Susan Pynchon: Diebold in Florida

There's been big questions from the 2000 and 2004 elections about whether the election system is rigged. In the 2004 elections a big sideshow formed around electronic voting machines, especially those from Diebold. The electronic voting systems (a.k.a. touchscreen voting) was supposed to fix the glaring problem with the 2000 election fiasco, which centered on the punch card system. But that's presuming touchscreen voting is the only alternative, which it is not.

"I Saw It Hacked": Diebold in Florida by Susan Pynchon relates a test performed in Leon County Florida of the Diebold voting system installed there. This test has become rather infamous as the "Harri Hursti Hack".

What she describes is a staged test. They ran a small mock election in which Harri Hursti demonstrated a vulnerability with the Diebold voting software.

Her article contains this very powerful paragraph:

And there, on the central tabulator screen, appeared the altered results: Seven "Yes" votes and one "No" vote, with absolutely no evidence that anything had been altered. It was a powerful moment and, I will admit, it had the unexpected result for me personally of causing me to break down and cry. Why did I cry? It was the last thing I thought I would do, but it happened for so many reasons. I cried because it was so clear that Diebold had been lying. I cried because there was proof, before my very eyes, that these machines were every bit as bad as we all had feared. I cried because we have been so unjustly attacked as "conspiracy theorists" and "technophobes" when Diebold knew full well that its voting system could alter election results. More than that, that Diebold planned to have a voting system that could alter results. And I cried because it suddenly hit me, like a Mack truck, that this was proof positive that our democracy is and has been, as we have all feared, truly at the mercy of unscrupulous vendors who are producing electronic voting machines that can change election results without detection.

Okay, so she managed to put together a powerful paragraph, but I don't see her report demonstrating what she claims. Nowhere in her report is this claim substantiated:

However, the Hursti hack is individually significant because the flaw it exposed is a planned vulnerability in the system, not something that is accidentally there. It had to be PUT there (programmed) on purpose.

I work with software and software quality in my job. I know very well that every piece of software has bugs in it. The existance of a bug doesn't constitute proof that the author purposely put that bug there.

She has not demonstrated that Hursti's hack is anything more than a bug in Diebold's software.

It's easy to point a finger at the Diebold corporation and claim they're evil. Their CEO was widely quoted before the 2004 election as boasting about how GW Bush would win the election. And of course it's easy to think, that might not have been bravado, but knowing that he can go in and twiddle the election results and ensure that GW Bush would win the election.

I agree with her theory -- it's very possible for Diebold or any other election hardware vendor to be selling machines which contain backdoors allowing elections to be rigged. For our democracy to succeed we have to ensure that's not the case, and that has to involve independant auditing of the voting machines. The secrecy surrounding the election hardware is troubling as it impedes the public from independantly verifying the voting machines are trustworthy. Unless the people can trust the voting machines, how can the people trust that our representatives were properly elected?

But that's just a theory until you can prove the assertion. In her story she brushes over the proof, jumping from describing the test to concluding that therefore Diebold purposely implanted the backdoor which Hursti walked through.

Carter-Baker commission recommends voting system improvements

Panel calls for improved voting lists, ID requirements (Monday, September 19, 2005, CNN.COM): Concerns a bipartisan commission chaired by Pres. Carter and James Baker. The commission was geared to making recommendations concerning the conduct of American elections.

What is the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform?

The Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform is a panel of distinguished civic and political leaders co-chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James A. Baker III. Dr. Robert Pastor, Director of American University's Center for Democracy and Election Management, serves as Executive Director of the Commission. The twenty-one members of the Commission represent a broad spectrum of the American political experience.

COMMISSION ON FEDERAL ELECTION REFORM

The full report and other information is available here: http://www.american.edu/ia/cfer/

The CNN article lists these as some of the recommendations:

• Congress should pass a law requiring voter-verifiable paper audit trails on all electronic voting machines.
• States should require voters to present photo IDs and offer free photo IDs to those who don't have drivers' licenses.
• All "legitimate domestic and international election observers" should be granted unrestricted access to the election process, within the rules of the election.
• News organizations should voluntarily refrain from projecting any presidential election results in any state until all polls have closed in all states but Alaska and Hawaii.
• States should establish uniform procedures for the counting of provisional ballots, which voters can use when there are questions about their registration.
• Also, states should develop registration systems that allow easy checks of voters from one state to another and the purging of outdated voter records

The article also discusses a recommendation by the private Commission on Federal Election Reform to change the primary system to schedule the primaries regionally. But it isn't clear from the article whether this recommendation was also made by the Carter Baker commission.

