What with all the talk of the disaster that is Diebold, Inc., other Voting Machine Companies such as ES&S and Sequoia have gotten a far too easy ride over the past several months. The easiest ride of all, however --- of the big four democracy-hating American Voting Machine Companies --- has gone to Hart InterCivic, which deserves no such benefit of the doubt.

So to be clear: Hart InterCivic voting systems suck just as much as the others.

Washington Post today has details on how their machines are sucking in the hotly contested U.S. Senate race in Virginia between George Allen and "James H. 'Jim'"

The "good news" reported in the article: "Hart InterCivic officials yesterday said they hoped to correct the problem by next fall."

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.Org

In this segment of 'Democracy At Risk' Lou and Kitty cover the latest cautionary report on voting and elections, in this report from Electionline.Org, a national non-partisan, non-profit group. Lou also reports on yesterday's breaking story from The BRAD BLOG regarding the elections security breach discovered in the Chicago, Illinois voter registration data base.

The text-transcript of Tuesday's segment on Lou Dobbs Tonight follows in full...

The endorsement from Esquire magazine is short and sweet, and is now added to the list --- along with the Daytona Beach News-Journal's endorsement of publications supporting Clint Curtis over the corrupt Rep. Tom Feeney (R-Abramoff) in Florida's 24th U.S. House Congressional District:

So much for Feeney's discredited attempts to sell the idea that Curtis is "not fit for Congress." Looks like the nation's newspapers and magazines seem to think it's Feeney who's not fit for the post.

And the voters, in yesterday's Zogby poll showing Curtis and Feeney in a "virtual toss-up," would seem to agree. Notable numbers, if only because Curtis has had almost zero money to use in his campaign while Feeney has had more than $1 million.

(Donate to Curtis here if you'd like to help --- unlike Feeney, Curtis is currently getting no money from either the national party or huge corporate PACs.)

In the meantime, the Curtis campaign has just released two new one-minute radio spots. They're both linked below. In the first one, he challenges Feeney to a public polygraph test for the both of them. (Clint has already passed one himself in re: his allegations about Feeney.)

-- Curtis for Congress, Audio Ad: "Take the Test, Tom!"

-- Curtis for Congress, Audio Ad: "Vote for Clint Curtis!"

Let us know what you think, and remember that donations made above will help to get these things on the air all over the 24th district in Florida to counter Feeney's disgraceful smear campaign against Curtis.

One last thought, posted below the fold is a comment sent to the Clint Curtis Blog from someone who claims to be a professional pollster who says about that Zogby poll showing the dead heat that the "That poll is even better news than advertised. That's not a dead heat --- you may well be winning!"

He goes on to add, "I'm a professional pollster and let me give you a polling insider's tip about how to interpret a poll like this one." Those "insider tips" are beneath the fold...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.Org

In this segment Lou interviewed two ex-Commissioners of the Election Assistance Commission. Ex-Chairman Deforest Soaries and Ex-Assistant Chairman Ray Martinez. As revealed in an earlier interview reported by BradBlog, Chairman Soaries is speaking out and speaking out loudly.

Of note in tonight's interview is this exchange:

The text-transcript of Monday's segment on Lou Dobbs Tonight follows in full...

Blogged from the road by Brad Friedman

Another stunning security breach has been exposed in our nation's electoral system, The BRAD BLOG has learned, as the online voter registration database --- containing the personal information of some 1.5 million voters in Chicago --- has been found to be vulnerable to both downloading and hacking.

The flawed electronic database which allowed the retrieval and modification of personal voter information --- including social security numbers and birthdates of Chicago voters --- was discovered recently by members of the Illinois Ballot Integrity Project (IBIP), a non-partisan group of Election Integrity advocates.

IBIP members say they were not only able to get full editing access to the online database, they also found they could modify the records for registered voters, setting them to inactive and otherwise changing addresses and other key information fields.

The ability to gain access and hack the system, said by IBIP to be covered on the front page of tomorrow's Chicago Sun-Times, was documented by the group on video-tape. (UPDATE 10/24/06: As promised, the Sun-Times story is now here...)

