This requires a Post for sure, and I am not sure where it will go, but lets try it anyway.

[teddy51]

80% of our voting in this country is currently being done on "ELECTRONIC voting MACHINES"
ES&S and DIEBOLD represent many states for there voting systems. None of these machines offer a paper backup, and both of these companies are Republican affiliated.

[ClassWarrior]

1. Wow, I was just going to rec this until I saw that the unrec patrol is out tonight. Okay. Kick too.

Really? Unreccing Rape-Publican election fraud?

NGU.

[NorthCarolina]

23. Why would someone on DU unrec this OP?

There's little doubt that our elections have been intentionally compromised. We should have known with a name like "Help America Vote Act". That must have been code for "help America vote the way Wall St and Corporate interests want".

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

27. Why do people always complain about UN RECS(-) and not RECS(+)

[madinmaryland]

43. LOL!

Good one!

[madinmaryland]

34. Un-reccing for whining about un-recs....

BTW... K&R

[SheilaT]

38. So do the unrecs get deleted somehow?

Because right now I only see 130 recs and no unrecs.

[madinmaryland]

42. Huh?

I think there is somewhere on the site you can go that will give you some of those stats. Not sure where or if it is much of anything.

:shrug:

[dixiegrrrrl]

49. rec'ing for unreccing for whining about un-recs....

:evilgrin:

[lob1]

2. I saw an article today, but I only skimmed it as I was late for

a doctors appointment. It seems they're trying to introduce paperless ballots here in California. They're selling it as a "green" issue. Does anyone know about this?

[teddy51]

3. I only know that they threw out Diebold in CA and won a law suite against the Company.

The law suit was settled out of court for something like 1.6 million, with no admitence of guilt by Diebold.

[applegrove]

4. Kerry lost because people believed the exit polls that gave him a win by 2PM when

we know republicans only reply to exit pollsters at a rate of 50% compared to 57% for democrats. There are lots of ways the GOP are stealing elections....voter ID laws come to mind.... but by diebold machine is not one of them.

[teddy51]

5. Sorry, but yeah it is.... We have a software engineer in Florida that testified to

writing software that flipped votes on Diebold machines, and he said that the piece of software written was so easy to write, that any novice programmer could write it.

So with no paper backup, our elections are a sham at best.

[emcguffie]

6. How can you possibly know that?

There certainly seems to be quite a big pile of evidence to say otherwise.

[applegrove]

7. Here is some info. I feel it is a big waste of effort if we concentrate on

exit polls from 2004 and diebold machines rather than voter ID laws, voter intimidation and the like. For sure there is GOP bad deeds going on, it just has nothing to do with computers.

http://www.pollster.com/blogs/exit-polls/2006/10/22-week/

http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Shy_Elephant_Factor

[HomerRamone]

28. And you "know" it has nothing to do with computers HOW? nt

[valerief]

29. self-delete; posted to wrong spot.

[applegrove]

41. The whole computers steal votes story came out of the 2004 election

where Kerry won the exit polls but lost the election. These websites show why it looked like kerry was so far ahead. And of course it was announced Kerry had won by 2PM. So democratic voters, who vote disporportionately late in the day, stayed home because they thought Kerry had a win. Now the MSM will no longer publish exit polls until the polls are closed and have since that very election. So it will not happen again. But if the reasoning for why people think votes were stolen by machine becomes mute should not the fight. I mean because there are so many other ways the GOP steals elections: voter intimidation, attacking acorn, voter id cards, etc.. We should be fighting those issues instead.

[valerief]

30. If you can convince Brad Friedman of Bradblog of that, then I'll believe you.

Otherwise, I'll keep trusting Brad.

[emcguffie]

47. I for one could not disagree more.

I think they are using all methods, right. And I think they are stealing a predetermined percentage of every election, which is sometimes enough to change the outcome and sometimes not. For those times when it isn't enough, it becomes particularly important to reduce voter turnout, particularly Dem turnout. So yes, they are working every angle, but the biggest one is the four to six percent they are flipping through the machines.

