CHANGE CONGRESS IN 2006!!!

Barb Burt, Common Cause asks: Help Us Make Voting Machines Secure

2006-04-19T20:00:00.000-07:00

From: Barb Burt, Common Cause
Date: Wed, 19 Apr 2006 13:59:00 -0700
Subject: Help Us Make Voting Machines Secure
--------------------------

The 2006 mid-term elections are only six months away, and we know that millions of voters will be faced with malfunctioning electronic voting machines that don't provide a voter-verified paper record and have no way to provide a genuine recount in a close election.

There is a way to prevent this debacle. Common Cause is part of a coalition determined to ensure the integrity of our vote. We have an ambitious campaign plan at both the federal and state levels designed to achieve this goal.

We need your support. This campaign will require significant resources to succeed, so we need your generous support. http://www.commoncause.org/PaperBallots

Two weeks ago, more than 150 of your fellow activists came to Washington, DC - at their own expense - for a two-day lobbying blitz in support of a federal law that would require a voter-verified paper record for electronic voting machines. Those citizen lobbyists, from 30 different states, attended more than 100 meetings in Congressional offices.

Their efforts had convincing results - at least eleven new sponsors of Rep. Rush Holt's bill, HR 550, the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act. We believe the bill would pass if brought up for a vote, but there is still resistance.

We need to keep the heat on over the summer months. There's not much time to get this done.

Please help us reach our goal of $15,000 by making your contribution today at: http://www.commoncause.org/PaperBallots

Thank you for everything you do for Common Cause.

Sincerely,

Barb Burt, V.P. and Director of Election Reform Programs
The Common Cause Election Reform Team: Arn, Barry, Ben, Ed, Jenny, Kirk, Megan, Rachel, Sam, Sibley, Susannah, and interns Mona and Tom.

CA: Who/ What's Stopping The SoS From Allowing Eligible Californians To Register To Vote?

2006-04-19T19:13:00.000-07:00

Update to the following article: In the wake of a legal opinion issued by the Legislative Counsel of California on Tuesday night, California Secretary of State Bruce McPherson filed new emergency regulations with the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) today, to amend his previous regulations that prevented thousands of eligible Californians from registering to vote.

"After refusing for three weeks to fix the problem, the Secretary has finally acknowledged that his regulations and his deal with the Bush Administration are what caused the problems that have prevented thousands of eligible Californians from registering to vote," said Senator Debra Bowen (D-Redondo Beach), the chairwoman of the Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee.

Legal Opinion Concludes the CA-SoS is "The Roadblock!"

By California State Senator Debra Bowen
April 19, 2006

The only thing that’s preventing the California Secretary of State from altering his regulations and data matching standards to ensure eligible voters can register to vote is the Secretary of State.

That was the conclusion reached in a legal opinion issued late Tuesday by the Legislative Counsel of California.

The opinion states there is nothing in federal or state law requiring the Secretary of State to adopt the regulations and data matching standards he’s been relying on that have combined to prevent tens of thousands of eligible California voters from registering to vote. A copy of the opinion is attached as a PDF file to the electronic version of this release and as a paper copy to the fax of this release.

“It's clear the Secretary has the legal authority to take the steps necessary to ensure eligible voters have the ability to register before the June primary, but whether he’s actually willing to put the voters ahead of the Bush Administration remains to be seen,” said Senator Debra Bowen (D-Redondo Beach), the chairwoman of the Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee.

“I’ve been saying for three weeks that this problem needs to get solved and the quickest way to fix it is for the Secretary to abandon his deal with the Bush Administration and change the regulations and the data matching standards he’s adopted that have pulled the rug out from under thousands of eligible voters,” continued Bowen. “If he won’t fix this problem for the voters, then, like everyone else who thinks preventing eligible voters from registering is a problem, I’m prepared to try and correct it legislatively.”

According to the legal opinion:

"… the Secretary of State has the authority under existing federal and state law to adopt regulations that, pursuant to appropriate safeguards to protect the accuracy and integrity of voter registration data, would allow state and local elections officials to correct erroneous information regarding a driver’s license or social security number contained in a voter affidavit of registration, or, if that information is not provided by the affiant, to add that information to the affidavit.”

"The Secretary of State has been saying for weeks that his hands are tied by the law and he can’t do anything to fix a problem that his deal with the Bush Administration in fact created,” noted Bowen. "Two weeks ago, the independent Brennan Center for Justice pointed out that wasn’t true and now we have a formal legal opinion confirming that nothing in the law prevents the Secretary of State from pulling down the hurdles he set up with the Bush Administration that have prevented thousands of eligible voters from registering to vote.”

Article II, Section 2, of the California Constitution reads:

“A United States citizen 18 years of age and resident in this State may vote.”

"The State Constitution ensures that everyone who is a U.S. citizen, is 18-years-old, is a resident of California, and isn’t in prison, on parole for a felony conviction, or mentally incompetent has a right to register to vote in this state,” noted Bowen. "The Secretary of State should be focused on upholding the Constitutional right that every eligible California voter is entitled to instead of working with the Bush Administration to put up roadblocks to prevent people from registering to vote."

On April 6, the Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee held a three-hour hearing on the problems that have resulted from the Secretary of State’s regulations and data matching standards, though the Secretary declined to take part in the hearing. During her testimony, Wendy Weiser of Brennan Center for Justice noted the Secretary of State has adopted the most restrictive standards in the country that are preventing “thousands and thousands” of eligible voters from being able to register to vote.

On April 7, in the wake of the hearing, the Secretary of State notified the county elections officials he would change his data matching standards in one area. The change allows people who submit a voter registration form with their driver’s license number on it (if the license was issued before December 2005) to be automatically registered by the Secretary of State’s computer system if the number matches a record in the Department of Motor Vehicles database using the first three letters of the person’s last name or their date of birth. Under the previous system, only the first three letters of a person’s name were used for the match, meaning people whose driver’s license was in a different last name (perhaps they’d gotten married), had spaces in their name the computer didn’t recognize (such as “de la Torre”), or had two last names (such as “Lam Chen”) were routinely rejected.

Following is a timeline of events:

November 2, 2005 – The Secretary of State announces he has entered into an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice to create the Statewide Voter Registration Database mandated by HAVA. The Bush Administration refers to it as a “model for other states . . .”

December 5, 2005 – The Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC) and the National Association of Latino Elected & Appointed Officials (NALEO) write to the Secretary of State to comment on the regulations he proposes to implement the agreement, saying they would “disenfranchise many voters.”

December 12, 2005 – The Secretary of State adopts emergency regulations to implement the agreement. Emergency regulations can only last for 120 days, so these were set to expire on April 11, 2006, but were extended on April 5, 2006.

February 24, 2006 – The Secretary of State responds to the APALC and NALEO letter by saying in part, he will consider amending the regulations following “the experience of the June primary.” This means tens of thousands of people may be prevented from registering to vote and voting in the June primary.

March 24, 2006 – The Brennan Center for Justice in New York (www.brennancenter.org) issues a report on how the 50 states are implementing the HAVA requirement to create a Statewide Voter Registration Database. The report finds that California has implemented one of the most restrictive systems in the country in terms of setting up barriers that may prevent eligible voters from registering to vote.

March 28, 2006 – Senator Debra Bowen and the League of Women Voters of California write to the Secretary of State independently, pointing out figures from Los Angeles County showing nearly 43% of all registration forms are being rejected by the Secretary of State’s database, and urging the Secretary to alter his regulations and data matching criteria to resolve the problem.

March 29, 2006 – The Secretary of State’s spokesperson is quoted as saying the rejection rate is 26% across the state. According to county elections officials, historically only about 1% of all voters attempting to register to vote are found to be ineligible to do so.

March 31, 2006 – The Secretary of State announces that instead of changing his regulations or data matching standards, he’s proposing legislation to change one piece of the law so that if a county elections official submits a voter registration form without a driver’s license number on it, the form will be accepted as long as there is a match to only one record in the Department of Motor Vehicle files. County elections officials estimate this will address between 33% and 50% of the problem.

April 5, 2006 – The Secretary of State files a request to extend his emergency regulations, saying “… the need for changes or additions to the regulations may only become apparent once their functionality has been observed in the course of an actual election . . . it is in the best interests of the voters of this state to readopt the emergency regulations . . . and wait until after the June 6, 2006, election to begin the process of revising the regulations and implementing them on a permanent basis. If the regulations are not readopted, the Secretary of State will be out of compliance with HAVA and the November 2, 2005, interim compliance agreement with the Department [U.S. Department of Justice], resulting in the risk of legal action by the Department ...”

April 6, 2006 – The Senate Elections, Reapportionment & Constitutional Amendments Committee holds a three-hour hearing on the issue. The Secretary of State declines to appear at the hearing. A witness for the Brennan Center for Justice testifies that as a result of the Secretary of State’s regulations and data matching standards, California’s policy is “an unmitigated disaster that would disenfranchise thousands upon thousands of eligible voters.” She also states the Secretary of State cannot be sued for changing the regulations or data matching standards in a way that doesn’t comply with his agreement with the Bush Administration. He can only be sued for failing to comply with HAVA and 41 other states have adopted regulations and data matching standards that allow eligible voters to easily register to vote without violating the requirements of HAVA.

April 7, 2006 – The Secretary of State, in an e-mail sent to county elections officials, announces he is changing his data matching standards in one area. The change would allow people who submit a voter registration form with their driver’s license number on it (if the license was issued before December 2005) to be automatically registered by the Secretary of State’s computer system if the number matches a record in the Department of Motor Vehicles database using the first three letters of the person’s last name or their date of birth. Under the previous system, only the first three letters of a person’s name were used for the match, meaning people whose driver’s license was in a different last name (perhaps they’d gotten married), had spaces in their name the computer didn’t recognize (such as “de la Torre”), or have two last names (such as “Lam Chen”) were routinely rejected.

April 18, 2006 – The Legislative Counsel of California issues a legal opinion concluding that nothing in state or federal law precludes the Secretary of State from changing his regulations or data matching standards to reduce the number of hurdles an eligible voter has to clear before being able to register to vote.

April 19, 2006 - The Secretary of State files new emergency regulations with the Office of Administrative Law (OAL) to amend his previous regulations that prevented thousands of eligible Californians from registering to vote.

NC: Early Voters Got Wrong Ballot

2006-04-19T18:54:00.000-07:00

By Jennifer Ferris: The Herald-Sun (jferris@heraldsun.com)
Apr 18, 2006 : 7:45 pm ET

PITTSBORO -- When Gene Brooks went to vote Tuesday he saw a few things on the ballot that shouldn't have been there: the names of Rep. David Price and his opponents in the race for the Democratic nomination in Congressional District Four.

Brooks lives in District Two, and shouldn't have been allowed to pick a nominee for the District Four race, but elections officials say a screw-up with the voting equipment caused Brooks -- and about 60 others -- to receive the wrong ballot.

The start of one-stop voting Thursday also marked the inaugural run of a new set of voting machines in Chatham County. Voters use a touch screen to pick candidates and ballots are stored on a portable medium called a PEB.

Dawn Stumpf, Chatham County director of elections, said Tuesday the ballot problem stems from an error made by the company that provides the new material, Electronic Systems and Software, Inc.

The choice of those new systems is the target of a lawsuit currently filed against the county Board of Elections, and the machines themselves have been questioned by many in the county.

The voters in two precincts -- Hadley and Pittsboro -- are split between the two congressional districts. ES&S should have provided different ballot styles for each group of voters, but only provided a single ballot style for democratic voters in those precincts, officials said.

This means there are about 60 extra votes in the District Four race that now must be sorted out, Stumpf explained. The District Four race is the only difference between the two ballots, and votes cast in other races will not be affected by the mistake.

When voting began Thursday, Stumpf said she knew something was wrong with the selections, but voters were allowed to continue using the errant ballots until Tuesday afternoon, when the state board told her to start giving voters from these districts paper versions.

Although Stumpf said she isn't sure exactly how she will sort out the extra votes in District Four, she said it was fortunate the error happened during early voting. By law, all one-stop -- or absentee -- ballots must be retrievable -- that is, connected to a voter -- so records will allow the elections office to match completed ballots against voters.

Voters participating in one-stop were assigned a unique number, which was then typed into the voting machine by the precinct worker before the voter could begin. Presumably, the elections office will retrieve votes made by anyone from the effected areas.

Another question is how the votes will be tallied come Election Day. The mis-programmed PEBs were sent to Goldsboro for reprogramming Tuesday. The master PEB contained all 300 votes cast during the first three days of voting.

The engineers at ES&S must find a way to sum up the votes from before and after the change. Stumpf said she wasn't sure how that would work, but she was certain all votes would be counted.

Starting today, Stumpf said, voters in all districts voting one-stop should receive appropriate ballots. During the primary in May the correct ballots also will be available. In fact, Stumpf said, catching the mistake during one-stop was actually fortuitous, because the primary ballots had been programmed incorrectly as well.

"We haven't lost any votes," Stumpf said. "It just appears we got a few extra."
(One has to ask how they "got a few extra...")

PA: Court Hearing To Decide Voting Machines' Fate

2006-04-19T18:44:00.000-07:00

By Jason Cato; TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, April 19, 2006

A three-day battle will be waged next week to determine whether Allegheny County voters will use new electronic voting machines in May's primary.

A lawsuit, which also names the state of Pennsylvania and the U.S. government, was filed last week. It claims the county's proposed $11.9 million purchase of 4,700 electronic voting machines from Nebraska-based Election Systems & Software was rushed and could pose problems during the May 16 primary.

The lawsuit, filed on behalf of seven voters and the group People for the American Way, seeks to have the county barred from buying and using the new machines until steps can be taken to safeguard voter rights.

U.S. District Judge Gary L. Lancaster, who will hear the case, met Tuesday with select lawyers for each party involved -- two attorneys each for the plaintiffs, county, state and federal governments.

A plaintiff and nine attorneys, including some from Philadelphia and Baltimore, were excluded from the closed-door meeting in his chambers, although the judge had ordered all attorneys for all parties to attend in person.

The preliminary injunction hearing on the voting machines begins Tuesday and will be open.

---

Jason Cato can be reached at jcato@tribweb.com or 412-320-7840.

NY: Nassau Voters Get Election Re-Run

2006-04-19T18:36:00.000-07:00

Court orders new vote on trustee candidates after write-in problems

By BOB GARDINIER, Staff writer; TimesUnion.com
Wednesday, April 19, 2006

NASSAU -- Residents in this small village will go to the polls Thursday for a court-ordered re-election after a March 21 vote was thrown out over problems with write-in candidates.

The only people on the ballot are two incumbent trustees, Paul Haebler and Dale French, who are running for re-election and were at first thought to be running unopposed. However, on March 21, several voters tried to submit write-in ballots for Barbara Motyl-Dobert and Brendan Cellery. The pair did not gather petitions to secure a slot on the regular ballot.

In an initial count, Haebler and French garnered 49 and 48 votes, respectively, for the two seats, while Motyl-Dobert got 56 write-in votes and Cellery 57, making them the apparent winners.

But Village Clerk Margaret VanDeusen, who supervised the election, threw out some of the write-in votes, enough to give incumbents the win.

The challengers contested her actions, and VanDeusen asked the county Board of Elections to re-canvass the votes.

On March 23, the county board agreed with VanDeusen about the irregularities and threw out 11 of Cellery's write-in votes and 47 of Motyl-Dobert's, making the incumbents winners.

Election officials said voters wrote the candidates' names in the wrong slots, voted for too many candidates or wrote only one letter of a candidate's name in each of several slots instead of writing the whole name in one slot.

Because French is VanDeusen's husband, some in the village of 1,161 residents complained of a conflict of interest and said she should have recused herself from overseeing the vote.

Rensselaer County Elections Commissioner Ed McDonough said there was no evidence VanDeusen tampered with ballots.

Tom Marcelle, attorney for election inspector Marcia Valenty and the write-in candidates, took the case to Rensselaer County Court, claiming voters received inadequate instructions for a write-in option and the voting machines were set up wrong.

Judge Patrick McGrath agreed with Marcelle and ordered a new election.

Polls will be open from noon to 9 p.m. Thursday.

Bob Gardinier can be reached at 454-5696 or by e-mail at bgardinier@timesunion.com.

Chicago: District 303 vote to be reviewed

2006-04-19T18:30:00.000-07:00

By William Presecky
Tribune staff reporter
Published April 19, 2006

Several members of a citizens group that campaigned unsuccessfully to win approval for St. Charles School District 303 to sell $86 million in building bonds have asked to review the March 21 vote in several precincts.

A petition for a so-called "discovery recount" was filed with Kane County Clerk John "Jack" Cunningham on Monday by members of Citizens for Excellence in Education, which supported the bond sale.

A meeting is set for Thursday to establish a schedule for the recount, Cunningham said.

The District 303 referendum proposal failed by roughly 1 percent, or about 130 votes out of more than 13,460 cast in Kane and DuPage Counties. None of the district's three precincts in DuPage County is included in the recount. The group has asked to examine results in nine of the district's 43 precincts in Kane.

Concerns were raised during and immediately after the primary that numerous St. Charles-area voters were unable to cast ballots when they arrived at their polling places. The supply of paper used to record the state-mandated paper trail required of all new electronic voting machines had been exhausted temporarily and time was needed to restock.

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Copyright © 2006, Chicago Tribune

Alaska: Suit Filed to Get '04 Election Data . . . (200% Voter Turnout!)

2006-04-19T17:49:00.000-07:00

Democrats File Lawsuit To Get 2004 Election Records

Anchorage, April 19, 2006 - The Alaska Democratic Party filed suit in Superior Court today (Case No. 3AN-06-7035 CI) seeking to force the Division of Elections to release public records needed to verify the 2004 election results. Read the complaint (Adobe Acrobat format) here.

"We are asking the court to release these public records so that the people of Alaska can be assured that their votes were counted correctly," said Alaska Democratic Party Chair Jake Metcalfe. "The Division of Elections' numbers do not add up. The Division has refused to release the public records that would allow us to verify the results. All we ask is that the Lt. Governor and the Director of Elections follow the law and meet their obligation to Alaskans so every one knows why these numbers don't add up."

The Alaska Democratic Party has been trying since last year to get the public records of the election in order to find out why there are numerous errors and discrepancies in the state’s reported results of the 2004 general election. The Division of Elections’ latest excuse for refusing to release the election information is that it would create “security risks."

"Nothing we have asked for compromises security," Metcalfe said. ""Why is the Division of Elections is so reluctant to provide these public records? What are they trying to hide?"

According to the Division of Elections' vote reports that were produced by the state's Diebold computer system and are posted on the Division's official web site, a far larger number of votes were cast than the official totals reported in the statewide summary.

In the case of President George Bush’s votes, the district-by-district totals add up to 292,267, but his official total was only 190,889, a difference of 101,378 votes.

In the U.S. Senate race, Lisa Murkowski received 226,992 votes in the district-by-district totals, but her official total was only 149,446, a difference of 77,546 votes.

In 20 of the 40 State House Districts, more ballots were cast than there are registered voters in the district, according to information on the state's web site. In 16 election districts, the voter turnout percentage shown is over 200%.

"Alaskans must have an accurate accounting of the 2004 election results. The accountability of our election system is at stake. Confidence in the integrity of our elections is fundamental to our democracy," Metcalfe said.

The ADP filed a formal public records request on Dec. 19, 2005, seeking the "central tabulator data file" taken from the Diebold-supplied computer used to run the "GEMS" (Global Election Management Software) application. This is the electronic file containing all final vote tallies for the 2004 General Election.

Under the public records regulations, the Division was supposed to release the data file on Jan. 4. On Jan. 4 the Division extended the deadline until Jan. 19.

In a Jan. 19 letter, the Division asserted that the file was proprietary information belonging to its contractor, Diebold Elections Systems.

In a Feb. 3 letter, the Division advised the Democrats that Diebold had agreed to waive its proprietary rights to the GEMS database files, and said that the records would be provided if it determined that the integrity of the election system could be protected. In the Feb. 3 letter the Division asked for an additional 10-day extension until Feb. 13, and the Democrats agreed. On Feb. 13, the Division again extended the deadline to Feb. 27.

In a letter dated Feb. 22, the Division denied the Democrats' public records request, citing "security risks."

Thanks, as always, to Bradblog.com for this report (Brad Blog is a "must-read" for people who want fair elections in the "electronic age.")

Here's another article on the suit from Anchorage Daily News

Cannonfire Blog

2006-04-16T19:43:00.000-07:00

Cannonfire

promises to provide updates...

IL: Primary Election a Mess; Tallies NOT Correct!

2006-04-15T13:46:00.000-07:00

CAMPAIGN 2006

Losing candidates, GOP say tallies still aren't accurate

By Josh Noel, Tribune staff reporter; jbnoel@tribune.com
Published by ChicagoTribune.com April 14, 2006

Claiming that scores of votes from last month's Cook County primary still haven't been accurately counted, a group of Republicans and losing candidates called for several unprecedented fixes Thursday, ranging from an audit of ballots to an entirely new election.

During a news conference in the lobby of Cook County Clerk David Orr's office, the group said it was motivated not by sour grapes, but by the bumbling of election officials.

"This is not Hurricane Katrina. This is not a disaster created by God," said Gary Skoien, chairman of the Cook County Republican Party. "This is a disaster created by our leaders."

At an impromptu news conference to respond, city and county election officials acknowledged many shortcomings on Election Day, but they said the votes, which were certified earlier this week, have been counted correctly. A standard recount of 5 percent of the ballots, done last week, was "right on the money," said Langdon Neal, chairman of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners.

"Unequivocally, no--there will not be a new election," he said.

In addition to Skoien, a group including Democrats Frank Avila, who lost a race for the Water Reclamation board, and Darryl Smith, who fell short in the primary for the Illinois House's 6th District, echoed criticisms that have been voiced during the last month, including poor training of election judges and faulty voting equipment.

Avila, a lawyer, said he has lined up close to 30 plaintiffs, mostly Democratic primary losers, for a possible federal lawsuit to seek recounts in every race.

Fueled by concerns about "poor management and organizational incompetence," Maureen Murphy, vice chair of the county GOP and a member of the county Board of Review, said she has met with about 200 suburban election judges who detailed a litany of problems from the March 21 primary.

Among the issues, she said, were a touch-screen voting machine that "blew up like an M80" and had to be unplugged; machines showing votes that hadn't been cast; and machines not working at all. In one meeting she asked about 125 judges how many of them were confident that every vote at their polling place had been counted, and no hands went up, she said.

"We tell people every vote counts. But we do not believe every vote has been counted," she said. "This makes what happened in Florida, folks, look like a textbook election," she said, referring to the 2000 presidential election.

Election officials have agreed that faulty equipment led to Election Night mishaps, and they are pledging to withhold $15 million owed to the vendor, Sequoia Voting Systems, until two investigations are finished. One will be conducted by an outside computer analyst, Neal said.

This week, Orr's office released a 10-point plan to improve voting before November's general election. Among the proposals are providing additional training for election judges, designating an equipment manager at each polling place to oversee the machines (as other counties have done), and staging a mock election to test the equipment.

"Our performance wasn't up to par," Neal said. "But everything I've seen indicates the votes were counted accurately."

Lawsuit Filed against PA County, Dept. of Justice!

2006-04-15T13:28:00.000-07:00

SUIT SEEKS TO STOP LAST MINUTE IMPLEMENTATION
OF ES&S VOTING MACHINES IN ALLEGHENY COUNTY, PA

Guest Blogged on http://www.bradblog.com/ by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA

Announced April 12th by KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: A group of citizens and People For The American Way filed suit against the Secretary of State; Dan Onorato, Allegheny County Chief Executive; James Flynn, County Manager; and senior officials at the federal Department of Justice. The citizen group includes members of the disabilities community who want to make sure the County purchases machines that are accessible to all individuals with disabilities.

KDKA reports:
The lawsuit filed today says that decision risks chaos on Election Day because of the lack of time to train election officials and educate voters about the change from lever machines which have been in use for 40 years.

“This rush to a new and flawed technology just weeks before the election threatens to sow chaos in the primary and compromise the fundamental rights of thousands of voters for years to come,” says Harry Litman, the former United States Attorney in Pittsburgh and an attorney for the plaintiffs. “It’s a bad deal for Allegheny County, and, we believe, a violation of federal law.”

The suit, Celeste Taylor v. Dan Onorato asks the court to prevent use of machines manufactured by Election Systems & Software until the County has spent the time necessary to identify voting systems that are secure; reliable; and accessible to voters with disabilities.
...
The plaintiffs cite elections in Texas, Florida, California, Ohio, and North and South Carolina where ES&S machines failed on Election Day.

A report by the Inspector General in Miami of a 2002 election found that the ES&S machines were not properly prepared; their results could not be audited; poll workers were unable to operate machines; and large number of voters simply gave up as a result.
...
The complaint alleges that DOJ has pressured Allegheny to buy the new machines by improperly threatening to take back about $12 million that has been given to Pennsylvania for improved voting systems.

These machines are sold and serviced by Elections Systems and Software, the same company that has played a major role in failures of memory cards and is a large reason why this nation is headed for a "Train Wreck" in our primary elections and, if no action is taken, in November.

OH: Preble County Awaits Printer for Absentee Ballots!

2006-04-10T13:14:00.000-07:00

April 4, 2006
By Rebecca Helmes
Staff writer, Palladium-Item News; pal-item.com

PREBLE COUNTY, Ohio -- On Wednesday voters across most of Ohio had the opportunity to start casting absentee ballots.

But not here.

Preble County Board of Elections Director Marilyn Jackson said her county is still waiting to receive its ballots from the printer and she doesn't know when they'll come in.

"We just don't have them yet," Jackson said about absentee ballots. "Not everybody's (other counties across Ohio) delayed."

Ken Fields, spokesman for Election Systems and Software -- the company that sold Preble County its optical scan election equipment for this year and is providing the ballots -- said it is his understanding that the county just agreed to the ballot on Monday.

