Important MoveOn Poll for Election Reform needs to be DU-ed!!!

[Stevepol]

Kathy Dopp sends along a reminder to be sure to vote in the MoveOn poll to keep it moving in the right direction with regard to election reform. She will probably post this herself but in case she's too busy elsewhere, here's her email:

Please help us steer MoveOn in the right direction as far as election
integrity. Move-On has just released an online survey.

Please be sure to fill in the following choices this way:

1. Require electronic voting machines to print voter-verified paper records
Very Interested
Vote counts cannot be audited without a voter-verified paper record.

3. Eliminate the third-party "spoiler" effect with instant runoff voting
Not Interested
It is VERY IMPORTANT to say "NOT Interested" on instant runoff voting.
While instant runoff voting is a great idea, LONG-TERM, it is a
disastrous idea for the short term because it would make it virtually
impossible to ensure that votes are counted accurately, the way voters
intend. We FIRST need to re-establish election integrity and THEN,
after we've implemented and tested basic measures to ensure election
integrity, THEN let us add instant runoff voting. To try to ensure
election integrity with instant runoff voting, AT THIS TIME, would be
virtually impossible due to the complexity of the mathematics, audits,
etc. IRV is a GREAT idea in the future, but not just yet please.

4. Train all poll workers to protect election integrity
It is important to note that it is impossible for a poll worker to
detect or prevent electronic vote fraud.

11. Other:
MoveOn left out all the tools for ensuring the accuracy of vote counts!

Please type in any one of the following in the "Other" category

a. Mandatory independent random vote count audits

b. Public release of detailed vote counts broken out by precinct and by
vote-type

c. Public exit polls

Here is their online survey:
http://political.moveon.org/eintegritysurvey/survey.html?id=6696-1269729-WQ9u9klOSV2ZK8AiLUBiFA&t=2

If only we could get groups like MoveOn and Common Cause to consult with
the experts on voting systems and election integrity issue so that
Move-On's efforts always helped to ensure election integrity (unlike
their unfortunate support for HAVA and other measures which have been a
boon for election tamperers).

Thank you.

Best Regards,

Kathy Dopp
http://electionarchive.org

[KoKo]

1. I found that poll to have very odd questions. And I didn't like that it

asked for Electronic Machines to "print" a verifiable paper trail.

No where did it mention Verifiable Paper Ballots that could be "hand counted." the emphasis was on Electronic Machines Printing Ballots. So I filled in at the end "Verifiable Paper Ballots" not "Printed Machine Ballots."

There were other questions about "proportional representation" that skewed the question to interpret this would help minority voters...yet didn't explain what the "proportial representation" would involved and give a counterpoint as to how it differs with what we have now.

There were other questions that were asked in a way that I think could skew the results of this poll. I found it disappointing although I filled it out...I don't think it addressed a narrow enough range of issues regarding the issue of DRE voting.

[mom cat]

2. This is a very important post...K&R

[Peace Patriot]

3. I marked "very interested" for all items. And I added:

Paper ballots, hand-counted at the precinct level, results posted in the precinct; banish private corporations, esp. rightwing Bushites (Diebold, ES&S) controlling our elections.

I really believe that a return to paper ballots is the only way to restore election integrity and transparency. "Voter verified paper ballots" are completely insufficient, when you have Diebold and ES&S "trade secret," proprietary programming code in the central tabulators (as well as the voting machines) and recounts are nearly impossible to obtain. The election system has been thoroughly polluted and corrupted by HAVA. That was its intention. (Tom Delay doesn't lavish $4 billion dollars on his buds at Diebold and ES&S without expected long term and short term payback.) We have a whole bunch of corrupt election officials, both Dem and Repub. We need to clean house. Half-measures just don't it.

That said, I'm all for whatever level of transparency we can get, ASAP. Measures like VVPB might be somewhat preventative--and could be helpful if we have candidates, lawyers and citizens poised to challenge every questionable result.

Regarding "Instant Runoff Voting," I see no reason not to SAY that I'm for it. Move-On is such a Democratic Party echo chamber, that they're never going to push it anyway. Aside from Bushite controlled vote tabulation, the two biggest political problems in this country are, a) a corrupt, entrenched two-party system where you have 60% of the population against a war (from way back before the invasion, in Feb. '03) and that majority cannot get its will enforced; and b) (related) vast campaign contribution and lobbying corruption. I don't want a tyranny under the Democrats, any more than I want the current tyranny. I go way back. My first vote for president was in 1964. I voted for the peace candidate, LBJ. (That's how they advertised him.) And what I got for that vote was upwards of TWO MILLION Vietnamese and other Southeast Asians slaughtered, without justification, and over 55,000 dead U.S. soldiers. And I see that train coming again. And the only way to stop it is to pull the Democrats back to the CENTER--representing the great progressive ANTIWAR majority in this country--with strong leftist voting--and, of course, it's not possible to do leftist voting in the current system without helping Diebold, ES&S and the U.S. Supreme court put fascist pigs in office.

The Democrats may not be as responsible for Diebold and ES&S as the Bushites are (they were getting anthraxed at the time), but they ARE responsible for the complete silence of the party leadership on this all-important issue, leading up and after the 2004 election. Their silence is INCOMPREHENSIBLE. We had rightwingnuts counting all our votes in secret! We furthermore had all the war profiteering corporate news monopolies FALSIFY their exit polls to "fit' the rightwingnuts vote count. That is insane. And THAT is why we need Instant Runoff Voting--to counter that kind of corruption, collusion and cowardice throughout our political establishment.

