Don Irvine repeats an item in The Hill retiring or losing politicians for needing new Twitter handles to reflect a status that doesn't include their former titles.
That rule doesn't seem to apply to the bylines of AIM writers, though. As we've noted, newly minted columnist and former Sen. Bob Smith includes "Senator Bob" in his byline, even though he hasn't been a senator for years. Indeed, a column by Smith published by AIM two days before Irvine's post carries the "Senator Bob" byline.
WJC Touts LeBoutillier's Fiction As Fact Topic: Western Journalism Center
Only the most dedicated, Obama-hating, fact-averse birther freaks would treat John LeBoutillier's fictional claim that Barack Obama's grandmother said he was born in Kenya as unambiguous fact.
Enter the Western Journalism Center. A Nov. 29 WJC post linking to a clip of LeBoutillier on "Fox & Friends" carries the headline "Obama Born in Kenya." No question mark, just a flat-out -- and completely false -- statement.
Of course, Floyd Brown and his WorldNetDaiily-assisted birther minions can barely breathe without saying something false or misleading about Obama, so this is nothing new -- it just reminds us of how little reason there is to take the WJC seriously.
Chuck Norris Joins 'Creator' Word Game Topic: WorldNetDaily
Chuck Norris rather belatedly joins in the gotcha game of focusing on single words President Obama says or doesn't say -- territory CNSNews.com has covered much more obsessively.
Norris' Nov. 29 WorldNetDaily column notes that " some media caught how President Obama twice omitted the words 'by their Creator' when reciting the Declaration in speeches over the past several weeks," then declares that there have been "actually seven presidential 'Creator' omissions in just the past few months!"
Norris went on to falsely suggest that Obama did not omit "creator" only once; in fact, even CNS gave Obama credit for using "Creator" on "several previous occasions."
But Norris isn't interested in facts so much as he is Obama-bashing, so we get darkly conspiratorial speculation instead: "To you, is omitting 'endowed by their Creator' from direct quotes of the Declaration in several speeches a permissible benign act of the president of the United States?"
Norris' column is a two-parter, so it appears we'll have to wait until next week for the answer.
Penny Starr, Anti-Gay Museum Critic Topic: CNSNews.com
CNSNews.com reporter Penny Starr seems to have made it her mission to critique museum exhibits. She's alreadyattacked two exhibits for not being right-wing enough.
Starr takes a slightly different approach in a Nov. 29 CNS article, this time complaining an exhibit has too many gay and/or naked people:
The federally funded National Portrait Gallery, one of the museums of the Smithsonian Institution, is currently showing an exhibition that features images of an ant-covered Jesus, male genitals, naked brothers kissing, men in chains, Ellen DeGeneres grabbing her breasts, and a painting the Smithsonian itself describes in the show's catalog as "homoerotic."
The exhibit, “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture,” opened on Oct. 30 and will run throughout the Christmas Season, closing on Feb. 13.
It takes a few more paragraphs for Starr to get around to quoting the actual purpose of the exhibit: "to examine the influence of gay and lesbian artists in creating modern American portraiture."
Which is the crux of what Starr is trying to get across here: Federally funded gay stuff.
To that end, Starr quotes a representative of the conservative Intercollegiate Studies Institute (which, of course, she doesn't identify as conservative) as saying that even though no federal funds went toward acquiring the exhibit, "most of the overall budget derives from tax monies for the facility, and maintenance and staff. Second, the exhibit appears inside and is monitored by staff. Finally, if it was funded only by outside funding the exhibit would be outside in a snowdrift."
Starr then quoted "Chris Edwards, director of tax policy studies at the Cato Institute and a former senior economist on the congressional Joint Economic Committee" -- because who's more qualifed to discuss art than an economist? -- asserting, "If the Smithsonian didn't have the taxpayer-funded building, they would have no space to present the exhibit, right?" Edwards adds, "Think about the Washington Post. ... They don't have to publish every op-ed that they get, right? They own the platform. In this case [the Smithsonian Institution], the taxpayers own the platform and so the taxpayers should decide what is presented on that platform."
