Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
Alvin I agree you 100% and could make other criticisms about our electoral/legislative processes, but it is probably off topic (though not any more so than the history of stuff). --- Tom Piwowar [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Alvin you are too cynical and too off topic too. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived Checkout One Laptop Per Child project laptop.org * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
Alvin you are too cynical and too off topic too. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
On Jan 10, 2008, at 6:47 PM, Tom Piwowar wrote: Recall the rigged California gas pumps of a few years ago. Observing that the state pump testers consistently bought certain quantities of gas the pumps were programmed to not cheat customers who bought those specific amounts. Due to this, it took years to discover the pumps were rigged. The Virginia weights and measures inspectors fill five gallon cans with gasoline. They are probably leaving themselves open to similar shenanigans. Steve * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection - found it!
I think I found the perfect voting machine that a few of you have described using in the past. I found a punch card voting expert who emailed me some links (below) to the device. It's called DataVote and I think it's great in its inexpensive simplicity and surety. They could keep its retro look as retro is fashionable or give it a modern facelift. Go DataVote GO! db On Jan 8, 2008, at 5:58 PM, db wrote: I was looking for brand info on ballot punch device used by some polling places. Some people have talked about using one that had a lever that cleanly and consistently punched an IBM card type ballots and in googling for such I came across your web article: http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/cards/chad.html Do you possibly know the brand? The DataVote system fits your description. I have a DataVote ballot in my collection: -- http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/voting/pictures/datavote.jpg The Smithsonian has a DataVote punch: -- http://americanhistory.si.edu/vote/resources_datavote.html Doug Jones db wrote: I wonder what the brand of puncher was ... does anyone know? In googling, I see reference mostly to the Votomatic that was problematically used in Florida. There is an older Coyle model shown in a photo in the following link: http://americanhistory.si.edu/vote/punchcard.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_machine#Punch_card ?? dab Tom Piwowar wrote: It was a system that used an IBM card and a hand pressed punch, with no electricity required. The card was inserted in the simple machine. You could see the card at all times. You slid a pointer down until it was next to your choice of candidate or issue. You then pressed down I used to live in a place that used those. As you wrote, they were great. Also, because they were inexpensive the poll had lots of them ready. So there was no bottleneck waiting to get at one of the small number of expensive machines. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection -- isn't electronic
db wrote: I read an article about those or similar machines. Partly because of the printer size issue and partly because of the cost, the printers they built in were small and cheap. That made them hard to load by the volunteer ... often senior citizen ... staff. Our machines use tape rolls, the same tape that is used to print the results - I forgot to mention those in the list of results objects in my original message - they print a zero tape at the beginning of the voting day and then a final tally tape at the end. And the vote counts have to match meters on the front of the machines (which can get pretty complicated at the end of the day for a number of reasons that have to do with provisional voting, voters from other precincts [legally] using machines in another precinct, etc.) The machines that use the paper rolls are as easily hackable as the DRE machines. Please note that the results on Tuesday in New Hampshire were in line with the exit/entrance polls in counties that hand-counted their ballots, but there were discrepancies in counties that used closed-source electronic systems. The zero tape and final tally have nothing to do with the actual votes when the systems have been hacked before the final tally. Provisional voters usually don't have their votes counted at all anyway. Best choice is hand counting in public with observers. Second best is open-source software counting votes in scanners with provision for hand-counted ballots in public for recounts. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiiaBqwqkXs http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5530 Betty * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection - have we found it?