An exclusive version of that video-taped hack has been made available to The BRAD BLOG.

-- Streaming Flash version...

Cook County elections officials are said to be scrambling to plug the hole in what has become an ever-increasingly unsecured system of voting in America in light of new regulations, encouraging the use of electronic voting systems, and state-wide registration databases, as set forth by Congress's Help America Vote Act (HAVA) after the 2000 Election Debacle.

In a news release sent to The BRAD BLOG earlier today (complete release posted at the end of this article), Bob Wilson, the Cook County chair of IBIP, says that the vulnerability would allow a malicous hacker to change voter registration status for thousands of Chicago voters.

"For example, you could change the status of all the voters in a precinct to inactive after the registration deadline so that when one of those voters checked their online status they might believe they were ineligible and wouldn't attempt to vote," Wilson says.

"Or, you could change their polling place information," he added, "so they would show up at the wrong precinct on election day . . . the possibilities are nearly endless and could cause election day havoc."

The problem was discovered by IBIP weeks ago, and the group immediately notified the appropriate authorities. "We had hoped that the Chicago Board of Election Commissioners would take quick action to plug this hole, but apparently that's not the case," IBIP member Peter Zelchenko is quoted as saying.

He estimates it would have taken little more than five minutes to fix the problem originally, but late last week IBIP and Zelchenko became aware that the security breach was significantly more severe than first thought. The Board was immediately notified again and finally began taking action over the weekend to install a new web interface for the system.

Zelchenko, an information technology expert who originally discovered the flaw, says the latest alarming discovery underscores the vulnerability of our new electronic system of voting in America. As reported by the news release:

Since the vulnerability reportedly affects only the online version of the voter registration database, as opposed to the master copy, it is hoped that the damage may be controlled and that any tampering might now be minimized. Such tampering --- either the collection of personal information for political, or more nefarious purposes, or legally registered voters having their online records deleted or otherwise set as inactive --- may have already occurred before the problem was discovered.

Whether the problem has been corrected by now or not, the remarkable security breach may have already given some voters incorrect or misleading information concerning the status of their registration or the correct location of their polling place when checking the online system for information.

We'll try to update this story when new information is available from the Sun-Times as we continue to be on the road and are unable to keep up and/or follow-up as much as usual.

The complete news release from the Illinois Ballot Integrity Project follows in full...

UPDATE, Posted by John Gideon 4:45pm PT: ABC News has now picked-up this story...

UPDATE by Brad, 8:09pm PT: Though we gave this story to ABC, having spoken to them earlier today, they didn't see fit to credit us. And yet, we always give them proper attribution for their stories. Sigh...Still always the bridesmaid I guess.

UPDATE 9:34pm PT: Chicago Tribune reports (and attempts to slightly downplay, as expected from the conservative Trib) "Voter information open to hackers". Associated Press reports "Group says data vulnerable, election officials investigating".

Blogged from the road by Brad Friedman

Once thought to have been a "safe" Republican U.S. House seat in Florida's 24th Congressional district the race to defeat the once-powerful incumbent Rep. Tom Feeney now appears to be up for grabs, according to a new Zogby International poll.

Computer programmer turned vote-rigging whistleblower turned Democratic Congressional candidate Clint Curtis is now in a virtual dead heat with Feeney, despite the sitting Congressman's enormous campaign treasury funded by top-tier GOP funders and corporate PAC money.

Curtis' campaign has, to date, been funded only by individuals across the nation via the Internet. Neither the DNC nor the Democratic Campaign Congressional Committee (DCCC) has contributed funding to Curtis's race, which now appears set to possibly unseat the once powerful Republican House Deputy Whip.

The inequity in funding may all now (hopefully) change as Feeney is seen as leading Curtis by only 2 points in the new poll commissioned by Election Integrity organization VelvetRevolution.us.

The Zogby poll showing the dead heat also reveals that Curtis is leading among likely voters who describe themselves as independent by a full 11 points!

