This is just getting worse and worse. Now it’s happening in Texas. (And in MO, if you read to the end of the article). And the vaunted “thousands of attorneys” from the Obama campaign and the DNC are still nowhere to be found.
With every incident so far reported of touch-screen vote-flipping during early voting in this year’s general election — from county to county in WV and in Nashville, TN) — it’s been the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen machine that has failed, flipping votes from one candidate to another not chosen by the voter. In most every instances [see update below], it’s been an attempted Democratic vote, flipped to a Republican, or another party.
These are the same machines that lost 18,000 votes in Democratic-leaning Sarasota County in the 2006 U.S. House Race for Katherine Harris’ old seat. The Democrat, Christine Jennings, was declared the loser to Republican Vern Buchanan (whose own wife had trouble voting for him that day), by just 369 votes. Several academic studies, and even the GAO, have been unable to rule out either tampering or hardware/software error for the disappeared 18,000 votes.
As we wrote earlier this week, after there was finally one report of a vote flipping from Democratic to Republican in TN (a very rare instance, btw), these machines need to be taken out of service now, impounded and quarantined immediately, and every voter needs to be given a paper ballot where these machines are currently being used. Voters who have such problems need to inform other voters waiting in line which machine should not be used (and we offer other tips below, as well).
[Update: The rare vote-flip from Republican to Democratic now seems to have been a hoax carried out by local Republicans, according to a TN election integrity activist who did some digging and reporting. Details here…]The latest reports today of ES&S vote-flipping come from Palo Pinto County, TX, where two voters — one of them an alternate election judge and office manager of the Palo Pinto County Democratic Headquarters — saw straight-ticket Democratic votes flipped to straight-ticket Republican votes. Two times for the first person, and three times for the alternate election judge!
The report is a doozy…
“When I cast an early vote [Wednesday] at Palo Pinto County Courthouse, my vote was switched from Democrat to Republican right in front of my face – twice!” reported Lona Jones, a Precinct 1 county resident.
Intending to vote straight party on the Democratic ticket, Jones said she was surprised Wednesday when the electronic voting machine “on the left as you face the machines” in the courthouse basement asked her if she wanted to cast her vote for a straight Republican ticket.
Thinking she had pushed the wrong button the first time the machine “came up Republican,” Jones said she repeated her intended straight-party vote.
“The second time I was sure to just touch the Democratic button,” she said, further reporting that the machine responded to her selection, “‘Do you want to change your Republican straight ticket vote to a Democratic vote?’ I pressed, ‘Yes,’ then it came back up and it was a total Republican ticket again.“
We’ve cautioned many times here at The BRAD BLOG, of the dangers of voting straight-party tickets, particularly in TX, where election officials have reportedly been giving disinformation to voters, but everywhere else that they allow it as well. Vote for each candidate, NOT straight-party!
But whether it’s a straight-party vote or not, no voter should ever cast a vote on a touch-screen machine unless they are forced to. There is absolutely no way that any vote ever cast on a touch-screen machine — with or without a so-called paper trail — can ever be shown as having been recorded accurately.
None. Zero. Scientifically impossible. Or if it isn’t a scientific impossibility, our many months of asking for evidence, from anyone, of such a vote having been accurately recorded by a touch-screen/DRE has yielded precisely no such evidence. And we’ve asked voting machine companies, election officials, and so-called “election experts” time and again, and none have been able to offer anysuch evidence. Ever.
So what do you do about it when your vote flips? Other than demanding a paper ballot, and demanding these machines be confiscated and quarantined immediately?
The article goes on to notes a very good point…
Yesterday, election integrity experts Emily Levy from VelvetRevolution.us’ and Kevin Zeese from TrueVote.us suggested that when this problem occurs, voters should first tell officials, and ask them to remove the machine from service.
Then…Alert everyone else in line waiting to vote which machine caused the problem, and warn everyone else not to use it!
These are among the steps recommended, with which I strongly concur:
- Call poll supervisors to observe the problem
- Fill out a problem report
- Refuse to vote on that machine
- Request that the machine be taken out of service
- Get a serial number of the machine if possible (may be unlikely in many cases)
- Tell other voters not to vote on that machine
- Call county/town election office
- Call local reporters
- Call voter problem hotlines (eg. 866-MYVOTE1 and 866-OUR-VOTE)
- Contact bloggers and Election Integrity websites.