I completely agree! (I was only pointing out that the electronic machines we have do work, even if they are pretty well kluged up.) The previous system was a very simple system using optical scanning of a simple marked paper ballot. It produced the original voter-marked ballot, a tape count, and a data pack of some proprietary nature about as big as the proverbial pack of cigarettes. It worked with 100% accuracy, was very easy for both voters and poll workers, very quick to count votes, and was quite inexpensive. Even if the power failed, we would have just accumulated the paper ballots and run them through the machine or hand counted them later. But we were forced by congressional legislation to abandon them in favor of the new electronic machines. Even at this time, the state legislature is considering getting rid of the electronic machines (fortunately, our county election board was wise enough not to dispose of the old machines, just in case...) It was also much, much easier to deal with write in votes, as the electronic machines require typing in write-in vote using a touch screen keyboard that would create horrible back-ups in voting if a serious write-in campaign were to occur. (The optical system looks for any marking in the write-in area and dumps those ballots into a separate bin for hand counting.) I don't have the name of the mark sense machines, but they were truly bulletproof in every way. Mike Mike db wrote: Mike ...Thanks for the informed details re: the computer voting machine that I was wondering about. I am a tech professional but I LOVE any type of system that does it's job extremely well with elegant simplicity, minimal overhead and low cost regardless of the tech involved. To me those qualities, define good functional design.In the tech field I think we often use computers unnecessarily to reinvent the wheel and the motivation for doing so is a combination of myopic tech fascination and the $ to be gained. The computer voting machines you describe, seem unnecessarily fraught with unwieldy power cords, battery overhead issues, various paper roll issues, hacking security and storage liabilities and unnecessary cost issues. The KISS theory (Keep It Simple Stupid) should apply here me thinks. All in all, it seems like a ballot machine like DataVote, that Tom and Alvin had used and I found reference to, is the way to go. Bring back IBM punchcards!! :) db * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection - found it!
-- http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/voting/pictures/datavote.jpg -- http://americanhistory.si.edu/vote/resources_datavote.html This is the one. Worked real nice. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
... they print a zero tape at the beginning of the voting day and
then a final tally tape at the end. And the vote counts have to
match meters on the front of the machines ...
This is the answer I got from my polling place in Montgomery county,
MD in 2004. Sure, if the number of total votes recorded by the
machines match the number of voters who walked in, that simply
means there hasn't been an electronic equivalent of ballot box
stuffing.
That does _not_ mean that those black box voting machines didn't
incorrectly recorded voters' choices. And, there's no way to
audit that fact without voters' choices being recorded in a medium
that could be hand counted (ie: voter verified paper records).
If they can't re-count without using the same (suspected) machines,
then I don't trust that system.
While I have my own doubts about the programming of the machines,
I think that the actual vote count is relatively secure.
Why should we believe the election officials or the black box
manufacturers that the count is accurate? The officials can test
the machines before the election day for various scenarios. The
manufacturer can have various internal quality testing. Yet, it
only takes one not-so-honest programmer to do something like the
following to skew the tallies on the election day.
if (today = election_day) #easy to predict in the US
if ( 8am time 5pm)
magik_min = RANDOM_NUMBER (3 to 53)
if ( magik_min time_minutes magik_min+4 )
do { display voter's selection
screw the voter and add votes to Party_X
}
end-if
end-if
end-if
The election officials won't catch this in their testing before
the election day. How do we know the manufacturer's QA is
good enough? If the HW are standard components and the software
is open, then others can do code audits.
Moreover, who knows if there are bugs that get triggered by a
specific sequence of events (ie: insert card; remove card; insert
card; touch screen; remove card; insert card; vote for the first
office; remove card; (ie: voting not completed) next person insert
card ... bug got triggered and the internal counters got totally
messed up) If the machine is a sealed black box, how do we know
there's no bug like that? Or even more weird ones? If the software
is open, then code audits might catch it and the bug could be fixed.
There has been much made about voter fraud and draconian identity
schemes imposed to prevent it, but I think the problem posed by
hacked voting machine software is orders of magnitude more serious
and has been paid little or no attention (the denials of the
machine vendors notwithstanding).
A well thought-out process would require election officials to reset
the machines (wipe their programs clean) and install the latest
software just before the election begins. Of course, proprietary
machine manufacturers would object to election officials being able
to have access to the internals.
As others have pointed out, punch card machines or optical scanners
would make much better, simple yet effective, mechanized voting
systems. However, the counting part of even those systems could be
influenced just as above. So, their codes must also be audited.
Moreover, the election results should be randomly audited against
the paper records to make sure nothing funny actually happened.
