Brand new touchscreen voting systems failed in GA and PA

[diva77]

https://bradblog.com/?p=13190

SNIP...two-decade old touchscreen voting systems failed in Indiana, including flipping votes for at least the fifth year in a row, while brand-new, 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting systems being deployed in Pennsylvania and Georgia failed fantastically in several counties. Some voters were left unable to vote at all or facing long lines --- even during otherwise sparsely attended off-year municipal elections! Some candidates were left off of the electronic ballots all together and others found themselves with reportedly ZERO votes recorded on the all-new, way-better-than-the-old unverifiable touchscreen computer Ballot Marking Devices (BMDs) tested in both PA and GA before wide deployment for the critical 2020 Presidential election.

In GA, voters were unable to vote in 4 of 6 counties where the new $100 million Dominion Voting Systems ImageCast machines were test run in municipal elections, before they are deployed statewide to 7.5 million voters next year. The electronic pollbook systems that creates voter cards that must be inserted into the touchscreens weren't working properly on Election Day in those 4 counties, after they had worked fine during pre-election tests and early voting.

In the critical battleground state of PA, there were all kinds of problems with the new ES&S ExpressVote XL systems deployed for the first time to Northampton County (where the systems were said to be operating incredibly slowly and results were reported as 0 for some candidates, as later confirmed by the County) and in Philadelphia, where candidate names were missing and many of the machines reportedly refused to work at all. (But this will all be fine by 2020, right?)
SNIP

------
bold type added for emphasis

[True Blue American]

1. We had a choice

Paper or machine. I voted paper. Old fashioned shade the dots as you do in absentee. Then scanned.

[diva77]

2. would be interested to know which county & state offered this choice

[True Blue American]

13. Montgomery County, Ohio

But I think it might just be certain areas. Others only had machines, then scanned.

Much better than the old Diebold machines I learned on after punch cards.

On the machine you put in a paper ballot, take it out, then it is scanned.

All your information is now computerized.. You.are asked to repeat your address.

[diva77]

41. Was the ballot generated by the machine? or were you handed a paper ballot that you hand marked?

Were there barcodes on the paper? If so, see post#38 in this thread

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100212665413#post38

[True Blue American]

42. Handed a ballot

Just like when I vote absentee then scanned. If I had done the machine alone paper would go into the machine vote, then scan. I think they were trying new machines. Every other vote in the res round voted on machines, the ere tinto a scnnr. To m, tht is double checked by aching, but you have papr if there is a recount. I lie the new system. Asked to come back, but the long day is killing. I think 2 shifts would be better, but they have trouble getting Judges.

[rickford66]

8. That's the system here in Broome County NY.

No problems.

[yardwork]

10. That's what we use in my deep blue county in N.C.

[grantcart]

11. The title is very misleading. There was no "failure"

Take GA

1) New machines being introduced are intended to create a paper ballot' and are not touch screen

2) Problems seem to be in pulling up voter registration data, no examples of switched or not counting votes were given.

3) Original article indicated that there were working machines in every precinct and that the problems of some machines caused 45 min delays in some precincts for a brief period.

No indications of incorrect candidate choice were reported.

[questionseverything]

35. of course there is no proof that any reported votes were correctly reported

since no human beings are allowed to verify and no human beings can spot check software

all for 100million bucks plus

<rolls eyes>

[grantcart]

37. that's not the point. The point is that the article on which this blog is based recorded

any allegations of denial of vote, change of candidate, etc.

More galling is that it gives the impression that these problems are consistent with touch screen problems with no paper trail when in fact the articles make clear that the problems that existed (such as calling up the identity of a voter from a data base) are part of an effort to introduce new machines that are specifically designed to create a paper ballot trail, something we all want. It is not remarkable that in transitioning from touch screen to machines that provide a paper trail that there may be some delays on the first major roll out.