And I see no reason at all not to say so to MoveOn.org, for what it's worth.

[Peace Patriot]

4. Point of info: Instant Runoff Voting would permit a voter to vote, say,

for Ralph Nader, but would prevent that vote from helping Bush in any way. The voter would do: First Choice-Nader, Second Choice-Gore. If Gore/Bush were neck and neck (as happened), the Nader vote would go to Gore.

Nader would be eliminated, but the Nader voter's vote would not become meaningless, and could not help Bush. That way, the Nader voter can express his/her actually "Middle America" views on war, corporations and NAFTA (say), to influence the Democrat back to the center, without suffering a fascist junta. (I was torn in 2000, because of NAFTA/GATT, the WTO, and other bad, bad trade agreements. I never have voted for Nader, but I wanted to, in 2000, because I KNEW that outsourcing of jobs was upon us, as well as destruction of unions, and huge environmental damage from global free piracy. But I couldn't abide Bush. I bought that argument. But I really, really, really wanted to vote against global free piracy! --and the system, basically, wouldn't allow it. I had a choice between outright fascists and Dems with a disastrous economic policy.)

Ballot "complications" (say, from Instant Runoff) are NOT an argument against paper ballots, or for electronics. Or, I should say, they are only an argument if you are catering to the war profiteering corporate news monopolies, who want to "call" elections early, both so that they can influence election outcomes, and to get democracy out of the way as fast as possible, and get back to their war profiteering. Speed kills--both people and democracies. Speed should NOT be a consideration. ONLY accuracy and verifiability should have any consideration in our election system. Just ask yourself this: Would you have been willing to wait a few weeks to NOT have George Bush as president?

No reason why we can't have all the old retired folks in a neighborhood, and young people, too, COUNTING the votes, IN PUBLIC, for as long as it takes. That's a good picture of democracy. Electrons whirring around invisibly inside a black box--because counting votes is just so complicated, we can't do it anymore--is tyranny. Non-transparency IS tyranny.

I suspect it's a Democratic Party argument that Instant Runoff Voting is just too complicated. But their stance on rightwing Bushites counting all our votes in secret is already so compromised and corrupt, how can we buy their argument on this (Instant Runoff)? Or the argument of election officials (also compromised and corrupt)? I don't buy it. I think entrenched Democrats don't want leftist votes pulling them back from the lobbyists who now control them, and entrenched election officials prefer a corrupt, manipulable political and election system because it gives them wrongful power. We are a creative, ingenious, energetic people. Give us a problem--like putting men on the moon--and we SOLVE it. (It's sad to think of, with these Bushites, how little they understand us, and how completely they have failed to rally our best qualities as a people!) We CAN handle a complicated ballot, and count it in a way that insures accuracy and verifiability. The problem is NOT complication of the ballot. The problem is political corruption.

[Peace Patriot]

5. And one more thing: KUDOS TO KATHY DOPP AND "US COUNT VOTES"!

What a great lady she is! We are truly blest to have someone of her caliber and dedication working on our behalf! Thank you, Kathy, from the bottom of my heart!

[kster]

6. Heres one for you

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2388627&mesg_id=2388627

[druidity33]

10. !!!

I agree with absolutely everything you just said...
kudos.



...together we can do it...

[nicknameless]

7. Kick

[freedomfries]

8. k & r

thanks for posting this excellent commentary by Kathy Dopp!
This lame moveon survey totally fails to take into account the new reality thrust upon us by privatized e-voting and counting. But it is the result of a lot of pressure and an important opportunity to educate our fellow dems about the brave new world of post-HAVA
s-elections!
Please take a few minutes to fill out the survey and add in your comments!

[freedomfries]

9. kick & klick on link

http://political.moveon.org/eintegritysurvey/survey.html?id=6696-1269729-WQ9u9klOSV2ZK8AiLUBiFA&t=2

[Misskittycat]

11. Done. My first comment was to consult election reform experts because

this is a complicated subject and most people, including progressives, don't fully understand the issues and the problems of electronic voting.

[autorank]

12. Stevepol. Thanks for the heads up. Just didit.

I was at the right hand column on every issue except proportional elections, but close there.

My comment for "other" "Elminate all electronic voting and tebulating machines, ENTIRELY."


Great post!!!

[pauldp]

13. done. n/t

[Kurovski]

14. Done.

Lord, but the electoral college bugs the crap outta me.

[freedomfries]

15. k & r

[AmBlue]

16. MoveOn's missing the mark

....and confusing people with this survey. They don't even mention mandatory audits or use the right language to describe Voter Verified Paper Ballots. I don't get why they don't just team up with the real experts in election integrity and send the folks doing all the hard work some help. All the election integrity groups are in need of people who want to work, and MoveOn members know that if we don't solve this problem first, nothing else we do is going to matter.

HEY MOVEON!! If you really want to do something meaningful, get with www.votetrustusa.org, www.verifiedvoting.org, and/or www.votersunite.org. They all could point your nose-- and the noses of your 3.3 million members-- in the right direction.

p.s. We could do without confusing surveys.

[Amaryllis]

17. Voter verified paper BALLOTS, PLEASE!!! Not paper records!