November 05, 2004

Move along...? There have been (very quiet) rumblings about Walden O'Dell's (chief executive of Diebold) involvement in the elections this year. Will the Black Box inquiries be disregarded as paranoid conspiracy theorists? Is there ANY way to verify that there was no tampering with the votes, or are we to blindly have faith in the "process" with NO oversight confirmation? There is attention shown to the Voting Machines, but little to the software running those machines and who had access to either during the elections.
posted by samlam 20 years ago
  • It is very important workt that they are doing. My understanding is that they obtained all sorts of records from a primary in the state of Washington that used these machines and found that they had been hacked. Whatever credibility their findings will ultimately have is not really the important issue right now. Certainly, it will be at a later time. What is important now is that they be allowed to obtain all of the information that they are seeking. Exit polling in Ohio showed a significantly different result than the official results. I am familiar with Diebold and I was specifically watching exit polls in Ohio because of his prior claims. I was a bit disturbed election day to find such a disparity between the exit polls and the official tally. My understanding is that this difference was considerably greater in Ohio than in the average state. The exit polling does not mean that there was any fraud. What it means is that combining those results with a new method of recording votes that is being conducted by a partisan party is reason enough to launch a serious investigation. Thanks to organizations like Black Box, that work will hopefully get done.
  • Who will watch the Watchers?
  • I think the best way to address this whole thing is just go back to paper ballots counted by civil servants monitored by representatives from both parties. It's worked for 200 years, it's verifiable, it's foolproof. No electronics should be allowed for such an important process.
  • Problems have already been found. http://www.ohio.com/mld/beaconjournal/news/state/10103910.htm
  • I should have added a quote for that URL: "A computer error with a voting machine cartridge gave President Bush 3,893 extra votes in a Gahanna precinct. Franklin County's unofficial results gave Bush 4,258 votes to Democratic challenger John Kerry's 260 votes in Precinct 1B. Records show only 638 voters cast ballots in that precinct."
  • SOME people would say (hows that for a FOX news bullshitism) that the Godpuclican party would NEVER lower themselves to tampering with the vote. I, for one, absolve them of all sanity.
  • just go back to paper ballots counted by civil servants Uh, don't forget that a very deliberate part of current GOP strategy is to replace as many people in the System as possible with uber-loyal partisans, and threatening the same to any remaining non-partisan civil servants.
  • Who will watch the Watchers? Tell me what channel and when and I'll punch it into my Tivo.
  • I *said* Seig!
  • Here's another article on that Ohio computer glitch. I know I really shouldn't, but I have hope now.
  • I'm sorry I'd like to believe this- but all that article says is there was a glitch, a wrong number got posted, and they caught it. The idea of fraud on the order of 140,000 votes is not impossible but hugely improbable. I think now is the time to think about WHY Kerry performed so poorly and to stay active and remember the presidental election is not the be-all and end-all of politics. This puts it in the best perpsective of anything I've read so far.
  • I find it freaky that Diebold is headquartered in North Canton, Ohio. Weird coincidence.
  • The CEO of Diebold, a big Republican donor, did at one point promise to "deliver Ohio to Bush." If the margin was as small as Fla. in 2000, it would certainly be worth looking into. But no one on the left likes to remember that every impartial recount analysis on Fla. in 2000 still showed Bush winning.
  • The NYT had an election calculator on their website but I can't seem to find the link at the moment. Anyway, I remember that you could specify what you would and would not consider a vote and it would spit out the results. My first choice came up with a Bush win by a couple hundred votes, while my second try at it gave it to Bush by two or three votes. I tried different stuff, though, and it was possible to come up with a Gore win, but it depended on what you wanted to call a vote (i.e., how far that chad had to hang, what kind of mark to accept in the absence of a perfect X, etc.). I agree with you, though, and I don't mean to say that Bush shouldn't have been elected in 2000. The states handle the way votes are counted. They draw up the rules. That's the way the system works.
  • From drjimmy11's link: Democracy isn't something you do every four years at the polls. The life of democracy depends on critical thinking and active participants in and outside of the political process, willing to organize and join democracy-building movements in between election cycles. Thanks for that, drjimmy11!
  • But no one on the left likes to remember that every impartial recount analysis on Fla. in 2000 still showed Bush winning. Yes, Bush "won" by 117 votes out of state of nearly six million votes. But with evidence of widespread disenfranchisement and bad ballot design that took away thousands of votes for the Democratic candidate, any rational human being clearly knows something was fishy. 117 votes is statistical noise; thousands of votes constitutes fraud.
  • I really wish there was some way we could get rid of the stigma around the idea that ambitious, resourceful people will act immorally, and will act together when they have a common goal. The words "conspiracy theory" shouldn't be loaded enough to invalidate any arguement. That's just absurd. People who know the facts of a situation who think that there is something more going on than the official exmplanation and want greater investigation shouldn't be lumped in with the abnormal gas station attendant who wants believe his life is some how importand because the government is going to kill him because he's the only one who knows what really going on. The latter is paranoid, the former couldn't be more reasonable. Could we have a word for people who cry "tinfoil hat" who are either afraid that parts of thier government really are that unscrupulous or simply afriad of letting anyone else know they find some "conspiracy theories" plausable?
  • Could we have a word for people who cry "tinfoil hat" who are either afraid that parts of thier government really are that unscrupulous or simply afriad of letting anyone else know they find some "conspiracy theories" plausable? Europeans think Americans are crazy that they hang the US flag everywhere: cars, houses, you name it. My dad puts it down to low national self-esteem. As if you don't publicly express your patriotism, not only you are a doubter and not to be trusted, but that actively hanging the flag everywhere is like a cultural defense mechanism: i.e. we know this country is somewhat ugly and rotten on the inside, but we need to wrap a smiley face around it, freshen it up with decorations.