But the biggest objection to these knee jerk OPs that automatically register alarm with every glitch is that it contributes to a general, and untrue, impression that there are massive problems in getting an accurate vote in the US.

When people complained about the accuracy of machine in 2016 they were in fact helping the Republicans undermine the election of Obama in 2008 and 2012 when the same machines were used.

In the case of the elections held this week unsubstantiated claims of general failure of vote counts undermines the fact that the Democrats won across the board. It will be these unsubstantiated claims that will be used by Bevin in Kentucky to try and over turn a legal and honest victory by the Democrats.

When you post articles critical of the vote count process when Democrats win you are in total agreement with Breitbart, the alt right and others who suggest that the Democrats stole the election.

[diva77]

38. Election integrity is a nonpartisan issue. The machines are nontransparent regardless

of which party you belong to when you "vote." That is the crux of the problem. We cannot be sure our votes are being counted as cast with computers being part of the process -- you cannot observe what happens to your vote when you submit it to a computer or when a tabulator is used.
We will face objections from both parties for the foreseeable future as long as these nonverifiable election systems continue to be used. And it's not just the equipment - we now have a system of extortion built into our elections systems -- if you hold office, you'd better approve of the budget for the equipment...or else buhbye office.

As for paper ballots, the problem with these ballot marking devices (BMDs) is that you cannot verify your vote since it is translated into computer code -- the bar code on the piece of paper.

Bar code fraud has been a problem in stores that use the bar code system -- an item on the shelf may be labeled as costing 50 cents; however, when that item gets scanned at the check-out, the actual charge from the bar code may differ from what the label on the shelf said -- you could, for example, be charged $50 for the same item.

The BMDs not only generate bar codes, but there is an extra diabolical feature -- when you submit your paper "ballot" after "voting," the BMD is capable of changing or adding votes to the paper.

Elections officials & vendors conducted a study to find out the % of people who don't check their "ballot" after "voting" -- this percentage is critical data for someone trying to calculate how to rig an election as "under the radar" as possible.

[grantcart]

48. Facts are a non partisan issue. Wild inaccurate exageration undermines people's interest

when there are actual problems.

I am guessing that in your rush to embrace the most exaggerated claims that you didn't bother to click through to the original source material that Bradblog was sourcing.

I did for GA and seeing that it wasn't consistent with either Bradblog or your OP didn't bother to continue to read the one about PA.

The original sourced material by the AJC which Bradblog is linked to bears no resemblance to Bradblog's interpretation or your citation of Bradblog.

Let's review what you posted:

while brand-new, 100% unverifiable touchscreen voting systems being deployed in Pennsylvania and Georgia failed fantastically in several counties. Some voters were left unable to vote at all or facing long lines --- even during otherwise sparsely attended off-year municipal elections! Some candidates were left off of the electronic ballots all together and others found themselves with reportedly ZERO votes recorded on the all-new, way-better-than-the-old unverifiable touchscreen computer Ballot Marking Devices (BMDs) tested in both PA and GA before wide deployment for the critical 2020 Presidential election.

As to the allegation that there was widespread system failure, here is what Bradblog's source the AJC actually reports:

https://www.ajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/problem-with-new-election-equipment-delays-voting-georgia-counties/vxltEshk0grck0uJiWA5RM/

Problem with new election equipment delays voting in Georgia counties

Bartow County Elections Supervisor Joseph Kirk said some of the Poll Pads weren’t functioning properly, but there was always at least one working in each precinct.

“It didn’t slow us down at all,” Kirk said. “Everything went fine.”

“It ran as smooth as silk” during early voting, Heard said. “The voters have been overwhelmingly positive with the new system.”

Your claim that "Brand new touchscreen voting systems failed in GA and PA" is not supported by the material that your source quotes.

As to the allegation that it was related to the touch screen part of the voting, the original source material does not support that either.

From the article

Poll workers weren’t able to create voter access cards on new voting check-in computers manufactured by KnowInk. Those cards activate touchscreen voting machines so that they display the ballot associated with the jurisdictions where voters are registered.

