Mississippi goes all Diebold Touch Screen - Secty of State: "great system"

[cyberpj]

Posted on Fri, Jul. 15, 2005
State unveils computerized vote machines
Counties will receive them at no cost
By JUSTIN HOOKS
SUN HERALD

BILOXI - Mississippi Secretary of State Eric Clark gave circuit clerks across the state a glimpse into the future Thursday, unveiling new computerized voting machines.

Clark presented the machines at the Circuit Clerk's 70th Annual Convention at Beau Rivage Resort and Casino, and said the touch-screen system will do wonders to improve the state's election process.

"This is just going to be a wonderful thing," Clark said. "For the first time ever, we'll be able to have accurate election-night returns from around the state. As information comes in from the counties, they'll be able to transmit in real time over a secure line to our offices. It's a great system."

Diebold Election Systems, which supplies 95 percent of the state's ATMs, won the $15 million contract to upgrade the state's voting systems and will provide training, maintenance, voter education and technical support for the next five years.

The upgrade is part of the the federal Help America Vote Act (HAVA) signed in October 2002. HAVA requires the replacement of all central scanner machines, lever machines and punch-card machines in the state by Jan. 1, 2006, and at least one available device that is fully accessible to the disabled in every polling place.

Clark said county governments don't have to worry about the cost of the upgrade, or the security of the new systems.

"You hear about (computer) hacking, but it just can't happen here," he said. "It's as secure as anything can be. Based on everything I've seen, these are the best machines available and they're coming at zero cost to the counties."

The federal government is covering 95 percent of the cost of the machines under HAVA, with 5 percent covered by state matching funds. Mississippi is expected to receive 5,164 Diebold machines, but each county has discretion to choose what manner of HAVA-compliant system it wants to use.

http://www.sunherald.com/mld/thesunherald/news/local/12136459.htm

[bluestateguy]

1. Computers aren't the answer to everything in life

Especially elections.

[aquart]

2. "Zero cost." You get what you pay for, fella.

Well, as a Republican, I assume, I expect he'll be very happy.

Funny how the feds are willing to fund purchases from Republican-owned companies.

[fearnobush]

3. Prediction - 2008: Mississippi, 200% of elegable voters chose JEB.

And the media will report it as a knock out victory for Dubya's 'lil' Brother.

[skids]

4. Hrm....

You think a bunch of clerks that used to report their vote totals like this:

http://www.sos.state.ms.us/elections/2004/General/index.asp

...are going to know their hand from their bunghole around a DRE? I mean, look at the handwriting on some of those things.

[kster]

5. Just with the evidence

put forth, from the experts at the DU if the FBI doesn't look into these voting machines and stop the insanity, because we do pay them to protect us from this kind of sh*t. We have to cut their benefits and pay big time, because right now I feel like I am doing part of their job, by trying to inform the public of the voting machine scam.

And I'm not even one of the experts.

[cyberpj]

6. I know - but there's no trusting the FBI, CIA or ANY government agency

right now to do anything honest!

The trick would be to get an HONEST INVESTIGATION and PUBLIC REPORTING on this fiasco.

And the longer it waits, the longer we are known as sore losers who just won't give up and admit we lost.

[merh]

7. Okay, as an explanation of sorts (and mind you, I do say sorts)

Clark is insisting that all Diebold systems that are purchased include the printers so that the ballot can be printed out for the voter, just as the ATM gives a receipt. Also, the majority of the circuit clerks that are responsible for the purchases for their counties are skiddish of Diebold and electronic voting in general. They won't commit, even though SOS Clark promises to supply them with machines. One clerk commented on television the other night (they held their convention here this week) that the fraud issues have them all concerned. They know about the allegations of fraud. They don't want to go to electronic voting, they want their paper ballots. It is the federal government forcing them to make a choice, they have a January 2006 deadline to contend with under federal law.

What I find amazing is that the repuke admin that govern's our state is trying to get SOS Clark out of office. He is one of 3 being considered for the Commissioner of the College Board. They don't want him as SOS, they want their own guy there, so Diebold is not held to the right standards.

I pray Clark stays, he is trying to comply with federal law and at the same time, protect our votes.