Just having the paper records is not sufficient.
And, we've spent how many billions of dollars (supposedly) to bring
democracy to Iraq? Why can't the federal government spend just a
tiny fraction of that money to bring a single, standard voting
system to our own country?
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Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
And, we've spent how many billions of dollars (supposedly) to bring democracy
to Iraq? Why can't the federal government spend just a tiny fraction of that
money to bring a single, standard voting system to our own country?
Because the big entrenched special interest groups have worked for more
than a century to be able to influence the government (and elections).
Why would these interests care about more efficient voting machines?...
when they already get their way with the candidates. Like a fish needs
a bicycle!
The candidates don't care (except for Gore maybe... who got caught in
the wrong place at the wrong time...) because they know where their
bread is buttered and it's not really in the ballot boxes.
Billions of dollars to bring democracy to Iraq? If you believe that I
have a bridge to sell you!! Think quick ticket to political support for
a going nowhere administration, arms sales, Oil, Oil, Oil and the
Straits of Hormuz.
All these apparent non-sequitor affronts to our democratic sensibilities
... like the voting machine boondoggles ... aren't really mysteries or
illogical if you think about them within the right frame of reference.
And, in my opinion, it's not our simple folk motives or benefits that
you need to be factoring in if you want to really understand how our
democracy is working and why
What, me a cynic??
db
Michael Fernando wrote:
... they print a zero tape at the beginning of the voting day and
then a final tally tape at the end. And the vote counts have to
match meters on the front of the machines ...
This is the answer I got from my polling place in Montgomery county,
MD in 2004. Sure, if the number of total votes recorded by the
machines match the number of voters who walked in, that simply
means there hasn't been an electronic equivalent of ballot box
stuffing.
That does _not_ mean that those black box voting machines didn't
incorrectly recorded voters' choices. And, there's no way to
audit that fact without voters' choices being recorded in a medium
that could be hand counted (ie: voter verified paper records).
If they can't re-count without using the same (suspected) machines,
then I don't trust that system.
While I have my own doubts about the programming of the machines,
I think that the actual vote count is relatively secure.
Why should we believe the election officials or the black box
manufacturers that the count is accurate? The officials can test
the machines before the election day for various scenarios. The
manufacturer can have various internal quality testing. Yet, it
only takes one not-so-honest programmer to do something like the
following to skew the tallies on the election day.
if (today = election_day) #easy to predict in the US
if ( 8am time 5pm)
magik_min = RANDOM_NUMBER (3 to 53)
if ( magik_min time_minutes magik_min+4 )
do { display voter's selection
screw the voter and add votes to Party_X
}
end-if
end-if
end-if
The election officials won't catch this in their testing before
the election day. How do we know the manufacturer's QA is
good enough? If the HW are standard components and the software
is open, then others can do code audits.
Moreover, who knows if there are bugs that get triggered by a
specific sequence of events (ie: insert card; remove card; insert
card; touch screen; remove card; insert card; vote for the first
office; remove card; (ie: voting not completed) next person insert
card ... bug got triggered and the internal counters got totally
messed up) If the machine is a sealed black box, how do we know
there's no bug like that? Or even more weird ones? If the software
is open, then code audits might catch it and the bug could be fixed.
There has been much made about voter fraud and draconian identity
schemes imposed to prevent it, but I think the problem posed by
hacked voting machine software is orders of magnitude more serious
and has been paid little or no attention (the denials of the
machine vendors notwithstanding).
A well thought-out process would require election officials to reset
the machines (wipe their programs clean) and install the latest
software just before the election begins. Of course, proprietary
machine manufacturers would object to election officials being able
to have access to the internals.
As others have pointed out, punch card machines or optical scanners
would make much better, simple yet effective, mechanized voting
systems. However, the counting part of even those systems could be
influenced just as above. So, their codes must also be audited.
Moreover, the election results should be randomly audited against
the paper records to make sure nothing funny actually happened.
Just having the paper records is not sufficient.
And, we've spent how many billions of dollars (supposedly) to bring democracy
to Iraq? Why can't
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
We use words in our thoughts and propagandists like to give us the
wrong words so that we will think the wrong thoughts.