We suspect that Starr has the greater problem with the gay stuff than the federally funded part. After all, she has already expressed her shock that a city's tourism bureau would dare to spend money to attract gays to town.
UPDATE: Newsmax has latched onto the story, and Starr has penned a follow-up in which top Republicans John Boehner and Eric Cantor are demanding the exhibition be shut down.
Meanwhile, Starr's boss, Brent Bozell, contributed an outraged tweet: "Elites in Washington using YOUR taxes to attack Christianity during Christmas."
Intra-ConWeb War Over TSA Scaremongering Topic: The ConWeb
WorldNetDaily has been perhaps the leader of any news outlet, ConWeb or otherwise, in spewing hatred over the TSA's stepped-up passenger screening procedures. From rehashing alleged "horrors" to shrieking about perversion and "gate rape" and radiation and germs and prison camps to the expected anti-gay freak-out, no attack has been out of bounds for WND. (Andthen there's WND's attempt to cash in on said screeching.)
Even Newsmax got into the scaremongering act, enlisting Dr. Russell Blaylock -- if you'll recall, he has also fearmongered over flu vaccine -- to suggest that the scanners "increase your risk of cancer or other diseases."
Now comes the arrival of a voice of reason on overblown coverage of the airport security issue, and that voice is from an unexpected place: Accuracy in Media.
In a Nov. 25 blog post, Don Irvine writes about how "The media has become obsessed with the number of TSA pat-down stories and in at least one case are now asking that travelers send them their screening experiences in hopes of getting that next big horror story":
We have already been subjected to numerous stories and video of passengers who have been subjected to the new TSA pat-down procedure for reasons that are often baffling to say the least. And the outrage has also spawned a new round of somewhat voyeuristic videos from people who seem to be more interested in stripping down to their skivvies and creating a scene rather than out of any concern about the new procedures.
But do we really need videos of women wearing lingerie or bikini’s or men in speedo’s (spare me please) at security checkpoints? No, but the media is playing along and PBS’ Newshour isn’t helping the public gain an unbiased view by asking for screening experiences. They don’t want to hear from you if you sailed through without a hitch, they want another story of a TSA agent patting down a small screaming child or a veteran with artificial joints being subjected to an embarrassing and invasive search.
Once again the notion of fair and accurate reporting has gone out the window in the name of pursuing the sensationalistic headline grabbing stories no matter what the facts may be. There is so much me-too journalism on this story that it is like a television show that has jumped the shark which portends it’s eventual demise. That’s what’s happened here with the coverage going so far over the top that it is now impossible to return to the story’s salient points and separate fact from fiction.
The TSA certainly isn’t blameless but like most government agencies they are terrible when it comes to public relations. As a result of not having an effective p.r. strategy they have let the media get away with focusing on a few horror stories and whip up more anger and anxiety from the flying public whose nerves are already frayed by high air fares , crowded planes and a laundry list of rules unevenly enforced about what is and isn’t permissible on a flight.
After having flown over a million miles in the last 20 years I have seen the changes in security first hand and while I’m no fan of the current procedures I consider it part of the price I have to pay for the convenience of flying.
I even went through the full body scanner this summer and frankly it was just another blip on my radar.
Who would've thought that a website that employs a writer who really wants to see gays dead would generate an actual cogent, reasonable analysis? You probably won't see WND or Newsmax touching this at all.
WND's Welch Likens Gay Rights to Church Demolition Topic: WorldNetDaily
WorldNetDaily's Dave Welch haslongbeen a gay-hater, and that tendency surfaces yet again in his Nov. 27 column, in which he warns about the danger of gays invading the small towns of America and demanding to be treated like (gasp!) everyone else:
Bowling Green, Ohio, is just the latest American city where the definitions of morality, family and marriage have fallen prey to the GLBT "anti-discrimination" offensive.
