BBV: Republicans complaining about voting machines in TWO states

[BevHarris]

The big news will be the court hearing in California today, EFF suing Diebold for abusive DMCA enforcement.

But for now, two new articles, both with info on Republican complaints against the machines. The first, in the Boston Globe, contains information you've probably heard. The second was news to me.

Boston Globe article

It's the computers' turn to mess up elections
By Hiawatha Bray, The Boston Globe 11/17/2003

..."In Fairfax County, Va., a Republican school board candidate lost by a handful of votes, then learned that at least one of the computerized ballot boxes had a glitch that may have subtracted some of her votes. "It's hard not to think that I have been robbed," the irate candidate told The Washington Post.."

(The above article refers to me as "the godmother of the movement." That's a new one.)

And this:

Connecticut impounds voting machines"
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?ewsid=10516659&BRD=1663&PAG=461&dept_id=13848&rfi=6

And this article has me wondering: Are the Republicans, once again, going to out-organize the Democratic contenders? Most have heard that a Republican candidate from Virginia filed suit against the voting machines.

Did you know that Connecticut has impounded 15 voting machines based on a complaint from a Republican candidate?

Connecticut impounds voting machines"

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?ewsid=10516659&BRD=1663&PAG=461&dept_id=13848&rfi=6

The Bethel Beacon - 11/14/2003

"The state is impounding the town's voting machines, and First Selectwoman Judith Novachek, who lost her seat in the Nov. 4 municipal election, said yesterday she is still considering whether to go to court to seek to have the results overturned and re-elections held.

"Town Clerk Sheila Zelensky said she received notice yesterday from the state Elections Enforcement Commission that 15 voting machines will be impounded as a result of problems that occurred at the polls and complaints that had subsequently been filed with its agency.

..."On the morning of Election Day, it was determined that there was a problem with the voting machines. Voters weren't able to split their votes in some of the board races. In other words, voters could not pick candidates from different parties for some boards, such as the Board of Finance and the Board of Education.

..."He stated that head moderator Cliff Hurgin, a Democrat, was seen behind a machine trying to fix it. Mr. Crnic claimed it is illegal to "tamper" with a voting machine once votes have been cast on it.
Mr. Hurgin said in an interview this week that the only part of the machine that was opened was a compartment that allows parts to be changed on them. This is something that is done routinely during elections. He added that opening this compartment does not have any affect on the votes that have been cast on the machine.

"It's done time and time again," Mr. Hurgin said.

Bev Harris
http://www.blackboxvoting.org

[Spazito]

1. This says two things to me...

it shows that BBV is an issue that crosses party lines which is good and it also shows that the concern is gathering many supporters.

[Occulus]

3. Yes... I'll agree, this is a good thing.

Party be damned on the BBV issue. This, I think, just may be one way to bring the two parties together prior to the 04 election.

[Wickerman]

2. Glad to see this

and kudos to Bev and Co. So, why are the Repugs the first to effectively offer a challenge and why does the media finally pay atttention to Repug candidates? Liberal media my ass.

[Mountainman]

4. Why do they have to wait until election day to find out the machines don't

don't work right?

Why don't they set them up then test them and the ones that don't work are pulled or fixed?
Do we have to wait until the election is stolen to find out we could have prevented it in the first place?

If a corporation would put in a system without testing it first, but rather waited until the nest business day and just turned it on and hoped everything would go right we would laugh them off the planet.

Why do we trust our democracy to such foolishness?

[BevHarris]

9. They say they do test them, but here's the problem

The "logic and accuracy" test does not seem to catch software programming errors, and cannot catch many types of fraud. The procedure for doing an L&A test is flawed (it has you do the test in "test mode" instead of "election mode" for example, and with touch screens, has a self test instead of a real test).

The situation is simple: They cannot fix the problem before the primaries. We need an immediate moratorium on these machines until we have time to do an auditable system correctly.

We need to go to paper ballots, hand counted, for the primaries.

Bev

[madfloridian]

5. Godmother Bev, interesting.

That is good it is getting the attention of both sides now. And godmother carries a good connotation. :-)

[zbdent]

6. On a sorta related note

There's a Repuke in NE Ohio who lost an election by a relatively slim margin.

The polling place was unable to open until 9am (instead of 6:30am) due to the guy with the keys being held in jail for DUI.

This repuke is screaming for a brand-new election because his home polling place was closed for 2.5 hours. Doesn't he remember that all those damn Democratic voters like to vote early in the day? All of a sudden, a Repuke is crying about voters not being able to cast their ballot.

[Baconfoot]

7. I don't know, I think that's a big deal...

You get significantly more votes in your home area than you do elsewhere.

I'd be angry if I were him too.

[billbuckhead]

8. Thank you for your work on this most important issue.

Nothing in our democracy is more important than this.

[frank frankly]

10. a bi-partisan kick

for fair and open elections