[cyberpj]

8. Thanks for that additional information. Ballot receipts are better

than nothing. And if what you say is true, I hope Clark stays too.

[merh]

11. I will try to find out more this week from friends of mine that are

clerks. If I find out anything, I will post it. :hi:

I am suspicious of the repuke college board (most appointed by repuke gov) considering Clark for the post of Commissioner of Higher Education and Colleges. If they offer him the post, that means they want him out of their way. They never give a job to someone unless they have that person's replacement in mind. x(

Also, thanks to DU, one of the lobbyists' polls on electronic voting was soundly defeated. I posted the link to the poll hosted by a local TV station here. The options were "touch screens" "paper ballots" or "punch cards". When I posted it, the "touch screens" were ahead. By the end of the polling, we put "paper ballots" ahead by 40%. The clerks pay attention to those polls, they are elected to office. The polls was the electronic voting lobbyists attempt to control the message - there were 3 choices, the odds were that the "touch screens" would have won and the other two would have "split the vote". They also wanted the figures to have to give to the clerks at this convention to prove that voters wanted their devices. So thanks to DU, we quashed that lobbying tactic. :grouphug: ;-)

[Amaryllis]

9. So are you saying the clerks can just stay with paper ballots and refuse

the evil machines? How does that work when a state signs a contract with the vendor but the clerks responsible for purchase? Can they just say no, thank you, we will stay with paper?

And we still have the tabulators and scanners to contend with for vote counting...sigh.

[merh]

10. No, that is the dilema - they know that they have to comply

with Federal law, but they don't trust Diebold or any other electronic voting company. I know some of the clerks and I will try to touch base with them next week to find out what the real talk was at the convention.

Who knows, they may all join together to oppose the law? :shrug:

I do know that Clark has included printers with the Diebold equipment that he will authorize be purchased. He said that Diebold supplies 95% of the ATMs and if we can trust them with our money, we should be able to trust them with our vote, as long as we have receipts of our actual vote.

If I find out anything, I will let you all know. :hi:

[Amaryllis]

12. But they don't have to get DREs to comply with federal law; paper ballots

are allowed by HAVA. I don't understand.
I don't trust Diebold with money, either . Chuch Herrin says that's a lousy argument; they make millions of dollars in errors each year but they have to balance it out in your favor because you have an audit record!

[merh]

13. The circuit clerks don't trust the electronic equipment

They are not jumping on the diebold band wagon. They are still trying to determine what changes, if any they will make.

[Fly by night]

16. We need to encourage a revolt among county voting officials nationwide.

I am seeing similar reluctance among TN election administrators to abandon their punch-card voting systems in favor of more complicated, more expensive and less accountable DREs, etc. We are encouraging these county officials to stay with their current systems until they can be assured that whatever system they change to is as verifiable as their old systems. This affects over one-fifth of the counties in Tennessee.

[merh]

19. My impression from the news coverage I have read or seen on

the issue is that county officials don't trust DREs.

[Amaryllis]

17. so are you saying they DO know they don't have t o go to DREs to

meet HAVA compliance.

[merh]

18. I can't say that - I haven't spoken to them about it.

I got the impression that they are trying to comply with HAVA and keep the paper ballots and not use electronic devices. Of course, that was from watching a short news coverage and reading news sources. I thought it best to wait until after their convention to see what I can find out about the majorities concerns and positions on the equipment.
The video of the news coverage can be found at the link below and the story is entitled "Don Culpepper Reports On New Voting Machines" scroll down and look at the videos available in the right hand column of the link. http://www.wlox.com/Global/category.asp?C=1702&nav=6DJH

If you have HAVA materials that I should provide the clerks, please let me know. I am willing to try to educate them on what HAVA requires, should they have doubts.

[Amaryllis]

21. I would get Myth Breakers to them al ASAP. Look at the info pages on

votersunite.org. you should be able to find all you need there. Ellen is very helpful for things like this.

[merh]

22. Thanks, I will do that this week.

Maybe if I get it to the ones I know, they will pass them on to others.

:hi:

[Cookie wookie]

14. HAVA does not require the use of DREs

There is a section in the document, "Mythbreakers", by VotersUnite (http://www.votersunite.org) laying it out.

