Big day in Ohio tomorrow

A last-minute fundraising push by the netroots, designed to generate an additional $30,000 for last-minute campaign work for the Hackete campaign instead generated $50,000.

Paul Hackett, win or lose, is the GOP's worst nightmare: an Iraq war veteran, pro-gun, pro-choice, a fiscal conservative, who seems to be picking up the mantle of Howard Dean. He's every bit as prickly, yet somewhat less exuberant, and whatever happens tomorrow, this is a star in the making.

All the news out of Ohio for Hackett is pretty good, while the news for Schmidt gets progressively worse, since she, like all Ohio Republicans, is up to her eyeballs in Coingate.

In all the excitement, however, too many bloggers have forgotten that this is, after all, Ohio, and Ken Blackwell still runs the election apparatus -- with the help of loyal party hacks like Bernadette Noe -- Wife of Tom the Coinscammer.

Here's what she managed to pull last November:

In yet another surreal twist in Ohio’s “coin-gate” scandal, the wife of Bush’s chief Ohio fundraiser, Tom Noe—who is currently embroiled in campaign finance and money laundering probes—surprised poll workers and observers alike by disrupting the ballot count during the 2004 general election, RAW STORY has discovered.

Bernadette Noe, who served dual roles as chairman for the Lucas County Republican Party and the Lucas County Board of Elections, sent twelve “partisans” into a warehouse on Election Day, according a memo authored by Ohio’s Director of Campaign Finance Richard Weghorst who was present at the time.

The Board was “directly responsible for the inefficient and unorganized election process” in the county, the report said. Weghorst found they had failed to lock and secure ballots and voting machines; manipulated the three percent hand recount; and failed to properly remove Ralph Nader from county ballots.

But perhaps the most striking event directly linked to Ms. Noe was what Weghorst described as “a note-worthy incident relating to security” on the evening of the election.

Weghorst, who was present at a local warehouse where ballots were being tabulated, says in his report that “two groups of partisan volunteers totaling approximately twelve people" arrived, whose "purpose for being there was not immediately known nor requested."

When the volunteers refused to leave the premises, Weghorst called the police, who then escorted the group away from the warehouse. It later emerged they had come at Ms. Noe's request.

A Diebold employee, Robert Diekmann, was also present at the warehouse that night.

[snip]

Reminiscent of an account reported on by RAW STORY regarding ballot tampering in Clermont County, Ohio, Ms. Noe was involved in an incident through which Republican volunteers were brought in to “assist” processing returned voter confirmation postcards. On her authority and that of several other board members, partisan volunteers were allowed to copy the returned cards.

They were subsequently caught by a Lucas County Democratic official peeling the return stickers off the voter confirmation cards, and were told to leave. Weghorst’s inquiry found no evidence they had been supervised.

Noe resigned in December, using the time-honored excuse of "wanting to spend more time with her family." But you can rest assured, that Republican goons are going to be armed for bear in the Second Congressional District of Ohio when the polls open tomorrow.