Ginny Weiler, deputy director for the Preble County Board of Elections, said the office found errors on the ballot Thursday and finally was able to speak with ES&S to resolve the issue on Monday.

James Lee, a spokesman for the Ohio Secretary of State, said he anticipates that the Preble County Board of Elections is sending out absentee ballot applications. Applications must be completed before people are allowed to cast absentee ballots.

"I'm confident that the board of elections is doing everything that they can to provide ballots to citizens," Lee said.

Indiana counties started absentee balloting Monday. Wayne County didn't have many absentee voters, but that gave the Wayne County Clerk's Office employees a chance to adjust to a new mandated statewide ballot system.

"We've had I think a few voters in," Wayne County Clerk Sue Anne Lower said. "It's been hectic."

Reporter Rebecca Helmes: (765) 973-4478 or rhelmes@pal-item.com
Originally published April 4, 2006

Indiana: Counties Still Dealing With Ballot Problems!

2006-04-10T13:06:00.000-07:00

IndyStar.com
April 7, 2006
By Vic Ryckaert; vic.ryckaert@indystar.com

Marion County Clerk Doris Anne Sadler blasted a voting machine company this morning saying it supplied error-filled ballots for next month's primary election.

Meanwhile, clerks in Johnson and Hancock counties, also are upset with the company because it did not deliver absentee ballots in time and failed to program touch screen voting machines.

Marion County's problem, Sadler said, is Nebraska-based Election Systems & Software did not print instructions on ballots for the non-partisan school board elections in Decatur and Washington townships. The error was caught Tuesday, the day after absentee voting began, and Sadler said it means two people are going to have to vote again.

"This particular problem seems now to be fixed and we got away with it only affecting two people," Sadler said during an emergency meeting of the Election Board this morning. "But given the history of the last two weeks, I'm afraid of what will crop up again."

The company supplies the county's optical scan and touch-screen voting machines. The county's elections are complicated, Sadler said. Ballots in the 914 precincts have more than 2,000 variations, depending on where a voter lives and what political party they claim.

Two weeks ago, ES&S delivered its first batch of ballots for this election and Sadler said they were rife with mistakes. County officials found new errors in the replacement ballots and sent those back too. They received the latest batch late last week, Sadler said, and spent the weekend proofreading.

"They don't proof anything before they send it to us," Sadler said. "I would love to fire them. I've had three years of serious issues with this company."

Sadler said she couldn't fire ES&S because there aren't many other options. Few voting machine companies are certified by the federal government, and Sadler said the others have similar problems.

Johnson County received its absentee ballots on Thursday, two weeks after the ballots were supposed to have been mailed to voters who submitted absentee applications, according to Johnson County Clerk Jill Jackson. The ballots, per state statute, should have been mailed to the county by March 18.

ES&S also failed to program Johnson County's touch screen voting machines. Jackson said ES&S technicians are on site and expect a computer disk today to update the machines.

"I guess what bothered us the most is that it's like it's no big deal that they missed a statutory deadline," Jackson said of ES&S. "They're a big company and it's like they don't care, that they'll get (the ballots) to us when they get them done, and that's not acceptable. I'm extremely disappointed in the vendor."

In Marion County, problems first surfaced in 2003 when ES&S provided software that was not fully certified by the Indiana Election Commission. The company compounded the problem by loading uncertified software on the touch-screen machines. It replaced the uncertified software with files that were incompatible with the programs that count the votes.

In fall 2003, the clerk's office had to hand-count more than 9,000 absentee ballots for the City-County Council election because ES&S had not obtained certification for software on a central counting machine.

Last August, the company settled a lawsuit over the problems and agreed to pay Marion County $1.2 million.

Star reporter Jason Thomas contributed to this story.
Call Star reporter Vic Ryckaert at (317) 444-2761.

Allegheny County, PA Tries Again...This Time with ES&S

2006-04-07T03:28:00.000-07:00

Plans to use Diebold, then Sequoia Fell Through When their Electronic Voting Machines Surprised them by Failing -- So County is Now Turning to KNOWN Failure, ES&S!

Originally Allegheney County, PA had hoped to use Diebold's electronic voting machines -- until they found out that Diebold machines were hackable.

Then they decided instead to go with Sequoia Voting Systems instead -- until they found out that their machines are hackable too.

Yesterday, with just six weeks left before their primary election, and against the wishes of Allegheny County's Chief Executive who felt it was safer to stay with their old lever systems, Allegheny decided instead to go with new ES&S touch-screen voting machines.

ES&S, of course, is the company whose machines failed all over Texas during the March 7th primary in Texas, leading to state-wide election contest by a Republican former Supreme Court Justice. ES&S saw more than 30% of their memory cards fail in recent pre-election tests in Summit County, OH, more than 1000 cards fail in NC, and their machines failed to work completely this week as early voting began in Indiana.

Good luck with the new ES&S voting machines Allegheny County, PA!

TEXAS: Election Results Challenged by Former TX Supreme Court Justice!

2006-04-07T03:11:00.000-07:00

Judicial candidate files challenge

By Anna M. Tinsley
Star-Telegram Staff Writer; April 6, 2006

Former Texas Supreme Court Justice Steve Smith has filed a formal election challenge to determine whether primary election problems in at least 11 counties across the state - including Tarrant County - affected his bid for the state's highest civil court.

Smith lost to incumbent Justice Don Willett in his bid for Texas Supreme Court Place 2 by about 6,000 votes, according to results posted on the Texas secretary of state's Web site.

"I have been unable to get a full and accurate response from government agencies without filing a lawsuit," Smith said in a written statement to the Star-Telegram.

"The bottom line is this: Every candidate has a right to know that all the votes were counted correctly," he said. "We have good reason to believe that the vote total is incorrect, and we believe that the election must not be finally decided until all the votes are correctly counted."

Smith's petition, filed in Travis County's 250th District Court, sets off the formal process for contesting an election and seeks access to inspect election records in the possession of the Republican Party of Texas, Tarrant County and Gregg County, which includes Longview.

Last month, Smith's staff formally requested detailed election data from Tarrant County under the state's public information law, including the audit trail, optical scan ballots and precinct-by-precinct results.

They apparently received some of the information they requested, officials said. Gayle Hamilton, Tarrant County interim elections administrator, could not be reached to comment Wednesday afternoon.

In Tarrant County, a computer programming error counted some votes cast in the March 7 primary multiple times and boosted the final tally in both party primaries by as much as 100,000 votes.

Hart InterCivic, the company that made the equipment and wrote the software, said that a procedural error led to inflated counts when merging totals from early voting, absentee-by-mail voting and election-day voting into one report on election night.

Local election officials say they have fixed the glitches and corrected problems with voting tallies.

"If the counting error in Tarrant County had not occurred, it is quite likely we would not have filed an election contest," said David Rogers, a spokesman for Smith. "We believe, however, that there may have been mistakes or fraud in places other than Tarrant County.

"The Tarrant County irregularities prompted us to look closely at possible problems in other areas of the state," he said. "We are concerned about problems in at least 11 counties across the state."

The court petition states that Smith believes that the final tally does not include legal votes cast for Smith in Armstrong, Cass, Childress, Dimmit, Kent, Limestone and Lynn counties. It also says that the final tally includes illegal votes for Willett in Galveston, Gregg, Tarrant and Winkler counties and does not include legal votes for Smith in Gregg, Tarrant and Winkler counties.

The document states that Smith wants to review election results and have an expedited hearing on the issue.

Anna M. Tinsley, (817) 390-7610
atinsley@star-telegram.com

Indiana: MORE VOTING PROBLEMS! (ES&S Voting Systems)

2006-04-07T03:00:00.000-07:00

I-Team 8 Finds More Problems with ES&S Voting Equipment

April 5, 2006 01:42 PM
By Pam Elliot

[Indianapolis TV News] I-Team 8 broke the story that many Indiana counties didn't receive official ballots for early voting that began Monday. On Tuesday, I-Team 8 uncovered a problem even worse.

Once again, a voting machine company is breaking Indiana law and violating county contracts.

Electronic voting machines were supposed to be working for early voting in the Johnson County courthouse. "This machine won't do anything," said Jill Jackson, Johnson County clerk.

Jackson blames the vendor, Election Systems and Software (ES&S).

"This is not fair to the voters of Johnson County, the taxpayers. They've paid for this equipment. They've paid for this service, and this is not acceptable," Jackson said.

What's missing is a "smart card" that allows you to vote. For now, copied paper ballots will have to do for absentee voting. Johnson County and nearly two-dozen others across the state don't have the official paper ballots.

The chairman of the Indiana Election Commission is angry. "It's inexcusable that ES&S did not get those ballots to those people," said Tom Wheeler, Indiana Election Commission chair.

The machine that counts the ballots considers a ballot defective if it is not official. If that is the case, when it comes out, somebody from the election board has to count the vote by hand.

I-Team 8 has also learned the batteries that came with Johnson County's $2.4 million equipment are old and failing. At least nine other counties have the same problem. If the battery fails, the internal ballots and all the votes cast will be lost.

"That's the problem with paperless ballots and no trail balloting. They're gone," Wheeler said.

"Although I am concerned about this issue, it is the responsibility of the counties to resolve this with their vendor," said Secretary of State Todd Rokita.

I-Team 8 asked Jill Jackson whether it was time to rethink the county’s choice of vendor. "I am certain that the county commissioners are going to want to revisit this, probably along with a lot of other counties in the state of Indiana," she replied.

Commissioner Wheeler says there's little the state can do. "We will try to hold their feet to the fire. But bottom line, those promises are to the individual counties," he said.

In a statement Tuesday, ES&S said: "We have worked with the counties in an often challenging time frame to provide them with what they need for the start of early voting. That process requires information that is provided to us from the counties and approval of the ballots by the counties. We are certainly focusing our resources on meeting the needs of the counties as we get the necessary approvals and information."

Omaha-based ES&S has been in trouble with the state at least twice before for not following Indiana law, but it's not the only vendor failing Hoosier voters. The certification expired last October on electronic voting machines made by Indianapolis-based Microvote, used by 45 Indiana counties.

Bankrupt AccuPoll CEO speaks out: No vendor "has a system that voters can trust"!

2006-04-07T02:13:00.000-07:00

With voting machine company now bankrupt, CEO speaks:
No vendor "has a system that voters can trust"!

Straight from the horse's mouth
by Sean Greene, electionline.org

The realities of the e-Voting market most recently took its toll on voting-machine maker AccuPoll, which filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, leaving two counties in Texas using its products with no vendor support and a frustrated former CEO in its wake.

The company, which produced the AVS-1000, a voter-verified paper audit trail (VVPAT)-equipped touch-screen machine, has ceased all operations. And it also leaves the company's former head fuming about the nature of the voting-machine business.

"I am not happy about the outcome, or the state of the industry. I think that something needs to be done. I'm not sure what it is, it probably doesn't include AccuPoll at this point, but I do not feel that any of the vendors has a system that voters can trust," said Dennis Vadura, former AccuPoll CEO.

"I think that vendors outright misrepresent the robustness, stability, and security of their systems. You just have to look at the litany of problems and it points at one thing, bad fundamental design, and not enough checks and balances. I also wonder why the other vendors were so adamant in fighting a VVPAT system requirement. They spent much more in fighting it than in implementing it," he said.

"It was too little business too late. Our investors were fed up with funding the company, and not winning business," Vadura said.

He also described a difficult experience in dealing with the government procurement process.

"I am extremely jaded by the government procurement and purchasing game. In some cases I would point the finger at sheer incompetence on the part of the procurement officers. Some of it is also due to them not wanting to take risk, or not wanting to make a decision for political reasons."

Those that did take the risk - the two counties in Texas - reported that both voters and officials that used AccuPoll said they were pleased with the performance of the machines and its VVPAT component during the March primary, even though they know going forward they will be administrating without a support network from the vendor.

"That's why we liked it," said Jane Jones, Delta County clerk, referring to the paper trail.

Both counties had support from former AccuPoll employees during the primary. However, when it comes to future elections, both county clerks noted they are on their own.

"We know the machine well enough. We'll just have to wing it," said Erath County clerk Gwinda Jones.

OHIO Election Workers indicted for fudging ’04 recount

2006-04-07T01:24:00.000-07:00

Prosecutor says Cuyahoga skirted rules

Thursday, April 06, 2006
Joan Mazzolini, Plain Dealer Reporter

After the 2004 presidential election, Cuyahoga County election workers secretly skirted rules designed to make sure all votes were counted correctly, a special prosecutor charges.

While there is no evidence of vote fraud, the prosecutor said their efforts were aimed at avoiding an expensive - and very public - hand recount of all votes cast. Three top county elections officials have been indicted, and Erie County Prosecutor Kevin Baxter says more indictments are possible.

Michael Vu, executive director of the Cuyahoga County elections board, said workers followed procedures that had been in place for 23 years. He said board employees had no objection to doing an exhaustive hand count if needed, meaning they had no motive to break the law.

Internet bloggers have cried foul since 2004 about election results in Ohio, one of the key states in deciding the election. They have been tracking Baxter's investigation with online posts about the indictments.

Baxter's prosecution centers on Ohio's safeguards for ensuring that every vote is counted.

Baxter charges that Cuyahoga election workers - mindful of the monthlong Florida recount in 2000 - not only ignored the safeguards but worked to defeat them during Ohio's 2004 recount.

Candidates for president from the Green and Libertarian parties requested the Ohio recount. State laws and regulations specify how a recount works. Election workers in each county are supposed to count 3 percent of the ballots by hand and by machine, randomly choosing precincts for that count.

If the hand and machine counts match, the other 97 percent of the votes are recounted by machine. If the numbers don't match, workers repeat the effort. If they still don't match exactly, the workers must complete the recount by hand, a tedious process that could take weeks and cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But the fix was in at the Cuyahoga elections board, Baxter charges.

Days before the Dec. 16 recount, workers opened the ballots and hand-counted enough votes to identify precincts where the machine count matched.

"If it didn't balance, they excluded those precincts," Baxter said.

"The preselection process was done outside of any witnesses, without anyone's knowledge except for [people at] the Board of Elections."

On the official recount day, employees pretended to pick precincts randomly, Baxter says. Dozens of Cuyahoga County election workers sat at 20 folding tables in front of dozens of witnesses and reporters.

They did the hand and machine count of 3 percent of the votes 34 of the 1,436 precincts and when the totals matched, the recount was completed by machines.

The recount gave Kerry 17 extra votes and took six away from Bush.

But observers suspected that the precincts were not randomly chosen and asked a board worker about it, said Toledo attorney Richard Kerger. The worker acknowledged that there had been a precount.

Kerger wrote a letter to Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Bill Mason, complaining and asking for an investigation. Mason recused himself, and Baxter was appointed special prosecutor. He brought elections workers before a grand jury to find out what happened.

"They screwed with the process and increased the probability, if not the certainty, that there would not be a full countywide hand count," Baxter said.

Everyone expected the recount to "be conducted in accordance of the law," he said.

Vu acknowledged that the selection of precincts was not completely random because precincts with 550 votes or fewer were not used. Nor were precincts counted where the number of ballots handed out on Election Day failed to match the number of ballots cast.

Baxter has said he can't understand why the three people indicted - all managers - continue to work at the election office. None has the same duties they had in 2004.

Kathleen Dreamer was manager of the board's ballot department. Rosie Grier was assistant manager. Jacqueline Maiden was Elections Division director and its third-highest-ranking employee. All have been charged with misdemeanor and felony counts of failing to follow the state elections law.

A May 8 trial date is set for Dreamer and Grier, but Baxter wants to combine all three cases, including Maiden's, who was indicted later.

Kerger said he was surprised by the charges. "We wrote, not to have any criminal charges, but just to find out what happened," he said. "The special prosecutor has the ability to conduct an investigation and not file any charges."

Kerger said he believes there are two reasons, generally, why an elections board would precount before a recount. The first is to change the results of the vote, which he does not believe happened. The second, he speculated, was that "the workers were so tired and didn't want to hassle with doing a hand recount."

To reach this Plain Dealer reporter: jmazzolini@plaind.com, 216-999-4563

Susan Sarandon: "US Elections Should be Monitored!"

2006-04-05T14:38:00.000-07:00

Sarandon Wants Monitoring for U.S. Elections
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12096127/
By Jeannette Walls
MSNBC
Updated: 2:44 a.m. ET April 3, 2006

Susan Sarandon wants the U.S. presidential elections to be monitored by outside interests. The “Bull Durham” star says that the 2004 vote was so fraudulent that we need international oversight — like troubled third-world countries do.

“I believe our next election should be monitored by international entities, just like it happened in Haiti and Iraq,” Sarandon told Brazilian newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo, according to our translator. “The last one was an embarrassment. Everybody knew there was fraud, but nothing was done about it. In some states there were more votes than people able to vote.”

Sarandon, who recently made headlines when she expressed her disappointment with Democratic Sen. Hillary Clinton — who is widely considered to be a possible presidential candidate — and isn’t terribly optimistic about other Dems. “I honestly hope that the Democratic Party finds a candidate for the presidency, but I recognize that the scenario isn’t inspiring.”

Her assessment of President Bush’s administration isn’t upbeat either. “I think we’ve never been as close to George Orwell’s ‘1984’ as before,” she said. “We live in a society where individual rights and legality are definitely threatened and that’s scary.”

Warning to Election Officials: Diebold Making Unannounced Visits To Their Machines

2006-04-04T18:57:00.000-07:00

Please forward to your local elections officials:

Warning: Black Box Voting has received credible first-hand reports from multiple states that Diebold is making unannounced visits to counties, sometimes when the elections supervisor is out of town. Diebold has prevailed on assistants and managed to gain access to the voting equipment.

Elections employees report to us that their questions to Diebold are not being answered to their satisfaction.

Here is what to look out for, and why this is so important:

1. Program changes: Watch very carefully whether Diebold puts a card into your machine and boots it up. Alert your staff to be on the lookout for this. By inserting one card, either the operating system or the voting software can be altered. Inserting two cards can change both.

Such changes can hide evidence of the kind of security vulnerabilities found by Harri Hursti and Security Innovation Inc. in Emery County, Utah. However, replacing the operating system and programs does not ensure the integrity of your machines, since the security vulnerabilities found appear to be able to survive overwriting both the operating system and the programs.

2. Swapping out equipment or components: We have credible reports that Diebold has swapped motherboards in some machines. We have less firm reports that Diebold has made reference to repartitioning memory and/or other adjustments. Either swapping the motherboard or repartitioning could obscure evidence of programming that shouldn't be there, and/or introduce new vulnerabilities to your system.

3. Swapping or recording serial numbers. The Diebold serial numbers do not appears to be burned into the machine/motherboard itself, but are simply affixed with a plate that can be replaced.

You should, immediately, photograph each of your machines' serial numbers.

Diebold denies that they have sold used equipment. However, a recent response from Deborah Seiler, the former Diebold sales rep who is now Elections Registrar for Solano County, California, gives a perception that someone is not being forthcoming.

Solano County used the Diebold TSx for one election and then rejected the system. Seiler, who took office shortly after Solano rejected the Diebold equipment, has reportedly responded to a public records request for the Solano County TSx documents containing the serial numbers that the documents were given back to Diebold and that Solano County no longer has them.

Diebold's odd explanation in Utah, that there were perhaps Chinese or Asian fonts on touch-screens delivered to Utah, would be consistent with selling machines from California. There were some 800 to 900 TSx machines, apparently, rejected by Solano County.

Black Box Voting encourages all recipients of "new" Diebold TSx machines to log serial numbers immediately, photograph or videotape them, and do so before Diebold arrives to visit your machines if at all possible.

It would be a good idea to take the keys to the voting machine storage facility with you when you are not in the office. Advise your staff not to allow Diebold to access your machines without your presence.

If Diebold comes to visit your machines, you are advised to tape record, videotape, and have several witnesses present to observe exactly what they do.

Better yet, tell them you need a written work order specifying what they will be doing in detail before you authorize it, and stand over them to observe during any access to any part of your system.

Diebold is a private company. As soon as you took delivery on your system, you have the responsibility to be in control of it and observe at all times. You are under no obligation to allow a vendor access (even if your state has mandated that you take these machines).

The upcoming security report, along with the testimony of Wyle Labs at the California Senate Elections Committee hearing last week, provide clear indications as to why preservation of your system AS IT WAS DELIVERED TO YOU should remain "as is."

Supreme Court: Voters Have No Standing To Object To e-Voting Machines!

2006-04-04T18:35:00.000-07:00

Supreme Court Denies Standing & Allows Costs Against Voting Rights Activist!

Washington DC -- April 4, 2006: In an alarming wake-up call to voting rights activists accross the country, the U.S. Supreme Court let stand last week a decision by the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals. The lower court ruled (Landes v Tartaglione, et al) that Philadelphia journalist and voting rights activist, Lynn Landes, had no standing to challenge the constitutionality of election laws which Landes claimed deny direct access to a tangible ballot and meaningful transparency to the election process.

Specifically, Landes challenged the use of voting machines and absentee voting in elections for public office. The defendants in the lawsuit were Margaret Tartaglione, Chair of the City Commissioners of Philadelphia; Pedro A. Cortes, Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; and Alberto Gonzales, Attorney General of the United States.

Landes says that the court's decision does not mean that the use of obstructive and non-transparent voting processes or technologies is constitutional. But, it doesn't send a good signal, either.

"Since I represented myself without the support of a voting rights organization, this decision may be a matter of the Court not taking me seriously, rather than any reflection on the case itself," says Landes. She points out that the Third Circuit based its dubious decision on three cases that had nothing to do with elections, voting rights, or challenges to the constitutionality of state and/or federal law.

Landes encourages activists to continue to pursue legal action, but adds a strong note of caution. "The Court is now packed with extremely conservative judges who are taking extraordinary steps to discourage civil rights litigants," she warns.

In what appears to be a punitive measure, the Supreme Court let stand the Third Circuit's judgment to tax court costs against Landes as the plaintiff, an unusual move in a civil rights case.

The Third Circuit's ruling ignored previous U.S. Supreme Court's decisions in Christiansburg Garment Co. v. EEOC (1978) and Fogerty v. Fantasy, Inc.(1994). In the latter case, Justice William Rehnquist stated, "... we found (it) to be the important policy objectives of the Civil Rights statutes, and the intent of Congress to achieve such objectives through the use of plaintiffs as "`private attorney[s] general.'"

In light of the Court's action, Landes is again emphasizing the critical need for 'open voting'. In a January 2005 article, Landes called for activists to conduct Parallel Elections outside of official polling places as a check against official election results.

Activists in California, Texas, and Florida did just that and more Parallel Elections are planned for this year. In Parallel Elections, voters are asked to vote twice, once inside the official polling station and again outside in a Parallel Election. Voters write down their name, address, and signature along with their choice of candidates. Unlike exit polling, Parallel Election ballots can and have been used to challenge official election results.

Landes also suggests that any candidate for elective office request that voters mail that candidate a letter indicating the voter's name, address, signature, a witness's signature, and for which candidate they voted. It should be mailed directly after the voter has voted at the polls. Candidates should delay conceding or declaring victory for at least a week after the election in order to allow sufficient time to receive these unofficial ballots.

Something similar to this idea was put into practice last winter in North Carolina. According to a February 6, 2005 editorial in the Ashville Citizen-Times, "...a voting machine error ...caused 4,400 votes to vanish in Carteret County. As (candidate) Troxler led in the count by 2,287 votes in a race that saw more than 3 million votes cast, the missing votes threw the outcome into disarray. Troxler's campaign rounded up affidavits from more than 1,400 Carteret voters who said they had voted for him." As a result, his opponent conceded.

Lastly, since it appears that America's political parties are particularly vulnerable to the influence of big corporations and the wealthy few (and have only given lip service to the right to vote and to have votes counted properly), Landes is encouraging all voters to consider supporting write-in candidates for political office.

--------------------------------------

Lynn Landes is one of the nation's leading journalists on voting technology and democracy issues. She has also written on the subject of the environment and health. Readers can find her articles and research at EcoTalk.org. Formerly, Lynn was a news reporter for DUTV and commentator for the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). Contact info: lynnlandes@earthlink.net / (215) 629-3553

SoS Kenneth Blackwell (OH) held Diebold Stock! (Running for gov.)

2006-04-04T10:07:00.000-07:00

April 3, 2006, 11:20PM

Ohio Official Invested in Vote Machine Co.

By ANDREW WELSH-HUGGINS Associated Press Writer http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/nation/3768954.html
© 2006 The Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — The state's top elections official said Monday he accidentally invested in a company that makes voting machines.

Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, who is seeking the Republican nomination for governor, said he discovered the shares for Diebold Inc. while preparing a required filing for the Ohio Ethics Commission.

"While I was unaware of this stock in my portfolio, its mere presence may be viewed as a conflict and is therefore not acceptable," he said in a letter included in his filing.

Blackwell said his investments are directed by an accountant and financial adviser without his knowledge or help, "similar to a blind trust."

He said a manager of his investments account at Credit Suisse First Boston bought 178 shares of Diebold stock at $53.67 per share in January 2005. Blackwell said the manager did not follow instructions to avoid such investments.

He said 95 shares were later sold at a loss but he still held 83 shares until discovering them and liquidating them Monday, also at a loss.

The state negotiated a deal with Diebold last year for $2,700 per touch-screen machine. In a statement given in May as part of a lawsuit, Judith Grady, who oversees the secretary of state's compliance with the 2002 federal voting act, said Blackwell was not involved with price negotiations.

What had been a mundane political duty took on new meaning last year after Gov. Bob Taft's failure to report several golf outings led to his no contest plea to ethics violations. He was fined the maximum $4,000.

Bob Paduchik, a spokesman for Attorney General Jim Petro, Blackwell's rival in the GOP primary, called for further investigation.

Democrats weren't buying Blackwell's explanation.

