Ideas For Change In America (part 3)

[kster]

- Vickie Karp

Return to citizen-run, citizen-counted, citizen monitored elections

Ditto to Tom Courbat's post. After five years of working on election integrity issues and co-editing a book entitled "HACKED! High Tech Election Theft in America", http://www.hackedelections.com ), evidence proves that touch screens AND optical scan counters can both be easily hacked to flip elections without detection. As Ion Sancho, Leon County Florida's highly respected Election Administrator said after witnessing the Black Box Voting/Harri Hursti hack of his Diebold optical scan counters, "I would've certified these election results without hesitation." (See the hack in the 2007 Emmy-award nominated HBO documentary, "Hacking Democracy" So elections which truly should be challenged can be hacked to make them seem like they really weren't that close!

Control of elections must be taken back from corporations, whose procedures right now and for the last several election cycles equate to secret vote counting (with secret software and non-transparent procedures -AND brought back into the hands of citizens through hand-counted paper ballot elections - WITH enhanced security procedures such as video cameras on the ballot box - WITH citizens monitoring all day - WITH ballot boxes never leaving the table until 7pm when the box seals are broken and multi-partisan teams of citizens count all the votes until they all agree on the totals...AND TOTALS are posted, as Tom said, AT THE PRECINCT LEVEL. In this way, ballot boxes are extremely difficult if not impossible to stuff; ballot boxes may end up in the river or in the trunk of someone's car, but only after all the votes are counted. If any other computerized counting device is used as a second count, the hand count MUST be the "count of record" or the real results can easily be subverted.

Let's learn from Black Box Voting and Ion Sancho---optical scanners are easy to hack! And let's go straight to the only transparent and citizen-controlled solution there is: Hand-counted paper ballot elections, with enhanced security procedures.

- Vickie Karp (Election Integrity activist/editor/writer/speaker), Austin, TX Dec 28 @ 12:32PM PST

http://www.change.org/ideas/view/return_to_citizen-run_citizen-counted_citizen_monitored_elections


Ideas for change in America (part 2)

~John Ervin


Hand Counted Paper Ballots (NOW)

The most single urgent issue confronting this country, preceding in importance all others, simply because it presupposes all other change in government, is emergent need for the return to observable voting process; and the only way to do that securely, and with voter confidence worthy of the name, is through the casting and counting of hard copy (i.e., paper) ballots, and posted at the precinct level, so as to secure the chain of custody for citizens. We have seen our democracy hijacked, de facto, by privatized voting interests, counting our votes in secret, an event that is absolute anathema to any believer in democracy, and prohibited by the U.S. Constitution, which mandates that one person shall cast a vote. Not a machine. The only way to return citizen confidence to voting, crucial to a credible and legitimate democracy, is to cast observable, palpable, ballots without the mediation of machines (or private voting criminals, ah, companies) and to have those ballots counted by fellow citizens as may be drafted at random, such as we do juries. If we do not resolve these chain of custody issues, we will not be secure in the results of our elections, nor even know who it is that controls and calculates them. We the People...must know; or change will be stillborn, void, and meaningless.

~John Ervin

http://www.change.org/ideas/view/hand_counted_paper_ballots_now


Ideas For Change In America (part 1)

Sheila Parks

Hand-Counted Paper Ballots for All Our Elections on Election Night

The right to vote, as well as the principle of "one person, one vote," are cornerstones of our democracy. The anti-slavery, women’s suffrage, and civil rights movements as well as the expansion of voting to young people are all part of the history of electoral reform in this country. Equally fundamental is the assurance that each voter knows that her or his vote counts and is counted as intended.

Hand-counted paper ballots elections with a secure chain of custody are a solution to the fraud and error of electronic voting machines (both touchscreens/DRE’s and optical scans) and the control of our elections by a privatized electronic voting machine industry. Both touchscreens/DRE's and optical scan machines have been hacked.

It is recommended that an HCPB protocol have the following characteristics: a) Ballots counted at the precinct by registered voters b) Counting done in full view of the public c) Counting videotaped d) Results posted at the precinct immediately after the count e) To be manageable, precincts no larger than 1000 registered voters. (Because the concept of HCPB operates at the precinct level, even large communities can adopt such a system.) The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) paid states hundreds of millions of dollars to buy electronic voting machines, both DRE’S and/or op scans. One machine can cost anywhere from $3,000-$5,000 and that amount does not include storing, maintenance, and upgrade. In contrast, for an HCPB election, the cost for the counting could be $2400.00 per precinct for each election, with ten teams of two workers each and paying each worker $20/hour for six hours ($120) and would keep the money in the community.

If hundreds of millions of dollars had not been spent for the purchase, storage and upgrade of electronic voting machines, imagine the money our communities could have used for health care and education.

Sheila Parks (activist/feminist/researcher), Belmont, MA Dec 30 @ 08:51PM PST


http://www.change.org/ideas/view/hand-counted_paper_ballots_for_all_our_elections_on_election_night

[Stevepol]

1. Well worth 5 Rec's!! Let it be!

[kster]

2. KNT

[Joe Chi Minh]

3. Nor would you have had 8 years of looting, leading to this depression.

[Joe Chi Minh]

4. "If hundreds of millions of dollars had not been spent for the purchase,

storage and upgrade of electronic voting machines, imagine the money our communities could have used for health care and education."

Nor would you have had 8 years of corporate looting of the country, leading to this depression.