Full Version: GAO Report Blasts Electronic Voting
A GAO report has been issued that confirms election discrepancies due to everything from wonky machines that recorded the opposite of what the voter wanted, to security issues that allowed anyone to tamper with voting results, to just plain not recording votes at all.
Some of the problems highlighted in the report include:
*In California, system failures led to “polling place disruptions and an unknown number of disenfranchised voters.”
*In North Carolina, where 4,000 votes were lost when the machines continued to accept votes after their memories were full.
*In Pennsylvania, where system failures caused many votes not to be counted.
*In Florida, where system problems caused delays of up to one hour with each voter.
*In Ohio…well, we all are familiar with what happened in Ohio.
And this gem:
Regardless of your political leanings, the flaws identified by the GAO are directly responsible for incorrect tallies of votes, and the inability of some voters to even be able to cast their vote.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
QUOTE
(1) some electronic voting systems did not encrypt cast ballots or system audit logs, and it was possible to alter both without being detected; (2) it was possible to alter the files that define how a ballot looks and works so that the votes for one candidate could be recorded for a different candidate; and (3) vendors installed uncertified versions of voting system software at the local level. It is important to note that many of the reported concerns were drawn from specific system makes and models or from a specific jurisdiction’s election, and that there is a lack of consensus among election officials and other experts on the pervasiveness of the concerns. Nevertheless, some of these concerns were reported to have caused local problems in federal elections—resulting in the loss or miscount of votes—and therefore merit attention. GAO’s Executive Council on Information Management and Technology is made up of leading executives in government, industry, and academia. GAO Report 05-956
Some of the problems highlighted in the report include:
*In California, system failures led to “polling place disruptions and an unknown number of disenfranchised voters.”
*In North Carolina, where 4,000 votes were lost when the machines continued to accept votes after their memories were full.
*In Pennsylvania, where system failures caused many votes not to be counted.
*In Florida, where system problems caused delays of up to one hour with each voter.
*In Ohio…well, we all are familiar with what happened in Ohio.
And this gem:
QUOTE
In addition, election monitors discovered that the system contained a flaw that allowed one DRE system’s ballots to be added to the canvass totals multiple times without being detected.
Regardless of your political leanings, the flaws identified by the GAO are directly responsible for incorrect tallies of votes, and the inability of some voters to even be able to cast their vote.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
QUOTE
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I think we need machines with an audio aspect and with buttons. You press the button, then the voice says as confirmation. "Thank you for voting for ConservPat. Is this correct?" Then if you press yes, you get a receipt which you then give to the voting officials so they can use it as a type of evidence if someone is accused of voter fraud.
QUOTE
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Hmmm, maybe the House Committee On GOVERNMENT REFORM!!!! Oh but they're wayyyy to busy investigating what shots Jason Giambi put into his hind parts to do that.
QUOTE
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Not unless Libertarian votes are being given to Republican and Democrats.
QUOTE
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Beause the liberal media would have no way of blaming the President for it...Those poor, poor guys.CP
QUOTE(ConservPat @ Oct 27 2005, 04:05 PM)
QUOTE
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I think we need machines with an audio aspect and with buttons. You press the button, then the voice says as confirmation. "Thank you for voting for ConservPat. Is this correct?" Then if you press yes, you get a receipt which you then give to the voting officials so they can use it as a type of evidence if someone is accused of voter fraud.
I have to keep this short as I'm at work. Adding audio to the voting machines wont solve the problems above. If a machine's buffer or memory is full and it starts dropping old vote records to make room for the new ones, it doesn't matter if you have audio or not, those votes are still going to be lost. I find it very surprising that a critical machine like these wouldn't have basic checks on them. Even Winblows knows when it's out of memory.
We geeks
of the world tried to warn DC but as always no one listened to us. Check out one of the more detailed resources here
I truly don't think that the machines are even close to the heart of the problem.
The variety of attempts at election fraud on election night 2004 boggles my mind. I simply didn't realize that people were so completely undemocratic in this country.
It seems to me that no matter who won that night it would have been by some sort of fraud.
Check out the Wiki on this topic!
This is the most comprehensive Wiki I have read....and the most disturbing.
It is clear tha tthere was an active attempt in Ohio to stop people from making their votes. According to this article, and the copious links, many of these have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt to have happened.
The most disturbing information about the voting machines themselves is this two part gem:
1.) Apparently the voting computers, at least many of them, could be accessed remotely and the AP had singular access to the machines ON THE NIGHT OF ELECTION. Come to find out the AP is the antithesis of "the liberal media"..their board being the "who's who" of right wingers in the communications sector. Read the article.
2.) The voting machines themselves seem to have been the brainchild of Republican insiders with 90% of the active machiens haveing been made by one of three companies with strong republican ties and histories of fraud and other illegal activity.
They refused to make their source code available to buying states and, come to find out, there were a variety of untraceable ways of changing vote counts in the individual machines.
These are serious issues. Perhaps it is left wing conspiracy theory...but a lot of these claims have been verified in a court of law. The bugs in the machines are documented.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
According to this Wiki we need to subcontract the design and manufacture of these machines to France.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
I imagine that the best way would be to leave it to the pros. Have universities and small companies compete to come up with the safest and most effective design acccording to a series of standards. Have a group of scientists field test the machines to determine the winners. Competition is so American!
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Was already going...going..going...now gone.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Well, you won't be reading an AP article about it.....
The variety of attempts at election fraud on election night 2004 boggles my mind. I simply didn't realize that people were so completely undemocratic in this country.
It seems to me that no matter who won that night it would have been by some sort of fraud.
Check out the Wiki on this topic!
This is the most comprehensive Wiki I have read....and the most disturbing.
It is clear tha tthere was an active attempt in Ohio to stop people from making their votes. According to this article, and the copious links, many of these have been proven beyond a reasonable doubt to have happened.
The most disturbing information about the voting machines themselves is this two part gem:
1.) Apparently the voting computers, at least many of them, could be accessed remotely and the AP had singular access to the machines ON THE NIGHT OF ELECTION. Come to find out the AP is the antithesis of "the liberal media"..their board being the "who's who" of right wingers in the communications sector. Read the article.
2.) The voting machines themselves seem to have been the brainchild of Republican insiders with 90% of the active machiens haveing been made by one of three companies with strong republican ties and histories of fraud and other illegal activity.
They refused to make their source code available to buying states and, come to find out, there were a variety of untraceable ways of changing vote counts in the individual machines.
These are serious issues. Perhaps it is left wing conspiracy theory...but a lot of these claims have been verified in a court of law. The bugs in the machines are documented.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
According to this Wiki we need to subcontract the design and manufacture of these machines to France.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
I imagine that the best way would be to leave it to the pros. Have universities and small companies compete to come up with the safest and most effective design acccording to a series of standards. Have a group of scientists field test the machines to determine the winners. Competition is so American!
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Was already going...going..going...now gone.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Well, you won't be reading an AP article about it.....
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
How about going back to basics, doing away with voting "machines" altogether, and issuing voters with a pencil. The put an "X" in the box next to the name of the people they want to vote for. Each voting paper is counted separately.
If there is more than one layer of election, use separate ballot papers for each one, rather than trying to cram them all into a single booklet.
Or, better still, hold different elections on different days.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
It should NOT be a political office (i.e. it should not be subject to election itself), and it should not be a private corporation.
I think it should be a senior civil servant rather than a political appointee. The same should apply to the person who is in charge of compiling the electoral register, and for federal elections, the same eligibility rules should be applied equally in all states. (States can do what they like with their own elections.)
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Well, I don't get to vote in the USA, so I don't have to trust the system there. I am glad that the British system is seemingly more robust, and at the same time I'm worried that our increasing tendency to use gimmickry to try and increase turnouts (postal and/or internet ballots, voting machines, etc.) puts the British electoral system at as much risk of corruption as the US system appears to be suffering from.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because they are small-c conservative, and not really "liberal" at all.
I don't like this much, CP. Even if the technology works fine, to maintain the secrecy of the secret ballot, you'd have to soundproof and enclose every election booth. Which, as well as costing a lot of money, opens up a fresh vein of disenfranchisement lawsuits from claustrophobics.
How about going back to basics, doing away with voting "machines" altogether, and issuing voters with a pencil. The put an "X" in the box next to the name of the people they want to vote for. Each voting paper is counted separately.
If there is more than one layer of election, use separate ballot papers for each one, rather than trying to cram them all into a single booklet.
Or, better still, hold different elections on different days.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
It should NOT be a political office (i.e. it should not be subject to election itself), and it should not be a private corporation.
I think it should be a senior civil servant rather than a political appointee. The same should apply to the person who is in charge of compiling the electoral register, and for federal elections, the same eligibility rules should be applied equally in all states. (States can do what they like with their own elections.)
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Well, I don't get to vote in the USA, so I don't have to trust the system there. I am glad that the British system is seemingly more robust, and at the same time I'm worried that our increasing tendency to use gimmickry to try and increase turnouts (postal and/or internet ballots, voting machines, etc.) puts the British electoral system at as much risk of corruption as the US system appears to be suffering from.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because they are small-c conservative, and not really "liberal" at all.
QUOTE(ConservPat @ Oct 27 2005, 09:05 PM)
I think we need machines with an audio aspect and with buttons. You press the button, then the voice says as confirmation. "Thank you for voting for ConservPat. Is this correct?" Then if you press yes, you get a receipt which you then give to the voting officials so they can use it as a type of evidence if someone is accused of voter fraud.
I don't like this much, CP. Even if the technology works fine, to maintain the secrecy of the secret ballot, you'd have to soundproof and enclose every election booth. Which, as well as costing a lot of money, opens up a fresh vein of disenfranchisement lawsuits from claustrophobics.