"If he can't manage to know what's in his checkbook, why would the people of Ohio want to trust this man with the state's checkbook?" said Brian Rothenberg, spokesman for the Ohio Democratic Party.

A Picture Worth A Thousand Words! (Scalia's Obscene Gesture To The Press)

2006-03-30T14:24:00.000-08:00

Last Sunday, after receiving the Eucharist at a special Mass for lawyers and politicians at Cathedral of the Holy Cross, a reporter asked U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia whether press reports about his lack of impartiality (due to his faith) on the issue of "separation of church and state" were true.

"The judge paused for a second, then looked directly into my lens and said, 'To my critics, I say, 'Vaffanculo,' punctuating the comment by flicking his right hand out from under his chin," photographer Peter Smith said. ("Vaffanculo" means "(expletive) you" in Italian.) Smith immediately snapped the picture in front of many witnesses, mostly from the press.

According to Smith, Justice Scalia then said to him, "You’re not going to print that, are you?"

Justice Scalia denied the entire incident after press reports about it. See: http://www.upi.com/NewsTrack/view.php?StoryID=20060329-014827-8886r. In response, Smith printed it and gave it out to the media.

Here's the picture.

You can read about the incident at: http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=132311
and http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=132848&format=text

On March 8, 2006, in a speech at the University of Freiberg in Switzerland, Justice Scalia opined that the U.S. Constitution provides no rights to enemy combatants. It was "crazy," he apparently said, that enemy combatants, like the ones held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, receive a "full jury trial." According to Newsweek Magazine, he stated, "War is war." See: http://www.politicalgateway.com/news/read.html?id=6740

Justice Scalia is not supposed to discuss a case pending in the Supreme Court. He is supposed to wait until he has heard oral arguments by the parties before he decides the issues. This time, he publicly expresssed an opinion to the press in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld, a pending Supreme Court case which challenges the legality of the Bush Administration's military commissions set up to try terrorism suspects without the benefit of the Geneva Convention or due process. By the time the court heard oral arguments Tuesday in Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld, Justice Scalia showed he had already made up his mind. Thus, Justice Antonin Scalia is disqualified from hearing the case and in participating in the court's deliberations in the matter.

Because of the statements he made in public, many have asked the obviously partial jurist to recuse himself.

In a letter delivered to the court late Monday, a lawyer for a group of retired U.S. generals and admirals cited Scalia's March 8th remarks at the University of Freiburg in Switzerland. The letter said Scalia's reported reference to the Geneva Conventions was of particular concern to the retired officers, as it is the exact issue in the case. They asked him to recuse himself. (http://www.thenewstribune.com/news/nationworld/story/5620464p-5048393c.html, http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/news/nation/14203488.htm)

Other calls for Scalia's recusal came Monday from the Center for Constitutional Rights, a civil rights organization that supports the challenge to the military commissions, and from Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee.

If he were a truly honorable jurist, he would have recused himself. He did not. He sat at the bench this week and heard oral arguments in the case. So much for the impartiality of the Supreme Court bench!

This is not the first time that Scalia has shown partiality. In 2004, after receiving great pressure to do so, he recused himself in a case on the constitutionality of the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, after he spoke out on the then-pending case at a rally in Virginia.

The Boston Herald added the following in their article at http://news.bostonherald.com/localRegional/view.bg?articleid=132311&format=&page=2:

The notoriously media-wary Scalia just last month had a Boston man tossed for heckling him at a speech at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington. In 2004, Scalia’s bodyguard confiscated a reporter’s digital recorder and erased a talk the judge had just given to a school assembly. The Justice Department later ruled the federal marshal had broken the law. In 1996, Scalia told a Baptist prayer breakfast that America was rife with enemies of Christians. In 2004, he ruffled feathers by duck hunting with Vice President Dick Cheney while the court was considering a case on Cheney’s energy task force.
(He refused to recuse himself in Cheney's case as well. So much for blind justice.)

Florida subpoenas voting machine companies

2006-03-29T16:38:00.000-08:00

Tampa Bay's 10 News; March 29, 2006

TALLAHASSEE, Florida (AP) — The Florida Attorney General's Office has issued investigative subpoenas to the three companies certified to sell voting machines in Florida.

Attorney General Charlie Crist is reviewing a dispute between the firms and Leon County's elections supervisor.

Diebold Election Systems, Election Systems and Software and Sequoia Voting Systems have refused to sell equipment to let disabled voters cast ballots without help in Leon County. Elections supervisor Ion Sancho has been outspoken about his concern that the devices can be easily manipulated to change race outcomes.

The companies' refusal has left Leon County, the home of the state Capitol, in violation of the federal Help America Vote Act.

Crist wants to see copies of documents relating to sales of voting machines by the companies in Florida since January 2003. Crist's office began the investigation in early February.

A spokesman for the elections division at Diebold says they haven't seen it, but will review it. Officials at Sequoia and E,S and S haven't returned messages seeking comment.

'06 Primary voting-machine troubles raise concerns

2006-03-29T09:25:00.000-08:00

USA Today; Washington/Politics
By Jim Drinkard, USA TODAY
Posted 3/27/2006 11:36 PM Updated 3/28/2006 7:04 AM

--------------------------------------------

States receiving the most federal money to upgrade voting systems since the Help America Vote Act was passed in 2002 (in millions).
By Marcy E. Mullins, USA TODAY, Source: U.S. Election Assistance Commission

--------------------------------------------

WASHINGTON — Problems using voting machines in the Texas and Illinois primaries this month have reinforced fears that the 2006 elections may be beset with glitches.

"There's a lot of evidence that some of those fears are coming to pass," says Doug Chapin, president of Electionline.org, a non-partisan group that studies elections. "The theory that new technology results in error seems to be borne out early in the process."

More than 30 million Americans will be voting on unfamiliar equipment this year, after modernization required by the Help America Vote Act. Congress passed the law in 2002 to address problems stemming from the 2000 presidential election in Florida.

Among early trouble spots:

• The largest jurisdictions in Illinois, Chicago and Cook County, encountered problems in the March 21 primary. In some cases, precinct election judges didn't get hands-on training before the election. There were paper jams, misplaced memory cartridges containing election results and long delays in counting.

Cook County Clerk David Orr says some problems were the result of introducing two new machines in each precinct: a touch-screen ballot and a machine that optically scans paper ballots. "We had our share of problems, but you expect it with new stuff," Orr says.

• In Texas, a candidate for the state Supreme Court will contest the March 7 primary because of what he calls widespread problems using new machines.

In Fort Worth, an initial ballot count showed about 150,000 votes even though there were only one-third that many voters, says David Rogers, campaign manager for the candidate, Steve Smith. And in San Angelo, balky new equipment and a close local race led to a recount that was halted after it appeared some votes were missing.

A spokesman for the secretary of state's office, Scott Haywood, says human factors accounted for any glitches, and they have been fixed. "Anytime you are using a new system, officials have to get used to it," he says. "Our biggest focus now is to increase training."

The next test: 10 states hold primaries in May, including Pennsylvania, which is scrambling to train voters and poll workers.

The state is "a disaster waiting to happen," says John Gideon, director of VotersUnite.org, a group that is skeptical about electronic voting.

The task is manageable, counters Michelle Shafer of Sequoia Voting Systems, an equipment maker that has customers in Pennsylvania and 19 other states. "We have seen this coming and have ramped up as best we can," and will be ready by November, she says.

How Elections Became a Criminal Enterprise

2006-03-26T15:50:00.000-08:00

I obtained these links from Democratic Underground Dot Com and I strongly recommend that you read the articles at the following links:

-----

How Elections Became a Criminal Enterprise

Part One: http://www.hermes-press.com/criminal_vote.htm

Part Two: http://www.hermes-press.com/criminal_vote2.htm

A blogger named "Amaryllis" posted the above links to Democratic Underground. Amaryllis provides the following quotes that give us hope:

“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible but in the end, they always fall - think of it, ALWAYS.” - Gandhi

If we give up, we are beat and they've won. As long as we don't give up, there is still hope of turning it around. We've made a lot of progress and it is mushrooming now.

Election Whistle-Blower Stymied by Vendors

2006-03-26T15:26:00.000-08:00

Finally, the "Main Stream Media" is reporting on Diebold and the other two faulty election machine companies that manipulate our vote! This is about time!

Diebold produes bank ATMs that are totally secure and invulnerable to attack, and their ATMs produce a verifiable paper receipt. It is unconscionable that Diebold says they cannot produce an equally secure, capable, tamper-proof e-Voting machine. Worse, it is completely outrageous that their lawyer says they only want their "authorized" people to test their machines and that they do not want independent experts to test them. Something is wrong in Denmark . . .

-------------------

After Official's Criticism About Security, Three
Firms Reject Bid for Voting Machines

By Peter Whoriskey, Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, March 26, 2006; Page A07

MIAMI -- Among those who worry that hackers might sabotage election tallies, Ion Sancho is something of a hero.

The maverick elections supervisor in Leon County, Fla., last year helped show that electronic voting machines from one of the major manufacturers are vulnerable, according to experts, and would allow election workers to alter vote counts without detection.

Now, however, Sancho may be paying an unexpected price for his whistle-blowing: None of the state-approved companies here will sell him the voting machines the county needs.

"I've essentially embarrassed the current companies for the way they do business, and now I believe I'm being singled out for punishment by the vendors," he said.

There are three vendors approved to sell voting equipment in Florida, and each has indicated it cannot or will not fill Sancho's order for 160 voting machines for the disabled. Already, he has had to return a $564,000 federal grant to buy the machines because he has been unable to acquire the machines yet.

"I'm very troubled by this, to be honest -- I can't believe the way he's being treated," said David Wagner, a computer scientist at the University of California at Berkeley who sits on a California board that reviews voting machine security. "What kind of message is this sending to elections supervisors?"

The trouble began last year when Sancho allowed a Finnish computer scientist to test Leon County's Diebold voting machines, a common type that uses an optical scanner to count votes from ballots that voters have marked. Diebold Election Systems is one of the largest voting machine companies in the United States.

While some tests showed that the system is resistant to outside attack, others showed that elections workers could alter the vote tallies by manipulating the removable memory cards in the voting machines, and do so without detection.

A Diebold spokesman scoffed at the results, and compared them to "leaving your car unlocked, with the windows down and keys left in the ignition and then acting surprised when your car is stolen."

State officials similarly played down the results.

But last month, California elections officials arranged for experts to perform a similar analysis of the Diebold machines and also found them vulnerable -- noting a wider variety of flaws than Sancho's experts had. They characterized the vulnerabilities as "serious" but "fixable."

"What he [Sancho] discovered was -- oops -- that the conventional wisdom was all wrong," said Wagner, a member of the panel that reviewed the Diebold machines. "It was possible to subvert the memory card without detection."

In the wake of that finding, Florida elections officials issued new guidelines this month for handling the memory cards. They require records showing who had custody of the memory cards, and are aimed at the same kind of security attack Sancho had simulated.

"It was total vindication," Sancho said.

Diebold officials maintain that their systems are secure when standard safety procedures are used to protect the memory cards from tampering.

"It didn't vindicate Mr. Sancho," said Diebold spokesman David Bear. "You basically follow these industry standards, and you don't have issues."

Now Sancho is required under federal laws instituted after the Florida voting debacle in 2000 to acquire 160 voting machines for disabled people -- and none of the state-approved vendors will provide the machines.

A spokesman said Diebold will not sell to Sancho without assurances that he will not permit more such tests, which the company considers a reckless use of the machines.

"While we welcome authorized testing and examination of our products by qualified professionals," Diebold attorney Michael E. Lindroos wrote Sancho last year, "actions such as yours only serve to undermine the public's confidence in the security and accuracy that good systems can provide when used with the proper procedures and by authorized personnel."

Another company, Sequoia Voting Systems, backed out of discussions with Sancho earlier this year. Spokesman Michelle Shafer said the company lacks the capacity to fill his order.

The third voting machine company, Election Systems & Software Inc., did not respond to three calls for comment directed through their sales representative.

The dispute highlights what many elections experts say is a failure in federal oversight. In Maryland, North Carolina, Texas and elsewhere, elections officials have called into question the security and accuracy of new voting machines. The experts said that a more rigorous federal oversight process, in which machine testers have no financial connections to the voting machine companies, is needed to ensure election security in the United States.

"The federal certification process for voting machines is broken, sadly, when it comes to security," Wagner said. "It was designed for the era of mechanical machines, and it hasn't kept up."

IL: No More $ To Sequoia Till Equipment Problem Solved

2006-03-24T16:01:00.000-08:00

By Warren Stewart, VoteTrustUSA
March 24, 2006

Election Offical Says The Last Few Days Have Been “Extremely Embarrassing”
Sequoia, As Usual, Blames The Election Workers

Responding to widespread failures in Tuesday’s primary elections Cook County and Chicago election officials have announced they will withhold payments to Sequoia Voting Systems until the vendor has fixed the system, which “did not perform adequately.” The county has already paid Sequoia $7.8 million of their $23.8 million contract with Sequoia.

"Nothing worked," Deborah Stein, board member of the Chicago Chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of Illinois told the Tribune. "They must have worked for 15 to 20 minutes to get it together. They acknowledged that they had not run a test on it before today. So they're pulling it out of the box."

Scott Burnham, a spokesman for Cook County Clerk David Orr, said "We will not make additional payments until we are satisfied with the system."

The Chicago Tribune also reported:

"There will be contract ramifications from their performance," said Langdon Neal, chairman of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners, noting that about $15 million of the city's portion of the Sequoia contract remains unpaid. As the counting continues, the lack of final totals has left several area communities uncertain about referendum outcomes for libraries and other projects. With 96 percent in, a tight race also remains for the Republican nomination in the 15th District for the Cook County Board between Carl Hansen and Timothy Schneider.

After seeing scanners jam on 21-inch ballots, Neal promised "extensive testing" before those machines are redeployed. He said efforts would be made to simplify the machine that is supposed to combine results from the two voting systems and transmit them downtown.

Neal, who called the last few days "extremely embarrassing," said the most severe problems were primarily limited to about 15 percent of precincts. He said at least some memory cards containing vote totals were defective or damaged, perhaps because they were inserted into a compiling machine while it was on, even though that is something Sequoia warned against doing. Paper trails are available for both voting systems, if the data storage devices are compromised.

See the rest of the Chicago Tribune article here.

NY: Motion to Intervene Denied in HAVA Lawsuit

2006-03-24T12:25:00.000-08:00

By New Yorkers for Verified Voting , March 24, 2006

The Motion by New Yorkers for Verified Voting, the League of Women Voters of New York State, and other New York State citizens, to Intervene in the Department of Justice/New York State HAVA lawsuit was denied today in U.S. District Court. Judge Gary Sharpe expressed concern about keeping the case from getting unwieldy if too many parties became involved. The Court held open the possibility that the proposed Intervenors may be allowed to participate later, at a point when a specific plan for HAVA compliance has been proposed.

In another positive development, Judge Sharpe pressed the Department of Justice (DOJ) to concede that it is not seeking to force the remedy called for in the original complaint, which called for "full and complete" HAVA compliance by September. The DOJ attorney signaled that they do not intend to try to force full compliance this year, and understand that there are physical constraints on what could be realistically accomplished in the
remaining time.

In a new development, the Court ordered the State Board of Elections to produce a proposed compliance plan by April 10. The Department of Justice will then have 10 days to react. At that point, the Court will evaluate the plan and determine how to proceed. The State Board has indicated that it is still working out the details of an interim solution.

"Our constitutional right to vote and to have those votes accurately counted must be protected." said Bo Lipari, Executive Director of New Yorkers for Verified Voting. "We believe that our Motion to Intervene should have been granted, so that New York State citizens have a voice in the outcome. However, we are encouraged that the Court has held the door open for us to participate later, when a specific plan is on the table."

NH Attorney General seizes Grafton ballots; results all in question after many counted twice

2006-03-24T11:53:00.000-08:00

March 15, 2006
Connecticut Valley (New Hampshire) Spectator

Joseph Cote, Reporter

GRAFTON — The New Hampshire Attorney General’s office came to Grafton Wednesday and seized the 369 ballots cast during voting Tuesday and the machine used to count them, after an unknown number of ballots were counted multiple times, according to Town Clerk Mary McDow.

The president of the company that makes the voting machines said operator error, not mechanical problems, put the results of all the town’s elections and warrant articles in question.

But Town Moderator Bonnie Haubrich said readings from the machine never indicated there was a problem.

The ballots will be recounted at a public meeting in Grafton, Senior Assistant Attorney General Bud Fitch said. That meeting has not yet been scheduled, but could be as soon as Saturday morning.

“There have been some questions raised on the accuracy of the outcome,” Fitch said. “We’re still trying to get a handle on what the issues are. At this point I don’t know there is anything wrong with the results. There were questions raised.”

The ballots cast for Mascoma Valley Regional School District voting were also seized along with the district’s counting machine. Haubrich said, though, that the Attorney General’s office assured her the school results are accurate.

“There’s not much I can tell you except that the counts are way off. They all could be switched for all we know,” McDow said. “I had no knowledge of this (Tuesday) night. It’s all the moderator that deals with the machine.”

McDow said it appears the switch that counts the ballots going through the machine was malfunctioning so that the machine counted ballots even when they jammed and were spit back out.

“Until they come in with a true vote, we don’t know what’s going on,” she said.

Haubrich said she thought something might be wrong because the machine rejected so many ballots. She intended to hand-count those ballots at the end of the night.

John Silvestro, president of LHS Associates, which services Grafton’s machine, said the machine’s operator is supposed to read a printout the machine produces when a ballot jams. The printout will show whether the ballot was counted. If it was, he said, the operator can clear that entry and put the ballot back through the machine.

“That’s usually what happens,” he said. “If you don’t read the message on the tape you’re kind of doing the election in the dark. Is it a machine problem? I would say absolutely not. This is an operator problem, and if they had questions, they should have called and gotten advice.”

Silvestro said election officials can call his company, in Methuen, Mass., at any time and a field agent will be dispatched to the voting location to repair or replace the machine. LHS had a field agent in Enfield all day Tuesday, he said.

“We didn’t receive a call from Grafton at all,” he said. “For some reason yesterday no one in Grafton opted to pick up the phone and give us a call.”

Haubrich said she did read the machine’s printouts, but they didn’t indicate that the machine had counted those ballots. It wasn’t until after the results were recorded and reported to the media that she realized the tallies didn’t match up with the number of ballots cast.

For instance, there were 193 yes votes and 198 no votes, a total of 391 votes, for Article 22. But only 369 people voted. The top two vote-getters for a three-year seat on the planning board, David Rienzo and Lloyd “Sam” Vose, got a total of 408 votes.

“It never said it counted,” Haubrich said. “I’ve never had that happen.”

Haubrich said she didn’t call LHS Associates because she didn’t think the machine had counted them, and so she counted them by hand after the polls closed. She called Selectboard Chairman Steve Darrow on Wednesday morning, and he decided they should notify the Attorney General’s office.

McDow said whatever happened Tuesday, it was an honest mistake.

“There’s no foul play or anything. It was just the machine or the dip switch or whatever that was the big problem. (Haubrich) did everything she was supposed to do as far as I can see.”

Supervisor of the Checklist Rosalie Babiarz spent most of the day at the polls, although she missed some time because she was ill. She said she didn’t see anyone checking the printout or clearing mis-counted ballots from the machine.

“I didn’t see that, no. What I saw was that when someone entered a ballot and it jammed, they tried to put it in again,” she said.

Fitch said his office will investigate whether anything was handled improperly, either intentionally or otherwise.

“We always will look at whether any election laws were violated,” he said.

Iowa House stalling voting bill - They Don't Want Voter-Verified PAPER RECORDS!

2006-03-24T11:33:00.000-08:00

Carole Simmons wrote the following letter to the editor of the Ottumwa Courier of Iowa.

Published in ottumwacourier.com: March 23, 2006 11:45 pm

Iowa House majority leadership is stalling a bill that benefits all voters, and instead pushing a bill that will likely cause more problems than it solves.

With the recent purchase of paperless touchscreen voting machines in over 60 counties, many Iowans will be unable to verify that their votes are correctly recorded. Their ballots — in the form of proprietary computer code — are hidden from view.

Iowa needs passage of SF351 to require voter-verified paper records. This will make meaningful audits and recounts possible, and increase voter confidence in the integrity of our elections. It is a truly nonpartisan measure, and both Democratic and Republican candidates for secretary of state have spoken in support of it.

But instead of taking action on SF351, House leaders are pushing a bill to require government-issued voter ID cards at the polls. This despite any evidence of a problem in Iowa with people impersonating registered voters. Requiring IDs may lead to delays at the polls, as voters without IDs will have to use provisional ballots. Delays and provisional ballots are known to decrease voter participation and confidence in elections.

Voter-verified paper trails will increase voter confidence. The House leadership should act in the public interest and pass SF351 now.

Carole Simmons
Fairfield

Programmer Who Alleged Plot To Steal Florida Election Runs For Congress

2006-03-24T11:09:00.000-08:00

By Carlos Miller, Raw StoryPublished: Friday March 24, 2006

To Republicans, Clint Curtis is a traitor; a back-stabbing liar with an imagination that rivaled Jack Abramoff's influence over Congress.

To liberal Democrats, Curtis is a hero; a stand up guy who blew the whistle on computer voting fraud, testifying before a group of U.S. House Committee Judiciary Democrats after the 2004 presidential election.

And to the man himself, the Republican-turned-Democrat is nothing but a computer geek who purports to have found himself smack in the middle of a brazen political plot to tamper with elections in Florida, where fact can be stranger than fiction and politics as shady as swampy underbrush.

After all, since the software programmer accused Florida Congressman Tom Feeney of asking him to create a computer program to steal an election, the plot has unraveled quirkier than a Carl Hiaasen novel.

So far, a state investigator who had been looking into a contract held by Curtis' former employer was found dead in a cheap motel room and an illegal Chinese immigrant, a colleague of Curtis' who worked for a close friend of Feeney's, was allowed to remain in the United States and received a $100 fine for passing sophisticated missile technology to China.

It's no wonder why Curtis keeps a loaded AK-47 behind his door. "When I first began reporting on espionage and Feeney's corruption, I received death threats," he asserts.

Now Curtis is preparing to square off against Feeney for the state's 24th Congressional District this November, a solidly conservative area in central Florida carved out by Feeney himself.

But before taking on Feeney, he needs to beat fellow Democrat Andy Michaud, a lifelong Democrat.

"Even Republicans know Feeney is a crook and they'd be glad to get rid of him," Curtis said. "I just have to persuade Democrats that I am Democratic enough."

Curtis says his main campaign issue is eliminating election fraud. See http://www.clintcurtis.com/

"This is not a partisan issue," he said. "I noticed recently in Texas there was a Republican that got some wild results in his primary. The Republicans can't run unless the people that control the machines want them to run."

In the Texas case, Republican Steve Smith is preparing a challenge after losing in the state's Supreme Court Justice primary election earlier this month. In Winkler County, Texas, where Smith respectively received 74 percent and 65 percent of the votes in the 2002 and 2004 elections, he received zero votes in the recent primary.

And in Smith's home county, Tarrant, where he outperformed statewide results by 13 percent in 2004, he underperformed statewide results by 23 percent earlier this month.

Smiths' opponent, Don Willet, has close ties to President Bush. Willet served as a special assistant to the president in Bush's quest for faith-based initiatives.

These bizarre results don't surprise voting rights activists, who have been crying foul over computer voting fraud since the 2004 presidential election, when some counties in Ohio cast more votes for Bush than there were registered voters.

But the fact that Curtis is one of the only politicians in the country addressing the issue of computer voting fraud is winning him support from outside his district as well as from other states.

Karyn Altman, a freelance writer and hospitality marketing professional in Miami, is one of a small, but dedicated team of volunteers throughout the country working to get Curtis on the ballot. Other volunteers are in New Jersey and California.

"Clint needs to raise $10,000 by April 7th so we can get him on the primary ballot," said Altman, who is in the process of organizing fundraisers for Curtis in South Florida. (Donate here.)

Like many Democrats, Altman started becoming disillusioned with politics after the 2000 Florida fiasco in which the Supreme Court voted to put Bush in the White House. In 2002, after the computer voting machines were introduced in Florida, she says it took her three attempts for her vote to register for her Democratic candidate.

"When I discovered afterwards that I was not the only one who'd had this experience, I became obsessed with learning about electronic machines and the ways they could be manipulated without detection," she said.

"I find it outrageous that in spite of all of the evidence, the mainstream media refuses to cover this story," she said. "And the Democratic Party refuses to even consider, at least publicly, the possibility that fraud and election rigging could be taking place."

Read the rest of the article at Raw Story here.

Fed Court: NY Must "HAVA" Plan by April 10!

2006-03-24T00:17:00.000-08:00

This is a slightly biased article is from Newsday. I point out the bias in [brackets.]

By MARC HUMBERT, Associated Press Writer
March 23, 2006, 4:29 PM EST

ALBANY, N.Y. -- A federal judge on Thursday ordered New York to come up with a plan by April 10 to comply with provisions of the Help America Vote Act requiring new voting machines the disabled can use this fall.

New York, which has lagged behind ["Lagged behind?" NY was deliberative! (They don't want to go like Ohi0 2004 or Florida 2000)] all other states in complying with the act adopted in the wake of the disputed 2000 presidential election, was sued March 1 by the U.S. Justice Department. It was the first such suit filed by the federal government against a state over non-HAVA compliance.

Thursday's order, from U.S. District Judge Gary Sharpe, also requires the state show him a plan to ensure a centralized, statewide voter registration system. [Whether it actually works or not.]

Lee Daghlian, a spokesman for the state Board of Elections, said the plan to be presented to the judge will likely be an updated version of one the board had been working on with Justice Department officials when the lawsuit was filed.

The judge refused to allow several interest groups, including the state League of Women Voters, to intervene in the case. They are worried the state will be forced to move too quickly and be stuck with new voting machines that aren't satisfactory over the long term.

