“The drumbeat against them was absolutely because of the lack of ability to cheat easily.”
I think it was because they found out it did not change outcomes for them.
Remember, it was DEMS who screamed about outdated paper, etc, and demanded computers. Then they about-faced (again) when that still didn’t win them close elections.
I don’t know what’s wrong with straight-up paper ballots. I’d prefer them, because I don’t trust electronic media not to erase memory of my vote and be identifiable, either.
The value of the Diebold machine vote was that the voter could review and change his vote on every candidate and issue before finally “casting” the ballot.
There was actually a statistical improvement of voters’ intentions becoming their actual vote, then there had been from either the optical scan or the paper or the hole punch ballot.
This meant the machines, absent human interference, gave a more accurate vote than previous systems. There were sufficient checks in the system to know that ‘votes’ were not lost in the software. The drawback was the lack of the paper showing each voters’ intentions that was available with other kinds of ballots.
Diebold does ATM machines, and how many transactions are erroneous? Customers get a receipt, and somehow that could not be engineered into the voting machines. I wish it could have been done. Maryland is scrapping them for 2010. I don’t know what we are going to have to use. I know that voting was much quicker with the Diebold machines, and (most) voters in the several precincts where I worked were comfortable with them.