Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney (for whom we readily admit having a crush since having met her at the National Election Reform Conference in Nashville – see swooning photo of both of us at right) discussed the latest chililng Diebold hack conducted several weeks ago by BlackBoxVoting.org in a BuzzFlash article by Matthew Cardinale published today.
The hack they performed was very important, and raised some serious hackles from the friendly folks of Diebold Inc. They of the promise to “deliver Ohio” for George W. Bush, and coincidentally, the world’s largest Voting Machine Company.
If you’re not familiar with the Diebold hack done by BBV (and you may be, since we’ve be woefully remiss in reporting on it here) or the angry response that Diebold sent to the election supervisor who allowed the experiement, you’ll want to read the whole article…
The problem, the Congresswoman said, is that the machines “haven’t been provided with appropriate software and safeguards. If they had the appropriate software and safeguards, then the machines wouldn’t be a problem. So either [provide] that, or go back to paper ballots,” she advised.
Rep. McKinney, along with Rep. Corrine Brown (D-FL), had been on hand for a hack demonstration in the Leon County Elections Office, in Florida, in May 2005. The demo was one of three meetings that had been organized by Bev Harris and the team at Black Box Voting. Diebold has since issued a vitriolic letter to Mr. Ion Sancho, Leon County Elections Supervisor, for allowing Black Box Voting to conduct the hack demo on site.
…
As Black Box Voting announced in recent weeks, two computer science experts have been able to hack into Leon County’s Diebold central tabulator as well as individual optical scan machines.
…
“Granted the same access as an employee of our office, it was possible to enter the computer, alter election results, and exit the system without leaving any physical record of this action,” said a formal statement posted by Mr. Ion Sancho on the Leon County Election’s Office official website.
The statement is available here.
YeeHaw! I’ll claim my fellow Georgian, Cynthia McKinney!
Go Cynthia, Go! Speak the truth!
Now we’re getting down to serious business. This is great news.
Note how Diebold responds with the very same behavioral tactics as the administration.
Rep. McKinney, along with Rep. Conyers, are leading heroic fights for truth and justice. They should all have our respect and support.
Florida is a bad cookie just waiting to fall to pieces.
Glad you got back to this, Brad.
All right, Brad put my picture up on the Bradblog! Don’t I look great? That’s me, just to the right of the Congresswoman’s head, in the back.
I am extremely proud of having been involved in Bernie Ellis’ group, the Gathering to Save our Democracy, which hosted the Nashville Election Reform Conference.
We’re still fighting the fight here in TN.
Shannon! Great to meet you! All of you make me proud to be on the side of the "Good Guys!"
Keep up the good work!
You should say "I have a crush".
{Another Jimmo post deleted. Apparently he’s unable to post without personally insulting others. All such posts of his containing insults, spam, reposted articles and posts he makes in names other than his own will be deleted. Apparently he is unable to support his point of view on any topic without resorting to one of the above. -WP}
For those of you who are interested in reading the original Diebold e-mails talking about the issues with the various equipment, they’re available.
In short, the e-mails are accessible and were the subject of litigation. You’ll also find links to the caselaw and other claims, plus some general case overview and docket information with press releases. [ More . . . ]
I’m looking forward to this being the last post by #6 here. We should not have to suffer its vile and inhumane comments. It is a psykopath and truly should either be incarcerated or hospitalized.
Go back to LGF and enjoy life with cretins there.
Yes Kira #8 –
Vileness just keeps getting viler and more insanely inappropriate.
After comments like #6 I think it might appropriate to bar Jimo completely. I’m sure he can find other places to spew. My parents taught me if you have nothing positive to add. Keep your mouth shut. If Jimo cann’t keep his mouth shut me thinks you should!
OT Info —
ConyersBlog is back! Congressman John Conyers’ blog is now open to comments and is accepting applications via the ConyersBlog Registration page.
The approval process takes 24-48 hours and acceptance of the user agreement. One that should keep the neocons civil.
Torqued – I registered earlier today and got confirmation within the hour.
Bev Harris has been saying it for months now, but Cynthia McKinney’s comments bring the issue into the public sphere.
Watch Diebold’s responses for content, not tone. If they avoid the central question, "Are these machines hackable?" and attack the messengers instead, it will be an enormous victory. The burden of proof will shift to THEM to prove the election was honest, not to US to prove it wasn’t.
Early signs are they’re attacking the messengers.
Cool, I’m looking forward to the improved ConyersBlog
It is essential that we have fair and honest elections in 2006. If the
Dems lose 5 Senate seats, the power of the filibuster will be lost.
If you live on the eastern seaboard, it is likely that legislation has
not yet been enacted in your state to require paper ballots. Go to
http://www.verifiedvoting.org/ and check the status of your state,
and then get to work!
What’s wrong with a huge citizen lawsuit? Wrongful aggression and expenditure on the basis of intentional misinformation? I know we have probable cause. Every criminal statute on the books has been transgressed. Let’s get ’em NOW, by means of a lawful uprising.
It’s time we stopped assenting to our own rape.
How, Peg C? Lots of lawsuits are already filed against this bunch of criminals.
I dunno — any ideas?
Remember the new law, tort reform that stops frivolous lawsuits and limits class action suits. Would our giant lawsuit be considered as such?
OT, one for the trolls …
Generation Chickenhawk
[snip] … By the time I encountered Cory Bray, a towering senior from the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business, the beer was flowing freely. "The people opposed to the war aren’t putting their asses on the line," Bray boomed from beside the bar. Then why isn’t he putting his ass on the line? "I’m not putting my ass on the line because I had the opportunity to go to the number-one business school in the country," he declared, his voice rising in defensive anger, "and I wasn’t going to pass that up."
