Thinking out loud this AM and would like input.

[Andy_Stephenson]

1. A Constitutional Amendment guaranteeing the right of every American to vote.

2. A paper ballot from every machine that is the final record of the election.

3. I would like to see federal elections held on and counted from paper ballots. Along with this I would like federal election day either a holiday or at a minimum every employee given 4 hours off, to vote or help to count.

4. Municipal and local elections could be held on electronic machines if the following conditions are met.

a. Paper Ballot produced...either optical scan ballot or uniform ballot printed from the DRE machines.

b. Minimum 6% random audit of the machines against the paper. The candidates would choose the precincts they want counted by hand...not the election office.

c. If any discrepancies arise the paper trumps the machine and would also trigger wider hand recounts.

5. I would also like to see a uniform system nationwide a'la e-VACS
http://www.softimp.com.au/evacs.html It is scalable publicly owned and far cheaper than Diebold, Sequoia et'al.

6. The voting system must be owned by the people. No privatization in this area should be tolerated.

7. The EAC and FEC are obviously falling down on the job...We need citizens oversight of the electoral process. Perhaps the creation of such a group could be included into a Constitutional Amendment.

8. Voter participation should be mandatory. Nuff said.

9. We should close the revolving door between voting machine companies and public service, if we do continue with private sources for voting systems. Personally I would like to stop the privatization of the voting system all together.

Please....if you want to add to this do so. I am really just thinking out loud this morning. What are some of the things you would like to see?

Andy

[Boswells_Johnson]

1. I'd include having elections run by a non-partisan body

that is transparent and accountable to congress.

[Sydnie]

7. I love that idea but how

do you select the people to run it? Would they be elected by the people, appointed by the govenor -- how? How can you assure that they are non-partisan? Requiring someone NOT to be affiliated or demanding that they NOT be allowed to work on any campaign could, in itself, be considered a violation of someone's constitutional rights couldn't it? I mean, look at union contracts for teachers for example. They are municipal employees and as such can't campaign for any candidate while at work. But there is nothing that prevents them from being active in any campaign outside of the scope of their duties. I think that is where the rubber meets the road and will be the hardest part to get a law about past.

I would absolutely love to see the people, at the very least, not be office holding members of any campaign, federal or local. But how do we get that done?

[Fly by night]

44. See #41 below -- let high school honor society members do the counting

They're not yet voters (if we use the 17 and under members), they're smart enough and they might be motivated to become voters themselves sooner if they become our "trusted servants" in the counting process.

[Salomonity]

60. uhm, one qualm

In many high schools, the students are overwhelmingly partisan. High school students share the political beliefs of their parents. I do NOT want votes counted by the honors society of Jeff Davis High School in Mississippi.

[Fly by night]

70. Then be sure that the same safeguards we need with any counting system

are also put in place with my suggestion. Like any newly implemented verified vote-counting process, I would want my suggestion to be balanced/safeguarded with a random recount of select precincts (for quality control purposes) and a facilitated right to recount all ballots if any "irregularities" occur. Then, if any partisan counting is found to have occurred among the high school kids, their school would be banned from the process and not allowed to count ballots again.

My guess is that most high school honor societies would not want to be labeled as either too dumb or too dishonest to be trusted to ever count ballots again. That's sure not the case with SoS Blackwell and the other well-fed foxes that we have guarding the chicken houses these days.

[Fly by night]

73. PS: Greetings to a fellow Mississipian

I'm an eighth generation mud-rat from Lowndes County, graduating from Lee High School (in the last segregated class there -- 1967). I would have had no problem relying on me and my classmates to count the votes, because we were much more concerned that we continue to be considered intelligent and honorable (particularly by adults) than that we be partisan. Besides, like rebellious kids everywhere, our parents' political affiliations were not necessarily our own.

Again, safeguards and redundancies will be important in any new verified voting system we implement. But high school honor societies wouldn't cost us anything and we would end up motivating those kids to get involved in the political process earlier -- to respect, treasure and covet the right to vote sooner than they do now.

[SaveAmerica]

55. I would like to add 'previous office holders' to that excellent idea

The lady in charge of elections in Gaston Co. NC (where so many problems - like more votes recorded than voters- happened) was the head of the republican party in that county before she held that position. So maybe it has to be made a law that to hold a position you can have no official or unofficial ties with a party.

[In Truth We Trust]

67. Andy I like some of your idea's however I prefer to keep it as tamper

proof as possible therefore as you may know from my previous posts on this subject I want paper ballots and hand counts period. Let's gop back to the future. Before Edison and the lightbulb (electricity) we used this method just fine. Progreesive "first world" countries use this method TODAY without suspicion and controversy. Let us take the route that insures the least probability or ease of widespread fraWd.

[cornermouse]

2. End gerrymandering for both parties.

Make nice rectangular or square shaped districts and make them permanent.

[Andy_Stephenson]

4. I'll drink to that...

but what about population shifts?

[hootinholler]

14. Publish a NIST Standard algorithm...

To determine district area from population density. This is one of the things computers are good at.

If the IEEE can publish standard algorithms for floating point math, then NIST certainly can here. All they have to do is open a comittee, I bet they could have a solid draft in 6 months. Congress should require it.

-Hoot

[kedrys]

Re: #8: Voting holiday, at least one day, with job and pay protection

No bullcrap, no excuses, no "my boss won't pay me if I miss work" or "I didn't have the time"...

We need to reform the vote, let's get serious. Your list of suggestions is a great start.

[Jo March]

15. Darn skippy! Columbus Day can go, IMHO.

We need to push for Election Day to be a holiday.

[housewolf]

108. That's it! Perfect -

Turn Columbus Day into Election Day - what better way to celebrate the discovery of our nation?

[me b zola]

124. Yes holiday

But we must have way to protect people who could not, by the nature of their career, take a day off (health care workers ect.). This also speaks to how to protect those who vote absentee & by provisional ballot, we need better guarantees for these people that their votes will be counted.

[deminks]

3. Great ideas, Andy!

I would also like to see laws prohibiting at least state SOS and county BOE employees prohibited from concurrently holding offices in any candidates' campaign organizations. (or receiving any funds from campaign organizations)

[Andy_Stephenson]

5. Absolutely

they cannot be beholden to a candidate at the same time they are administering an election for the candidate.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

6. This deals with the ease of voting and informing people on election day

where their vote should be cast.

As we all well know, people were waiting in long lines to go into vote, only to be told that they were at the wrong polling place. Then there is the case of those voting in the wrong precincts (where I live it's called a district).

I think it should be mandatory that in front of every polling place be a list with addresses and the precincts and polling places that are appropriate for those addresses. Before getting on to the line, the voter would look at the list and know if they were in the right place or not. They would also have their precinct number.

[Andy_Stephenson]

9. Agreed...but if you do have to cast a provisional ballot

it will be counted.

And lets give felons their right to vote back as soon as they step back into society.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

21. Andy, I definitely agree on the felons.

The provisional ballots are a different matter. What would prevent someone from going to different polling places, voting provisionally, and having all of those votes count immediately?

[Andy_Stephenson]

28. Provisionals are checked

in the final canvass. If you voted twice...it would be found out just as it is now. but blackwells order that if you voted in the wrong precinct that it would not be counted for any reason is wrong IMHO.

There are ways to check provisionals they are in place and will work.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

95. That's great if they can do that! This way the provisionals are not tossed

to the side and are meaningful. :)

[housewolf]

110. This gets sticky with local issues -

such as votes on judges, school districts, local bonds, etc. That's a major reason why votes need to be counted with the appropriate precinct on the machines that are set to read those specific ballots. There may be some way to deal with this, I'm not sure....

[Sydnie]

12. We could do that as a local voters advocacy group

We could create those signs ourselves if they refuse to do so. I love that idea!

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

24. We could do that Sydnie, but it has to be law. There will be places

Where you can't count on advocacy groups to do that. I believe all election laws should be uniform and easy access to the system for all. :)

[Eloriel]

57. And/or require that each precinct have its own polling place

instead of having multiple precincts vote in one building -- that just invites precisely the kinds of problems we saw in Ohio. Coincidence? Doubt it.

[Andy_Stephenson]

63. Very good Idea...

I especially like this one. It stops a lot of confusion

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

85. Some places might not have public space to do one polling place

per precinct. We are limited here, so there are several districts within the same building. Each and every precinct does have a master list of addresses with all the districts and address ranges to guide you to the correct place. That's why I mentioned the list outside of each polling place posts the precincts for each address. I gather this would cover a municipality.

[harmonyguy]

111. More than one precinct at one place CAN be done. Here's how...

First off - I'm Canadian, and am mainly familiar with our system. I'm sure it's NOT perfect, but it seems to be simple and managable, without many of the headaches of the US system(s).

In Canadian Federal Elections the paper ballot is very simple - here's a sample:
http://www.elections.ca/yth/pdfs/offtheshelf_form9a_e.pdf

Every ballot is pre-numbered - twice. The ballots come from the print-shop padded into books of either 50 or 100 (can't remember which). When a voter recieves their ballot at the polling station, the poll officer places his/her initial on the back of the actual ballot and detatches the ballot from the book, leaving the stub with its number IN the book. The ballot is folded with the officer's initial visible on the outside. The voter takes the ballot, goes to the booth, unfolds the ballot and marks their selection, and refolds the ballot in the same way - officer's initials on the outside. The ballot is handed to the officer, who checks his/her initials, and then detaches the numbered counterfoil (second stub) from the ballot and offers the ballot back to the voter to deposit in the ballot box, or with the voter's permission directly deposits the ballot in the ballot box. It's this last step, where the officer checks for his/her initials AFTER the voter has made their mark that prevent the voting in the wrong precinct problem. By his/her initials, the officer will see that the ballot didn't come from his/her precinct, and will send the voter back to the right one - the one from which the voter obtained the ballot. (In the last Federal election, we had three polls (precincts) in one room, and had no problems. As the blank ballot was handed to the voter, they were instructed to bring the voted ballot back to the officer that gave it to them.