Under HAVA, state officials are looking to replace all of New York's approximately 20,000 lever-action voting machines with high-tech devices. But the state board has said it is not feasible to have new machinery in place everywhere until the 2007 elections.

The federal lawsuit seeks to force the state to have new machinery in place, at least for the disabled, by this fall's elections.

Critics of the lawsuit have said it threatens to force the state and its counties into buying technology that might have to be quickly replaced, ultimately wasting money. The federal government has already given New York $220 million to update its voting system.

"The process is being rushed," said Neal Rosenstein of the New York Public Interest Research Group in the wake of the judge's action Thursday.

Rosenstein said voting rights for disabled people are important but "it's not a huge segment of the population."

Daghlian said the elections board is trying to determine how many disabled voters there are in the state.

Voting for a database that works

2006-03-23T18:56:00.000-08:00

By Cindy Rodríguez, Denver Post Staff Columnist;
Article Launched: 3/23/2006 01:00 AM on DenverPost.com

During the contentious 2004 presidential election, Rebecca Yaffe and Tony Thompson were among the legions of people nationwide who knocked on doors, offered voter- registration forms and urged people to vote.

Armed with a thick printout of registered voters they'd received from the Broomfield County Election Division, they set off, convinced they could motivate Democrats to vote out President Bush.

But a curious thing kept happening.

"We'd knock on a door and say, 'Mr. Johnson?' and the person who answered the door would say, 'He hasn't lived here in years,' " Yaffe recounted.

The files were almost useless for canvassing because they contained outdated information. Sometimes, the voter lists included two or three families living in the same house.

"It was a mess," Thompson said of the files, which both Democrats and Republicans rely on to drum up support from their bases and convince unaffiliated voters.

So Thompson and Yaffe set out to fix the county's database on their own. Most people wouldn't fathom undertaking such a project, but Thompson, a software architect for Level 3, builds complex software programs for a living. This one was a snap.

The software program, which Thompson named The Broom - because it swept away duplicate names and erroneous phone numbers in Broomfield - took five days to build. Creating the database took two weeks, with about 400 volunteers helping input detailed, up-to- date information.

Once it was done, word spread. Soon, Democrats across the state asked the pair to help clean their county's voter files. Organizers for Mark Udall, Ken Sala- zar and John Kerry tapped them as well.

Their project turned into a statewide effort. Two years later, they refined the software so it's easy to use, with encrypted information on a server they say can't be hacked.

All of the state's registered voters, nearly 3 million of them, are in the database.

Officials consider the software such a valuable resource that Thompson, Yaffe, a Web designer, and their friend Eddie García, a commercial banker, decided to market it.

Their company is called Sweep Enterprises LLC. They say theirs is the only comprehensive and accurate voter database in the state.

That's not stretching the truth. The current state data, collected by Colorado's 64 counties, is a hodgepodge of information, some of it old, some of it repetitive, some of it incomplete. Dana Williams, a spokeswoman for the secretary of state, said the counties send new data every month, which is dumped into a state database that was created by the secretary of state's Division of Information Technologies. It's not in compliance with the federal Help America Vote Act.

The company the state contracted with to do the work, Accenture LLC - a company with a history of failure - missed every deadline. The state terminated the contract and is back to Square One, about four months behind the Jan. 1 federal deadline.

The database delay means a push-back on implementing an electronic balloting system throughout the state, which is good news to those who are leery of tampering.

"We hope to get a system implemented in 2007, but we don't know exactly when," Williams says. "It depends on the company we contract with."

Williams said a request for proposals for a database system will be announced at the end of April.

It would make sense for the state to steer clear of contracting with Electronic Data Systems, the $200 million state social services system created two years that has been a nightmare from Day 1, causing delays in Medicaid and food stamp payments.

But does Sweep Enterprises, a fledgling operation with three employees that has a ready-to-deliver Colorado voter database, stand a chance with the state?

The company will have to wait and see.

Cindy Rodríguez's column appears Tuesdays and Thursdays in Scene. Contact her at 303-820-1211 or crodriguez@denverpost.com.

Did White House Direct Phone Jamming Scheme?

2006-03-23T18:42:00.000-08:00

US NEWSWIRE; 3/23/2006 7:22:00 PM
Contact: Damien LaVera of DNC Public Affairs at (202) 863-8148

WASHINGTON, March 23 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A new report suggests that the national Republican establishment--including the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and even the Bush White House -- may have had a role in the criminal Election Day phone jamming scheme that disenfranchised countless New Hampshire voters in 2002.

The Union Leader today reported that "court records show Ken Mehlman's office received more than 75 telephone calls from now-convicted phone-jam conspirator James Tobin from Sept. 30 to Nov. 22 of that year." At the time, Mehlman -- the current RNC Chair -- was White House political director. (Union Leader, 3/23/06) This raises the disturbing question of whether Tobin, who worked for the RNC and the NRSC at the time and has since been convicted on two criminal charges for his role in the scheme, discussed the plan with one of the President's most important political strategists.

Today's news also has important implications for other national Republican figures. At the time the phone jamming scheme was devised and implemented, Tobin's supervisor at the RNC was Terry Nelson, who Arizona Republican Senator John McCain recently hired as a senior strategist for his Political Action Committee. This means that McCain may have hired one of the key figures in the phone jamming scheme.

"Each new development in this case raises troubling questions about the extent to which key national Republicans had knowledge of or were involved in a criminal scheme to keep New Hampshire voters from getting to the polls," said Democratic National Committee spokesman Luis Miranda. "The revelation that, in the days leading up to the phone-jamming campaign, Ken Mehlman spoke regularly with a man who has been convicted of criminal charges in this case raises deeply disturbing questions about the Bush White House's commitment to protecting fundamental right of Americans to vote.

"The American people have a right to know whether the White House political director had a hand in building an Election Day game plan predicated on keeping people from voting. And they need to know why John McCain is turning a blind eye to the role one of his closest advisors may have played in this scandal. Democrats will continue to fight to protect every Americans' right to cast their vote and have their ballots counted."

McCain Strategist Terry Nelson Supervised James Tobin During NH Phone Jamming Scandal; Tobin Convicted of Federal Telephone Harassment Charges. Tobin worked for the RNC and the NRSC during 2002, and was supervised by RNC Political Director Terry Nelson. On Election Day, a telemarketer hired by the New Hampshire GOP jammed the telephones of five state Democratic and one firefighters union get-out-the-vote phone banks. James Tobin was found guilty in December of federal telephone harassment charges for his role in the scandal. (Manchester Union Leader, 10/20/05; Union Leader, 3/23/06)

Tobin Called The White House Office of Political Affairs 75 Times In Six Weeks. "In the days before and after the state Republican Party's 2002 Election Day phone-jamming scheme, the man who now chairs the Republican National Committee was the White House director of political affairs. Ken Mehlman's office received more than 75 telephone calls from now-convicted phone-jam conspirator James Tobin from Sept. 30 to Nov. 22 of that year." (Union Leader, 3/23/06)

Email posted on Bradblog: Democracy is DEAD in TX!

2006-03-23T16:21:00.000-08:00

The following email was sent to BRAD BLOG and Brad posted it yesterday. Brad Blog is arguably the most important e-Voting machine news aggregator on the web, with Democratic Underground a close second. I strongly recommend that you check these two sites regularly for updates!

From: Jerry Lobdill [EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED]
Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2006 7:23 PM
To: TheBradBlog@cville.com
Subject: EXCLUSIVE: Hart InterCivic Whistleblower Warned of Texas, Ohio E-Voting 'Fraud' Concerns in 2004!

I am a retired physicist and system engineer who has specified, designed, tested, and evaluated computing systems for the US Navy for 30 years.

I live in Tarrant County and have been involved closely with the campaign of Doreen Geiger for Democratic Party County Chair. The March 7, 2006 election included the general election for this race. I was there on election night when Tarrant County reported periodic results of the election. The numbers of votes reported were so large that they were astonishing. The results were updated at 90 minute intervals six times. The final reported vote count for County Chair was about 44,000.

The next day there were questions from all contested races, and at 4 PM there was a press conference at the Tarrant County Elections Administration. The speakers were Gayle Hamilton, interim Elections Administrator, a vice president from Hart Intercivic, and both the Democratic Party and Republican Party County Chairs. The theme was that the error was "procedural" and not a software error. It was an error in which the running sum of votes for each candidate was erroneously substituted for the incremental count for each of the six periods. The officials emphasized that the error would not change any of the announced winners.

Although the programmer who allegedly made the error was in attendance, he did not speak.

Ms. Hamilton said that because of the error any candidate who wanted a recount would get one at no charge. Ms. Geiger and a candidate for JP, John DeLorme asked for a recount. None of the reporters in attendance apparently knew enough about computer systems to ask technical questions.

After the conference I built a spreadsheet model of the erroneous processing algorithm and showed that it would not be possible to know what changes would occur in the outcomes of the races without reprocessing the original vote counts from each of the 212 polling stations. I sent this result to the Star-Telegram (Anna Tinsley) and to all of Doreen's staff and supporters. The next day the Elections Administration announced that at least one result was changed in a Republican race. This infuriated the Republicans.

On Tuesday, March 14, Gayle Hamilton announced that the Secretary of State had prohibited her from doing any free recounts. Also on Tuesday, Doreen was told that she could not have a promised Access database of precinct by precinct returns for her race until after the vote had been canvassed. And then, instead of getting it free as promised, she'd have to pay $50 for it.

Tonight the Democratic Party of Tarrant County, in violation of the State Rules voted to approve the vote when they didn't have a quorum present. The incumbent County Chair refused to recognize points of order several times during a heated exchange on the issue. The Chair shouted down several people who rose to a point of order, and rammed the vote through. This Chair behaves as if he had some sort of financial interest in electronic voting.

Democracy is dead here.

TN Election Commissioners Asked to Resign

2006-03-23T15:04:00.000-08:00

Cheatham County Election Commissioners asked to resign

Administrator Sandra Smith takes retirement

By Gary Burton; The Ashland City Times
Published: Wednesday, 03/22/06

NASHVILLE - The Cheatham County Election Commission is being asked to resign or show just cause to the state why the five members should not be removed from their positions.

An investigation by the Tennessee Election Commission concluded Tuesday with Brook Thompson, state coordinator of elections, informing state election commissioners with the results of the probe.
Commissioners discovered several problems with local voting including:

Workers were told to make the number of voter applications and ballots match - even if the numbers were off.

Poll workers were instructed by the election administrator to cast fraudulent ballots if the applications and voting booth activations did not match, and

The election administrator had possession of both keys to ballot boxes during an election.

“I’ve lost confidence in the Cheatham County Election Commission,” Thompson said. “This is not a fun thing to do.”

Investigators were tipped-off about irregularities in the November 2004 election by a former election office worker. Thompson said there were about 34 fraudulent votes cast in the November 2004 election, but did not feel there were enough to affect any elections.

Thompson said Beth Henry-Robinson, an assistant in his office, found several problems with Cheatham County election operations.

“First of all, if at the end of a day's vote, the number of applications failed to agree with the number of votes, poll workers were instructed by the election administrator to ‘make them match,’” Thompson said.

Sandra Smith served as election administrator for the last 23 years until she retired as of Monday - citing her mother's health as the reason for her departure. Last week, Smith said she wanted to retire rather than cause problems for the election office.

“If something is wrong in this office and it was my fault, I just feel like the best thing to do is leave,” she said. “I don't want something I may have done to hurt this office, the people who work here or my family.” Smith said in an interview Tuesday that one of the ballot box keys was in her desk drawer, but did not know what to do with it.

“We always tried to give the keys to a Democratic and Republican chairman during the elections,” she said. “On the occasion the commission is talking about, the Democratic chairman had one of the keys, but the Republican chairman was not available. The state didn’t tell me what I was supposed to do at that point, but I guess I should have asked more questions.”

Thompson said poll workers were also told to cast fraudulent votes if the votes did not match.

“Next, on the first day of early voting, if the number of applicants exceeded the activation of the poll booth, workers were directed to cast votes to balance the votes,” Thompson said.

Thompson also told commissioners that the keys to the ballot boxes, normally held by the Democratic and Republican members of the Cheatham County Commission, were both kept in Smith's possession.

“This is a direct violation of the law,” Thompson added.

State commissioners agreed to send a letter to the local commissioners requesting that they either attend the next meeting in Nashville April 18 for a “just cause hearing” to defend themselves or resign from their positions.

“This is a very serious situation,” said Tom Wheeler, state commission chairman. “Very serious.” He also informed the state commissioners that elections in the county were approaching and legislators would be advised to be prepared if local commissioners all resigned at once and replacements needed to be appointed.

Robert D. Perry, chairman of the Cheatham County Election Commission, said the move by the state would not affect the group’s newest member.

The other four members of the local election commission could not be contacted for comment Tuesday before press time.

NBC 5: Vote Counting Resumes Thursday (23 Mar)

2006-03-23T14:54:00.000-08:00

Stroger Holds Slim Lead As Counting Resumes

UPDATED: 11:12 am CST March 23, 2006

CHICAGO -- The Democratic primary for Cook County Board president was decided with Forrest Claypool's concession Wednesday, but election officials said they would continue counting ballots by hand on Thursday (two days after polls closed) regarless.

The camp of challenger Forrest Claypool accused election officials of "flying blind" with new equipment that they weren't prepared to use. Some of the brand new machines apparently broke down, leaving no way to count many of the ballots but by hand.

At midday Wednesday, various reports of missing ballots and ballots still locked up in precincts unsettled officials.

The new voting machines didn't present a widespread problem to voters, with the most common complaint among them being unwieldy ballots that didn't protect privacy.

But the new electronic voting system turned into a real challenge when it came time to count the votes.

"The fact is, we tried it and it failed. It failed miserably. The level of confusion that reigned through the evening is more than unsettling," a Claypool spokeswoman said.

With technology malfunctioning in nearly 200 precincts in the city and county, boxes were hauled overnight into election headquarters. Officials tallied votes until 3 a.m., as officials were crowded with questions from the campaigns about the integrity of the process.

"The integrity of the election process will be carefully and vigilantly guarded," an election official said.

But members of both board president camps continued to voice concern. "It's not enough to say that we're going to maintain the integrity of the process. We need to know how, and we need to know how they are going to proceed," said a spokesman for the current board president, John Stroger.

But the campaigns for Stroger and Claypool are being forced to sit it out until the final vote count comes in.

"Is this disappointing? Yes. Am I upset about this? Yes. But nothing, I don't think, has happened so far (that) impugns the electoral process," a top election official said.

Election officials say one key problem is that they don't know exactly where the uncounted ballots are from, which could ultimately make a difference in the lead Stroger held Wednesday morning.

With 87 percent of the votes counted around noon Wednesday, Claypool had 47 percent of the vote to Stroger's 52 percent.

Illinois - Tuesday's Election Results Not Final (voting machine problems!)

2006-03-23T13:51:00.000-08:00

The results of Illinois's Tuesday, March 21, 2006 primary elections remain "unofficial," and in some cases incomplete, due to slow results in Chicago and Cook County. In some categories, results in only the contested races are given. Check http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/elections/chi-primaryresults-htmlstory,0,2520894.htmlstory#statewide for updates.

New machines, poor training slowed count

Precincts uncounted even after Wednesday

By James Janega, John McCormick and David Kidwell, Tribune staff reporters. Tribune staff reporters Josh Noel, Carlos Sadovi, Courtney Flynn, Charles Sheehan, Hal Dardick, Tonya Maxwell, David Mendell
Published March 23, 2006

As ballot counting stretched into a second night, judges and election officials on Wednesday blamed confusion in the primary election on vast numbers of poll workers who had not been trained for Cook County's complicated new electronic voting system.

Most of them had barely studied machines that scanned paper ballots or enabled touch-screen voting. Many didn't see those devices--or the one used to combine and send their information--until Election Day.

Langdon Neal, chairman of the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners, further said that 4,000 of Chicago's 14,000 election judges attended no training and instead relied on a judge's manual that was sent in the mail and was written in a complicated and confusing manner.

(snip)
"The way it worked in the class and the way it worked in real life was different," said Bill Anderson, 58, a 38th Ward election judge who took a three-hour class last week at Wright Junior College.

"We were told it was going to work as 'A, B, C, D', and it didn't happen like that," he said. The election judges endured glitches, missing equipment and pervasive questions surrounding Cook County's $54 million electronic voting system, which bogged down on its inaugural run.

But judges' headaches during the day were nothing compared to that night, when a second wave of technical problems arose while combining votes from two different voting methods and trying to transmit them on a third. The equipment is made by California-based Sequoia Voting Systems.

Amid a tumbling backlog of voting data, returns were pushed so late that many judges simply packed up their polling places late Tuesday or early Wednesday and went home. In the confusion, county and city officials had no idea which precincts were accounted for and which were not, or where records of their votes were.

At noon Wednesday, Chicago was missing 252 memory cartridges, 93 from machines that scanned in paper ballots and 159 from touch screens. County officials couldn't find 162 memory cartridges from suburban precincts--68 from optical-scanning machines and 94 for touch-screen balloting.

The problems led midday to the sight of Cook County Director of Elections Clem Balanoff--his tie loosened and eyes bleary--rifling through blue duffel bags at a county warehouse for precinct returns for uncounted votes on missing memory cartridges.

The frantic count took a pause Wednesday afternoon when Forrest Claypool, Democratic challenger for Cook County Board president, conceded defeat by a razor-thin margin to incumbent John Stroger. He said slow vote reporting had delayed the outcome but didn't influence it.

With the county's highest-profile race settled, attention turned to others.

Residents in Bellwood, for example, are waiting to learn about a $14 million referendum proposal for a new library. At the end of counting Wednesday, results were roughly tied with 62 percent of the vote in and counting to resume Thursday.

"It's still a jump ball," said Mayor Frank Pasquale.

There were dozens of other referendum proposals on the ballot, some close, their outcomes equally unknown.

Maryland Votes 137-0 To Drop Diebold (Brilliant!)

2006-03-23T13:16:00.000-08:00

NY Times Editorial, March 23, 2006
Common Sense in Maryland

Diebold, the electronic voting machine maker, suffered another sharp setback recently, when Maryland's House of Delegates voted 137-to-0 to drop its machines and switch to paper ballots. The vote came in the same week that Texas held elections marred by electronic voting troubles. Maryland's State Senate should join the House in voting to discontinue the use of the Diebold machines, and other states should follow Maryland's lead.

Maryland was one of the first states to embrace Diebold. But Maryland voters and elected officials have grown increasingly disenchanted as evidence has mounted that the machines cannot be trusted. In 2004, security experts from RABA Technologies told the state legislature that they had been able to hack into the machines in a way that would make it possible to steal an election. Senator Barbara Mikulski, a Democrat, informed the State Board of Elections in 2004 that voters had complained to her that machines had mysteriously omitted the Senate race.

The Maryland House's bill calls for replacing the Diebold machines with optical scanning machines for this fall's elections. Gov. Robert Ehrlich Jr., once a Diebold supporter, has said he'll sign the bill if the State Senate agrees. Optical scanning machines would be a vast improvement. Voters using them fill out paper ballots, which are scanned electronically. Those ballots are a permanent record that can (and should) be used to double-check the machine results. Although time is short, Maryland should be able to get optical scanning machines operating by the fall. Even though the Board of Elections has been resisting the proposal, that should not stop the General Assembly and the governor from fighting for machines that voters will trust.

The Maryland House voted days after Texas held an election with the sort of disturbing electronic voting glitches that have by now become common. In Tarrant County, as many as 100,000 extra votes appeared on the machines — election officials insisted that they knew which ones to eliminate to make the results correct. In a hotly contested Congressional race in another part of the state, results were delayed by programming errors in the machines used in two crucial counties.

Many states have passed laws requiring paper records for electronic voting. What is happening in Maryland is important, because not a single member of the House stood behind the once popular Diebold machines. It is just the latest indication that common sense is starting to prevail in the battle over electronic voting.

Oregon - ES&S Voting Machines delayed (ES&S wants to avoid liability!)

2006-03-23T12:47:00.000-08:00

I am sure that ES&S wants to avoid liability if their machines fail to deliver the integrity of the election. (Gee, I wonder why???) I hope Oregon does not waive ES&S's liability for failures.

Access - Supply issues may prevent Oregon from offering machines to disabled people in May, as required by law

By Matthew Preusch, Monday, March 20, 2006

People with disabilities in Oregon probably won't get to use specially designed voting machines in the May primary as planned, putting the state in violation of sweeping federal reform law.

A contract dispute with the supplier has delayed delivery of the voting machines, required under the 2002 Help America Vote Act.

"We spent a year trying to put this together," said Gene Newton, a state election official coordinating changes spurred by the new law. "To hit this snag at the end was really unexpected."
(snip)

At least 21 other states also missed the Jan. 1 deadline to offer the machines, according to electionline.org, a nonpartisan election database. The law requires states to have a machine in every polling place by this year to allow disabled people to vote independently and privately.

The state thought it had a deal to spend nearly $1 million on 100 terminals, but supplier Election Systems and Software of Omaha, Neb., asked to change liability, license and other provisions in its contract at the last minute, said Anne Martens, a spokeswoman for Secretary of State Bill Bradbury's office.

The state has refused to make changes because it would then have to start the bidding process over, Martens said. Last month, Bradbury's office sent a letter to the company saying the state considered it in breach of contract.

State and company officials plan to meet later this month to continue negotiations, said Amanda Brown, a spokeswoman for Election Systems and Software. The company could still supply machines in the future, and "we are hopeful we can do so soon," she said.

But in a recent letter to the U.S. Department of Justice, state Elections Division Director John Lindback said the state doesn't believe it can reach an agreement with Election Systems and Software and that it intends to sue the company to recoup extra costs incurred trying to comply with the voting act.

Matthew Preusch: 541-382-2006; preusch@bendbroadband.com

Read the entire article at: http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/news/1142825126230010.xml&coll=7

Marion County Indiana Voter Registration System Fails Again

2006-03-23T12:25:00.000-08:00

Rich Van Wyk Channel 13 Eyewitness News

Marion County, March 20 - The system worked in the afternoon. Yet earlier during a statewide test Indiana's first ever voter registration system failed. Marion County workers couldn't enter voters' names and address.

Joel Miller with the Marion County Board of Voters Registration says, "Two days into the system we've had two failures. It is scary to think what could happen for the election."

Until now, each county kept their own voters registration records. The statewide system, mandated by Congress, is intended to reduce voter fraud and insure reliable results. Dozens of counties are participating in a simulated election, a six-day test.

Everyday county workers get a playbook that tells them what to do that day. It is a surprise so they can't plan in advance.

Friday error messages surprised workers when the system failed. Monday morning there were more error messages, a second, different failure.

How serious are the problems? The answer depends on who answers.

On Marion County's nonpartisan Board of Voters Registration, Miller, the Democrat, is "concerned. I am very concerned." Kyle Walker is the Republican. "It doesn't disturb me based on the types of problems they are. They are very easy to identify and very easy to correct."

The statewide voters registration system is the responsibility of Indiana's secretary of state. Republican Todd Rokita calls the test a success, saying in a prepared statement that county workers could have switched to a backup system.

The test runs through Friday. Everyone hopes the kinks are worked out of the system before it is put to a real test in May's primary election.

Video: Closing Argument by Alan Shore - Boston Legal

2006-03-21T01:54:00.000-08:00

The following is a partial quote from the closing argument made by Alan Shore (played by James Spader) on the television show Boston Legal, which aired on March 14, 2006 (Partial quote; it is worth reading the entire closing argument at http://www.boston-legal.org/19-stickit/ep19-stickit.shtml#dialogue):
---
Alan Shore: When the weapons of mass destruction thing turned out to be not true, I expected the American people to rise up. Ha! They didn't.

Then, when the Abu Ghraib torture thing surfaced and it was revealed that our government participated in rendition, a practice where we kidnap people and turn them over to regimes who specialize in torture, I was sure then the American people would be heard from. We stood mute.

Then came the news that we jailed thousands of so-called terrorists suspects, locked them up without the right to a trial or even the right to confront their accusers. Certainly, we would never stand for that. We did.

And now, it's been discovered the executive branch has been conducting massive, illegal, domestic surveillance on its own citizens. You and me. And I at least consoled myself that finally, finally the American people will have had enough. Evidentially, we haven't.

In fact, if the people of this country have spoken, the message is 'we're okay with it all.' Torture, warrantless search and seizure, illegal wiretappings, prison without a fair trial - or any trial, war on false pretenses. We, as a citizenry, are apparently not offended.

There are no demonstrations on college campuses. In fact, there's no clear indication that young people seem to notice.

Well, Melissa Hughes noticed. Now, you might think, instead of withholding her taxes, she could have protested the old fashioned way. Made a placard and demonstrated at a Presidential or Vice-Presidential appearance, but we've lost the right to that as well. The Secret Service can now declare free speech zones to contain, control and, in effect, criminalize protest.

Stop for a second and try to fathom that.

At a presidential rally, parade or appearance, if you have on a supportive t-shirt, you can be there. If you are wearing or carrying something in protest, you can be removed.

This, in the United States of America. This in the United States of America. Is Melissa Hughes the only one embarrassed?

Watch the video at: http://www.boston-legal.org/19-stickit/BL-2x19-Stick-It-ClosingArguments.asx

e-Voting Lawsuit Reaches Supreme Court!

2006-03-20T17:19:00.000-08:00

WOW! A non-lawyer, representing herself, has taken the issue of electronic voting machines all the way to theUnited States Supreme Court! It is a "David and Goliath" kind of case. I wish her luck. It is indeed curious that I did not find this important case anywhere in the Main Stream media. I happened on it quite by accident. Her Supreme Court Brief can be found at http://www.ecotalk.org/lawsuitSC.htm.

