Free Republic

Disabled Community Hopes Touch-Screen Voting Continues By JAKOB SCHILLER (03-19-04) Berkeley resident Karen Rose did not have to hire someone to accompany her to the voting booth during the March primary and read the ballot to her. With no one looking over her shoulder, Rose was able to vote without having to reveal to anyone else who she voted for. Rose, a member of the city’s Disability Commission, is blind. Two weeks ago, she was able to vote completely on her own by listening to recorded instructions through headphones provided with a Diebold touch screen voting machine specially designed...

The attached news story briefly described the untimely Friday, March 12th death of perhaps America’s most influential advocate of a verified voting paper trail in the era of touch screen computer voting. Gibbs, an accountant for more than 30 years and the inventor of the TruVote system, died when his vehicle collided with an 18-wheeled truck which rolled his Chevy Blazer several times and forced it over the highway retaining wall where it came to rest on its roof. Coincidence theorists will simply dismiss the death of Gibbs as a tragic accident – the same conclusion these coincidence theorists came...

During this month's Democratic presidential primary in Florida, an elections staffer in Polk County mistakenly gave five voters extra ballots -- giving them the chance to vote twice. In Bay County in the Panhandle, a technical error gave Richard Gephardt more votes than presumptive nominee John Kerry -- even though Gephardt had dropped out six weeks earlier. In Miami-Dade, a Herald reporter registered as having no party affiliation was urged by a precinct staffer to vote in the Democratic primary after the poll worker mistakenly activated the wrong ballot on the touch-screen voting machine. The incidents were minor, but nothing...

"SAN FRANCISCO - A manufacturer of electronic voting machines has employed at least five convicted felons as managers, according to critics demanding more stringent background checks for people responsible for voting machine software." snip "Andy Stephenson, a Democratic candidate for secretary of state in Washington, conducted a 10-day investigation in Seattle and Vancouver, where the men were convicted." snip "Computer programmers say software bugs, hackers or electrical outages could cause more than 50,000 touch-screen machines used in precincts nationwide to delete or alter votes."

<p>SACRAMENTO -- California legislators said on Thursday they want to stop the use of all paperless electronic voting machines in the state, fearing the same type of fiasco that plagued Florida in the 2000 election.</p> <p>State Sens. Don Perata (D-Oakland) and Ross Johnson (R-Irvine), the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate election committee, sent a letter to Secretary of State Kevin Shelley urging him to decertify all paperless touch-screen voting machines before the general election.</p>

Smooth Vote Is Encouraging South Florida Sun-Sentinel Editorial Board Posted March 11 2004 "Boy, that was easy." That was how a 5-year-old boy described his experience as a [FL] "voter" on Tuesday. His father had taken him into the voting booth with him and told him which buttons to press. It went off without a hitch. And so it went, for the most part, throughout South Florida. Voters and public officials in Broward and Palm Beach counties expressed relief and satisfaction that the municipal and presidential primary elections had gone smoothly, with only minor glitches reported. It was a far...

Councillor Gerry Breen today pointed to the situation of 2 prominent US senators (Hillary Clinton and Bob Graham) calling for a paper trail of the electronic voting while Cullen & company drive blindly on. "The setting up of a commission whose focus is solely on the secrecy and accuracy of the Nedap/Powervote system and excludes the Ombudsman is merely a cynical exercise in diversion.A full review of Electronic Voting is required now" Breen concludes. (See report below) Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Bob Graham called Wednesday for a paper trail to back up Electronic Voting throughout the country. The Democratic...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Eric A. Smith Hot Damn! Design 81-03-3959-5371 snowdog@juno.ocn.ne.jp (please distribute among your membership.) An Emergency Call-to-Arms: A Five-Step Battle Plan for YOUR Future This is a call to arms to you -- as an American and a custodian of your nation's future. Please act as if your life depends on it -- it well might. We have been led down a dark, perilous road. The journey has touched us all, from mothers and fathers burying children in a war over nonexistent WMD, to firefighters and policemen promised vital funds only to be cheated and asked to...

