Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/1208/p03s03-uspo.html
December 08, 2006 edition

Election controversy hits Florida, again
Sarasota recount is complicated by electronic voting systems. One solution: Bring back paper.
By Amy Green and Ben Arnoldy
SARASOTA, FLA.; AND BOSTON – The Sunshine State is once again the scene of a messy election controversy, and residents of Sarasota, an affluent beachside community, aren't the least bit amused.

More than a month after polls closed, the certified loser for the congressional seat is refusing to concede, given an extraordinary wave of ballots with no vote cast in that race and a margin of victory as skimpy as a bikini.

But determining just what went wrong, if anything, has proved difficult given the voting machines involved: touch-screen computers with no printout for voters to confirm. The problems roiling Florida's 13th Congressional District may be one reason that a federal advisory board on Tuesday recommended that the next generation of electronic voting machines be "software independent." In essence, that means creating an independent auditing trail.

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I love auditors, most are good people, and overall, audits are good for us. It’s called CYA – Cover Your Ass! Document everything. Paper trails cover your ass … unless of course you’re doing something illegal, in which case paper trails will nail your ass to a wall.

…

In my household, one of us is a registrated Democrat and the other a registered Republican so we get voting literature from both sides – and I highly recommend it – it’s enlightening!

I’ve notice that there is something that has been consistent for the last three elections – that is, the Republican party consistently advocates that their party vote by Absentee Ballot. The democratic party does not. Now, when I say they consistently advocate – I mean it’s mentioned in almost every piece of mailed literature and every phone call urging us to get out and vote…

“Be sure to send in your absentee ballot! You have ___ days left!”

We even received recorder phone calls from the Governator himself urging us to get our absentee votes in. (which our son loves btw – “mom, the governator’s on the phone!” – “hang up!” I grouchily reply. he doesn’t of course, he thinks it’s fun – because he loves to mimic him. my son’s antics actually make it all pretty funny. – okay enough about that.)

All the while, the Democratic party literature and phone calls in our area did not stress this.

What I’m getting at is this… in this area the Republicans were smart and the Dem's were not. By their actions – the Republican party knows and has understood the flaws in the “new voting system” and
a) found a way around it, and
b) found ways to use it to their advantage;

while the Dem’s did not, but should have.

Now, I’ve said and posted this before … but I’m going to say it again:

The next time you vote, unless or until your district has a working paper trail in place – USE THE ABSENTEE BALLOT.

In fact - I've created a new slogan (belatedly): "Absentee Balloting - it's not just for Republicans any more!"

...

It's important, if we really want our votes to count, that we leave an audit trail - and once again Florida shows us that.

Alright.

If that's what it takes.

I can't believe it's come down to that.

Seems there was a lot more to it than that,

Or maybe there never was, not really.

We'll see, I guess.

The last I heard there will be a paper trail for 2008.

Another tidbit from the November 2006 Harper's Index

Minutes it took a Princeton researcher to hack into a Diebold voting machine in September: 1

– “mom, the governator’s on the phone!” –

stilltrucking wrote:

whimsicaldeb wrote:– “mom, the governator’s on the phone!” –

Hang up!