New "Holt Bill": Fraudulent and Deceptive Use of term "Ballot"

[Land Shark]

The "new" Holt bill is a totally deceptive and fraudulent bill.

Why?

It uses the term "Ballot" to mean nothing much more than the old-fashioned "paper records" under the original "old" HR550 --- in other words in the "new" Holt "ballot" actually means something that will NEVER get counted on the FIRST count. Under the "new" Holt bill, just like under the old one, they will still count the electronic votes FIRST and release those as the results on election night, and the paper "ballots" only count (again just like the old Holt bill) if the audits show discrepancies.

And some of us were SO excited that we were gonna get paper "ballots" out of the Holt bill's new form. Progress. Bullshit.

In fact the new Holt bill, just to make this PERFECTLY clear, would require a sign to be placed in polling places that says IN ALL CAPS:

‘THE PAPER BALLOT

REPRESENTING YOUR VOTE

SHALL SERVE AS THE VOTE OF

RECORD IN ALL RECOUNTS AND AU-

DITS. DO NOT LEAVE THE VOTING

BOOTH UNTIL YOU HAVE CONFIRMED

THAT IT ACCURATELY RECORDS YOUR

VOTE’.

Well, as the conviction of the Cuyahoga County, Ohio (Cleveland) elections officials quite clearly shows (thanks to citizen efforts like Kathleen Wynne's video and the prosecutor's work) you really can't count even on DEMOCRATIC officials to recount or audit even DEMOCRATIC counties in order to help DEMOCRATS like John Kerry for President! Now why is that?? Well, human nature trumps the statutory drive for accuracy and elections officials are not supposed to be partisan no matter what -- so -- guess what takes over? (1) avoiding work during holidays and (2) they've already invested their pride and jobs in the original vote count and they last thing they want to do is embarrass themselves or audit themselves.

(We've yet to apply the lessons of Arthur Anderson and Enron to post-election remedies, you could say).

Of course the public oversight that would possibly give us meaningful post-election remedies is woefully unaddressed in the "new" Holt bill. We prefer the notion of the government auditing itself on the very processes (elections) that give the government all of its legitimacy, money, power, and taxing authority (if any).

Don't you think that every reasonable person would think that a "ballot" is something that gets counted on election night and/or is part of the initial results? They would. That's why everyone should tell Rep. Holt and all of his cosponsors that this bill is fraudulent and deceptive use of the democratically sacred term "ballot"

It takes a lot of chutzpah to propose a bill like this concerning ONE'S OWN RE-ELECTION to CONGRESS and use the term "ballot" in such a deceptive way. The studies already show that only a relatively small percentage of voters catch errors in the paper trails. It's kind of like the percentage of people who closely check their grocery store receipt, basically. If it "seems about right" even if they look at it, it won't be closely, so lots of errors creep through.

Only now, under the "new" Holt bill, those 80% or more of the errors that creep through to the paper "ballots" are now "voter-verified" gold-standard super duper VOTER CONFIDENCE fraudulent totals! Wunderbar! The voters will know what really counts (not the paper) and they won't check the paper, Holt even insists on a giant sign in all capital letters to make sure of that.

For any doubters, an unamended part of HAVA states that state law governs what constitutes a vote so unless state law changes, there's nothing about Holt that is going to give you a real ballot, only a fake fraudulent paper record dressed up as a ballot.

THere are more problems, big problems, with the new Holt bill, but that's enough for one post, this stuff doesn't go down easy. By no means limited to just this fraud on the public, something smells in the world's largest democracy when this bill presumably comes in with some two hundred plus congressional cosponsors and is on a fast track so powerful that (some say) mere citizens can not stop it.

[kpete]

1. "Fradulent paper record dressed up as a ballot"

EXPOSED DUE TO

MAJOR SHARK ATTACK

Love and Peace to you, kpete

[bananarepublican]

2. Why the *uck wasn't electoral reform part of the 'first 100hrs'? n/t

[Land Shark]

3. good question. But actually the Congress has so much to learn that it's not READY

in the first 100 hours to just DO something. Their instincts are not yet trained finely enough to reflexively and strongly seek the kind of public oversight that makes elections actually meaningful and perhaps reliable. Otherwise it's just the government auditing itself, or counting its own votes/paycheck, thereby proving we've not yet learned the lessons of Arthur Anderson not being a true outside auditor of Enron (too many consulting $$ at stake, so you don't get an honest audit)

Well, with arthur anderson they would have lost one lucrative client among a whole bunch of them, if they risked an honest audit of Enron. WIth the government and elections they risk EVERYTHING in an honest (major) election, including their own offices in many cases. Surprise surprise, we don't get honest recounts and audits of elections.