The theme I see is increased reliability of voter identification, and improved verifiability. I of course strongly support voter-verifiable paper trails.

For example if the election were conducted with a touch screen system, and the touch screen computer produced a paper card containing the votes. So long as the card is printed with a known font, font size, etc, then it's easily scannable by a computer, and at the same time is easily human readable. Hence, we would have the advantage of digitized information allowing a quick counting process, while at the same time giving the people comfort knowing their vote was registered properly and can be recounted easily.

But that leaves as an issue the red flag discussed yesterday. There's a concern with Deibolds tabulating computers whether or not there's security holes. You could have the front end of the system, the vote taking, be nice and orderly, but with insecure tabulating computers the election validity would still be unclear.

The commission was conducted with the assistance of: http://electiononline.org/

Deibolds role in rigged voting

Background: Following the fiasco finish to the 2000 U.S. presidential elections (effectively dramatized by Michael Moore) there was major hue and cry to "fix" the election system. I guess some people took "fix" a different way than the people meant them to take it. In the 2004 election we had the rise of "voting machines" which were supposed to be easier than the punch card system. The spin put forward was the 2000 fiasco was due to confusion on the voters part, with the punch card ballots being problematic to use. Supposedly having a touch screen is easier.

While punch cards are straight out of the 1930's in terms of technological prowess, I think the use of voting machines ought to be rethought. As a computer professional I know damn well that digitally recorded information is very changable, and as a U.S. citizen I dearly want my vote to be properly recorded and counted.

Digitally recorded votes are susceptible to being untraceably changed, with the only safeguard being the security of the computers used to take votes, transfer votes, and process votes.

One of the stories that emerged in 2004 is at http://www.BlackBoxVoting.org/ ... it concerns relative insecurity of the dominant voting machine, built by Diebold. For example, the Diebold CEO was also highly involved with the Bush campaign and was recorded boasting that Bush would win the 2004 election. Considering the closeness of that election, it's very "interesting" for him to have made such a boast.

One of the things BlackBoxVoting.org did in 2004 was locate and publish a bunch of Diebold internal memos detailing known security problems with their voting machines, how they had circumvented the qualification processes which were meant to properly certify the machines for use in elections, etc.

Now we have "The Brad Blog" with this stunning exclusive story: EXCLUSIVE! * A DIEBOLD INSIDER SPEAKS! DIEB-THROAT : 'Diebold System One of Greatest Threats Democracy Has Ever Known' Identifies U.S. Homeland Security 'Cyber Alert' Prior to '04 Election Warning Votes Can be 'Modified Remotely' via 'Undocumented Backdoor' in Central Tabulator Software!

Basically what we have here is an insider anonymously contacting this Brad fellow. Apparently the insider is fairly high level, having represented Diebold to the public at times. He tells that certain problems are well known within the company, but that there is a top-down demand for silence on these problems. The people who have spoken up about it have been "isolated".

The problem cited is "remote access" to the GEMS central tabulator machines. Each one has a modem in it which, if connected to a phone line, allows remote access to the tabulator machine. Further the security on the remote access port is weak enough that the US-CERT (a cyber-security team) has rated it a "medium" risk, which is pretty damn flimsy. Hence, modifying the election on a broad scale wouldn't require cooperation from a large team, but could involve a small team who goes around accessing tabulator machines remotely and changing the election results.

It's easy to see in this the typical scared corporates trying to cover up a problem 'lest it hurt the sales figures which directly ties to the stock price. This reaction has happened over and over in various corporate-connected disasters throughout the ages. For example, take tobacco and smoking. For decades, while people were continuing to die from smoking tobacco, the people being told there wasn't any proof connecting tobacco smoking with lung cancer, but all along the tobacco companies knew there was a connection. Their denials were directly tied to preserving sales, because if they told the truth their sales probably would have plummeted. Well, considering what's happened now that we know that tobacco smoking causes lung cancer ... their sales might not have plummeted as badly as they feared.

In any case, the Brad Blog guy got to talk with a Diebold PR guy who denied everything and provided a whitewashing study that supposedly proves the Diebold machines helps with greater accuracy in the elections.

I don't care if their machines helped in a few ways ... so long as they cannot be independantly validated, so long as they're provided under veils of corporate secrecy and whitewashing, so long as there's no paper trail allowing truly independant validation of the election results, etc, then we cannot trust our elections. If we cannot trust our elections, then how can we trust that the politicians are going to be held accountable to us???