In other words there was a kink in the software in some of the machines in some of the precincts linking the voter database so that the voter would get the correct ballot for the jurisdiction where they were voting. I am guessing that there were corrective patches made that weren't uploaded to all of the computers so that a few computers needed to have the fix added.

Nothing in the article indicates that there were problems in vote totals, assigning the correct vote to the correct candidate, etc.

But the greatest lie is in the completely dishonest framing of the actual facts and what happened.

Anybody reading your version of what happened would assume that this is part of a corrupt system trying to use unreliable touchscreen systems to control and influence vote counts. The AJC article documents that the opposite is true but by omitting the context you have given a completely shameful mispresentation of the facts.

Here is what the original sourced material states:

The problem didn’t occur during the previous three weeks of in-person early voting, when about 9,000 voters in the six pilot counties cast ballots on equipment made by Dominion Voting Systems, which won a $107 million state contract this summer to replace Georgia’s electronic voting machines with a system that prints out paper ballots.

In other words these machines are being added to the GA voting system to do exactly what we want: create a paper ballot.

No one reading your OP would have understood that unless they clicked through to the original source which documents a story completely contrary to the impression your OP gives.

Many people think that because in their mind they think they care more about an issue than other people they don't have to spend the time to get the actual facts but rush in with unsubstantiated and reckless assertions. I have a different view. I believe that if you actually care about the material you are posting that you are obligated to click through to the original source. If I don't have time (I work more than 80 hours a week and travel on the road 90% of the time) to do it right then I pass on it. I have 2 hours break tonight and I have decided to go back and reread all of the original source material and how you presented it because I think it is important. Life is short and my time is limited and I don't have the time to invest following anybody who is so careless with facts so I will take advantage of the tools available to make sure our paths don't cross again. That you don't immediate delete the OP only demonstrates your determination to promote something that you emotionally agree with regardless of its accuracy. That is what a lot of Republicans do.

Getting beyond the fantastical claims of your OP I found that the AJC to be illuminating, educational and refreshing for two reasons.

The first reason (which could never be discerned from your OP) is that GA is taking positive steps to have paper ballots available for the March Primary. Good for them.

The second is that there was a very human and touching element to the AJC story which showed that the election workers were very concerned about the human impact that the short delays were causing. This was a very positive story but some people are so concerned with finding anything that supports their preconceived idea what was happening and are determined to cherry pick stories so aggressively that they really miss what is really happening.

No massive failure. One voter was going to miss his opportunity to vote. So what did the election workers and the contractors do? For a change lets not interpret the original source material but let it speak for itself

Some voters were delayed about 15 or 20 minutes, and one precinct remained open until 7:30 p.m. to accommodate a voter who had to leave for work before casting a ballot in the morning, Rigby said. Election workers got around the problem by manually pulling up ballots on touchscreen voting machines so that they displayed the ballot associated with the jurisdictions where voters

Wow election officials working with their contractor to keep a precinct open so that a single voter wouldn't miss his right to vote because he worked long hours. What a scandal.

[diva77]

49. a paper ballot, hand marked would not cause a voter to have to wait longer, or switch booths to vote

in, etc. These malfunctions in the aggregate can affect the outcome.

The cyberexperts have spoken out about these machines. Nothing you posted disproved any claims about voting machines.

We'll just have to agree to disagree.

I'm done with this exchange.

[stopdiggin]

51. "I am done with this exchange"

And I think you should be. The cherry picking from article to OP .. serves to discredit your whole premise. You are free to have, an express, your own opinions .. but you know what the second part of that statement reads.