At the closing of the polls, the number of voters who voted are counted in the poll books, the stubs in the books of ballots are counted, the (now-removed) counterfoils are counted, and of course the ballots themselves are counted. Guess what?? They all match. Occasionally, a ballot with the counterfoil still attached will make it into the ballot box (not good), in which case there is a defined procedure for handling its removal once the ballot box is opened.

Ballot Box stuffing is practically impossible since there are actually 4 count checks, poll book count, ballot stub count, counterfoil count and ballot count, not to mention the check of initials by the poll-officer.

For that matter, we even have examples of what to accept and what to reject as marks on ballots.
http://www.elections.ca/yth/pdfs/offtheshelf_form22a_e.pdf

http://www.elections.ca/yth/pdfs/offtheshelf_form22b_e.pdf

The only technology involved is a writing stick and it doesn't even HAVE to be a #2 pencil. No walk-away reciepts, no cryptographic ballyhoo, and no machines. We're all done the count and listening to the results on the radio an hour or two later.

HG

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. Reform Voter Registration and Absentee Voting rules

Absentee voting & voter registration is a mess right now and is one of the easiest place to pad the elections.

The Republicans did all kinds of tricks in these two areas. Everything from throwing away Dem registration forms, to losing 1000's of absentee ballots, to casting ballots for dead people, to targeting poor illiterate elderly people in order to 'help' them vote.

If we don't fix these problems as well as the problems with the machines, we will continue to have rigged elections.

[Andy_Stephenson]

11. All voters at age 18...automatically

registered when renewing their Driver Licence.

In Washington State we have MotorVoter. When you get your DL they ask if you want to register to vote. If you say yes...your registered right then and there.

I am not so fond of absentee voting. It should be reserved for true hardship cases.

[DoYouEverWonder]

26. Both solutions would solve a lot of problems

In regards to absentee voting we definitely need to reinstate some of the former rules.

In Florida, they got rid of the rule that says you have to have your ballot signed by a witness. The Repugs were gung ho to get rid of that one. It just makes it so much easier to steal old and dead people's votes that way.

On the other hand Early Voting needs to be expanded and every state should have to offer it. Plus, every county must have more than one place set up for EV based on population.

[Andy_Stephenson]

30. The security of early voting should also be

as stringent as in regular voting. This ios not the case in Florida.

[DoYouEverWonder]

37. Early Voting

seemed to be pretty good where I live, but we have a competent SOE.

BTW: Did you know Kerry won big time in Early Voting in FL? I think those numbers are a lot closer to the real numbers for election day.

[Boredtodeath]

48. It is not the case ANYWHERE

Early electronic voting CANNOT BE SECURED.

The only way to secure an electronic election is to OPEN AND CLOSE the election database. Once "Set to Election" it cannot be closed until the end of the election; hence every early voting card is completely unsecured during the week/2 week period of early voting.

None of the electronic software systems allow you to open and close the security door as long as an election is in process; not even to print daily reports. It is completely INSECURE.

edit: typo

[flyarm]

52. and isn't it rather suspicious...

that the places with this great experiment of early vote occured in battleground states??
as a poll watcher i will tell you..early vote is a recipe for vote fraud!
fly

[Boredtodeath]

59. Yes, it is a recipe for fraud.

And that's why these partisan election officials are so high on the idea. It gives them WEEKS to rig the election.

Also note - there are no laws in place for citizen OBSERVERS during early voting.

[flyarm]

81. i don't know about the lws but i was a citizen observer for early vote in

florida..we were not kept out..i was a poll watcher for early vote...from 7 am til 7 pm daily..but in some soe offices i was kept out of the room the machines were in..but that was in only one soe office i worked other offices i was allowed to be where the machines were...we were not objected to..although i must say one of * poll watchers one day never sat in and observed the machines,.he only worked the lines outside and tried intimidating voters..until i called in a kerry lawyer to stand out there and stop him!!
and also stopped some religious folks who were attempting to "so called" help people with their absentee ballots....yeah right...yes we did stop alot of shenannigans ..where we could.
but we werenot stopped from being citizen observers...as long as we were trained...and some of us were trained and worked the primaries so we could be at large poll watchers so we could go where we were needed the most..or the so called hot spots...not sure how other states operated but we wereorganized in this effort in fla.
fly

[flyarm]

50. see my other post on early vote fla!

i wrote this on another post on early vote in fla! i was also used as a tester to our machines in december..
fly

Democratic Underground Forums - here in fla pinellas as well!!
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=268654&mesg_id=272008

[Eloriel]

68. I don't think automatically registered would work, tho I like it otherwise

People move often -- every 3 years is (or was) the national average. Unfortunately, you do have to be located within voting districts of various types, which requires that your address be up to date.

OTOH, maybe there's a way to let people vote wherever they want, as long as it's only once. IOW, why MUST I vote just in my district? Maybe I would prefer to go into DeKalb County, GA, for example, to help Cynthia McKinney win? (Just a wild thought -- I really am wildly in favor of really opening up the franchise, along the lines Andy suggests here with "automatic registration," a national holiday for election day, and whatever else we can think of.)

I have GRAVE CONCERNS about Motor Voter because I know it's been used to deny people the right to vote -- some of those records have just been "lost" somehow. I also have grave concerns about the computerized, state-wide requirement (and of course the "purges" too) under HAVA.

I agree with your concerns about Absentee, and I am pretty much adamantly against early voting. Both IMO give too much opportunity to invalidate those votes, or check the returns in order to be able to plan for the fix.

I am 100% in favor of a Constitutional Right to Vote Amendment, and here's a great article by Jesse Jackson on the subject also discussed here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x77208

No change in no-account system
November 23, 2004
BY JESSE JACKSON
http://www.suntimes.com/output/jesse/cst-edt-jesse23.html



and here's one by Jesse Jr., about IRV:

JESSE L. JACKSON JR. AND JAMES D. HENDERSON
Making elections better, and stopping divisiveness, too
By Jesse L. Jackson Jr. and James D. Henderson | December 25, 2004
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2004/12/25/making_elections_better_and_stopping_divisiveness_too/

Sigh. While I'm doing links, might as well provide some of the links on Voting Reform ideas from the last two months or so:

Yet another reason why we need to expose the election fraud NOW
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x194252
Link: http://www.bucyrustelegraphforum.com/news/stories/20041224/localnews/1785490.html

This is just the beginning, things have to be fixed it is too obvious
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x149709

Repost: INVITATION: Let's Think Tank Election / Voting Reform
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=75403&mesg_id=75403

How we should run elections...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=107646#110845

Voting receipts should also have Tally's on them
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1408791#1408819

[sandnsea]

130. Registration Receipts

People should be given receipts when they register. WE have to educate them that those receipts are to be treated like gold. But at least they'd have something to prove they registered that could be taken to the polls. Signed receipts could also be used to track registration fraud. Any group doing registration drives would be required to keep names and signatures on file, or send them to the SoS. The group should also be required to check those signatures before they send the registrations into the county. This could fix alot of registration problems, same day registration would obviously be better but isn't likely to happen nationwide.

[ginnyinWI]

132. same day registration is the answer

Here in Wisconsin you can register to vote the same time that you vote. You need to bring proof of address: a driver's license, a phone bill, a lease agreement, etc, and show an ID. You raise your hand and are sworn in on the spot, then you go and vote.

[dragonlady]

150. Absolutely right

You can cure a lot of problems with same-day registration--shredded registrations, moving a short time before election, records lost by the election officials, people who couldn't get to the city hall downtown to register but can get to the polling place near their home, etc. It's a wonderful system.

[hootinholler]

23. Holo seal on absentee ballots.

If M$oft can put one on every license then why not on all absentee ballots? Serially numbered, you know what seal you issue to whom.

-Hoot

[flyarm]

58. then maybe...

we wouldn't loose some 70,000 absentee ballots here in one county in fla??
#1 we need to hold people criminally accountable...not just losing their jobs, but make them criminals pronto if someone commits voter crimes!
we still have no answers where 70,000+ absentee ballots dissapeared to!
fly

[Eloriel]

80. YES!!! Criminally accountable

That's another major issue -- if you look at some of the court cases regarding voting issues, there's one overwhelming factor that arises. We lose because judges don't hold our right to vote as important and sacred as WE do. That's because the LAWS don't support them holding our vote as important and sacred as WE do.

ALL our laws, in each and every state, need to be buffed up to a high sheen to make vote fraud, vote suppression, and all the other shenanigans (even vote administration INCOMPETENCE) something REALLY serious, with heavy duty penalties.

As an aside, there is NO excuse, for example, for the kind of, um, "incompetence" shown by GA SoS Cathy Cox (being charitable here, calling it incompetence). I have said often and will say it again, my fonest wish is to see her in prison stripes. That will probably never happen. Why? Because our laws don't support that. Unless she's found guilty of kickbacks or something similar(and that's unlikely, which is NOT the same as saying I don't think that happened), she'll get off scott-free.

(BTW, she also just announced, probably unofficially, her candidacy for Gov. in 2006 which we all knew was coming. I wonder if Diebold will continue to be grateful enough to her to help her win that too?)

