I know Brad, ain't that f#$ked up or what ?

My own cynical mind says it's a conspiritoral corporate plot to keep the non-regular voters home (the my vote doesn't count, so why bother crowd)

Where's our Smedley Butler ? We need one pretty bad right about now

The once proud and once relatively progressive LA Times, now owned and dominated by the conservative Tribune Co. in Chicago, IS utterly useless. Brad doesn't even mention that they endorsed McPherson over Bowen. The endorsement was NOTHING but a fluff piece based on McPherson campaign claims with absolutely no indication of the slightest understanding of what has really been going on under this buffoon of an SOS, chosen by by Republican Corporatist Arnold Schwartzenegger. In the Times most laughable comment, they state "McPherson is a moderate Republican who believes the office should be nonpartisan, and he administers accordingly. He exudes respect for the public's right to an open government by providing easily reviewable data on political campaigns and state functions. This yen for transparency..." As Jody Holder pointed out in a recent comment here, this is the same guy who arbitrarily, unilaterally, and without the required public hearings, disbanded California's well-established Voting Systems and Procedures Panel, made up of 6-8 individuals traditionally appointed by the Secretary of State, and then abandoned the long-successful and open voting machine certification process that had been used by both Republican and Democratic SOS's in CA. At the previous public hearings process, "the Election Division staff would present their reports concerning the vendor’s application and their subsequent examination of a proposed voting system. The panel was able to ask them questions concerning the reports. The vendors were also present and the panel also asked them questions. At the end of that time the public was then invited to offer expert testimony, raise questions, or make comments about the proposed voting system. Then the panel would make a motion and vote whether they would make a recommendation to the Secretary of State to approve the voting system. This process allowed the voting public to be involved, and made the process, as well as the staff and vendors, publicly accountable. June 2005 was the last hearing that was conducted in this well-established and open fashion, and that hearing occurred shortly after McPherson took over as Secretary of State. McPherson then proceeded to disband the panel and abandon these successful and open processes. Now the public 'hearings' consist of the public being allowed to state their comments into the record. There are no longer question or answer sessions between panel members, staff and vendors. Expert testimony is no longer heard in any open sessions. There is no longer any panel discussing what they learned, raising issues publicly, and conducting a public vote." That is apparently how, as the LA Times put it, "he exudes respect for the public's right to an open government". What a joke of a newspaper and what a joke of a SOB (oops, that should have been SOS)!!!!!!!

Actually, the LA Times did mention e-voting a couple of weeks ago when they endorsed McPhearson for SoS. If that action isn't enough to cancel one's subscription to the Times, I can't think of anything that would top it! The LA Times thought McPhearson did a great job of bringing efficiency and good management to the SOS's office. That may be true, but they have used those good management practices to defraud the people of CA and undermine our electoral system. That's like endorsing Mussolini because he got the trains to run on time!

Is the U S Attorney's Office article a joke or what? I mean where are they on investigating the BIGGEST FRAUD EVER PERPETRATED ON MARYLAND CITIZENS via Linda Lamone. They should be investigating her for crimminally withholding evidence on the secrurity of these abominations, not cosulting with her! When smoke and mirrors can't get the job done any more chaos and confusion does. I guess the backasswardness should come as no surprise when it comes to government, but please get your priorities straight as to what the BIGGEST CRIMES ARE!

You gotta know some poor unemployed bastard is going to pick up one of those machines when it turns his democratic vote into a republican one and he's going to throw the thing through the window. And the republicans like Ted Haggert and Cheney are going to be whining about what an animal the guy is. What a joke.

Seeing all the frustration with just making sure our votes get counted, and, having over 20 years in software engineering and internet solutions, I'm seeking exposure to what I feel is the solution to the use of technology in our voting systems. I've designed a concept called Vote and Verify. It can be seen at VoteAndVerify.com Very simply, it allows voters to Verify online that their votes made it in the final official data base, and, gives them a tiny 3" receipt with encrypted/coded numbers that will allow them to prove errors/tampering conclusively. This means that you can finally use touch screens, optical scanners, or other electronic technology but it forces, bottom line, that the votes must correctly arrive in the final data base. You no longer need to Vote and 'Trust.' You can now Vote and Verify. Please help spread the word on this solution. I've been guest on a couple of radio shows and would like to get the word out.