Voting Systems Lawsuit Reaches U.S. Supreme Court
Monday January 30, 11:01 am ET

WASHINGTON, Jan. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- A little-noticed voting rights lawsuit has made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court (Docket No. 05-930). It constitutes the first legal challenge to the widespread use of nontransparent voting systems. Specifically, the lawsuit challenges the use of voting machines and absentee voting in elections for public office.

The lawsuit was originally filed by freelance journalist Lynn Landes in July of 2004 in Philadelphia federal court (U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania). The Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Landes on November 2, 2005.

In her lawsuit Landes claims that, as a voter and a journalist, she has the right to direct access to a physical ballot and to observe the voting process unimpeded. Voting by machine or absentee, Landes claims, introduces obstacles and concealment to a process that must be accessible and transparent in a meaningful and effective manner.

Landes is representing herself in this action.

"I tried to get civil rights organizations interested in this case, but had no luck. Their disregard for this issue is incredible. It's clear to me that without direct access to a physical ballot and meaningful transparency in the process, our elections have no integrity whatsoever," says Landes.

The defendants in the Landes lawsuit are Margaret Tartaglione, Chair of the City Commissioners of Philadelphia; Pedro A. Cortes, Secretary of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania; and Alberto Gonzales, Attorney General of the United States.

Attorneys for the defendants have successfully fought Landes, claiming that she did not prove an injury and therefore does not have standing. Landes counters that she has the right to challenge the constitutionality of acts of the legislative branch under federal statute and case law, most significantly under Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. 137 (1803).

Early American history seems to favor the Landes position. Prior to the Civil War, voting was a public and transparent process. It was only after the war, as the elective franchise expanded to minorities and women, three changes to state and federal election laws were adopted that eventually made the voting process a private and nontransparent enterprise: absentee voting was allowed (1870's), the Australian secret ballot method was adopted (1880's), and voting machines were permitted by Congress (1899).

Today, 94.6% of all votes are processed by machines and approximately 30% of all voting is conducted early or by absentee.

The defendants' response is due at the Supreme Court no later than February 24, 2006. The Landes lawsuit can be found at the following url: http://www.EcoTalk.org/lawsuit.doc.

    EcoTalk.org
    Lynn Landes, publisher
    215-629-3553
    lynnlandes@earthlink.net

New Diebold Machine Failures Right Out Of The Gate

2006-03-20T16:18:00.000-08:00

Emery County (Utah) Clerk Bruce Funk has been running elections for 23 years. He was quite content with his optical scan system. The state of Utah thought otherwise: On Dec. 27, Funk took delivery on 40 Diebold TSx touch-screen machines, part of a statewide directive.

"I had concerns about Diebold," says Funk, "but I thought, 'If the state is going to mandate it, then I guess they'll assume responsibility if anything goes wrong.'"

Not so. He soon learned that he will be responsible but the state will decide what election system will count the votes.

"You're going to hate my guts on Election Day"

Funk's concerns escalated when he heard a particularly unusual statement by Diebold sales rep Dana LaTour.

"Some of you are going to hate my guts on Election Day," she said to the assembly of elections officials. Later, another Diebold representative named Drew was asked what LaTour meant when she said "Some of you are going to hate my guts..."

"We're going to have problems on Election Day, and we're just going to have to work through them," he said.

Failures right out of the gate

Shortly after Funk received his "brand new" TSx machines, Diebold helped him do acceptance testing. Two of the 40 machines promptly failed the test. Diebold arranged to take them away.

The remaining machines showed several defects -- crooked paper feeds that jam, memory card bay doors that wouldn't close, parts getting stuck, coming loose, falling off.

Taking a closer look

Funk thought it might be a good idea to take a closer inventory.

He booted each machine up to check the battery. Some of the machines were marked with little yellow dots, and he got to wondering about that, too. He studied the screen messages, and noticed something very odd.

Most machines had about 25 MB of memory available, but some had only 7 MB of free memory left. One had only 4 MB of available memory. For perspective, the backup election file generated by the Diebold TSx is about 7.9 MB. Now why would brand new voting machines have used-up memory?

Time to get a more in depth evaluation

This prompted Funk to seek an evaluation. He asked Black Box Voting to help him analyze his voting system.

After several consultations, Black Box Voting determined that the nature of the problems in Emery County might be systemic and might be national in scope. Therefore, we arranged for and underwrote the services of Harri Hursti and Security Innovation, Inc.

Neither Funk nor Black Box Voting were prepared for the depth and breadth of the problems discovered. Based on these discoveries we will begin with a series of articles followed by concise, but more formal reports.

Part I

Hursti quickly determined the three most likely causes of the low memory problem:

1. There might be completely different software in the machines with low memory.

2. Some machines might contain different external data

3. Or, some of the machines might have been delivered with natively different amounts of memory available.

Hursti approached issue #2 first. If the used memory was due to external data or archived election files stored on the system, he reasoned, removing any such files would clear the memory. He discovered that some of the machines did contain test election data, and he deleted the extra data. This produced only a small improvement in available memory, however.

As for issue #1, different programs on the machines -- or, the existence of something stored in memory which is hidden, such a find would obviously be disturbing.

Issue #3, the possibility that some machines had different amounts of memory left in their life cycle, is particularly troubling. The technology choice Diebold made -- memory storage consisting of flash memory, which is known to degrade over time -- carries with it a possibility that used machines will be near the end of their memory life cycle. If such machines were delivered to Emery County as "new," this would be like buying a "new" car with 100,000 miles already on it.

The only thing that was known about the cause of this problem was that there were different amounts of memory. The reason remained to be discovered. In the course of evaluating the reason for the low memory, we learned much more about the TSx.

Is there an infra-red port for remote communications?

Hursti also examined the remote communications capabilities of this system. He found no infra-red (IrDA) ports.

"The whole thing here is that it's network aware even when RAS is not running. You're not dialing out and it's network aware. And it's actually configured to use an Ethernet board...It's all the time network aware...Perhaps all you need is this Ethernet cord and a wireless cord inserted and off you go."

"I haven't asked any 'pins' (Personal ID Number). It hasn't been hostile to me at all. It's a very friendly guy."

Hursti made a number of observations about the touch-screen, and connected it to his laptop for further "conversation."

In the interest of brevity, we will return to this issue in a later article in this series.

A "Shocking" discovery

It's common for polling places to have too few outlets for a bank of voting machines. The normal cure is to set up hook the computers up in a daisy-chain configuration, with one plug to the wall, and the rest of the plugs linking voting machines together.

Diebold's output plug falls out readily, exposing live 110 volt wall outlet power on bare wires.

This happened on every TSx we tested, and presents a significant safety hazard for poll workers, especially the elderly. According to Hursti, the electrocution might only result in a burned hand, and probably wouldn't be fatal.

This is a design flaw worthy of a general recall for standard consumer and office electronics.

Diebold: Down for the count?

While analyzing the memory storage problem, Hursti discovered a critical security hole in the foundation of the touch-screen. Then he found another in the "lobby," and another on the "first floor." Taken together, these present a potentially catastrophic security hole.

These are not programming errors, but architectural design decisions.

Black Box Voting is turning the "road map" of the most dangerous security findings over to the proper authorities. We won't let anybody sit on this for very long because elections are looming and elections officials need to know what to do now.

A concise and more formal report will be released from Security Innovation, Inc., and this will discuss the procedures for preparing a recovery path for these security holes.

Two things we have learned already:

1. Source code reviews alone are NOT sufficient. Access to fully functional systems MUST accompany source code reviews.

2. Honest election officials and citizens again take the lead in learning the truth about voting machines. We ask for maximum public support for Bruce Funk, who showed courage and commitment to responsible elections. The important and effective work of Utah voting integrity advocates Kathy Dopp (http://www.uscountvotes.org) and Jocelyn Strait should be applauded by fellow activists. They have played an important role to inspire this study in Utah, which may in turn assist with efforts in many other states.

PERMISSION TO REPRINT GRANTED, MUST LINK TO http://www.blackboxvoting.org

California Voters Filing Suit to Halt Use or Purchase of Diebold

2006-03-20T15:49:00.000-08:00

VoterAction.org announced that they will file suit on behalf of several plaintiffs. The suit is "aimed at halting the use or purchase of Diebold electronic voting systems" in the state. All I can say is THANK GOODNESS!!

---

MEDIA ADVISORY
March 17, 2006, San Francisco, CA
Contact: Martha DiSario, Pacific Communications: (415) 235-1230
Deborah Goodson of Howard Rice: (415) 399-7882

Dolores Huerta Joins California Voters Filing Suit to Halt Use or Purchase of Diebold Electronic Voting Systems in the State

Voter Action to Hold March 21st News Conference, 10:30 -11:30 AM, PST

Who:
Lowell Finley, Esq., Counsel for voter plaintiffs, Co-director of Voter Action, and expert on election law, election privatization, and electronic voting machine issues
John Eichhorst, Esq., Co-counsel, Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin
Holly Jacobson, Co-director, Voter Action
Dolores Huerta, Plaintiff, and social activist, co-founder, United Farm Workers
Bernice Kandarian, Plaintiff, and President of the Council of Citizens with Low Vision International

Voter Action, www.voteraction.org, is a not for profit organization dedicated to providing legal, research and logistical support for grassroots efforts to ensure the integrity of elections by guaranteeing that every citizen's vote is recorded and counted as intended. Voter Action led successful litigation in New Mexico to block purchase and use of the types of voting machines that are most prone to error and most vulnerable to tampering, and is now supporting similar efforts in numerous states across the country.

What:
Attorneys Lowell Finley and John Eichhorst, on behalf of more than 20 California voters including Dolores Huerta and Bernice Kandarian, will brief media on a legal action to be filed on Tuesday, March 21, in the Superior Court of the State of California, aimed at halting the use or purchase of Diebold electronic voting systems. Ms. Huerta and Ms. Kandarian will also speak and answer media questions.

Why:
Diebold's TSx touch screen voting system is a severe security risk, and does not accommodate all disabled voters as required by law. The Diebold system is difficult if not impossible to audit or recount, and has been proven vulnerable to malicious tampering in tests and studies. Diebold technology contains "interpreted" code, which is easily hacked, and illegal for voting systems in the State of California.

Where:
Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin
Three Embarcadero Center, 10th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94111

Lowell MA Vote Problems Probed By DOJ!

2006-03-20T11:14:00.000-08:00

This is interesting! The DOJ is probing the failure of Lowell, MA's election commissioner to translate ballots into Khmer. Meanwhile, the DOJ ignores all of the vote counting problems encountered by election counting machines produced by Diebold, ES&S, and Sequoia! Bizarre!

We now know that the DOJ is paying attention to the election problems; they want to ensure that ballots are translated into foreign languages - BUT they are actually IGNORING the bigger, nation-wide vote counting errors caused by flawed e-Voting machines. I have greatly "snipped" this article. The complete article can be found HERE.
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Lowell Vote Problems Probed
Translating ballot into Khmer (Cambodian language) eyed

By Stephanie Ebbert, Globe Staff | March 19, 2006

The US DOJ is conducting an investigation into voting problems in the city of Lowell, as advocates called for an increase in voting assistance to growing immigrant populations in the Bay State.

The Lowell investigation, confirmed by a DOJ spokesman this past week, is the 4th recent probe into alleged voting rights violations in Massachusetts city elections. Other cities targeted by the DOJ are Springfield, Lawrence, and Boston, which entered into a consent decree to print ballots in multiple languages, including Vietnamese, Chinese, and Spanish.

The DOJ's Civil Rights Division launched a major initiative to ensure that communities are complying with the Voting Rights Act last year. Last fall, the DOJ announced it would send federal observers to monitor the November elections in Boston, Lowell, and 14 other communities across the country. [My Query: Will the DOJ pay any attention to voting machine errors?]

DOJ spokesman Eric W. Holland confirmed that the Voting Rights Section of the Civil Rights Division is investigating Lowell, but refused to provide additional details on the probe.

Holland confirmed the DOJ is also investigating complaints in Springfield, where observers from a nonprofit voting rights group last November documented a lack of translators, a lack of information regarding their right to provisional ballots, and rudeness by poll workers.

In Lawrence, the department is investigating problems after the city sent letters to some 15,000 voters shortly before Election Day advising them they were no longer considered active voters.

Last summer, the DOJ sued the city of Boston for violating provisions of the Voting Rights Act requiring the Election Department to provide ballots and poll assistance in Spanish and for allegedly coercing limited English speakers to vote certain ways. As part of a settlement, the city also agreed to print ballots in Chinese and Vietnamese in precincts with high concentrations of those voters.

In a letter he sent to the election commissioners in January, staff attorney Glenn D. Magpantay detailed the results of the group's survey of 116 Asian-American voters at three poll sites. Five voters said they were directed to the wrong polling places, and one had to cast a provisional ballot because his name was listed incorrectly in the voter roll.

SoS William F. Galvin characterized the issues raised by the group as "fairly minor." John Bonifaz, a voting rights advocate running against Galvin, criticized him for not being aware of the investigations.

"It remains bewildering to me how the secretary of state's office seems unaware of these investigations," said Bonifaz. "I don't think we should have to rely upon the Bush Justice Department to enforce the Voting Rights Act in Massachusetts. I think we should have a secretary of state who is being proactive and ensuring that the Voting Rights Act is being enforced around Massachusetts."

Magpantay said the city still has not addressed problems raised in the 2004 elections when, his group alleges, voters whose names were not on the rolls were not told that they could vote by provisional ballots, as required under a 2002 federal law.

"We look forward to the city translating the ballot in Khmer. And we're looking forward to discussing problems with the 2004 elections," Magpantay said.

Stephanie Ebbert can be reached at ebbert@globe.com. - © Copyright 2006 Globe Newspaper Company.

US evangelicals warn Republicans: "DO MORE!"

2006-03-17T17:13:00.000-08:00

By Jamie Coomarasamy
BBC News, Washington

Prominent leaders from the Christian right have warned Republicans they must do more to advance conservative values ahead of the US mid-term elections.

Their message to Congress, controlled by Republicans, is "must do better".

Support from about a quarter of Americans who describe themselves as evangelicals was a factor in President George W Bush's two election victories.

The Republicans will need to keep them onboard if they are to retain control of Congress in November.

BALANCE OF POWER

435 seats - all to be contested in mid-terms
Republicans hold 231 seats; Democrats 201; one independent; two seats vacant
Democrats need to win net 15 seats to win control of House

At a news conference in Washington, some of America's most influential conservative leaders said the current perception among evangelical Christians was that the Republican majority was not doing enough for them.

Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, said that apart from confirming two conservative judges to the Supreme Court, "core values voters" did not feel that Congress was advancing their interests.

100 seats - 33 to be contested in mid-terms
Republicans hold 55 seats; Democrats 44; one independent
Democrats need to win net six seats to win control of Senate

The leaders appear to be reflecting a growing sense of frustration among the Christian right, over what they see as a lack of legislative progress on issues such as banning same-sex marriages.

And while this was not quite a call to arms, it will cause concern in Republican circles in the run-up to the mid-terms.

Exit polls suggested that more than three-quarters of white evangelical Christians voted for President Bush in 2004.

But according to a recent opinion poll, the number of them who want Republicans to retain their Congressional majority is not much above 50%.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/4815912.stm

Published: 2006/03/17 10:31:10 GMT

How To Steal an Election

2006-03-17T08:08:00.000-08:00

From Washington Post, March 16, 2006:

It's easier to rig an electronic voting machine than a Las Vegas slot machine, says University of Pennsylvania visiting professor Steve Freeman. That's because Vegas slots are better monitored and regulated than America's voting machines, Freeman writes in a book out in July that argues, among other things, that President Bush may owe his 2004 win to an unfair vote count. We'll wait to read his book before making a judgment about that.

But Freeman has assembled comparisons that suggest Americans protect their vices more than they guard their rights, according to data he presented at an October meeting of the American Statistical Association in Philadelphia.

True 2004 Election Results - Map

2006-03-16T14:33:00.000-08:00

We often see 2004 Election Results maps, which display "Red States" and "Blue States" as if there are no people with opposing political views in those states. This is not the case. Jerry Leibowitz created a map of the 2004 election results which is accurate.

The following map, created by Mr. Leibowitz, graphically displays the actual percentage of voters within each state who voted RED and who voted BLUE!

It is good (and, in fact, comforting) to remember that there were people in the RED states who voted for John Kerry.

When Electronic Voting Comes to MY County

2006-03-16T10:49:00.000-08:00

Betrayed, outraged, that the worst, most corruption-prone Vote system is Foisted upon my own community

by Rob Kall
http://www.opednews.com

Tonight I found out that my county's supervisors decided, along party lines, to dump its old, reliable, trustworthy lever machines and replace them with unreliable, electronic machines, with no verifiability, no paper ballots.

I feel horrible-- betrayed, exposed and outraged. Local activists have done yeomans' jobs of educating both the public and the commissioners about the liabilities and negatives of electronic "DRE" machines and the strengths of optical scanning (OC)machines with paper ballot records. The more verifiable, higher integrity OC machines have a lower cost over time, by millions of dollars.

In the recent OpEdNews/Zogby Peoples poll, Pennsylvania voters said that they favored paper ballor or lever machines over electronic machines 84% to 13%.

Why would the commissioners-- the two republican commisioners-- James Cawley and Charles Martin-- choose a more expensive, less trustworthy, less reliable device that a massive majority of the voters don't want? That's the question.

Why didn't PA Governor Ed Rendell (former DNC leader) influence this situation? Why did he appoint a Secretary of State, Pedro Cortes, who voting integrity activists report did all he could to prevent the adoption of the most reliable systems?

This doesn't add up.

Some say the machine manufacturers contributed to campaigns. It's clear that the machine manufacturers are in far too close and too tight with the Secretaries of state, nation-wide. They help pay to sponsor meetings. Check out the (PDF) National Association's of Secretaries of State (NASS) corporate affiliates. This association, NASS, could be a cesspool of corruption, where these mid level state bureaucrats, these Secretaries of State, like Ken Blackwell and Katherine Harris, some of the most crooked, dangerous enemies of Democracy have found ways to gain power. Harris stole an election for Bush and became a member of congress. Blackwell is running for governor of Ohio, helped no doubt because of his dirty work aiding in the theft and corruption of the Ohio vote (sue me you SOB, Mr. Blackwell. Let's air this out in court.)

Some say the Commissioners are crooked, that they were made promises by the manufacturers. Some say Rendell's campaign received contributions. But this is speculation.

In PA, there is already one lawsuit against Secretary of State Pedro Cortes, and more are in the works. That probably won't do much to fix the problem with the two county commissioners. Word is, that when the one Democratic commissioner voted against the electronic machines, the one Republican commissioner appointed by the Republican machine blanched. There's no doubt that the payback for the commissioners betraying the desires of the voters of Bucks county will be the most active campaign against Republican control in history. Of course, the Republicans will be controlling the counting of the votes.

Governor Rendell seems complicit in this outrage. Add to his abuse of democracy, by attempting to force a senate candidate, Bob Casey, jr., upon the electorate, without an open primary, and Ed ends up with an interesting situation. He may lose Pennsylvania-- lose the governor's race, cause the loss of the senate race (if Casey wins the primary) and lose the whole state, so it becomes a red state. Rendell may very well lose, if Casey runs, because Casey's issue positions are abhorent to women and blacks. If Casey is running, he will turn off Republican women who split their "tickets" to vote for Rendell and Casey, because of the women's rights/ abortion issue. That won't happen if Casey runs. Matter of fact a lot of progressive women are saying they're so disgusted with Casey, they certainly won't work for his campaign and may not even vote for him. They're looking at staying home or voting for a third party candidate.

Our OpEdNews/Zogby Peoples poll found that Casey's support by African Americans was literally cut in half when they learned his positions.

Add this situation to Rendells culpability in allowing electronic voting to happen across the state and you get a lot of angry voters who just may send a message to Rendell and the Democrats who think taking away safe voting and women's rights is the way to win elections.

I think you know what I think of these DLC, democratic fakes. I call them Republicrats, and I think we need to purge the Democratic party of them. But that's another Op-ed.

Rob Kall is editor of OpEdNews.com, President of Futurehealth, Inc, and organizer of several conferences, including StoryCon, the Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story and The Winter Brain Meeting on neurofeedback, biofeedback, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology.

Give To The Stephen Heller Legal Defense Fund

2006-03-16T09:46:00.000-08:00

Stephen Heller is a whistleblower

He is alleged to have seen and then exposed legal documents proving that Diebold Election Systems, Inc., the country's leading manufacturer of electronic voting machines and voting machine software, was using illegal, uncertified software in their California voting machines, thereby defrauding the state of California, the taxpayers of California, and disenfranchising the voters of California.

Did California applaud this courageous whistleblower, and prosecute Diebold for defrauding California?

No.

What happened to Diebold: Diebold was not prosecuted. Instead, California Secretary of State Bruce McPherson (Republican, running again in November '06) recently approved the use of Diebold voting machines throughout California for the November election. He did this after Stephen Heller exposed the fraud, and despite research reports from the GAO and a UC Berkeley research team, which exposed numerous hardware and software flaws that make Diebold machines imminently hackable! This is a travesty of enormous proportions. This is an outrageous abuse of the law and of power.

What happened to Heller: On February 21, 2006, Stephen Heller was charged in Los Angeles Superior Court with 3 felonies: felony access to computer data, commercial burglary and receiving stolen property. He pleaded not guilty.

Stephen Heller is running out of money to pay his legal defense bills. The blogosphere is coming to his aid. Please consider donating a few bucks!

* * * * *

Hello everyone,

This is Michele Gregory, Stephen Heller's wife. Once again, Stephen and I thank you for all of your help and support. Your encouragement and kind words have been invaluable to us in this very difficult and frightening time.

As you know, Stephen has been charged with some very serious crimes for allegedly blowing the whistle on Diebold Election Systems. He has pleaded innocent to all charges. He needed the very best legal defense, but criminal defense attorneys are very expensive. So far, starting in August of 2004, we have covered Stephen's legal bills with our personal savings and by taking a second mortgage on our house. Our savings are now gone, and our credit is strained.

And so, with the help of some friends, I have started the Stephen Heller Legal Defense Fund and corresponding website.

For more detailed information about this case and how to donate, please go to http://www.hellerlegaldefensefund.com/ . The site has details on Stephen's case, news, press articles, blog posts, and information about the defense fund, including detailed information on how it is run and how you can donate, should you wish to.

Whether or not you are able to donate, please pass the website around to everyone you know. Stephen's lawyer has said that public awareness of his situation will be beneficial to his defense.

Thank you all for all you have done, are doing, and will do. Stephen and I are in your debt; you have our gratitude.

With love,

Michele Gregory
Proud and loving wife of Stephen Heller

* * * * *

Should you wish to donate with a check, please make the check out to "The Stephen Heller Legal Defense Fund" and mail it to:

The Stephen Heller Legal Defense Fund
c/o Michele D. Gregory, Fund Administrator
17216 Saticoy St., Box 234
Van Nuys, CA 91406-2103

The fund itself is a non-interest bearing, FDIC insured checking account opened on March 7, 2006 at the First Federal Bank of California, Encino branch. Stephen's name is not on the account and he does not have access to the money. Monies can only be used for payments to Stephen's attorneys, and the account has been set up after advice from attorneys and with full transparency.

Stop Election Day cheating -- or it will spread further

2006-03-16T07:23:00.000-08:00

By Robert Steinback
Miami Herald, March 15, 2006 (http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/14100465.htm)

If you bet on a race horse, and later heard about serious allegations that the winning horse may have been illegally doped to gain an advantage, would you demand an investigation?

You know the answer. It would depend on whether or not you bet on the winning horse.

That's what has made much of America so hesitant to demand accountability regarding a growing ledger of allegations that the November 2004 election was so badly tainted that one could fairly question the outcome of the biggest race of all -- the one for the Oval Office. Anyone who questions the reliability of the election is assumed to be a sour-grapes bad sport who has fallen into the thrall of aluminum-foil helmeted conspiracy theorists. And the media, ever tremulous about affirming their critics' allegations of liberal bias, would sooner remove a hot radiator cap than make a mission of investigating the anomalies.

But the anomalies were real. Many have been documented. They kept thousands in swing states from voting, and prevented thousands of ballots from being counted.

Not incidentally, most of the 2004 anomalies benefited one party.

What stands out in the analysis of 2004 voting practices in the critical state of Ohio, says Columbus State Community College professor Bob Fitrakis, "is the asymmetrical nature of the anomalies. Virtually every single anomaly tends to favor Bush, just overwhelmingly."

Fitrakis, a lawyer who holds a Ph.D in political science, has done considerable research into the critical Ohio election, which Bush officially won by 118,599 votes to recapture the presidency. Fitrakis will present his evidence in a book, What happened in Ohio: A documentary record of theft and fraud in the 2004 election, coauthored by Harvey Wasserman and Steve Rosenfeld, to be released in September.

Among their findings:

• Four percent of the 5.6 million votes cast in Ohio -- some 224,000 ballots -- were not counted for various reasons. Nearly two-thirds of those disallowed votes came from urban, heavily Democratic districts.

• In certain heavily Republican counties, John Kerry received fewer votes than obscure Democrats running in statewide elections. In Butler County, for example, a retired black judge from Cleveland in a long-shot race for state Supreme Court got 61,000 votes. Kerry got 54,000.

''The drop-off [in votes] was at the top of the ticket, which is abnormal,'' Fitrakis said.

• Voter turnout in two precincts exceeded 100 percent of the voters registered. In one precinct, 679 out of 689 voters reportedly cast ballots -- yet, ''In a couple of hours, we were able to find 25 people who said they didn't vote or were out of town,'' Fitrakis said.

(See a 2004 article Fitrakis wrote for The Columbus Free Press at http://www.freepress. org/columns/display/3/2004/983.)

Electoral problems are hardly limited to Ohio. Brad Friedman, the proprietor of the Brad Blog website (www.BradBlog.com), has documented mounting suspicion of the veracity and reliability of electronic voting machines used across the nation.