They repeatedly use the word Democracy to describe our form of
government, and we all follow along and use Democracy also. The word
Democracy makes us think that we have a say in the way things are
run in our nation.
However, the form of government of the USA has never been a
Democracy. Our current form of government, instituted with the
ratification of our Constitution, is a Republic. This means that we
have NO say in the way things are run. It means that every two years
we are given the Appearance of an opportunity to choose between
tweedledum and tweedledee to Represent us, and that often (as we've
discussed here) the mechanism of the choice is such that we don't
actually have that small choice! After the Election of the
Representatives the tweedledums and tweedledees meet and decide
which of their several paymasters they will follow. They then declare
what the ordinary citizen must do and shall not do, and then further
declare that once again, Democracy has triumphed!
Those who are paymasters can call the tweedledums and tweedledees and
say Let's have lunch tomorrow and I'll tell you what I'd like to see
happen with issue X. These paymasters, and the tweedledums and
tweedledees, are known as Republican party members and Democratic
party members. Any person who is not a paymaster or a tweedledum or a
tweedledee, is not a member of those Political Parties. They may think
that they are a member (and they are encouraged to so think!), but
they are not.
Alvin
On Jan 10, 2008, at 12:43 AM, db wrote:
And, we've spent how many billions of dollars (supposedly) to bring
democracy to Iraq? Why can't the federal government spend just a
tiny fraction of that money to bring a single, standard voting
system to our own country?
Because the big entrenched special interest groups have worked for
more than a century to be able to influence the government (and
elections). Why would these interests care about more efficient
voting machines?... when they already get their way with the
candidates. Like a fish needs a bicycle!
The candidates don't care (except for Gore maybe... who got caught
in the wrong place at the wrong time...) because they know where
their bread is buttered and it's not really in the ballot boxes.
Billions of dollars to bring democracy to Iraq? If you believe
that I have a bridge to sell you!! Think quick ticket to political
support for a going nowhere administration, arms sales, Oil, Oil,
Oil and the Straits of Hormuz.
All these apparent non-sequitor affronts to our democratic
sensibilities ... like the voting machine boondoggles ... aren't
really mysteries or illogical if you think about them within the
right frame of reference. And, in my opinion, it's not our simple
folk motives or benefits that you need to be factoring in if you
want to really understand how our democracy is working and why
What, me a cynic??
db
Michael Fernando wrote:
... they print a zero tape at the beginning of the voting day and
then a final tally tape at the end. And the vote counts have to
match meters on the front of the machines ...
This is the answer I got from my polling place in Montgomery county,
MD in 2004. Sure, if the number of total votes recorded by the
machines match the number of voters who walked in, that simply
means there hasn't been an electronic equivalent of ballot box
stuffing.
That does _not_ mean that those black box voting machines didn't
incorrectly recorded voters' choices. And, there's no way to
audit that fact without voters' choices being recorded in a medium
that could be hand counted (ie: voter verified paper records).
If they can't re-count without using the same (suspected) machines,
then I don't trust that system.
While I have my own doubts about the programming of the machines,
I think that the actual vote count is relatively secure.
Why should we believe the election officials or the black box
manufacturers that the count is accurate? The officials can test
the machines before the election day for various scenarios. The
manufacturer can have various internal quality testing. Yet, it
only takes one not-so-honest programmer to do something like the
following to skew the tallies on the election day.