And besides, being a College Republican is so much more fun than counterinsurgency warfare. [snip]
This is a pretty cool story Brad. The only part that gets me is when she said,"if they had the appropriate software and safeguards then it wouldn’t be a problem." I have a problem with this "if then" statement. Why would you or American voters ever choose a voting machine company which counted votes electronically in secrecy for Bush and Cheney without a paper ballot trail. Knowing Diebold/Triad’s past track record why would anyone in their right mind allow them to count any more election votes? Why would you ever want to entrust this voting machine company or their machines to be used in an election again? Even if this identifies some of the electronic voting machine problems in the last presidential election, this system of voting must be rooted out like the corrupt bastards in office if we are ever to have so called fair political elections.
Re: Grizzly #19,
I agree. There is still a big gap in the understanding of many people around the nature and kinds of vulnerabilities involved in electronic voting.
BBV is due to come out with a number of reports in the next week. One major Technical Report is due out on July 4 or sooner, and others are to follow soon after. These reports deal with the hackable memory cards on the optical scanners, the hackable counting computer, the audit logs for Palm Beach Co. (FL), what was revealed by analysis of these logs, and recommendations on what is needed for "ground-up" reform of our election system rather than window dressing.
There are new video clips on the BBV website, including one in which ballots and official signed poll tapes were discovered in a trash bag due to be taken to the dump. (BBV made out a FOIA request on the spot in order to access the documents in the trash bag and prevent them from being destroyed.)
It is exciting to see the fruits of patient, careful investigative work coming to light.
re: PegC #16 citizen lawsuit claiming wrongful aggression and
expenditure on the basis of intentional misinformation?
Stanley Hilton (former Chief of Staff for Bib Dole) filed a $7 billion
suit on that basis against BushCo. The suit was dismissed not
for lack of merit but on grounds of "sovereign immunity"–you
can not sue a sitting President. How they could decide this
when the sex harassment suit was allowed to go forward
against Clinton on grounds that "no one, not even the President,
is above the law," I don’t know.
Speaking of lawsuits, there’s an interesting one in Snohomish
County in WA alleging that by using electronic voting machines
the Board of Elections is improperly outsourcing the vote
counting to a private company. If this suit prevails it could
inspire cookie cutter suits all across the country.
In Diebold news, the stock is down 9% on huge volume today.
It’s gone from 57 to 46 in two months.
{Another Jimmo post deleted. Apparently he’s unable to post without personally insulting others. All such posts of his containing insults, spam, reposted articles and posts he makes in names other than his own will be deleted. Apparently he is unable to support his point of view on any topic without resorting to one of the above. -BF}
There will always be people who are so wrapped up in bu$hworld propaganda that they won’t be able to see the truth about the Empiricist plan to conquer and control the world. They have bought into the whole 9/11 charade of neocon FEAR propaganda. They are reacting like the crowds who blindly & rabidly followed (dare I bring the German dictator up? … well you all know who I mean … ) that certain person. They may never know the truth — there is always that faction.
Societal Stockholm Syndrome
# Perceived threat to survival and the belief that one’s captor is willing to act on that threat
# The captive’s perception of small kindnesses from the captor within a context of terror
# Isolation from perspectives other than those of the captor
# Perceived inability to escape.
http://web2.iadfw.net/ktrig246/..._cave/sss.html
Victims’ Observed Strategies for Survival
Victims have to concentrate on survival, requiring avoidance of direct, honest reaction to destructive treatment. Become highly attuned to pleasure and displeasure reactions of victimizers. As a result, victims know much about captors, less about themselves. Victims are encouraged to develop psychological characteristics pleasing to captors: dependency, lack of initiative, inability to act, decide, think, etc. Both actively develop strategies for staying alive, including denial, attentiveness to victimizer’s wants, fondness for victimizer accompanied by fear, fear of interference by authorities, and adoption of victimizer’s perspective. Hostages are overwhelmingly grateful to terrorists for giving them life. They focus on captor’s kindnesses, not his acts of brutality. Battered women assume that the abuser is a good man whose actions stem from problems that she can help him solve. Both feel fear, as well as love, compassion and empathy toward a captor who has shown them any kindness. Any acts of kindness by the captors will help ease the emotional distress they have created and will set the stage for emotional dependency of Counterproductive Victim Responses
Denial of terror and anger, and the perception of their victimizers as omnipotent people help to keep victims psychologically attached to victimizers. High anxiety functions to keep victims from seeing available options. Psychophysical stress responses develop.
http://www.yahoodi.com/peace/stockholm.html
Where’s the coverage on the Commission/Hearings? (The alternative meeting on the 29th and the "real"–or is that "surreal"–Baker-Carter commission on the 30th?)
I hope someone is covering both of these events.
There are a few fascinating nuggets of info here: http://www.bbvforums.org/cgi-bi...=7439#POST7439 including some really stupid comments from Pastor (of "six or seven" fame).
And slightly higher up in that same thread (link in #26) is this comment by Bev Harris:
". . . during testimony at the Election Assessment Hearing today, there were audible gasps when the information was released that the logs showed Palm Beach County counting some of their ballots on Oct. 19."
I think the fun is just beginning.
Catherine #26 & 27,
Will the information in the forums at bbv be written up anywhere else that you know of? This really is getting exciting!!
Catherine, nevermind! I just re-read your #26. Agree – I hope someone was covering the 2 meetings!
"If you live on the eastern seaboard, it is likely that legislation has
not yet been enacted in your state to require paper ballots. Go to
http://www.verifiedvoting.org/ and check the status of your state,
and then get to work! "
Nice… so basically, they make it so faulty electronic voting is used for the elections they want to win, then get laws passed to revert back to paper ballots in time to make sure nobody else uses the same fraudulent methods to take power away from them. Nice.