Currently voting is trusted because political adversaries supervise the process. Previously the mechanics were, well, mechanical, ie, open for inspection.
That really is worth saying more often.
If we here can't agree on how to make machine voting both robust and private, then EVEN IF A PERFECT SYSTEM COULD BE DESIGNED it is extremely unlikely that a large number of people could be persuaded that it /was/ perfect.
So if public confidence in the mechanisms of voting is considered desirable, no electronic or digital system is viable.
> You can run an algorithm on any subset of codes, including just > your own, [...]
you already lost 94% of the electorate. They are saying "huh?" and going back to whatever they were doing before the election rudely interrupted them.
Current electoral systems work - where they do - because the officials keep their hands above the table, and because members of opposing political parties co-operate in snooping on each other, because it is in their interest to do so.
This adversarial system not only works (sort of, most of the time, in jurisdictions where the local law enforcement isn't entirely in the hands of one sector of society) but it can be made to appear to work (well enough to satisfy that minority of voters who seem to care)
And leaving aside the ritual invokation of gas ovens and 747s, this nasty socialist agrees with the burden of Tim's rant - if people don't want to vote what business is it of government to force them to vote?
If someone doesn't want to vote, that's their choice, and a tiny increment to the tiny portion of influence possessed by those of us who do vote. So no skin of our noses. If all of you zombies give up voting than the rest of us get to choose the government, for what its worth.
As for lotteries - you want to encourage stupid people to vote?
Public holidays for voting are as bad - they are likely to lead fewer people to vote of course - just as in every other public holiday those who get off work will head for the hills or the beaches or the bars or the sports stadiums (and why not if they want to?) and those who have to work anyway will be even busier than normal.
It is enough if registration is simple and open, if there are sanctions against employers/landlords/unions/political parties/thugs in general preventing people voting, and if there is a postal vote scheme for people who really can't make it on the day. Most countries don't even have all that yet (big chunks of the USA didn't not that long ago), why complicate things unnecessarily?
Ken Brown (resident evil lefty)