I think in order to ensure accuracy, completely new machines need to be made that can hold a lot of memory (unlike the voting machines that were accepting votes and not counting them). Also, i think polling places need stricter restrictions such as checking IDs when people have to vote, etc.
The government should clean up this problem (or have the federal government set up a plan with state governments to have each state initally do a clean up and the federal government make the final changes)
Well, I am still going to vote on election day but my trust in our system is a little skewed. Hopefully before the next presidential campaign, changes will be implemented.
The government should clean up this problem (or have the federal government set up a plan with state governments to have each state initally do a clean up and the federal government make the final changes)
Well, I am still going to vote on election day but my trust in our system is a little skewed. Hopefully before the next presidential campaign, changes will be implemented.
I think we need to look at why we thought we needed these machines in the first place. The ridiculously outdated manual equipment used to "count" the 2000 election was somehow replaced by ridiculously inadequate computer methods. I really don't see how a computer system solves more problems than it creates.
In my opinion, the solution to the election debacle was not to go computerized, it was to use better manual methods. The whole reason the punch cards are used is so that they can be counted both by machine and by hand, if need be. The computer votes can't be counted by hand, and even if there is no neferiousness going on, there is far too much room for error. I am sure that it would have cost the country far less to develop better manual methods than to produce the electronic systems of the last election.
I think we need to look at why we thought we needed these machines in the first place. The ridiculously outdated manual equipment used to "count" the 2000 election was somehow replaced by ridiculously inadequate computer methods. I really don't see how a computer system solves more problems than it creates.
In my opinion, the solution to election problems debacle was not to go computerized, it was to use better manual methods. The whole reason the punch cards are used is so that they can be counted both by machine and by hand, if need be. The computer votes can't be counted by hand, and even if there is no neferiousness going on, there is far too much room for error.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Don't throw good money after bad. Dump the whole computerized idea and come up with a better manual method that produces real hard copy.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Put Lani Guinier in charge of the FEC.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
What trust!?!?
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because there isn't any sex involved.
In my opinion, the solution to the election debacle was not to go computerized, it was to use better manual methods. The whole reason the punch cards are used is so that they can be counted both by machine and by hand, if need be. The computer votes can't be counted by hand, and even if there is no neferiousness going on, there is far too much room for error. I am sure that it would have cost the country far less to develop better manual methods than to produce the electronic systems of the last election.
I think we need to look at why we thought we needed these machines in the first place. The ridiculously outdated manual equipment used to "count" the 2000 election was somehow replaced by ridiculously inadequate computer methods. I really don't see how a computer system solves more problems than it creates.
In my opinion, the solution to election problems debacle was not to go computerized, it was to use better manual methods. The whole reason the punch cards are used is so that they can be counted both by machine and by hand, if need be. The computer votes can't be counted by hand, and even if there is no neferiousness going on, there is far too much room for error.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Don't throw good money after bad. Dump the whole computerized idea and come up with a better manual method that produces real hard copy.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Put Lani Guinier in charge of the FEC.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
What trust!?!?
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because there isn't any sex involved.
I'd first like to say this report has a nice "I told you so" quality for those that were seriously doubting these claims before and after the 2004 election, I won't mention names 
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I think the GAO report itself does a good job of pointing out the problems with these machines, that should be a start.
I'll start by repeating my position that electronic voting is critically important to move forward, but we simply are not ready to use this technology in big elections with a lot riding on them.
1. I believe that a group should be formed composed of industry professionals, not politicians, to certify and test these machines. The designs should be rejected until these and other problems are solved.
2. These machines must be proven with a high degree of accuracy in numerous state and local races before they should even be considered for federal races. So far this hasn't been done. The machines are installed in numerous counties but we have relatively few success stories - what we have a lot of is court cases and fraud charges.
3. The funding needs to be there to get an adequate number of machines into all counties.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
I didn't have any in the first place, it confirms my suspicions and gives me some greatly appreciated ammo against those that disagreed with me.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because it doesn't exist, what we have is the "corporate" media and a story like this doesn't sell advertising.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I think the GAO report itself does a good job of pointing out the problems with these machines, that should be a start.
I'll start by repeating my position that electronic voting is critically important to move forward, but we simply are not ready to use this technology in big elections with a lot riding on them.
1. I believe that a group should be formed composed of industry professionals, not politicians, to certify and test these machines. The designs should be rejected until these and other problems are solved.
2. These machines must be proven with a high degree of accuracy in numerous state and local races before they should even be considered for federal races. So far this hasn't been done. The machines are installed in numerous counties but we have relatively few success stories - what we have a lot of is court cases and fraud charges.
3. The funding needs to be there to get an adequate number of machines into all counties.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
I didn't have any in the first place, it confirms my suspicions and gives me some greatly appreciated ammo against those that disagreed with me.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Because it doesn't exist, what we have is the "corporate" media and a story like this doesn't sell advertising.
Every election is a crucially important one.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
A non-partisan commission. If any issue should be non-partisan, surely accurate vote counting is it.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
The US system? Never had any. Bev Haris demonstrated pretty clearly that computerized voting machines could be interfered with.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
As others have said, there is no "liberal media". There is a corporate media. Stories about the voting system are news, but not entertainment, so they don't make the cut.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Abandon voting machines! There are many problems with voting machines:
1) open to tampering (especially with the computerized systems.
2)Prone to error. Hanging chads, etc.
3) They are expensive to purchase and maintain.
4)They cause long lines at the polling place, if there aren't enough machines to go around. There were many stories of people waiting hours in line at their polling places. There is no reason for this, and it's probably one of the main reasons voter turnout in the US is so low.
Up here in Canada, we use paper ballots. They work very well.
Tampering? It can happen, of course, but large piles of paper have to be manipulated, and there are representatives of all parties at the polling places. Significant tampering would be hard to get away with.
Errors? Well, if you can't manage to put an "X" where you mean to, your vote wont count. Errors tend to be on the voters side, not on the tabulation side. People counting ballots by hand will make mistakes, but not many, and the ballots are available for recount if the race is close.
Costs? No machines to purchase or maintain, just a box of pencils and some cardboard screens. Higher manpower requirements on voting day, but it's not that big a cost.
Delays? There are 20 or so voting booths (small table with a cardboard screen for privacy) at every polling place. Generally, if there's a delay, it's in checking peoples identities as they arrive, not during voting itself. I've been voting for 20 years, and 15 minutes was the longest I've ever had to wait. That was a real rarity, and workers said it was the busiest it had been all day.
Why NOT use paper ballots? The only criticism I've head is "But that's so old-fashioned!" . There is no reason NOT to use paper ballots. They DO take longer to count, but we still regularly have results within hours of the poll closings.
Anyone else have any reasons NOT to go back to paper ballots?
It has been a couple of weeks since I asked the question about the lack of media coverage of this story. Even if you believe the media is a conservative corporate tool (which I do), I am still flat out amazed at the silence of the press. After all, we just had an election! It's pertinent! It's timely!
After doing a cursory search, the only mentions I can find are from foreign news sources. And this:
It makes me wonder what it takes to get a journalist to act like a journalist. Here is solid evidence that the presidential election was...er, um, not as accurate as one might wish, and there is nary a peep from an enterprising MSM newsie?
Edited to add link to Brad Friedman's article.
Just by the by - oddly enough, one of the ink spot ballot machines wasn't working right at my polling place yesterday. It was smearing ink all down the side of the ballots.
After doing a cursory search, the only mentions I can find are from foreign news sources. And this:
QUOTE
BradBlog.com's Brad Friedman says major wire services and American newspapers have given little or no coverage to last month's Government Accountability Office (GAO) report confirming election irregularities.
Friedman made his criticism in an article titled "Mainstream Media to American Democracy: Drop Dead!" It appeared Friday on HuffingtonPost.com, which is named after syndicated columnist Arianna Huffington of Tribune Media Services. Editor & Publisher
Friedman made his criticism in an article titled "Mainstream Media to American Democracy: Drop Dead!" It appeared Friday on HuffingtonPost.com, which is named after syndicated columnist Arianna Huffington of Tribune Media Services. Editor & Publisher
It makes me wonder what it takes to get a journalist to act like a journalist. Here is solid evidence that the presidential election was...er, um, not as accurate as one might wish, and there is nary a peep from an enterprising MSM newsie?
Edited to add link to Brad Friedman's article.
Just by the by - oddly enough, one of the ink spot ballot machines wasn't working right at my polling place yesterday. It was smearing ink all down the side of the ballots.
It appears that the GAO report is very plain in saying that my and your votes could be manipulated. You could vote for one person but the voting machine(software) could record your vote for another person. It couldn't be plainer then the nose on your face.
After the 2004 presidental election, there were a few of us AD members that questioned the validity of the voting machines. Of course, in a flash, we were called kooks, eccentric, or conspiracy nuts.
The statements from the informed majority were:
1. no one can manipulate the votes
2. or if it was possible,too many people would have to be involved. From the GAO report, it appears only a very few people would have to be involved.
I have noticed that our informed majority have become silent lately. No apologies for calling us kooks, but that would be contrary to their nature.
After the 2004 presidental election, there were a few of us AD members that questioned the validity of the voting machines. Of course, in a flash, we were called kooks, eccentric, or conspiracy nuts.
The statements from the informed majority were:
1. no one can manipulate the votes
2. or if it was possible,too many people would have to be involved. From the GAO report, it appears only a very few people would have to be involved.
I have noticed that our informed majority have become silent lately. No apologies for calling us kooks, but that would be contrary to their nature.
The idea of a computerized system becoming the only system makes me feel a bit nervous about the validity of voting in the future. I think that even if each system were in a closed circuit (ie. not open to the internet/ethernet, no wireless, NOTHING) that they could still be tampered with or (much more commonly) malfunction.