[questionseverything]

60. the truth is no human being can verify that software is doing what we are told it is doing

without specific testing, which is not allowed

so all the ballot totals are a "trust me system"

that is not the check on democracy our system requires

for 100 million plus an awful lot of paper ballots could be printed

and counted in full public view

you are bright enough to know about the vw software scandal, and you know the same thing could happen counting votes so my question is why are you pretending it is not possible?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_emissions_scandal

[grantcart]

61. Your comments have nothing to do with mine

My point is that nothing in her excerpt related to the original sourced article which reported that

A) there was no systemic failure of touch screen voting, it had nothing to do with the actual voting process.

B) they experienced a temporary problem in the pre voting process of uploading voter data so that the correct data from the voter's ID would pull up the correct jurisdictional ballot for the machine. As only a few machines were effected and those machines were corrected within a few minutes it almost certainly was the result of a corrective soft ware patch that wasn't uploaded properly.

C) the most egregious omission is that this contract was part of a process that we all want done, creating paper ballots and a paper trail. This was an important second test (the first one done on a more limited roll out yielded zero problems) of a new process that will produce a paper ballot and paper trail.

I was suspicious that there would be a) such a quick diagnosis of a problem and b) that there would be identical problems in both Georgia and PA.

When I read the detailed report in the AJC article it was clear that the facts in the local paper were not being reflected in Bradblog report or the OP.

The allegations simply were not true.

It isn't just a "boy cries wolf" scenario, which would be bad enough on such a serious subject as it will undermine people's interest because they will have found that earlier similar reports were untrue, but it is especially reckless to make accusations about election results being the result of a "failed system" when the Democrats way out performed expectations. Breitbart and the GOP in Kentucky would love to report about massive systemic failures and the Democrats didn't really win because of "system failures" in the voting machines, which the local article didn't indicate.

I will match your condescending "your are bright enough" with this "you are bright enough to not just take the OP at face level and click to the article quoted and click through the "interpretation" to read the original source material which paints a completely different than that in Bradblog or the OP.

I think that it is such an important issue that Democratic discussions of it should be accurate and clear, that we should not read local news reports with a preconceived conclusion in mind and then distort the facts to fit what we think, that is what Fundamentalists do when they read the Bible and what Republicans do when they try to cook up allegations of wide spread voter fraud. The methodology is shameful regardless who does it and creates an emerging cloud of Nihilism that tries to paint everything as part of a compromised system that is beyond hope, which in this case is particularly ironic because the good people of Georgia appear to be preparing for a complete paper ballot system by the Presidential Primaries. When put in context the AJC article was a positive article about the election system there taking a major step forward. Nihilism is Trump's religion. His aim is to paint everything as having questionable facts, limitless interpretations, relative moral ambiguity and all of the normal systems need to be handled by a strong man. There is nothing in the AJC that suggests that a single vote was incorrectly made or reported. That is not a "failure". Trying to publish that it is a failure is nothing more than a lazy epistemology with an attempt to twist facts to support a predetermined conclusion, classic Nihilistic nonsense.

[questionseverything]

62. that is a long winded way to say my comments are correct

ur point seems to be if I explain the vote counting process is non transparent, the big bad repubs will see the vote counting process is non transparent

nothing proves the votes were counted incorrectly but nothing you have said proves they were counted correctly

having paper in Georgia is better than no paper but we need human beings to count those paper ballots in an open and transparent manner

[questionseverything]

44. when the vote counting process is not open and transparent it is just a trust me system

trusting the millionaires that own the vote counting machines is not something I am going to do...if you want to scold me for that it is still a semi free country but I think you are the mistaken one

and you have no idea if the vote totals are accurate or not because no one is allowed to inspect the software...you are afraid the democratic governor's election will be challenged in ky well guess what maybe the repubs up and down the line that were "elected" weren't really elected at all...we will never know because we have given up our right to oversee every step of our elections

when a "glitch" can disenfranchise 10s of thousands of voters it is a bs system

[True Blue American]

43. Drivers license

Brings up voter info on IPad . Then you are asked to repeat your adress.