if (today = election_day) #easy to predict in the US
if ( 8am time 5pm)
magik_min = RANDOM_NUMBER (3 to 53)
if ( magik_min time_minutes magik_min+4 )
do { display voter's selection
screw the voter and add votes to Party_X
}
end-if
end-if
end-if
The election officials won't catch this in their testing before
the election day. How do we know the manufacturer's QA is
good enough? If the HW are standard components and the software
is open, then others can do
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
Our county uses Sequoia machines that run on Windows 2000. They produce: a count on the hard drive, a CD-R, a count on a memory stick, and a paper ballot (that is stored in a sealed bin). The paper ballot can be viewed through a Plexi-glass window prior to the voter pressing the key for the second time to cast their ballot. They get to reject the ballot and do it over twice. If they still don't like it, the ballot is discarded, and they have to cast a hand written provisional ballot that has to be approved by a special judge assigned to the county election board. We have never had anyone reject a ballot they cast, but I suppose it could happen. The CD and the memory stick are removed from the machine at the end of the day and hand carried back to the Board for counting. The machines and the paper ballots are shut down and retrieved by the board the next day. I suppose someone could break into the buildings where the machines are kept for the night and mess with the results, but I don't see how they could alter the paper ballots in the bin. Plus, the CD and the memory stick would be at the court house, under guard. The general feeling is that this approach is pretty good, compared to others I have heard about. We used to use optical scan machines that were dead simple and just about bulletproof, but they made us get rid of them and go to electronic machines (that most of the voters hate and cost a LOT of taxpayer money). Mike Michael Fernando wrote: Can You Count on Voting Machines? http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?pagewanted=1ref=magazine I would like two things from the voting machines: 1) The process has to be transparent. That means no proprietary HW or software that can't be examined to see that they don't do something funny on the election day. The software doesn't have to be all that fancy; after all, the only thing it has to do is keep a few counters. Openness is a beautiful thing. 2) The ballots cast should be able to be counted without any machines if desired. This means storing the _voter_verified_ ballots in paper form separately so that a hand count could be carried out, if needed. There are two reasons for using voting machines: a) to reduce the human errors during the marking of a paper ballot, b) obtain an accurate count in minutes, not days. If we the voters can't _verify_ that the machine is doing what it is supposed to (or claimed to) do on _that_ (election) day, then there's no trust in the process at all and might as well ask the machine vendors to tweak their machines to the benefit of their favorite candidates. Maryland's Diebold voting machines do neither of the above two. Complain to your state government. Complain to the officials when you go to your polling place. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
I like the system that we had in Montgomery County, Maryland, before we received the Diebold machines. It was a punch card system. No, not the notorious Florida system where you use a pencil to poke out previously scored circles. It was a system that used an IBM card and a hand pressed punch, with no electricity required. The card was inserted in the simple machine. You could see the card at all times. You slid a pointer down until it was next to your choice of candidate or issue. You then pressed down on a handle. At light pressure, nothing happened. As you increased the pressure, suddenly the punch came down and punched a nice neat rectangular hole in the card. AFAIK, there wasn't a problem with hanging chads. In my experience, the punch either did nothing or punched cleanly and completely. If the cards were guarded, there was no way to cheat the system, and the cards could be easily saved and counted and recounted. Yes, it was simple, inexpensive, reliable, accurate, difficult to cheat, and easily re-countable, and did not require electricity. That's probably why they replaced it. I guess that the politicians like a system that's complicated, expensive, unreliable, inaccurate, easy to cheat, can't be recounted, and uses electricity. A system that's expensive can provide greater campaign contributions from the manufacturer of the system. A system that's easy to cheat allows the politicians to assist the uneducated voter to get the proper government. Am I being cynical? Ahem. Alvin On Jan 6, 2008, at 2:12 PM, Tom Piwowar wrote: Great long article in the NY Times... Can You Count on Voting Machines? www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?pagewanted=1ref=magazine Perfection isnt possible, of course; every voting system has flaws. So historically, the public and candidates for public office have grudgingly accepted that their voting systems will produce some errors here and there. The deep, ongoing consternation over touch-screen machines stems from something new: the unpredictability of computers. Computers do not merely produce errors; they produce errors of unforeseeable magnitude. Will people trust a system when they never know how big or small its next failure will be? * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