I hate to say it, but the only people who could fix this would be specialized technicians, and that makes me nervous too. When a small amount of people have access to a large amount of information, powerful information, such as election results and such it seems that things could too easily be changed, especially on a computer system. With the manual style (like a punch card or something) a vote can't be changed permanently, the worst that could happen is it could be nullified.
To me, the best thing to do would be to go back to the old manual system. Granted, it's not perfect, but there are probably better systems we could use to speed things up. Like the punch card idea where it could be counted by machine or by hand. If a money-counter like machine is used then it could count the votes quickly and accurately and all we would need to do is design a more simple, "idiot-proof" (which might be harder to design than the computerized system) ballot system. Plus identifying marks could be used to avoid people who try tampering by adding a watermark or some sort of reaction to UV light like currency. Perhaps we should see how counterfeit money is counted and detected then model our voting system after that, I would hazard a guess that our money checking system is far more advanced than our voting system at being accurate.
I hate to say it, but the only people who could fix this would be specialized technicians, and that makes me nervous too. When a small amount of people have access to a large amount of information, powerful information, such as election results and such it seems that things could too easily be changed, especially on a computer system. With the manual style (like a punch card or something) a vote can't be changed permanently, the worst that could happen is it could be nullified.
To me, the best thing to do would be to go back to the old manual system. Granted, it's not perfect, but there are probably better systems we could use to speed things up. Like the punch card idea where it could be counted by machine or by hand. If a money-counter like machine is used then it could count the votes quickly and accurately and all we would need to do is design a more simple, "idiot-proof" (which might be harder to design than the computerized system) ballot system. Plus identifying marks could be used to avoid people who try tampering by adding a watermark or some sort of reaction to UV light like currency. Perhaps we should see how counterfeit money is counted and detected then model our voting system after that, I would hazard a guess that our money checking system is far more advanced than our voting system at being accurate.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I'm with Julian and Stickman on this one. Paper ballots. Put an X in a box next to the candidates name (in pen, not pencil, guys). Count them by hand. Twice. Once by a conservative/Republican, once by a liberal/Democrat. Have a third (neutral) party certify the agreed count.
Nothing is more vital to our form of government than elections. I am not willing to sacrifice "ease" for accuracy. This happens once a year, at most. I don't care if it takes two months to count paper ballots by hand. I'm willing to wait - as should we all be. It is the ONLY way to secure our elections. All other methods are prone to error and corruption. Even hand counts aren't foolproof, but if anyone can come up with another system that is guaranteed to be more accurate, I'll happily endorse it. Until they can, other systems should not even be considered.
Who should be in charge of the effort to "clean up" the vote counting system?
I don't care. Whoever can force a return to paper ballots and hand counts only. In this case, I don't care if it comes from the judiciary, Congress, or by royal decree. With the restoration of an accurate voting system, there's no need to "clean up" anything.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Nope. I had none.
Why hasn’t the so-called "liberal" media been all over this story?
Because it is "so-called".
I have a question of my own here. Why is there no participant in this thread with "Republican" next to "Party affiliation" in their profile? Perhaps they know what the GAO wouldn't say: in the 2004 election, one party and one party only benefitted from these "problems".
I'm with Julian and Stickman on this one. Paper ballots. Put an X in a box next to the candidates name (in pen, not pencil, guys). Count them by hand. Twice. Once by a conservative/Republican, once by a liberal/Democrat. Have a third (neutral) party certify the agreed count.
Nothing is more vital to our form of government than elections. I am not willing to sacrifice "ease" for accuracy. This happens once a year, at most. I don't care if it takes two months to count paper ballots by hand. I'm willing to wait - as should we all be. It is the ONLY way to secure our elections. All other methods are prone to error and corruption. Even hand counts aren't foolproof, but if anyone can come up with another system that is guaranteed to be more accurate, I'll happily endorse it. Until they can, other systems should not even be considered.
Who should be in charge of the effort to "clean up" the vote counting system?
I don't care. Whoever can force a return to paper ballots and hand counts only. In this case, I don't care if it comes from the judiciary, Congress, or by royal decree. With the restoration of an accurate voting system, there's no need to "clean up" anything.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Nope. I had none.
Why hasn’t the so-called "liberal" media been all over this story?
Because it is "so-called".
I have a question of my own here. Why is there no participant in this thread with "Republican" next to "Party affiliation" in their profile? Perhaps they know what the GAO wouldn't say: in the 2004 election, one party and one party only benefitted from these "problems".
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
A return to paper ballots would be a start. The machines have not proven to be reliable, therefore should be taken out of service, and as others have recommended, a non-partisan commission should look at viable technological alternatives to paper in the future.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
No more than had already been affected by constant findings of dead people voting and other instances of partisan fraud.
Why hasn't the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Heh....so called......
The media hasn't been all over this story because there is no smoking gun to point at anyone. The story isn't sexy unless it can be used to bring down someone in power. The GAO findings don't conclude that either major party benefited from the errors, so the end result is a report of techno-garble that won't interest the squishy middle of America.
A return to paper ballots would be a start. The machines have not proven to be reliable, therefore should be taken out of service, and as others have recommended, a non-partisan commission should look at viable technological alternatives to paper in the future.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
No more than had already been affected by constant findings of dead people voting and other instances of partisan fraud.
Why hasn't the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
Heh....so called......
The media hasn't been all over this story because there is no smoking gun to point at anyone. The story isn't sexy unless it can be used to bring down someone in power. The GAO findings don't conclude that either major party benefited from the errors, so the end result is a report of techno-garble that won't interest the squishy middle of America.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
I'll buck the trend. We don't "need" paper ballots. As long as the will is there to defraud the final vote, the fraud will happen. The best thing to do is to make it as difficult as possible. Also there needs to be a genuine effort to make elections free of even the appearance of impropriety. In this our nation has fallen shamefully short.
We need to make sure that we are picking technology and techniques based on the desire to have a perfect system. Not based on who gets a contract or any other less banal reason.
I think we can create a system that uses available technology effectively and effective double book accounting standards.
I couldn't believe I was going into an election booth in 2004 and pressing some buttons and being told thanks. Why am I supposed to trust that system? Fraud in government? My governments? Could I ever believe that (BIG SARCASTIC SMILEY)?
Why is our government so god-awfully behind technologically?
How about this? I go into vote. I select on a screen. And out prints a numerically registered voting receipt in duplicate like with my credit/debit card receipt system that even the week-old Chinese restaurant down the street has the ability to purchase.
I verify that it has my picks on it. I keep one copy. And I deposit another in the paper box before I leave. Then we can count those, account for the number of missing ballots using the same type of system I always used with my tickets when I bartended or waited tables or closed a restaurant for a night.
At the end, the computer tally and the paper double check for a precinct should have the same result. At that point then the books are right and the precinct is closed.
A computer can be rigged to print a receipt with a carbon copy. If counting once carefully is good, then double checking with a different system is even better right? This is my idea of spending my tax dollars responsibly.
The technology should be subjected to rigorous independent inspections. And a paper back-up system should always be ready in case of emergency.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
We all should be. Technology and officials should be reassigned permanently away from elections if there is a problem once. Training and planning should be ongoing and some really dedicated and tenacious people should be thinking through our electoral systems to see coming problems. 2000 was a shame, 2004 was a sham. Not because it was a republican conspiracy, but because the system should have been flawless after the embarrassing debacle of the previous presidential election.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Yes. It makes me troubled for the future of our electoral system.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
It's not good for ratings. This isn't a liberal/conservative problem. It is a problem of mediocrity and glacial movement. B-O-R-I-N-G. Some celebrity has a new diet program that will hook people in for fifteen seconds. Move the election story to another day. And it is a report. It is not sensational. The events studied were way longer than fifteen minutes ago. It doesn't appeal to the right demographic. The media's dog ate its homework.
Ranting into John Belushi's speech in the tunnel under the venue where the Blue's Brothers were escaping but ran into John's irate machine gun wielding ex.
I'll buck the trend. We don't "need" paper ballots. As long as the will is there to defraud the final vote, the fraud will happen. The best thing to do is to make it as difficult as possible. Also there needs to be a genuine effort to make elections free of even the appearance of impropriety. In this our nation has fallen shamefully short.
We need to make sure that we are picking technology and techniques based on the desire to have a perfect system. Not based on who gets a contract or any other less banal reason.
I think we can create a system that uses available technology effectively and effective double book accounting standards.
I couldn't believe I was going into an election booth in 2004 and pressing some buttons and being told thanks. Why am I supposed to trust that system? Fraud in government? My governments? Could I ever believe that (BIG SARCASTIC SMILEY)?
Why is our government so god-awfully behind technologically?
How about this? I go into vote. I select on a screen. And out prints a numerically registered voting receipt in duplicate like with my credit/debit card receipt system that even the week-old Chinese restaurant down the street has the ability to purchase.
I verify that it has my picks on it. I keep one copy. And I deposit another in the paper box before I leave. Then we can count those, account for the number of missing ballots using the same type of system I always used with my tickets when I bartended or waited tables or closed a restaurant for a night.
At the end, the computer tally and the paper double check for a precinct should have the same result. At that point then the books are right and the precinct is closed.
A computer can be rigged to print a receipt with a carbon copy. If counting once carefully is good, then double checking with a different system is even better right? This is my idea of spending my tax dollars responsibly.
The technology should be subjected to rigorous independent inspections. And a paper back-up system should always be ready in case of emergency.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
We all should be. Technology and officials should be reassigned permanently away from elections if there is a problem once. Training and planning should be ongoing and some really dedicated and tenacious people should be thinking through our electoral systems to see coming problems. 2000 was a shame, 2004 was a sham. Not because it was a republican conspiracy, but because the system should have been flawless after the embarrassing debacle of the previous presidential election.