[James48]

3. Paper trail MUST be provided.

Accept no less. Tell your elected reps you will accept no less.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

5. Absolutely. Election security is not an issue only for those who cheat. . . . . nt

[gab13by13]

7. I have been doing that for 15 years in Pa.

and was told I had no choice. I asked for a receipt saying that I voted, and was told no. I asked if I could take a picture of my ballot and was harshly told no way. I told them I was tired in voting into a black hole that had no means of verification. It isn't the poll workers fault I know.

My Rep. is Glenn Thompson, someone who breathes natural gas and drinks oil. He is totally worthless and gets reelected every year because he has an R beside his name.

[Ms. Toad]

12. Allowing you to take proof of who you voted for from the voting place

Allows would allow the Republican party to literally buy the election, since it provides the person whose vote was bought to prove their vote to the person buying it. (Or prove to your abusive spouse you voted the way he wanted, or to prove to your boss that you voted at demanded in exchange for keeping your job),

That is not a theoretical "I don't think the machine counted my vote." It is historical fact that the secret ballot was intended to fix.

[exboyfil]

26. And those problems exist for absentee ballots

Honey let me fill that ballot out for you.

[Ms. Toad]

34. Correct - but the benefit of allowing people who are unable to get to the polls

to have another party return the ballot outweighs the small portion of famlies in which an abusive spouse would vote for his spouse.

The more significant problem is the Republcan Party - or the corporate boss buying votes contingent on proof of how they voted. Those are largely prevented by restrictions on who can return the ballot to the board of elections.

[True Blue American]

14. Paper trails are scanned

So you have both computer and paper. I like the new machines.

[Snoopy 7]

4. DITTO

In Texas our ES&S machines only gave my wife and I the amendments and didn't give us any candidates, even as our choice won. But, I have been warning my wife and others that this would happen and I even told my wife about the Las Vegas hackers that broke into the voting machines in minuets. And she always complains that I "over react/exaggerate" about everything. When I gave her the website she looked at it and discarded the link, and she's got a masters and is continuing her education, as if I was over reacting again...

[BumRushDaShow]

6. The ES&S machines here in Philly were confusing for many elderly

I actually had to wait probably 20 minutes in line (and this was mid-morning when there's normally few if any people voting in my polling division) due to the confusion about how to operate the machine (I had watched the little demo video before I went to vote).

The voter is given a long narrow "blank" sheet that is the "ballot" and that is fed into the machine (similar to how you would feed paper currency into a vending machine) to start the process.



Once the voting is done, the voter selects to "print" it so that the selections can be verified when they are printed onto the blank ballot. But the problem is - the printed ballot descends into and remains inside a voter-inaccessible "chute" with a clear plastic cover and that chute is unlit. So unless there is a huge light shining on the machine from above or within/in front of it, you can't even read what the printout says. And then since the ballot strip is long, and due to the position of the chute, you have to bend down to try to read the selections that print near the bottom (and the whole printout is in a small font to fit on that narrow ballot form).



Once the printed ballot is "visually" verified, a button push sucks it back into the machine and you're done.

I want to go back to this -

[True Blue American]

15. No scanner?

[BumRushDaShow]

18. I'm assuming the ballots are removed from the machines once voting is completed

and put in a scanner by the poll workers?

[Hermit-The-Prog]

39. a scanner is another way to hide real ballots from real people

Scanners displace people. When the paper has been scanned, the paper becomes less important than the electronically developed number. People become dependent on that number.

Elections are vastly more important than check-out lines at the grocery. Paper ballots need to be readable (verifiable) by the voter, observable from vote to count, and counted in public view.

Scanners are not ballots. Scanners hide ballots and the count.

[BumRushDaShow]

40. I agree

although the way this version of the system works, the printed ballots are human-readable with the actual ballot selections printed on them once the voter has made their selections (including both the names/offices of the candidates picked and any ballot questions answered as a yes or no or no response). So theoretically, the stack of ballots could be manually looked at and hand-tabulated, ignoring that QR code that the voting machine generated on the ballot printout for use by the scanner.

