Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

As expected there are a number of articles concerning the Diebold Security Vulnerability. Bucks County Pennsylvania will be the only county in the state to use their lever machines in next week's primary elections. One commissioner said, "In the long run, we decided to have a good election. I'd rather have a good election, and we'll fight over the $950,000 after he we have a good election. I think that is the right thing to do.'' And there are still reports coming in regarding failures in Indiana, West Virginia, and Arkansas....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon

As was expected the corporate media picked-up the latest in Diebold's sordid story --- which we reported first here last Friday --- with articles by Ian Hoffman yesterday and today and even the Associated Press stepped in as well.

Unfortunately the headline of Hoffman's article yesterday characterized the security hole as being a 'glitch'; which this certainly is not. It is also not a 'flaw' as it was characterized by today's Hoffman and AP articles. (Ed note: Hoffman has been very good at reporting on all of these related stories, so we don't wish to be overly critical of him, but rather point out the inaccurate characterization.)

This is a 'feature' that was knowingly installed by Diebold. It was not a mistake or something that was overlooked in the design of the software. It is not a 'bug', 'glitch', 'flaw', 'error in programming' or any other simplistic name. Michael Shamos, a Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor and veteran voting-systems examiner for the state of Pennsylvania has said this:

Johns Hopkins University computer science professor Avi Rubin, who published the first security analysis of Diebold voting software in 2003 had this to say:

In the meantime the state of Georgia has decided that there is nothing that they have to do because their administrative rules already mitigate the problem. Of course, they made that statement without knowing what the full problem is.

A redacted copy of the Hursti "Critical Security Alert: Diebold TSx and TS6 voting systems" can be found at BlackBoxVoting.Org. Bev Harris guarantees that the redaction only resulted in 50 words being removed from this copy of the report.

Finally, I would be remiss in not pointing to this final line of Dan Goodin's article for AP:

Uh, Dan, you could have had a more timely article, and probably scooped Ian Hoffman if you had read The BRAD BLOG on Friday, where you would have found the whole story posted exclusively that day.

It's about time that the corporate media begin looking to the blogs as a source instead of ignoring us like we aren't here. Or at least admitting that they're looking to the blogs as a source, instead of only attributing those in the MSM.

Will Dan Goodin or the AP post a clarification to their story? We're not holding our breath.

Guest Blogged by John Gideon

Just hours ago Betty Ireland, the Secretary of State of West Virginia filed a formal complaint against ES&S with the federal Elections Assistance Commission. A story in the State Journal quotes Secretary Ireland:

There have been failures all over the state. A small sampling of problems gives us:

The national media? Mums the word for them, it seems.

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Today a report from West Virginia with the headline "Voters trust touch screens" begins with a paragraph or two about comments from voters in Morgantown; all complimentary, according to the author, of the iVotronic machines those voters used. The article then proceeds to three paragraphs describing how a 'glitch' kept any vote count being taken off of the PEBs in Taylor County. Also from West Virginia is the news that SoS Betty Ireland has filed a formal complaint against ES&S with the EAC. Essex County New York announced that they would be using lever machines for all elections this year. The Diebold security vulnerability was written about by Ian Hoffman and a lawsuit in Arizona against Diebold and Sequoia was announced. ...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

One day of early voting and Craighead County Arkansas has run out of ES&S provided paper ballots. They are now printing their own with hints that the Attorney General will now get involved. Tomorrow, a lawsuit is being filed in Arizona against the purchase or use of Diebold and/or Sequoia DREs (more on that tomorrow). West Virginians go to the polls today but 6 counties will only have paper ballots because of the failure of ES&S. Fifty Texas counties are still without software from ES&S to support local elections on Saturday. Test ballots provided by West Virginia state elections division to Jefferson Co. could not be read accurately by the counties optical scan machines. The county blamed the test deck....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

It's not often that we see the corporate main stream media actually doing a lot of research for an article. Today we have an exception in an article in the Rocky Mountain News from Denver all about Sequoia's recent failures and even their brush with a bribery scandal in 2001. Texas counties have been in the early voting process for the past week with some ES&S counties only able to use paper ballots due to non-arrival of ballot programming. Arkansas began early voting today with many counties using paper ballots because of the greed of their vendor, ES&S. In fact, even the paper ballots printed by ES&S were "Like they threw a muffin in the air and let the pieces fall wherever."...

By John Gideon, Executive Director, VotersUnite.Org and Information Manager, VoteTrustUSA.Org --- May 8, 2006

This has been another week of "Train Wrecks" across the country. Three states had major primaries with mixed success and failure, a few states had local elections with failures, and some states are preparing for May primaries and they are meeting the "oncoming locomotive" as they can't get machines or software for the machines and are having to revert to paper ballots or lever machines.

Elections Systems and Software (ES&S) is now facing investigations, lawsuits, or just plain pissed-off elections officials in West Virginia, Arkansas, Missouri, Indiana, Texas, Pennsylvania, California, and other jurisdictions. And now we learn that Diebold has a huge security vulnerability that all voting systems experts who know the details are very concerned about.

Next Tuesday, May 9, finds the train barreling down on primary elections in West Virginia and Nebraska. May 16 brings potentially hazardous primary election whistle-stops in Kentucky, Oregon and, the grand central station that is Pennsylvania.

