Lever Machines ROCK! (Get over it!)

[Bill Bored]

NY Still Lagging In Voting Machine Upgrades

By: Michael Scotto

The city's board of elections held a hearing in Lower Manhattan Wednesday
night to address the federal government's mandate of upgrading voting
machines before the next election cycle. NY1's Michael Scotto filed the
following report.

The conversation has been going on for years. At the city Board of
Elections, a hearing was held on the two computer voting machines the city
hopes to choose between in the coming months.

-snip-


Many people at the hearing wish the state would just keep the old
machines, saying new ones open up the door to voter fraud.

"Once you allow software, which we know is undetectably mutable, to count
the votes, then we have no idea how our votes are counted. But we can see
on the lever machine," said Andrea Novick, Election Transparency Coalition.

"I think it's a lot easier to keep the lever machines," said Howard
Stanislevic, eVoter Education Project.

At this point, it looks like voters will be pulling those levers for yet
another round of elections unless Albany can make up its mind.

Video and full article here:
http://www.ny1.com/content/top_stories/94972/ny-still-lagging-in-voting-machine-upgrades/default.aspx

[Captain Hilts]

1. I think 'lagging' is the wrong word! Great signs! nt

[Bill Bored]

2. Signs available here:

Horizontal:
http://www.wheresthepaper.org/KeepTheLeversHorizontal.pdf

Vertical:
http://www.wheresthepaper.org/KeepTheLeversVertical.pdf

[kster]

4. WHERES THE PAPER . com is promoting paperless levers?

This doesn't make a lick of sense.

They want to know WHERES THE PAPER, then they support a paperless vote counting machine??????


THINK ABOUT IT FOR CHRIST SAKE.

:hi:

[Bill Bored]

5. Lever machines are NOT computers. Have a nice day.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x512293

[kster]

6. We are on the INTERNET future America is gonna know who is telling the truth

Please keep that in mind.

Hand Count the Paper Ballots at the Polling place, if there are no paper ballots at the polling place to be counted,

YOU ARE BEING SCAMMED!!!! (PERIOD)

You know it and I know it, and most people on DU know it.

Good Day Sir............

[Bill Bored]

13. Post #12 is the truth. Read it! nt

[Peace Patriot]

8. I've thought about it, and I think New York should keep its old, reliable,

virtually unriggable, and already paid for, publicly owned lever voting machines--and should fight like hell to retain them. Wherever there is 'TRADE SECRET' electronics, there is potentially massive, invisible riggability, and, what is equally damaging and dangerous, corporate privatization of our election process. Elections become the secret purview of the "high priests" of technology. The simple process of casting your vote and counting them becomes a realm of gobble-de-gook for most people. That is wrong and undemocratic. And the cost is exorbitant and neverending. If New Yorkers some day want to convert to hand-counted paper ballots, fine--but that does not seem to be a realistic option at the moment. I'm all for HCPB's. I think that's the very best system--as well as the one that fosters the most public participation. But next to that old, tried and true HCPB system, lever machines are best, and are also time-tested and understandable by most people. And virtually free!

We have suffered disaster in the second Bush-Cheney term, which I attribute to Diebold & brethren. No more contracts for those fuckers! I pray that New York resists it, and I applaud the New York activists with all my heart. Keep the levers!

I don't understand your point, Kster. "Think about it for Christ's sake." I am thinking about it. So are the New Yorkers who are trying to prevent privatization.

[Captain Hilts]

10. Yes, NY needs a southern-style 'states rights' campaign!

ER: Works great!

[Bill Bored]

12. NY Counts Paper Ballots BY HAND, ON ELECTION NIGHT, BEFORE the Ballots leave the poll site.

kster is apparently not familiar with the situation in NY, and not a supporter of avoiding computerized software-based vote counting.

To oppose keeping lever machines in NY is to advocate, by default, for ballot scanners and software, currently without the necessary checks and balances to make that process reliable and secure.