I expect the intent of the scanner was to get the vote totals reported faster but my most immediate objection based on what I experienced, was the difficulty "verifying" my printed ballot after I had it print my selections and before submission, due to the lighting situation.

[questionseverything]

45. exactly scanners can be programmed to give incorrect results just like touchscreens

real people counting real ballots in full public view is the only solution

[DeminPennswoods]

16. No you don't

My first election as a judge of elections was one with the old lever machines. There are multiple chances for mistakes. First, you have to deal with an official count ballot for each machine. The year I worked was a judicial retention election, so the official tabulation ballots were, I'm not kidding, about 4'x6'. They were too big to fit on a table. The spaces to write the count were small because there were so many names on the ballot. Second, someone has to go behind each machine and read the numbers off the back. That number has to be entered on each of the official tabulation sheets by whoever is tasked with recording the count. There are numerous chances to make a mistake by mis-reading the count from the back of the machine to making a mistake in writing the count (like transposing a number). Last you have someone at the election bureau again reading and adding with more room for mistakes.

It would be relatively easy to cheat, too because it was highly unlikely the machines ever would be re-opened to verify an entry that was made on the paper official count ballot.

[BumRushDaShow]

19. You are conflating "human error" (in reading/transcription), which can be rectified by others

to the issue of (potential purposeful) "machine error" where the programming might leave off candidates/questions during a glitch or the touchscreens get screwed up (or were made to screw up) and don't advance to the next screen of candidates or don't register the tap correctly.

But seriously, I don't like the idea of an unlit ballot when trying to verify. That pissed me off royally.

[DeminPennswoods]

24. Well, my point is, it would be very easy to add (or subtract)

votes, intentionally or not, and the odds of someone dragging a lever machine out and checking the number were slim to none.

[BumRushDaShow]

27. Well I know the lever machines were monstrosities

compared to these fold-up types that are like large suitcases... But it's the principle. (which is why you see me chuckling in my posts)

It's just that the levers give you that nice tactile "thwip-click" as you select your candidates - but I guess more importantly, like the previous machines we had, all the candidates and questions were on one big "board" vs this new system where you have to hit the option to go to another page.

I don't have an issue with going to another screen to "continue" but the 80+ year old folks in line in front of me were really flummoxed and spent a long time in the booth (and needed quite a bit of help from the poll workers). I think in their case, being able to do mail-in ballots in the near future will be a godsend!

[DeminPennswoods]

30. Agree, it's more complicated

The old "new" machines were specifically designed to be like the lever ones to minimize confusion. This is something entirely new. It still cracks me up when I recall the biggest problem voters had with the previous machines was not knowing how to open the curtains since they were so used to having them open automatically when they pulled the lever to vote. I don't know how many voters I had to tell, just open them with your hands and walk out. LOL!

[BumRushDaShow]

31. LOL!!!!!

Ain't that the truth with the lever opening and closing the curtain and expecting that to happen with the replacement machines. Plus the "new" booths were smaller than the old lever machines, so it almost felt cramped in there.

(of course the blinking red lights were confusing to some folks too at the time )

[DeminPennswoods]

25. Didn't you guys get to test run them at various

locations like they did when the touch pad machines replaced the lever ones?

[BumRushDaShow]

29. They had minimally-advertised "demos" at various locations around the city

but Philly is like 142 square miles and many of them were held during work hours (like 10 am - 1 pm) at select locations (I don't recall any close to me). And as it was, the whole procurement process of the system was under investigation all summer, so it was up in the air as to whether it would even be used or not. It has been a bit of a mess this year.

[True Blue American]

22. When I first

Worked we had the old punch cards. Then Blackwell bought the diebold machines,pieces of junk as my Republican Hudge remarked when we trained on them. Voters did insist on paper trails like old fashioned adding machines. We spent hours untwisting them. Not nough memory cards. Lines all over in a small precinct. Thousand times worse in the cities and close to Zcolleges.

