Volusia recount could help ease nation's suspicions

[sled]

Volusia recount could help ease nation's suspicions

http://www.news-journalonline.com/NewsJournalOnline/Opinion/Editorials/03OpOPN82112204.htm

Last update: November 22, 2004

Once again, Volusia County has the unwanted privilege of being the
focus of national attention in a presidential election.

Representatives from Black Box Voting, an advocacy group that reviews
the accuracy of electronic vote-tabulation machinery, have chosen the
county as one of their first challenge areas. Encounters between local
elections officials and Black Box members -- including disputes over
election-related documents found in trash bags -- have both sides
feeling bruised and suspicious.

It doesn't have to be this way. Bev Harris, founder of the Seattle-
based Black Box Voting, and Supervisor of Elections Deanie Lowe should
have the same interest at heart -- protecting the integrity of the
229,580 votes cast in the Nov. 2 election. They should be allies, not
adversaries.

Many issues drew Harris' attention to Volusia County, foremost among
them the glitch in 2000 that caused Al Gore's vote tally here to drop
by 16,000 votes. Then there's the memory-card failure that erased
13,244 votes from a machine at the county's early-voting site in
Daytona Beach. (The ballots were re-tabulated and included in the
final total.) These are not enough to cast doubt on Volusia's returns,
but they are enough to draw a second look. The next step will probably
be an in-person inspection of ballots from as many as 50 precincts, a
move Harris was still discussing Friday. That inspection could prove
(or disprove) a theory that forms the basis of Harris' national
reputation. For the past two years, she's been publicly probing the
possibility that touch-screen and optical-scan vote-counting systems
from the nation's three largest vendors are vulnerable to outside
tampering.

[talk hard]

1. Is the election over yet?

I think folks are assuming that the election officials even give a crap about whether or not this was an honest election. From what I've read, they just want to put it to bed.

Since when did counting the votes become such as a chore? And to election officials no less. IT'S THEIR DAMN JOB!!!!

Just because the America media has "moved on" doesn't mean it's over. All the dirty tricks to suppress the vote across the nation deserve some scrutiny.

And for chrissake count the damned provisional ballots! That was a clear avenue for the R's to take out some votes against Bush.

[teryang]

2. Early voting was a joke in Daytona

You had to stand in line for hours. Thousands gave up.

[sled]

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