We need to not only change laws to make it easier to convict people, possibly easier to prove, and even IMO to criminalize the kind of dereliction of duty exhibited by the Cathy Cox's of the world. That would require some very stiff standards for how SoS's are to behave, but IMO we can do that.

Hmmm. Hey, boredtodeath -- I just thought of something. Does Georgia have any recall law on the books? If there is, wouldn't it be cool to start a recall petition against Cathy Cox?

Okay, back to the subject. So a Constitutional Right to Vote Amendment would help, but in the meantime we need to work at the state level to change some of these laws.

I suggested to hedda-foil (of the National Ballot Integrity Project) about trying to develop some Model Legislation (at a slightly later date, once some of this craziness is all over with), and she loved the idea.

But one of the most important things is also taking a look at all the ways they gamed the system, and CAN game the system. That will be a fairly large undertaking, IMO, because we're still finding things out.

[Boredtodeath]

136. Good question

Hmmm. Hey, boredtodeath -- I just thought of something. Does Georgia have any recall law on the books? If there is, wouldn't it be cool to start a recall petition against Cathy Cox?

I don't know, but it's one hell of an idea.

The questions should be:
1. Are there recall laws?

2. On what basis could she legally be recalled?

Sounds like a great research project, doncha think?

[zalinda]

10. I would also add

that only federal races be held on Nov 2nd, as for President, Congress and/or Senate. This could be done with paper ballots, and counted that night, and the news agencies would still have their drama nights.

The local ballots could be done on a different day. The Oregon example is the best, but many would fight it. If you did it this way, you could limit ballot items, and send out once a year. There are a lot of people out there who need work, even one day a year. Wouldn't it be wiser for the state to spend a million dollars paying poor people (who will just go out and spend it) than to send millions of dollars to a company who is more than likely out of state, and they won't see any of that money coming back to their economy?

zalinda

[Andy_Stephenson]

16. I agree...Federal Elections should be

seperated from local elections.

[NoPasaran]

89. I don't agree with this

We consciously used the interest aroused by the presidential race to build awareness and understanding of our local races. With the high turnout in November, we were able to do very well, including unseating incumbent repubs. I can't begin to imagine how we could have generated the level of interest in a district judge race needed to get our guy in without it being tied in to something more glamorous at the top of the ballot.

[flyarm]

65. you are right on this one!!

we had so many bogus amendments on our fla ballots..it took me an entire day to look up all the suprem court justices there were questions of ..should they remain in office...bogus bull crap...i made copies of all the supreme court justices records and posted them on the walls at the kerry campaign because the questions were dubious at best, and it was the most "called in " questions we got at kerry headquarters here...at any given time there were 10-20 people ( voters who stopped by hdqtrs) writing down who the scjustices were... on their papers so they would be ready for the vote...it was perposterous and it was meant to slow down the vote..those of us who got absentee ballots recognised that right away...
these questions could have all been addressed in the primary that was held on aug 31st!! it was all part of the ploy!!

i saw in poll watching that the questions gave the majority of the voters the hardest delema...most were asking how on the sequoia machines they could pass those questions and just vote kerry/* and the senator...most did not want to read these questions to vote them!!

fly

[flpoljunkie]

13. Several bills will be introduced in upcoming session of Congress. Not all

will meet all the standards necessary for free, transparent and auditable voting. We must study them to know which one to support. Senators Harry Reid, Boxer and Kerry have all indicated they would be introducing bills.

It would seem best if the Democrats united behind one bill that would solve all the myriad voting problems that produced yet another presidential election whose results lack legitimacy.

[Andy_Stephenson]

18. Sorry but the good Senators are late to the game.

We need to let them know what we want. Otherwise we will get another bill like HAVA.

[flpoljunkie]

77. We absolutely need to let them know what is required to reform elections.

We need to demand that they get behind real election reform in this session of Congress and that we expect them to get a bill passed and signed into law this year, or we will not support them in 2006.

They are there to represent us and pass the laws. It is our duty as citizens to hold their feet to the fire to get it done-and get it done now!

[Boredtodeath]

17. Screw random audits - audit EVERY vote

At the precinct, before the results LEAVE the precinct.

Count the paper.

Confirm what the machines say.

ONLY PAPER IS AN OFFICIAL BALLOT.

Look at the precinct numbers folks - you're talking less than 2,000 pieces of paper per precinct. USE THE PAPER.

Don't wait until there are 4 MILLION pieces of paper to audit the vote and make it a huge task. USE THE PAPER.

No result is released from a precinct until the PAPER AUDIT is complete.

[Andy_Stephenson]

25. Ok so we go all paper...

But how do we count King county in an evening? We have in some elections over 1000 splits. It could become a very cumbersome task quickly.

If we go to all paper hand counted...It will require a holiday to do the election...otherwise we will get no participation.

Hmmm...How about this. Working counting votes could be an obligation sort of like jury duty...that might work.

[Boredtodeath]

39. See post #38

That might be an answer.

And a resounding YES we go all paper. Period.

[Fly by night]

41. Let high school honor society members count the paper ballots

There are plenty of high schools in America (distributed roughly by population), with larger schools in larger cities also having more members in their honor societies. Let the 16 and 17 year old honor society members do the counting -- that way, no voter counts her/his own vote. (I don't have a problem with that, actually, but some might.)

There is something poetic and motivating (to the young not-yet-voters counting the ballots) about this plan. These days, I would much rather trust a 17 year old to count my vote than a politician, a bureaucrat or a Repug-programmed computer.

Besides, if Canada can count all their votes in four hours, we certainly could do the same thing also.

Do the honorable thing -- let smart high school kids count our votes.

[Boredtodeath]

56. Good idea. Make them the Election Audit committee

As described in my post #38. ALL HONOR societies, and give them classroom credit for it - make it the semester exam in Civics/History class.

[livvy]

42. How about...

a multiple day voting period or window with Election day the day the ballots are counted? This would eliminate long lines. I like the idea of a "jury duty" type thing for the counting. Some good ideas going here!

[Eloriel]

104. NO! on both

The more time you give for voting, the more opportunity you give for rigging that vote.

Further, people don't register to vote NOW because they don't want to be pegged for jury duty (I finally convinced my own son, now 35, to register and vote anyway, just this past year), add vote counting to it and you're done. I am VERY much in favor of encouraging civic participation, but we're going to have to do that with enticement, not force.

[livvy]

107. Jeesh...

I was just doing a little brainstorming here, Eloriel. Lighten up. No need to

[luaptifer]

53. if security or auditability assured, why not vote over a couple days?

or even up to a biz-calendar week? resolves the holiday issue i'd think and even if scum succeed in gerrymandering all but one machine out of a dem precinct, it doesn't create such a narrow-window deadline.

[Boredtodeath]

62. See post #59.

If we close the security holes in early voting, it's the best approach. But we MUST close the security holes first.

[Coexist]

120. Electors aren't due until Jan 6th

So we don't have to count them all in one night. Fast is not always better.

[Sydnie]

19. I love the idea of number 7 n/t

[Boredtodeath]

38. Regarding #7

We should work to create a separate "Election Audit Committee" for every precinct.

After being at the polling place for 12 hours, elections officials want only to get the hell out of there. Hence, the most important step of the election (counting the vote) is completed by exhausted, harried citizens. We should bring in a fresh auditing crew when the polls close - citizens and party officials to COUNT the votes.

We need fresh minds, fresh hands, fresh citizens counting the ballots.

[Andy_Stephenson]

46. Great idea!

I love it.

[Boredtodeath]

51. Thank you. Now let's make it happen.

The advantage with this is training can be separated as well. You don't have to TRAIN officials conducting the election in counting the ballots. Only the Auditors have to be trained on how to count. Only the Pollworkers need to be trained on how to conduct the election.

And no one is EXHAUSTED for caring enough to be civic minded.

[flyarm]

76. ohhh my ..you sure have that right!!

we can bellyache from here to eternity..but we need to get off our rear ends and all become ..poll workers...the repubs are so ahead of us in this..they are organized and they are running the show at the polls here in fla...
i was a poll watcher and i can tell you this...the poll workers where i was working in general..were so old and one lady was so bent over and on deaths door step..it was appalling to me that these are the people guarding the chicken coop...i swear this one lady was unable to hear, to read, or even sit in the chair she was so bent over and she was falling alseep all day..she couldnt run the card machine..and she could find no ones name in the sign in books...it sure woke me up..i will not be a poll watcher next election..i will be a poll worker..we need dem representation ..take the time..get trained...we need dems in these polling places...i was poll watcher in 2 primaries, 2 weeks of early voting and for general...well the poll workers were almost all repubs where i worked...and i worked at all different places...why do we blitch and gripe , but we dont organize and get off our rear ends and become poll workers??
i am going through first class that comes available..we need more of us watching the chicken coop...we need more of us running for local offices..the rpubs will run for anything, and many times they are unchallanged...at least thats the way it is in fla...i live both in fla and n.j...people are alot more asstute in n.j. than they are here in fla...
so many of you here at du are much more intellegent than those running for office...you are passionate...you are aware and on top of more than most running for office are..run in your local area...

and if you say..well you run fly..well i did ...i ran for delegate..i never ever even ran for homeroom leader in shcool...but i did this time and i beat out life long politicians..why?? because i was informed..i could answer the people..i knew the issues that were bugging the "people"..i was one of 3 women out of 12 that won and i tied for first place with votes...and who came in third?? the only elected dem woman we have..head of dept of ed...yes i beat out all the regulars..all the die hard dems who are all life long office holders!!

you can too...we need new voices..we need new ideas..we need passion..
i heard that over and over from dems here ..that they voted for me because of my passion...because i could move people to do what they only thought of doing..but never did...

we need all of your voices out there folks...don't get angry get active in your community...share your intelligence...share your knowledge where its not singing to the choir!..citizens are desparate for your knowledge...

i know i know..i sound like i am on a soap box...but i would not have run if my husband had not pushed me..he humiliated me into it..he went to some dem meetings with me..and he kept saying ..you are smarter than most of these people..you know more than most of these people..you are more aware of whats going on than most of these people...i was like mostof you..i had a internet group that was " out there" educating people of what was going on..daily i was tied to this machine..researching and getting it out there...but there was more..much more..that my husband made me realize i had to do...and that was getting involved with people in my community...and getting them inspired , and educating them ...

and letting them see my passion..its contagious folks...it really is...

ok..enough of my soap box...
i know many of you do the stuff on the ground...but not enough..we don't have enough great people running this party..,we need to take it over and run it great..not just ok..ok doesn't work anymore...

fly

[Boredtodeath]

144. Been there, done that

After working 12 hours in a polling place, my fondest wish was to get it over with and go home. It is an exhausting, difficult day done by real patriots (regardless of party affiliation) whose major concern is civic duty.