- Raise holy hell.
VR has more details here on what to do if you see your vote flip. [Disclosure: The BRAD BLOG is a co-founder of VelvetRevolution.us.]
Also, before you go to vote, bring a video camera (a cell phone video camera will do), to document the vote-flipping when you vote, and then upload it to VideoTheVote.org and YouTube, etc.!
Unfortunately, Lona Jones — who did contact our associates at VotersUnite.org with the problem earlier this morning (they instructed her to contact the media, which she did, leading to the report we’re quoting here) — was not the only one to have the same problem, with the same failed ES&S iVotronic touch-screens, in Palo Pinto:
“She told me she had already voted and had problems,” said Crosier. “She told me her story and I told her I had the same problem Wednesday morning.”
Like Jones, Crosier tried to cast a straight party Democratic vote at the courthouse annex, “and it came up straight party, Republican party.”
Crosier recognized her election trainer, who was helping to monitor the polls, and called him over. “We went back through the process and it did it again,” she said of the third time the touch-screen machine suggested she vote Republican.
This has got to stop. Paging Barack Obama, the DNC and the “thousands of attorneys” we’ve been told for months that they “have on the ground, ready to move in as soon as any problems are reported.”
Are your pagers not on yet?! What are you waiting for? Concession Day on November 5th?
Oh…and this just in from an Election Integrity advocate in swing state MO:
Just wanted to let you know that Missourians for Honest Elections is in the process of confirming five separate reports of vote flipping — from Democrat to Republican — on the iVotronic machines that are the only means the Board of Elections is providing for in-person absentee voting at its headquarters in Maplewood [St. Louis County, MO].
–Cynthia Richards
We’ll try to offer more details on the problems in MO when we get them. No doubt, thousands of Obama/DNC attorneys are on their way…
EXACTLY!!
As I commented on an earlier story, the DNC/Obama legal teams need to be out in the field NOW, not after the horse has left the barn. They knew early voting was going to be huge, they’ve been pushing for early voting since forever. To not have legal observers out there keeping an eye on the early voting is derelict.
Geez, not having the lawyers our there in the field is perhaps more frustrating than the voting machine problems.
I have a question:
In ’04 when my daughter went to vote she brought her digital camera & was told “You can’t film in here.” They were adamant about it. What should one do in that case??
Meanwhile: daily kos’ designated election reform expert actually explains why things aren’t so bad after all…
http://www.dailykos.com/storyon.../21/508/641237
Also fun was a couple of days ago when kos was boasting that the “left wing” had successfully marginalized its conspiracy theorists under his guidance…
… are we having karma yet? 🙂
Brad,
The Tennessee “votes flip to Obama” story is not true. I sent you a detailed email earlier today describing what I learned by talking to three of the principals involved in the story (the reporter, the Election Registrar and one of the Republican county election commissioners). Here is what I posted on Democratic Underground about what I found:
DREs may be nefarious, BUT they are loyal — TN “votes flip to Obama” story debunked
Disclaimer:
Lordy, I would give anything if the story publicized earlier this week on BradBlog and here at DU — that three voters in a rural Tennessee county using ES&S iVotronic DREs had witnessed their votes jump from McCain to Obama — was true. Why? Because a story like that is so rare but, if true, it would affirm that electronic voting carries risks for all voters, not just “tin-foil-hat” Democrats. As we worked our TN Voter Confidence Act bill through our legislature (to ban DREs and move to paper ballots/random audits), it would have really helped us if there had been examples of Republicans being harmed by this equipment as often as Democrats, or at all. Unfortunately, my follow-up on the Tennessee story this morning proves to me what my OP title says: DREs may be nefarious BUT they are faithful — to their Republican masters.
I would strongly recommend that everyone read the original story published in the Decatur County Chronicle (weekly, circulation 2,700, motto: “Blessed in the nation whose God is the Lord” (Psalm 33:12)) this past Tuesday. Here’s the link:
http://www.decaturcountyonline....e.asp?art=1244
Here’s what I learned in speaking with the local reporter, the Decatur County Election Registrar and one of the Republican county election commissioners who was interviewed for the story:
— The newspaper learned about the story “… when the voters called the paper to report the vote flips from McCain to Obama”. Or maybe it was a call from the two county election commissioners quoted in the story — both Republican party members of the five person local commission — one of whose father-in-law happens to be the newspaper publisher.