Cliff-

Sounds good to me but the readership and commenting can be way down on blogs like this on weekends, so your comment #6 above may not get the attention it deserves. You should e-mail Brad (TheBradBlog@cville.com) and see if he will let you post a guest blog. Having someone behind you with the credibility (and readership) Brad has gained in this area could give your project a big boost.

Hi Cliff!

That looks good.

Have you presented your idea to people like Harri Hursti, or Chuck Herrin, White Hat Hacker or others who have been active in discovering the many ways fraud can occur without leaving a trace?

That would be the real test!

Thanks Steve, I took your advice and fired off an email to Brad. I really appreciate your suggestion.

Hi Kira, I looked at the discussion on the page you linked to. He is a strong advocate of paper only, no computers. Interestingly enough however, at some point computers ultimately come into play during tabulation/totalling, etc. Unless you complete the 2nd half of the technology by adding Vote and VERIFY, I agree it's best to stay totally paper. But, we've entered an age of technology where we probably won't go back, therefore, it is important to have something that will check the final result in the data base-- banks don't have an issue with customers feeling a need to ask what brand of machines they use, or where the got their software... that's because you can verify your deposits and transactions and you have a receipt to prove what you've done. I may try contacting those you suggested, yet please feel free to refer them to this Blog if you or anyone else has some time. --- boy am I verbose person huh.... guess I just feel passionately about this.

Cliff,

The reason Chuck Herrin wants paper ballots is the fact that he believes all computers can be hacked.

Oddly enough, Canada has a totally transparent, verifiable & secure paper ballot voting process - and they are able to count the votes in around 4 hours. They also videotape & air it live while counting.

No one who knows computers will be happy with electronic voting until we have open source software and make the entire process transparent.

My husband just figured out something that makes this method ripe for fraud --- with that little ticket, vote buying would skyrocket.

Hand counted paper at the precinct level, then the totals are sent to the county, makes it a hell of a lot easier to isolate the fraudulent counts from the legit that way.
All absentee ballots received early to the county are sorted out and delivered to the original precinct the absentee was supposed to vote in on election day to be counted.
Then one week has to pass to let all the straggling absentee ballots come in before certification, I guess we could let the county level count them.
IMO

Hi Kira, We don't need to see open source code for banks, all we need is to be able to verify the transactions and have a paper receipt say if we make a cash deposit. Same with the votes... I don't care what software they use, as long as the end result is correct! On buying votes, that is why with Vote and Verify the receipt is encrypted and cannot be forged nor interpreted without the proper software and encryption codes... It would be very expensive and perhaps tracible since to view the translated codes you must go online.... time consuming and difficult. Can't say it couldn't be done, it would be very difficult. In the end it is highly illegal to buy/sell votes--- it is also illegal to tamper with voting machines... I think I'd rather try and catch them because I think there is a far greater chance of damage that way.

Hi FlorIdiot... I agree that unless they go to a full Vote and Verify method to confirm that your vote ended up correctly in the final data base and where you can prove it if it did not, then it might be best to go full paper. However, there are many undetectable ways there can be still tampering and loss of votes in that system as well. The idea is to get away from having to inspect the "process"... but just be able to confirm that the "final result" is correct. You don't care what goes on in the bank after you make a deposit, but I'll bet you'd be quite angry if your transaction didn't show up on your bank statement, and if you didn't get a receipt to prove what you did. Just imagine the utter chaos if your bank wouldn't give you a receipt nor would they allow you to see your balance or transactions, nor would they give you anything to prove what you deposited! Well, that's where we are with voting. The ultimate system is to be able to vote as securely as making a bank deposit.

Just wanted to thank everyone for their comments. Due to them I answered the questions of how to safeguard from having votes sold; how it provides for 100% recounts, etc. I updated the web page with this info. and also the Flash Presentation. So again thanks for great comments.

web site is at: http://www.voteandverify.com/

I've said it before and I will say it again and again and again. The amount of time the media will focus on election problems is directly related to how much the media beleives the Republicans are going to lose.

If the Dem pick up a majority anywhere, I fully expect the next week to be nothing but storeis on the failure of voting machines.

Mark my words.