But, yes, in every polling place I worked, the Republican partisans outnumbered the DEM partisans in the neighborhood of 5:1. We can never win this war as long as our people have more important things to do on election day.

In addition, most of the poll workers I worked with were VERY senior citizens. Getting the young adults involved in the entire election process is becoming critical. That's why I love the idea of the honor societies and colleges mentioned up thread. Giving them class credit for maintaining a "Election Auditor" certification makes perfect sense as a way to encourage that participation.

[Jo March]

20. The ballots should be kept secure at all times

None of these shenanigans where anyone who wants can walk in and get the ballots and mess with them.

Ballots should be treated like they are evidence - there should be a chain of custody and sealed ballot bags.

[GetTheRightVote]

22. Being a programmer, the only honest election is with paper ballots

The machines will always be open to fraud and without question from all parties concerned, every electon done on them will be open to party discontent. We must go the way of the simplest form of voting, the paper ballot. Lynn Landes is the leader in this area, her email address is as follows:

[e-mail]

Contact her if fair elections are your desire.

:)

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

27. There is no other way in my book too. Recyled paper at that! n/t

[valis]

29. Regarding 8.

If voter participation is mandatory, then there should be also some mandatory training of some sort. About certain issues, not sure. Many people who don't vote, don't do so because they know nothing at all about the issues and are not interested in politics. I'mnot sure that having a ton of people coming in and voting bt flipping a coin would be a good outcome... Not sure....

[Andy_Stephenson]

32. We all get a voters phamphlet in Washington...

Mandatory participation is a good thing...then people WILL educate themselves on the issues and candidates.

[valis]

43. Right, CA too.... it may work, I guess...

[housewolf]

115. Motivating people

In this country it seems that they only thing that motivates people is money. You register your car on time bacause if you don't, you pay a fine (and bigger fines if you get caught).

So let's turn to a republican strategy here and opt for a voting TAX CREDIT! Everyone who votes gets a tax credit of some amount, an amount substantial enough to be motivating.

I mean, we're not going to fine people or take them into ccurt or jail them for not voting....

[SnoopDog]

117. Tax Credit? Not a bad idea - I like it.

[Amaryllis]

31. No machines! Use the Oregon system. Paper ballots period. Still need some

work on the tabulators, though.

[Andy_Stephenson]

34. I affectionately call Oregons system

Vote Fraud by mail.

An all mail based voting system is has many openings for fraud to occur.

Sorry...poll based voting is truly the safest.

[Farmgirl]

83. Why do you say that?

I live in Oregon where we have paper voting by mail. We have high participation rate (86%) and I believe fairly good safeguards in place. There are always ways to make it better, but I'd like to hear your concerns regarding Oregon's system and why you think it's fraught with fraud.

[Andy_Stephenson]

94. Hmm my concerns...

1. You trust your ballot to the post office. It is an attack point.

2. The state/county knows how many ballots they send. But there is no way to know how many were sent back. Opening room to vanish a few if need be.

3. Selling of votes or coercion can be problems.

4. You use Diebold central tabulators in Oregon .

[Amaryllis]

148. As I said, we need to work on the tabulators. And we don't HAVE to mail

them.
We can drop them at BOE or county library. It virtually eliniates voter suppression and discrimination. No lines. Of course it does make exit polls more difficult, but the repubs are working on eliminating those anyway.
The potential for fraud seems minor compared to what has been done in OH and FL. If there are other arguements, I truly would like to hear them.

[brainshrub]

33. I'm not sure about #8.

What if you don't like any of the candidates? I think your freedom of speech would be violated if you HAD to vote for someone.

While I don't like the idea of mandatory voting, I do like the idea of a "none of the above" option.

[Andy_Stephenson]

35. There is always the option of

writing yourself in.

[elare]

36. Very good suggestions

As I read through the comments to this posting, I'm once again amazed at the difference between the voting process in Canada & the US.

For years we've had a law in place that requires that everyone have at least 3 consecutive hours off work in order to vote (i.e. If you work until 4:00 and the polls close at 8:00 you're ok because you have 4 hours ... but if your work day begins at 9:00 am and goes to 7:00 pm ... your employer MUST allow you to leave early or start late in order that you have 3 hours to vote. And you cannot be penalized with a loss in pay)

Our federal & provincial elections are solely for that purpose ... you walk in and mark one "X" on your paper ballot. Local elections are held separately. I participated once in the counting of a provincial election ... we were done 30 minutes after the polls closed, with observers from all parties in complete agreement and the total votes counted for that poll 100% in agreement with the ballots given out.

We have a national registry of voters; and there are several ways to get on the list. The easiest way is to simply answer "Yes" on your tax return to be included in the registry. Prior to the election, voter registration cards are mailed to everyone on the list ... the cards clearly indicate where you go to vote, hours of voting, etc. There is heavy advertising prior to the election informing people that they should have received their cards, and that if they haven't received it, to contact their local election office in order to get on the list (local office information is included in the print advertising, phone numbers to call for the information is included in the TV & radio advertising).

Voting CAN be a simple process ... the more I learn about voting in the US, the more grateful I am that our process is so different.

Before you jump down my throat about this, I'm not trying to say that Canada is or is not a better place than the US ... I'm just pointing out positive aspects to our system that will hopefully someday be implemented in the US. And yes, I'm aware that our government is considering the use of touch screens in our elections ... and I'll fight that with every ounce of energy that I can muster.

[jdog]

40. Number of voting machines per precinct strictly determined by law

according to population of area??

[Andy_Stephenson]

45. Agreed.

and they must be in propper working order.

[harmonyguy]

121. Strongly DIS-agree !!!! All precincts should use the same number....0

Number of voting machines per precinct strictly determined by law. Agree

according to population of area?? Disagree

Number of voting machines per precinct strictly determined by law. All precincts should be equal and should use zero (0) machines !!

Paper Ballots, hand counted, don't need no steeenkin' machines.

;-)

[BeFree]

47. What? No Faith in the current system?

You, Andy, are being modest. You have just written the basis for new election laws we need established, yesterday.

But let us not give an inch to the privatization of the process. It needs complete and un-encumbered citizen involvement. There should be no point in the whole operation that, when you ask a question, it goes un-answered, or you are obstructed. Have you ever been obstructed?

Kerry on.

[DemReadingDU]

49. I would like an online system that I could verify I voted

For those people who have a checking account, how many go online to verify that the checks have been posted? You can go back several months or years to look at old checks, debit & credit entries.

Well, why can't we have an online voting system that people could enter, with ID/password, to verify who they voted for and the issues they voted for? A person should be able to go back several years to see all the people they voted for, and all the issues.

It's been a thought swirling around in my head recently.

[Andy_Stephenson]

54. The problem with this is

then your boss could demand to see who you voted for. Or...vote selling could become a problem.

Voting and ballots should remain secret.

[luaptifer]

71. secrecy is a key problem but here's a masking proposal

a commentor to my kos diary

Who Needs Paper Anyhow?! Not vendors of e-vote machines suggested this:

I personally would like to see a system like this:

The voter signs in and recieves a smart card key to access the ballot prep machine.

Using touch screen input methods, the machine prepares a printed ballot with a globally unique id number. Since the GUID is not connected to the voter's name, secrecy is ensured. Tally is entered into a database with GUID.

Voter proceeds to verification station. Ballot is read and results displayed. If voter verifies ballot is correct tally is entered into second database with GUID. If ballot is not verified, GUID is voided, ballot physically marked void, voter issued new key card. During Machine tally, voided ballots are reconciled via GAAP with first database.

All ballots, void and valid, must be accounted for using GAAP in mandatory hand count.

btw, that diary was based on an update re FL's HAVA implementation that indicated the evote vendors were not favoring paper-verified voting http://election.dos.state.fl.us/dreinfo/pressrelease.pdf

eg.,

...they do have a prototype in development but have no real interest in bringing it into production unless one of his customers mandates it. He stated that he believes the idea of a voter verifiable paper ballot is a bad idea and he's hoping that cooler heads will prevail and the topic will be dropped.

[Lurker321]

61. "Voter participation should be mandatory" -

that is equivalent to taking my right to vote. The right to vote implies a right not to vote. You make it mandatory, it is not a "right" any more, it is an "obligation".