— The three voters who reported the vote-flips (but only to the newspaper — they have still not contacted anyone at the Election Commission) were the mother, the father-in-law and either the cousin or the uncle of the Decatur County Republican Party Chairman
— All four of them are in business with each other at the local sawmill.
— None of the aggrieved voters have listed phone numbers.
— When the Decatur County Election Registrar offered to call a county election commission meeting to discuss the vote-flipping incident, the Republican commissioners declined.
— Neither of the Republican commission members have been back to the county election commission office to file any formal complaint about the equipment or to ask that it be de-commissioned.
— When I spoke to one of the Republican county election commissioners myself, he described the three voters who reported vote-flipping as “rabid Republicans” who had likely been encouraged to “push” (read: “invent”) this story because of all of the coverage about ACORN. He does not believe the vote-flipping story himself.
So folks — I report, you decide. As for me, my initial skepticism has (sadly) been confirmed. What looked like a rare glimpse at bi-partisan harm caused by DREs has sadly been — once again — another debunked exception that reinforces the rule.
When I finished my conversation with the county Election Registrar (who was completely open and helpful throughout our conversation) by saying “You know, when I heard this story, I smelled a fish. And it weren’t fresh-caught”, she said “Exactly.”
Folks, we’ve just witnessed a little bamboozlry on the banks of the Tennessee River, in a sleepy little backwoods county whose Republicans are as slimy as they are stupid. Their little attempt at small town psy-ops has plopped pathetically — like poop from a dying pachyderm.
Like the ACORN brou-ha-ha-ha-ha, this story has no merit.
DREs may be nefarious BUT they are faithful.
That’s all folks.
———–
We have been swamped with fake stories in the last few weeks (fake plumber, fake assault victim with a “B” carved in her face, fake vote-flipping to Obama in backwater Tennessee). Given how sensational (and “man bites dog”ish) the TN vote-flipping story was, I was amazed to learn today that no one from the media (or from anywhere else) had bothered to call the principals to check on the story. Maybe journalism will be my next career, but I prefer to function as a citizen who occasionally has to “be the media”. After all, someone has to.
Thanks again for your good work, and please accept this correction as a cautionary tale. Sometimes, when voting machine “glitches” seem to finally be even-handed in their vote-flipping, it turns out to be a story that is too good to be true. Like this one.
Bernie Ellis, Organizer
Gathering To Save Our Democracy
Bernie Ellis said:
I got news for ya, bubs, it’s your career NOW! Whether you like it or not (and no whining, you didn’t hear me whine about that same thing, didja?! 😉 )
Great work. I’ll update the stories to point to your superb sleuthing/follow-up!
(And P.S. I’m sorry I missed your email when you sent it, as I’m getting buried and missing alot of them!)
hey brad!
i’ve been following your stories closely and now feel smarter than my friends. and alarmed!
is there a coordinated effort in place to send your daily news to the dnc and obama camp, urging them to stand up?
Has anyone reported problems w/ voting for each candidate individually?
If not, suggest people not use the “straight ticket” option?
Ashley asked:
If there is, it’s not being coordinated by me! I nominate you, Ashley! (Only partially kidding.)
Wilburrr… That Fucking Piece Of Shit john fund (probably trust fund) was spouting lies about “voter fraud” tonight the “Pig Faced” dan rea show on wbz … and he was lapping the shit up like piglets at the trough.
If so many observable votes are being flipped, you can just imagine what’s really going on.
Great article Brad, and thank you Emily and VR! Exactly what was needed.
Very helpful, pro-active tips every voter in the country should be aware of. Calling for a machine to be removed and making damn well sure everyone at the polling location knows about it, is not only well within our rights, we should consider ourselves duty bound to do so.
Joan (#2)– Yes, in some states it is illegal to film inside the polling place. I would caution against risking arrest no matter how delightful and fully exonerating the resulting footage may be. But I would also pose: how much more illegal is it to manipulate a federal election? …just sayin’.
