Friday, November 26, 2004

Madsen's report on funding for vote fraud: Follow up

You would hate shopping with me. I always get a case of morning-after buyer's remorse.

Last night, I felt certain that Wayne Madsen was on to something important. Now, although I still urge everyone to follow his work, I feel less confident.

Madsen, you will recall, is the fellow who has encountered sources -- as yet unnamed -- who say that vote fraud can be connected to a mysterious company, allegedly Saudi-linked, called Five Star Trust. If you haven't read my previous post, you'll need to do that now before we proceed.

(Go on. I'll wait.)

(Back? Excellent. Let us continue.)

Madsen has written some excellent material in the past, which is the main reason why I placed great stock in his article. Here's his bio:

Mr. Madsen has some twenty-five years of experience in computer security and data privacy. As a U.S. Naval Officer he managed one of the first computer security programs for the U.S. Navy. He subsequently worked for the National Security Agency's National COMSEC Assessment Center, Department of State, RCA Corporation, and Computer Sciences Corporation.

He has testified before the House International Relations Subcommittee on International Operations.

He is also a freelance investigative journalist and a syndicated columnist. His columns have appeared in the Miami Herald, Houston Chronicle, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Atlanta Journal Constitution. He has appeared frequently as a guest commentator on television and radio.

Mr. Madsen is the author of The Handbook of Personal Data Protection (London: Macmillan, 1992)
A serious fellow, no doubt about it.

And Five Star Trust, as noted earlier, is a seriously suspicious company. Take the wheeler-dealer most closely associated with the company, J.R. Horn. This guy was convicted of wire fraud in 2001; while out on parole, he commited the same crime (the figure of a billion dollars has been mentioned), only to be sentenced to a mere 18 months. I can't help but compare Mr. Horn's cushy fate to those well-known cases of minor pot dealers sentenced to years in prison.

So why now does a touch of "buyer's remorse" color my initial enthusiasm for Madsen's piece?

Because everything about this "FIve Star" company reeks of con artistry. Yes, consters do frequently butt up against the worlds of covert operations, money laundering, espionage and so forth. Here's the problem: When you stumble into the world of the professional con artist, how do you know when -- or if -- these David Mamet characters are lying to you?

Those who followed parapolitical controversies in the 1990s may recall the "three Rs": Reed, Russbacher, and Riconosciuto. If you recognise those names, you'll know the difficulties of dealing with any source saddled with legal troubles and an elastic attitude toward the truth.

All of which makes me wonder about just who has been feeding Madsen his information. I'm sure that the writer himself is honest -- but what about his sources? Even the smartest researcher can be played for a sucker.

Madsen has promised a follow-up report very soon, so perhaps he will provide more details. Until then, we (or at least I) must face another poser:

I received a letter from someone unknown to me, telling me to place certain information on my blog. I won't reprint this text here, but a cautious summary should do no harm.

The badly-written letter stated that Greg Palast is working with Madsen on the "Five Star Trust" angle, and that they both need funding. I was directed to a web page offering a PayPal donation button.

The writer connected Five Star to CyberNet, which figures in Jeff Fisher's charges. You can read a good discussion of this business here.

This same letter also connected Five Star to Accenture, the Enron-linked (actually, Arthur Anderson-linked) offshore company which has received government contracts for a system identifying visitors to this country (photographs, fingerprints, perhaps even iris scans) and which also received a contract to provide the military with an online voting system, which bears the unnerving name "Secure Electronic Registration and Voting Experiment" (or SERVE). The letter closed with an unclear reference to the Green party.

This missive struck me as very suspicious. If Palast and/or Madsen need donations, surely they would make their own plea directly; why would they have Mr. Anonymous Stranger act on their behalf?

In short: I smell a scam. I've phoned Madsen and written Palast, and will soon know the facts. In the meantime, let me know if you have received a similar mailing.

For god's sake -- double-check (and triple-check)before making any donations!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

You have quite a penchant for dismissing things out of hand, Pomeroo. As always, you succeed in disproving nothing. How is Madsen's story any more far-fetched than the notion of thousands of Democrats in a dozen states walking in circles talking to dimwitted exit pollers repeatedly in hopes that early exit polls would get leaked and discourage people in Western states from voting? How is there any less evidence for it?

Anonymous said...

Pomeroo: you should be permanently banned for posting same thing three times! Spammer! Meanwhile, re Accenture and online voting for military and overseas. Guardian UK story estimated that approx 6 million expats had registered or tried to, but process was difficult and many not able to vote in time perhaps. Ditto military. But these votes would be scattered over many states. No question the surge of expat voters would have been prompted more by desire to boot Bush. Two stories in reputable papers said that online voting was to be counted by Omega Technologies. Among the findings I got from Google were that OT is involved with optical scanners and wireless networks.

As to Madsen, I did find his article intriguing but feel that ultimately the key to finding out if anything happened is probably going to come from the BBV investigation if anywhere, unless the unhappy techs that Madsen refers to do come forward.