In the U.S. the politicians are theoretically supposed to serve us. Obviously in recent years this theory has been demolished. But that's part of the social contract forming the bedrock of this country. We the people need to take our country back.

Count Every Vote, because every vote COUNTS

Kerry cites voter intimidation examples (Sunday, April 10, 2005 Posted: 7:37 PM EDT (2337 GMT) CNN.COM)

I suppose he's risking accusations of sour grapes. However, John Kerry appeared at a League of Womens Voters event and said:

"Last year too many people were denied their right to vote, too many who tried to vote were intimidated," the Massachusetts senator said at an event sponsored by the state League of Women Voters.

"There is no magic wand. No one person is going to stand up and suddenly say it's going to change tomorrow. You have to do that," he said.

As I've previously covered (look backwards in the 2004 election category) the 2004 election did have quite a few irregularities. And despite the denials of the Republican camp, the irregularities were at their behest, and performed by people in close cahoots with the Republican leadership.

Democracy in-action, U.S. versus Ukraine

An interesting sideline to the U.S. national election just concluded, is the Ukraine election which happened at the same time. Both elections ended in a very close vote, with a certain cloudiness to the results. Yet in the U.S. there's no outcry, while in the Ukraine the "loser" refused to take on the "loser" role, and instead declared that he really is the winner, that the election was rigged, and there have been mass protests in the streets since.

Democracy inaction If U.S. officials who are complaining about election fraud in Ukraine applied the same standards in Ohio, then our own presidential election certainly was stolen. By James K. Galbraith; salon.com Nov. 30, 2004

In this salon.com article, Galbraith compares the election results in Ohio with the Ukraine, and thinks the U.S. form of democracy is coming up wanting. I wonder, in 2000, how much of of Al Gore's calculus was being shy of risking a confrontation, risking raising the ire of the people. Would (I'm thinking out loud) the republicrats be afraid they'd lose control of the game if the people were to take to the streets in a massive way as they are in the Ukraine? And what of Kerry's calculus in 2000? One side is that he could simply return to being a Senator, and try again in 2008, while another side is the size of the vote gap that we covered earlier, and the unlikelihood of any recoount overcoming the size of the gap.

It's interesting to ponder "what if" either democratic candidate had been braver. But what about us, the people, of whom this more perfect union is created? Where is our will in this? It is, supposedly, our will which causes the more perfect union that is this country to exist, yes? Why is our will so badly represented by our supposed representatives?

Since that's such a large question, I'll just have to leave that as a question for the reader to ponder.

In the meantime you might find the companion article also interesting: Where democracy refuses to die The media was pro-government. In much of the country, the election machinery was controlled by the ruling party. Voter fraud was rampant. But the people of Ukraine will not surrender. By David Talbot; salon.com Nov. 30, 2004

The Talbot article is an interview of Olena Prytula, editor in chief of Ukrayinska Pravda (Ukrainian Truth).

You know, as Stalin said, it doesn't matter who votes, it's who counts.

In the disputed regions of Ukraine, Yanukovych's people controlled the results counting. Comparitively, in Ohio it was George W Bush's Ohio Campaign manager who was also the Secretary of State and hence in control of the people counting the results. As they say, it doesn't matter who votes, but who does the counting.

Ohio judge denies recount request

Ohio judge denies recount request

Wednesday, November 24, 2004 Posted: 7:55 AM EST (1255 GMT) CNN.COM

As noted previously there's a few questions of foul-play in the latest election. Some people requested a recount in Ohio, but the recount has been denied (for now) until the first count becomes "official". Once officialized the Judges will consider the recount request.

"We're Sorry" and "Apologies Accepted"

Here's an interesting bit of global healing that spontaneously sprang up after the 2004 US election.

http://www.sorryeverybody.com/ is a "foto blog" which is allowing people to express how sorry we are that Bush won this time. It's full of photographs ...

The companion site
http://www.apologiesaccepted.com/
is for people from around the world to say something like "we accept your apologies".

I'm really liking the outpouring of concern between the U.S. and the rest of the world that's happening through these two web sites. The highest purpose of the Internet is to provide connection between us all, and here it is happening.

Shaking up the cabinet

Since the election the cabinet has seen a few departures. It's known that over 1 1/2 years ago, Bush required his cabinet members to stay on, and not resign, until after the election. Now that the floodgates are open, we have people leaving and being replaced.