Sorry, I will not stand for you taking my "right" to vote away.

[Andy_Stephenson]

64. As a citizen of a Democratic Republic...

voting is an obligation IMHO.

[Lurker321]

72. As I said, I consider voting a right,

not an obligation, and would fight for that right and against someone taking it away from me, as your proposal would.

[seventythree]

158. agreed

[IndyOp]

66. Registration & more...

Registration at Bureau of Motor Vehicles would have to have a LOT more oversight to be fair. There were a lot of problems with BMV registrations in Indiana, and, I think in other states. If registrations from BMV's in 'some areas' are not processed correctly then we have a means of election fraud.

Here is a novel idea: Purge all voter registration rolls - dump 'em. Use names/addresses on tax returns as the basis of the voter registration roles -- everyone who hands in a tax return is automatically registered. For those people who don't pay taxes alternate ways of registering will be provided. I know that our local WorkForce Development and Medicaid/Medicare and Social Security offices have voter registration forms available. (I wish we could just use names & addresses from these programs, but the Repubs will cry foul given that they think everyone who needs these programs is already cheating the system by drawing multiple checks, etcetera).

Also we MUST have public control of the voter rolls -- right now the voting machine companies and some other shady companies, like Accenture, are doing this job. Cannot be trusted!

All voting-age adults MUST vote (?) - just an idea - a discussion of the merits may be worthwhile.

And, yes, absolutely 100% paper ballots, placed in see-through ballot boxes, counted publicly. For local, state, and federal elections.
MUST standardize & simplify provisional ballot procedures - the additional affidavit that voters had to sign in Ohio is obvious voter suppression.

A voter holiday would be great - especially if we could make it a Monday and allow voting across the country over the 3-day weekend. (I am a bit concerned about extending the voting period beyond 2-3 days. The longer ballots sit around the less secure they are.)

I love the idea of making vote-county duty like jury-duty -- awesome idea! Employers must pay them for the day.

:kick:

[velvet]

69. the Australian system

All paper. Elections held on a Saturday. Federal, State and local elections held separately.

I'm not saying our system is perfect and of course our population is only about the size of New York state's, but anyhow here's a link to some info on its workings - there might be a few ideas in there you could appropriate ... http://www.australianpolitics.com/voting/

[Stephanie]

74. The paper ballot, hand-counted, should be the final recorded vote.

The electronic voting machine tallies should function sort of like exit polls. The vote tally is not finalized until after the hand-count of the machine-printed paper ballots.




:hi: gbnc!

[Andy_Stephenson]

88. Works for me.

:hi: Stephanie

[fooj]

75. andy- you are a true patriot! you never stop!

My favorites- #1,3,6! Do you think(esp. now) realistically we can dump Diebold,Triad, etc? The shrub is president of the free world (ironic, isn't it?) because of these companies. Ughhh!

[flyarm]

78. bottom line is...

if we don't own the codes to the tabulators.."we the people" we will never have a legitimate election...
the codes belong to us...we paid for them, we vote with them, our votes are tabulated by them, and if we can't even see what our votes registered..how the hell can we have an election with them??

we need to own what we pay for...i dont buy a car and leave without the ignition key!
we need to own our elections..not the companies that make the machines...we need transparency..or we have no elections..we just have an excersize in futality!

fly

[fooj]

79. great points!

:headbang:

[mdb]

82. One important issue I didn't see other than in the link provided,

and I think it should be one of the priorities on top is open source software used for electronic voting systems to increase confidence by making the process transparent to the public.

[HomerRamone]

84. The essential paradox of voting machines

http://xymphora.blogspot.com/2003/11/essential-paradox-of-voting-machines.html

What is the essential paradox of computer touchscreen voting? The essential paradox of computer touchscreen voting is that there is absolutely no way to confirm the fairness of the result produced by the machines without having them create a countable and counted paper record of each voter's voting choices in a form that can be confirmed as accurate by the voter at the time of the voting. This paper record, and the fact it has to be collected, safely stored, and then counted, looks exactly like the old-fashioned paper ballot and counting process, leading one immediately to the conclusion that the machines have added nothing to the process. Why spend millions of dollars on the machines and their constant maintenance if you could accomplish the same thing with some paper ballots and ballot boxes? The voting machine companies are well aware of this paradox, which is why they have put up so much resistance to having their machines create paper records. Once they create paper records that have to be counted, the machines are obviously just glorified ballot printing machines, with the additional hassle of an extra counting process to ensure that the results are fair. To put it another way, if we had started with computer voting machines, and some genius came up with the idea of replacing them with paper ballots and ballot boxes and hand counting of ballots, that would be regarded as a major improvement in the whole voting process, being all at once more secure, cheaper, and easier.

[huckleberry]

86. H.R. 2239 - Voter Confidence & Increased Accessibility Act

I just received a letter this week from Jim Moran, my representative in Virginia's 8th district, in response to an e-mail I sent him about investigating voter fraud. In it he states that he is "a co-sponsor of legislation introduced by Representative Rush Holt, Voter Confidence & Increased Accessibility Act (H.R. 2239). If enacted, this legislation would amend a number of provision in the recently passed help America Vote Act of 2002. Among the provisions amended, this bill would extend the period of time available for states to receive federal grants to implement requirements of the Help America Vote Act. It also requires that a voter-verified paper record suitable for manual audit be produced for each and every American voter when they cast their ballots. While this legislation was not considered by the House of Representatives before the conclusion of the 108th Congress, I will continue to support it during the 109th Congress."

Here is a link to the Rush Holt's website --

http://holt.house.gov/issues2.cfm?id=5996

This bill seems to address a lot of our concerns.

[Andy_Stephenson]

87. Rush Holts bill is a band aid...

we need bottom up and top down reform.

as an example. "voter-verified paper record" is not a BALLOT. Read my sig line.

[mdb]

90. The last sentence of Jim Moran's letter says a lot.

Repubs don't even want to hear these bills. They don't even get a vote because they are never even put on the table to be heard. Repubs don't want to fix the system. This is the kind of talk that needs to be brought forward. Questions like how come Repubs are against a paper trail? How come they don't want open source software?

[Andy_Stephenson]

92. I am against a paper trail...as should you

Voter Verified Paper Ballot. Nothing more nothing less.

[mdb]

97. A "voter-verified paper ballot"

Same thing as a "voter-verified paper audit trail".

Is there a difference?

[Andy_Stephenson]

98. Read my sig line

When no statutory definition for a term exists, the first fallback in all courts is to consult the definition in Blacks Law Dictionary. a compelling case can be made for the fact that ballot is defined in Blacks Law Dictionary...Paper is defined in Blacks Law Dictionary but "Trail" is completely absent. Collectively the definition for ballot and the definition for paper generate a clear and easily understood legal definition of the paper ballot needed to ensure the integrity of our vote. Paper trail produces no such record.


Never surrender your ballot for a "paper trail" There is a difference and it is HUGE.

[mdb]

99. Well a lot of people use both terms as meaning the same thing.

I can understand trail is not in the law dictionary. I will be using the term "paper ballot" from now on as the legal term. Until it is put in the dictionary anyway. Thanks for the heads up. :-)

[New Earth]

91. what do you think of the Electoral College?

I don't see you mention it up there. You think we should keep it or get rid of it? I'm still unsure how i feel about it, personally.

[Andy_Stephenson]

93. The EC has got to go...

sorry it was an oversight.

It is time for direct election of the President.

[ClassWarrior]

96. I thought this was a pretty good list...

A Constitutional right to vote

Clean Money financing

National standardized registration

National election holiday

Simultaneous voting hours coast-to-coast

Instant Runoff Voting

Paper & pen ONLY

Standardized counting procedures

and of course abolishment of the Electoral College

NGU.

[bush_is_wacko]

100. Laws need to be passed forbidding election officials from participating

in any campaign activities for either candidate. No contributions, no endorsements. This should be punishable by federal law. This is also one of the biggest obstacles I have seen. Everyone involved in our political process wants to support a specific candidate. You know, if our freaking teachers aren't allowed to tell students who they should endorse, we can accomplish the same thing with our election officials. They should be allowed to vote, but never allowed to discuss who they vote for or support until the election is over.

BTW teachers can face severe punishments for telling students who to vote for, but they can choose to tell their students who they voted for. Most of them have the dignity to withhold that information until the election has already been decided.

[Bill Bored]

101. On the Amendment

Andy,

I was thinking that while the amendment probably should have been done long ago, it could be divisive and divert attention from issues such as verified voting. Here's why:

1. There will be legal disagreements because the States already guarantee the right to vote and the Constitution guarantees equal protection for a number of groups. Lawyers on this forum debate this issue all the time.

2. I would argue however, that there is no Constitutional guarantees for equal protection of opposition parties now, which is the problem the Dems have been experiencing lately. The ruling party has been using racial and demographic profiling to keep the Dems away from the polls, but it's not NECESSARILY because of racism. Maybe a federal law to prohibit this sort thing, based on party affiliation, would do the trick?

3. Imagine the fights over whether to allow felons to vote or not, nationwide. The problem in FL was that non-felons were put on the felons list, and even this has not been resolved. It must already be a crime under state law to make a bogus list like the ones in FL. Why hasn't anyone been prosecuted?

4. If you explicitly guarantee the right to vote for President, by extension, you're doing away with the electoral college. Should there be an exception of some kind for that? A lot of states will want to keep it because they don't have enough warm bodies to get representation otherwise. There will be a big fight over this.