I could no longer take the 16 hour day and pressure. 3 of our great team quit.

[DeminPennswoods]

17. BTW, the voting bill Gov Wolf just signed

allows for no excuse mail-in voting. Link: https://www.governor.pa.gov/newsroom/governor-wolf-signs-election-reform-bill-including-new-mail-in-voting/

No excuse mail-in voting
The law creates a new option to vote by mail without providing an excuse, which is currently required for voters using absentee ballots. Pennsylvania joins 31 other states and Washington, D.C. with mail-in voting that removes barriers to elections.

50-day mail-in voting period
All voters can request and submit their mail-in or absentee ballot up to 50 days before the election, which is the longest vote-by-mail period in the country.

Permanent mail-in and absentee ballot list
Voters can request to receive applications for mail-in or absentee ballots for all primary, general and special elections held in a given year. Counties will mail applications to voters on the list by the first Monday of each February. Voters who return an application will receive ballots for each election scheduled through the next February. Pennsylvania is the 12th state to provide voters with the automatic option.

[BumRushDaShow]

20. I posted that in the PA forum yesterday!

https://www.democraticunderground.com/107412369



(am happy as a bouncy )

[Garrett78]

21. Let me guess, these issues disproportionately harmed Democrats?

[Initech]

23. *pretends to be shocked*

[exboyfil]

28. One thing we have to do is stop having some much

local and state stuff on our federal ballots. When I hear about the pages of resolutions I understand their purpose. To slow down and confuse the federal elections (and probably high profile state elections as well).

[stopdiggin]

52. so you want to have separate ballots?

for different government levels? Or vote on different dates? Either option there sounds to me like a real suppression to overall voting. Maybe I misunderstood.

[dewsgirl]

32. I wonder if these are the ones Ivanka is involved with?🙄

[meow2u3]

33. I voted on one of those new and not-so-improved machines

I had trouble voting on some of the judicial retention votes--and the results for one of the judicial elections read double digits for the Democratic judicial nominee. They had to recount the ballots by hand and got the accurate results.

The only good thing about those new machines is the paper backups.

[questionseverything]

36. the races should all be hand counted in transparent full public view

[Blue_true]

47. Maybe that worked in 1872. There are just too many people voting in modern times. nt

[questionseverything]

50. there are still hand counted communities/sort and stack goes quickly

polling stations don't have to cover so much area

counting the federal ballots would not take that long

democracy has to be transparent

[stopdiggin]

53. you have federal, state and local offices

then judge retentions, and quite probably several ballot initiatives and amendments (again, possibly at several levels) ... Yes, hand counts can take a LONG time.

[Blue_true]

58. I am lucky enough to live in a county where local issues and races are not voted on

during statewide and national elections. The local primaries and general vote is held at other times. One of the reasons why some of Florida's larger southern counties become such shit-shows during statewide and national elections is the vote on everything during a statewide or national election, producing monstrous ballots that confuse voters.

[questionseverything]

59. is why i said , count the federal offices by hand

the others could be spot checked

[Blue_true]

46. Most new systems have bugs, some major bugs.

Better to find them during an off election than during a presidential election.

[Hearthrob]

56. Call me simple but we have been using a potential device for years. Plop an eye scanner on it,

Click on yes or no for each question, click on continue, click on finished, click to view or correct summary, click on submit (to central master computers), click on print, click exit.

Your toilet paper order has been successfully submitted and has elected your candidates of choice.

Please keep this receipt for one year to verify your choices.

Thank you and hope you have better luck this time!

[Blue_true]

57. Sorry, I am not as conspiratorial about some things that just happen in life. nt

[yortsed snacilbuper]

54. My polling place is a catholic church,

I wouldn't put it past them to fiddle with it.

[rockfordfile]

55. Corruption