So far the departures and replacements indicate that the administration is going to take an even harder line. For example the replacement Attorney General is the fellow who wrote memo's giving legal cover for the torture in places like the Guantanamo Bay and abu Ghraib prisons.

As of November 16, here are the departures:

• Colin Powell: Secretary of State; being replaced by Condoleeza Rice (cnn article)
• John Ashcroft: Attorney General; being replaced by Alberto Gonzales (cnn article)
• Don Evans: Secretary of Commerce
• Rod Paige: Secretary of Education
• Ann Veneman: Secretary of Agriculture
• Spencer Abraham: Secretary of Energy

Apparently along with Colin Powell, the whole senior management of the State Department is leaving. So much for moderation in the second term.

Along with cabinet departures there is a shakeup at the CIA.

Top leaders of CIA's clandestine service resign
Monday, November 15, 2004 Posted: 11:14 PM EST (0414 GMT) CNN.COM

As The CIA Turns...
WASHINGTON, Nov. 16, 2004 CBS NEWS

Top CIA staff quit US spy agency
Last Updated: Tuesday, 16 November, 2004, 04:34 GMT BBC

C.I.A. Churning Continues as 2 Top Officials Resign
By DOUGLAS JEHL
Published: November 16, 2004 NYTIMES.COM

Spies rise up against CIA chief
By Marcus Warren in New York
(Filed: 15/11/2004)
Telegraph.co.uk

CIA purge may be in the works
New director allegedly was told to get rid of those disloyal to Bush
By KNUT ROYCE
Newsday - published in Houston Chronicle

CIA's No. 2 official retires amid reports of infighting
Saturday, November 13, 2004 Posted: 1628 GMT (0028 HKT) CNN.COM

ActForChange.com activism

Even though salon.com did a good job debunking the specific issues raised concerning the 2004 election, I feel concerned. The use of paper-trail-lacking voting machines must be stopped, for example, since we must have accountability in the voting system.

ActForChange.com (a division of Working Assets) has two calls for action out right now. The action is simple, sending an email to congress-people asking for investigation and reform.

Investigate Electronic Voting Machines

http://www.workingforchange.com/activism/action.cfm?ItemId=18055

Pass Meaningful Election Reform

http://www.workingforchange.com/activism/action.cfm?ItemId=18051

Make Election Day a National Holiday

http://www.workingforchange.com/activism/action.cfm?itemid=17781

Election validity concerns

UPDATE [November 10, 2004] salon.com has an article today examining most of these issues, and finding good and simple explanations for all of them. Salon.com is not the kind of organization that would whitewash over issues, but revels in digging up dirt. The explanations they offer are good to my eye.

Was the election stolen?
The system is clearly broken. But there is no evidence that Bush won because of voter fraud.

BLACK BOX VOTING (web site, book) bills itself as "Consumer protection for elections". As the site says:

Voting without auditing. (Are we insane?)

In other words, we hold a vote, then do not double-check whether the vote was tampered with. I find the idea compelling, especially with what she reports in a pilot study:

Such a request [ed- freedom of information act] filed in King County, Washington on Sept. 15, following the primary election six weeks ago, uncovered an internal audit log containing a three-hour deletion on election night; “trouble slips

Voter turnout highest since 1968

Voter turnout highest since 1968 (CNN)
Wednesday, November 3, 2004 Posted: 2:17 PM EST (1917 GMT)

One bright spot of this election is the higher level of interest. This is reflected in voter turnout. On NPR in their interviews with officials around the country, one point that came up over and over is the heavy turnout.

This reminds me of an interchange I had in a college course. The professor was talking about how voter turnout is high in many other countries, primarily the ones with a parliamentary system. He posed the question "why". The answer I shot back was "people here are bored with politics, in those countries the stakes are higher and it's more interesting overall" to which he said "interesting".

As I noted on "Ranked Choice" or "Instant Runoff" voting a few days ago, the U.S. election system isn't very representative. Since it's winner-take-all rather than proportional representation, the voters are highly incentivized to vote for the winner rather than the one who best represents their voice.

In this presidential race I found myself with two poor choices, and picked the least poor of the choices (well, Kerry would have been a pretty good choice, but I had a clear preference for Wesley Clarke). That's because my agenda was to get Bush out, leaving Kerry as the strongest voice to support who stood a chance of defeating Bush.

If the election were proportionally representational, I could have voted my conscious with less qualms. Say Clarke were still votable, I could have listed him as my primary choice, listing Kerry as the secondary choice, etc. Or it might be even more precise than that, because in the countries that do have proportional representation there are lots of parties available to choose from.