I know which felony would be PROSECUTED to the full extent of the law and which one will be swept under the rug by every Law Enforcement Agent in the country. I know which one is more likely to be hyped as “criminal” and which one will be reported as impartial, election day “glitches”…
But I don’t think anyone who is arrested for “illegal filming of the polling place with the intent of ensuring their vote wasn’t altered by ES&S’s machines that have proven to be completely faulty time and time again”–I doubt they’d be convicted by a jury of their peers…assuming they can get a juried hearing of peers, that is.
Best thing to advise your daughter is to film as near to the polling place as she can. The rules on this vary from state to state/ county to county, but you should be able to film any public building–it’s your right as a citizen.
If something nefarious is going on, have her get as many voter testimonials on film as she can for the public record. Then upload it to Video the Vote per Brad’s suggestion as early as you can.
Our goal is to streamline our rapid response with election protection–you upload the video at VTV, it’s automatically linked to YOUTUBE, who’s partnered with Video the Vote this year along with PBS, so these problems will have more push to the national platform than they’ve ever enjoyed in elections past.
I really believe that thanks to Brad, Bev, VTV, John Gideon, Velvet Revolution, Why Tuesday and all of YOU–we can take the video evidence, post it, broadcast it, and this year it will put enormous pressure on the candidate (and his “mysterious lawyers”) to act.
It’s different this time.
They can’t quite swing their normal pre-game play.
Folks are onto ’em. Even my uber-conservative Sarasotans are onto the shenanigans of KATHY DENT! The local blogs are lit up with even the most hard-lined supporters saying it’s time for her to go. Keep it up! No matter what the polls say!…
It would be great if we could get one of these votes flipping on video. In fact people have been denied the right to receive a paper ballot. What about people taking pictures of their vote – when possible with their cell phones. These files could then be sent immediately – if something is amiss – to the proper authorities/investigative team.
These times demand radical but simple solutions. Asking for machine removal might be the normal thing to do but will be ignored as will all our protest. The only sure way to defeat this monster is to cut off it’s head. If after a reasonable amount of trials a vote is stil being flipped just grab the largest object in the room and smash the shit out of the machine. If enough people are willing to go to this extent we will solve the problem quickly and efficiently.
Re: videoing your particular vote…
The problem is that the steps used to acquire hard evidence of vote flipping -sans a poll worker witness- are also the same steps that could be used to sell your vote (either willingly or under coercion.)
Which, of course, is illegal and thus various localities have differing laws to prevent it.
It’s a monstrous Catch-22 and is also one of the reasons why e-voting fails from first principles… in other words it should never have been allowed to happen in the first place.
http://www.pubrecord.org/nation...strations.html
Bush Orders DOJ to Probe Ohio Voter Registrations
Unbelievable. Where are the Dems? If they started pushing back on these crimes, it wouldn’t just help the election, it would help the various Dem campaigns by being a stellar example of Repug criminality and dishonesty. Where TF are they?
Your on this big B? Link
They’re doing it again
…It was teh Boner that brought it
Whitey, trying to hold the man down!
I agree with Tom that smashing the machine will be more effective although nobody will. We now live in a nation where trillions are openly looted from the masses and they continue to be more satisfied with American Idol.
Where are the lawsuits? What are they waiting for?
I’m an attorney. I drove 500 miles to work Toledo during the 04 election and watched them steal Ohio under our noses.
Afterwards,I got a nice “thank you” from the Ohio Dems. I said, “f that, where’s the recount?” They are steealing it and what are we lawyers gonna do about it?
Why no suits?
Let’s all contact every do-gooder election protection organization and ask them, demand that they file suit. If for no other reason than to bring attention to this scandal.
I did early voting yesterday in Delaware, Ohio. There was a uniformed officer of some sort standing in the office. Is that voter intimidation? Maybe it wasn’t for me, but is it for some people?
I double checked my ballot, and I am pretty sure I successfully voted for Obama.
Back in 2004, when I voted in Worthington, my vote switched from Kerry to Bush, but I saw it, de-selected bush, and reselected Kerry prior to hitting the Vote button.
Barack’s campaign and the DNC should pour how many attorneys and resources into Texas?
Since Texas is solid red – the smart move would not be to waste legal efforts on a lost cause? Currently we are trying to win the election not use the election to fix broken systems in solidly red states – that would come after the election.