<p>SACRAMENTO -- California legislators said on Thursday they want to stop the use of all paperless electronic voting machines in the state, fearing the same type of fiasco that plagued Florida in the 2000 election.</p> <p>State Sens. Don Perata (D-Oakland) and Ross Johnson (R-Irvine), the chairman and vice chairman of the Senate election committee, sent a letter to Secretary of State Kevin Shelley urging him to decertify all paperless touch-screen voting machines before the general election.</p>

The human oops factor caused more upset than technology failures in Tuesday's balloting, according to the complaints of confused, frustrated or angry voters. The most reported problem: Democrats couldn't vote in their party's presidential primary because poll workers pushed the wrong buttons to activate their voting machine key cards. Some caught the error in time, but others realized it only after voting in municipal races and then asking why their ballots didn't have the presidential primary. They said they got either apologies for the mistake or blame for not speaking up sooner, but in either case, they didn't get to...

Warning that the presidential election is at risk, two state lawmakers said Wednesday that they would ask Secretary of State Kevin Shelley to ban the use of touch-screen voting machines in the November ballot. ``There were far too many problems in last week's primary election to continue using the electronic voting machines,'' state Sen. Ross Johnson, R-Irvine, said in a statement. ``I don't want to see California become the Florida of 2004.'' Electronic voting machines are used in 15 California counties, including Santa Clara and Alameda. Last month, Johnson, who is vice chair of the Senate Elections and Reapportionment Committee,...

<p>March 11, 2004 -- WASHINGTON - Sen. Hillary Clinton said yesterday voters in New York and elsewhere may not be able to trust future election results, charging the company that makes high-tech voting machines may skew results to help Republicans win.</p>

This is worth the $4.50 cover price, folks. Go buy it -- lots of interview quotes never before seen, including one with a Finnish hacker and a whole new rendition of the Phil Foster (Sequoia) indictment, with details from his own brother-in-law. * * * * * * "Strangely, another function allowed anyone with access to the GEMS central server to create minus votes. Why...would there ever be cause to record negative votes in an electronic voting machine? Later, Diebold spokesman David Bear would offer this response: "'Yes, negative votes can be entered into GEMS. If for some reason an...

<p>Oddly enough, Silicon Valley has been a laggard when it comes to applying the technology it's famous for to the election process. Now it's finally beginning to catch up, and it has suddenly become the locus of an overdue -- and profoundly important -- debate about the mechanics of democracy in the 21st century.</p>

Two Democratic senators often mentioned as possible candidates for the vice presidential spot on the 2004 ticket talked voting Wednesday - but not for themselves. Sens. Bob Graham of Florida and Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York are pushing legislation that would ensure a printed receipt of votes cast on new touch-screen computer terminals, arguing it will restore voter confidence in the election process. They both insisted the move had nothing to do with future political aspirations - and everything to do with past political confusion. "We can't ever go through what we went through in 2000," said Clinton, referring...

(CBS) Today's presidential primaries in the South are not only a dry run for the issues in November -- but also for new high-tech voting machines. Judging from their use in other states so far, touch-screen voting may not be foolproof -- or tamperproof. Ads promoting computerized voting make fun of the 2000 electoral mess in Florida. "This chad. I can't tell if it's hanging. That's no way to vote,'' says one commercial. But as CBS News Correspondent Vince Gonzales reports, experts nationwide have found serious security problems with the new touch-screen voting systems. "If there's another close election, we...

Poll workers struggling with a new electronic voting system in last week's election gave thousands of Orange County voters the wrong ballots, according to a Times analysis of election records. In 21 precincts where the problem was most acute, there were more ballots cast than registered voters. Wide margins in most races seem likely to spare the county the need for a costly revote. But the problems, which county officials have blamed on insufficient training for poll workers, are a strong indication of the pitfalls facing officials as they try to bring new election technology online statewide. "The principal of...

Human Errors in New Electronic Voting System Give Some California Voters Wrong Ballots LOS ANGELES (AP) - Approximately 7,000 Orange County voters were given the wrong ballots in last week's election by poll workers unfamiliar with a new electronic voting system, the Los Angeles Times reported Tuesday. As a result, many people voted for candidates outside their legislative districts, the newspaper said. However, "from what we have seen so far, we do not believe any of these instances where people voted in precincts they shouldn't have voted in would have affected any of the races," said Steve Rodermund, Orange...

WEST PALM BEACH -- Florida's voting machines came under attack again Monday when a lawmaker sued state election supervisors because new ballot counters lack a paper trail needed for possible recounts. Democratic U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler said voters need to be assured every vote is counted, particularly in close races where a manual recount is required by law. "Why doesn't Gov. Bush simply say, "Let's improve our Florida election system even more than we've done so, provide for certainty and provide for security and in case something goes wrong, have a back up?'" Wexler said moments after filing the lawsuit...