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
Yes. It makes me troubled for the future of our electoral system.
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
It's not good for ratings. This isn't a liberal/conservative problem. It is a problem of mediocrity and glacial movement. B-O-R-I-N-G. Some celebrity has a new diet program that will hook people in for fifteen seconds. Move the election story to another day. And it is a report. It is not sensational. The events studied were way longer than fifteen minutes ago. It doesn't appeal to the right demographic. The media's dog ate its homework.
Ranting into John Belushi's speech in the tunnel under the venue where the Blue's Brothers were escaping but ran into John's irate machine gun wielding ex.
QUOTE(Wertz @ Nov 13 2005, 11:10 AM)
I have a question of my own here. Why is there no participant in this thread with "Republican" next to "Party affiliation" in their profile? Perhaps they know what the GAO wouldn't say: in the 2004 election, one party and one party only benefitted from these "problems".
That's an easy one. We are too busy trying to figure out what went wrong in the 2005 elections. After all, that was a sweeping victory by the other side wasn't it?
So, rather than posting here, we've been holding emergency meetings on our VRWC Election manipulations committee to figure out just what went wrong.
We think we know, but if I told you what it was, I'd have to kill ya.... 
QUOTE(ConservPat @ Oct 27 2005, 02:05 PM)
QUOTE
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
Hmmm, maybe the House Committee On GOVERNMENT REFORM!!!! Oh but they're wayyyy to busy investigating what shots Jason Giambi put into his hind parts to do that.
I agree wholeheartedly with this. An existing committee should pick this up and run with it. Would do them some good.
QUOTE(popeye47 @ Nov 13 2005, 08:47 AM)
It appears that the GAO report is very plain in saying that my and your votes could be manipulated. You could vote for one person but the voting machine(software) could record your vote for another person. It couldn't be plainer then the nose on your face.
After the 2004 presidental election, there were a few of us AD members that questioned the validity of the voting machines. Of course, in a flash, we were called kooks, eccentric, or conspiracy nuts.
The statements from the informed majority were:
1. no one can manipulate the votes
After the 2004 presidental election, there were a few of us AD members that questioned the validity of the voting machines. Of course, in a flash, we were called kooks, eccentric, or conspiracy nuts.
The statements from the informed majority were:
1. no one can manipulate the votes
This report shows that someone COULD manipulate the votes. It doesn't show that someone DID manipulate the votes. That's why most of us didn't subscribe to the grand conspiracy theory. The vast majority of election results were pretty darn close to what the polls predicted, as I recall. (but not the exit polls in some cases, separate topic please)
QUOTE(Wertz @ Nov 13 2005, 01:10 PM)
I have a question of my own here. Why is there no participant in this thread with "Republican" next to "Party affiliation" in their profile? Perhaps they know what the GAO wouldn't say: in the 2004 election, one party and one party only benefitted from these "problems".
Even if only one party benefitted from "these problems" there were certainly many problems of the traditional variety, and those seemed likely to benefit...well, let's say the "other" side. see here for philly details. see here for summary.
QUOTE(acvr report)
The report finds that paid Democrat operatives were far more involved in voter intimidation and suppression activities than were their Republican counterparts during the 2004 presidential election. Examples include paid Democrat operatives charged with slashing tires on GOP get-out-the-vote vans in Milwaukee and an Ohio court order stopping Democrat operatives from calling voters telling them the wrong date for the election and faulty polling place information.
The report further finds that thousands of Americans were disenfranchised by illegal votes cast and a coordinated effort by members of certain "nonpartisan" organizations to rig the election system through voter registration fraud in more than a dozen states. Examples include a law enforcement task force finding "clear evidence of fraud in the Nov. 2 election in Milwaukee," including hundreds of felon and double voters and thousands more ballots cast than voters recorded as having voted in the city and multiple indictments and convictions of ACORN workers for voter registration fraud in several states.
The report further finds that thousands of Americans were disenfranchised by illegal votes cast and a coordinated effort by members of certain "nonpartisan" organizations to rig the election system through voter registration fraud in more than a dozen states. Examples include a law enforcement task force finding "clear evidence of fraud in the Nov. 2 election in Milwaukee," including hundreds of felon and double voters and thousands more ballots cast than voters recorded as having voted in the city and multiple indictments and convictions of ACORN workers for voter registration fraud in several states.
The report above was met by collective media silence as well, so I suppose at least our 'corporate media' are consistent.
I don't want to start a flame war or serve as an apologist for bad technology produced by evil Republicrats. I'm just pointing out that, while this fraud MAY be used to benefit one side, the most dangerous and most common fraud is over-registration, double voting, fake addresses, intimidation, etc. Good old fashioned vote fraud. And it still goes on like crazy. In the Washington governor's race, there is no way anyone will ever have confidence in that election, and those were paper ballots. It's just that some were 'lost' and some were 'found' and some were cast by dead people. Mayor Daley would be proud.
QUOTE(Eeyore @ Nov 13 2005, 10:20 PM)
How about this? I go into vote. I select on a screen. And out prints a numerically registered voting receipt in duplicate like with my credit/debit card receipt system that even the week-old Chinese restaurant down the street has the ability to purchase.
I verify that it has my picks on it. I keep one copy. And I deposit another in the paper box before I leave. Then we can count those, account for the number of missing ballots using the same type of system I always used with my tickets when I bartended or waited tables or closed a restaurant for a night.
I verify that it has my picks on it. I keep one copy. And I deposit another in the paper box before I leave. Then we can count those, account for the number of missing ballots using the same type of system I always used with my tickets when I bartended or waited tables or closed a restaurant for a night.
My only concern about this technology is that a true audit wouldn't be trusted. Was it a problem with the receipts? Could someone forge receipts and demand a recount? We can't expect every voter to re-produce their receipts on demand in case of fraud.
I think that whatever system we use has to stand on its own, vs. having receipts / audits at a later date. Something has to engender trust in the system and paper ballots are probably the best way forward. Anything but these darn punch cards. I'd say that requiring ID, using paper ballots, and more professional/independent election judges would be a big help.
QUOTE(Carlitoswhey)
This report shows that someone COULD manipulate the votes. It doesn't show that someone DID manipulate the votes. That's why most of us didn't subscribe to the grand conspiracy theory. The vast majority of election results were pretty darn close to what the polls predicted, as I recall. (but not the exit polls in some cases, separate topic please)
Au contraire. The whole purpose of the report was suspicion that irregularities DID occur, as stated at the very beginning of the report.
QUOTE(GAO Report @ Page 2)
Nevertheless, some of these concerns were reported to have caused local problems in federal elections—resulting in the loss or miscount of votes—and therefore merit attention.
(emphasis mine)I can't imagine that even if there was rock-solid proof that votes were miscounted that anything will be done about it at this late date....though I would certainly love to see someone booted out of an office he didn't legitimately win.
QUOTE(DaffyGrl @ Nov 15 2005, 02:40 PM)
QUOTE(Carlitoswhey)
This report shows that someone COULD manipulate the votes. It doesn't show that someone DID manipulate the votes. That's why most of us didn't subscribe to the grand conspiracy theory. The vast majority of election results were pretty darn close to what the polls predicted, as I recall. (but not the exit polls in some cases, separate topic please)
Au contraire. The whole purpose of the report was suspicion that irregularities DID occur, as stated at the very beginning of the report.
Yes irregularities DID occur. Every bullet you excised and nearly every problem listed in the report was "system problems" or "system failure." "System Problem" is not synomonous with "someone manipulated the votes."
QUOTE
QUOTE(GAO Report @ Page 2)
Nevertheless, some of these concerns were reported to have caused local problems in federal elections—resulting in the loss or miscount of votes—and therefore merit attention.
(emphasis mine)I can't imagine that even if there was rock-solid proof that votes were miscounted that anything will be done about it at this late date....though I would certainly love to see someone booted out of an office he didn't legitimately win.
QUOTE(carlitoswhey @ Nov 15 2005, 12:54 PM)
QUOTE(DaffyGrl @ Nov 15 2005, 02:40 PM)
QUOTE(Carlitoswhey)
This report shows that someone COULD manipulate the votes. It doesn't show that someone DID manipulate the votes. That's why most of us didn't subscribe to the grand conspiracy theory. The vast majority of election results were pretty darn close to what the polls predicted, as I recall. (but not the exit polls in some cases, separate topic please)
Au contraire. The whole purpose of the report was suspicion that irregularities DID occur, as stated at the very beginning of the report.
Yes irregularities DID occur. Every bullet you excised and nearly every problem listed in the report was "system problems" or "system failure." "System Problem" is not synomonous with "someone manipulated the votes."
You are re-writing history quite a bit Carlito. There are many of us that were arguing quite passionately in 2004 that these machines were in fact flawed and the system could quite easily be gamed. Evidence was even cited of precisely how it could be done by an average person with a little bit of inside knowledge. Still even in the face of that almost anyone with a "Republican" tag next to their name here claimed that the machines were perfect and above reproach. Anyone who thought otherwise was spinning wild tin-foil hat theories, even those of us with IT backgrounds that know even the best intentioned software has serious flaws when hurried to market.
Now we have proof that the machines did make mistakes, several of the mistakes in fact that people cited previously - this time from an unimpeachable source. The report does not assign blame for the mistakes or assign motive but it says without a shadow of a doubt that they happened.
If you don't feel that casts doubt on the validity of an election that despite millions of votes cast really came down to a few thousand votes in a lot of states and precints then I guess you just don't care about fair elections.
Personally I think it is probably to late to get a real investigation going now that a year has passed, but those of us that thought something was up in 2004 were right, period.
