Larisa Alexandrovna

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Larisa Alexandrovna (born December 7, 1971 in Odessa, Ukraine) is a journalist. She currently works as Managing News Editor of Raw Story, and contributes opinion and columns to blogs such as the Huffington Post, online publications such as Alternet, and has had her work references in Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair, and Newsweek among others.

Contents

[edit] Early life

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Larisa Alexandrovna was born to Aleksandr Yurovich and Klavdia Borisovna, both Ukrainian Jews, in the Ukraine while it was part of the Soviet regime. During the early 1970s, Alexandrovna and family moved around various European cities until an entry visa could be acquired into the US. She has lived in New York City since 1999.

Her influences include Dorothy Parker, Anne Sexton, Vladimir Nabokov, Gabriel García Márquez, Isabel Allende, Maureen Dowd, and Naomi Klein.

[edit] Election 2004

Further information: Election 2004

Immediately after the 2004 Presidential election came to a close, claims of voter disenfranchisement, dirty tricks, ballot tampering, and fraud were being made across the country.

Few journalists continued to explore questions surrounding the election results. Alexandrovna, along with Bob Fitrakis, Greg Palast, Brad Friedman[1], and Mark Crispin Miller, among a handful of others, however, kept claiming that anomalies and complaints existed in Ohio and Florida.

Alexandrovna claimed to have uncovered a case of ballot tampering, intimidation, and recount fraud in Clermont County, Ohio. In an article titled Ohio recount volunteers allege electoral tampering, legal violations and possible fraud, published on January 26, 2005, volunteers provided testimony and video footage of stickers on ballots as well as other issues during the 2004 recount:

These volunteers, observing the recount on behalf of the Greens, Libertarians and Democrats, assert that during the Dec. 14, 2004 hand recount they noticed stickers covering the Kerry/Edwards oval, whereas the Bush/Cheney oval seemed to be "colored in." Some witnesses state that beneath the stickers, the Kerry/Edwards oval was selected. The opti-scan ballots were then fed into the machines after the hand recount. [2]

The article prompted Congressman John Conyers (D-MI) to request an FBI investigation.[3]. Although never fully investigated by the FBI, Alexandrovna's three month investigation was cited two years later in an article by Robert F. Kenney Jr. in the June 01 2006 Rolling Stone entitled "Was the 2004 Election Stolen?", he stated his belief that the Republican party stole the 2004 American presidential election.[4]

In another investigative piece on election issues, Alexandrovna followed up on research done by Bradblog, an obscure leftist weblog, into an election commission set up to address reforms. Alexandrovna made the claim that the Baker-Carter Commission on Federal Election Reform, named after its two co-chairs – James A. Baker III and Jimmy Carter – was comprised of phony election advocacy groups, unsavory corporate interests, and skewed discussions away from what she considered to be the most important issues.

"Serious questions of conservative partisanship have surfaced surrounding an electoral reform commission co-chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and erstwhile Secretary of State James Baker… The [Carter Center] denies any involvement with the Baker-Carter Commission on Federal Election Reform. Carter stepped down from the center in March… As revealed earlier by Brad Friedman of Bradblog.com, The American Center for Voting Rights appeared on the election reform scene. It is led by GOP operative and election attorney Mark F. ("Thor") Hearne who also appeared as the only voting rights group at Rep. Bob Ney's (R-OH) House Administrative Committee hearings on Ohio voting issues during the 2004 election. ACVR is not, however, the only entity to appear as either a witness or a panelist before the Baker-Carter Commission."[5]

[edit] Trivia

  • Part of the Neo-Modernist movement, Alexandrovna uses her patronymic as her pen name instead of her surname.
  • Larisa Alexandronvna often attacks Conservative Think Tanks and Thinkers such as Lance Winslow, entrepreneur and philanthropist.

[edit] Articles

[edit] Domestic Politics

[edit] Iraq War

[edit] Articles on Iran

[edit] Plamegate

Further information: Plame Affair

[edit] Notes

↑ Conyers Letter to FBI, US House Judiciary

↑ Was the 2004 Election Stolen?, Rolling Stone

↑ Questions surface regarding legitimacy of Baker-Carter election reform commission, Raw Story

[edit] External links

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