I think you have captured the essence of the problem accurately. It's all about the money... db Alvin Auerbach wrote: I like the system that we had in Montgomery County, Maryland, before we received the Diebold machines. It was a punch card system. No, not the notorious Florida system where you use a pencil to poke out previously scored circles. It was a system that used an IBM card and a hand pressed punch, with no electricity required. The card was inserted in the simple machine. You could see the card at all times. You slid a pointer down until it was next to your choice of candidate or issue. You then pressed down on a handle. At light pressure, nothing happened. As you increased the pressure, suddenly the punch came down and punched a nice neat rectangular hole in the card. AFAIK, there wasn't a problem with hanging chads. In my experience, the punch either did nothing or punched cleanly and completely. If the cards were guarded, there was no way to cheat the system, and the cards could be easily saved and counted and recounted. Yes, it was simple, inexpensive, reliable, accurate, difficult to cheat, and easily re-countable, and did not require electricity. That's probably why they replaced it. I guess that the politicians like a system that's complicated, expensive, unreliable, inaccurate, easy to cheat, can't be recounted, and uses electricity. A system that's expensive can provide greater campaign contributions from the manufacturer of the system. A system that's easy to cheat allows the politicians to assist the uneducated voter to get the proper government. Am I being cynical? Ahem. Alvin On Jan 6, 2008, at 2:12 PM, Tom Piwowar wrote: Great long article in the NY Times... Can You Count on Voting Machines? www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?pagewanted=1ref=magazine Perfection isnt possible, of course; every voting system has flaws. So historically, the public and candidates for public office have grudgingly accepted that their voting systems will produce some errors here and there. The deep, ongoing consternation over touch-screen machines stems from something new: the unpredictability of computers. Computers do not merely produce errors; they produce errors of unforeseeable magnitude. Will people trust a system when they never know how big or small its next failure will be? * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
It was a system that used an IBM card and a hand pressed punch, with no electricity required. The card was inserted in the simple machine. You could see the card at all times. You slid a pointer down until it was next to your choice of candidate or issue. You then pressed down I used to live in a place that used those. As you wrote, they were great. Also, because they were inexpensive the poll had lots of them ready. So there was no bottleneck waiting to get at one of the small number of expensive machines. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
I wonder what the brand of puncher was ... does anyone know? In googling, I see reference mostly to the Votomatic that was problematically used in Florida. There is an older Coyle model shown in a photo in the following link: http://americanhistory.si.edu/vote/punchcard.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_machine#Punch_card ?? dab Tom Piwowar wrote: It was a system that used an IBM card and a hand pressed punch, with no electricity required. The card was inserted in the simple machine. You could see the card at all times. You slid a pointer down until it was next to your choice of candidate or issue. You then pressed down I used to live in a place that used those. As you wrote, they were great. Also, because they were inexpensive the poll had lots of them ready. So there was no bottleneck waiting to get at one of the small number of expensive machines. * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
Re: [CGUYS] Voting Perfection
Tom Piwowar Great long article in the NY Times... Can You Count on Voting Machines? snip I saw an article ... somewhere ... about a proposal to make vote verification much simpler. After voting, you would be given a copy of a randomly selected ballot that wasn't yours. The ballot would have a serial number, the serial numbers wouldn't match to names, they would match to the ballot, that is the list of ballots and how each one voted would be preserved. If 10% of the people would check how the ballot they had verified with the reported vote, the safety of the ballot would be assured. I'm not a mathematician but it does sound simple. Who knows, it may even work! -- Take care | This clown speaks for himself, his job doesn't Wayne D. | supply this, at least not directly Keyboard missing - Press F1 to continue * == QUICK LIST-COMMAND REFERENCE - Put the following commands in == * == the body of an email send 'em to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] == * Join the list: SUBSCRIBE COMPUTERGUYS-L Your Name * Too much mail? Try Daily Digests command: SET COMPUTERGUYS-L DIGEST * Tired of the List? Unsubscribe command: SIGNOFF COMPUTERGUYS-L * New address? From OLD address send: CHANGE COMPUTERGUYS-L YourNewAddress * Need more help? Send mail to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] * List archive from 1/1/2000 is on the MARC http://marc.info/?l=computerguys-l * List archive at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/ * RSS at www.mail-archive.com/computerguys-l@listserv.aol.com/maillist.xml * Messages bearing the header X-No-Archive: yes will not be archived