Still, it's exciting that so many people turned out. The people seem energized about politics in a way I hadn't thought possible. Heck, I'm energized about politics in a way I hadn't thought possible. I plan to keep up the sort of activism I've been doing, because I know my ideas and voice are worthy of being spoken. Just as everybody elses voices and ideas are worthy of being spoken.

We have a country to take back from the corporatist pseudo-royalty that have hijacked this country. They have bought and paid for the presidency twice now, and their candidate has a real mandate now rather than the pseudo mandate he stole in 2000, and they are about to get their dream supreme court justice (Renhquist will be dead soon). We have to keep the pressure on our representatives to represent us.

Vote results watching

It's 10:15 PM PST (1:15 EST) and Fox News has called Ohio for Bush. Is Bush's cousin still news director there?

Okay, that's a cheap shot ... I'm surprised since 50% of Cincinnati remains to be counted and the difference is around 100,000 votes. While that's a strong lead, Cincinatti has a lotta voters and all around the country the urban areas are voting democratic. I think it's still too early to call Ohio right now.

UPDATE [10:57 PM]: Saw on
salon.com
a field report that some inner-city precincts in Ohio did not have enough voting equipment, and that people are still waiting in line to vote at midnight their time.

UPDATE [11:35 PM]: CNN has called Michigan for Kerry, while none others have. This is not a surprise though, and most of the other uncalled states are expected to go to Kerry. If Bush really has Ohio and Kerry has the rest, then we'll have a 269-269 tie.

Hence, Ohio is the key. Cincinatti still has 75% uncounted, but is overall leaning to Bush. The NPR voices keep saying there are many uncounted provisional ballots. There's something like 1/4 million votes remaining to be counted.

At the Kerry-Edwards headquarters, Edwards came out for a late-night speech-let saying they would fight for every vote. We can't expect a concession from them tonight.

UPDATE [11:43 PM]: Fox called Michigan for Kerry.

Apparently the Secretary of State in Ohio had noted they would not count the provisional ballots until the 11th day after the election. Presumably to allow the mail to deliver mailed votes.

UPDATE [2:30 AM]: I'd woke up in the middle of the night and checked. Nevada had been awarded only by NPR to Bush.

UPDATE [6:00 AM]: Other networks have awarded Nevada to Bush, but not all. Conspicuously Fox is not. On the other hand the Bush camp is claiming victory.

Over the past couple weeks there's been a series of salon.com articles pointing to shennanigans by the Ohio Secretary of State that were similar to the shennanigans pulled in Florida in 2000. We'll have to dig through those and see what that's about, as it's clear we're likely to have a drawn out battle over who gets Ohio.

UPDATE [6:08 AM]: CNN's web site reports that 100% of Ohio's counties have reported, with Bush having a 130,000 vote lead. My argument of last night doesn't hold any longer, Cincinatti voted for Bush by a comfortable margin. The only remaining thing to count in Ohio is the "provisional" ballots, which may include the absentee ones...?

Of concern is the report from salon.com of at least one precinct still having voters waiting to vote well into the night (after midnight). How widespread was that? How many voters gave up after such a long wait?

UPDATE [6:25 AM]:

With Echoes of 2000 Vote, Ohio Count Is at Issue (NY TIMES) :
Iowa is planning a recount due to the closeness of results there. The Ohio Secretary of State reportedly told the Bush camp that statistically even the provisional ballots are not enough to help Kerry, hence the Bush camp is claiming victory. The Kerry camp claims there are 250,000 or more provisional ballots in Ohio to be counted.

UPDATE [9:40 AM]:

Kerry calls Bush to concede (CNN) :

A Kerry adviser said the campaign had concluded that the too-close-to-call battleground state of Ohio was not going to come through for the Democrats.

The adviser said there was no way to gain votes on Bush without an "exhaustive fight," something that would have "further divided this country."

... During the brief conversation, Bush told the senator he was "an admirable, worthy opponent."

"You waged one tough campaign," McClellan quoted the president as saying. "I hope you are proud of the effort you put in. You should be."

Kerry must have looked at the numbers and decided the margin was too far out to overcome. The official difference in Ohio stands at around 140,000 votes, with somewhere around 175,000 (or more) provisional ballots to count. In order for them to make a difference, the provisional ballots would have to have been for Kerry at a vastly higher proportion than the regular ballots, which is highly unlikely.