Friedman told me he blames the reticence of the mainstream media to tackle the issue for the public's lack of fervor about what he sees as a threat to the nation's electoral integrity.

"The people who hear about the information, get it," he said. "But they're just not hearing it enough, and that's because of the media."

He cites an October 2005 report by the nonpartisan General Accountability Office which concluded that the nation's electronic voting system is rife with flaws, weak security controls and inconsistent voter-system standards.

Had you heard of this report? I hadn't, until Friedman referred me to it. And yet California just recertified a Diebold Co. voting machine even though it contains computer language rejected by federal guidelines because it makes the machines vulnerable to hacking.

Until the public demands changes, we'll continue to be plagued by partisan supervisors of election who -- as in Ohio in 2004 and Florida in 2000 -- simultaneously hold high positions in a top candidate's campaign. By electronic vote-counting machines lacking proper security controls or any way to recheck the vote afterward. By voter-purging tactics and preventable Election Day obstacles that mysteriously hurt one party more than another.

There's good reason for Bush supporters and rock-ribbed Republicans to demand corrective action to prevent the anomalies that surely compromised the 2004 election: The risk that failure to curb the abuses will encourage the competition to resort to similar tactics. The last thing anyone wants is a cheater's arms race. Either you stop the cheating, or you encourage more of it.

Bradblog: Whistleblower Warned Texas, Ohio of E-Voting 'Fraud' Concerns in 2004! (SOSs ignored him.)

2006-03-14T03:00:00.000-08:00

100,000+ Votes Were Errantly Added by Hart Machines in a Single County in Last Tuesday's Primary via Flawed, Paperless 'eSlate' Touch-Screen System!
---------------------------------------------
Former Hart Employee, Tarrant County TX Election Worker Notified State, Legal Authorities in 2004 About Serious Voting Machine Problems, Procedures...All Warnings and Complaints Ignored

Continuing in an exclusive BRAD BLOG series on Voting Machine Vendor and Election Fraud whistleblowers, another insider, from yet another voting machine company, has now come forward to reveal a myriad of known problems inside both the company and in several states and counties with whom they do business.

During last Tuesday's Primary Election in the state of Texas, scores of "computer glitches" -- as voting officials and electronic voting machine vendors like to refer to them -- were revealed occurred across the state. Many of those "glitches" occurred on electronic voting equipment manufactured and supplied to various counties in Texas by the Hart InterCivic company.

One such "glitch" occurred in Texas' Tarrant County, which encompasses Fort Worth. That "glitch" resulted in some 100,000 votes being added to the result totals across the county's paperless Hart-Intercivic "eSlate" touch-screen voting system.

Letters sent by William Singer of Fort Worth, a former Hart InterCivic "technical specialist" and current Tarrant County election worker, to state officials back in July of 2004 warned of exactly such problems. The letters, obtained and published on The BRAD BLOG (link below), reveal that there were serious problems and concerns of possible election system meltdowns that were already apparent with the Hart machines in Tarrant County long ago. However, the warning letters were all but ignored by both election officials and even state law enforcement officials.

In Singer's July 29, 2004 letter to Texas Secretary of State, Geoffrey S. Conner, Singer listed the following problems, which Conner ignored:

The audit trail for Hart's election generation software (BOSS) had invalid entries. Hart was aware of this and declined to fix it, and Robert also declined to fix it. I informed him that I had developed a simple, reliable, and effective method to remove the invalid entries (while at Hart), but he still refused to fix the information in the audit database.

The public test was fake. We ran a public test but discovered a series of problems with the election we were setting up, and in the course of resolving those issues had substantially different election databases to be used in the actual election. I had inquired about rerunning the public test, but was told it was unnecessary, troublesome, and pointless. ... There was also no record of adjustments made for each new iteration of the election databases.

The Hart technician that arrived onsite in Tarrant County admitted to being untrained, the company declined my offer to help, and instead allowed their untrained technician to make changes to Tarrant's election computers. The work was done improperly and had to be fixed twice, and was only finally completed because I intervened and corrected several problems so that the county could continue preparing for the next election.

Hart admitted to Tarrant County that votes are sometimes lost when using the disabled voting units

ES&S was pressuring Tarrant County into using unapproved software for election day, and told the staff there that they were also pressuring other jurisdictions to do the same thing. ... Tom Eschberger, a vice-president for ES&S, was the person who actually came onsite and tried to apply this pressure, and also asked what kind of deal they could offer to get Tarrant County to stop using Hart Intercivic's products.

There was a computer used to combine results from two separate vendor systems which did not have a password. I attempted to add one, but was ordered by Robert not to, on the grounds that it was a "change". ... This computer was the final reporting machine which would be used to generate reports for, among others, the SOS office, the press, and the parties, so the lack of a password was a real concern.

In my work area, where there were several computers used to program the elections, there was no physical security of any kind. I didn't have a closed office much less a lockable door

Anti-tamper devices provided for some of the computers were used improperly or not at all.

Hart did not release bug lists to Tarrant County for their software, and ES&S did so only intermittently and did not respond when I asked for updates

Tarrant County had no organized backups nor any procedure for doing so, nor any regular or safe way to maintain such backups.

During several Tarrant County elections Hart performed on the fly report fixes during elections, even while results were coming in.

Singer concludes his letter to Connor by noting; "As you, and other election officials must be aware, running a complex election is never as simple or easy as the law allows or we would like to believe. And I have recognized these realities in my consideration of the behavior and choices of others, and tried to judge them only on the more severe issues of which I am allowed, under confidentiality agreements, to speak."

The letter to Blackwell describes a number of alarming concerns about the electronic voting systems of Hart Intercivic, their gaming of the testing procedures, as well as the conduct of their highest-level officials.

Among the complaints and concerns contained in his letter to Ohio SoS J. Kenneth Blackwell are both "Fraudulent Acts" and "Fraudulent Claims":

The computer submitted to the examiners in Ohio for security testing was setup specifically for this test. Since I was the person who actually designed and setup the current configurations I was the only one who could have setup such a computer for the review. Not only was I not permitted to do so, I did not even discover Hart had shipped a computer to the state until after the review had started.

Hart sales staff has claimed to the Ohio SOS office that results are not transmitted over public networks. This is untrue, and indeed, absurd," wrote Singer. "Unofficial results are transmitted through public phone lines, and even mediocre 'hackers' can access such networks via the internet.

HIS COMPLAINTS WERE COMPLETELY IGNORED...

Read the complete article and see the documents at http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002542.htm

The Theft of the Presidency: Both 2004 and 2000

2006-03-11T18:36:00.000-08:00

"The morning after the 2004 presidential election was eerily similar to the morning after the 2000 presidential election. All the well-founded predictions that George W. Bush would lose went out the window, and he was once again, by some sleight-of-hand, installed in the office previously awarded to him by the Supreme Court.

"Something was seriously wrong. There were questions, not all of them from Democrats, but the American press ignored them. . . "

The above two paragraphs commence an excellent account that traces the history of the Theft of the 2004 Election by the Bush Administration and its cronies (including, probably, the three e-voting machine manufacturers that were able to get certified -- despite software and hardware problems inherent in their systems.) So, read the entire article at:

http://www.hermes-press.com/criminal_vote2.htm

If you found that article valuable, read about the theft of the 2000 presidency, as rubber-stamped by the U.S. Supreme Court. This is at:

http://www.hermes-press.com/criminal_vote.htm

Retired Supreme Court Justice O'Connor Warns Of Dictatorship

2006-03-11T14:03:00.000-08:00

Sandra Day O’Connor, the recently retired Supreme Court justice, no longer faces the obligation of keeping her mouth shut. Last Thursday, in a speech at Georgetown University, she openly criticized Republicans who criticized the courts.

O'Connor said that Republicans challenge the independence of judges and the freedoms of all Americans.

O’Connor said that attacks on the judiciary by some Republican leaders pose a direct threat to our constitutional freedoms. O’Connor began by conceding that courts do have the power to make presidents or the Congress or governors, as she put it “really, really angry.” "But," she continued, "if we don’t make them mad some of the time we probably aren’t doing our jobs as judges, and our effectiveness is premised on the notion that we won’t be subject to retaliation for our judicial acts."

"The nation’s founders wrote repeatedly," she said, "that without an independent judiciary to protect individual rights from the other branches of government, those rights and privileges would amount to nothing." But, said O’Connor, "as the founding fathers knew statutes and constitutions don’t protect judicial independence, people do."

And then, without actually naming names, she took aim at former House GOP leader Tom DeLay. She quoted his attacks on the courts at a meeting of the conservative Christian group JUSTICE SUNDAY last year when DeLay went after the courts for rulings on abortion, prayer and the Terri Schiavo case. This, said O’Connor, was after the federal courts had applied Congress’ one-time only statute about Schiavo as it was written. Not, said O’Connor, as the congressman might have wished it were written. This response to this flagrant display of judicial restraint, said O’Connor, her voice dripping with sarcasm, was that the congressman blasted the courts.

It gets worse, she said, noting that death threats against judges are increasing. It doesn’t help, she said, when a high-profile senator suggests there may be a connection between violence against judges and decisions that the senator disagrees with. She didn’t name him, but it was Texas senator John Cornyn who made that statement, after a Georgia judge was murdered in the courtroom and the family of a federal judge in Illinois murdered in the judge’s home. O’Connor observed that there have been a lot of suggestions lately for so-called judicial reforms, recommendations for the massive impeachment of judges, stripping the courts of jurisdiction and cutting judicial budgets to punish offending judges. Any of these might be debatable, she said, as long as they are not retaliation for decisions that political leaders disagree with.

"I," said O’Connor, "am against judicial reforms driven by nakedly partisan reasoning."

Pointing to the experiences of developing countries and former communist countries where interference with an independent judiciary has allowed dictatorship to flourish, O’Connor said we must be ever-vigilant against those who would strong-arm the judiciary into adopting their preferred policies. "It takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship, she said, but we should avoid these ends by avoiding these beginnings."

This summary is from the Raw Story. The audio can be heard at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5255712.

Summit County, OH Voting Has 30% Failure Rate In Tests

2006-03-09T19:09:00.000-08:00

Posted on Beacon Journal, Thu, Mar. 09, 2006

Summit voting gear flunks

By Lisa A. Abraham, Beacon Journal staff writer

The computer memory cards in the newoptical-scan voting equipment at the Summit County Board of Elections have experienced a 30 percent failure rate in testing this week.

A spokeswoman for the company that makes the voting machines said the problem can be corrected before the May 2 primary.

A consulting company that Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell hired has been in the county since Monday testing all the new voting equipment before its planned use May 2.

Tests on Monday and Tuesday showed that about 30 percent of the computer memory cards -- which should read and store vote tabulations -- did not work, Elections Board Director Bryan Williams said. "We are noticing a high failure rate," he said Wednesday.

Election Systems & Software in Omaha, Neb., makes the machines. Williams said ES&S officials believe they have isolated the problem to the computer cards produced by one of its subcontractors. ES&S contracts with several companies to make the memory cards, Williams said.

"We're looking into the extent to which this affects others," said Ellen Bogard, spokeswoman for ES&S. "It will be remedied if there are other cards that need to be replaced."

The first 177 cards tested Monday worked flawlessly, Williams said. When testing began on the remaining 348 cards, however, the failure rate was so high that the rest were thrown out. ES&S had a second batch of cards sent to Akron on Tuesday, but Williams said those cards experienced a similar failure rate. He said a third batch is expected to arrive today.

Optical-scan voting involves a printed paper ballot that a voter marks by filling in a circle with a pencil -- similar to the way students take standardized tests. The ballots then are fed into a scanner that reads the marks and records votes on a computerized memory card.

The Summit elections board bought 525 readers -- one for each of the county's 475 voting precincts, plus 50 extras.

"With the majority of them, the memory card cannot be read by the computer," Williams said.

He said company officials told him all the cards by the particular maker have been recalled in Ohio and may be recalled nationally.

Jerry Amick, ES&S' account service manager for Ohio, said 28 Ohio counties have the company's optical-scan machines, but testing in those counties showed no problems. "No other counties in Ohio got the bad cards; they already have pre-testing done," Amick said.

He denied that the cards by this particular manufacturer were distributed nationally and said a national recall will not be necessary. Amick would not name the manufacturer.

Bogard said the cards are like a floppy disk and "are easily managed if there is an issue. The testing process worked. We've identified the problem. It will be remedied well before any election," she said.

Williams said testing of the voting equipment will continue in Summit through April.

Blackwell spokesman James Lee said the secretary of state's office is confident the problems will be fixed and said the testing of the equipment will continue. "This is all part of the testing process. This is why we test," he said.

But Wayne Jones, chairman of the elections board and one of its two Democratic members, said the problems only reaffirm for him that the wrong voting machines were selected for the county. "I had trouble with the technology to begin with, and this just reaffirms the bad decision that was made," he said.

The elections board split along party lines when deciding what voting system to buy to replace the county's punch-card system. Democrats wanted to buy touch-screen voting machines made by Summit County manufacturer Diebold. Republicans wanted the ES&S optical scan system. Blackwell broke the tie vote in December.

Republican board member Alex Arshinkoff said Wednesday he was not familiar enough with the problems to offer comment.
Lisa A. Abraham can be reached at 330-996-3737 or labraham@thebeaconjournal.com

Incumbents return in a big way (Voting Machines "Flipped" Votes to Them!)

2006-03-09T19:01:00.000-08:00

Marshall Cook, who ran against incumbents in Pinellas County, Florida, tried to vote for himself on an e-voting machine made by Sequoia. It kept "flipping" his vote in favor of his opponent, the encumbent! The following is buried in the BOTTOM of an article on how incumbents won the election (unbelievable!):

And on Election Day Cook charged that the voting machines malfunctioned in several precincts, including his own precinct at Skyview Recreation Center. When Cook tried to vote for himself, the machine defaulted to a vote for Taylor. A precinct worker finally moved Cook to a different booth. [I am sure that this solved the voting problem . . .]

Later in the day, Cook said he had other reports of voting machines malfunctioning in similar ways.

Nancy Whitlock, communications director for the Pinellas County Supervisor of Elections Office, said there had been a problem at Cook's precinct. One machine, she said, registered a different answer when voters touched it. Poll workers recalibrated it to fix the problem.

Whitlock said she did not know how many people had voted before the problem was caught. But the machines, she said, allow voters to look at their votes before finalizing them.

No one else complained, so it is unlikely the problem affected many, if any, other votes, she said.

Tarrant County, TX has a computer glitch in Primaries

2006-03-09T12:38:00.000-08:00

Posted on Thu, Mar. 09, 2006

Vote spike blamed on program snafu

By ANNA M. TINSLEY and ANTHONY SPANGLER
STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITERS

An undetected computer glitch in Tarrant County led to inflated election returns in Tuesday's primaries but did not alter the outcome of any local race, elections and county officials said Wednesday.

The error caused Tarrant County to report as many as 100,000 votes in both primaries that never were cast, dropping the local turnout from a possible record high of about 158,103 voters to about 58,000.

Because the errors added votes equally for each candidate, the glitch did not change the outcome of Tarrant County races but narrowed the margin of victory in some statewide races. In the close Republican primary race for Texas Supreme Court, for example, incumbent Don Willett edged past former Justice Steve Smith by only about 1 percentage point with the corrected vote tallies.

Questions about possible problems were raised by election staff late Tuesday night, as it became apparent to some that the county would far exceed the 76,000 votes cast in the 2002 primary elections.

"We didn't think there was a problem," Hamilton said. "We should have stopped right then.

"But we didn't question it at that time."

Read the full article at http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/news/local/14056065.htm

Also at http://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/localnews/tv/stories/DN-tarrantglitch_09wes.ART.North.Edition2.5181972.html:

County officials said the only race potentially affected was the close contest between GOP incumbent Don Willett and challenger Steve Smith for the Texas Supreme Court Place 2 seat. It's not clear yet whether the new numbers would alter the outcome of that race.

David Rogers, campaign manager for Mr. Smith, said his candidate is considering asking the secretary of state for a recount. Mr. Smith originally lost by 21,000 votes, but the margin is now fewer than 5,000.

"That is less than 1 percent," Mr. Rogers said. "We are looking at the statute tonight, and we'll probably make a decision [about a recount] in the next 24 hours."

Texas Primary Augurs Upcoming E-Trouble in E-Merica.

2006-03-09T12:30:00.000-08:00

Go to http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002522.htm to see problems with e-voting systems in Texas primaries the other day. Keep in mind that the problems in 'E-Lections' generally don't begin to surface until some time after Election Day...

(The links to these articles are found in Bradblog.com:)
1. Galveston County - New voting system, same problems (Hart eSlate and eScan)
2. Jefferson County - Voting woes mar debut of electronic ballots (ES&S iVotronic)
3. Jefferson County - Confusion mars new voting process
4. Robertson County - Robertson County vote tallies delayed (ES&S AutoMark)
5. Tom Green County - Computer problems delay election returns (Hart eScan)
6. Webb County - Cuellar defeats Rodriguez in congressional grudge match (Counting problems – ES&S)
7. Webb and Bexar County - ‘Glitches' get blame in Webb (ES&S)

New voting system, same problems (Galveston)

2006-03-07T23:20:00.000-08:00

This is the first article that there were problems with e-voting systems in the Texas primary:

By TJ Aulds
The Daily News

Published March 8, 2006
Galveston County’s elections were to have moved into the computer age Tuesday with the party primaries.

But despite a new electronic voting system and new software for voter registration, problems long a part of the county’s election night history cropped up again.

Thousands of voters never received registration cards. It was a problem that had the phones at the county courthouse ringing with calls from frustrated voters across the county.

“It’s been a nightmare, it really has,” said County Tax Assessor-Collector Cheryl Johnson, who is also the county’s voter registrar.

Johnson blamed the problem on a glitch with new software that was required under state law. The cards printed fine, but postal service scanning machines had trouble reading many of the addresses, she said.

“I’d say it’s easily 10,000 that came back, probably closer to 20,000,” Johnson said as she pointed at boxes full voter registration cards with bright yellow postal stickers indicating addresses were not valid.

“You always get some that come back because of a problem with the address, but with many of these we found there aren’t any problems with the addresses,” Johnson said. In many cases, she said, the glitch caused letters to be mailed to people stating they needed to update their addresses with the county, when they had never moved.

Problems retrieving data from the new eSlate system delayed the release of election results. The first returns, which included the results of the 5,700 early votes, did not emerge until 9:20 p.m. — two and half hours after the polls had closed.

County Clerk Mary Ann Daigle said it was mostly human error that caused the delays. The ballot board, a group of elected judges who go through mail-in ballots by hand, was delayed because of a late mail run, she said.

Poll workers at two locations, one in Texas City and the other in Galveston, also failed to bring all of the required equipment to the courthouse for counting, she said.

Daigle said problems existed at at least two polling locations where the eSlate and eScan systems used in the election malfunction more than once. The systems shut down at the Municipal Utility District No. 12 in Bayou Vista and at Weis Middle School, forcing those wanting to cast ballots to do so using emergency ballots. Daigle said those equipment malfunctions though did not have anything to do with the delays.

Johnson promised an investigation into the irregularities with the voter registration.

That was little comfort to Sharon Tipton, who moved from Galveston to Santa Fe in November. She was one of those who never received a registration card; her husband received his.

“In January, I checked on it and was told I had to complete the change form again, even though my husband’s information had been sent in the same envelope as mine originally,” said Tipton. “I went to the west county (annex) and completed the form again.”

Still no card arrived.

“I didn’t even bother to go and vote,” said Tipton, who could have still voted had she provided a driver’s license or other form of identification.

Even then, a provisional ballot could have been filed until her correct address information could be verified, Johnson said.

Maryland Gov.: Touch-Screen Voting Fallible (Want's paper receipts!)

2006-03-07T17:53:00.000-08:00

Touch-Screen Voting Fallible, Ehrlich Says
Elections Official Urged To Back Paper-Ballot Bill

By Ann E. Marimow
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 6, 2006; B01

Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) has embraced a legislative proposal to abandon the state's touch-screen voting machines for the coming election, in which he is a candidate, and to lease others that provide a paper record to verify results.

"Maryland's lack of a paper trail means we are no longer a national leader in elections systems and that our equipment is susceptible to system failures," the governor wrote in a letter to be delivered today to the chairman of the State Board of Elections. "It is inexcusable for us not to be prepared for a catastrophic system failure in the 2006 cycle."

Ehrlich's endorsement is the latest turn in the debate over Maryland's electronic voting machines that were used in nearly every polling place in the 2004 election. The state has committed $90 million to the system, which critics say is vulnerable to tampering.

State Elections Board Chairman Gilles W. Burger and Administrator Linda H. Lamone have defended the current system, made by Diebold Election Systems, as secure and the most accurate in the nation.

Switching to optical scan machines, which use paper ballots, is "not ideal," Burger said in a letter to Ehrlich late last month, because it would introduce such problems as printing errors and questions of voter intent. Burger and Lamone say they also are concerned that voters in the state's largest jurisdictions -- Prince George's and Montgomery counties and the city of Baltimore -- have never used an optical scan system for voting at the polls.

The governor's letter is part of an ongoing debate between Maryland's political leaders and elections officials about how and when voters should cast ballots in the 2006 election.

Last month, Ehrlich -- who championed the Diebold machines in 2003 -- wrote to Burger to express concern about reliability questions raised in California and Florida about those machines, which Ehrlich said would be exacerbated by early voting. A review of California's voting systems found more than a dozen vulnerabilities that security analysts said could be fixed; the California secretary of state has granted conditional certification.

In the February letter, Ehrlich told Burger that he had lost confidence in the elections board to conduct accurate contests. He backed a paper trail but did not offer a specific plan. More than two dozen states now have some requirement for vote verification.

In the latest letter, of which a copy was given to The Washington Post, Ehrlich calls on Burger to endorse legislation by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Sheila E. Hixson (D-Montgomery) that would require the state to lease an optical scan system for the coming election. Hixson has said it would cost the state less than $16 million; the elections board has estimated it at more than $60 million.

The bill was approved by Hixson's committee Friday. Its chances in the Senate are less certain because Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr. (D-Calvert) does not favor leasing new machines for the 2006 elections.

Ehrlich's latest letter also recommends that there be two independent security studies of the electronic machines and that the board "aggressively and publicly" push to delay plans for early voting.

© 2006 The Washington Post Company

"Paper Ballot Rectipts" May be added to Georgia's electronic voting machines!

2006-03-07T17:43:00.000-08:00

It seems that there ARE some Republicans with a modicum of integrity! Three precincts (only?) will get to see a form of "paper ballot" in their e-voting machines.

Posted on Mon, Mar. 06, 2006

GA Senate Approves Study of Voting Paper Trail

Associated Press

ATLANTA - The state Senate on Monday unanimously approved a plan that could lead to paper ballots being added to Georgia's electronic voting machines.

"My hope is that this legislation will take us one more step forward toward having the most trustworthy, secure voting system in the country," said Sen. Bill Stephens, R-Canton, the plan's sponsor and a candidate for secretary of state in this year's election.

According to the plan, which passed 51-0, precincts in Bibb, Camden and Cobb counties would be outfitted with the paper balloting for November's general election.

If all went well, the state could add the receipts to all of its voting machines by the 2008 presidential election, Stephens said.

Under current SoS Cathy Cox, Georgia switched to an all-electronic voting system in 2002 in the aftermath of the chaotic presidential vote in Florida.

Under the Stephens plan, voters don't keep a copy of their ballot, but instead would be able to review the paper receipt under a clear, plastic cover before finalizing their vote.

The paper ballots could be used in the event of a recount or other challenge to an election's vote total.

Cox, a Democrat running for governor, supports the bill.

Senate Democratic Leader Robert Brown, of Macon, said he supports the measure, but would have liked to see at least one rural county participate in the pilot program and to have seen more counties involved in the test.

The plan now goes to the House. Senate Bill 500, http://www.legis.ga.gov/

Voting machine stolen from elections judge

2006-03-07T17:11:00.000-08:00

FABULOUS SECURITY! I hope that the e-Voting machine is returned . . . AFTER the thief figures out where all of the flaws are (and submits a report to the public)!

Voting machine stolen from elections judge

11:50 AM CST on Monday, March 6, 2006
From Dallas News - Staff Reports

An electronic voting machine was stolen from the home of a Dallas County elections judge over the weekend.

Sgt. Don Peritz, a Dallas County Sheriff spokesman, said the judge notified sheriff's dispatchers Sunday afternoon that the iVotronic touch-screen machine was stolen from his home in the 200 block of East 5th Street.

Dallas County Elections Administrator Bruce Sherbet said the machine will not function without an additional piece of hardware called a personalized electronic ballot, or PEB.

Mr. Sherbet said his employees identified the serial number of the stolen machine and have blocked it from any access to the elections system, reducing the risk of vote fraud.

Dallas County purchased about 750 of the ADA-compliant special voting machines for visually impaired and blind voters. The machines cost about $3,000 each, roughly the same amount the county puts out for an electronic touch-screen voting machine.

Sgt. Peritz said sheriff's detectives are investigating the theft.

Dallas Morning News staff writer Herb Booth contributed to this report.

Mayor and 13 Others Charged With Fixing Election

2006-03-03T17:56:00.000-08:00

This small group must not be as connected to the "powers that be" in Washington!

New York Times:
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: March 3, 2006

WISE, Va., March 2 (AP) — An investigation that began with accusations that cigarettes, alcohol and pork rinds were offered for votes in a small coal-mining town led to the indictment Thursday of the mayor and 13 other people on charges of election fraud and corruption.

A state grand jury indicted the 14 on charges of fixing the May 2004 election in Appalachia, a town of about 2,000 in Virginia's rugged southwest corner. A town councilman, a police captain and a police officer were also named in the 269-count indictment.

Most of those indicted face multiple counts, all of which are felonies. Most of the counts carry a maximum punishment of at least 10 years in prison.

