A: Generally, it isn’t, unless you are under oath when you deny the conviction. This question often appears on employment applications in which the applicant is warned that a false answer will result in the applicant’s rejection, or if already hired, the applicant’s termination. There are federal and state laws that criminalize voting, if the voter has a prior felony conviction. A felony is defined by statute as any crime for which the maximum sentence of imprisonment exceeds one year. Stevens was convicted of multiple federal felonies. I’d have to check the federal voting statute to see how the word “conviction” is defined because no conviction is “final” until the appellate process has been completed and the conviction has been upheld. I don’t believe the federal statute defines “conviction” as a “final” conviction and my answers are based on this assumption.

Q: at the very least, if there is no specific crime, isn’t it contempt of court?

A: No, it would not be contempt of court, unless the court ordered the person not to vote, which may have happened in Stevens’s case after the jury delivered its verdict. The Court has the authority to remand a convicted defendant into custody pending sentencing. If the Court decides to permit the convicted defendant to remain free pending sentencing, it always imposes conditions of release and a prohibition against voting may be one of the conditions. If not, since voting is a crime, Stevens would have violated one of the standard condition of release; namely, do not commit any crimes. Assuming a violation, the matter would not be handled as a contempt. Instead, the pretrial supervision officer would advise the Assistant United States Attorney who tried the case and file a motion to revoke the release. The court would hold a hearing.

Q: can a person file a grievance as a friend of the court against stevens?

A: No, because the proper procedure is to contact the Assistant United States Attorney who prosecuted the case, the lead investigator, or the pretrial release officer supervising the defendant’s conditional release. Contact the Pretrial Supervision Department of the United States Probation Office in the city where the case was tried, which is Washington D.C. in Stevens’s case. Note, however, that his probation officer probably works out of the Anchorage office since Stevens lives there. Check with the D.C. office to find out. When defendants reside outside the district where the case is pending in the federal system, supervision of the defendant’s pretrial release is assigned to the pretrial office in the district where the defendant resides. That probation officer would report any violations to the court where the case is pending.

To avoid a yes-you did; no-I-didn’t situation, a photograph or video would be helpful although every voter has to sign-in when they vote, so the sign-in list should be consulted and probably would be by an official with access to the list, if a complaint results in an investigation.

However, with so many people voting early, Stevens may have voted absentee, or by mail before the jury returned its verdict. If so, he would not have violated the law, but his vote should not be counted. You would have to check with the State of Alaska, assuming that’s where he’s registered to vote, to find out if it allows early voting. I think each state maintains a list of the people who voted absentee, or early, and that list should be checked to see if and when Stevens voted. If he voted early or absentee after the jury delivered its verdict, he’s got some splainin to do.

Excellent point. This is exactly the problem with concentrating wealth. Capitalist, free market systems depend on consumer demand. After the wealthy buy their five mansions, yacht, private jet, and twelve automobiles, that’s it. They invest their wealth in real estate, stocks or whatever. For the most part they don’t buy things, certainly not enough to keep something like an automobile industry going. Demand comes from the middle and lower classes because there’s more of them. If they have the money they buy stuff and that gets things going.

Our present economic problem has three solutions. We print money to bail out everyone in sight which should be very inflationary, but has not been as yet; we ask our creditors to cut us slack so we invent new stuff and put our people to work; or we tax the wealthy and use their money to prime the pump or a combination. We cannot change things without increasing demand and we can’t increase demand unless we decide to trickle up rather than trickle down.

See Bradblog for an up-to-date look at the voting machine problems.

sadly:

This one’s for the new generation from the old generation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pl3vxEudif8

The link’s not working. Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes!

I live on the west side of michigan, but i’m still betting this side is going heavily to Obama. Downtown is plastered with the signs, which is more than i can say for the McLame ones.