[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 16 (Wednesday, February 3, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H530-H531]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Frank) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker, I recently got some first-
hand experience with the way in which the right-wing propaganda machine
operates. The pattern appears to be to begin with a lie and then have
that lie multiplied through an echo chamber that repeats it and repeats
it.
In this case, a man named John Fund, who is an editorial writer at
the Wall Street Journal, one of the most right-wing of our publications
these days, on the editorial page just told a lie about me in November
of last year. He gave a speech at Restoration Weekend. I don't know
what they were restoring, but it certainly wasn't respect for the
truth. And he said, ``Democrats were very rattled by the November 3
election results. What do liberals do when they lose elections? They
change the rules. In January, Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank will
propose universal voter registration.'' ``There'll be felon
reenfranchisement too.'' ``The Feds will tell the States, `Take
everyone on every list of welfare recipients you have, take everyone on
every list of unemployed you have.' ''
It's a lie. He made it up. It's not even a misinterpretation. It's
not a quote taken out of context. It is a total myth. There is no such
bill. There wasn't in November. Then right-wing echo chamber picks it
up. The Washington Times, the voice of the Reverend Moon, says, Schumer
and Frank ``have plans to ram through legislation that will produce
universal voter registration.'' And they say it will be on the floor of
the House in 2 weeks. It's the lie repeated. Glenn Beck joined in. Rush
Limbaugh joined in.
This begins with a totally fictional accusation by John Fund with no
basis whatsoever. It is then repeated by Glenn Beck and repeated by the
Washington Times and repeated by Rush Limbaugh. None of them have
checked what we were talking about, none of them seeing if it was
accurate.
I was asked by a constituent why I had done that. My response was,
Done what? I didn't do it. So I checked into it, and I found that the
source of this was Mr. Fund's totally irresponsible myth in November.
So I wrote to Mr. Fund--and I put this letter in there--and said, I was
puzzled to hear you say this. I checked. I now write to tell you that
you are entirely wrong in your assertion about me, and in the absence
of your being able to show any basis on which you made such a
statement, to ask you to acknowledge that fact.
He is not only a liar; he is a coward. He wouldn't do it. My staff
member, Mr. Gural, asked him, called him up and said, Well, what was
this based on? He said, Oh, I made a mistake. Well, have you issued a
retraction? Mr. Gural asked him. Oh, yeah, he said. Can we see a copy?
Mr. Gural reasonably asked. Oh, I told a couple of people.
So here we are. Mr. Fund makes it up. It's a lie. It's a myth. There
was nothing there. And it's to discredit all Democrats. His right-wing
cohorts then echo it and echo it. The next thing you know, it's going
to be coming on the floor in the House in 2 weeks. People hear it, and
it's all over the blogs. This is the Democrats' disregard for the
electoral process. And when we call Mr. Fund's attention to the fact
that this was a lie, what does he say? Whoops. But he's not going to
tell anybody about it.
Mr. Speaker, this is not the only case of this. And I know this has
happened before; but because I was directly involved here, I am in a
position to document this. It begins with a lie from this editorial
writer from the Wall Street Journal. It is then a lie repeated by all
of his right-wing colleagues. And then when he is nailed in the lie, he
simply blithely refuses to do anything about it.
I hope people will take from this the lesson to be very skeptical
when these right-wing propagandas--Limbaugh or Beck or the Washington
Times or the Wall Street Journal editorial board--propagate these
vicious smears.
Partial Text of John Fund's Speech at Restoration Weekend November 21,
2009
Democrats were very rattled by the November 3rd election
results. What do liberals do when they lose elections? They
change the rules. In January, Chuck Schumer and Barney Frank
will propose universal voter registration.
What is universal voter registration? It means all of the
state laws on elections will be overridden by a federal
mandate. The feds will tell the states, ``Take everyone on
every list of welfare recipients you have, take everyone on
every list of unemployed you have, take everyone on every
list of property owners, take everyone on every list of
driver's license holders, and register them to vote
regardless of whether they want to be.''
By the way, there'll be felon re-enfranchisement too. At
that point, you have destroyed the integrity of the
registration process.
Now they will sell this very cleverly. They will say,
``Well, OK, ACORN did have some problems with voter
registration. We shouldn't have these third party rogue
groups out there. So let's put ACORN out of business. Let's
register everybody.''
