there's only one way to solve this election fraud problem . . .

[OneBlueSky]

after reading this 2003 article from truthout.com (posted awhile ago by DUer truehawk) . . .

http://www.truthout.com/docs_03/102503C.shtml

and having followed this BBV issue since Bev Harris first began her campaign to expose it, I've come to believe the truth of this statement by the article's author, Victoria Collier:

These machines are nothing but Trojan horses built by and for election thieves. With the ballot-less computer, there is no way to recount, no way to prove any discrepancy, inaccuracy or fraud.

I also agree with her recommendations . . .

The bottom line is that a computerized vote count is a secret vote count -- and that's illegal. Technology cannot supercede the constitutional and mandatory provisions of election law, which require open and verifiable elections. There is no way to do a public vote count with computers. . . we should march to our Secretary of State's office and demand the restoration of a hand-counted paper ballot system.

as Ms. Collier pointed out, the rigging of election has been going on for a long time, and it's benefited BOTH parties . . . that's very likely why we're not hearing anything about election fraud from the Democrats -- being part of the problem, they have no interest in seeking a solution . . .

which leaves seeking the solution up to us, the American people . . . to you, to me, to Bev Harris, and to every American who values democracy and wants to see it restored through honest, open, and verifiable elections . . .

so we should, for now, forget about who we'll run in 2006 and 2008, because it won't make any difference if the current voting system isn't shit-canned and replaced with the simplest and most straightforward system available: paper ballots marked with pencils and counted by local election officials monitored by representatives of both parties . . . THAT's where we have to direct our attention, starting now and continuing until the mess that our electoral system has become is fixed . . .

[sce56]

1. AMEN

And I'm not very religous

[scottxyz]

2. One caveat

Ballots should be marked with PEN (indelible ink) - not pencil.

[OneBlueSky]

5. sounds good to me . . . n/t

.

[On the Road]

3. I Agree the Machines are Illegal in Most States

because they are unable to perform a recount.

[Eloriel]

17. Not to worry

Some states have been busily "fixing" that by removing any need for a recount. In GA, for example, they made the electronic vote the "only legal vote," so even if they had paper ballots printed out by the machine and verified by the voter, they'd be useless -- until/unless they changed that law.

[UL_Approved]

4. Yes, we all know that

This is the problem. No secure records exist on the computerized voting systems. The Enron-style accounting has now hit the voting booths. This technology is a sham and needs to be removed. It never should have existed in the first place. But we do need to get rid of it. I just hope that the coming years teach our nation that democracy is a fragile thing, and can easily be destroyed.

[sandnsea]

6. mail-in

No precinct challenges, no lines, no intimidating tactics. Mail carriers know if ballots are going to houses with no occupants, duplicate ballots, etc. Paper ballots.

And registrations with carbon copy receipts, signed by the person doing the registering along with the group. All groups doing registration drives must keep names and signatures. That way anybody who registers has a receipt and the name and the company to protect against registration fraud.

I think there's simple solutions to these problems, the simpler the better.

[In Truth We Trust]

7. A HUGE AMEN to that!

This is the gospel according to truth

[lupita]

8. Thank you so much for posting this!

I have been concerned about working hard to get our guys elected, and then, not making any difference because in the end they will cheat.

Is this something that can be addressed federaly?

Lupita

[OneBlueSky]

9. well . . . John Kerry is saying today that . . .

"I will fight for a national standard for federal elections that has both transparency and accountability in our voting system. It's unacceptable in the United States that people still don't have full confidence in the integrity of the voting process. I ask you to join me in this cause."

if he's serious about this, maybe he needs about a million e-mails demanding federal legislation outlawing BBV and mandating paper ballots in all federal elections . . .

[damntexdem]

10. What neither party will admit to:

the vote belongs to the voter. It is the voter's right to have it counted -- not even the candidate who is cheated holds that right.

[OneBlueSky]

11. I hope that everyone will re-read this excerpt . . .

and think carefully about it . . .

These machines are nothing but Trojan horses built by and for election thieves. With the ballot-less computer, there is no way to recount, no way to prove any discrepancy, inaccuracy or fraud.

despite what the politicians and the voting machine companies are saying, BBV was NOT developed to facilitate voting . . . the sole purpose of these machines is to steal elections and not get caught . . . think about that, and understand what it means . . . because we're being played for fools by those in power . . .

[OneBlueSky]

12. kick . . . n/t

.

[Technowitch]

13. Sorry, but if you think that paper votes weren't sometimes fraudulent...

...you are rather naive.

Where do you think the phrase 'ballot stuffing' came from? Or all those jokes about the dead people in Chicago coming out to vote?

I'm not saying that electronic voting is better. What I am saying is that they simply made no particular attempt to make it any less capable of being tampered with -- even though such was entirely possible. Not perfect, mind you, but still better than plain paper or all-electronic ballots.

[shraby]

14. Paper ballot marked with pen

then deposited into a box in the middle of the room. If the box gets full, another empty one is placed on top of the first one. When the polls close, the boxes are emptied out in front of everyone who stays to watch the count as well as official observers from each party. The totals are posted in the room for everyone to see and left there then the ballots and totals taken to the county seat where another total of all the precincts are posted and left for viewing.

[boi1946]

15. What about watermarked paper,

for the ballot to be counted, complete with serial number, with corresponding copy to be retained by the voter in case of loss or recount?

[Oak2004]

16. Paper ballots are certainly tamperable

I know this well -- I was at the wrong end of some paper ballot shenanigans when I ran for high school student body president and "lost" by 12 votes. That was possible because a "disturbance" in the cafeteria became the excuse for an opponent to lock himself in the room with the ballot box for about 15 minutes.

To tamper, the tamperers have to be physically present with the ballot box, yet out of view of any witnesses who would object. If rules require that the ballot box be continuously observable to any interested party, then funny business becomes extremely difficult.

Sometimes there will not be enough pollwatchers, or there will be an unfortunately timed bathroom break, or local pols will misuse the police or fire department to get rid of observers. Local election results might still be tampered with (though not any more so than they are today). But it's almost impossible to make observers disappear all across a state, let alone all across key states.

[no1hedberg]

18. I don't think

that applying technology to the voting process is necessarily a horrible thing. The problem as I see it is applying the wrong technology. An electronic voting machine, that is fairly believable, and reliable would be relatively simple, and in some cases could help election officials catch voter fraud. First make the machine a simple means for "making" a ballot. Allow the voter to go through the vote process, and at the end review their ballot to ensure they made no mistakes. Then the machine could print a receipt that could again be validated by the voter, stating exactly who they voted for. The receipt should include a tear off portion with a vote serial number that corresponds to a number on the actual vote that is turned in. Secondly the machine should have no means to network with any other computer. The machine could add the votes to it's internal count, but the paper ballot should be the only official count. In this way votes could be tabulated quickly, and intermediate results released, by the machine.(simply add the totals from all the machines in your precinct) The paper ballots could then be counted cautiously without pressure to complete the count so results could be posted. Also there could be comparisons between vote counts acquired by the machine and those registered manually, to indicate fraud. No hanging chads. No illegible ballots. (verifiable by the voter before turning in their ballot) No official electronic counting. Voters could even verify that their vote was counted by the serial number on their ballot. The machines could even present the ballot to a voter in a large format for the vision impaired, in foreign languages for voters for whom English is a not their primary language, yet still present a countable ballot in the same format as everyone else's.

There are voter benefits to technology if the people creating the technology genuinely have the voters interest in mind. We just need reform immediately. It's sad that India can carry out votes every year on electronic voting machines, and this country can't.