Earlier in the day Andrew Card announced:

We are convinced that President Bush has won re-election with at least 286 electoral votes," Card said. (

CNN Transcript of Card's comments

)

To arrive at that number Bush would have to carry Ohio, Iowa and either New Mexico or Nevada. In other words, to make a clean sweep of the remaining states.

I believe that Bush's congradulation of Kerry and the tough campaign he fought, also applies to all of us who worked on getting the word out.

UPDATE [11:11 AM]: CNN calls Ohio for Bush, leaving New Mexico and Iowa still unaccounted for and Bush's total at 274. Kerry is giving his concession speech.
*** Sigh ***

"Record voter turnout predicted"

I'm listening to the morning news - and they're discussing huge voter turnouts all over the country. Yipee!

VOTE EVERYBODY!!!

"Ranked Choice" or "Instant Runoff" voting

In the 2000 election an issue Ralph Nader pushed very strongly is the disproportionate representation we have among elected officials.

The election system in the U.S. is "winner take all" which ultimately means that we end up with two parties getting the vast majority of the vote. But, really, is the range of individual opinion adequately represented by two parties?

Let me suggest, echoing Ralph Nader, that the two-party winner-take-all system is not doing a good job of representing the will of the people in this country.

We have to take this carefully because this country has a couple hundred years of experience with the system we use. But we can point at many countries around the world where proportional representation exists, and does work. In all those countries there are many "minor" parties, and I believe that the range of individual opinion is much better represented.

Unfortunately I think (haven't verified) that these countries are also ones lacking a separation of power between the branches of government. That is, the Prime Minister of England (currently held by Tony Blair) is a member of Parliament. That would be like the President of the United States being a Congressman (either Senator or Representative) as well as being President.

The Founding Fathers of the United States of America purposely chose separation of powers. Congress (the Legislative branch) is a different branch of government from both the Judicial and Administrative branches of government. Under the equal branches of government theory, the President is elected separately from the Legislature and the President cannot also be a Legislator.

This makes the style of proportional representation used in those other countries unusable in the United States.

However the system that Ralph Nader promoted during the 2000 election cycle is very workable in the United States. A few locations in the U.S. are now using this very same system:

Instant Runnoff --or-- Ranked Choice

The idea is that instead of voting for one person, you rank the top two or three choices among the candidates. You might end up with

Favorite: Mickey Mouse
Next Favorite: Prince Valiant
Least Favorite: Dick Tracy

The individual voter then has more say about who they like. That, by itself, would be a vast improvement over the current situation that devolves our choice into "hold your nose, and vote for the least smelly candidate".

What happens next?

Why, this is magic. In the vote counting machines a fancy dancing shuffle is done.

Say that Mickey is showing badly in the count (Minnie may have cussed out a reporter, for example). Your vote for Mickey is then applied to your next favorite. Suppose Prince Valiant is also not doing so well (maybe Saracens are getting a lot of sympathy this year), so your vote is then moved over to Dick Tracy. This process is repeated for up to three times, or until a winner is found.

What this means to the winner is they have a better assurance that their voters truly preferred them over the other candidates. Under the current system, a voter for Mickey Mouse may have simply found him the least offensive of the available choices, and not truly preferred Mickey at all.

One may think it unfair that when ones vote is moved to a secondary or third choice, that the vote count in full. There is a simple solution to this:

Primary preference: counts full
Secondary preference: counts 1/2
Third preference: counts 1/3

More information

Instant Runoff Voting (IRV) A Fairer Way to Conduct Single-Winner Elections (http://www.fairvote.org/irv/index.html)

American Conservative Mag backs Kerry

Kerry’s the One By Scott McConnell

The referenced article is a damning critique of Bush's presidency, from a Conservative point of view. He doesn't give much credence to Kerry, expects Kerry to be a one-term president largely inneffectual becuase he'd be bogged down with the Iraq situation and a Republican Congress. Perhaps this is the core argument:

Bush has behaved like a caricature of what a right-wing president is supposed to be, and his continuation in office will discredit any sort of conservatism for generations. The launching of an invasion against a country that posed no threat to the U.S., the doling out of war profits and concessions to politically favored corporations, the financing of the war by ballooning the deficit to be passed on to the nation’s children, the ceaseless drive to cut taxes for those outside the middle class and working poor: it is as if Bush sought to resurrect every false 1960s-era left-wing cliché about predatory imperialism and turn it into administration policy. Add to this his nation-breaking immigration proposal—Bush has laid out a mad scheme to import immigrants to fill any job where the wage is so low that an American can’t be found to do it—and you have a presidency that combines imperialist Right and open-borders Left in a uniquely noxious cocktail.