Personally I don't believe it is of any value to try and figure out if there was some nefarious plot to influence the election in 2004. What I am interested in is completely shutting these machines down until they are certified by a highly respected group of independent professionals.
QUOTE
You are re-writing history quite a bit Carlito. There are many of us that were arguing quite passionately in 2004 that these machines were in fact flawed and the system could quite easily be gamed. Evidence was even cited of precisely how it could be done by an average person with a little bit of inside knowledge. Still even in the face of that almost anyone with a "Republican" tag next to their name here claimed that the machines were perfect and above reproach. Anyone who thought otherwise was spinning wild tin-foil hat theories, even those of us with IT backgrounds that know even the best intentioned software has serious flaws when hurried to market.
Thanks CJ for that statement.
First our Republican friends strongly denied that anyone could adjust or tinker with the votes.
Now they have changed their tune to state that there is no proof that anyone may have tinkered with the votes.
We never stated that we knew the vote was manipulated. We state that there was a chance for it to happen.
Now we know that was a possibility that it could happen.
But alas, the goalposts have been moved again by our Republican friends.
Almost similar to the WMD situtation.
Just keep moving the goalposts, and their team will never lose.
QUOTE(popeye47 @ Nov 15 2005, 05:43 PM)
QUOTE
You are re-writing history quite a bit Carlito. There are many of us that were arguing quite passionately in 2004 that these machines were in fact flawed and the system could quite easily be gamed. Evidence was even cited of precisely how it could be done by an average person with a little bit of inside knowledge. Still even in the face of that almost anyone with a "Republican" tag next to their name here claimed that the machines were perfect and above reproach. Anyone who thought otherwise was spinning wild tin-foil hat theories, even those of us with IT backgrounds that know even the best intentioned software has serious flaws when hurried to market.
Thanks CJ for that statement.
First our Republican friends strongly denied that anyone could adjust or tinker with the votes.
Now they have changed their tune to state that there is no proof that anyone may have tinkered with the votes.
We never stated that we knew the vote was manipulated. We state that there was a chance for it to happen.
Now we know that was a possibility that it could happen.
But alas, the goalposts have been moved again by our Republican friends.
Almost similar to the WMD situtation.
Just keep moving the goalposts, and their team will never lose.
Well, since I can't really count myself as among your Republican friends, I won't be offended by this
Or as you said of me at the time:... "Since you are one of the few on AD that is willing to debate intelligently instead of make SNIDE IMMATURE REMARKS ..."
As a few of us were saying at the time, yes of course someone COULD tamper with electronic code, much as someone COULD pay homeless men with packs of cigarettes if they vote for Democrats. I think that DaytonRocker (who knows a little about programming) said it best.
QUOTE(DaytonRocker)
In summary, if you left me (or any decent programmer) with an evoting machine alone for a couple hours, I might be able to rig an election. If you left my 5 year old daughter alone in a room with a box full of paper ballots for a couple hours, she could rig an election.
As noted multiple times within the GAO report, there has never been a proven case of fraud involving tampering with electronic voting systems. If, however, such a case of fraud (notably an inside job) did occur, it would be difficult to prove. Nor do we believe that either party seeks to leave decent programmers alone with voting machines for a couple of hours.
I'll keep saying what I was saying back in November of 2004 - for such a fraud to be so small as to not be obvious (like changing, say, 3% of the votes) it would have to be so widespread (like, every one of maybe 800 counties across 8 states) that it would indeed have to be a grand conspiracy and would not ever happen without it being found out. It's just not realistic. Just because the Diebolt CEO is a republican does not meant that his legion of programmers would cooperate, just to give one example.
Many of you appear to be connecting the dots with these different sorts of mechanical, human and electronic errors and at least hinting that this benefits Republicans - but the GAO report just doesn't say that. And, as I noted, all of these different, detectable sorts of errors indicate exactly the opposite of an organized plot to steal the election. Which, if I read "we all know what happened in Ohio" and "I would certainly love to see someone booted out of an office he didn't legitimately win" by our topic starter, how else am I supposed to read that?
We all agree that voting systems should work and work accurately. This GAO report is helpful. As noted, it doesn't prove "Bush stole the election" which is why it's not leading prime time TV newscasts.
**It's off topic, but as to your WMD comments, I just can't understand how Bush, Sandy Berger and Madeline Albright saying exactly the same thing about WMD makes Bush a liar and the other two truth-tellers. (you happy CJ - I didn't mention Clinton once there! ) Maybe you guys could enlighten me in another topic sometime.
QUOTE(carlitoswhey @ Nov 16 2005, 11:18 AM)
As noted multiple times within the GAO report, there has never been a proven case of fraud involving tampering with electronic voting systems. If, however, such a case of fraud (notably an inside job) did occur, it would be difficult to prove. Nor do we believe that either party seeks to leave decent programmers alone with voting machines for a couple of hours.
According to blackboxvoting.org it took no expertise at all and only a few seconds to exploit the largest flaw in the Diebold machines.
QUOTE
According to the Aug. 18, 2004 report by CompuWare Corp., an independent evaluation commissioned by the Ohio secretary of state:
"... an unauthorized person with access to the GEMS server can access the database and change ballot definition files and election results."
The ability to selectively change ballot definition files with mail-in votes can achieve vote swapping from one candidate to another. In GEMS, each candidate is assigned a number.
Sims: #413
Irons: #200
Lange: #522
In GEMS, you can selectively change the candidate identifier number for mail-in votes, like this:
Sims: #200
Irons: #413
Lange: #522
This will cause the mail-in results to give Sims votes to Irons, and vice versa, a very dangerous vulnerability for close elections. (You can also change the votes themselves in GEMS, but that requires adjustments in several GEMS database tables.)
Changing the candidate identifier number in GEMS provides one-step adjustment that takes only seconds, and can be implemented any time during the absentee vote-counting process to flip results. As demonstrated in the Leon County, Florida elections office on May 2, 2005 by Dr. Herbert Thompson and Black Box Voting, this kind of GEMS manipulation does not require opening the GEMS program, does not require a GEMS password, and does not show up in any audit log.
The standard safeguard for this known risk is to compare results reports from voting machines with GEMS results reports. However, Black Box Voting has learned that Diebold's mail-in vote-counting system does not produce a voting machine report.
"... an unauthorized person with access to the GEMS server can access the database and change ballot definition files and election results."
The ability to selectively change ballot definition files with mail-in votes can achieve vote swapping from one candidate to another. In GEMS, each candidate is assigned a number.
Sims: #413
Irons: #200
Lange: #522
In GEMS, you can selectively change the candidate identifier number for mail-in votes, like this:
Sims: #200
Irons: #413
Lange: #522
This will cause the mail-in results to give Sims votes to Irons, and vice versa, a very dangerous vulnerability for close elections. (You can also change the votes themselves in GEMS, but that requires adjustments in several GEMS database tables.)
Changing the candidate identifier number in GEMS provides one-step adjustment that takes only seconds, and can be implemented any time during the absentee vote-counting process to flip results. As demonstrated in the Leon County, Florida elections office on May 2, 2005 by Dr. Herbert Thompson and Black Box Voting, this kind of GEMS manipulation does not require opening the GEMS program, does not require a GEMS password, and does not show up in any audit log.
The standard safeguard for this known risk is to compare results reports from voting machines with GEMS results reports. However, Black Box Voting has learned that Diebold's mail-in vote-counting system does not produce a voting machine report.
Edited to add: If you read the Diebold memos linked below you will see that they were aware of this problem in 2001 latest.
QUOTE
I'll keep saying what I was saying back in November of 2004 - for such a fraud to be so small as to not be obvious (like changing, say, 3% of the votes) it would have to be so widespread (like, every one of maybe 800 counties across 8 states) that it would indeed have to be a grand conspiracy and would not ever happen without it being found out.
Oddly?, this same exploit in the software targets mail-in votes for switching. According to the same article, mail-in votes are the only ones in most states that are not subject to a double check in a hand recount. Thus they can go easily undetectable.
QUOTE
Therefore, the only way to catch a GEMS hack for mail-in votes is a hand count. California requires a hand count spot check -- but the 1 percent required is not only insufficient to catch manipulation, it is not required for mail-in votes. Most states using GEMS don't have hand count spot checks at all, leaving mail-in votes to the mercy of GEMS.
QUOTE
It's just not realistic. Just because the Diebolt CEO is a republican does not meant that his legion of programmers would cooperate, just to give one example.
If you read the Diebold memos, loads of their internal email stolen by a hacker, you can see that their programmers were well aware of the problems and remained MUM tothe outside world. I guess you can hope that people wouldn't be so mercenary but I guess they just are...
QUOTE
Many of you appear to be connecting the dots with these different sorts of mechanical, human and electronic errors and at least hinting that this benefits Republicans - but the GAO report just doesn't say that. And, as I noted, all of these different, detectable sorts of errors indicate exactly the opposite of an organized plot to steal the election. Which, if I read "we all know what happened in Ohio" and "I would certainly love to see someone booted out of an office he didn't legitimately win" by our topic starter, how else am I supposed to read that?
Here's just one example of alleged illegal activity by Diebold leading to a dubious election result. But there are more examples, like Chuck Hagel's election using ES&S machines from his own company. Polls had him way behind but he amazingly won. But, back to the example at hand:
QUOTE
According to Rob Behler, an engineer hired as a contractor to work in Diebold's Georgia warehouse last year, the Diebold systems had major functioning problems.
Behler said 25 to 30 percent of the machines in one shipment to the warehouse either crashed upon booting or had problems with their real-time clocks, causing the systems to register the date inaccurately then boot improperly or freeze up altogether.
"They did not meet what I would deem standard operation," he said.