5. If we don't have verified voting, the amendment may never pass anyway, so VVPB + mandatory audits has to be the first priority, and it needs to be done in a way that isn't divisive, unless the Repukes make it divisive.

Note I'm not saying I disagree with having this amendment, but IMO, making it such a high priority will divert attention from getting the VVPB and auditing in place that we desperately need. We should also be enforcing state laws now, and I don't see this happening. If the Repubs control the federal govt, we won't see the amendment or its enforcement either. Verified Voting has to be the #1 priority, IMHO of course.

[harmonyguy]

114. Thinking about amendment the other day....

...when I heard Jackson's speech - it hit me. I didn't realize that y'all didn't have this in your constitution. (Forgive me, I'm a Canadian)

Then it dawned on me that an amendment to your constitution to include the right to vote should ONLY be done AFTER all the other things are in place, such as paper ballots, hand counting etc.

As seen a few months ago, any talk of amending the US constitution is met with all kinds of passionate and in some cases ranting debate. Opening up discussion of an amendment for voting rights will almost certainly trigger a lot of 'while we're at it' amendments, which might end up overwhelming and indeed over-riding the original amendment. In the process the amendment to add voting rights gets lost in the shuffle, and has the possibility of being stripped out of whatever amendment does eventually get passed.

Not that my voice from up here matters, but while I agree that an amendment IS the right thing to do in the long run, in the more immediate term there are a lot of other things that can be accomplished to bring about some semblance of fairness to the system.

Your mileage(kilometerage) may vary.
HG

[Bill Bored]

123. Well, unless there's a Constitutional Convention, which only happened

once, in the very beginning, you can have one narrowly focused amendment, but with one-party rule, you're right to say that it could easily be contaminated!

Still, we agree that other matters should take priority.

Good day, eh.

[coffeenap]

102. What if voting for national office was SEPARATE from

local, regional, state elections? Then it wouldn't matter where you vote--just so you vote once. Wild, I know, but, why not? Different day?
Different system.

[coffeenap]

103. sorry-didn't see it was alread here

[loudsue]

105. Great thread, Andy! I have one other thing to add....

There should be a public audit of all precinct totals sent to the County level, and from the County to the State, and from the State to the national totals.

These totals need to be PUBLISHED, all along the way, and verified by those who have been doing the counting.

The Central Tabulators have been suspect as to where some of the changes have been taking place, and there needs to be an auditable, and AUDITED, mechanism for getting the totals, where EVERYONE can see that the totals were correct.

NO LOOPHOLES!! NO SECRET CODE!! NO SHENANIGANS!!

That needs to be our rallying cry.

:kick::kick::kick:

[gkhouston]

106. move election day back to October...?

as someone else said, "Columbus Day can go". We need to allow time for recounts or contests to occur. It's not like we need to give our citizens time to get their crops in before traveling to the polls. Granted, this would increase the length of the lame-duck session of Congress, but they do such weird-ass things when they're trying to get elected that I'm less concerned about their post-election antics than their pre-election activities.

Gina

[SnoopDog]

109. Sequentially numbered ballots....

Paper ballots with precinct and unique sequence number printed on each ballot.

You mark the ballot, place the ballot in a 'verifier machine' to preclude under/over ballots. You would have a 'none of the above choice' for all candidates. The validator machine will insure the ballot is valid. If 'spoiled', the voter would be given a new ballot - the spoiled ballot properly marked and tabulated as spoiled.

Then, humans count the vote and a machine count the vote. Its called dual audit.

I like the idea of one poster - registering to vote is mandatory and to be done by officials (no get out the vote scammers). You don't have to vote if you don't or can't.

There was a thread like this in December...

I think we should compile our suggestions, vote on what we all like and submit our 'bill' to our Congress. This would be our first Citizens Initiative!

Lets see this to completion. AFTER=Americans For Transparent Election Reform.

[harmonyguy]

112. See this post above for an example of how it can be done....

complete with examples.....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=271970&mesg_id=272630&page=

HG

[SnoopDog]

116. I am all in favor of learning from others - like Canada...

Doesn't it just floor you that the Repubs in Congress forbade - actually insured, that a paper trail was not in HAVA. Just who the f*uck do they think they are... To purposely not have an audit trail. These pricks are over-throwing our government. We need to fight these pigs.

[all.of.me]

113. Andy, you are too humble about 'just thinking out loud' !

This is an almost complete list of what we envision! It and the ideas that have followed it are fabulous. I love the idea of high school kids counting the votes. I have a daughter in 9th grade, and she is a good kid! She does not believe in breaking the rules. She is honest and hard working, and I can see kids like her doing their civic duty. (By the way, she is excited to be of voting age in 2008!)

What if voting was carried on over a period of a few days? If it was on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, making Tuesday a holiday, then people might be motivated to get out on Sunday and Monday, leaving themselves Tuesday as a no-work day. I definitely think, though, that if election day is just one day, it should be a holiday so people can get to the polls.

I also like the ideas of separate groups of people for separate tasks, like pollworkers and auditors. Then no one is too tired to not be clear and focused.

My only objection is mandatory voting. I don't like mandatory anything (except waking up in the morning!). It makes me feel squished, like there is no choice. Like someone said, it's a right to vote or not vote.

I especially don't think people would like it if it was tied into Motor Vehicle, the IRS or some other government entity. <shudder>

My other thought on that is how mandatory voting could be enforced. What would the penalty be for not voting?

Thanks for all your hard work!

Geneva T

[KerryReallyWon]

118. And the repug majority will all vote for this because.....

????????

[housewolf]

119. Instant Run-off & "None of the Above"

What opinion do DUers have of Instant Run-off voting? Personally I like the idea a lot - it's where you get to rank your selections for an office and if no one wins a majority of the votes (no clear winner) they are re-evaluated.

Also what about a "None of the Above" selection to give voters a chance to invalidate an election if no acceptable candidates are presented?

[katinmn]

133. I support Instant Run-off Voting

The current system means some people are forced to choose between the lesser of two evils, because they accept the "don't waste your vote" argument.

[seventythree]

159. I like the thought but ....

it would be expensive and I wonder how we will teach folks to rank, when teaching to clear punch seems to be a task. I'm for "none of the above."

[grasswire]

122. the simplest idea of all...

...and one with the greatest protection....

NCR paper ballots. Three copies. White to the ballot box. Pink to the voter. Yellow to an archive only used for recounts, held as a doublecheck.

The usual argument against "receipts" is that votes can be sold.

But the likelihood of buying enough votes from individuals to sway an election is NOTHING compared to the ease of electronic fraud. It would be risky and difficult to buy thousands of individual votes.

Some emerging democracies are using NCR paper ballots.

[harmonyguy]

128. I'm curious...

Not to be argumentative, but very curious...
...why the voter would need a copy?
They know how they voted, and unless there is an attempt to connect the vote with the voter, ie: loss of secrecy, I don't understand this.

HG

[wiggs]

125. Election officials cannot be partisan campaign participants. nt

[Lisabtrucking]

126. When done, we need to send to all house and senate members. n/t

[Zan_of_Texas]

127. my list

Anything that is not human-observable throughout the entire chain of voting and counting is not appropriate or secure.

Same day registration, as is done in Minnesota and other states.
(Study in Cleveland showed that 1 in 20 registrations did not make it onto the voter rolls accurately. If projected, this problem alone could have endangered 35,000 votes in the state of Ohio. http://www.caseohio.org/CaseOhio/Registration_Problems_Study.htm Registration problems were at the top of the tens of thousands of problems reported to Election Protection.)

Ink a finger as in Venezuela, to prevent voting twice that day.

Absentee and overseas and military voting are problematic -- I admit to having no solution to these. However, internet voting is absolutely not an answer.

Boot the DREs out of the polling places - no electronic tabulation of votes period. Use machines as paper ballot generators only. Districts that bought them can sell them to districts that don't have them, so those districts can have one or two per polling place for disabled voters. (An accessibility expert tells me they don't work as well as some would have you believe anyway.) For more on this, see How To Fix a Broken Electoral System In Six Easy Steps, by Bruce F. Cole, Friday, November 19, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1119-29.htm

National holiday for voting. One, or maximum two day voting period.

Felons not in jail should be restored their rights to vote.

Full-time election officials should not chair campaigns or campaign for candidates running for offices under their jurisdiction.

Campaign finance - continue efforts to establish public financing, and keep corporate money out of campaigns.

[suffragette]

129. Number 6 is key

It is so important that the privatization of this system be stopped and ownership be placed back in the public sector where it belongs.

[ginnyinWI]

131. No more voting machines or polling places.

Voting through the mail like Oregon does. Tabulate by machine if you must, but hang on to those paper ballots! Have both Republican and Democratic observers while the votes are tabluated. No punch card ballots--paper ballots on which you mark with a permanent marker.

The benefits: no polling place nightmares: no lines, no voter intimidation. Paper trail. No big investment in equipment. If people can get their tax returns in by a certain date, they should be able to get their votes in the mail by a certain date. We'd have an election day deadline, and then everybody would have to sit on their hands for a week or so while everything was counted.

[mzmolly]

134. I would like to see a standard procedure across the nation. Same machines

same procedure across the board! You touched on this.

* We have opti-scan machines in the TC area of MN, and I think with a 6% audit as you mention Andy, that would be a secure system.

I love your idea for citizen oversite (bi-partisan oversite of course) we need AUDITS and severe penalties for not meeting national voting standards.

I've said before I was in banking, and if banks don't meet criteria and their audits don't come out clean, they are fined big time - and or SHUT DOWN.

