[adx]

Why not combine methods? Touch-screen machines that print out a human-readable and machine-readable ballot (print the name, with the machine-readable stuff next to it), that then gets fed into an optical scanner? And include a touch-screen "keyboard" so you can hunt-and-peck for write-in candidates. No dimpled chads or guessing who they meant to vote for, since all you'd have to do is see what's printed, not written, on the ballot.

[weegee]

That's along the lines of what I suggest. Such a system is no more or less secure from "tampering" than any other.

What this type of electronic ballot (which does not have to be "touch screen" to be electronic) does is eliminate the problems from improperly punched cards or jammed switches that prevented the recording of votes for certain candidates/parties/ballot initiatives.