  • and the story rises to the mainstream media? "- over 20 percent of the machines tested by observers around the country failed to record votes properly." It should...but probably won't.
  • I am all for a thorough audit to learn for next time. But arguing that one vote machine malfunctioned and gave Bush 4000 extra votes, therefore his 140,000 vote win is invalid... doesnt quite compute. It was also different in 2000 b/c Gore won the popular vote. This time Bush won by around 3 million votes nationally. We may not like it, but that is the people making their choice clear. I despise Bush and all he stands for, but I believe in our system of government and stand behind it, whether my guy wins or not. That's the same reason I am against impeaching Bush, until he does something impeachable. The attack on Clinton was not just an attack on Clinton- it was an attack on the Office of the President. If the elected president can be removed at any time simply because people dislike him, that undermines our entire government, the Constitution, and our way of life. I am not prepared to do that simply out of anger.
  • to summarize better: I will never defend George W. Bush or anything he stands for. But I will defend the right of the people to choose and respect their choice, because I would want them to do the same if my guy had won, and because that is the only was our government has worked for 200+ years and can continue to work as the founders intended.
  • "only way our government has worked"
  • "...I will defend the right of the people to choose and respect their choice...." drjimmy, that's precisely why about 90% of the people on this planet think that U.S. citizens are idiots who support a violent, terrorist war machine. The fact that U.S. citizens would actually elect this asshole TWICE really confirms that half of your country (thankfully no longer my country) are self-centred imbeciles with no care or consideration for the rest of the world. Guess what? The only way they're wrong is if they've underestimated the number of idiots.
  • drjimmy, what exactly have you been doing for the past four years re monitoring the news? Have you been in suspended animation in a capsule or something? The years before that when Reagan and Bush I were around? The savings and loan scandal, Iran-Contra, BCCI, etc. etc. ad infinitum. . . No wonder the rest of the world thinks we're a bunch of clueless, ignorant morons. Not that I'm accusing you of that, but for God sakes man, get out and read a few books in the current affairs section at your local bookstore, monitor the foreign press and compare them against what you see here in this country. *please*, for everyone's sake, don't make such naive statements like the one you just made. So very, very sad.
  • My understanding from Unprecedented is that a full Florida recount would have elected Gore, but that the partial recount Gore insisted on would have resulted in a Bush victory.
  • There weren't very many electronic voting machines in Ohio, but you can still skew the vote the old fashioned way.
  • wow, some people called me a moron back in 2004 and I missed it. All for saying that I hate Bush but I think he should be president if he won the election. Good times, good times.
  • yeah but you didn't miss it. Pfft. What a maroon. I keeed!
  • has anyone seen coppermac and mikeygity or whatever lately? They must be off leading the revolution to overthrow Bush. I wish they would come back and share more of their Earth-shaking politcal wisdom with us. So very, very sad.
  • coppermac spent several months in Kyrgyzstan - his wife, who's a teacher went to help out a school there. (Some pretty pictures.) He's made a couple of comments since he returned to Canada, but may have broken the MoFi addiction.
  • Well good for him I suppose. I was kind of shocked to come back and find I was able to provoke so much anger when what I said was essentially "I am in favor of democracy all the time, not just when the guy I like wins." Doesn't seem that controversial a statement to me but I guess post-election feelings were running high.
  • I think you made a good point in 2004.
  • Wow. As reported on BradBlog and elsewhere, California SoS Bruce McPherson has suddenly and unexpectly recertified Diebold's voting technology. McPherson had previously rejected the flawed machines with fine sounding words about how they were "not good enough for California voters and not good enough for me." For reasons that are not altogether clear, however, they're suddenly good enough for him now. Why the about-face? "After rigorous scrutiny, I have determined that these Diebold systems can be used for the 2006 elections," McPherson says. But that explanation only adds to the confusion. The "rigorous scrutiny" turns out to be a damning report that, as Brad Friedman reports, includes the following language: ... the implementation of cryptographic protection is flawed: There is a serious flaw in the key management of the crypto code ... This key is hard-coded into the source code ... which is poor security practice because, among other things, it means the same key is used in every such machine in the U.S. Worse, the particular default key in question was openly published two and a half years ago (italics are RJE's).
  • Uh-oh.
  • Lou Dobbs: Voting machines put U.S. democracy at risk When voters lose confidence in our elected representatives, we can vote the bums out. But what is the recourse if American voters lose confidence in our electoral system?
  • Oh I'm sure the elected officials will get right to work on solving this one. It's not like it's at the core of our democratically elected republic. *goes back to chasing wimmen around*
  • *cranks up the volume on the Benny Hill sax music*
  • *pinches TUM, tips cap, runs off*
  • These wimmen, do they come with knockwurst by chance? *tosses spare change at TUM*
  • HBO Documentary airing November 2: Hacking Democracy In Florida, Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho presided over a trial "mini-election" to see if the vote could be hacked without being detected. Before votes were actually cast, computer analyst Harri Hursti "stuffed the ballot box" by entering votes on the computer's memory card. Then, after votes were cast, the results displayed when the same memory card was entered in the central tabulating program indicated that fraud was indeed possible. In other words, by accessing a memory card before an election, someone could change the results - a claim Diebold had denied was possible. Of course, I don't have HBO...