Need advice on confronting Diebold, etc at our Countys' Vendor Meeting:

[elehhhhna]

We have a vendor fair next week, open to the public. We are in DeLay's district. I need a simple, short list of the most pertinent Q's I should ask each vendor. HELP??? Top 5 Questions, please?




"Urgent Action: Electronic Voting Machines

Fort Bend County is in the process of purchasing electronic voting machines as required by the Help America Vote Act. The County Commissioners will vote on what brand voting machines to buy, with recommendations from the County Elections Office, on April 12th. Democratic Party Chair Elaine Bishop informed us at last Monday's meeting that the County Elections Office is leaning towards Diebold voting machines.

snip

Attend a voting machine vendors fair in Stafford to learn about the different brands of voting machines and ask the questions that concern you. The vendor fair will be on April 7 from 1-5PM at the Stafford Centre, 10505 Cash Rd (the intersection of Cash and Murphy Rd). For further directions, click here.

www.fortbenddemocrats.org

[LiberalEsto]

1. Try this site

http://www.truevotemd.org/

best of luck to you!

[AllegroRondo]

2. My number 1 question - paper trail

do these machines produce an auditable paper trail? can the votes be verified through a manual audit that does not rely on memory cards?

[Andy_Stephenson]

6. Hi...Andy Stephenson here...nice to see you posting at DU

but if I EVER see you use the words paper trail again...I will wash your mouth out with soap.

The term you are looking for is Ballot.

As in do these machines produce a voter verified paper ballot?

Thanks,
Andy

[seabeyond]

3. ask them was it 1 in 3, 1 in 4 kerry vote that went to bush

if a person voted straight democratic ticket. and why when they knew the first day of early voting, they allowed this problem to continue for two weeks and on election day

and with that, how the hell they expect anyone to trust their machine

[seabeyond]

4. i am also curious why across the nation, all the votes that

accidently were not registered correctly, why all of them went to bush and away from kerry.........across the nation, each and everytime, without fail. ask them if they have any idea what the odds are of that

[jen4clark]

5. Hard to know where to start...

Check this site:
http://www.ecotalk.org/VotingSecurity.htm#9


Can a voting machine company be owned by foreigners and run by felons?

Yes. Sequoia is the third largest voting machine company in America and is owned by a British-based company, De La Rue. Diebold is the second largest voting machine company in the country. It counts about 35% of all votes in America. Diebold employed 5 convicted felons as senior managers and developers to help write the central compiler computer code that counted 50% of the votes in 30 states. Jeff Dean, Diebold's Senior Vice-President and senior programmer on Diebold's central compiler code, was convicted of 23 counts of felony theft in the first degree. Dean was convicted of planting back doors in his software and using a "high degree of sophistication" to evade detection over a period of 2 years. see: fraud & irregularities

Is there any evidence that voting machines have been rigged?

Yes.

Lots of it. An extensive history of voting machine irregularities can be found in the following:
Election 2004-Voters Unite.org
The Conyers Report - Read Excerpts
Black Box Voting, Ballot-Tampering in the 21st Century (Chapter II) by Bev Harris (2003)
Accuracy, Integrity, and Security in Computerized Vote-Tallying, by Dr. Roy Saltman (1988)
my own list

[Andy_Stephenson]

7. I was the one that broke the felons story...

They no longer work for Diebold. However the code Jeff Dean wrote is still in the machines today. The stories I could tell about Jeff Dean would curl your toenails.

and BTW he also wrote a voter registration system that interfaces with GEMS. Bad Juju IMHO.

Andy

[hedda_foil]

8. The premise of the purchase is a lie.

"Fort Bend County is in the process of purchasing electronic voting machines as required by the Help America Vote Act."

HAVA requires no such thing. This is a palpable lie. Get thee to www.VotersUnite.org and download (and read) MythBreakers (second edition) immediately. It will prepare you to counter anything you hear.

[elehhhhna]

9. Reading up--thanks Hedda!