As the American Family Association revealed in their documentary ("They're Coming To Your Town") several years ago, GLBTQIA (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgendered, Questioning, Intersexed and Allies) activists have been quietly moving into small to midsize towns across the country and taking advantage of those who thought the sexual diversity battle is only in the "big cities."
Certainly, as "big city" Houston (population 2.25 million) was just reminded again, the battle certainly exists there as well. Lesbian Mayor Annise Parker has in her first year appointed a lesbian as judge who even by the media's standards was utterly unqualified, issued an executive order opening up city restrooms to the gender-confused and finally, to cap the year, just appointed a radical transgender activist as a city municipal judge.
However, small towns like Eureka Springs, Ark., (population 2,350 and featured in the AFA documentary) and midsize towns like Bowling Green (population 27,775) are increasingly in the crosshairs of the Human Rights Campaign, the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force and their cronies like the ACLU.
We have no idea what Welch is talking about when he says the "lesbian judge" appointed by Parker -- whom Welchdespises for her gayness -- is "utterly unqualified." The only person we could find who fits Welch's description is Barbara Hartle, an "out lesbian" whom Parker nominated to head Houston's municipal courts. She was formerly an associate municipal judge, and she holds a law degree. How much more experience does Welch think she needs?
Welch went on to be offended that anti-discrimination ordinances that covered sexual orientation passed in those small towns, screeching that "non-discrimination is now the hammer used to bludgeon communities into submission by the Purveyors of Perversion."
Welch then goes in full-tilt scaremongering mode by referencing a controlled demolition of church buildings:
While we've argued that "sexual orientation" is a preference and not determined at birth, they blew right past us to add gender identity, gender expression and now … genetic information. While we get all worked up about our jobs, the economy and national security, the enemy has successfully destroyed our foundations.
Pastor Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Church in Dallas described the mechanics of their recently completed destruction of some old church buildings and how explosive charges were placed at strategic locations in the buildings' support beams at the foundation level.
When the button was pushed, explosions were heard, but nothing happened. At least, not for a few seconds. Then, the buildings simply collapsed on themselves in a pile of rubble.
I strongly urge you to watch the video and see these church buildings become nothing more than dust and wreckage. Then think of America following the same course.
As these GLBTQIA operatives run for city councils, become mayors, sponsor referendums and carry out an effective takeover of your town, will they take you by surprise since it always happens "somewhere else"?
When the dynamite explodes and the "institutions" collapse, will you find you were too busy just living your own life and doing church to have seen what was coming?
Finally, after complaining that one pastor "made no formal endorsement of either side" on an anti-discrimination ordinance, Welch added: "It sounds like his gender identity may be up for question. If that sounds harsh, so be it."
Newsmax's John LeBoutillier popped up on "Fox & Friends" this morning to promote his new book, "The Obama Identity," which he's presenting as fact cloaked in fiction. It appears, however to be fiction cloaked in fiction: LeBoutillier repeated the utterly discredited claim that "Obama's grandmother, living in Kenya, we have her in the book, it's fiction, but in reality she has claimed consistently that he was born in Mombasa, Kenya. She said this, adamantly, on the record."
Lest we forget what a conspiracy-mongering nutjob LeBoutillier is, we've compiled a short history of his Clinton-hating over at Media Matters. Remember the Counter Clinton Library? That was him.
LeBoutillier's co-author for his book, by the way, is Ed Klein, best known for a hatchet job of a bio on Hillary Clinton that Newsmax gamelytried to defend.
WND's New Poster Boy Even More Sleazy Than We Thought Topic: WorldNetDaily
A few weeks back, we highlighted the truth about Walter Fitzpatrick, WorldNetDaily's new birther hero whose background WND must whitewash in order to continue to present him as a poster. Turns out that background is even more seamy than we suspected.
An alert ConWebWatch reader directs us to a lengthy list of Fitzpatrick's contacts with law enforcement, which range from numerous instances of alleged domestic violence and harrassment to restraining orders and various other judgments filed against him.