Behler said Diebold provided warehouse workers with at least three patches to apply to the systems before state officials began logic and accuracy testing on them. Behler said one patch was applied to machines when he came to the warehouse in June, a second patch was applied in July and a third in August after he left the warehouse.
Behler first informed Bev Harris, owner of the BlackBox Voting site, of the situation. Harris has spent a year investigating problems with electronic voting systems, and is the author of a forthcoming book on the technology. She said the practice of patching systems after they've been certified opens the possibility for anyone -- from Diebold employees to local election officials -- to install malicious code on a machine that could alter election results and then delete itself to avoid detection.
According to Harris, this scenario is particularly worrisome in light of what happened in the Georgia gubernatorial race, which ended in a major upset that defied all polls and put a Republican in the governor's seat for the first time in more than 130 years.
Behler said 25 to 30 percent of the machines in one shipment to the warehouse either crashed upon booting or had problems with their real-time clocks, causing the systems to register the date inaccurately then boot improperly or freeze up altogether.
"They did not meet what I would deem standard operation," he said.
Behler said Diebold provided warehouse workers with at least three patches to apply to the systems before state officials began logic and accuracy testing on them. Behler said one patch was applied to machines when he came to the warehouse in June, a second patch was applied in July and a third in August after he left the warehouse.
Behler first informed Bev Harris, owner of the BlackBox Voting site, of the situation. Harris has spent a year investigating problems with electronic voting systems, and is the author of a forthcoming book on the technology. She said the practice of patching systems after they've been certified opens the possibility for anyone -- from Diebold employees to local election officials -- to install malicious code on a machine that could alter election results and then delete itself to avoid detection.
According to Harris, this scenario is particularly worrisome in light of what happened in the Georgia gubernatorial race, which ended in a major upset that defied all polls and put a Republican in the governor's seat for the first time in more than 130 years.
QUOTE
We all agree that voting systems should work and work accurately. This GAO report is helpful. As noted, it doesn't prove "Bush stole the election" which is why it's not leading prime time TV newscasts.
Please, by all means, take a gander at this list of wild improbabilities that actually occurred in the Ohio election of 2004.
My favorite is this one:
QUOTE
But Bush’s numbers meant 13,566 people who voted for C. Ellen Connally, the liberal Democratic candidate for Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice, also voted for Bush. In Butler Country, Bush officially was given 109,866 votes. But conservative GOP Chief Justice Moyer was given only 68,407, a negative discrepancy of more than 40,000 votes. Meanwhile, Connally was credited with 61,559 votes to John Kerry's 56,234. This would mean that while Bush vastly outpolled his Republican counterpart running for the Supreme Court, African-American female Democrat running for the Supreme Court on the Democratic side outpolled Kerry. By all accounts such an outcome is inconceivable. Again, it indicates a very significant and likely fraudulent shifting of votes to Bush.
Add to that the fact that Ken Blackwell, the Republican Secretary of State went through legal contortions to stop the public viewing of voting records after the 2004 election. At the same time the uncounted ballots were left out on a table and unprotected so that they could not be verified as untainted AND some Diebold employees showed up "inexplicably" and dismantled a bunch of the machiens used in that vote so the electronic record was lost.
I understand that the stalwart believer will sum this all up to a series of unfortunate coincidences, but lets be logical. The best arguments are made through the buildup of many small bits of evidence. Truth can always be made to seem relative. Thus, when so many factors point to one thing there can only be one conclusion. The republicans rig votes WAY better than Democrats. While the dems cut some tires in an unimportant district and flyered yet others with bad informaiton the republicans went to great levels of complexity. They targtted spcific areas, relied upon numerous methods of vote interruption and ensured that no "smoking gun" issues could lead back to them. The many deceipts are clear. Claiming that they do not add up to one BIG organized deceipt is a matter of sheer faith. And let me tell you, I have never seen a politician part a body of water or turn water into wine....and as such I have no such faith in them.
QUOTE(cube jockey)
... Anyone who thought otherwise was spinning wild tin-foil hat theories...
QUOTE(La Herring Rouge @ Nov 16 2005, 07:31 PM)
Just kidding. Well, since I have a job and don't have time to investigate every hare-brained claim by Bev Harris, I'll pick two or three and run with those. Hope you don't mind, but time is money. 
QUOTE(La Herring Rouge @ Nov 16 2005, 07:31 PM)
Edited to add: If you read the Diebold memos linked below you will see that they were aware of this problem in 2001 latest.
<snip>
If you read the Diebold memos, loads of their internal email stolen by a hacker, you can see that their programmers were well aware of the problems and remained MUM tothe outside world. I guess you can hope that people wouldn't be so mercenary but I guess they just are...
<snip>
QUOTE(carlito)
It's just not realistic. Just because the Diebolt CEO is a republican does not meant that his legion of programmers would cooperate, just to give one example.
If you read the Diebold memos, loads of their internal email stolen by a hacker, you can see that their programmers were well aware of the problems and remained MUM tothe outside world. I guess you can hope that people wouldn't be so mercenary but I guess they just are...
First off, since you have linked to memos being stored on a university student's personal web page, I suggest that the burden is on you to prove these are authentic, and that they say what you say they say. Moreso than "if you check the link you'll see..."
I checked the link and frankly whatever. There are disgruntled product developers at every company including mine. And every company has profit pressure - believe me, I personally had to rush a product to market last year, and it caused me much stress and the final product was not perfect. That does not mean that whomever in the state that would have access to these machines would know how to exploit this bug and go ahead and exploit it. Yes, it's a potential bug, but it's not a stolen election.
QUOTE(laherringrouge)
QUOTE
Many of you appear to be connecting the dots with these different sorts of mechanical, human and electronic errors and at least hinting that this benefits Republicans - but the GAO report just doesn't say that. And, as I noted, all of these different, detectable sorts of errors indicate exactly the opposite of an organized plot to steal the election. Which, if I read "we all know what happened in Ohio" and "I would certainly love to see someone booted out of an office he didn't legitimately win" by our topic starter, how else am I supposed to read that?
Here's just one example of alleged illegal activity by Diebold leading to a dubious election result. But there are more examples, like Chuck Hagel's election using ES&S machines from his own company. Polls had him way behind but he amazingly won. But, back to the example at hand:
QUOTE
According to Rob Behler, an engineer hired as a contractor to work in Diebold's Georgia warehouse last year, the Diebold systems had major functioning problems.
Behler said 25 to 30 percent of the machines in one shipment to the warehouse either crashed upon booting or had problems with their real-time clocks, causing the systems to register the date inaccurately then boot improperly or freeze up altogether.
"They did not meet what I would deem standard operation," he said.
Behler said Diebold provided warehouse workers with at least three patches to apply to the systems before state officials began logic and accuracy testing on them. Behler said one patch was applied to machines when he came to the warehouse in June, a second patch was applied in July and a third in August after he left the warehouse.
Behler first informed Bev Harris, owner of the BlackBox Voting site, of the situation. Harris has spent a year investigating problems with electronic voting systems, and is the author of a forthcoming book on the technology. She said the practice of patching systems after they've been certified opens the possibility for anyone -- from Diebold employees to local election officials -- to install malicious code on a machine that could alter election results and then delete itself to avoid detection.
According to Harris, this scenario is particularly worrisome in light of what happened in the Georgia gubernatorial race, which ended in a major upset that defied all polls and put a Republican in the governor's seat for the first time in more than 130 years.
Behler said 25 to 30 percent of the machines in one shipment to the warehouse either crashed upon booting or had problems with their real-time clocks, causing the systems to register the date inaccurately then boot improperly or freeze up altogether.
"They did not meet what I would deem standard operation," he said.
Behler said Diebold provided warehouse workers with at least three patches to apply to the systems before state officials began logic and accuracy testing on them. Behler said one patch was applied to machines when he came to the warehouse in June, a second patch was applied in July and a third in August after he left the warehouse.
Behler first informed Bev Harris, owner of the BlackBox Voting site, of the situation. Harris has spent a year investigating problems with electronic voting systems, and is the author of a forthcoming book on the technology. She said the practice of patching systems after they've been certified opens the possibility for anyone -- from Diebold employees to local election officials -- to install malicious code on a machine that could alter election results and then delete itself to avoid detection.
According to Harris, this scenario is particularly worrisome in light of what happened in the Georgia gubernatorial race, which ended in a major upset that defied all polls and put a Republican in the governor's seat for the first time in more than 130 years.
Yes, "more than 130 years" sounds impressive until you think back and remember that blacks were liberated by a Republican president and then denied the voted by Segregationist Democrats. So, in, say 1930, when the Democratic primary was whites only, winning that primary was essentially the same as winning the general election. For about 130 years. As far as a major upset...more than 100% of the 'undecideds' went with Perdue in the last month of the polling. If these polling organizations would stop over-sampling liberals, maybe they could get one right once in a while, but until then, you will just have to keep shouting vote fraud.
QUOTE
We all agree that voting systems should work and work accurately. This GAO report is helpful. As noted, it doesn't prove "Bush stole the election" which is why it's not leading prime time TV newscasts.
QUOTE(la herring rouge)
Please, by all means, take a gander at this list of wild improbabilities that actually occurred in the Ohio election of 2004.
My favorite is this one:
My favorite is this one:
QUOTE
But Bush’s numbers meant 13,566 people who voted for C. Ellen Connally, the liberal Democratic candidate for Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice, also voted for Bush. In Butler Country, Bush officially was given 109,866 votes. But conservative GOP Chief Justice Moyer was given only 68,407, a negative discrepancy of more than 40,000 votes. Meanwhile, Connally was credited with 61,559 votes to John Kerry's 56,234. This would mean that while Bush vastly outpolled his Republican counterpart running for the Supreme Court, African-American female Democrat running for the Supreme Court on the Democratic side outpolled Kerry. By all accounts such an outcome is inconceivable. Again, it indicates a very significant and likely fraudulent shifting of votes to Bush.
