ED NOTE: BRING YOUR VIDEO AND STILL CAMS WITH YOU TO VOTE, ESPECIALLY ON TOUCH-SCREEN, TO DOCUMENT THIS STUFF!
The Miami Herald is reporting that votes on touch-screen voting systems in in South Florida are flipping from Democrat to Republican candidates.
Not a single report of a vote flipping from a Republican to a Democrat so far. As usual.
…
Debra A. Reed voted with her boss on Wednesday at African-American Research Library and Cultural Center near Fort Lauderdale. Her vote went smoothly, but boss Gary Rudolf called her over to look at what was happening on his machine. He touched the screen for gubernatorial candidate Jim Davis, a Democrat, but the review screen repeatedly registered the Republican, Charlie Crist.
…
Joan Marek, 60, a Democrat from Hollywood, was also stunned to see Charlie Crist on her ballot review page after voting on Thursday. “Am I on the voting screen again?” she wondered. “Well, this is too weird.”
Marek corrected her ballot and alerted poll workers at the Hollywood satellite courthouse, who she said told her they’d had previous problems with the same machine.
Poll workers did some work on her machine when she finished voting, Marek said. But no report was made to the Supervisor of Elections office and the machine was not removed, [Broward Supervisor of Elections spokeswoman Mary] Cooney said.
…
Mauricio Raponi wanted to vote for Democrats across the board at the Lemon City Library in Miami on Thursday. But each time he hit the button next to the candidate, the Republican choice showed up.
The Herald didn’t mention it — but we will — the type of touch-screen voting machine reportedly failing in Broward was the ES&S iVotronic.
That’s the same model of voting machine that was also reportedly flipping votes in St. Louis County from Democratic candidate Claire McCaskill to Republican Jim Talent in Missouri’s extremely close U.S. Senate race as we reported late last week along with several similar incidents reported in both Texas and Arkansas as well.
Note in the Herald report linked above, the Broward Supervisor of Elections spokeswoman also admits that “it’s not uncommon for screens on heavily used machines to slip out of sync, making votes register incorrectly. Poll workers are trained to recalibrate them on the spot — essentially, to realign the video screen with the electronics inside. The 15-step process is outlined in the poll-workers manual.”
A “15-step process” for recalibrating by poll workers with a few hours training? Brilliant.
And this…
Cooney said no machines have been removed during early voting, and she is not aware of any serious problems.
Relax, people. It’s only democracy. Do you actually want it to be accurate too?! George Will’s column on Sunday, — which either supports electronic voting or doesn’t, it’s hard to tell — seems to think you’re probably asking way too much.
UPDATE 2:40pm PT: And more reports coming in now from Florida of votes hopping from Democratic candidates to Republicans. This one via Tampa Bay Tribune…
Upon leaving, I told the woman to whom I handed my voting card about the problem. She said, “Sometimes these things just don’t work.”
They said:
“it’s not uncommon for screens on heavily used machines to slip out of sync, making votes register incorrectly. Poll workers are trained to recalibrate them on the spot “” essentially, to realign the video screen with the electronics inside.”
What? I design software for a living and I have never heard of a properly designed piece of software where such a thing is “not uncommon”. Happens once in a blue moon? maybe. During bug-testing, sure. During a version 1.0 release when sufficient real world testing hasn’t been possible? possibly, although finding it would be cause to shut down all machines with the same software until the bug could be identified.
Can you imagine if your ATM machine worked this way? Oh, sorry, sir the screen was out of synch and we debited your account $500 instead of the $40 you actually took out. This kind of thing would boggle the mind if the evidence of incompetence/malfeasance in the past six years wasn’t so great already
If mis-calibration was purely a technical problem, then it would, over time, favor Democrats equally to Republicans.
But somehow, 99% of the errors favor the Republicans.
That’s not a technical error — that’s a planned theft.
Election fraud is NOT, and never has been, a non-partisan problem. It is a criminal activity sponsored, conducted, and supported almost entirely by the Republican Party and their supporters and operatives.
If this keeps up, there will be a civil war in the USA, with blues killing reds in the streets before it is over. Namby-pamby BS groups that claim that fixing the electoral process is a non-partisan effort need only look at where their money comes from. The Republicans want to spend every penny and focus only on measures that prevent people from voting like I.D. cards and poll checks. Everybody else wants to look at the WHOLE picture (including the fairly rare issue of voter fraud) and fix the WHOLE election mess.