We won't get hand counts just by filling out millions of paper ballots. No other state has gotten hand counts that way either. Just ask Florida, Ohio, Alabama, Michigan and even California where they NEVER hand count more than 10% of the ballots, even when a contest is practically a tie such as the CA CD-4 House race in 2008!

Unless and until NY can get its act together by at least hand counting enough paper ballots to see who won our elections, and by continuous observation of those ballots post-election, we should NOT be giving up either the lever machines, or the hand counting of paper ballots cast by voters with special needs, counted on election night at the poll sites right after the polls close.

[MarjorieG]

14. NY gets 3% spot check. No one pushing for audits. We count absentees and BMD ballots that night.

[kster]

15. "I'm all for HCPB's. I think that's the very best system" You need not say more than that

there are four types of baby seats on the market, which seat do you buy for your baby/grand child
A)The Touch screen Baby seat. B)The Optical Scan Baby seat C)The Lever Baby seat, or D)The Hand Counted Baby seat.

If you feel D)The Hand Counted Baby seat is the best system available for your child/grand child, why would you promote New York using C) Lever Baby seats?

Just asking.

[troubleinwinter]

16. "I don't understand your point, Kster"

Perhaps Kster's point is just endless, mindless spam.

HCPB are not opposed by anyone here. It's a matter of developing a system and logistics that will work in these times of long ballots and shortages of pollworkers. We must work out realistic, difficult logistic solutions to very complicated issues, while fighting off dangerous systems like internet voting and IRV.

Kster does not offer practical solutions, and never has, just spam waste. Energy should be spent on the issues and solutions and logistics, not the energy-waster: kster.

I am appreciative that we have New York standing up!!! Digging in!!!

[kster]

17. Why strap NY kids into a "lever" baby seat , when we can strap them into a

"hand counted" baby seat?

Especially when "HCPB are not opposed by anyone here". As you say, and as DUer Peace Patriot says..."I'm all for HCPB's. I think that's the very best system"

Why in gods name would you push Lever baby seats in NY?

Just asking.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x512388#512406

[OnTheOtherHand]

18. there's something basic you seem to be missing

New York already has lever machines. The question right now is whether we scrap them all and switch over to optical scan, or not.

I've got to wonder whether you actually have kids, because I do, and I sure as heck haven't been able to give them the best of everything, all the time. Welcome to the real world. Your position seems sort of like recommending that we throw out our baby seats and hope that we can get better ones instead. If you would do that to your kids, that bothers me.

I do think that some of the pro-lever talking points are over the top. So it goes.

[Bill Bored]

19. DID SOMEBODY SAY MINDLESS...

[Bill Bored]

20. Oh, and another thing....

Andi Novick already TRIED to get the State of NY to use HCPB for Federal Elections to comply with HAVA. That's one reason why some want to paint her as a "fringe" activist.

But the point is, she's been there and done that, which is more than we can say for YOU, kster (unless of course you're really Lynn Landes in disguise).:rofl:

Anyway, Novick was not successful, although her legal arguments were correct. HAVA explicitly allows HCPB. (Betcha didn't know that either.)

So if you want to advocate for HCPB, go find a state willing to consider it for the 3 federal offices. Hint: the first one starts with "P" but US House elections are much easier to rig, so I'd try for hand counting those first.

[Wilms]

3. .

[MarjorieG]

7. Hadn't seen this. I'm just left out of range.

HAVA doesn't require we get rid of levers, and with other states unable to upgrade from paperless DREs, arguments to replace because of auditing are phony that say we should.

State law of 2005 said we needed to switch to comply, because we couldn't say no to the vendors camped out for almost two decades to sell electonics, or to the commissioners thinking they were going to get shiny and new.

Very uphill fight with the disability community insisting they vote like everyone else, so we need to get scanners for everyones' paper ballot. Took a few years to get them off of touchscreens pitched by their lobbyists.

[Stevepol]

9. K&R

[tbyg52]

11. I like lever machines just fine.

Anything can be hacked, but lever machines are harder than most. And can do less damage at one time.