That's what I believe, anyway. I mean, I really, really believe that. And I base that belief on observations I made back in 2004. Unfortunately, I've been ill and I won't be able to argue this effectively at all. However, I am not the only one who believes this. Unfortunately, those who do believe it tend to get in trouble on this board.

This point of view definitely draws lots of detractors.

I also believe it's a waste of time to argue endlessly about it. Anything we do to change any of these situations helps, but we should address all of them.

[teddy51]

11. Watch this video to see code written to flip votes!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pisBdNLmo-A

[emcguffie]

46. Hmm. Maybe you were being sarcastic and I didn't get it?

I certainly believe those machines are stealing all of our elections, or almost all of them. I mean I believe they steal a percentage of votes in every election, which is not always enough to change the outcome.

This is days later, I think, so I hope I'm replying to the right person.

Thanks for the reply.

ETM

[emcguffie]

48. Now I think you replied to me in error.

I agree with you, absolutely. It's someone else who doesn't. Sorry, I've already forgotten who it is. I have a problem with short term memory, seriously. And I don't know how to go back and look in the middle of posting.

So, I think you are quite right.

[SwampG8r]

13. if they dont respond to pollsters

where do the 50% and 57% come from?
if they didnt respond how did they assign party membership?

[applegrove]

16. Here is a link. Apparently Tories in Britain are shy too.

http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Shy_Elephant_Factor

[SwampG8r]

21. gotta admit its a good question though

[applegrove]

22. Yeah. It is a great question.

[applegrove]

15. Delete. Duplicate post.

[SalviaBlue]

40. Exit polls were reliable in every election prior to the Bush/Kerry election.

They have been compromised just like vote counting has. Having Diebold and the other private companies count our votes is not democratic.

[truedelphi]

8. Actually the Diebold OptiScan offer backup. However,

The officials make it very hard to have a meaningful recount, even when the Optiscan machines and their paper backup exist.

Often the same ballots are simply run through a second time. And just as bad, often election officials, like your County's Registrar of Voters, will charge extremely high amounts of money upfront to whatever citizen's group that wants the recount.

For instance in Marin County CA, when a recount of the hospital district election was sought, the group was told they needed over 100K to have the recount. That was a cost of almost $ 1 a ballot. Even though there were only 600 ballots separating the winner fromthe loser.

We need a Federal Mandate that if election results are close, a recount can be ordered, and that its costs are assumed by the government.

[dflprincess]

32. We use scanners in Minnesota (don't know which brand)

and, thanks to the paper backup, Al Franken is a Senator & Mark Dayton is governor.

I worry that who programs the machines will get better at making sure the vote differences are outside the automatic recount limits.

[vaberella]

9. people should either rally to their congressman for changes or...

write in ballots.

[Bluenorthwest]

14. They need to rally their STATE Congresses

Election rules are made in the States. No machines here. Lots of paper trail. No polling places. Other states have goons at tables checking your id to use a video game voting device, because they do not elect Democratic Secs of State, nor do they push for State level change.

[bvar22]

10. The REALLY scary part?

There are even MORE of these unverifiable BBV machines since "The Democrats" took the House, the Senate, and the White House.
You would think that after the clearly stolen election in 2000,
and the questionable election in 2004
that the Dem Party would want to so something about it,
but NO.
Only silence on this issue.

Over 92% of the American people support Transparent, Verifiable Elections,
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x446445
but not a peep from the leadership of EITHER Party.
Why?
...because elections are too important to b left up to The People.

THIS, more than any other single issue, deeply scares me,
and supports those who claim that its ALL Kabuki Theater,
and TPTB routinely change the Public Spokesman and Brand Labels every 8 years or so to maintain the Marketing Illusion of a choice.