U.S. IS SUING NEW YORK OVER 2002 VOTING LAW (HAVA)

2006-03-02T12:51:00.000-08:00

Is New York acting to protect the rights of its citizens to vote for the candidate of their choice (without having their votes altered)? I think so. I think "Big Brother" is trying to ensure continuing GOP control of this country by forcing all states to install flawed electronic voting machines that intentionally "err to the right." Three cheers to NY for standing up for its people! Forcing the states to install untrustworthy e-voting machines should cause outrage across this country. Yet, it rarely is mentioned; except when a state refused to follow the GOP plan. Read the following article from the Los Angeles Times (on the web at http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-vote2mar02,1,6322576.story)

U.S. Is Suing New York Over 2002 Voting Law

The state has been the slowest to implement the Help America Vote Act, according to federal officials, and could lose $49 million in aid.
From Associated Press
March, 2 2006

ALBANY, N.Y. — The Department of Justice sued the state of New York on Wednesday over its worst-in-the-nation record of complying with the Help America Vote Act, the first time federal officials have sued a state over the new voting requirements.

Adopted after the disputed 2000 presidential election, the act was designed to update the nation's voting systems. Supporters of the act have identified New York as making the least progress in complying with the legislation.

But a frequent critic of New York's compliance said the federal lawsuit might "do more harm than good" by forcing New York to quickly buy new voting machines that could be low-quality. That could "throw this [2006] election into chaos," said Neal Rosenstein of the New York Public Interest Research Group.

"It's absurd to rush such a process," he said. "The rotten HAVA implementation process on the state level shouldn't be mirrored by a rotten judicial enforcement process."

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Albany and charged that the state had failed to put in place a system that would allow disabled voters to cast their own ballots capable of generating a paper record, and that the state had failed to create a statewide computerized voter registration database.

"HAVA contains important reforms designed to ensure that elections for federal office will both allow access to all voters and ensure the integrity of the process," said Wan J. Kim, assistant attorney general for civil rights, in a statement released by the department. "We believe today's lawsuit will help ensure that New York voters enjoy the benefits of these important reforms." [Here's my comment: If there is the slightest chance that these machines could manipulate the vote, then what is "the integrity of the process" about which Wan Kim speaks? Why are they rushing into a potential electorial abyss?]

The state had been negotiating with Justice Department officials for weeks to avoid the suit.

The lawsuit seeks a court order requiring the state to promptly submit a plan detailing how it will comply with the law signed by President Bush in 2002. The provisions at issue in Wednesday's lawsuit took effect Jan. 1.

Thus far, New York has received $221 million in federal aid to help it comply with requirements, including $49 million specifically dedicated to replacing the state's lever-action voting machines. A news release from the Justice Department said New York could lose the $49 million if it does not have new voting machines in place by the state primary election in September. State officials have said it is unlikely they will be required to return the money.

There was no immediate response Wednesday to the lawsuit from New York Atty. Gen. Eliot Spitzer, who has been representing the state in talks with Justice Department officials.

Federal officials have also been talking to other states about their progress on the act.

Voting Activists accused by PA Secretary of State of stalling HAVA

2006-03-01T03:27:00.000-08:00

As a heavy handed tactic to force counties to buy unverifiable, paperless electronic voting machines; the federal Department of Justice sent a strongly worded letter to the State of Pennsylvania saying that all counties must be in compliance with HAVA by the May 16 Primary Election. Disgusting. The Republicans are going to win by a landslide in November! I am watching this in dismay.

Voting Activists accused by PA Secretary of State of stalling HAVA

Blaming the Victims?
http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_votepa_060228_voting_activists_acc.htm

VotePA NEWS

For Immediate Release: February 28, 2006

PLAINTIFF RESPONDS TO PA SECRETARY OF STATE ALLEGATIONS
THAT LAWSUIT DELAYED VOTING MACHINES

Westmoreland County citizens responded strongly today to Secretary of State Pedro Cortés’ recent memorandum that stated their court case has impeded the progress Pennsylvania counties are making toward buying new voting machines to comply with the federal Help America Vote Act by the May 16 primary election.

Ten Westmoreland voters filed a lawsuit last month along with state senator Jim Ferlo who represents part of the county, seeking to preserve the right to choose a voting system under the Pennsylvania Constitution and approve any change from lever machines to electronic voting by referendum. Earlier this month Commonwealth Court Judge Dan Pellegrini ruled in favor of the citizens, but Westmoreland County and the Pennsylvania Department of State have appealed that decision to the State Supreme Court. In the meantime, Secretary Cortés’ memorandum was sent to all county officials and appeared on Governor Ed Rendell’s web site over the weekend.

As lead plaintiff in the suit, Mary Beth Kuznik expressed dismay that an honest effort made by citizens to preserve the rights of all Pennsylvanians under the state Constitution was being blamed for a delay in buying voting machines and a potential loss of Help America Vote Act funding.

“Nothing could be further from the truth,” said Kuznik, who is also founder of the election integrity alliance VotePA. “Regardless of whether or not our suit was filed, Pennsylvania has been way behind in getting voting systems certified. Counties could have held the referendum required by our state Constitution and still have met the HAVA deadline, but many held off on their decision because they were waiting until well into the new year for more machines to come out.”

According to Kuznik, no voting machines were certified by the Pennsylvania Department of State under HAVA until August 2005, and then there was only one available -- albeit a good one -- until mid-November. She said that information and leadership was lacking with counties being forced to rely on the vendors' biased information rather than hard facts about the machines. This has led many officials to make a choice based on price and promises rather than concrete information.

“The notion that our group of citizens somehow acted to disrupt HAVA is absurd,” Kuznik said, “and I personally told Secretary Cortés’ staff several times that it was already too late long before our suit was filed. I am an elected Inspector of Elections, a pollworker myself, and I know the training and logistics that will be involved to make the switch to a new system. To make the May deadline, machines should have been ordered in November or December at the latest, but the Department of State was still examining voting machines in January and acting like there was plenty of time.”

In further developments, the federal Department of Justice involved itself in the matter when it sent a strongly worded letter to the State of Pennsylvania saying that all counties must be in compliance with the HAVA by the May 16 Primary Election. The move was seen by Kuznik and her group as a heavy handed tactic to force counties to buy unverifiable, paperless electronic voting machines.

Under HAVA, counties are required meet certain standards that are largely resulting in a move to electronic voting methods. The mandate leaves many voters concerned that the newer, largely untested computerized systems are prone to breakdowns, fraud, and potentially thousands or millions of lost or miscounted votes. Citizen groups and computer experts have called for equipping machines with the ability to produce a paper either marked or verified by the voter, and keeping the papers available in a locked ballot box to serve as the official record of the vote in case of audit, machine breakdown, or recount.

Kuznik said that her group and others are calling upon Secretary Cortés and Governor Rendell take the next step to make sure that votes are protected by pushing for hearings and ultimate passage of SB 977 / HB 2000.

SB 977 and its identical House version HB 2000 would provide that all voting systems in the state produce a paper record or ballot allowing voters to verify that their choices are being recorded as cast, with an audit of 5% of the precincts chosen at random in each election. The bills, proposed by Senator Joe Conti (R-Bucks) and Representative Dan Frankel (D-Allegheny) have co-sponsorship of over one-fourth of their respective houses, but are delayed in the State Government committees and have been unable to move to either the public hearings called for by the Governor’s Task Force on Election Reform, or to a floor vote in the General Assembly.

“Pennsylvanians want to see and verify their vote on a piece of recountable, auditable paper,” said Kuznik. “Regardless of the outcome of the Westmoreland County lawsuit, let’s get these bills moving and passed into law so that when we do move to the new machines our citizens can be confident that their votes will be counted accurately.”

###

Governor's statement:
http://www.governor.state.pa.us/governor/cwp/view.asp?a=1115&q=445763

Cortés' memo (Note: this is in Adobe Acrobat format):
http://www.governor.state.pa.us/governor/lib/governor/evscountyletter022306.pdf

In Their Own Words: Republicans on Perjury & Obstruction of Justice

2006-02-28T23:44:00.000-08:00

I found a post on Democrats.org that is a good read. It is called "In Their Own Words: Republicans on Perjury & Obstruction of Justice" and I highly recommend it...

"Recently, Republicans have been implying that an indictment for perjury is simply a "technicality." But they didn't always feel that way. Here's a collection of things they had to say then."

Here are some gems:

Current Majority Leader Roy Blunt (R-MO) – "This is not about the president's personal conduct...When the president commits perjury that clearly is an attack on the judiciary, on the rule of law." [AP, 12/16/98]

Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) – "Perjury and obstruction of justice are serious offenses which must not be tolerated by anyone in our society." [Washington Post, 2/12/99]

Senator Michael DeWine (R-OH) – "Obstruction of justice and perjury strike at the very heart of our system of justice...Perjury is also a very serious crime...The judiciary is designed to be a mechanism for finding the truth-so that justice can be done. Perjury perverts the judiciary, turning it into a mechanism that accepts lies-so that injustice may prevail." [Congressional Record, 2/12/99]

There are quite a few more at http://www.democrats.org/a/2005/10/in_their_own_wo.php

Oil Industry Contributes to Imbalance of Power

2006-02-28T20:38:00.000-08:00

The president's budget fuels up alternative energy, but compared to Big Oil's political activity, is the cleaner-power industry shouting into the wind? [I say, "YES!"]

By Courtney Mabeus

February 17, 2006 | To rehabilitate a nation he has diagnosed as “addicted to oil,” President Bush has proposed a number of initiatives to spark alternative energy development. His proposals, outlined in this year’s State of the Union address and his 2007 budget, mark a surprising shift in attitude given the president and Vice President Cheney’s ties to the oil and gas industry that once employed them. Although Big Oil and its alternative little sisters share an objective—to provide energy to the nation’s consumers—campaign finance records indicate they could not be more different politically.

The oil and gas industry, currently enjoying record profits, has contributed more than $186 million to political candidates and parties since 1989, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. About 75 percent of the industry’s contributions went to Republicans. Exxon Mobil Corp., which reported the highest profit in U.S. history just before Bush’s January address to Congress, and ChevronTexaco are two of the all-time top contributors to political campaigns.

By contrast, political contributors associated with solar, wind, ethanol and other sources of power development have given just 1 percent of what contributors associated with oil and gas have—a little more than $2 million to federal candidates and parties. Cruise lines and manufacturers of nutritional supplements are among the many industries that have given more. Nearly 60 percent of alternative energy’s money went to Democrats, the minority party in Congress right now.

Unless the industry raises its profile in Washington, legislation favoring alternative power sources may stand little chance—especially if it’s at the expense of oil and gas.

The oil and gas industry’s contribution patterns have become steadily more Republican since the GOP takeover of Congress in 1994. In this 2005-06 election cycle, the top two recipients of the industry’s campaign contributions are Texas Republicans—former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, with more than $95,000 from the industry, and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton, with more than $91,000. The industry’s top recipient during the 2003-04 election cycle was another Republican from Texas: President Bush. He received more than $2.6 million from oil and gas interests.

Please read the rest of the article at: http://capitaleye.org/inside.asp?ID=203

Pima County, AZ Election Director Launches Outburst When Questioned about DIEBOLD purchases!

2006-02-28T20:25:00.000-08:00

I am beginning to suspect that there is more to Arizona's decision to purchase Diebold voting machines for the upcoming mid-term elections. . . A Republican is trying to keep his job. So, in order to ensure that he keeps it, he is installing intentionally flawed Diebold voting machines (which always err to the right.) Sometimes the guilty just get angry! Read on:

Pima County Election Director Brad Nelson Launches Outburst At Election Reform Advocate in Response to Question About New Touch-Screen Voting Machines
Letter Calls for Censure of Official as Onlookers Stunned by Encounter, Feared Violence Would Break Out...

The battle between Election Officials and Election Integrity Advocates has been simmering and intensifying for some time. Last week, in Arizona, one such confrontation boiled over briefly into an outburst...

The battle between Election Officials and Election Integrity Advocates has been simmering and intensifying for some time. Last week, in Arizona, one such confrontation boiled over briefly into an outburst at a public meeting which was documented on video tape. In what could be a preview for the Electoral Integrity fight still to come, Pima County, Arizona's Election Director Brad Nelson went into a short tirade last Tuesday as the video camera rolled during a local Democratic precinct council meeting in the state's 26th Legislative District.

The BRAD BLOG has obtained the exclusive video of the event which reveals the Republican Nelson flying off the handle and shouting as he confronts Election Integrity Advocate, John Brakey, "nose to nose" during a question about Diebold's DRE (touch-screen) voting machines. Before Brakey was able to get to his main question concerning Nelson's plans for Logic and Accuracy testing on the machines, he was interupted by Nelson's outburst over whether or not he had, in fact, signed a contract for use of the new voting machines in the county.

Diebold's hackable touch-screen machines have been recently approved for first-time use in the state by Arizona's Secretary of State Jan Brewer.

While Nelson's confrontational rant was just short of anarchic, it certainly sent a shockwave of concern throughout the room of stunned onlookers.

One of the witnesses present, Rev. Gerry Straatemeier, described the "intimidating behavior" displayed in the incident as "completely out of line for a public official". Straatemeier was so troubled by the display that she sent an open letter to the Pima County Board of Supervisors calling for Nelson to be censured for the behavior. In the letter (posted in full at the end of this item, along with a text transcript of the event) Straatemeier says, "I really thought he was going to land a blow on Mr. Brakey and I was scared to death."

In the video, Nelson charges towards the camera at one point -- which Brakey was standing near -- coming so close that it's impossible to see anything but his chest in full camera's full frame.

Straatemeier, in her letter, suggests the tirade was an attempt to intimidate Brakey -- and other election integrity advocates -- from further inquiry into the controversial Diebold touch-screen voting equipment now coming into Arizona despite a Dept. of Homeland Security warning that their tabulator software is hackable, a non-partisan GAO report confirming the failures and loss of ballots via electronic voting, and a recent independent analysis [PDF] commissioned by the Sec. of State of California which warns about the hackable "interpeted code" used in Diebold voting machines despite a ban on such code by the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) guidelines.

As we reported in May of last year, Brakey has for some time been closely investigating a number of troubling anomolies in recent Arizona elections. His intensive work auditing his own precinct in Pima County, where he says evidence suggest fraud occurred in the 2004 election, was covered in detail last year by The Tuscon Weekly. That work has brought him in contact many times in the past with Nelson -- without incident apparently, until last week.

Last Tuesday, as the following video shows, the simmering frustration and growing anger roiling up between many Election Officials and Election Reformers, has finally begun to make its way to the surface and into the public eye...

A complete text transcript of the incident, and a copy of Straatemeier's open letter to the Pima County Board of Supervisors calling for censure of Nelson is located at http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00002473.htm!

AZ State Secretary Defends Purchase of Diebold Voting Machines

2006-02-28T20:14:00.000-08:00

By Howard Fischer
Capitol Media Services
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 01.05.2006

PHOENIX - Secretary of State Jan Brewer on Thursday defended the decision to purchase touch-screen voting equipment from the Diebold Corp.

Her comments came during and after what was supposed to be a routine announcement by the Glendale Republican who wants another four years in office.

But a small group of protestors, apparently mobilized by comments made Thursday morning about Diebold by a Phoenix radio talk show host, showed up with hand-made signs decrying the purchase.

A Brewer campaign worker had to call Capitol police to have the protestors moved back so Brewer could give her speech - a speech which boasted of the state getting rid of the last punch card ballots as part of her accomplishments since being elected in 2002 but one that never mentioned the Diebold contract.

But Brewer, responding to media questions, called the noisy protestors "anarchists" and said they were off base.

"I don't think there is a problem with the Diebold equipment," she said. Brewer said a committee investigated the bids and the machines passed on the guidelines.

"I think that there are a lot of conspiracy theorists out there that are trying to blow this completely, totally out of proportion," she said.

Most Arizona counties already have bought and use Diebold machines for optical scanning of ballots.

Brewer's office got involved after federal law required states to purchase machines for their counties which are accessible to the disabled. That led to an award Friday to buy touch-screen machines for every polling place, most of them from Diebold.

Last year Leon County, Fla., got rid of its Diebold scanners after it was shown they can be "hacked" to alter election results without leaving a trace. Since that time some other communities have refused to purchase machines from that company.

But state Elections Director Joe Kanefield, who works for Brewer, said that Florida test was meaningless.

"It was a flaw that could be inherent in any system if security measures are not in place," he said. Kanefield said the testers were given access to the heart of the machine, something he said cannot happen with the protocols that govern Arizona election law.

"I established very precise procedures and security measure so this would not happen in Arizona," she said.

One of the protestors Thursday was Ernest Hancock, a long-time Libertarian Party activist who hopes to be his party's nominee for Brewer's office. He complained that the touch screens are flawed because they leave no paper trail to be counted if there are questions about whether a machine accurately recorded the votes.

Kanefield said, though, the machines ordered by the state do produce a paper receipt which is kept by election officials in case of a court challenge.

Brewer, a former state senator and Maricopa County supervisor, faces a primary challenge from former Phoenix Mayor Skip Rimsza. The only other formally announced candidate in the race is former Tucson city councilman Bruce Wheeler.

2004 Balloting Irregularities in Pima Arizona

2006-02-28T19:55:00.000-08:00

John Brakey insists there was fraud at one precinct during November's election--and he has evidence backing him up. This article is old. But, interestingly, Pima County, Arizona's Election Director Brad Nelson went into a short tirade just last Tuesday (as a video camera rolled) during a local Democratic precinct council meeting in the Arizona's 26th Legislative District. I am posting that as well.

2004 BALLOTING IRREGULARITIES

By DAVE DEVINE, Published at www.tucsonweekly.com on MAY 26, 2005:

Pacing as he talks, John Brakey believes he has uncovered serious problems with November's election results in Pima County--results that could have national implications.

Brakey admits he was a Democratic Party poll watcher who was escorted from his own precinct. But after six months of extensive research, Brakey is convinced what he saw on Election Day was voter fraud.

He accuses some of the people who worked at his polling place of stealing votes for George Bush. "These people knew exactly how the system works. I know those people were in there doing bad things," Brakey says.

Contacted by Brakey the day after Election Day, Pima County's director of elections, Brad Nelson, looked into the complaint. "There were four Republicans and three Democrats working at the polling place," Nelson says, "and I spoke to as many of them as I could. They have all attested in writing ... that everything was fine."

Acknowledging the poll workers did make errors in how they handled both the balloting and bookkeeping processes, Nelson indicates that some of them won't be asked back for future elections. Then he adds: "There were bookkeeping problems, but I can't find anything to substantiate irregularities that affected the outcome of the election."

After countless hours of research, Brakey ardently disagrees. He thinks poll workers obtained ballots by marking "spoiled" on some valid ballots and then casting their own choices as replacements.

Brakey also believes several people who requested early ballots but came to the precinct on Election Day had their "provisional" ballots manipulated there. Based on the records he has, Brakey additionally insists that other votes were cast by poll workers who covered up the act by making it appear people who didn't vote actually did.

Scattered across Brakey's dining room table are stacks of election documents for his precinct. He has entered all the data into a computer that allows him to track the voters. "The county looks at numbers," he emphasizes, "but I looked at names."

Once the alleged problems are meticulously explained, with the paperwork carefully examined, it makes for a strong argument that well more than 10 percent of the almost 900 votes from Brakey's polling place were questionably handled. It was a very busy day at the precinct, but the irregularities are glaring.

Among numerous categories of problems, several stand out. Thirty-nine questionable "provisional" ballots were apparently improperly placed into the optical-scan vote-counting machine instead of being sent to the Pima County Recorder's Office for verification. In addition, while the poll workers certified there were 59 provisional ballots cast, only 53 people actually signed as having done so.

The list of problems grows longer. Some voters' names appear twice on the official roster of those who showed up on Election Day, indicating they were given two ballots. Precinct records also indicate that several people were provided a second ballot because they spoiled the first one, but Brakey says he has contacted a handful of these people--and they deny it happened. Based on that, he believes poll workers cast at least some of these second votes.

Nineteen people also didn't sign in at the precinct, but according to the polling place paper trail, a few of them did cast ballots there. Others from this same list aren't shown as voting by the recorder's office, but claim they did. One person in this latter category, when contacted by phone by the Weekly, was positive she did vote in November.

For those who did not sign in on Election Day but had a ballot given out in their name, it's possible someone else may have gotten it. An example is a Libertarian voter who didn't sign in, and is not shown as voting by the Pima County Recorder. Her name, however, appears on the roster, prepared by poll workers, of those who actually received ballots--but she is mistakenly listed as a Republican.

When asked to explain this particular discrepancy, Nelson replies: "I have to fall back on what the board workers told me. But that absolutely should not happen."

Brakey thinks this process was intended both to create votes for George Bush and to switch some intended for John Kerry to Bush. "It was all part of a strategy," he says, "with the intent to convert enough Democratic votes to Republican to win the (national) popular vote."

Not satisfied with his own analysis, Brakey hooked up with David Griscom, a 33-year employee of the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C., before his retirement to Tucson last year. Reviewing the precinct results statistically, Griscom says he found the data supports Brakey's views.

"There was fraud," Griscom insists after trying to mathematically reconstruct what happened at the polling place. "I think the poll workers arbitrarily picked some innocent people and were in cahoots with other voters."

These serious allegations were turned over to the Pima County Attorney's office. After an investigation, the case was recently closed, based in part on Nelson's written assertion that he found "the integrity of the November 2, 2004 General Election at (the) Precinct sound and reliable."

Brakey remains undeterred, saying of the county election's director: "He's a bureaucrat and wants this swept under the rug."

Even though John Kerry received only 1 percent less of the precinct's votes than Al Gore did in 2000, Brakey continues to believe there was foul play involved last year.

"No way was this gross error," he insists. "The only way you screw things up this bad is you have to plan. It was methodically planned out. But if it was gross error, we have a pretty bad system, and your vote is a joke."

Alaska Rebuffs Raw 2004 Vote Data (Who actually won in 2004 is unknown!)

2006-02-28T11:56:00.000-08:00

You know about Florida. You know about Ohio. But did you know about ALASKA? If Diebold's e-voting machines incorrectly counted votes in Bush's favor in 2004, in these three states, then Kerry should be president. What will happen in the 2006 Elections? Is it any wonder that California's Republican Secretary of State Bruce McPherson recently certified Diebold e-voting machines for the upcoming Mid-Term elections - after the UC Berkeley computer experts reported that the Diebold machines were FLAWED? SHAME ON HIM!

State [of Alaska] Rebuffs Raw Vote Demand
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/7386582p-7298824c.html

STANDOFF: Democrats Want 2004 base Election Data;
Machine Firm Is Playing Coy.

By LISA DEMER, Anchorage Daily News (Published: January 24, 2006)

The state Division of Elections has refused to turn over its electronic voting files to the Democrats, arguing that the data format belongs to a private company and can't be made public.

The Alaska Democratic Party says the information is a public record essential for verifying the accuracy of the 2004 general election and must be provided.

The official vote results from the last general election are riddled with discrepancies and impossible for the public to make sense of, the Democrats said Monday. A detailed analysis of the underlying data could answer lingering questions about an election many thought was over more than a year ago, they say.

"Basically what they say is they want to give us a printout from the (electronic) file. They don't want to give us the file itself. It doesn't enable us to get to the bottom of what we need to know," said Kay Brown, spokeswoman for the party.

At this point, it's impossible to say whether the correct candidates were declared the winner in all Alaska races from 2004, Brown said.

The private contractor hired to provide Alaska's electronic voting machines is Diebold Election Systems. It has told Alaska officials it owns the "structure of the database" though the data itself is public.

State officials say the Democrats have it wrong.

"The issue is not about whether public information can be released, because the Division of Elections has already offered to provide the information requested by the (Alaska Democratic Party)," elections director Whitney Brewster said in a written statement. "The issue is that the (Democratic Party) is asking for a file format the state of Alaska uses but does not own."

Diebold told the state it owns the format, which can't be released because it's a company secret.

Diebold maintains its voting systems produce accurate results, as proven through recounts in numerous close races, said Mark Radke, Diebold director of marketing.

Questions still hound the company. Some elections officials in other states are questioning whether its electronic machines are secure. Investors have sued the Ohio-based parent company, Diebold Inc., over whether it concealed problems with its voting machines, among other issues. Its chief executive, who once vowed to deliver Ohio electoral votes to President Bush, recently stepped down.

The latest controversy concerns the database holding the results of Alaska's 2004 general election. Democrats say it's important for them to see the database in its original structure ---- the format in which the data was created and now is stored and reported. That's how they hope to figure out if the votes were registered and reported accurately.

But under the state's contract with Diebold, that cannot be released, Brewster said.

Documents provided by the Democrats show that Brewster contacted Diebold and was told the public data can be released only after being transferred to a common format such as Microsoft Excel.

In a Jan. 6 e-mail, Diebold's lawyer, Charles R. Owen, told Brewster that "the structure of the database file ... is proprietary information."

Perhaps, but it's not secret. Anyone can examine Diebold's format on a Web site set up by activists who have been raising questions about the company, the Alaska Democrats said.

"Copies of these kinds of files have been sitting on the Internet for over two years, with Diebold's knowledge," said Jim March, an investigator with Black Box Voting, a private organization that calls itself a national consumer protection group for voters.

Diebold has blocked the group's efforts to get election files in California, Colorado and Washington state, March said. But the data format has been released in a Florida county and in Memphis, Tenn., during a challenge of a mayoral election, he said.

What the state has offered leaves out "the forensic traces we need to figure out what really happened," March said. The Black Box group is helping the Alaska Democratic Party.

"The results from the 2004 election in Alaska just plain look squirrelly," March said.

For instance, district-by-district vote totals add up to 292,267 votes for President Bush, but his official total was only 190,889.

Election officials have an explanation. Early votes for statewide candidates were not recorded by House district but rather were tallied for each of the state's four election regions. Those regional totals then were reported for every House district, essentially inflating the vote total many times over.

