This is really getting annoying. This should be a no-brainer, right? What am I missing? Why would there be ANY resistance to having a way to verify a machine count or even just to have a recount?
As Wired.com reports, Diebold may face criminal charges after a voting systems panel in California recommended on Thursday that the Secretary of State decertify the Diebold system and that the Attorney General pursue criminal and/or civil charges against the company.
(This is the same system used in Georgia.)
wired
And by the way, an audit of California’s voting machines by the Secretary of State showed that every single system provided to them was an uncertified system. Every single one.
calvoter story
Dennis Kucinich calls for suspending use of electronic voting machines.
kucinich website
A citizens group in Maryland sues the state Board of Elections for using unsafe, and therefore illegal, voting machines.
baltimoresun.com
The Georgia election code ALLOWS changes to our voting machines without recertification.
...Let that sink in for a moment...
Code section 21-2-324(f) says:
(f) When a machine has been so approved, no improvement or change that does not impair its accuracy, efficiency, or capacity shall render necessary a reexamination or reapproval of the machine or of its kind.
www.legis.state.ga...
Unfortunately, it is not clear as to who shall determine whether a change impairs accuracy or not. Are we to take the manufacturers word for it? (Please note that the CEO of Diebold recently said he was “committed to delivering the Ohio vote to Bush” in a fundraising letter.
commondreams )
The Georgia code also says: “(g) Neither the Secretary of State, nor any examiner appointed by him or her for the purpose prescribed by this Code section, nor any superintendent, nor the governing authority of any county or municipality or a member of such authority, nor any other person involved in the examination process shall have any pecuniary interest in any voting machine or in the manufacture or sale thereof. “ (21-2-324(g))
Which is fine, except is doesn’t provide any procedure for checking or verifying such a conflict. Who checks? How do they check? Are their tax returns available? Are we supposed to trust them when they tell us they have no pecuniary interest? Who wrote this language anyway?
When one thinks of ways to alter votes maliciously and attempt to hide the effort, figuring out a way to change only certain votes- rather than wholesale changes- seems to be the simplest way to approach it. So is there any evidence of such a symptom? Hmmm.
“...county officials tested one of the machines in question yesterday and discovered that it seemed to subtract a vote for Thompson in about "one out of a hundred tries...”
And that wasn’t even Diebold!
washingtonpost.com story
In an tragic accident, the CEO of a leading manufacturer of secure voting systems was killed in March.
www.tennessean.com...
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