Fired New Mexico US Attorney was attacked by “voter fraud” agitator

News from McClatchy News Service on the New Mexico US Attorney firing:

A New Mexico lawyer who pressed to oust U.S. Attorney David Iglesias was an officer of a nonprofit group that aided Republican candidates in 2006 by pushing for tougher voter identification laws. Iglesias, who was one of nine U.S. attorneys the administration fired last year, said that Albuquerque lawyer Patrick Rogers pressured him several times to bring voter fraud prosecutions where little evidence existed. Iglesias believes that he was fired in part because he failed to pursue such cases.

He described Rogers, who declined to discuss the exchanges, as “obsessed … convinced there was massive voter fraud going on in this state, and I needed to do something to stop it.”

Iglesias said he only recently learned of Rogers’ involvement as secretary of the non-profit American Center for Voting Rights Legislative Fund – an activist group that defended tighter voter identification requirements in court against charges that they were designed to hamper voting by poor minorities.

Rogers, a former general counsel to the New Mexico Republican Party and a candidate to replace Iglesias, is among a number of well-connected GOP partisans whose work with the legislative fund and a sister group played a significant role in the party’s effort to retain control of Congress in the 2006 election.

“Voter fraud” was investigated in NM and none was found, just as it has been discredited in the rest of the country. But this issue is a common thread in the US Attorney controversy, and one which links it directly to Karl Rove, who is obsessed with the subject. Claims of voter fraud are simply a way of suppressing the vote, intimidating voters and those who register voters. This highly undemocratic tactic is only one of the many “dirty tricks” developed by Karl Rove.

Afghanistan going to hell along with Iraq, part II

Air power just doesn’t win hearts and minds; and don’t tell me how we’ve painted their schools….
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Air strikes by foreign forces in Afghanistan have recently killed more civilians than the Taliban and the U.S.-led operation should cut them back, an Afghan rights group said on Monday.

Instead, NATO and U.S.-led coalition troops battling the Taliban and other insurgents should boost the number of their foot soldiers — already numbering nearly 50,000, Afghanistan’s Independent Human Rights Commission said.

In the latest incident involving civilian fatalities, Afghan officials said on the weekend that 45 civilians were killed in an air strike in the south of the country.

The NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said the toll from the pre-dawn raid was much lower.

The rising toll on civilians is proving a major irritant for President Hamid Karzai whose government is under fire for rampant corruption, growing insecurity and lack of economic development.

Civilian deaths caused by foreign forces have sparked protests demanding the expulsion of foreign troops and Karzai’s resignation.

“Air operations have killed more civilians than Taliban,” Nader Nadery, a commissioner with the rights group told Reuters.