[Kaleko]

35. You speak for me. n/t

[lucca18]

12. I do not trust electronic voting machines.

I wish we could do away with all of them, have all paper ballots; and if it takes "days" to count them all, so be it! We deserve honest and fair elections.

[lunatica]

17. I vote absentee

I voted once on a computer and stood there waiting for a printout and when I realized I wasn't getting one and there was no reviewing of my votes for me to see I decided never to vote on a computer again.

There's absolutely no reason not to get a confirmation. It's obvious that it's all rigged and it's been proven in a large number of tests.

[Blue Owl]

18. CALLING ALL DEMOCRATS

Time after time after time, the GOP is caught lying, cheating, and stealing.

TIME after TIME after TIME.

When the FUCK are we gonna call out these liars, cheaters, and thieves who are recklessly trashing our democracy?

KICK and REC

:kick:

[glinda]

19. Plain truth needs to be kicked upwards!

[FarLeftFist]

20. ANY ELECTRONIC DEVICE can be tampered with.

[fascisthunter]

25. the fact this is ignored, is criminally negligent in my opinion

to willfully throw your vote into such an insecure method, is crazy and careless.

[fascisthunter]

24. Calling All Voters... you are losing your rights to two private companies

do you REALLY trust them to count votes accurately even with their horrible even dubious record? How valuable is your vote to YOU? How much do you CARE? Depend paper ballots and counted by HAND!

[TBF]

26. Kick

:kick:

[MrMickeysMom]

31. That's effen A spot on, teddy51...

You get a better receipt at an ATM machine...

HEY! Diebold MANUFACTURERS ATM machines!!!

WTF? :o :wtf:

[Jim_Shorts]

33. There is a reason the Dem's won't talk about the problem

They are afraid that if they make a big deal about vote tampering, a lot of people will say "why should I bother to vote if it won't count anyway" and it will push turnout down.

[bvar22]

45. Well, thats the Cover Story anyway.

The Dems refuse to do anythingto secure our elections by making them transparent & verifiable
because "it may make some voters believe that their vote isn't being counted"!!!!

The OPPOSITE is true.

NOT doing anything makes it worse.




You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.

Solidarity!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[byronius]

36. K&R.

[defendandprotect]

37. When will Democratic Party begin to show interest in computer voting -- ????

Keep in mind this isn't only the voting computers which began coming in during the

late 1960's -- i.e., I'd question every election back to Nixon/Humphrey --


It's also the LARGE computers used by our corporate-press which gave them new powers

to PREDICT and CALL winners and losers -- PREDICT and CALL Electoral College votes and

PREDICT and CALL the winner of the presidential race --

In 2000 what we saw was simply a reversal of those new powers --

The LARGE computers came in during the mid-1960's --


Imo, many here mistakenly think that computers became a problem in 2000 -- rather they've

been a serious problem for a very long time. Back in the late 1960's, two Florida

journalists noted the very odd and unlikely results that the computers were turning out

and began investigating them --

They signed a book contract based on the story of their investigation --

"VOTESCAM -- THE STEALING OF AMERICA" --

You can read the book online here -- http://www.constitution.org/vote/votescam__.htm

It's also available here and there for about $3 a copy -- !!







Also noticed this quote which another poster provided -- and seemed worthwhile to pass

it along ---

"The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth

of a private power to the point where it becomes stronger than their

democratic State itself.

That, in its essence, is Fascism -- ownership of government by an individual,

by a group or by any controlling private power."

President Franklin Roosevelt


--- and that should make it quite clear to anyone here still questioning whether

it's Fascism yet, or not!

"Congress is under the control of the oil and coal industries" -- Al Gore/Rolling Stone


Our government and its agencies has been bought lock, stock and barrel by elites/corporate

fascists --

[OwnedByFerrets]

39. Kick for the TRUTH

[Inuca]

44. I voted on a Diebold several times

already and it DOES have a paper backup, it's even visible (with difficulty) through a small window. There may be models that still do not have a paper trail, I don't know, but you generalized statement is not correct.