Pinto: Hey McGovern, It’s Worcester Stupid!

Friday, March 30, 2012

Chris Pinto Guest MINDSETTER™

Remember that old saying about the cobbler’s children? It refers the cobbler who is so busy making shoes for his customers that he does not have the time to make any for his own children.

Well here in Central Mass, we have a congressman who is so busy dropping in on radical regimes across the world and demanding reforms in other states far beyond his district that he has no time for his own constituents.
Over the years Jim McGovern has injected himself into issues in Havana, Venezuela, Columbia (with FARC terrorists), Sudan, Iraq and Texas while ignoring issues in Hopkinton, Worcester, New Bedford and Fall River
Now McGovern has found a new cause, voter ID laws in Texas, while ignoring potential election abuses right in his home district.

While the congressman is, by his own description, very liberal I do believe that he and I believe that “every vote should be counted.”

Throwing Rocks at Texas

I was shocked and appalled last week when I learned that in July of 2011 Congressman McGovern signed a letter to Attorney General Holder urging him to investigate Voter ID laws being proposed in the state of Texas, a law that is nearly identical to laws that are currently in place in Indiana and other states. Since the Indiana Voter ID law has already been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court, why would the congressman be worried about the possibility of problems with proposed laws in another state? Here's a copy of the letter: Download PDF

The Texas law is nearly identical to the Voter ID law in Indiana that recently survived a challenge in the U.S. Supreme court. Perhaps the Congressman knows more about the law than the Supreme Court? Or, perhaps the Congressman thinks the Supreme Court ruling is wrong. After all, he has told us that the Constitution is wrong.

It is possible that Congressman McGovern has not read any of these laws and bills and that he is unaware of the Supreme Court ruling on the Indiana Voter ID law. Perhaps a congressman with a law degree would be better prepared to comment.

The congressman participated in the parliamentary trick that forced ObamaCare onto the American public, a bill about which his friend Nancy Pelosi told us: “We have to pass the bill so that we can find out what is in it”. So maybe Congressman McGovern hasn’t read the Voter ID law that has now passed in Texas.

What is even more curious is that Rhode Island passed Voter ID laws, which were described in the media as “strict”, and there was no outcry from their members of congress. Some in the media were surprised that Gov. Chafee signed the bill into law, and other suggested that the Rhode Island law should be used as a template for Massachusetts Voter ID laws. The thinking was that if the laws in RI were acceptable in a state where the Legislature was, like Massachusetts, dominated by Democrats, then with some tweaking we would be able to pass a Voter ID bill that could actually become law in Massachusetts.

So why would Congressman McGovern sign a letter asking Attorney General Eric Holder to monitor the law proposed in Texas, but not send a letter regarding the laws in the liberal Democratic state of Rhode Island? Maybe Congressman McGovern was just, as Elizabeth Warren would say, “in the streets, throwing rocks,” at the conservative Republican state of Texas.

Every vote was not counted in 2010

“No right is more important to the proper functioning of our society than the right to vote. Each of us has an absolute right to have our vote counted. As Americans, we expect, and demand, no less.
Past elections properly should remain in the past, but we cannot allow serious problems in those elections to go unremedied. If we do nothing about what went badly wrong in the past, we can expect the same problem will occur again”

Jim McKenna – Letter to the Editor New Bedford Standard-Times

The 2010 Republican primary was historic for Massachusetts’ Republicans. Two candidates, Jim McKenna (a former prosecutor) and Guy Carbone, were attempting to qualify for the general election ballot for the constitutional office of Attorney General by write-in during the primary. Jim McKenna made history by receiving the required ten thousand write-in votes and was placed on the ballot as the Attorney General nominee for the Republican Party in November 2010.
McKenna received 27,711 votes and Carbone received 9,505 votes.
In Worcester of 849 votes were cast as write-ins, yet only 370 votes were attributed to either of the candidates. Almost 500 voters in the city of Worcester were disenfranchised. Maynard, Springfield, Fall River, Lawrence, Boston, Revere, Chicopee, and Peabody all were cited as not counting votes by Mr. McKenna.

“There was a massive statewide failure to count votes,” Mr. McKenna maintained. “This is what the cities and towns are supposed to do, count the votes. This is what we trust them to do.”

Telegram and Gazette – August 2011

Jim McKenna filed a complaint with the Department of Justice Voting Rights Section regarding the massive voter disenfranchisement in August of 2011. Voting Rights Section referred him to the Secretary of State William Galvin. After the sending three letters to Mr. Galvin, Mr. McKenna has received a response indicating that the Secretary of state is going to take no action. Jim McKenna then brought his complaint to U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, who referred him to the Voting Rights Section of the Department of Justice.

City Council and congressman must take action

The Worcester City Council must take action on this issue. The ballots from the 2010 primary will be destroyed in July unless action is taken to preserve them. Since Mr. McKenna has been passed from one government organization to another without any resolution, a failure to preserve the ballots until the issue is resolved would place a stain on the electoral process in our city that may take years to erase.

Congressman McGovern has an opportunity to show that he isn’t the cobbler that is too busy with his (Hollywood activist) customers to make his own kids some shoes. A letter to the Justice Department to get this investigation moving before the ballots are destroyed in July, would prove that he truly cares about actual disenfranchised voters in his home rather than grandstanding about laws that are already settled by the U.S. Supreme Court.

The investigation and resolution could take years, but the DOJ could preserve the ballots now so that an investigation can be conducted.

If the Congressman takes no action, then the Cobblers kids should consider divorcing their “dad”, Jim McGovern.