According to the report from Zogby International of 402 likely voters in Florida's 24th district when asked "If the election for Congress were held today and the candidates were Democrat Clint Curtis and Republican Tom Feeney, for whom would you vote?" respondents replied as follows:

The two point difference between Curtis and Feeney is well within the poll's +/- 5% margin of error. As we're currently on the road, and scrambling with a number of breaking stories even while barrelling down the highway towards home, we hope to have more details on the poll after we get the opportunity to review the internals, which look very good indeed for the challenger Curtis.

(DISCLOSURE: The BRAD BLOG is a co-founder of VelvetRevolution.us)

Feeney (R-Abramoff), the one-time gubernatorial running mate of Jeb Bush and close friend of the Bush family, carved out what was believed to have been an extremely "conservative" 24th Congressional district for himself while Speaker of the Florida House. Ascending to the U.S. House in 2002, Feeney was not even challenged for the seat in 2004, as he was thought to be unbeatable. Many Florida papers have continued to knee-jerk report on the race in those terms despite the lack of any known polling for the contest between Feeney and Curtis until now.

Curtis is the computer programmer and political novice who has alleged (as we originally broke back in December of 2004), that he was asked by Feeney to create electronic vote-rigging software back in 2000 when both men worked together for the Oviedo, Florida, software firm, Yang Enterprises, Inc. (YEI). At the time, Feeney was YEI's general counsel and registered lobbyist even while he was Speaker of the Florida House and even while they had multi-million dollar contracts with the state. Feeney has since been named one of the "Most Corrupt Members of Congress" two years in a row by the D.C. ethics watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW).

He remains the only sitting U.S. Congressman who went with Jack Abramoff on one of the lobbyist-paid golf trips to St. Andrews, Scotland, who has yet to be indicted.

Feeney has mounted a costly smear campaign attempting to label Curtis as "crazy" and unfit for office in light of the charges. Yet Feeney's campaign, which has included a number of documented lies, unevidenced claims and attacks, and even a controversial mailing which offended voters when it included doctored photos of Curtis and a Hustler magazine cover --- seems to have backfired.

The Daytona Beach News-Journal, which reported on a number of Feeney's ethical lapses over the years, recently endorsed Curtis over Feeney, criticizing the sitting Congressman for "not really talking issues in this campaign" and "choosing to focus largely on denigrating his opponent." Curtis, meanwhile, the paper says, "is an independent thinker" who has "prepared well" for office.

Curtis, once a Republican until his dealings with Feeney soured him on the party, made his allegations concerning Feeney and YEI long ago via sworn affidavit, video-taped testimony to a Congressional panel, and a polygraph test, which he has called on Feeney to take. Feeney has denied Curtis's allegations, many of which have since been documented via state and federal reports as accurate, but has refused to either take a similar polygraph test, or even meet face to face with Curtis.

His story has also been highlighted in a number of documentaries. We recently posted documentary video footage from the film Eternal Vigilance, which tells the basics of Curtis's story through interviews with the whistleblower.

Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer

Diebold's "system is utterly unsecured," said cyber-security expert Stephen Spoonamore in the online print version of ABC World News' report on Sunday Night.

Spoonamore continued, "The entire cyber-security community is begging them to come back to reality and secure our nation's voting."

With the election only 16 days away, ABC World News worries "about another Florida style ballot fiasco" in tonight's e-voting segment. One major concern, it seems, is that e-voting machine maker Diebold's source code is turning up in random mail boxes, as The BRAD BLOG reported last Thursday. Yet, despite this latest revelation coming on the heels of a Princeton study evidencing the ease in which Diebold machines could be hacked, Diebold maintains everything is peachy.

-- ABC's Video report here...
-- ABC's printed report (with additional details) here...

UPDATE FROM BRAD 9:22pm PT:

We're delighted to see that ABC News has finally decided that there is a story here worth reporting. Wish they had come on board long ago. In any case, the print version of their story, written by Jake Tapper, Rebecca Abrahams and Eduardo Sunol, has several notable details above and beyond the video report. In addition to the comments from Spoonamore above, there's this...

Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer

(Hat tip to BRAD BLOG emailer Mike from The Campaign to Give Jack Cafferty a Show)

(Blogged on the road by Brad from the Bioneers Conf. in Marin, CA)

It was one thing when Daytona Beach News Journal endorsed computer programmer turned vote-rigging whistleblower turned congressional candidate Clint Curtis over his Democratic primary opponent (whom Curtis thumped in that race).

It's quite another thing --- a coup, in fact --- that now the News Journal has endorsed Curtis over the powerful sitting U.S. Congressman and former Florida Speaker of the House, the corrupt Tom Feeney (R-Abramoff), in their race for the U.S. House seat in Florida's 24th district.

Feeney, of course, is Jeb Bush's former gubernatorial running mate, the man who promised to deliver Florida's electoral vote to George W. during the 2000 fiasco no matter what the Supremes had to say, the only so-far unindicted Congressman to have gone with Jack Abramoff on a paid golf trip to St. Andrews, Scotland, and the man whom Curtis accused --- via affidavit, video-taped Congressional testimony, and lie-detector test --- of commissioning a vote-rigging software prototype in 2000.

Shamefully, Feeney has done little more than mount a disgraceful smear campaign against Curtis, attempting to paint him as "crazy" and not fit for office. The campaign seems only to have highlighted Feeney's own lack of seriousness as a legislator; one fit more for prison than the U.S. House of Representatives.

The News Journal's complete endorsement of Clint Curtis seems to bear that out, to Feeney's eternal disgrace. Here's a few snippets...

...

Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer

Lou Dobbs and Kitty Pilgrim report on the frenzy to hire computer science graduate students by state officials fearing an e-voting machine disaster on election day. Dobbs also has a brief report on the Supreme Court decision upholding (for now) the new Arizona law requiring photo IDs of voters.

- QuickTime Player version...

The text-transcript of Friday's segment on Lou Dobbs Tonight follows in full...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon (with additional snark provided by Brad Friedman)

The Washington Post is reporting in Friday editions that the FBI is investigating the "possible theft" of Diebold electronic touch-screen voting system source code in Maryland.

While the Maryland State Board of Elections admits that the disks contained "the software...used in Maryland in the 2004 elections," Diebold denies everything. Of course. They gave their catch-all apologia --- the software is for "versions...that are no longer in use in Maryland" --- although they were forced to acknowledge "the version of one program apparently stored on the disks is still in use in 'a limited number of jurisdictions.'"

The disks feature logos from Ciber Inc. and Wyle Labratories, Inc., two labs that test voting machines and software (sort of) for Diebold. Both firms deny the disks are theirs.

According to the article...

WaPo goes on to report...

So will Diebold just continue to deny that anything has happened or can happen? Will MD State Election Director Linda Lamone just pass on Diebold disinformation as she always does (despite knowing better...since she's seen the unredacted scientific reports on these systems from security organizations like SAIC and RABA?) Or will someone finally understand that this is a massive problem that needs immediate attention?

Maryland, along with Georgia, was one of Diebold's original "showcase states," implementing Diebold's hackable paperless touch-screen voting across virtually the entire state since 2002. With failure after failure, we might add.

If it's all not bad enough, in what is reported by WaPo as "an unrelated development" in the same article, a new report from Maryland state auditors revealed that the state's new voter registration database does not have proper security controls in place for access to the data...

On the same day as NYTimes front paged a story on the coming electoral meltdown. Chicago Trib follows suit in a front pager today that focuses on massive problems in Chicago and Cook County.

Like the Times, who modified their original headline yesterday shortly after publishing to refer to "Voting Woes" instead of "Voting Chaos" as it was originally described, the Trib turns backflips to downplay the concerns, blame as much as possible the poll workers and "human error," along with "glitches" and "hiccups," instead of placing blame where it squarely deserves to be placed: on the Voting Machine Companies and the Elections Officials who approved this garbage for use in our elections.