We need to have these machines diligently tested and AUDITED via mock elections, BEFORE any and all elections - period.

I don't know about making voting mandatory but I do believe that more people will vote if they have confidence in the system.

AUDIT AUDIT AUDIT, surprise audits with severe penalties for Secretarys of State and their subordinates if they don't make the grade.

[Niche]

135. The way Canada does it. Paper ballots, required voting from all

citizens - in which they come to your door and register you at 18. And no more than 1000 voters per precinct. Honest, clear, informed voting.

[elare]

137. Mandatory voting

There is no mandatory requirement to vote in Canada

[EFerrari]

138. Andy, I haven't worked this as long as you have but, it seems to

me that over and above the particular changes to our process, we need a **mechanism** that is more truly democratic. So, for example, when there is a problem in a state like OH, where one party controls everything, our federal elections aren't subject to such abject manipulation.

We need a non-partisan mechanism to oversee our federal elections. I'm not saying this well. We need Fair Witnesses, lol, that won't drag their heels like Blackwell did or be beholden to GE or Disney or be dependent on the political bully of the day.

[Andy_Stephenson]

140. I agree...

100%

[Vektor]

139. I like it! But is there any way...

that we can at least TRY to ensure that voters actually have a realistic grasp of the issues? How many people go to the polls and vote knowing NOTHING about what's really going on in the world, but picking the candidate that their buddies, family, or church told them to?

I think the sheer number of oblivious voters and what an effect they have on election results is frightening.

My husband and I joked that any one wanting to vote should have to take a class, or a series of them about current world affairs and the economic, environmental, moral, and social effects of what's going on at the present time. A non-partisan education program that gives facts and figures, a balanced view of the issues, and presents both sides of the coin.

This of course is probably not realistic, but something like it - somehow, would be great.

Uninformed voters frighten me.

Case in point, my husband's grandparents - they are in their 80's and are registered Democrats. They receive Medicare, are on many prescription meds, their income comes from a few orchards they own.
They told me they haven't voted Dem in a while, because "the Democrats want to tax you, and put everyone out of business." Aghast, I asked them why they thought this, what they meant, and how did they feel about Bush's policies regarding Medicare benefits. I also asked if they had any idea how tax policies affect different people in different income brackets, and why that is.

Their response? "Heh?! Honey, speak up, I don't hear so good!"
Basically, they have NO IDEA why they feel the way they do, and at 85 years old, are too set in their ways to give a shit if they are misinformed, or underinformed.

That's two Bush votes in the bag for no good reason. Multiply that by the millions of other people who have no idea why they vote the way they do, or who vote on misinformation, gossip, rumors, and spin

What can we do about that?

[EFerrari]

142. Court them : ) n/t

[Andy_Stephenson]

145. Exactly

We have to educate them.

If not us...the republicans will.

[EFerrari]

147. That's right. The hardest thing we're dealing with isn't the Evil

Empire. It's the limits of our patience.

And I don't mean, let's be real good appeasers, not at all.

It just that this whole struggle demands good communication skills. And those require self restraint. And that requires patience. The patience of an ant colony. See Frost.

[Vektor]

168. People also...

...hate to hear/see/observe anything that threatens the belief system they have set up for themselves, or someone else has set up for them. New ideas and change are very threatening...it's that whole cognitive dissonance thing.

If many of the people who voted for Bush thinking he was "a good moral patriot" were forced to see the truth, they'd be mighty unpleasantly surprised. The truth can be pretty ugly so they tune it out, and head to the polls in droves, believing Bush will make everything alright because their church told them that, and they want so desperately to believe it.

That is the huge obstacle we are up against, mass ignorance.

[seventythree]

157. exactly why mandatory voting is no good

[bardgal]

141. GET IT THRU YOUR HEADS! NO MACHINES EVER!!!!!

Paper ballots, paper receipts, it won't matter!!!!!

WAKE THE F^CK UP PEOPLE! If any form of electronics/computers are envolved in ANY WAY - THEY CAN MANIPULATE THE VOTE.

It doesn't matter how long it takes to tally, but PAPER BALLOTS and HAND COUNTS THAT ARE MONITORED are the ONLY WAY TO INSURE A FAIR ELECTION.

GET OVER THE "EASE" FACTOR OF E-VOTING. IT'S WHAT GOT US INTO THIS MESS IN THE FIRST PLACE.

[Andy_Stephenson]

143. I disagree...

electronics can be safe as long as proper auditing and safeguards are in place.

[EFerrari]

149. But, what about the tabulators? I can give you a piece of paper

and then hack your vote. Your piece of paper will never be respected and my vote totals will be broadcast to the nation.

[Andy_Stephenson]

151. There is no need for tabulators if done properly...

All you need is a calculator...paper and a pen..

[EFerrari]

152. Get them to let go of their sexy machines? There's the rub. n/t

[Andy_Stephenson]

153. No we need to force it.

for our country's sake.

[EFerrari]

155. I'm with you. It's counter-intuitive. We'll have hands full.

But, "no one said this would be easy" -- Leslie Marmon Silko.

[eridani]

169. True dat

But putting the safeguards in place is an expensive nuisance. The machines don't really add anything.

[kster]

154. I'm with you

freeze the machines for 20 years. Put them online and let the experts and hackers have at em ,they can get a perfect system till then ... paper only.

[seventythree]

160. me too, paper only

[euler]

165. We all need to get it through our head that....

....the Constitution grants states the right to determine how their electors are chosen. In other words, the constitution gives states the right to determine whether they will use punch cards, lever systems, electronic voting, etc. Until this right is repealed by constitutional amendment, we must appeal to each of the 50 state legislators to change their laws and mandate paper ballots. 50 different efforts to 50 different political bodies ? Forget it, won't happen.

You focus on the wrong goal. The only way to guarantee paper ballots everywhere is to repeal the rights of states to choose their own method to pick electors. But this isn't possible either.

[fearnobush]

146. How about an anonymous voter ID number printed on the paper.

This ID number will be unique to each voter. It will be printed on the internal paper ribbon as well as the external receipt given to the voter. Only this ID number or combo of numbers and letters will be printed on the receipt. The ID on a paper receipt will enable a voter to guarantee their vote was counted in the event of a recount or a questionable vote entry.

[Andy_Stephenson]

161. This idea smacks of Vote here

Voter Verified Paper Ballot means what it says.

Proper Auditing and stringent controls are what is needed.

[KaliTracy]

156. registration changes and paper ballot

Registration:

1. New voters sign registration form with CARBON -- so they get a reciept, and the person who helped with registration forms SIGNS the registration form, too.

2. New (and old) restristrations get a database number. (See below, voting for use of this). It is ON the registration form, both the original and carbon copies.

PLUSES: Database number on registration allows for NO disapearence of blocks of voter registration. A person assigned to get new votes is assigned a block of numbers. Forms which are not valid/or completed/or ripped-not used, have to be turned in, and reason for the voter registration number not to be used has to go into database instead of voter information.

Voters who are deemed not elegible can be easily notified to rectify the situation, and can easily be made elegible after all criteria is followed.

Queries can easily be made per district to see how many registered voters are (new and old) for a district. But that should matter to much because of the actual Voting being a paper ballot Vote.


Paper Ballot Voting:

1. Each person gets a booklet with tear-off sheets inside per type of race (One sheet per type). Sheets are color coded at top, or have different symbols at top (Shapes, etc.) -- to easily do a "first round" of divying up the votes. for counting. (Squares in one pile, Circles in another, Rectangles in third and so on).

2. When a person gets a booklet, they

a. sign the poll book

b. they compare the number on the poll book to the number that is placed right then on their book (when the voting book is issued, the poll worker issues a book, puts the database number sticker on the outside of the book, and Signs the number so that the signature overlaps on the cover and the label. Voter signs poll book and lable associtated with his/her name.

c. Voter goes anywhere with "cubby" area to vote. MULTIPLE (more than 20 cubbies available.) -- The fact that it may take longer at the poll table is moot with many, many cubbies, because the voter won't have to wait once he/she leaves poll table.

d. This is important -- if voter choses NOT to vote for a race there is a check box which states DO NOT WISH TO VOTE FOR THIS RACE. There also should be a line for Write-in candidates.

e. This is also important: TWO ballot boxes --
e1. one for the TEAR OFF election results (Voter tears off and puts in ballot sleeve all of the pages, and puts into box.)

e2. one for the EMPTY BOOKLET, which still has the number (nothing else). Voter shows election official all races are torn out of book. Easy to cross reference the number of books to the number of people signed in to the number of votes cast.

e3. "Undervotes" become moot because there is Clear Voter intention.

e4. With this system voters could register the same day they vote -- May want to put actual results in a Provisional Ballot Box, pending verfification. ???

Thoughts?

[seventythree]

162. motor voter

dispensed with the kind of registration forms you speak of -- that is what we always did in Illinois, but that changed with motor voter at the SOS offices. I used to tell folks -- keep your receipt in your wallet until the county clerk sends you your registration card so you will have proof that you registered should something go wrong. We always had to account for all the forms we took out, and include any we spoiled with the return of the remainders. I don't think SOS motor voter registrants get receipts, but I could be wrong.
Like your thought on paper ballots and booklets -- maybe more cumbersome than what is needed -- same day registration still bothers me, but I have to think more about it.

