Attn: Rocket Scientists...
...Stalin said, "I don't care who you vote for as long as I count the votes."
"Colo. Bans Most Electronic Voting Machines"
And junk 'em they should. No electronic voting machine will ever be hacker-proof, no electronic election will ever be reliable.
Yes, the paper voting system can also be monkeyed with...you can always stuff ballot boxes and have dead people vote. BUT, it takes an army of people to pull it off, and armies talk...and the armies have to be here in this country.
With electronic systems, one person with a virus can rig the entire election from anywhere on the planet.
I'll take the paper ballots please.
"(AP) Colorado's top election official decertified electronic voting machines used in many of the state's largest counties Monday, calling into question equipment used in past elections in a move he said could have national implications.
...The news comes days after Ohio's Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner urged Cuyahoga County to switch to the optical scan system - ballots filled out by hand and read by computer - in time for the state's March 4 presidential primary."
Yay Colorado! Also California and Florida for working to clean things up! Our swing-state buddy Ohio has just issued a report slamming its three providers of electronic voting equipment -- including the renamed Diebold -- and recommending that the 50 counties which use them scrap the machines in favor of a paper-trail-leaving optical scanning method.
Colorado's Sec. of State Jennifer Brunner, detailed the many ways that hackers could infiltrate the systems...things like easily picking locks and using magnets to manipulate vote counts. Even adding "malignant software" into boards of election servers!
Thank goodness my Oklahoma still uses the paper ballot, scanned by a machine.
Every state's voting infrastructure needs to be overhauled and in tip top shape by next year's presidential elections. No matter which side wins, we don't want another dimpled ballot/hanging chad fiasco like we had in 2000.
For a couple of weeks we looked like a banana republic. As the Supremes pondered, I wondered if tanks would start rumbling through the streets. I thought Gore did the right thing ...to have dragged it out would only damage our country more. Another reason I like Gore.
Next thing you know, we spent $3 billion nationally to purchase the touch-screen machines to replace the old punch-card voting system that had failed us.
Too bad we didn't listen to all the experts who warned us that hackers, software bugs and poorly trained poll workers could intentionally, or accidentally, erase or alter voting data on those silly machines.
We all should demand paper ballots. Any fool could see that electronic voting machines are error-prone and easily hacked. We need to use only machines that create a paper record.
Allen Raymond's book--"How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative"--is coming out next month. He describes how he ran an illegal election-day scheme to jam the phone lines of New Hampshire Democrats during the state's tight 2002 Senate election...and says these dirty tricks went even higher in the Republican party.
Ever wonder why it was only the Republicans who fought every mandate to have a paper-trail....oops, I think I already know.
Actually, Republicans...if you're so sure about your victory why don't you just quit fighting the paper ballot and PROVE once and for all that those whiny Democrats are just sore losers. Not doing this speaks volumes.
