BBV: CBS Three parter on Voting: "What Could Go Wrong"

[RedEagle]

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/10/22/politics/main650884.shtml

What Could Go Wrong: Part I

(CBS) By Jarrett Murphy,
CBSNews.com producer
(This is Part I in a three-part series examining potential problems on Election Day and beyond)

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"We're going to be losing, due to ill-considered computerization of votes in 15 counties in Florida, an additional 27,000 votes … mostly in Democratic areas, especially in minority areas," contends investigative journalist Greg Palast.

(CBS quoted Palast- and called him an investigative journalist? Whoa....)


...snip....

One such election was the 2002 Florida primary. It took longer than expected to boot-up touchscreen devices manufactured by Election Systems & Software. A report by the Miami Dade's inspector general blamed both poor performance by election staffers and flaws in the ES&S technology.

...snip...

"Some polling places didn't open for many, many hours and people waited in line and there were no backup or substitute ballots to be used in the case of machine malfunction, so many, many people were turned away," she said.

...snip...

"But a survey by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel found that in that March vote, the percentage of votes not recorded by touchcreen machines (made by both ES&S and Sequoia Voting Systems) was eight times higher than when paper ballots were used with optical scanners. In other studies, estimates of the undervote rate on different voting machines vary."