In favor of Election Day being a national holiday? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
In favor of non-partisan Secretary of State positions? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
In favor of same-day registration with proper I.D.? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
In favor of paper ballots, counted by hand? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
In favor of public ownership of the voting process? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
In favor of MASSIVE voter registration efforts so that as many people (who are eligible) take part in our Democratic Republic? Democrats. Republicans oppose this.
See a pattern?
Republicans (and by association, anybody who supports them in any way) are CRIMINALS and TRAITORS. Enough of this “play nice” crap. \
November 8, maybe all the “save our powder” Democrats will figure it out. Probably not.
Um, two points.
One, touch screens should not require calibration past the point of initial set up. If they were in such a condition where they did require calibration, i.e. the on-screen pointer not going where the voter is touching, it would be difficult to even make choices on all the ballot lines. Are we supposed to believe that this ‘miscalibration’ only affects Senatorial candidate screens?
Two, if the “15-step process” to recalibrate the screen is PUBLIC INFORMATION and is TAUGHT to poll workers, is it not possible that a) these ‘miscalibrations’ on the machines in question are deliberate b) anyone with the will or incompetence can recalibrate a machine at the start of an election, fix it towards the middle or end and no one will be the wiser?
Remember, 3 votes flipped in each precinct in Ohio and we’d have a different president right now.
Want to see the Republican Party call for paper back-up balloting? Tell them George Soros just bought Deibold and ES&S. It would be law in 24 hours
Can we be confident that some of these flips aren’t counting as actual votes? I know they show up on the review screen and people have the option to try again…but seriously, how do we know that these instances aren’t actually counting as votes regardless of whether the voter choses to change or try again?
I just last night put up a cafepress.com site with some buttons you can wear as videographers if you take your camera to precincts to record “issues” like this that happen there. These buttons will ask others to ask you to record them voting rather than you having to bug them all of the time. Go to this page. I’m not marking these up at all. Just want to help in any way possible ensure we can get adequate monitoring at the polls come next week.
Again, “glitches and hiccups” 100% favoring one party…THE REPUBLICANS!!! ALWAYS!!!
Where is there a headline, “Touchscreens flipping from Republican pick to Democrat”? Doesn’t exist!
My God! We all know this is happening! And nothing is done about it!
I think the only way this will be settled is if the touch-screen machines do not count the votes. They should simply create a card with the choices printed on it. These cards would then be the actual, legal ‘vote’ and be placed in a sealed receptical. If the card is wrong, then election workers destroy it in view of the voter and the voter creates another.
It’s not “random” errors, when it favors one party 100%!!! The Republicans will keep the House and Senate! And the Dems will remain silent, on behalf of their constituents.
Comment #1 EGP: They “slip out of sync” in favor of ONE PARTY ALL THE TIME??? BULLSHIT!
(comment not directed at you, EGP, but at the quote)
Where are all the good people in high places, fighting for us voters??? Blatant theft, right in front of our eyes. We all see it happening. This time we’re pointing it out LIVE while it’s happening, because we know AHEAD OF TIME, due to Brad and Bev. But still, good people in high places not protecting us. ARE THERE ANY GOOD PEOPLE IN HIGH PLACES LEFT IN THIS COUNTRY????????????
i don’t know why brad blog doesn’t want to include my comments. I’m on your side, guys, and my suggestion to arrest these folks while the crime is taking place ( right now ) is what any unintimidated, self respecting
society would do.
do you want these folks to go on stealing, thugging and killing ? or do you just want to impress us with how many articles you can gather, and how quickly.
It is not only not random as BIG DAN said but is also a clear indication of fraud by stupid criminals. A smart criminal would leave the verification the same as the choice but use another variable to indicate how the vote actually will be counted. That way the vote is switched just as effectively as it is switched by these stupid criminals but there is no way to see that the vote was switched. It is all over but the counting and all of us “conspiracy theorists” know who is taking care of the counting.
Trouble: Where are the people who are SUPPOSED to be arresting these guys? I’m at work right now…
Sounds to me like the vote-switching software in the ESS machine was poorly written, and sometimes flips the vote before the voter completes his ballot. It was probably supposed to flip votes afterward. These incompetents can’t even steal an election right.