"Section 301(a)(3) of HAVA requires that each polling place provide at least one voting method that allows disabled individuals to vote in privacy. Accessibility is required; DREs are not."

"Voting systems that record votes electronically (Direct Record Electronic - DRE) are only one of the many available voting systems that provide accessibility for disabled individuals. Alternative voting systems that allow the disabled to vote unassisted are available and cost a fraction of the price of DREs. For example:
Electronic ballot-marking devices, such as the AutoMark by ES&S. (3)
Ballot templates (tactile ballots) like those used in Europe and Rhode Island. (4)
Free ballot-printing software offered by Open Voting Consortium to run on PC systems. (5)" p. 9.

They go on to say that "HAVA does not prohibit punch card and lever systems, etc. "

On page 10: "HAVA also explicitly preserves jurisdictions' rights to use paper ballots. Section 301(c)(2) specifically says that the term "verify" may not be construed to forbid the use of paper ballots. It states:
(2) Protection of paper ballot voting systems.--For purposes of subsection (a)(1)(A)(i), the
term "verify" may not be defined in a manner that makes it impossible for a paper ballot
voting system to meet the requirements of such subsection or to be modified to meet
such requirements."

As far as the Diebold printing technology they've added, it is designed to be extremely difficult to use for counting or recounting. The paper records just scroll into a big roll. That could also be contested in the courts, since the voter's anonymity is not preserved because having all the votes on this big roll preserves the order of the voting.

ES&S is marketing the AutoMark which is accessible to the blind and read with Optical Scan equipment. It can only be used with ES&S, not Diebold, but is a better alternative, if you can get it, as ES&S bought the company that developed AutoMark and now are trying to squelch it's sales.

There are people currently auditing the 2004 election in Georgia and they are finding that the results are a mess. Diebold and electronic voting is touted as being "accurate." That's one of their big selling points. Going over precinct tapes and daily recap sheets and comparing them to the certified results online gives a very different picture, as the poll workers struggle to rectify the differences in their voter certificates (evidence of how many people showed up at the polls) and the count on the DREs.

Having fewer undervotes in Georgia (aka CalTech MIT study) is another point used to sell Diebold's "accuracy." However, a Ga researcher found that the daily recap sheets show that there were zero undervotes in all races in Dekalb County (a county that reported a total of 276,771 votes in the 2004 General Election), but hundreds of "blank votes." What are "blank votes'? It appears the Diebold software is moving hundreds and hundreds of votes into a category called "blank votes," votes not accounted for in the figures given by the Ga SOS to CalTech for their study. That researcher has reported that this is looking like it's the rule across the board, not just for Dekalb county.

I think what we're going to find out after the audit is that the machines are not accurate, and that doesn't even bring into question whether the votes were recorded by the software as the voter intended.

[merh]

25. Those that use punch cards have to replace them. They

are told if they use any company other than Diebold, they will not recieve the full amount of money allocated to purchase new equipment.

One clerk said that instead of the full amount, they would only get 25% of the monies.

This is a strong arm tactic by SOS Clark for sure.

[kster]

15. Cool! No more voter suppression and long lines in Mississippi

just some DRE and throw in a couple optiscans, with the new and improved voting system they can steal your vote in secret,and without all them unsightly long lines and election challengers.


They can steal them vote's from the privacy of their own home. And no one is the wiser.

[Cookie wookie]

20. In Georgia the motto from the SOS and Elections' Division

(aka Diebold) is "Paper = Fraud." There is a lot of bragging about how no fraud has ever been detected using paperless DREs.

What they should be saying is: "Paper = detectable fraud." Without it, who knows? Perfect crime, no fingerprints, no evidence.

[Janice325]

23. Have you seen this thread on DU yet re: Clark, Mississippi and Diebold?

Seems as if Haley Barbour has offered Clark more money (ie, a position with Department of Education paying $200,000, whereas he's "only" currently making $90,000 as Secretary of State).
I hope the link works. The post is pretty recent:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4129909

[cyberpj]

24. Someone in DU predicted this would happen

Said it's SOP to get problems out of the way.

Too many people are all too willing to take the money and run.