Please, by all means, understand why I won't link my computer to a website that features hateful cartoonist Ted Rall. Seriously.
So, only 62% of those who cast a vote for Bush as president cast a vote for a conservative supreme court candidate in Ohio. Wow, that sounds like a big deal, if I've got my conspiracy hat on. So, I'll meander down to Ohio's Butler County, and see that on November 7, 2000...
The two leading Supreme Court vote-getters got about 73% of the vote that Bush did. What an amazing, huge, conspiratorial discrepancy. AND they both outpolled Al Gore! Smart voters in Butler County, even if they do live close to Kentucky.
QUOTE
President
George W. Bush, R 83,680 63.42%
Al Gore, D 44,661 33.85%
-------
Supreme Court Justice Term commencing Jan. 1, 2001
Deborah Cook 60,936 55.22%
Tim Black 49,417 44.78%
Supreme Court Justice Term commencing Jan. 1, 2001
Terrence O'Donnell 58,897 51.93%
Alice Robie Resnick 54,517 48.07%
Why, it's as if some Democrats voted for a liberal Supreme Court judge, but wanted a Republican president rather than Al Gore. George W. Bush, R 83,680 63.42%
Al Gore, D 44,661 33.85%
-------
Supreme Court Justice Term commencing Jan. 1, 2001
Deborah Cook 60,936 55.22%
Tim Black 49,417 44.78%
Supreme Court Justice Term commencing Jan. 1, 2001
Terrence O'Donnell 58,897 51.93%
Alice Robie Resnick 54,517 48.07%
As for Bev Harris being a wingnut, I honestly don't know what you have to do to be banned from Democratic Underground, but somehow she managed. This is a site where posters engage in death threats, rape fantasies, and the most vile subjects ever with regards to conservatives. But Bev Harris is too extreme for them.
QUOTE(wired.com)
Democratic Underground, a political discussion site that has been a popular forum for debate on the reliability of computerized voting machines, has barred one of its most prominent and outspoken contributors on the topic from further posting.
In a written statement, site administrators said Friday that they barred Bev Harris, founder of Black Box Voting, because her postings on the site "have made positive discussion of verified voting increasingly difficult."
In a written statement, site administrators said Friday that they barred Bev Harris, founder of Black Box Voting, because her postings on the site "have made positive discussion of verified voting increasingly difficult."
Ok I'll try this again Carlito...
This is quite possibly one of the most significant findings. What it means is that you could alter the results of the election after the fact and it would be completely undetectable.
Mother Jones reports:
Yep you read that right, there is a signed affidavit saying that at least one of the technicians working on these machines was ordered to fudge the recount.
There were thousands of reports across the country that voters submitted where they cast their vote and then saw upon review the vote had actually be cast for the other candidate. This is documented and indisputable unless you believe 1000's of people are lying. That is just the people that reported the problem, I'm sure there are many thousands more that didn't review their ballot or didn't catch the error.
If the machines were uncertified then we have absolutely no way of knowing what state they were in, whether they were tampered with, etc. This is simple common sense Carlito, no tin foil theories required.
In other words Carlito it wouldn't take some vast conspiracy to alter election results on a large scale. All one would need is access to the network and they could access thousands of non-password protected machines.
I cannot see how anyone familiar with programming, security or IT in general could even begin to defend the integrity of these machines because the facts simply aren't on their side. In my opinion this rises to the level of criminal negligence on behalf of the voting machine vendors. Can you imagine the outrage across the country if financial and banking software was equally insecure? Oh we just lost $100 out of your checking account sir, we don't know where it went. That isn't a problem right?
Based on the current evidence this does not add up to election fraud because most of the evidence that could have proven this is gone. For the past year the people that have wanted to investigate this have been called conspiracy theorists and shut out. What it does add up to is absolutely no confidence in the 2004 election results and doubts of any future elections that use these machines.
QUOTE(GAO Report)
(1) some electronic voting systems did not encrypt cast ballots or system audit logs, and it was possible to alter both without being detected;
This is quite possibly one of the most significant findings. What it means is that you could alter the results of the election after the fact and it would be completely undetectable.
Mother Jones reports:
QUOTE
Sherole Eaton is a 66-year-old mother of five and a lifelong Democrat. In 2004, she was serving as the deputy director of the Board of Elections in Ohio’s Hocking County. Her path to controversy began on December 10, when a technician from Triad, a company that supplied electronic voting machines used in Hocking and 40 other Ohio counties, arrived at her office to help the staff prepare for the upcoming statewide recount of presidential ballots. According to an affidavit Eaton would later file, the tech, Michael Barbian, found that the computer the county used to store and count votes wouldn’t boot up. So he took it apart, connected it to a spare computer in the office, called Triad, worked on both machines some more, and then pronounced the original computer ready for the recount. He then instructed Eaton and the Board of Elections director, Republican Lisa Schwartze, on how to construct a “cheat sheet” so the hand recount would match the official tally. Barbian allegedly said he’d made similar service calls in five other Ohio counties.
Yep you read that right, there is a signed affidavit saying that at least one of the technicians working on these machines was ordered to fudge the recount.
QUOTE(GAO Report)
(2) it was possible to alter the files that define how a ballot looks and works so that the votes for one candidate could be recorded for a different candidate
There were thousands of reports across the country that voters submitted where they cast their vote and then saw upon review the vote had actually be cast for the other candidate. This is documented and indisputable unless you believe 1000's of people are lying. That is just the people that reported the problem, I'm sure there are many thousands more that didn't review their ballot or didn't catch the error.
QUOTE(GAO Report)
(3) vendors installed uncertified versions of voting system software at the local level.
If the machines were uncertified then we have absolutely no way of knowing what state they were in, whether they were tampered with, etc. This is simple common sense Carlito, no tin foil theories required.
QUOTE(Gao Report Page 26)
Regarding access controls, many security examinations reported flaws
in how controls were implemented in some DRE systems. For
example, one model failed to password-protect the supervisor functions
controlling key system capabilities; another relied on an easily guessed
password to access these functions. In another case, the same
personal identification number was programmed into all supervisor
cards nationwide—meaning that the number was likely to be widely
known.
in how controls were implemented in some DRE systems. For
example, one model failed to password-protect the supervisor functions
controlling key system capabilities; another relied on an easily guessed
password to access these functions. In another case, the same
personal identification number was programmed into all supervisor
cards nationwide—meaning that the number was likely to be widely
known.
In other words Carlito it wouldn't take some vast conspiracy to alter election results on a large scale. All one would need is access to the network and they could access thousands of non-password protected machines.
I cannot see how anyone familiar with programming, security or IT in general could even begin to defend the integrity of these machines because the facts simply aren't on their side. In my opinion this rises to the level of criminal negligence on behalf of the voting machine vendors. Can you imagine the outrage across the country if financial and banking software was equally insecure? Oh we just lost $100 out of your checking account sir, we don't know where it went. That isn't a problem right?
Based on the current evidence this does not add up to election fraud because most of the evidence that could have proven this is gone. For the past year the people that have wanted to investigate this have been called conspiracy theorists and shut out. What it does add up to is absolutely no confidence in the 2004 election results and doubts of any future elections that use these machines.
I think Cube Jockey's points are outweighing Carlito's points, but...
How do you get past the fact that it is unprovable? Irregular voting patterns might look suspicious, and clear evidence of how fraud would be possible might look suspicious, but that is where it ends.
This is an important point. If one wanted to commit fraud with computerized voting, the way to do it is to spread the discrepancies over several districts, so that no one voting site stands out too glaringly. Thus, any discrepant pattern that you find can always be explained by non-fraudulent explanations.
At this point, trying to understand the situation leaves the realm of logic, and enters the realm of belief. If you like the president, you are likely to believe he legitimately won, and if you don't like the president you are likely to believe the opposite.
If we want to keep our analysis scientific (sort of), then we need to make a prediction and see if it turns out to be true. So, here is a prediction:
Changes to the computerized voting system, in swing states where republicans control the voting apparatus, will be resisted if the suggested changes would make vote rigging impossible. However, similar changes will be allowed in regions that are not swing states with republican-controlled voting appartus.
If this occurs, and is measured in fair way, it would be evidence in favor of vote-rigging. However, it would not be proof, and the republicans could still laugh at the democrats and call them tin-hat conspiracists.
How do you get past the fact that it is unprovable? Irregular voting patterns might look suspicious, and clear evidence of how fraud would be possible might look suspicious, but that is where it ends.
This is an important point. If one wanted to commit fraud with computerized voting, the way to do it is to spread the discrepancies over several districts, so that no one voting site stands out too glaringly. Thus, any discrepant pattern that you find can always be explained by non-fraudulent explanations.
At this point, trying to understand the situation leaves the realm of logic, and enters the realm of belief. If you like the president, you are likely to believe he legitimately won, and if you don't like the president you are likely to believe the opposite.
If we want to keep our analysis scientific (sort of), then we need to make a prediction and see if it turns out to be true. So, here is a prediction:
Changes to the computerized voting system, in swing states where republicans control the voting apparatus, will be resisted if the suggested changes would make vote rigging impossible. However, similar changes will be allowed in regions that are not swing states with republican-controlled voting appartus.
If this occurs, and is measured in fair way, it would be evidence in favor of vote-rigging. However, it would not be proof, and the republicans could still laugh at the democrats and call them tin-hat conspiracists.
QUOTE(DrProctopus @ Nov 18 2005, 11:23 AM)
I think Cube Jockey's points are outweighing Carlito's points, but...
How do you get past the fact that it is unprovable? Irregular voting patterns might look suspicious, and clear evidence of how fraud would be possible might look suspicious, but that is where it ends.