Kerry's patriotism and courage

John Kerry deserves to be the next President of the United States. While I fault him for voting to approve the war in Iraq, I believe he is the perfect person to lead this country at this time.

By way of example let me point to a story of John Kerry and his courage.

How John Kerry exposed the Contra-cocaine scandal

Derided by the mainstream press and taking on Reagan at the height of his popularity, the freshman senator battled to reveal one of America's ugliest foreign policy secrets.

By Robert Parry

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/10/25/contra/index.html

This is a story from the 1980's. Remember the fight in Nicaragua, with the Contra forces fighting to overthrow that government? The story that eventually became the Iran-Contra scandal?

In early 1986, the 42-year-old Massachusetts Democrat stood almost alone in the U.S. Senate demanding answers about the emerging evidence that CIA-backed Contras were filling their coffers by collaborating with drug traffickers then flooding U.S. borders with cocaine from South America.

Kerry assigned members of his personal Senate staff to pursue the allegations. He also persuaded the Republican majority on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to request information from the Reagan-Bush administration about the alleged Contra drug traffickers.

In taking on the inquiry, Kerry challenged President Ronald Reagan at the height of his power, at a time he was calling the Contras the "moral equals of the Founding Fathers." Kerry's questions represented a particular embarrassment to Vice President George H.W. Bush, whose responsibilities included overseeing U.S. drug-interdiction policies.

John Kerry broke that story, by having his own staff investigate it.

The Contra's were up to their eyeballs in aiding the drug trade, so that it would give them more money for their fight. Remember the anti-drug rhetoric of the time?

Apparently hypocrisy and lies are not new with this administration, but have been part of politics for awhile.

In 1984 Congress explicitly forbade aid to the Contras. Yet the Administration kept arranging for aid to the Contras, eventually leading to illegal arms sales to Iraq the profits from which were funneled to the Contras. Yes, we sold arms to Iraq and a few years later invaded Iraq. Somehow it's fitting that "1984" appears at the beginning of this paragraph.

I won't go into all the details - the author of the salon.com story as a journalist of that era was heavily involved in covering this same story, and since wrote a book giving all the details: Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & 'Project Truth'

What I am wanting to say is how this is a perfect example of why John Kerry is the best man to be president at this time. He has several times over his life risked his career in publicly challenging the powers that be to stand for the truth.

Today we are suffering from the lies and mistakes of the powers that be. Today we need for those powers to be challenged.

Bush supporters need a reality lesson

Bush Supporters Still Believe Iraq Had WMD or Major Program, Supported al Qaeda This and other fallacies have been shown to be believed by the majority of Bush supporters, while the majority of Kerry supporters know it to be false.

A recent study
by Program on International Policy Attitudes shows how divergent are the opinions held by Bush and Kerry supporters.

One of the authors of the study has this to say: "To support the president and to accept that he took the US to war based on mistaken assumptions likely creates substantial cognitive dissonance, and leads Bush supporters to suppress awareness of unsettling information about prewar Iraq."

Cognitive dissonance is no doubt a $50 word for the "huh?" factor that happens when you learn a strongly held belief is false.

All I can say is "hurry up and learn the truth already"!!!

Review: Will they trust us again?

This is another gem by Michael Moore, author of several books and movies unveiling some of the ragged truth about modern America. Will they trust us again is nothing more than page after page of letters from the troops.

These are shockingly raw letters talking of lost lives, interrupted dreams, rage at being misused for a war with such shaky premise, and more.

These are the troops who are supposedly all gung-ho fighters, republican to the core, supporting the commander in chief, and so on. Yet letter after letter talks of betrayal by their commanders, and in some cases how they hate their commander in chief.

To be sure the letters speak of dissension in the ranks. There are many gung-ho fighters in the military fully in support of what they're doing in Iraq and elsewhere. It's clear from this book that there are many dissillusioned fighters in that very same military, hating what they are being forced to do, perhaps even hating who they have become.

For example

I hate the army and my job. I am supposed to get out next February but will now be unable to because the asshole in the White House decided that now would be a great time to put a stop loss in effect for the army. So I get to do a second tour in Iraq and be away from those I love again because some asshole has the audacity to put others' lives on the line for his personal war. I thought we were the good guys.

This from an infantryman who began the war in complete support of the President and the stated goals.