Fitzpatrick was also court-martialed and convicted of failed to properly supervise the spending of his ship's "morale, welfare and recreation" money, effectively ending his Navy career.
Also, here's another bit of whitewashing done by WND. In April, Bob Unruh wrote that Fitzpatrick faced a "rioting" charge "for confronting a grand-jury meeting in Tennessee." Brian Fitzpatrick similarly wrote in his Oct. 28 article that Walter Fitzpatrick "tried unsuccessfully to place evidence about Obama's eligibility before a Monroe County grand jury in 2009."
In fact, such grand jury proceedings are closed to the public. As one Tennessee newspaper pointed out, "Grand jury proceedings, by law, are strictly private and only the grand jury and the officer making his or her case are allowed in the room. Even a court officer is not allowed into the courtroom during a grand jury session."
Fitzpatrick is the man who WorldNetDaily consider s a sane and reasonable advocate for making the case against Barack Obama's "eligibility" to be president. Apparently, Orly Taitz wasn't crazy enough.
WND Defends Anti-Gay Groups on SPLC List Topic: WorldNetDaily
Part of WorldNetDaily's anti-gay agenda is to run to the defense of any person or organization whose anti-gay behavior is called out for what it is. So when the Southern Poverty Law Center added several organizations to its list of anti-gay hate groups, WND was moved to respond.
A Nov. 24 article by Brian Fitzpatrick, carrying the self-pitying headline "Hate intrudes on Thanksgiving" -- ignoring, of course, the hate spread year-round by the groups in question -- complained that the SPLC "placed a virtual who's who of pro-family and Christian organizations, including the Family Research Council, the American Family Association and the Traditional Values Coalition, on a list of 13 'hate groups' for opposing the homosexual political agenda."
Which is, of course, not what the SPLC did. And Fitzpatrick knows that since he quoted the SPLC's criteria in his article noting that "the SPLC’s listings of these groups is based on their propagation of known falsehoods – claims about LGBT people that have been thoroughly discredited by scientific authorities – and repeated, groundless name-calling. Viewing homosexuality as unbiblical does not qualify organizations for listing as hate groups."
Fitzpatrick dutifully quotes the predictable denunciations of the SPLC by supporters of the groups placed on the list -- for instance, he quotes Coral Ridge Ministries' Robert Knight saying that "Smearing legitimate groups merely for disagreeing about homosexuality is a very hateful act" though that is a false statement -- but he couldn't be bothered to list the specific examples that earned those groups a place on the SPLC list.
Fitzpatrick has a growingreputation for journalistic hackery at WND, and this is just another example.
MRC Touts 'Climategate' Anniversary, Ignore Plagiarized Paper Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center was all over the first anniversary of the so-called "climategate" scandal:
At the Business & Media Institute, Julia Seymour wrote that the emails "showed potential manipulation of temperature data," pretended that the "hide the decline" remark was something sinister (it isn't), and insisted that the "so-called 'independent' investigations" that exonerated the participants of thte most serious claims raised by deniers like the MRC were nothing more than a a "whitewash."
At NewsBusters, Noel Sheppard touted a right-wing article criticizing "the atrocious media coverage of the scandal," ingoring that some of that atrocious coverage same from his own side.
So when news came of accusations that a global warming-related report contained key sections that were plagiarized, you'd think the MRC deniers would be jumping right on that breach of scholarship. They didn't.
Why? Because this made their side look bad. From USA Today:
An influential 2006 congressional report that raised questions about the validity of global warming research was partly based on material copied from textbooks, Wikipedia and the writings of one of the scientists criticized in the report, plagiarism experts say.
Review of the 91-page report by three experts contacted by USA TODAY found repeated instances of passages lifted word for word and what appear to be thinly disguised paraphrases.
[...]
Led by George Mason University statistician Edward Wegman, the 2006 report criticized the statistics and scholarship of scientists who found the last century the warmest in 1,000 years.