Wouldn't it be great if the integrity of our voting system was at least as high as in the banking system? I'm looking forward to the day when we are discussing what is best for 'the people' instead of whether or not votes were counted. That's why I've spent so much time designing Vote and Verify.

ELECTION EVE PREDICTION:
COMPUTER FRAUD WILL ENSURE
FAKE G.O.P. VICTORY

by Daniel Barenblatt

New York
9:45 pm
November 6, ’06

posted on bradblog 5:15 am, Tuesday, November 7, '06

My safe prediction: Republicans will retain their majorities in the House and Senate, and again confound the pre-polls that showed candidates behind in key individual races, and a Democratic sweep or near-sweep on the whole, because the system is now rigged with computerized, unauditable, secret e-voting, that gave such apparently fraudulent, statistically impossible victories to the GOP in the 2002 and 2004 elections.

The pre-polls taken in advance of election day have the Democrats ahead of the Republicans by large margins in both public approval ratings and in answer to the question of which party candidate people say they will vote for on November 7. Newspapers and TV news commentators have frequently stated that the Democrats are likley to gain a majority in the House or Senate, or both. In America today there is a widespread sense of economic malaise, alienation and opposition to the bloody Iraq war quagmire.

Yet George Bush has repeatedly said in speeches that he is confident the Republicans will not lose their majorities, prevailing as they did the 2002 and 2004 elections. The "insider" smart money seems to agree with him, as the Wall Street stock market is way up
today, the day before the elections, and the Dow Jones invariably goes up for Republican triumphs and down when a significant Democratic victory appears imminent.

The 2004 election saw thousands of computer e-votes tallied, resulting in Bush victories in a number of counties, that were far greater than the number of registered voters in those counties. This instantly proved the presence of large-scale electronic election theft, since the instances of thee events were in far too high a number to be coincidence, and always handed the margin of victory, not once to Kerry.

There were also many observation of vote-switching from people who tried to vote for Kerry, but saw the final touchscreen page on their computer vote machines showing that ther vote was being registered for Bush instead.

This was documented to happen in the 2002 election races, again, always favoring the Republican (for example in the Jim McBride-"Jeb" Bush governor race in Florida). It has also been repeatedly documented in the primary elections of 2006; for example in the July McKinney-Johnson race in DeKalb county, Georgia, an all-Diebold machine election. This same county, and also Fulton county, Georgia, had myserious patches placed on their Diebold vote machines shortly before election day of 2002, that according to a recent statement by RFK Jr., resulted in a statistically improbable surprise victory for Republican Saxby Chambliss over the popular Democrat Max Cleland in Georgia's race for Senator.

The last week leading up to Nov 7, 2006 has witnessed an extraordinary campaign of GOP phone-calling "dirty tricks" enacted against the population, in efforts to mislead people into going to the wrong voting locations for their district, frighten them into not voting with threats of arrest and imprisonment once their IDs area checked at the polling place voter registration verification, anger them into not voting by harassing them with false flag calls in which the GOP harrasser falsely identifies himself as a Democrat, and other cruel voter suppression techniques.

If anyone objects to the idea that computer vote machines are being rigged in advance to steal the elections for the GOP as "paranoid" or a mere "conspiracy theory," the above slipping of the Republican Party mask to reveal their obvious and proven ruthless, and mass-mobilized vote stealing operations, of the analog not digital sort, should immediately silence these objections.

One would also do well to remember the 1972 election year Watergate Hotel break into Democratic Party campaign offices, to steal campaign documents, by Republican operatives of the Nixon White House. An administration that included Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld in high level positions. That Republican election-sabitaging maneuver resulted in the downfall of a presidency.

The computer vote machines such as Diebold, ES & S, Sequoia, optical scan machines, central tabulating computers (hidden from public vieew and used to tally even votes that are initially recorded on paper ballots) and other electronic voting machines are now in greater use than ever before for this upcoming U.S. election, despite their being shunned as insecure and unauditable by other nations, and their proven record of being used to falsify election outcomes to invariably swing the results to create fake Republican/right wing victories. Therefore, continued Republican control of both houses of Congress, through rigged electronic voting, is a safe "psychic prediction" bet.

Please send comments, opinions, and corrections to: jeanlouisbour@yahoo.com