Barack isn’t going to lose Texas because of flipped votes on crud systems and he would not win it by starting a legal action.
Maybe the smart money is on Fl – PA – IA – IN – CO?
Great blog – keep up the good work!
Why anyone would go within three feet of those machines is a mystery to me.
I’m voting early because I’m a poll worker, so if any stuff comes up in my 12th ward, I’ll be watching.
It might be helpful to place people OUTSIDE the 25-foot perimeter within which no campaigning may be done, with signs reading: “USE A PAPER BALLOT.”
.
Hey gang,
Here’s a link to Obama’s website, where I just left a suggestion. Go there after you leave a comment here, and maybe somebody will listen….
http://answercenter.barackobama...nduser/ask.php
Mac
… capt said on 10/25/2008 @ 9:35 am PT…
“Barack’s campaign and the DNC should pour how many attorneys and resources into Texas?”
Bullshit.
… or, more formally…
Non Sequitur: that does not follow.
Hoooboy does it not follow.
1: Part of the Obama campaign’s defense against the (so far valid) criticisms that they were ignoring electoral problems that could be fixed in advance was that “they were on top of it” with “thousands of
warheadslawyers ready to fly”…… and Obama is currently sitting on more cash than he can spend before the election…
So… where the hell are they?
2: Realpolitik. So you would throw away all the votes in Texas, and its congressional and local races, just in the hope that a narrowly-elected President Obama will be able to “fix everything” after the fact?
Got some news for you, sunshine: that centrist republican (of another era) corporate shill (see FISA et all) will not only be unable to get things done without an overwhelming cross-regional voter mandate at the polls, he has repeatedly stated that he’s not even going to try.
Now unwrap your head from the Obama spin and reflect upon the following:
“When they came for the red state votes I did nothing, because I was not a red state voter…”
@ Agent Provocateuress 99: is WP updated with Obama in the dict?
They have had 8 years to replace these machines with optical scan machines which have a paper ballot back up. These machines are still being used for one reason only, to steal votes and elections.
Where are the attorneys? Was this just a bluff?
It’s not voter fraud that’s the problem…
It’s the republiKKKan ELECTION FRAUD !!! that’s been the real problem.
Just wanted to let anyone know that I too was having fantasies of knocking a machine over which would probably get me arrested(not good) but which might draw a little more attention to the problem(highly desirable). Probably won’t happen cuz we have optical scan machines here in Massachusetts but I was even wondering if maybe I should knock over our optical scanner just to make a point. If they fuckin’ steal it again, I’m hoping we take it to the streets. No more. It’s time to become old-fashioned and become citizens again.
love,
David Lasagna
Brad,
I have a theory on why the machines are flipping votes.
My husband works with touch screen cash registers. The screen is “tiltable” because depending on the angle you from which you look at it, you will see the “touch buttons” in different places.
Thus a short person thinking he is voting for Obama whose name is above McCain will actually push the McCain button because from his lower angle it looks like its in front of Obama’s name. The reverse is true for a tall person looking down who sees the McCain button which is actually over Obama’s name but he sees McCain from his perspective.
I may have the perspective backwards but I think you will get the idea. This is a shot in the dark because I haven’t seen the machines but I hope it helps.
Brad,
Another thought. If the machine is on a table, like in your picture, the angle again will distort the placement of the touch buttons.
My mind (again) is reeling from the reek. Our economy—not to mention the world’s—is crumbling & the dollar continues its slide into the toilet. Our president, a global laughingstock, has decimated the long-respected reputation of the country with his brutal, arrogant, bumbling “leadership”. Thousands have lost their pensions, due””it sure looks to me””to the callous broken promises of the unconscionably greedy. Thousands are still without healthcare, losing their jobs or their homes, or all three at once. Thanks, george.
So we have these two men to choose from…
On one side what I see is a smart, respectful, measured young man who seems calm under pressure & who seems to live his values. Married to one woman for–oops, he forgot how many years. HA..any married woman’s familiar with THAT sort of thing from a husband. I know I am. Somehow I’d find that a lot easier to forgive than if I found he’d shouted out “Kill him!” at a rally. Because damn, that much therapy’s expensive.