"The report was integral to congressional hearings about climate scientists," says Aaron Huertas of the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington, D.C. "And it preceded a lot of conspiratorial thinking polluting the public debate today about climate scientists."
But in March, climate scientist Raymond Bradley of the University of Massachusetts asked GMU, based in Fairfax, Va., to investigate "clear plagiarism" of one of his textbooks.
Bradley says he learned of the copying on the Deep Climate website and through a now year-long analysis of the Wegman report made by retired computer scientist John Mashey of Portola Valley, Calif. Mashey's analysis concludes that 35 of the report's 91 pages "are mostly plagiarized text, but often injected with errors, bias and changes of meaning." Copying others' text or ideas without crediting them violates universities' standards, according to Liz Wager of the London-based Committee on Publication Ethics.
There's another reason the MRC didn't report this scandal: because it previously touted Wegman's research.
A January 2007 NewsBusters post by Amy Ridenour highlightedhow "the eminent statistician, Dr. Edward Wegman, who has described himself as a Gore voter," was among the "expert witnesses" who testified before a House committee.
Turns out he may not be so eminent after all.
If the MRC actually cared about science, it would be outraged by this. But they've said nothing, which tells us they care only about politics, not science.
WND Baselessly Attacks MN Secretary of State, Franken Topic: WorldNetDaily
A Nov. 25 WorldNetDaily article by Aaron Klein attacks Minnesota Secreatary of State Mark Ritchie as having taken donations from "a shocking list of radicals that reads like a 'Who's Who' of the far-left world."
But Klein -- like conspiratorial anti-Obama blogger Trevor Loudon, from whom he lifts this attack -- offers no information as to how much these people gave to Ritchie, and neither link to the original data to back up their claim.
We found what is purported to be a database of Ritchie donations for his 2006 campaign on Loudon's KeyWiki website, and it seems that these donors were only a tiny part of the total donations.
For instance, the first person listed by Klein is "Barbara Baran, a member of Democratic Socialists of America." according to the database, she gave $150. "Max Palevsky, a former trustee of the Marxist-oriented, Soros-funded Institute for Policy Studies," gave $250.
This, by the way, is out of $106,000 reportedly donated to Ritchie's 2006 campaign.
In describing the affiliation of other donors, Klein falsely describes the organization J Street as "pro-Palestinian." In fact, it is a Jewish-led group that describes itself as "pro-Israel, pro-peace" and favors a "two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict." (Klein has previously falsely smeared J Street as "pro-Hamas.")
Klein also wrote that Ritchie "oversaw the recount of the 2008 U.S. Senate race that put onetime comedian Al Franken into office," later stating that "fallout from the 'recount' that handed Franken the 2008 victory still is developing." It's unclear why Klein put "recount" in scare quotes, because it's indisputable that a recount took place.
Klein then repeated claims by right-wing group Minnesota Majority -- first reported at WND in an October article by Bob Unruh -- "it was found that at least 341 convicted felons voted in Hennepin County, where Minneapolis is located, and another 52 voted illegally in Ramsey County, home to St. Paul. The number of felons voting in those two counties alone exceeded Franken's margin of victory, the investigation revealed."
Neither Klein nor Unruh reported that Minnesota Majority's claims are largely overblown. MinnPost repoted that out of 451 names submitted by Minnesota Majority to the Hennepin County Attorney's Office for alleged illegal voting by felons, only 47 will result in charges. Election law expert Michael McDonald has stated that there are "solid reasons to suspect that Minnesota Majority has overstated the number of illegal votes."
Klein's intention, of course, is to undermine Ritchie and falsely portray him as conspiring to make Franken the winner of the Senate race. In fact, there's no evidence whatsoever that Ritchie acted contrary to law. Indeed, as writer Jay Weiner states, various panels of judges and even the lawyer for Franken's Republican opponent, Norm Coleman, said there was no widespread fraud in the election.
