My Letter to my Democratic Congressman & Senators

[Bill Bored]

Take whatever you want from this. Edit out the partisan stuff if you want. Let me know what you think.

"Dear Congressman and Senators:

Currently, due to the privatization of vote counting and lack of a verifiable audit trail for voting machines in many states, as a long-time voter, I now have no confidence whatsoever in our electoral process and in my informed view, anyone who has such confidence is hopelessly naive. The FACT is that in most states of our nation, there is absolutely no way for the voters to know that their votes are being counted correctly as cast at the crucial time of the election with any reasonable degree of certainty.

"Trust but verify." Ironically, this was Ronald Reagan's advice about the former Soviet Union, a regime who's former leader, Joseph Stalin, has said that those who count the votes have the real power -- not those who merely cast them. So why now are we expected to trust four Republican owned and operated companies, their proprietary source codes, and our poorly trained, ill-equipped, albeit well-intentioned election workers to run our computer-controlled elections without any verification of the vote? I am not a Republican by any means, but Reagan was right about one thing: we should trust but also verify!

Recently in Ohio. a statewide recount of the votes for President of the United States was performed illegally by not selecting the 3%-hand-counted precincts randomly. This opens the door for counting fraud or errors in any of the larger precincts counted only by machine in nearly every county in the state. This experience has shown that even recounts, done mostly by machine, and not done according to the laws on the books can be hacked. Such recounts therefore prove nothing. A handful of votes shifted in each precinct in Ohio from John Kerry to George Bush could have easily given Bush a victory of over 100,000 votes. Since 97% of the votes in the state have still not been counted in a transparent way, we still do not know who our President-elect is and maybe we never will.

Now, unless the Democratic party is willing to become a permanent minority opposition party, allowed to exist merely for the purpose of maintaining the illusion of democracy, I'd suggest you do something about this situation, to the extent that you are still able, as soon as possible. After all, it happened on your watch too.

The voter verified paper ballot advocated by Congressman Rush Holt, Senator Bob Graham and perhaps to a lesser and more vague extent by Senator Clinton, means absolutely nothing without the proper RANDOM auditing procedures in place to use it to rule out error and fraud with reasonable statistical certainty. Any legislation requiring the paper ballot must also include mandatory random audits for every election, regardless of victory margins. With our secret ballots, computers can adjust a candidate's margin of victory to be outside that for which a recount is mandatory as easily as they can change a single vote. Depending on state laws and the degree of actual vote tampering by these machines, it is indeed possible that we have seen our last mandatory recount. It's time the laws caught up with the technology and more importantly, with those who control it.

Since you are now firmly in the minority in both the House and the Senate, it would seem that your only hope is to work with us ordinary citizens and our legislators at the state and local level to change our laws in all 50 states and the District of Columbia to require an auditable vote. But there is one thing you can still do at the Federal level, at which you MAY have actually been elected to serve: you can stand with Congressman John Conyers and others in their effort to reject Ohio's slate of electors, and for that matter, those of ANY state without a voter-verified paper ballot and the audit procedures to use it. In case you're still wondering, FLORIDA just happens to be one such state, I believe contrary to its own laws in fact, but there are many others from which to choose.

Such a move, while it may seem controversial, is perfectly reasonable given the fact that we do not know with ANY reasonable degree of certainty, which electors were actually voted for by the people of these states. To certify such electors is tantamount to being complicit in whatever fraud may actually have taken place, so it makes a lot more sense to endeavor to detect or rule out such fraud through a full investigation of the electoral process before certifying ANY electors from states where there is no audit of the vote.

Thank you for your time and attention to this most urgent matter."

[indianablue]

1. Excellent .... wonderful piece of writing.