[anaxarchos]

163. This is from the Kennedy School at Harvard.

The number one reason (one third of the sample) for not voting is "Because I moved recently and hadn’t registered at my new location" (32%). Also "Because I didn’t have any way to get to the polls on election day" (20%), "Because I didn’t quite know how to go about registering to vote" (13%), "Because I thought I was registered, but when I went to vote I learned I wasn’t and could not vote" (6%), "Because I was worried that my right to vote would be challenged and I would not be allowed to vote (3%), etc. Overall, the difficulty of registration and voting logistics issues trump political issues (like "voter apathy") almost two to one.

"In many democracies, registration is renewed automatically when a registered voter moves to a new residence. America’s registration system, which places the burden of registration on the individual rather than, as in Europe, on officials, depresses turnout in other ways, too. One in eight of non-voters with an interest in voting said they simply do not know how to go about registering."

"Although it is difficult to estimate precisely the combined effect of these various factors, there is little question that several million more Americans would have cast a ballot on Election Day if the country’s registration and voting system were more welcoming."

http://www.vanishingvoter.org/Releases/release111104.sh...

Personally, I would add obligatory voting which really ammounts to a voters EXPLICIT decision to not vote and puts the onus of tracking you down on the government (i.e. reverses the obligations of a system of personal registration and election).

[kcora]

174. Christianity helps turn out the vote

Because from what I saw this past elections, Christians were told it was in the bible they needed to vote. They also get together in a place where, if it is in their interest to get them to vote, they make the process easier.

Tracking people moving would be impossible. How would you even know when someone moved?

But maybe other avenues could serve the same purpose the churches did (for those of us who don't attend). Like paying taxes. Or paying filling out paperwork for a new job. A simplified process - here's your payroll deduction sheet, here's your new registration form for voting.

But like I said in other posts, if we want the system to change, there's lots of good ideas about changing it out there. What's keeping us from getting it changed?

[euler]

164. You're missing at least one step.

It's not that simple. In addition to your #1 which gives a new right to citizens, several other existing constitutionl rights or states rights will have to be repealed in order to achieve most of your other suggestions.

But this is fatal to your thesis because it can only be accomplished by constitutional amendment, which means 2/3 of all states must approve. I don't really have to tell you that 2/3 of the states aren't going to agree to having power taken from them.

[No Exit]

166. Hello Andy--I'm a newbie, but I have some input...

Hello, first I'd like to say I've seen your posts and know that you are one who has actually been doing the HARD WORK of this election fraud investigation. I would like to say how much I admire you and the others who are actually doing something. W/O you guys, people like me would still just be sitting around as depressed as we were on Nov. 3. Thank you!

Regarding your point 1, the Constitutional Amendment. I am a lawyer. When I see federal laws--especially something as important as a Const. Amend.--being proposed, I always feel that red flags are going up. This is b/c I am suspicious of making too many federal laws. No, I'm not one of those crazed "states rights" extremists, but I just know how intrusive and overbearing the federal government can be into all our lives once it gets its foot in the door. For example: take a look some time at what they are doing regarding child support. Sometimes it's bad to have different standards in every state, but other times it can work to a citizen's advantage. Case in point: suppose you don't like the restrictive atmosphere of the laws in Mississippi... you can if necessary move to, say, Oregon or Massachusetts. We need to have choice.

You know that "marriage amendment" all the wingnuts were pushing? Talk about a bad idea! Those idiots couldn't see beyond the part where they thought, "Oh, good, now gay people can never ever have this wonderful institution of marriage." (Gag me.) But the idiots didn't realize that with such an amendment, there was a good chance that ALL SORTS of items formerly thought to be domestic relations law would be suddenly within the jurisdiction of the federal courts. Currently people getting divorced at least have a chance of persuading their local judge to give them a judgment they can live with. But if the federal gov't. got in and started with their "guidelines" bit, soon there would be a lot of domestic judgments which were inflexible and dissatisfying to people b/c "everything has to follow federal guidelines."

Another example of this is criminal law, various parts of which are being usurped by the federal government day by day. Federal prosecutors play with a deck stacked heavily in their favor! Far better for citizens to be prosecuted by their own state authorities. Better chance of a fair proceeding, believe it or not.

So I think an amendment is probably not a good idea. Let's see how much of HAVA they are not bothering to enforce, and let's ENFORCE it! Except, as you said, paper ballots should reign supreme no matter what--any provisions of HAVA that contradict that should be scrapped.

I really like the rest of your proposals. They are informed and well-thought-out. No. 8 does kind of bother me, though--mandatory participation? It would be really hard to enforce that, I think.

"Voting system owned by the people...no privatization in this area tolerated"... YES YES YES!!!

[Klimmer]

167. My thoughts on this . . .

Many great ideas here. Great discussion.

My idea (and some have already alluded to some of it) is to use fill-in-the-bubble paper ballot with carbon copy attached that must be filled out in pen. Once you vote, a complete ballot carbon copy is given to you to keep, and the other one goes into the lock-box to be counted. Both are a matching pair but unique serial number.

On your way out if chosen, when exit polled, (if you happen to be so lucky; I've never once been exit polled) you must show your complete carbon copy. So exit polling can continue to be used to call the election in a timely fashion.

At the BOE office or where ever this happens, the ballots are "image" scanned by computer and the software automatically posts your ballot by serial number to a County run or State run website so at some time after you vote you can verify that your vote really did count looking at an actual image of your entire ballot using the WWW from any where in the world. The ballots are then "hand" counted/tallied, to alleviate any fear of tampering via computer fraud. Computers are used only to create an image of your ballot not to count it.

If the need arises for a recount(s), since all ballots are visible to the entire world via the WWW and at anytime, it is a simple matter to have at once BOE and/or many independent citizen groups do them simply and with much less cost involved. In fact, if a citizen wanted to recount a precinct, a city, whatever, they could. This record of the vote would stay on-line for 2 years. In addition, and if needed for any reason, the actual full paper ballot remains also.

Any voting citizen who has a problem with their ballot that has been posted on-line (or not) can easily return back to BOE and show their carbon copy to rectify any discrepancies.

This system would allow for true transparency, verification, and the ability to recount by anyone at anytime.

Is this a good idea or a bad idea? If bad why?

[Andy_Stephenson]

170. Bad Idea here is why...

You go back to work after voting. Your boss is a prick and wanted you to vote for the NAZI party. Well, you said pluck you and voted a straight Democratic ticket. Your boss now demands to see how you voted. Guess what? You are now gainfully unemployed.

Pen, Paper, Proper Auditing, and well trained election workers...that is all we need.

[jbnow]

171. An option I haven't seen here

are something like the machines used in India. They have so many advantages in terms of potential fraud and cost ($200 per machine)

This surely isn't the best article on it, but I hurried.

http://www.slate.com/Default.aspx?id=2107388&MSID=A41CDCC79CDF47F1A6C6C88866FBB008

In fact, it's not much of a computer at all, more like a souped-up adding machine. A column of buttons runs down one side. Next to each button is the name and symbol of a candidate or party. These are written on slips of paper that can be rearranged. That means unscrupulous politicians couldn't rig the machines at the factory, since they wouldn't know which button would be assigned to which candidate. Also, the software is embedded—or hard-wired—onto a microprocessor that cannot be reprogrammed. If someone tries to pry open the machine, it automatically shuts down. After much testing, India adopted the machines for nationwide use this year.

Technology shouldn't be chosen at a local level. Source codes must be open to inspection

[kcora]

172. My comments

#1 - A Constitutional Amendment for every American OVER 18, to replace the ones for men of all races and, oh yes, women? I'm missing the point of what that would gain, except if you combine it with #8, requiring each to vote (Constitutional too?). It's kind of like making it a law that everyone has to think. Just because they have to vote doesn't mean they'll make good decisions.

We started out as a country where only land-owning males (meaning having some education and interest in the country) could vote. For a reason. Because they were afraid the common man could be swayed too easily with slick words. Like what's happening today. Where people make their decisions based on what they see in 60 second or less commercials!

You can't mandate a conscious. I don't know how to make that one better. I know you're trying. Maybe we should have to mandate that every American, before they can vote, should have to go through the same education process as a foreigner who is getting his citizenship. At least then he/she would have to be somewhat informed.

[kcora]

173. I like this topic - it makes me think, thanks!

The election process.
We need paper ballots to validate the system, at least give a semblance of keeping people honest. The feasibility or relative accuracy of trying to count every ballot - it would be like checking every part that goes out of the factory. But maybe the same quality assurance method that's used for some high quality products should be used for each election, i.e. 6% sampling, recount if the sample is off by a certain amount. I think what you'd like is to have the greatest accuracy possible. We do it all the time for manufacturing; they have methods that work there, why not use the same ones for elections?

I liked the idea of voting on a machine that added the votes and produced a paper ballot so you could see for yourself that the machine counted the same candidates that you intended to vote for.

We definitely need a uniform federal voting system. Just like we need and have uniform federal interstate highways. We got them through a combination of federal and state funding. Funny that they were more important than the voting process.

The hows are probably out there from far better minds than mine. We fund projects for all kinds of silly to serious things. If we consider it important, we can change it.

To sum it up, I agree with you:
- no privitization
- need a paper trail
- need quality assurance checking that the counting method matches the votes

We also need:
- consistent, easy to understand, voting methods. Right now it would be like having a stop sign be a different shape/color in every state. Imagine the chaos if states wanted their own shades of red (or different colors) on stop lights.

We have the brain power to make a good system. The question is, who's benefitting by not having a good system? It's more than not having the money. Like term limits for elected officials, it's about power. And who loses it if the system is made better, less open to problems or fraud. And how do we, the people, make out needs and desires overcome the resistance of those who are benefitting.

Thank you for your morning eye opener. Have a good day.