How do you get past the fact that it is unprovable? Irregular voting patterns might look suspicious, and clear evidence of how fraud would be possible might look suspicious, but that is where it ends.
It isn't unprovable, it is now a year later unprovable. There is a big difference there. Stonewalling and demonizing the other side can be effective.
However as I have tried to state I have no interest in investigating the 2004 elections any more than it takes to fix the problems with these voting machines. I don't throw in with the people that think we need to remove Bush because he was illegally elected, he is doing a fine job of burning the goodwill for his party where he is.
But, I do very much care about future elections. In their current state these machines are absolutely unacceptable. Voting is probably one of the most important things we do as citizens and for the process to be put on in this manner is completely unacceptable and threatens our Democracy itself. You have machines that are completely flawed and any 12 year old that fancies hacking could compromise the security. You have voting companies that openly express partisan opinions and have partisan alliances. Finally you have no independent panel of experts that has any governance over the whole thing. It is a disaster waiting to happen.
With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
Ok, I'll take a swing at this one. The answer is, open the source. Either have open source software in which developers can actively develop on the software or have disclosure, meaning anyone can view the source code of the e-voting system. As long as one or multiple companies are in charge of creating the e-voting system, you're going to have the possibility and fear of rigged elections. Everyone knows how paper ballots work, so everyone should know how your electronic voting works. So, what does opening the source mean? Well, that means that anyone who has the skills to contribute to the development of the application can freely access, download, and run the code that will be used in the e-voting. (Stay with me hear, I know many of you think this is a horrible idea). Full disclosure of the source means that you have a crack team of 1337 programmers to create the e-voting system but they have to make their code viewable to the public. So, the smart thing would be for the government to set aside some money and hire a team of programmers to create an electronic voting system. These are the "core" developers. They're in charge of what goes into the development. So, while I may be able to look at the code for e-voting, and make all the hacks I want so Butler county Ohio (funny you'd mention this of all places) gets their head out of their *ahem* and vote Dem, it doesn't mean it's going to get into the final product.
So, what are the benefits of opening the source? First off, everyone can rest assured their is no rigging going on by the e-voting system or those creating it. Don't believe it? Look at the code for yourself. (The code will ahve to be heavily commented of course so you plebians, I mean, non-programmers, can understand what's going on.)
Second, you have more eyes looking at the code. While I can't actively develop on the finished product, if I download the program and find a bug, I can submit a bug fix, or at least write up a bug report to the development team to have it fixed. The more people looking at it, the more bugs are found and quicker it's fixed. For a perfect example of this, look at how long it takes a patch for Mozilla Firefox to come out (~6-24hrs) vs. Micro$haft's IE (uhhh 6 months? If ever.) This full disclosure system generally allows for more bugs to be caught and be caught earlier.
Third, not to start a flame war, but open source is more secure than closed source. Simply put, if Windows was more secure than Linux, then why would the NSA use Linux? (Obviously it's customized...one of the benefits of Linux, but still.) How well you hide the source code is NOT to be expected to keep the system secure.
Now, the one drawback that I'm going to get is: "Well if everyone can see the code, what if some liberal hippy finds a bug and doesn't tell anyone and then rigs the next election?" To which I will answer:
1.) Chances are, if one guy found an exploit for the system, ten other people will find it and one is bound to submit a fix.
2.) How do you know a Diebold developer didn't just let a bug only he knew about into the system? How do you know that "patch" for Diebold 2.0 didn't have malicious code in it?
3.) What if Diebold's code got leaked to a select few and they found bugs and told no one? Think Diebold's code is safe? Just ask Valve about Half-Life 2. Or Microsoft about their Vista build, or Windows ME.
Another drawback of course is that since your code is open source, people are going to know what bugs are still in the system during the final release. So, since anyone can look up what defects are still "open" then they may not trust the voting system. However, it would be expected that the major exploits would be fixed before the system went into production and that the other defects could not (easily?) be reproduced by someone who is constrained only to the voting hardware. Of course the answer to this is also that I'm willing to bet the love of my life (my bike) that Diebold's code went into production with defects still in it. Actually, I know it did because of all the problems we had
For a great example of how something similar to this would work, read this:
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/policy/2004/04/26/ovc.html
More info here:
http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/
http://www.votehere.com/
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/policy/2004/04/26/ovc.html
http://www.evoting-experts.com/index.php?p=68
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/23/op...oting_software/
http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,619...html?tw=rss.TOP
Who should be in charge of the effort to "clean up" the vote counting system?
Everyone.
Ok, I'll take a swing at this one. The answer is, open the source. Either have open source software in which developers can actively develop on the software or have disclosure, meaning anyone can view the source code of the e-voting system. As long as one or multiple companies are in charge of creating the e-voting system, you're going to have the possibility and fear of rigged elections. Everyone knows how paper ballots work, so everyone should know how your electronic voting works. So, what does opening the source mean? Well, that means that anyone who has the skills to contribute to the development of the application can freely access, download, and run the code that will be used in the e-voting. (Stay with me hear, I know many of you think this is a horrible idea). Full disclosure of the source means that you have a crack team of 1337 programmers to create the e-voting system but they have to make their code viewable to the public. So, the smart thing would be for the government to set aside some money and hire a team of programmers to create an electronic voting system. These are the "core" developers. They're in charge of what goes into the development. So, while I may be able to look at the code for e-voting, and make all the hacks I want so Butler county Ohio (funny you'd mention this of all places) gets their head out of their *ahem* and vote Dem, it doesn't mean it's going to get into the final product.
So, what are the benefits of opening the source? First off, everyone can rest assured their is no rigging going on by the e-voting system or those creating it. Don't believe it? Look at the code for yourself. (The code will ahve to be heavily commented of course so you plebians, I mean, non-programmers, can understand what's going on.)
Second, you have more eyes looking at the code. While I can't actively develop on the finished product, if I download the program and find a bug, I can submit a bug fix, or at least write up a bug report to the development team to have it fixed. The more people looking at it, the more bugs are found and quicker it's fixed. For a perfect example of this, look at how long it takes a patch for Mozilla Firefox to come out (~6-24hrs) vs. Micro$haft's IE (uhhh 6 months? If ever.) This full disclosure system generally allows for more bugs to be caught and be caught earlier.
Third, not to start a flame war, but open source is more secure than closed source. Simply put, if Windows was more secure than Linux, then why would the NSA use Linux? (Obviously it's customized...one of the benefits of Linux, but still.) How well you hide the source code is NOT to be expected to keep the system secure.
Now, the one drawback that I'm going to get is: "Well if everyone can see the code, what if some liberal hippy finds a bug and doesn't tell anyone and then rigs the next election?" To which I will answer:
1.) Chances are, if one guy found an exploit for the system, ten other people will find it and one is bound to submit a fix.
2.) How do you know a Diebold developer didn't just let a bug only he knew about into the system? How do you know that "patch" for Diebold 2.0 didn't have malicious code in it?
3.) What if Diebold's code got leaked to a select few and they found bugs and told no one? Think Diebold's code is safe? Just ask Valve about Half-Life 2. Or Microsoft about their Vista build, or Windows ME.
Another drawback of course is that since your code is open source, people are going to know what bugs are still in the system during the final release. So, since anyone can look up what defects are still "open" then they may not trust the voting system. However, it would be expected that the major exploits would be fixed before the system went into production and that the other defects could not (easily?) be reproduced by someone who is constrained only to the voting hardware. Of course the answer to this is also that I'm willing to bet the love of my life (my bike) that Diebold's code went into production with defects still in it. Actually, I know it did because of all the problems we had
For a great example of how something similar to this would work, read this:
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/policy/2004/04/26/ovc.html
More info here:
http://www.openvotingconsortium.org/
http://www.votehere.com/
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/policy/2004/04/26/ovc.html
http://www.evoting-experts.com/index.php?p=68
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/06/23/op...oting_software/
http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,619...html?tw=rss.TOP
Who should be in charge of the effort to "clean up" the vote counting system?
Everyone.
Odd, but nobody seems to be mentioning what i see as the largest systemic problem in the US voting system. It's a problem that's been well reported, but seems to be regarded as normal and acceptable, though it would raise huge howls of protest should it occur here (Canada) or in most western countries.
The problem? Long lines at polling places.
What could discourage one from voting more than knowing it's going to take all day?
Voting machines? Even if they were 100% secure, unless there are enough machines at EVERY polling place so that voting proceeds quickly and smoothly, then they are an unacceptable solution.
Is this even recognized as a problem in the US? What is being done about it?
The problem? Long lines at polling places.
What could discourage one from voting more than knowing it's going to take all day?
Voting machines? Even if they were 100% secure, unless there are enough machines at EVERY polling place so that voting proceeds quickly and smoothly, then they are an unacceptable solution.
Is this even recognized as a problem in the US? What is being done about it?
QUOTE
[b]With crucially important elections occurring in the next couple of years, what needs to be done to assure that each vote is counted accurately?
What needs to happen is that these machines must not be used in any election in any state. We need to move to hand-counting again or other methods.
Who should be in charge of the effort to “clean up” the vote counting system?
QUOTE
Does this report affect your trust in the voting system?
I already knew it was rotten to the core, especially when my own Senator Chuck Hagel is financially connected to Diebold and that the last couple of close elections-there are still unresolved issues.
When voting machine corporations have a lovey-dovey relationship with that party-you just know that where there is smoke....... QUOTE
Why hasn’t the so-called “liberal” media been all over this story?
The "liberal media" is following the market-a gradual "dumbing-down" that is charting Jessica Simpson's divorce rather than issues of substance. When a pole falls during the Thanksgiving parade and everyone knows about it, you know that people don't know about more important issues going on-sometimes I wonder if that's truly accidental.
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