The headline is "Voting Glitches Feared on Nov. 7," but as a close reading of the article reveals, these are not "voting glitches." They are not even "glitches." They are FAILURES of the voting machine companies and elections officials. Period. End of story. Got that?

The story rightly refers to "a virtual meltdown" in last spring's primary in Chicago and Cook County, and goes on to add that vote totals can be completely fried...

So vote totals can be entirely "fried" and yet we're actually using this system on November 7th?! Moreover, note the language above that says it's "possible for workers" to fry the vote totals. Instead of the more appropriate, "it's possible that the poorly designed systems could have their entire vote totals fried."

As I've gotta hit the road to head up North for speaking engagements and meetings over the next several days, and as things are now melting down all around us, as predicted --- with some 20 days left until Nov. 7th --- my patience is just about worn thin with the apologists, liars, and those journalists, "advocates," and public officials who have no excuse to claim ignorance anymore.

So I hope you'll pardon the more graphic language I feel compelled to use below...

We spoke about the Democratic, and actually qualified candidate for California Sec. of State Debra Bowen yesterday.

So, equal time. Let's talk about the completely unqualified, partisan mouthpiece, the current Schwarzenneger-appointed California Secretary of State and accomplished liar, Bruce McPherson.

Oh, and as the end of yesterday's debate revealed, he's also a loathsome human being.

The two debated before the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board. It was broadcast live --- now available to watch on the web --- and very informative. Here are some thoughts of ours on several of McP's obfuscations lies comments during the debate.

NOTE: Quotes of his below aren't always exact, but damned near. With one of McP's quotes, however, we had to go back and check three times, just to make sure we heard him right. We did. And we're appalled.

He actually said, "Under Secretary of State Bowen, if that ever happens, I will tell you, the blind and disabled will not be eligible to vote privately and independently."

Bowen replied gracefully by saying his comment was "shameful" and "not [McPherson's] finest moment."

Our personal replies to that appalling comment, and McP's host of other lies, follow below, and are far less charitable. As you may know, the election for California SoS may prove to be the most important race for the future of the nation's electoral system. Our snarky, point-by-point rebuttal to the truth-challenged McP --- who is working for the voting machine companies, not the voters of California --- follows in full...

Nice of New York Times to start paying attention...now that it's too late to do much of a damn thing about it.

FLASHING now at DRUDGE REPORT...

UPDATE 7:35pm PT: Complete NYTimes story now up. "New Laws and Machines May Spell Voting Chaos". It's well worth a read!

FURTHER UPDATE BY JOHN GIDEON 9:00pm PT: The story reveals that many of the voting machines now being used in Yolo Co, California for voters with disabilities only work in Vietnamese. These machines are only being used in the county because SoS McPherson and his staff unfairly denied certification to Vote-PAD which was supposed to be used in that county.

FURTHER UPDATE BY BRAD 9:20pm PT: Looks like the NY Times, who hasn't done much of any reporting on this topic up until now has had second thoughts already. The original headline discussed "...Voting Chaos" but has now been softened to "...Voting Woes". I've got my money on "chaos", not "woes" this November. It's a shame they've backed off. They were so close to telling the truth. Sigh...

FURTHER UPDATE BY JOHN 8:10am PT: While my 'UPDATE' from last night says many machines only worked in Vietnamese the article actually says 'some machines' and I have now found that, in fact, 3 machines were affected. My apologies for the incorrect wording.

Good news for voters and democracy in Missouri!

Bad news for Mark F. "Thor" Hearne II, the democracy-hating, snake-oil selling, high-level GOP/Team Bush operative and the insidiously evil man behind the entire phony disenfranchising Photo ID legislation movement across the entire country through his phony "non-partisan" front group, "American Center for Voting Rights" (ACVR), whom we exposed long ago.

The most satisfying part of this, perhaps, is that "Thor" is from our hometown of St. Louis, Missouri, where's he's been pushing his powerful, behind-the-scenes buttons fighting in favor of this crap for years.

On calls and deadlines right now, so can't give much more info for the moment. Will try to update as needed later...Just out from AP...