Is there a programmer in the house?
Cars with bad brakes may creep, but not computers. There is a flaw in the program.
Some variable is being incremented with each vote, or perhaps with every 8 votes. It is a variable that governs the position of some or all of the touch zones on the screen. The increment allows the spots to slowly migrate.
The set-up program establishes system variables that govern the location of the sensitive spots. The counting program should be able to read these variables, but should not be able to write to them. It is writing to them.
Ever had a Windows program blow up because it tried to write to memory that was outside its allocated space? This is the same thing. The counting program is writing to the memory space of the system program. This e-voting machine appears to lack that protection.
It could be either incompetent programming or a design flaw. In either case, it is reason to pull these machines out of production until the flaw is identified and the machines are vetted for other comparable flaws.
Apparently the slow migration of the zone map off the screen happens until a voter complains, then the machine is reset, it happens again, the machine is reset. This is a relaxation oscillator, generating a sawtooth wave. Integrate the area under the wave and you will approximate a count of the votes switched.
Trouble ahead, trouble behind:
It sounds like you are having problems submitting comments. It must be a ‘glitch’ in the software, not ‘human error’!
It is amazing that mostly bloggers are aware of the voting irregularities. I remember e-mailing and faxing Kerry of the rigged machines – heads up people!! Still it came as a shock. Now, 2 years later same song, different verse. rove is aware and I am convinced gw is too. rove and gw both stated they don’t believe in polls and believe they will hold both houses of the legislature. I am not surprised!
This isn’t incompetency in programming, this is a deliberate way to add in extra votes for the Republicans.
Most people will just trust the poll worker and not know that they are being duped into voting twice or thrice, or whatever in the same session, so will try and correct it, but at the same time will have at least two votes, one for the dem, one for the repig.
And most of those poll voters don’t know that is what they are duping those poor dems into doing.
Yet one more way to steal the elections.
Those machines need to be seized NOW by a judge, and forced out of the polling places. Where are the DNC lawyers? They should be down there, RIGHT now. Rachel Maddow is reading this story RIGHT now, actually.
I called the Pembroke Pines/Miamar Democratic Club and the spokesman didn’t REALIZE this is what is going on. He thought the machines were just “out of synch”. We have to educate everyone on this. A computer screen does not just “get out of synch with software” to be “recallibrated”! I mean what would people think if that happened on their home PC or MAC?
Jesus!
Trackback: And in another sunny part of the country.
The fact of the flaw is enough to pull the machines. You don’t have to assign motive. Yet.
That fun can be had later. Better for now that a dispassionate realist pull the flawed tool out of production before it embarrasses someone important.
Call the county data system managers.
The machines have a demonstrable bug that overwrites the system area. Bingo. Who knows what else it touches?
My new saying is, “Where are all the good people in high places, who are supposed to be fighting for us? Aren’t there any left in this country?” We should be WATCHING good people in high places fighting for us, which is their job. The breaking point is coming where we’re going to have to do it ourselves. It’s called a “revolution”…that’s what happens when Dems are silent, and no one who is suppposed to be fighting for us, is actually fighting for us.
Dan, sure, but I think they are actually adding extra votes in for republicans… I think this needs to be stopped immediately. I can just see this: “High Republican turnout in Florida, who knew the polls could be so wrong???”
People….Brenda Snipes is the Broward County Elections Supervisor…sounds like she should be called….and since voter fraud is a crime….maybe the police should be brought in.
John
Oakland Park, FL
I contacted Jim Davis’ campaign and referred whomever would look into this HERE. So thanks John.
Mike Malloy is on right now! Novamradio.com!
Much more contact info is posted in the update on this story (first posted last night, so a lot of comments since) at DailyKos. Just go to dailykos.com and look in “Recommended Diaries” for the updated contact info, with some of the eaddresses, phone numbers, etc., of officials named in comments above.
Lets put the heat on the people in charge of elections. Sue Cobb….a Jeb Bush appointee…is Secretary of State in Florida. I say do calls and emails to the people below and the media outlets.
Ask the Florida Secretary of State, Sue Cobb, why those machines have not been removed from further use??