Let's take a look at some of the continuing derailments from the past week, about which prompted Brad Friedman of The BRAD BLOG to ask of D.C. politicians and, more notably, the National Mainstream Media: "Is anybody there? Does anybody care?"

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Five Missouri counties (all ES&S customers) have announced they will return to paper ballots or drag out their lever machines because ES&S cannot have them ready for the primary. They have now joined a majority of Arkansas counties who are also going to be in violation of federal law because they agreed to contract with ES&S. Cuyahoga County Ohio is still counting ballots as of this morning. ...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

The big news for today was the big news yesterday also. Diebold TS and TSx have an existing security problem and all states and/or counties who use these machines must fix this problem. Computer scientists and others who have information on this issue strongly suggest that all states involved should contact Diebold or the Pennsylvania Secretary of State's office for more information. Don't let Diebold tell you there is no problem. It is there and it is something that needs to be dealt with. Pulaski County Arkansas got their new machines on Thursday morning finally. They got their software on Thursday afternoon. The software does not work on the machines. It's back to square one and paper ballots. "I am absolutely appalled by ES&S' delays and the hardships ES&S has placed upon this state and our county officials" said West Virginia Secretary of State Betty Ireland. Also in West Virginia two more counties have announced they will not use ES&S voting machines in next week's primary. They will use paper ballots. ...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Two reports from Belmont County Ohio and both in the same news paper report how an Election Commission member said the machines were a complete success while the other article talks about how elections workers were saying they would never work in another election again. Diebold has announced in Pennsylvania only that they have ''potential security vulnerability''. It is probably not only an issue in PA but no one else has been notified yet. North Carolina seems to have been able to hold a relatively problem free election based on their first state-wide use of optical scan voting and even though their vendor is ES&S....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

"The last-minute nature of the entire process presented by ES&S has eroded voter confidence, unnecessarily, and will make our election procedure suspect," Kanawha County (WV) Commission President Kent Carper wrote. Among the news of problems in Indiana, Ohio, North Carolina, and Tennessee is the news from Pima County, Arizona where they have decided to cancel a $2M order with Diebold because of questions about the reliability of their machines. In Clark County Indiana we get this quote from Ken Fields of ES&S, ""For some reason, it's not functioning," Fields said."We're confident the votes are being tabulated correctly, but the reporting function" didn't operate as the company wanted." Ireland has apparently finally decided that e-voting is "dead in the water". Two headlines in the same paper on two articles released at the same time: "Snafus plague new digital ballot system" and "Glitches mar Ohio's first punch-card free election". As of 5PM Pac. votes were still being tallied in Cuyahoga Co., OH....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Today's primary election in Vanderburgh Co., Indiana is expected to attract about 10,000 voters to the polls to choose major party nominees for November's general election. With the primary expected to cost the county more than $130,000, that is about $13 per voter. ES&S has missed another deadline, this time in Arkansas, which means that absentee ballots will not be sent out to qualified Arkansans on time and as per the state law. A local paper in Lancaster Co., Pennsylvania is touting the accessibility of the county's Hart eSlates because they were tested and found to be accessible by 20 deaf or hearing impaired voters. Jefferson Co., Arkansas announced that they would leave their new iVotronic machines in storage and bring out their old lever machines for the May primary and June runoffs. Good news from DC today is that both houses of congress and both sides of the aisle agreed on a deal to renew the Voting Rights Act....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

"To say the least, I am absolutely appalled by ES&S' delays, and the hardships ES&S has placed on this state," said West Virginia SoS Ireland Friday afternoon. "It is inexcusable." A glitch in some of the systems in some of the counties allows users of the company's iVotronic machines to cast ballots and have their votes recorded correctly, but does not count the votes properly. Tomorrow begins a string of 28 primaries or primary run-offs in 23 states over the next two months. Why is it that the Financial Times, a UK media outlet, is reporting on what our national media is ignoring; the threat of mass confusion in our elections?...

By John Gideon Executive Director VotersUnite.Org and Information Manager VoteTrustUSA.Org

When asked by a reporter, "Which is harder to manage, your two children or ES&S?" Marion County, Indiana Clerk Doris Ann Sadler told the Indianapolis Star this week, "Oh, ES&S, definitely. My children are really very easy. In fact, at times I think my children would have done a better job with the voting machines. And they're (ages) 7 and 4."

The Electronic Voting Machine Vendor locomotive is still running away down the track at an alarming speed. However, this week some states and county election officials seem to be beginning to notice and are now sending out signals that they intend to either stop the train or � barring that --- at least ensure that companies such as Election Systems and Software (ES&S) do not profit too much from their arrogance, ineptitude and now epidemic failures.

Legal complaints against the company were filed this week in West Virginia and Indiana to add to the one previously under way in Oregon. Threats have been heard from Texas, Arkansas, Ohio and elsewhere. Election officials have been forced to change voting procedures in many states and counties to accommodate for ES&S' growing array of failures.

Meanwhile no one seems to be talking about the people who will be most affected by this train wreck; the voters�

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Indiana has announced that they are filing a legal complaint against ES&S for problems that have caused havoc and caused counties to be in breach of state and federal laws. West Virginia counties are faced with problems with their ballot programming software which will delay the results in the primary later in May. Two counties in North Carolina will be using hand-counted paper ballots on Tuesday but are they really doing this with an ulterior motive? ...