On the other side I see a too-easily rattled, erratic, & shockingly disrespectful man with a short fuse who seems—to my mind— to live values the opposite of the ones he claims to hold; a man who has lately fanned the flames of racial bigotry and who has– I’m sorry, this STILL boggles my damn mind– actually called his wife a ‘cunt’ in public, in front of reporters, yet! (‘media ethics’? oxymoron?)
But oooh, the first guy is ‘black’! (bi-racial, actually, but I guess that’s too ‘nuanced’…he’s got some black blood, therefore he’s black).
So faced with this continuing, couldn’t-be-more-blatant criminal suppression of votes on one side, and with the issues-driven, wildly successful (and way too reminiscent of ’04) get-out-the-vote effort on the other, the choice certainly seems crystal-clear to me. And yet we still hear about these amazingly detached, still-pondering-the-options, Solomon-like ‘undecided voters’.
Who ARE these people? What part of this crazed obscene carnival is still unclear to them?? To say “I don’t get it” is a monumental understatement.
David Sedaris puts it metaphorically, and far better than I ever could. He likens our options to the dinner choice offered by an imaginary airplane stewardess:
“”¦’Can I interest you in the chicken?’ she asks. ‘Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?'”¦”
Hmmmmmm…..I’ll need a bit more time to decide……
Thank you, Jeannie, #11, for addressing my question! Much appreciated. ~Joan
Hey, Zap, nice to see you. Obama does not seem to be updated in the dictionaries of the world…. I keep getting the little red line under it when I type it.
Errr… “undecideds”?
This is not the time or the place for an Obama spinfest, especially as the “undecideds” are already having their decisions made for them in that respect.
In fact the “undecided” voters will turn out to have voted exactly how the machines said they voted… just like everybody else.
Just submitted this to the Obama campaign. Thanks for the link.
There are reports of vote flipping in early voting from West Virgina, Tennessee, Missouri, and Texas so far. All of them flipping from Democrat to Republican. There is also finally a lawsuit filed in Pennsylvania by the NAACP to get more paper ballots available as an alternative to the DREs. This should be vigorously supported. Where’s the Obama campaign? Where are all those lawyers at the ready? As I’m sure you’re well aware we need to be fighting the battle on all fronts. I believe millions of Americans are more than ready to back you up on these issues. Please supply leadership on the vulnerability of electronic voting front. We’re starving for someone to stand up for our right to have our votes counted as cast. Let’s go!
(more info on all this at BradBlog.com) thanks for all your work,
David Lasagna
also–left a message for Rachel Maddow at her Ask Dr. Maddow line–212 871-8173–asking her to ask one of those lawyers when they plan on doing something about the vote flipping. Maybe she’d be moved by few more calls.
I figgered Ed’s link would have something to do with dick 😉
99: Hmmm… so could it be a design feature that wordpress is constantly whispering in my ear that “Obama” is in error? 🙂
Willburrr… I smelled fowl … when I heard votes were flipping from
MaGoo to Obama !
Oh, crikey, Zap, that must be a nightmare for you! Can’t you tell your machine that it’s not an error? I think, actually, that the spellcheck features are in our browsers, too. I get the same thing on other software and other sites. So I think the browser people should update the dictionaries.
Or… they’re Republican shills… 😛
This is for Ed….
In Montgomery Cty, Texas, yesterday my husband tried to vote straight ticket. We had been forewarned that the machines had problems with straight tickets. His vote kept popping back to Mccain/Republican. Twice this happened. Next to him, my machine was doing fine, I had gone line by line. When I told him to go back and do a line by line two older women immediately came over and told me I could not talk to him. I said it is my husband, she replied, “it is illegal for you to talk to him without being sworn in.”
Today I called our Election Office to ask about this and was told I could help my husband if I didn’t touch the screen. Supposedly they are checking if his vote was registered.
99: … and it turns out you’re right. The Konqueror web browser I use for graphical sites has a choice of built-in spell checkers and the default client, “Aspell”, was turned on.
So the WordPress Republican Conspiracy Theory fails…
And it wasn’t a problem anyway as it was only applied to the form input text box for comments… so my malady was self-inflicted, of limited extent, and easily cured 😉
Well, that’s a relief. I was having visions of you sitting there enduring untold agonies while your machine was reading you the typo-laden threads of Blogistan and holding my head….
These vote-flipping machines are a set-up. A dry run.
