Machine Problems Worsened 2008 Voting Woes

[Wilms]

Machine Problems Worsened 2008 Voting Woes

Voting machine issues and the confusion they caused compounded the delays faced by untold thousands of voters this fall.

By Steven Rosenfeld, AlterNet

November 13, 2008

The electronic voting problems in the 2008 election are broader than recently-publicized snafus such as machines not turning on, voter databases omitting names, or touch screens not properly recording votes, according to an analysis of 1,700 incident reports from the nation's largest voter hotline.

Moreover, the voting machine issues and the confusion they caused among poll workers appear to have compounded the delays faced by untold thousands of voters this fall, a preliminary analysis of 1-800-OUR-VOTE reports by Joseph Lorenzo Hall, a researcher at Princeton University and the University of California, has found.

snip

"Another curious feature of the data is the voters' uniformly negative attitudes toward contingency or back-up plans," he said. "Voters are often upset and mistrustful."

snip

It is impossible to know how many votes were affected by the issues cited in these incident reports. However, depending on the state and location, individual paperless voting machines could be used by 200 to 600 voters, and paper-ballot scanners could be used to count even larger numbers of ballots. While the presidential results would not appear to be undermined by any of these problems, they do reveal that machinery-related problems are more extensive than many people assume.

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http://www.alternet.org/democracy/107034/machine_problems_worsened_2008_voting_woes/?page=entire

[RC]

1. We need to make illegal electronic voting machines.

Use only paper ballots. If optical scanners are used, the a certain percentage of the voting places need to be counted by hand and compared to the optical scanner. If there is a discrepancy, find out why and fix it, then certify the votes from that voting place.

The only reason to use electronic voting machines is election fraud. Outlaw them!

[bkkyosemite]

2. Your suggestion is what they do here in OR and we mail in our ballots too.

[HCE SuiGeneris]

4. It seems we already make voting machines that operate illegally.

:evilgrin:

[RC]

8. Yeah, I noticed that also.

I was too lazy to fix it.

[tbyg52]

3. Proud to provide rec #5

We pulled it out this year due to extreme diligence. The system should not make such necessary. The system must be fixed.

[Melissa G]

5. #7 n/t

[Bill Bored]

6. DUers can analyze the data for themselves here:

http://www.ourvotelive.org/home.php

NOW GET TO WORK Y'ALL!

[Bill Bored]

7. Here's the report referenced in the article in the OP:

http://www.josephhall.org/nqb2/index.php/2008/11/12/vir1112

[Stevepol]

9. Election Defense Alliance has good figures about EVM discrepancies.

This site doesn't spend as much time detailing the different types of EVM problems, but focuses on the statistical discrepancies between the actual vote and the exit polls.

www.electiondefensealliance.org