Now the problem, of course, is there are a lot of
duplicates. And there are a lot of people on those rolls who
are illegal aliens. It's not a clean list. They don't care.
So, this is the issue you haven't heard about. There's a
reason you haven't heard about it. They don't want you to
hear about it.
The path between the day this bill is introduced and the
day it hits the House floor will probably be less than two
weeks. Get ready for it. You can stop it. Don't get me wrong.
But this is their stealth bill that is even more sneaky than
the health care bill.
____
[From the Washington Times, Jan. 7, 2010]
Editorial: Letting Crooks & Illegals Vote
Democrats have a political death wish. At least that's how
it looks. There's no other explanation for their feverish
push to take over the health care system when a huge majority
of Americans are opposed to the plan. But facing an angry
public, Democrats are scheming to find ways to manipulate the
electoral process so they can cling to power even when voters
want to kick the bums out.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat, and Rep. Barney
Frank, Massachusetts Democrat, have plans to ram through
legislation that will produce universal voter registration.
No matter what they claim, the rule changes will make it
possible for illegal aliens to register to vote and for
others to register multiple times.
The proposal is to register everyone on every welfare list,
everyone getting unemployment insurance, everyone with a
driver's license, everyone who has had run-ins with the legal
system, everyone owning any property--basically everyone on
every list the government keeps. People will be registered to
vote whether or not they want to be registered. If
individuals are on any public record, they will be
automatically registered.
Obviously a lot of illegal aliens have driver's licenses,
and many get other government benefits. Quite a few have rap
sheets. People's names and other identification information
are frequently recorded differently across these different
lists, which means that one could be registered a separate
time for every slight variation in how their personal
information is kept on file.
The legislation is also expected to give felons the right
to vote. Why Democrats insist on letting someone who has
raped multiple women vote on social policy is beyond us.
According to Democrats, robbers who have preyed on helpless
victims--and even murderers--have the judgment to tell us how
law enforcement should be run in this country.
In May 2005, Public Opinion Strategies surveyed felons who
had their voting rights restored and nonfelons who voted in
Washington state. Even after accounting for the voters' race,
gender, education level, religious habits, employment, age
and county of residence, the book Freedomnomics found that
``felons were 36 percent more likely than nonfelons with the
same characteristics to have voted for [John] Kerry [a
Democrat] over [George W.] Bush [a Republican] and 37 percent
more likely to be registered Democratic.''
For years, Democrats have fought against requiring photo
IDs at polling places. The
[[Page H531]]
practice, which is simply a way to make sure voters are who
they say they are, is used in about 100 other countries.
Mexico, for example, has cracked down on voter fraud and is
strict about requiring photo identification to vote. If
Democrats have their way, it will be easier for Mexicans to
vote in America than in their own country.
It speaks volumes about Democratic unpopularity that they
have to look to criminals and illegal aliens to try to shore
up their voting base.
____
House of Representatives,
Washington, DC, January 13, 2010.
Mr. John Fund,
The Wall Street Journal,
New York, NY.
Dear Mr. Fund: I was puzzled during the last couple of
weeks to be asked why I was supporting something called
``universal voter registration,'' which supposedly would
allow all sorts of undesirable people to register to vote. I
was puzzled because I have had absolutely no involvement in
such a proposal.
I asked my staff to check the source of the rumor, and we
discovered that it is you. Apparently last fall, you invented
a story that Senator Schumer and I planned to introduce such
legislation. I've since learned that Senator Schumer is
working on legislation regarding voting, but I am told that
it does not remotely resemble your version of it. But more
importantly to me is that I have had no involvement with this
whatsoever, with Senator Schumer or anybody else.
You simply made this up with regard to me. I must tell you
that I was not surprised, because this sort of fictionalized
attack on political opponents has sadly become characteristic
of many on the right. And once you lied about me in this
regard, several of your right-wing colleagues in the media,
including Rush -Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the Washington
Times, repeated it.
I should note that, again not surprisingly, you made no
effort to check with me or anybody who works with me to find
out if what you said was true. You made your assertion with
no factual basis and without any effort to verify it. To me,
that qualifies as a lie.
So I now write not simply to tell you that you are entirely
wrong in your assertion about me but, in the absence of your
being able to show any basis on which you made such a
statement, to ask that you acknowledge that fact.
Barney Frank.
____________________