My theory: The noecon operatives are testing the American public and media with machines that reveal a blatant “error” that favors the Republicans, but is apparently easily fixed. (Although thanks to the UCSB team we know the flipped vote could still go through, even after being corrected.)
This is a test to see what our response will be.
They are getting confirmation that the response will be minimal, and can be framed as either voter error, or liberal wingnuts trying to wreak havoc with our wonderful election system.
Then, on election day, they can run these vote-flipping machines with impugnity, confident that between the American media and the oh-so-cautious Democratic candidates, no one will comment on the elephant in the living room, except us predictable wingnuts.
Sweet, eh?
That’s what I think.
Wilburrr… It Cracks me up how all the maggots come crawling out of the woodwork come election time . . .
Someone who’s experienced this needs to call Obama’s headquarters immediately. Their contact number is on the website.
Lora, I think your right…oh look at the shiny object over there!
Please shut up about the Obama nonsense.
I hate to ruin it on election day for you, but no one in the Obama campaign cares about this. No one is really paying attention to electronic issues. They think they can win by overwhelming numbers.
If they say the machines are broken, that means the GOP can say the election was illegitimate. They will continue to look the other way as long as they are winning.
I’ve spoken to high level Obama people and they really have no clue about voting machines. They have no clue about voting machine allocations or malfunctioning touchscreens. They think out of state lawyers standing around outside of polling places makes a difference.
The Obama campaign is waiting until there are problems and they will use their high tech comm system to send these reports up the flagpole on election day. It will be totally useless, but that is their plan.
Obama, just like McCain, could give less a crap about counting every vote. They only care about counting your vote when the election is close enough that it might matter.
Brad,
It seems the states are doing something different. Where to begin?? It seems everyone should bombard…okay, contact… their congressmen to amend/repeal HAVA to get rid of the machines and use paper ballots, pencil and oversight of the counters. With all the problems we have, Canada (as you know!) has the results of their election by 11pm.
I live in Dallas. I voted last Wednesday on a touch-screen voting machine. It is not easy to trust a system knowing that the machines are unreliable. I even hit the back button to make sure my vote for Obama was still checked — it was. Although the machine did not flip the vote I did not feel comfortable after I hit the “vote” button because nothing showed my vote was accepted.
I have to admit Iam surprised that Obama’s people aren’t on top of this since he has an army of around 5000-plus attorneys — I believe I read that some had already been called to deal with problems in Florida and Ohio. I’ve seen several reports about machines flipping to McCain in West Virginia, but no mention was made whether Obama’s attorneys had looked into this. What is especially disturbing is the poll workers are telling the voters not to worry about it — that their vote was counted. (Sure it was counted … for McCain).
The possibility that voters — especially those who stand in line an hour or more, some for even as long as 5 hours — are not paying close attention to whether the machine flipped their vote makes me wonder how many votes are not corrected?
Whether a voter intends to vote for Obama or McCain is not so much the point — as much as every vote should count. But it becomes the point when machines only flip to McCain.
Someone mentioned Obama would not win Texas so that should be no big deal. We do not know that for a fact considering all the new voter registrations — many of whom use cell phones only — aren’t usually polled.
The republicans do not want to lose power. They are absolutely frantic. But we must not allow another election to be stolen. There is simply too much at stake.
Therein sitting idly by doing nothing is not an option! Channel your angst, frustration and outrage toward taking action now. Call your local TV and radio stations, write letters to local and national media. Until they get enough complaints this will not get reported.
I am English and amazed at the American obsession with voting machines which cost thousands of dollars and only used once a year. I understand you get the result out almost immediatetly the polls close but in presidential polls the new president does not take office until January !!
Bill Topping ~ More like Billions of dollars in total and it’s a Travesty !
It’s funny how we never hear anything about the massive voter registration fraud being carried out by the Marxist front group ACORN. I wonder why???
[Ed note: You’re not hearing about it here because it’s not true. –99]
Looks like our fat american fingers werent made compatible with the sensitivity of the touch screen itself. Maybe the machine is more accustomed to the skinny illegal immigrant fingers that are rampant amongst the population trying to vote.
Perhaps placing a sign on the machine that says no voting with elbows allowed. Most americans eat with elbows on the tables, they probably elbow rested the screen.