("stop loss" is military jargon for the order that has gone out canceling all limits on the length of tour for all soldiers. This and other jargon is something you will learn through reading this book.)

I can't recommend this book more highly, for it will awaken you to the feelings our soldiers are going through. The news reports filtered through official journalism, or the statements by the country's leaders, well, they just cannot do justice to what our soldiers are experiencing on the ground in Iraq. It is in seeing their words, their heart and soul, that we can appreciate what they are doing.

I will warn you however, this is a very powerful book. It is full of heartrending stories. But, then, that's why I'm wholeheartedly recommending it.

Jiggering the vote?

Over the months I've seen a few articles discussing efforts by the Republicans to play with the voting system. Using intimidation against minorities causing them to not vote, or outright tilt the percentages of republicans/democrats voting. Today salon.com has an article detailing a recent story in the news ..

Sproul play
The RNC-funded firm Sproul & Associates stands accused of lying, cheating and even destroying Democratic voter registration forms to get more Republicans to the polls.
(By Farhad Manjoo; http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2004/10/21/sproul/)

The story is that Sproul & Associates set up a faux voter registration drive that was geared to tilting the number of registered Republican voters. What they did is hire temp workers, instruct them to conduct a pretend voter survey, and then for anybody who indicated a preference to support Bush, to offer to register them to vote. If they indicated a preference other than Bush, to walk away.

Now, last summer I did a little impromptu voter registration drive of my own (Self-organized voter registration drives). I know, from having thought about this, from having been in the act of registering voters, that to do it in integrity you either need to

• be up-front about your affiliation
• register anybody

In my voter registration drive, I was willing to register anybody. I believe we all have the right to the voice that is our vote, no matter what ones political leaning. To do anything else is to be incredibly dishonest. But let's get back to the salon.com story ...

Instead Sproul & Associates organization was anything but an integrity driven voter registration operation.

In Las Vegas we have an October 13 news story of a false voter registration scheme that threw away any registration form marked "Democratic". In that case it was Voters Outreach of America, a false front-organization operated by Sproul & Associates.

In Portland OR we have a very similar story, also on October 13. [registration required to read story]

In Pittsburgh PA, well, we have the same story again. This time on October 20.

In Charleston WV there's another story, this time on August 20, of the same scheme with the same outline. To find the article go to the Charleston Gazette web site (http://www.wvgazette.com/), enter "Bragg Sproul" in the search box, and click on the "Library" button.

In Jackson County (Oregon) the story is a little different. In that case, as in several others around the country, a letter was sent to a library asking for permission to conduct a voter registration drive outside the public library. The letter claimed to be from "America Votes" but was not from the real "America Votes" but a false front organization set up by Sproul.

Whitewashing voting problems

Problems with e-voting? Blame the humans

Technology industry group says no problems with voting machines

By Paul Roberts, IDG News Service

http://www.infoworld.com/article/04/10/19/HNvotingproblems_1.html

The article refers to an press kit released by the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA) that attempts to explain possible causes for problems with voting machines.

The press kit is here: http://www.electiontech.org/

As the Infoworld article claims, the site basically whitewashes over technical problems and tries to pin most of the problems on us poor humans.

Well, gee, since when do we have to bend over backwards to kowtow to the limitations of the machines? We're building these machines for our use, to help us, so why shouldn't we expect the machines to be an aid to us rather than a hindrance?

In this case we have to consider what it means to hold an election, and how we can have mechanical assistance that helps us run the elections the way we need them to be run.

For example: votes must be anonymous, votes must be recountable, the system must be reliable, we the people must be able to trust the result, therefore the system must be resistant to tampering, the system must represent the peoples will, etc

Those are a few requirements that come off the top of my head.

A system that does not produce a paper trail is not trustworthy. This is because the bits stored in a computer can be tampered with, but paper is not tamperable.

Here's how I would like to see voting machines be: You'd have a touch screen system designed by human-computer-interface specialists who are given freedom to properly design the user interface for understandability. The voters use the touch screen system, and select their votes. In addition there is ample opportunity for them to "write-in" candidates of their choosing. Next, when the vote is finished, what's produced is a sheet of paper out of a laser printer. The voting machine doesn't tabulate into a central database, instead it's kept standalone. The sheet of paper has the voters vote written in words on the paper, but they formatted for easy scanability. The paper ballot is turned into the election official. At the end of the day the ballots are trucked to a central location, and scanned in.

Such a system should be more reliable than the punch-card systems that have been used, and still preserve recountability as well as the other requirements I listed above.