x-post from Texas forum: TRO prevents use of electronic machines in Webb County; hearing tomorrow

[WolverineDG]

The story broke on Saturday in the Laredo paper. www.lmtonline.com Unfortunately, you can't search the archives for free anymore (damn republican owner!). There is a hearing set for tomorrow morning (quite possibly will be postponed until at least the afternoon, as most attorneys & all the judges will be attending the funeral of a prominent local attorney). Here is a link to the story which ran tonight on the local news station though:

http://www.pro8news.com/news/local/31328619.html

dg

on edit: there is at least one machine at each early voting site, but only the hearing or visually impaired are allowed to use it, if they request. Despite warnings that the election process would be "disrupted" by forcing voters to vote on paper ballots, everything was running smoothly at the polling sites today.

[Eric J in MN]

1. What is TRO? NT

NT

[WolverineDG]

2. Temporary restraining order--prevents the use of the machines

except for the disabled.

sorry for the legalese. :)

dg

[billyoc]

3. Temporary Restraining Order

[stillcool]

4. that's great!..

I think this election is going to keep the courts busy. Hopefully they're not all over-run with cons.

[sonias]

5. Wow - you get to use paper

Lucky!

Check out this interactive election map at DVICE
http://dvice.com/voting/ - they have Texas on code orange - "Texas is significantly vulnerable to hacking because of it's heavy reliance on optical scan machines.

Actually we should be "code red". Extremely vulnerable to hacking because 70% of our voting population votes on paperless DREs. They didn't take into account where the voters are located on the map. Just because the majority of our counties don't use paperless DREs doesn't mean that's where the majority of the votes are.


Houston (Harris County) alone is almost 2 million voters or about 15% of the whole vote in Texas.

Sonia

[Wilms]

6. Webb County Equipment Detail

Centrally Counted, ES&S Model 650 Optical Scan

Accessible Polling Place Equipment ES&S iVotronic DRE-Touchscreen


http://www.verifiedvoting.org/verifier/map.php?topic_string=5std&state=Texas&county=Webb&ec=mixed&year=2008

[WolverineDG]

7. Update: article from today's paper

http://www.lmtonline.com/articles/2008/10/21/news/doc48fd76eac1f73364689884.txt

Many officials subpoenaed for today's hearing. More later when I get it.

dg

[Gman]

8. LOL! Laredo is the Mos Eisley of Texas politics

you will never find a more vicious hive of scum and villainy.

[WolverineDG]

9. So nothing that happens here matters?

:eyes:

dg

[Gman]

10. As long as it stays confined to Laredo (and Zapata)

that's fine with everyone else. Nothing that happens there is ever of any surprise to anyone. There are no allegiances, there are no political parties in Laredo. It's all about who puts out the most street money wins, Democrat or Republican. And that street money likely includes hacking voting machines. In Laredo, you don't know if it's the Democrats or the Republicans that are hacking voting machines. It can even include taking ballot boxes across the river for a little "work" as happened a few years ago in a certain primary race. Then, there's Zapata that waits until noon of the day after election day to report results once they know how many votes are needed for someone to win. Strange place, Zapata. They can have as much as a 95% turnout, but no one claims that they voted.

Nothing at all surprises anyone about there.

[WolverineDG]

11. UPDATE: NO MACHINES DURING EARLY VOTING

An agreement was reached today between candidate Louis Bruni & Webb County that the electronic voting machines will not be used during the early voting period. A hearing will be held next week to determine if they will be used on Election Day. BTW, the vast majority of voters in Webb County vote during early voting, which ends next week.

dg

[emlev]

12. That's great news. Thank you! eom