9/14 New York Voting machine problems. The 'sovereign' power of voting machines

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

New York Voting machine problems. The 'sovereign' power of voting machines

Sept 14, 2010

"Voting machines have acquired the sort of 'sovereign' power that only voters should enjoy in a true democracy. What would you call it but a travesty of democracy where the people are relegated to the background and the unverifiable machine records (which can be wrong, manipulated) become the sole basis for declaring elected representatives?" ~ G.V.L. Narasimha Rao, a leading election analyst and a political commentator in India...

All this and more in today's voting news below...

AL: Alabama: "I see dead people" on the voting rolls
http://www.votelaw.com/blog/archives/006439.html
TPMmuckraker reports: J. Christian Adams, the former DOJ lawyer at the heart of the New Black Panthers case, has sent letter to 16 states warning them that they are breaking voter law by not removing dead and ineligible voters from their rolls.

CA: Federal judge upholds city's IRV system
http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/Federal-judge-upholds-citys-instant-runoff-voting-system-102831014.html

CT: Connecticut Democrat Sues Secretary of State Over Denial of Ballot Access Due to Lost Paperwork http://www.ballot-access.org/2010/09/14/connecticut-democrat-sues-secretary-of-state-over-denial-of-ballot-access-due-to-lost-paperwork/

CT: Hartford Courant joins in fighting last war
http://www.ctvoterscount.org/courant-joins-in-fighting-last-election-war/

NC: Bladen County elections investigation update
http://www.wwaytv3.com/bladen_county_elections_investigation_update/09/2010
BLADEN COUNTY, NC... The candidates and campaign workers who were implicated, including McCrae Dowless and Levi Roberts, have been cleared of any wrongdoing.

State elections investigators are still looking into other allegations, including potential problems with absentee ballots.

NC: A Statewide Race To Use Instant Runoff Voting
http://www.ncnn.com/content/view/6368/26/ The Instant Runoff system is not without its critics, who say the equipment used for voting will have a hard time handling such a process.

NY: Update: E-voting machine woes stop some voters N.Y. * (various problems)
http://www.verifiedvotingfoundation.org/article.php?id=6776
Machine shutdowns reportedly cause long delays in casting votes in New York primary election

NY: Share Your Stories From the Voting Booths * (voters report problems)
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/share-your-stories-from-the-voting-booths/
Send us your comments and observations, so we can establish a water cooler on how New York’s latest democratic foray (with a small “d,” of course) played out.
...
Sample comment: "Something tells me my vote is going to end up in Raleigh-Durham like a piece of misrouted luggage."

NY: NY Primary Program in the News
http://www.866ourvote.org/newsroom/news?id=0258

NY: Election Watchdogs Positioned to Record Voting Mishaps Caused By New Ballots
http://beta.wnyc.org/articles/its-free-country/2010/sep/13/election-watchdogs-positioned-record-voting-mishaps-caused-new-machines/
Advocates and election watchdogs say the new machines -- and the new paper ballots they come with -- set voters up to make several mistakes.

NY: New York State Makes Arbitrary Choice to Credit Over-Votes for a Fusion Candidate to the Democratic and Republican Parties
http://www.ballot-access.org/2010/09/14/new-york-state-makes-arbitrary-choice-to-credit-over-votes-for-a-fusion-candidate-to-the-democratic-and-republican-parties/
the New York State Board of Elections has made a quiet decision to credit the votes to the Democratic and Republican Parties, when a voter votes for one candidate twice (once on the ballot line of one of the two major parties, and once on the line of a smaller party).

OH: Elections board reduces precincts to save money (Lucas County)
http://toledoblade.com/article/20100914/NEWS09/100919839
Voters are to receive a letter in the mail in the next few days telling them their new precinct number and voting location. That information also is available on the board's Web site, www.lucascountyvotes.org.

Linda Howe, director of the board of elections, said yesterday that the board reduced the number of precincts from 495 to 397 last year and this summer further reduced that number to 354.

National

THERE MIGHT BE A VOTE ON JUST THE DISCLOSURE PROVISIONS OF THE DISCLOSE ACT http://electionlawblog.org/archives/017002.html

"JUSTICE DEPARTMENT IG TO INVESTIGATE VOTING RIGHTS SECTION"
http://electionlawblog.org/archives/016996.html

Not So Fast on the Draw: “Trigger” Funds Provisions Come Under Fire
http://electls.blogs.wm.edu/2010/09/13/not-so-fast-on-the-draw-%E2%80%9Ctrigger%E2%80%9D-funds-provisions-come-under-fire/
There has been another wave of challenges, however, that targets not contributions from outside sources but the “matching” or “trigger” funds provisions of various states, including Arizona, Connecticut, and Florida. In these states, if a candidate spends over a predetermined limit the state may provide public money to the other candidate to “match” that spending.


International

Losers must trust election results, not just winners
http://www.indianevm.com/blogs/?p=460
Ironically, the electronic voting machines have rendered candidates totally powerless and made the officials and agencies involved in the conduct of elections supremely powerful. If the electronic count shows that a candidate has lost, that is to be taken as gospel truth.

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[Renegades of Funk]

1. Just voted in NYC

One of the scanning machines didn't work at my poll place.
They really need to fix this before November.

[Bill Bored]

2. I'm curious: Why do you need more than 1 working scanner?

And how do you know the other one was really working?

[Renegades of Funk]

3. TIme purposes

It was really slow at my polling place today, but I expect that in November it will be a madhouse. For time sake have more than one machine will make the process go much quicker.
The two machines were next to each other and one of them had trouble reading my mom's ballot. They said that the machine has been like that all day.

[Bill Bored]

4. Interesting. NY's new scanners seem to take a while to scan the ballots. nt

[Wilms]

5. On the plus side, that might improve the error rate, and even the MTBF.

:shrug:

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

7. NC has the ES&S M100 and none of those problems

the new DS200 reminds me of a DRE/touchscreen with its huge 8 inch LED readout.

Add to that NY's requirement for a full face ballot, for the sake of having a full face
ballot, instead of common sense and here you go, craptastic voting.

Here's how we do it in NC.

You go to poll worker table, you tell them your name, they check the poll book,
(paper or plastic), then have you sign a voter authorization sheet (verifies that all info
still correct, gives them an up to date signature)

Then you are given your ballot.

(Almost always one single ballot, with contests on front and or back side)

Go to booth, mark your ballot.

Walk to voting machine, insert ballot into slot, upside down or right side up,
doesn't matter the orientation.

1 second, the ballot is in the scanner.

You are done!

[Bill Bored]

9. NY watned a lot more bells and whistles.

Here they think that because their scanners take digital pics of the ballots, folks may be convinced that the count is correct, or that the pics haven't been doctored. This added several thousand bucks to the cost of each scanner. Would we have been better off with M100s? Not necessarily, but at least with the older technology, there would be less that go wrong and perhaps greater reliance on paper ballots instead of electronic ballot image files (as with DREs).

[Stevepol]

6. No prob: most elections these days are fixed before November.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

8. we have post election, pre certification audits

and in 2006 we had recounts in several diff contests, including congressional.

in 2008 the audit indicated the count was accurate, and
a study of residual votes for President showed that your vote for president had
a significantly greater chance of counting in optical scan counties, compared to DRE/VVPAT counties.