The results should be reported differently next time, officials have said.

Democrats also contend more than 2,000 Alaskans cast valid absentee ballots that weren't counted in official totals.

Unless they get the entire file, they won't be able to understand what caused the "bizarre and inaccurate reports" from Alaska's 2004 election, they say.

"These votes belong to us," Brown said. "These are all public record. It's wrong that a contractor like Diebold can keep us from seeing the record."

Daily News reporter Lisa Demer can be reached at ldemer@adn.com and 257-4390.

The Corporation as a "Person" To Which Living Human Beings are Subservient

2006-02-27T12:39:00.000-08:00

As a former corporate banker with both a business degree and a law degree, I am concerned at the losses Americans are increasingly suffering at the hands of large corporate interests. These corporate interests have much more power to line the pockets of politicians. And their lobbying efforts are emaciating the laws that were created to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity," as provided in the U.S. Constitution. Living, breathing human beings are less protected and have less rights, these days, than corporations. In effect, human beings are subservient to corporations. How did this happen?

The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution was ratified in 1868, soon after the end of the Civil War. It declares that no state shall deprive "any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." The "person" Congress and the ratifying states had in mind—the human being in need of equal protection, particularly in the states of the old Confederacy—was the newly-freed slave. But it applies to all human beings. And, as the result of a case 18 years later, it applies to corporations.

In 1886, the United States Supreme Court granted corporations the same rights as living persons under the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. The case was SANTA CLARA COUNTY v. SOUTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD CO., 118 U.S. 394 (1886), and it held that a private corporation is a "person" entitled to the same legal rights and protections the Constitutions affords to any person. The doctrine of corporate “personhood” subsequently became a cornerstone of corporate law, and it was introduced into that 1886 decision without argument. According to the official case record, Supreme Court Justice Morrison Remick Waite simply pronounced before the beginning of argument in the case that:

"The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.

I am not against the idea of corporate "personhood" in general. However, the actual application of "personhood" to corporations seems to accord mere human beings a lower status to corporations under the law.

Here are some examples:

1. Corporations have the right to put corporate money into politics; and corporations generally have much more money to "contribute." As a result, corporations have taken control of our major political parties and politicians. Corporations also contribute to politicians via PACs ("Political Action Committees," where corporate executives collect the money from employees and spend the money on lobbying efforts.)

2. Banks and businesses make tax-deductible contributions to political causes and lobbies that are intended to, and do influence the vote on Federal, state and local proposals. Mere human beings are not able to compete with these corporate “persons,” because they have less money to play with. Due to their lack of bargaining power, human beings do not have equal access to lobbies and politicians.

3. Corporations use the 4th Amendment right to privacy to keep out OSHA, EPA, and other protections intended to protect working human beings. (Remember the recent spate of coal mining disasters, where numerous human beings died. The mines had received hundreds of fines related to violations of health & safety codes; yet they failed to pay one penny, or to correct the violations.) Human beings work for dangerous corporations at their peril, because they have unequal bargaining power when it comes to the protection of their “health and safety.”

4. Unions were created as a way to give human beings some say in the way they are treated in corporations. Unions have been able to ensure that corporations pay a fair wage, but they also ensure that corporations provide safety in the workplace. Additionally, unions often act as a PAC for human beings. Under the current administration, corporations easily kick out unions whenever they can.

5. The Constitution provides that the bankruptcy laws throughout the U.S. shall be uniform. Powerful bank and corporate-sponsored credit card lobbyists rewrote the bankruptcy law (called the "Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act," which does not protect consumers.) This law, which took effect Oct. 17, 2005, effectively obliterated the ability of human beings to obtain a "fresh start" after filing for bankruptcy protection, if they are able to file at all. No longer can a human being be relieved from his debts by filing a bankruptcy petition. Again, the law was changed because human beings have unequal bargaining power over corporations.

6. Credit card companies change the terms of their credit card agreements AFTER consumers have used the credit cards. While Federal, state and local governments cannot pass ex post facto laws, and while contracts ordinarily cannot be amended unless both parties to the contract agree, such laws and rules do not apply to credit card companies (who, by the way, have reported record profits over the last several years.) In this one instance, credit card companies have more rights than governments! Because of the power to change their credit card agreements, credit card companies have been able to add charges, outrageous late fees, and exhorbitant interest rates; and consumers are powerless to fight them. There is absolutely no question that the credit card lobbies are powerful. Again, unequal bargaining power.

7. Corporations cannot go to jail is they are indicted for crimes. (How can you jail a fictional entity?)

8. Human beings often cannot afford to litigate against a corporation, whereas corporations have money set aside to litigate against humans.

These are just some of the examples. There are many more. We need to restore the rights of human beings in this country.

By the way, since the U.S. Constitution makes no mention of corporations anywhere, I wonder whether the powerful Federalist Society (which seeks to "limit" strictly the interpretation of the Constitution and not "insert" what was not originally intended) would seek to overturn Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Co. How would they square this case with their doctrinal belief in "Original Intent?" One wonders . . .

AMERICA FOR SALE: The Cost of Republican Corruption

2006-02-27T09:53:00.000-08:00

Download the full report here http://www.democraticleader.house.gov/pdf/AmericaForSale.pdf (Note: This link takes you directly to the Adobe Acrobat file, which is 762KB in size. You may want to right-click the link and select "Save Link As" to download it!)

Congresswoman Louise Slaughter (D-NY) released a 103 page (.pdf) report detailing the Republican culture of corruption and it's impact on the American people. There is no question that a true culture of corruption has developed under today's Republican Congress and the Bush White House. The real-life costs it has, and continues to have, for everyday Americans are staggering. The recent, and unprecedented, subversion of our legislative process and federal government is not simply an "inside the beltway" problem. America - all of America - is literally for sale. Here are some examples:

A Confusing and Expensive Medicare Program Millions of American seniors have been forced into a confusing and expensive new Medicare drug program that was not created for them, but for the insurance and drug industries who were given special access to shape this legislation.

An Energy "Strategy" That Saves No Energy While American consumers must live with an energy policy that the Energy Department itself has found will not reduce our high oil and gas prices, the Republican Congress and the Bush Administration have rewarded the oil companies with billions of dollars in new tax breaks and subsidies. [According to the Republicans, welfare for the rich is fine; but welfare for the poor is an abomination!]

Polluters Re-Writing Environmental Laws The quality of the air we breathe and the water we drink has been degraded because energy lobbyists temporarily working in the Bush Administration have undermined some of our country's most important environmental standards.

A Nation Still Vulnerable to Terrorist Attacks No American citizen can be sure that the billions of dollars the federal government is spending on homeland security projects are making us safer, rather than just making politically-connected defense contractors richer.

A Government Run by Political Hacks Americans have no confidence that their government will be able to adequately respond if a disaster (natural or man-made) strikes their community, because its agencies are staffed not by professionals, but by political cronies and lobbyists like Michael Brown, who botched the federal government's response to Hurricane Katrina.

Fat Cats Get Their Defense Contracts, but Soldiers Don't Get Their Body Armor American soldiers and their families don't know if they are going to have the body armor and other supplies they need to fight in Iraq, because Members of Congress are instead steering hundreds of millions of dollars to defense contracts for products and services the military often says it does not need and, at the same time, unscrupulous contractors like Halliburton are defrauding the government of millions of dollars.

Drug Companies Get Off the Hook if Their Products Injure Americans While American citizens, public health officials, and first responders worry about how our country would handle the outbreak of a flu pandemic, the Republican Congress recently relieved the pharmaceutical industry of any responsibility for the harm their vaccines or other products might cause during such a crisis.

Corporate Profits Up, American Family Income Down While record numbers of American workers are losing their good-paying jobs as well as their health and pension benefits, large corporations are enjoying new tax breaks and record profits, and are still free to move their corporate organizations overseas to avoid taxes.

Student Loan Debt, Student Loan Industry Profits Both at Record Highs Thanks to the efforts of newly-elected Majority Leader John Boehner, private student loan companies are some of the most profitable companies in America and American students are graduating with record student loan debt.

These examples show that our government is working on behalf of the special interests, not the public interest, and the time for a change is long overdue. The above are just a few examples taken from different sections of Congresswoman Slaughter's report showing that Republican politicians have taken care of special interests instead of the American people.

The report makes an attempt to quantify the damage caused by this Congress and the White House. For example:

14.2 million American seniors (including millions of our sickest and most vulnerable seniors) are stuck in a complicated, expensive, and inefficient Medicare prescription drug program because the Republican Congress and the Bush Administration allowed lobbyists from the insurance and pharmaceutical industries to design this program.

60 million American families who heat their homes with natural gas and 8 million families who heat with heating oil are paying higher bills this winter, even though the Republican Congress recently passed their "national energy plan" into law. Although this plan gives the energy industry billions in new tax breaks and subsidies, it doesn't lower prices for consumers or make our country more energy independent.

The 150,000 U.S. troops currently deployed in Iraq may not have the equipment they need because of waste, fraud and cronyism by the Republican Congress and the Department of Defense. While Halliburton and other companies with Republican connections get their contracts, our soldiers still don't have the body armor and armored vehicles they need to fight the war.

750,000 households in the Gulf region are still displaced today, more than 5 months after Hurricane Katrina hit that region, at least in part because the political hacks the Bush Administration put in charge of crucial homeland security functions were not adequately prepared to prepare for or respond to this disaster.

More than 10 million students and their families will have larger student loans to repay because House Republicans, led by new Majority Leader John Boehner working hand-in-hand with his commercial loan industry allies, cut $12 billion from the student loan program in the recent reconciliation bill and shifted the costs on to students and their families.

Please read the full report. It will open your eyes.

Bush's Obstruction of History

2006-02-26T16:20:00.000-08:00

By John Wertman, Sunday, February 26, 2006; B07 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/24/AR2006022401805.html)

At some point in the next few months, President Bush is expected to announce his choice for the location of his presidential library. Once it's open, most of the media attention is likely to focus on the public exhibits, which will no doubt extol the president's compassionate conservatism, his leadership immediately after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and his impressive selections of John Roberts and Sam Alito for the Supreme Court.

More important to history, however, are the documents that the National Archives will store in the Bush library. These records tell the real story of an administration. Some reveal heartfelt empathy and honest division about a hard decision facing a president at a given moment in time; others may prove embarrassing and show nothing but the basest of political motivations. But for better or for worse, these records belong to the American people and should be available so that future generations can learn from the triumphs and failures of our past leaders.

It was chiefly for this reason that Congress passed the Presidential Records Act in 1978. The law was intended to ensure that after a period of no more than 12 years, presidential records, other than those dealing with existing national security matters and a few other exempted categories, would be made available to the public forever. Thus the law serves as the final check on indiscretion in office and the final basis for presidential accountability.

The law's presumption of public access held firm for more than two decades, but in 2001 President Bush used post-Sept. 11 security measures as a reason to issue an executive order that turns the law on its head. Bush's decree allows former presidents and their heirs to bar the release of documents for almost any reason. It flies in the face of congressional intent and forces our nation's leading historians to take legal action if they want to gain access to documents.

The executive order, No. 13233, drew quite a bit of attention when it was first issued. A group led by the watchdog organization Public Citizen challenged the order's legality in federal court, but the case has been plagued by procedural delays and is still pending. A handful of bills were introduced in Congress that would have overturned the order, but none made it farther than committee.

Unfortunately, time has taken its toll on efforts to force the order's repeal, and hardly any public or political attention is being paid to the issue today, even though it represents a wholesale change in the way the federal government preserves and promotes our national public memory. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Fairfax County's Rep. Tom Davis (R), who chair the committees with jurisdiction over presidential records, have been approached numerous times by historians, scholars and public interest groups regarding the order, but they have failed to act. They should look to the commendable example of Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Babineaux Blanco (D), who recently released 100,000 pages of records related to the Hurricane Katrina response. Blanco seems willing to face deserved criticism if it will help prevent officials from repeating mistakes the next time we face similar crises.

I was lucky enough to have had a chance a few years ago to ask former president Gerald Ford about the Presidential Records Act and was struck by his answer. "I firmly believe that after X period of time, presidential papers, except for the most highly sensitive documents involving our national security, should be made available to the public," he said, "and the sooner the better." He also told me that the researchers he's talked to at his presidential library have been grateful that most of his documents were made available. Ford's answer is especially telling because of the way in which he took office: He followed what he called the long national nightmare of Watergate into the White House and has a better sense than most of the importance of presidential accountability.

Until the original intent of the law is restored, public access to the records of our former presidents stands in limbo. Congress must act now to correct this injustice or one day the George W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum may be derided as a hiding place for secrets concerning matters that dogged the administration.

The writer was on President Bill Clinton's White House staff from 1999 to 2001 and is now director of public policy at the Association of American Geographers. He will answer questions from 2 to 3 p.m. tomorrow onhttp://washingtonpost.com.

Ohio Voting Fraud, Explained

2006-02-26T12:30:00.000-08:00

From: http://www.xopl.com:
As far as I'm concerned, this is the final and definitive proof that both the 2000 and 2004 elections (and probably the 2002 Congress races) were fradulent:

There's two pretty scary articles out there, one from the Free Press and another written by some tinfoil hat blogger.

In the case of the Free Press article, you can't really declare it as crazy lefty conspircy theory considering they are merely summarizing the Government Accountability Office's report (PDF) on elections problems. Incidentally, this GAO report has gotten very little coverage.

But the most telling piece of information is this...
In the 2004 presidential election, an electronic voting machine (manufacturer: ES&S) in Youngstown, Ohio (Mahoning County) recorded NEGATIVE 25 MILLION votes for Kerry. Sources: MSNBC, House.GOV PDF (Google HTML version), and any Google search for "voting machine in Mahoning County recorded a negative 25 million votes for Kerry".

So what is so significant about negative 25 million votes for Kerry that I would sit here are claim to you, at risk of looking like a totally nuts conspiracy theorist, that this piece of information finally cements for me that the 2004 election was fraudulent?

It's pretty simple really: I'm a computer scientist, and every time I've talked to a fellow geek I've said that if the electronic voting machines can be hacked/rigged that some white hat ("good" hacker) out there would only have to register some ridiculous number of votes – say a number greater than the population of the USA or the population of the planet – in order to bring the issue to the table for the media and every America. That kind of move would be an obvious sign of tampering, as compared to somebody who wanted to actually sway the election results who would simply only change a few thousand or hundred votes here and there.

Well, it happened. And, instead of a really, really big number they chose a number that would be equally suspicious: a negative number.

Or did they?

A few things don't make sense:

Most white hats are (arguably) Democrats, so why would they cast negative votes against Kerry?
Even if you think I'm wrong on point #1, the more important question is, why the hell would a voting machine be able to register a negative vote?

Well, that's just it really. I don't think this hacker trying to make his or her point did register a negative vote for Kerry. I think they registered a really, really BIG vote for Kerry.

Negative 25,000,000 is actually the same as +4,269,967,296 as far as your computer is concerned. Allow me to explain...

Most microchips these days represent an integer number as 32 ones and zeroes, or "bits." Both positive and negative numbers can be stored in the same 32 bits. A programmer has to tell the computer whether the number stored in the 32 bits is positive or negative. If the programmer tells the computer the number is signed (can be positive or negative) then the computer reads the integer as some value between -2,147,483,648 and 2,147,483,647. If the programmer tells the computer the number is unsigned (always positive) then the computer reads the integer as some value between 0 and 4,294,967,295.

In many computer programming languages, integers are by default signed... positive or negative. This is the case in the C language, which was most likely used for the voting machine. If the programmer is unskilled enough to write a hackable machine, then it is also quite likely they used the default for the integers rather than realising that votes would never be negative, and explicitly using unsigned integers. (Actually... totally regardless of whether the programmer used signed ints or unsigned ints, the actual mistake the programmer probably made was not using %u, and using %i or the very commonly used %d in their sprintf statements instead... which would have caused +4 billion to be logged as -25 million.)

So, the white hat hacker, who was desperately trying to tell our Nation that the machines cannot be trusted, registered FOUR BILLION votes for Kerry (that's 60% of the population of the planet). And, because the programmer was unskilled, this very big number got put into the 32-bits of a signed integer, which means this very large positive number was read by the computer as a smaller negative number (-25,000,000).

Ok, so wouldn't it be more likely that the hacker just put in a nice round number like -25,000,000 rather than 4,269,967,296? Of course! BUT, I'd say it is pretty obvious the number was rounded by the media in their reporting. It's just as effective and much easier to say "negative 25 million" on the news rather than 25,123,456 or whatever. Hell, you had better HOPE that number wasn't actually exactly -25,000,000, because if it was, then that almost surely excludes the possibility of a computer error.

So, in review...

If I was going to make a point about the complete terror of electronic voting machines, I would register a ridiculously huge number of votes for one candidate in order to force a National dialogue. And I've shown above that SOMEBODY DID THIS.

And mind you, this is just my analysis of one very specific situation. If you read the GAO report, or the summary from the Free Press you'll learn about many, many more reasons to believe our most fundamental democratic exercise has been compromised.

So, what do you do now? Petition your Congress members! Give them a call. Tell them to stop wasting their time on issues we'll never ever agree on as a country (like abortion, religion, the death penalty...), and instead concentrate on legislating our elections and ESPECIALLY electronic voting machines.

I DO NOT think we should use electronic voting machines at all, but if we do, they need to be open source and have a paper trail. Moreover, they need to be audited before the election, and stored in a secure location after the audit until they are used in the elections, and then audited again afterwards.

This isn't a partisan issue. [snip] Every single American, regardless of political positioning, should want severely strict review of our elections in this country. Mr. Republican: wouldn't it burn you up if a machine counted your vote for Kerry instead of Bush? Kerry did win in many states and many counties you know......

Look, I know that this is all a pretty, dare I say, f**king big claim I'm making. It is, and should be, hard for anybody to swallow the idea that we can't trust our elections in this country. Nobody should want to have to believe something so terrible on a day to day basis.

But, the time has come to look at the facts. And, remember, this DOES NOT have to be about some wide sweeping conspiracy to get Bush back in the White House. It simply could have been only a few people acting alone. Many of the articles written on this subject offer compelling evidence of just that. Our elections need to be reviewed, not because of conspiracy, but because our electronic voting machines are so easily tampered with by pretty much anyone (and that's when they aren't simply just malfunctioning on their own).

This is why we need to drop the partisan bullshit on this topic and take a close look at our elections system... to prevent a few criminals out there from making our elections a fraud.

Good night, and good luck.

Urge Congress to pass HR 550 as written!

2006-02-25T21:29:00.000-08:00

The H.R. 550 "I Count!" Lobby Days Coalition, which includes Common Cause, Electronic Frontier Foundation, VerifiedVoting.org, VotersUnite.org, VoteTrustUSA, and Working Assets is working together to safeguard our elections by ensuring the passage of H.R. 550, the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act, introduced by US Representative Rush Holt of New Jersey.

H.R. 550 would require a voter verified paper record of every vote, establish mandatory random hand counted audits to verify the accuracy of electronic tallies, and prohibit the use of secret software and wireless communication devices in voting machines.

The recent change in leadership of the Committee on House Administration may have created a new opportunity for passage of this vital election integrity measure. Previous Lobby Day events in June and August of 2005 were a huge success, generating 24 new cosponsors on the bill from both parties. Please join us in Washington DC April 6 and 7, to build even greater bipartisan support for this critical bill.

What we can do:

Go to Election Integrity Action Center and fill out the requested information. An email will automatically be sent to your Representative. Your name will also be added to a petition that will be delivered to the members of the Committee on House Administration during the "I Count" Lobby Days, April 6-7, 2006.

Sign up to Go to WASHINGTON D.C. on April 6 and 7 to lobby for HR 550, a bill that would require all voting systems to produce a voter verified paper record of every vote. Please be mindful that the meetings will be taking place in WASHINGTON D.C., and only sign up (here) if you really think you will be able to travel to Washington and attend.

U.S. Christian Leaders Apologise For Iraq War

2006-02-25T17:26:00.000-08:00

By Ximena Diego

NEW YORK, Feb 24 (IPS) - Christian leaders from the United States lamented the war in Iraq and apologised for their government's current foreign policy during the 9th Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Porto Alegre, Brazil, which ended Thursday.

"We lament with special anguish the war in Iraq, launched in deception and violating global norms of justice and human rights," the Very Rev. Leonid Kishkovsky, the moderator of the U.S. Conference for the WCC, told fellow delegates from around the world.

Kishkovsky is the rector of Our Lady of Kazan Church in Sea Cliff, New York, and is an officer in the Orthodox Church of America.

Taking an unusual stand among U.S. Christian leaders, the United States Conference for the World Council of Churches (WCC) criticised Pres. George W. Bush's actions in response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

"We are citizens of a nation that has done much in these years to endanger the human family and to abuse the creation," says the statement endorsed by the most prominent Protestant Christian churches on the Council.

"Our leaders turned a deaf ear to the voices of church leaders throughout our nation and the world, entering into imperial projects that seek to dominate and control for the sake of our own national interests. Nations have been demonised and God has been enlisted in national agendas that are nothing short of idolatrous."

The message, written like a prayer of repentance and backed by the 34 Christian churches that belong to the WCC, mourns those who have died or been injured in the Iraq war and says, "We confess that we have failed to raise a prophetic voice loud enough and persistent enough to deter our leaders from this path of preemptive war."

Among the attendees was the Rev. Bernice Powell-Jackson, North American President of the World Council of Churches. A civil rights activist for more than 25 years, Jackson previously served as executive director of one of the Justice and Witness Ministries predecessor bodies, the Commission for Racial Justice.

The U.S. Conference of the WCC also criticised the government's position on global warming. "The rivers, oceans, lakes, rainforests, and wetlands that sustain us, even the air we breathe continue to be violated... Yet our own country refuses to acknowledge its complicity and rejects multilateral agreements aimed at reversing disastrous trends," reads the message.

Earlier this month, a group of more than 85 U.S. evangelical Christian leaders called on Congress to enact legislation that would reduce emissions of greenhouse gases, which most scientists believe contribute to global warming.

The U.S. Conference of the WCC message also said, "Starvation, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the treatable diseases that go untreated indict us, revealing the grim features of global economic injustice we have too often failed to acknowledge or confront."

"Hurricane Katrina," it continues, "revealed to the world those left behind in our own nation by the rupture of our social contract. As a nation we have refused to confront the racism that infects our policies around the world."

The statement comes days after the National Council of Churches (NCC), the United States chapter of the WCC, endorsed a U.N. report on the situation of detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba.

Separately, in a letter addressed to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, NCC General Secretary Robert W. Edgar called on the U.S. to bring the detainees to trial, release them, or to "close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility without further delay". It also asked Rice for access to the Guantanamo facility "to monitor the physical, spiritual and mental conditions of the detainees".

At the Brazilian conference, the Rev. John Thomas, president of United Church of Christ, was quoted as saying: "An emerging theme in conversation with our partners around the world is that the U.S. is being perceived as a dangerous nation."

He called the Assembly "a unique opportunity to make this statement to all our colleagues" in the ecumenical movement. The statement says, "We come to you seeking to be partners in the search for unity and justice."

Thomas acknowledged that not all church members would agree with the thrust of the statement, but said it was their responsibility as leaders to "speak a prophetic and pastoral word as we believe God is offering it to us".

The WCC is the largest Christian ecumenical organisation, comprised of 340 Christian denominations and churches in 120 countries, and said to represent 550 million Christians throughout the world. The U.S. Conference of the World Council of Churches alone represents 34 Christian churches, including Orthodox, Evangelical, Lutheran and Anglican churches, and four million members throughout the country.

The Roman Catholic Church is not a member of the WCC but has worked closely with the Council in the past. Since its origins in 1948, the WCC gathers in an Assembly every seven years with each member church sending a delegate. (END/2006)
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=32288

Sign the Voter Confidence Petition in Support of H.R. 550

2006-02-25T14:21:00.000-08:00

"Anything of value should be auditable. Votes are valuable, and each voter should have the knowledge-and the confidence-that his or her vote was recorded and counted as intended. Passage of this bill (H.R. 550) will be a big step in restoring that confidence, which is the very foundation of our democratic republic."

- Rush Holt on The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005

Please go to the website and read the entire article! The following is only a small part of it:

The 2000 election was highly contested, but there was physical evidence - punch cards - through which the results could be independently confirmed. In 2004, more than 43.5 million voters (25%) voted on electronic voting systems that cannot be independently audited. While the 2004 election was also highly contested, there were even fewer audit trails to review than in 2000 (only 12.5% of registered voters voted on unauditable electronic voting systems in 2000). Thus, an aura of uncertainty remains about the result. We cannot allow another federal election to take place, and perhaps again be subject to dispute, without the availability of a voter-verified paper record for every vote cast so that the results can be confirmed and accepted with finality. Both the losing and winning candidates - and their supporters - deserve such confirmation. Our future as a democratic republic demands it.

The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act (H.R. 550) will:

Mandate a voter-verified paper ballot for every vote cast in every federal election, nationwide; because the voter verified paper record is the only one verified by the voters themselves, rather than by the machines, it will serve as the vote of record in any case of inconsistency with electronic records;
Protect the accessibility requirements of the Help America Vote Act for voters with disabilities;
Require random, unannounced, hand-count audits of actual election results in every state, and in each county, for every Federal election;
Prohibit the use of undisclosed software and wireless and concealed communications devices and internet connections in voting machines;
Provide Federal funding to pay for implementation of voter-verified paper balloting; and
Require full implementation by 2006

There are many politically contentious issues in election reform, but making sure votes are counted accurately is not one of them. Because of its narrow scope, its realistic goals, and its strong bi-partisan support, with 159 co-sponsors both Democrat and Republican, H.R. 550 is our best hope to restore integrity and voter confidence to our electoral process - the very foundation of a representative democracy.

We urge you to pass H.R. 550 as written immediately.