A side note for all of you obama supporters out there, ill see you on the front lines of ww3. The one where america gets taken over by terrorists from the inside. Remember those sleeper cell’s that we have? Well guess who is their main man in command. OBAMA n’ BIDEN. Not OSAMA BINLADEN. Get a clue and read between the lines for once.
You are voting for a terrorist. By choice.
Think of it like this, the word Change, what does it mean.
Change the constitution,
Change the bill of rights
Change your freedoms
Change your trust in god
Change your country from bad to worse
Now Change your mind, and vote for mccain.
… bat man -er… never mind… 99 said I couldn’t do that anymore… 😉
… but if it isn’t obama fans blinded by the spin it’s racist rethuglican spew instead?
Hint for you, bat-brains: the problem isn’t the nigh-nonexistent specter of voter fraud that the rethugs like to terrorize themselves with… the problem is all the perfectly legal votes being prevented, diverted, and or corrupted in transit… and the electoral machinery -both metaphysical and literal- that encourages such corruption.
An illegal Pakistani immigrant will not be able to steal a rethugs vote…
… but the GOP and the Bushies have both openly admitted that they’re working like hell to steal mine.
Pisses me off.
And Obama and the DNC are busy ignoring it (after the grandiose promises to the contrary) which also pisses me off…
Please, tell me this is just an isolated case.
If the premise of this post is true, no, it can’t be true. I will not believe it.
Computer problems perhaps? Snaffu’s in the system?
Common in every sophisticated system.Shit happens.
It’s pretty easy to get a digital in a ladies purse-not so easy for men. Proof would be appreciated, otherwise it’s just hear-say.
… Smarty Pants said…
(Grade school word juxtaposition omitted for sanity’s sake)
Forget it… the nekoanarchists will be the ones to seize control of the means of catnip production, comrade!
But Smarty Pants also made a list!
… Very good, Smarty Pants! You have correctly listed Bush and and the Rethugs accomplishments over the past eight years! Now let’s work on your multiplication tables…
(Hmmm… Wouldn’t Bush and the Rethugs be a lousy name for a band?)
Zap
It seems the shill mill has gotten wind of this thread and they just do it to irritate people so badly that we pop up with all kinds of invective against their assholishly tedious lies. They don’t recognize their collusion with plutocrats is digging their own graves right along with the rest of ours. Scrambling for minimum wage in their sweat shops, they figure your vote isn’t as important as their paycheck. They make it a big old game, however many of their fellows are starving and dying in the streets. One more trip to the drive-up window at McDonald’s beats caring about the rest of us every time.
Wilburrr… ~ Don’t trip over the trangents and riff-raff . . . . .
“Someone should tell Hitler.” You people need to wake up. Neocon – “liberal” with a new name. Politics is the elites game, if you play you have to play by their rules. I am from Texas and the elite(rep and dem) have been “stealing” elections long before electronic voting. Wake up, this election process is an illusion. The only vote that counts is Rockefeller’s or the “crown”. The only choice we have is, which one of Bush’s cousin you want to “vote” for, Barky or son of Cain. Why are most of the previous pres related to each other and the British/German crown? Wake up and look at the big picture, in other words long term instead of the short term memory mentality. Whoever gets “elected” is only a puppet, 8 years of Bushy should tell you that. If you are expecting “change” for the better you are in for a rude awakening. Wake up, you are fighting each other instead of the real problem, the ones running the show behind the scenes.
Chi0ne1 ~ “Someone should tell Hitler.” I talked to him yesterday … He Knows … and send you his regards . . .
Saw Mark Crispin Miller on PBS talking about this computer voter fraud.
His book proves it.
The name of the book is Loser Take All by Mark Crispin Miller.
During the P.B.S. interview he said there is nothing that can be done other then video it so after the fact it can be proven.
guys … has it ever occurred to you, that Obama and his team just might have something up their sleeves? No way they are just going to ignore these issues, they’re too smart for that. So don’t despair. There is some sort of “counter insurgency” being planned to thwart the theft of this election, don’t worry. I refuse to believe otherwise. They are not asleep at the wheel – no way. But, maybe they want to keep their strategy quiet for now … so that the thieves can’t plan to counter-act it. I really think they must have some plans in place to ensure that this election is as honest as possible. Take heart.