Meanwhile, shouldn't we be urging our major media to make more of the GOP's flagrant voting suppression tactics, combined with those actions by GOP election officials to ensure smooth voting at GOP suburban precincts and long lines and 3 hour waits at inner city and college precincts, etc.

What is the burning question to me is, why would GOP commit such flagrant abuses of the Voting Rights Act unless it was needed to make a difference? And secondly, why has no-one been prosecuted?

Anonymous said...

Dr. Gonzo: "Oh god-fuck! I think I see the pattern here".
A scammer(s), have chosen to manipulate 'the left' for some quick cash, setting up some stuff for people to find, dangling a mythical "centre of the spiders web" and now set up 2 or more unwitting participants to 'investigate', then sending out emails asking people to donate to help fund the investigation. If Kerry was President-Elect (and there's still time for that, you fuckers, not that it'd be able to do anything to fix the economic melt-down thats on the horizon which BushCo. deserve to be in charge of) them a similar scheme would undoubtably be floating around attempting to manipulate 'the right', after a bit more digging Madsen will come out red faced apologising for being pawn & et al.
Pom, your anger of the enfranchised never ceases to amuse.
LamontCranston.

Ron Brynaert said...

Pomeroo: "I've mentioned these data before, but let's return to the results in Queens County, New York. In 2000, Gore beat Bush by 417,000 to 122,000. This year, Kerry won by 395,000 to 153,000. There was no campaign here; the polling places are completely controlled by Democrats; we vote on ancient machines. Somehow, Bush increased his vote by 27%. Explain, please."

You're the one that should explain.

I can't tell you how much it pisses me off when people claim that Democrats control the polling places in New York City. The worst part...is that too many Democrats believe that, too. The Board of Elections is bipartisan.

Queens County Board of Elections Commissioners:
Stephen H. Weiner, Comm. R
Terrence C. O'Connor, Comm. D
Kathryn James, Dep. Ch. Clerk R
Barbara Conacchio, Chief Clerk D

Why Are We Back In Iraq?

Ron Brynaert said...

It's completely true in your opinion...But these are the facts...(I'll reprint it since for some reason you didn't see it)

Queens County Board of Elections Commissioners:
Stephen H. Weiner, Comm. R
Terrence C. O'Connor, Comm. D
Kathryn James, Dep. Ch. Clerk R
Barbara Conacchio, Chief Clerk D

Ron Brynaert said...

"There is no Republican organization in New York."

And I'm delusional? They seem to have done pretty damn good in the last three mayoral elections.

As for Staten Island...Ah I see your point, now....you mean there is no overt Gop suppression in New York City except for Staten Island. Perhaps that explains why the number of registered Democrats outweigh Republicans 119,054 to 80,985...yet, somehow, anyone named Molinari or something close to it win by large margins.

As for New York City poll watchers, you're lying about that, too. 1894 - Bipartisan Control - The state establishes a system, in effect to this day, under which all election positions, from Board of Elections officials to poll watchers, must be divided equally between the two major parties.

And Joseph Cannon isn't a conspiracy theorist, he's spent a good amount of time debunking many of the initial reports in this election.

There is definitely acts of voter fraud, suppression and etc. committed by both sides...but only a Foxhead would argue that it's the Democrats who are more responsible.

As for what you wrote about Florida...you're lying again...a complete state recount using nearly any set of standards proves that Gore won the most votes in 2000. Believe what you want to believe..but that's the truth. Gore made a big mistake by asking for recounts in only some of the counties...but the Supreme Court would've stopped it anyway.

Don't worry...my site is also keeping tab of GOP allegations of Democratic acts of voter fraud, etc. This should be a non-partisan battle. Our electoral system is completely fucked. If you think Bush won by 5 million votes...fine...let's find out...support recount and election reform.

But...please...please...please...do a little googling before you write lies...it makes you look stupid.

John said...

Hi Joesph,

My name is Bozos for Bush, from DU and BBV. I just saw your blog for the first time, tonight. It's clear that the person/people behind the badly written letter which you suspect to be a scam, etc, is none other than Auditors and his friends at BBV.org's message boards.

I quote "What follows is a whole lot of information on Five also known as 5 Star Trust that has been compiled and needs to be followed up on, for certain, along with their donations to Accenture Inc. We have requested that Greg give us the link to his donation funds page, or someone that knows Greg, so that we can begin spreading his much needed funding across the web. We are prepared to fully back and fund any nvestigation that takes place. Without further influence here is
5 star trust."

Here is the link to prove my suspicions: http://www.blackboxvoting.org/cgi-bin/dcforum/dcboard.cgi?az=show_thread&om=116&forum=DCForumID4122&omm=14&viewmode=threaded

This guy and his "research team" have led a lot of people on a wild goose chase, which has spilled over to both Democratic Underground and CommonGroundCommonSense. After battling this guy for days, I finally tricked him by posing as "Amy Riderman" and he fell for it. Any help you can provide to DU to make them realize this is all a scam would be appreciated, as I got banned for of all things, trying to put a stop to all this garbage.

If you email me, I will send you specific links to all sorts of his bogus claims. Thanks!

John