Blogged by Brad from Houston…
Christopher Drew at New York Times follows up his article yesterday on the possible/pending death of the Holt Election Reform Bill (HR 811). In today’s piece, however, he begins to report on the fact that there are alternatives to DRE touch-screen machines which offer the same interface for disabled voters, but without the dangers, as I opined about yesterday.
Of course, even that option — an electronic assistive device that offers touch-screen voting and/or audio voting for disabled and blind voters — is not good enough for Jim Dickson of the American Assoc. of People with Disabilities (AAPD), who is quoted by the Times as continuing to use his considerable access and ability to bully Congress members into sticking with DREs only. What the New York Times fails to report when mentioning Dickson is that he’s received thousands of dollars from various voting machine companies who also prefer that every American be saddled with their shitty, unaccountable, inaccurate, easily-hackable DRE technology.
Christopher Drew and the NY Times have a responsibility to disclose that point when quoting Dickson as a source in their stories. They were the ones, after all, who reported on Dickson and the AAPD having “received $26,000 from voting machine companies” in 2004 alone.
Instead, Dickson is reported by the Times only as “a lobbyist for the American Association of People with Disabilities…whose group prefers the touch-screens.”
That Dickson — Vice President for Governmental Affairs of AAPD, “a broad coalition of 36 national disability-related organizations,” according to his bio page — is, again, hijacking election reform and the inevitable move to paper ballots for the entire country ought to be the actual lead in Drew’s otherwise well-researched piece today. Unfortunately, it’s not even mentioned.
That he and Ralph Neas — President of People for the American Way (PFAW), the staunchest and most well-moneyed supporters/hijackers of Holt’s legislation, who fought a dishonest battle to keep the bill from banning DREs from the get-go — are well-aligned from their days together at the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR) is also an important detail that has been largely absent from the what little mainstream coverage there has been about the entire affair.
As well, Farhad Manjoo at Slate has more details today on the latest insider battles now going on concerning the bill. Of note, even VerifiedVoting.org, who had previously been staunch supporters of the Holt bill, are now coming about against the proposed compromise legislation that would require paper trails added on to DREs. That’s good to see, but one wonders how they could have been so supportive of previous versions of the bill which also did exactly that.
For the most part, as revealed by both articles, the compromising insiders allowed into the late battle, of course, tend to include only those with the access and the money to buy it. Regular old voters and election integrity advocates, and even disabled voter advocates (like Noel Runyan, and those who do not advocate the use of dangerous DREs), are decidedly absent from the last-minute negotiations/compromises being sought, reportedly, by Steny Hoyer and Nancy Pelosi on behalf of House leadership.
CORRECTION: Our initial report said that AAPD’s Jim Dickson received money from “voting machine companies such as Diebold”. While the New York Times has reported money he’s received from “voting machine companies”, we don’t yet know if it was Diebold, specifically, as in the case of the National Federation for the Blind (who received $1 million from them) or other voting machine companies specifically. Either way, Dickson has been generally less than forthcoming on the issue when asked about it by various folks, including The BRAD BLOG.
I remember that guy. He’s the blind guy who broke out in tears at the second of two worthless hearings held by Republicans to address the voting machine issue. I hope he breaks out in tears on his death bed for participating in this dangerous charade.
There was one very good moment at that hearing though when Princeton Univerity’s Edward W. Felten did a LIVE hack right there on C-span.
If the media had reported on that, or at least covered it for more then one day, we could expose this “help the handicapped” farce.
Probably a good time to switch for VV.org and still save face, as long as their on now best to forgive and forget IMO
…a lot of the groups didn’t realize that they were being snookered at first by the EVM mfrs I don’t think.
I welcome VV back into the enlightened fold. Let’s hope many more will follow their lead.BC3ED
Always the creepy looking guy!
Hi Guys
Help America Vote (for us), Holt (Halt) election reform. The titles of these bills are really cheeky in their sheer contempt for the fools (sorry but as I see it you may wave democracy a distant farewell if they put this one past some election reform advocates)
Thank goodness Brad Blogger still have eyes and can see what appears to be too hard for the other well intentioned election reform groups who are supporting this Bill.
What are they putting in the water?
If I heard this correctly …
A do nothing movement put down another do nothing bill while accusing a congress of being a do nothing congress.
The common denominator thru all these years, all these reports, all these singularities, is do nothing.
As the electronic voting machine companies thrive and gather around for another vote fest in yet another distant Nevervember.
As the white knights of a movement quitely qui tam away into silence.
Do nothing mission accomplished … it was all in the stars … hey what’s your sign?
While everyone is being distracted by Holt, the much much worse S1487 is moving. And look who is giving testimony on it. I don’t know all the names, but the usual ones for voting integrity are not on here. Who picks these panels????
National: Hearing to receive testimony on S. 1487,
the Ballot Integrity Act
by David Kibrick
July 25th, 2007
On July 25th, 2007, at 10:00 AM, the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration will hold hearings on S. 1487, the Ballot Integrity Act.
The hearing will consist of 2 panels, with the following witnesses testifying:
Panel 1:
The Honorable Deborah L. Markowitz
Vermont Secretary of State
Montpelier, VT
(Representing National Association of Secretaries of State)
Mr. George N. Gilbert
Director, Guilford County Board of Elections
Greensboro, NC
Ms. Wendy Noren
Boone County Clerk
Columbia, MO
(Representing National Association of Counties)
Dr. Michael I. Shamos
Professor, School of Computer Science
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA
Mr. Ray Martinez
Policy Adviser, The Pew Center on the States
Former Member, Election Assistance Commission
Austin, TX
Panel 2:
Ms. Mary Wilson
President
League of Women Voters
Washington, DC
Mr. Doug Lewis
Executive Director
The Election Center
Houston, TX
Ms. Tanya Clay House
Director of Public Policy
People for the American Way
Washington, DC
Written testimony by the panel witnesses will be posted here as it becomes available:
Audio recordings of the testimony will be posted here as they become available:
With the spectre of the senate republican filibuster nothing is going to get thru that the election machine companies do not want thru.
The election integrity movement has so far been background noise demanding heavenly legislation. After screwing up the movement stars rationalize that the status quo is better than anything not perfect.
The fickle finger of fate touches us once again at the ballot box.
As I understand it the problem that started this voter machine reform was the inability of the old machines to punch a decent hole. Why not just sharpen the punches?
EVM == Electronic Voting Machine
mfrs == Manufactures (e.g. Creators of this shit)
Honestly, the blind and other disabled folks are not being helped by this lunacy. I would not want to disenfranchise the very itsy-bitsy minority of blind and other disabled voters, but if that is what it took (it wouldn’t) to get a 100% verifiable and accurate vote count, I’d go for it.
Folks, the ballot has to be hand counted. Counted by hand. We don’t have to wash our cloths by hand, we don’t have to churn our butter or hand crank our cars, but we do have to hand count our ballots. Otherwise, a criminal minority will steal our elections. Again.
Please Brad, you know darn well that HR 811 has NEVER required paper trails or DREs, and you also know that VerifiedVoting has never supported that position.
Marybeth Kuznik, VotePA.us