Florida Secretary of State, Sue Cobb phone: 850-245-6500
Florida Division of Elections
phone: 850-245-6200
Broward County Supervisor of Elections, Brenda Snipes
phone: 954-357-7050
Very concerned, Thanks
Sincerely,
John
Oakland Park, FL
Pulling a misbehaving system from production and reverting to a backup method is standard and usual in an information system environment. A move back to paper or punch card would be appropriate here.
It is also standard operating procedure to run a new system in parallel with the old for several business cycles to make sure that the new system has the same outputs as the old when given the same inputs.
A bug such as this should have shown up in the manufacturer’s testing process. That it did not is appalling. The test schema that the manufacturer used should be subpoenaed. The testing was obviously not ISO 9000 compliant. That level of competence should be written into the purchase order for systems like this.
OT, but important:
THOSE BASTARDS!!!
NPR’s live call in radio show – On Point – has the number 1-800-423-8255. They asked for people to call concerning their vote problems show this morning.
I called them repeatedly when they were live, checking to see that I was calling the right number, getting only a busy signal. My call was redirected to a PHONE SEX LINE!!!
Now, I’m not against such things as phone sex, but have never called one myself… Do you think that somebody didn’t want my call to go thru? Do you think they also thought they’d get me angry if NPR was running a “phone sex” line?
Here in the country where they’ll steal the vote any way they can; where the government has free reign to listen in to anybody’s conversation in a search for “terrorists;” do I think they’d actually jam the lines so folks couldn’t get thru and talk about election reform? Do I think they’d try to somehow (however foolishly) associate NPR election shows with their idea of illicet sex? Uhm, yeah. They’d do that.
Damn.
Check out October 30th’s Diane Rehm show. It’s about voting machines and Diebold’s Mark Radke takes a real beating. You wouldn’t know it from listening to Radke’s Cheney-like responses, but TRUST ME!
The topic of this thread comes up about 2/3’s of the way through the show when someone says that a vote can be changed if someone pushes the flat part of their finger on their selection. Diane’s reaction, (which is always civil), is pretty funny.
Take a listen!
Update.
This morning I did call the State of Florida Elections Board Office…..and Broward County Supervisors Office and complained. All I got was a denial of any problems with the electronic voting machines. They both alleged that they had no reports of problems. One stated that you cannot believe what you read on the internet. Well, I did track down Joan Marek of Hollywood, FL quoted above…and she is real.
John Wright
Oakland Park, FL
John – Comment#31 –
They said you can’t believe what you read on the internet? How about the freakin’ Miami herald, that’s where the story originated. A guy wrote a letter to the Tampa Tribune yesterday about and he had the exact same problem with his vote. He could probably be tracked down as well if the elections board was interested
There was video on Lou Dobbs last night of a candidate testing the machines. She pushed the button for her own name and her opponent’s name came up.
People can see this flaw when they vote.
The workable issue is that these machines are not ready for prime time. THEY HAVE A BUG. Whatever is making the touch zone map creep out from under the screen image can do other damage.
Buggy transaction machines get pulled from production.
Voting is a transaction.
the election judges should keep an incident log writing down what has happened at the polls. At least that what they do in Minnesota. I would ask the election judge for a signed receipt indicting the error, the machine ID number and my vote intent. At least this is the start of a ‘paper’ trail.
Just went to the Miami Herald website, did a basic search on ‘voting’ & ‘touch screen’…. the stories that came up were either about how ‘Great’ the machines worked and gave anecdotes about how people were thrilled and happy or about how investigations are being done about links between Smartmatic and Hugo Chavez…lots of stories about Chavez…but not vote hopping.
I had to search for ‘Debra A. Reed’ before the story referenced here showed up!
A mentioned on the Brad’s main page…those corporate media whose are NOT properly reporting on election fraud…just like in 2004.
Steve
Fleming Island, FL
I built a website to track elections in Florida.
I uses checks to see if you are a registered voter in Florida then builds your specific ballot for you providing links to the candidates. With enough participation it can double check an election. Plus I just posted two you tube videos at the very end of the home page of http://www.shadowvote.org that Show fifteen unsecured machines in a room at the palm harbor public library which we had reserved. So we had the machines Sequia dres to ourselves for a couple hours.