[KoKo]

59. But....what happened to all the Info from the Conyers Basement Hearings and

where Jesse Jackson, jr. pledged to make it a priority to introduce the Bill that would finally Make Voting a Part of the Constitution?

What happened to that? They have all the info, plus the Ohio prosecutions and more that's gone on in Florida. :shrug: I know they are busy with "other things" like Iraq but Verifiable Paper Ballots, Random Handcounts and Audits are too important to go awaiting until after '08.

When is it appropriate to ask: WHAT'S HOLDING THEM UP? And, why is Russ Holt still pushing another Bill that does so little for us. Why isn't someone else standing up?

[Land Shark]

62. People are being lectured that any major pro-public oversight is not "realistic"

presumably that includes Jesse Jackson's constitutional amendment.

One of the ways HAVA really messed up our elections is in creating an extraordinarily complex MULTI-disciplinary system that probably no single human being understands completely (law, elections, computers, statistics, bureaucracy and voting systems all need to be understood very well)

Organizations that should know a lot better, like People for the American Way, were lined up in advance in favor of holt. They know reform is needed, but this and every other bill out there right now (IMO) is a false solution. Frankly we probably need to lobby PFAW as much as anybody else.

The system can't seem to admit that they REALLY messed up this country in passing HAVA and instutionalizing e-voting. Bandaids can not and will not work. Jackson's approach at least is not a bandaid, though the devil's in the details. I personally prefer to claim voting as in inalienable right we don't need to grant to ourselves and certainly not beg Congress for, yet having something on paper such as a Constitution can certainly help.

[GuvWurld]

4. K&R

but let's try not to look so surprised

[Wilms]

5. Just come right out and say it, LS.

Holt isn't going to ban DREs. Right? That's what your OP refers to. Correct?

I'd be happy to see legislation to do that, but I don't expect it. And I certainly wouldn't have expected it from Holt. The Holt bills have never been about banning DREs.

I'm just glad for all the bad press DREs are getting and hoping more and more jurisdictions will dump/not consider them.

If anything in the new bill (as in last session's 550) makes DREs less attractive-all the better.

I was luke warm to 550. I look forward to seeing what got improved. Here, there is no surprise. (Except for that pathetic sign that will, supposedly, get voters to verify the paper. A few, I'm sure. A few.)

What else have ya got?

[Land Shark]

6. DRE's are a specific problem, Electronic Counts are the General Problem

all electronic counts are on trade secret software and those are still given primacy.

There is the argument that turning DREs into "expensive ballot printers" means that DREs no longer exist. (i.e. Direct Recording Electronic...)

I think your reasoning is generallly sound Wilms but everyone can read the bill for themselves and see if DREs survive. In any case it's playing semantics here in ways that people will not appreciate.

[Wilms]

7. And I should have noted I appreciate what you're saying about bastardizing the ballot.

(Hmmmm: "bastardizing the ballot")

As for the software, it'll be somewhat disclosed, ie: on file with the EAC. No? (I know. It's still software.)

And I'd hope for a law where a vigorous audit is given primacy. 550's audit would have been good for most, though not all, statewide races for senate and president. Congress was another story.

Turning DRE's into ballot markers ain't a bad idea.

[garybeck]

8. My reaction.

I agree 100% to call a paper receipt a ballot is a horrible thing, and I am surprised about this because as you know LS I have had extensive conversations with you and others about this very issue. This is the very surprising because it is the first time I have seen in a bill, such incorrect use of the legal term "ballot." Think this very issue, in itself, is reason to bang down the door on Holt's office.

On some of the other issues, I do not feel as strongly as you.

The sign, for instance, which reminds people that they should check the receipt, that is a good thing. they should change the wording, and not call it a ballot, but the sign should be there.

Which brings me to an area of contention. I know there are studies which show that many people do not check their paper records. But I think it is misleading to compare it to people checking their grocery receipts or their ATM receipts. I believe that if there were audits on all elections, that awareness about the importance of checking your receipt could be conveyed to the people effectively, especially the Democrats. They are willing to stand in line for 4 hours, find their polling place when people like Karl Rove are trying to misdirect them. I think they (we) can also add to this long list of the gauntlet we need to go through to make sure our vote gets counted. I can see big web ads, maybe even TV commercials reminding people to check their paper receipts on election day, and I think it would be effective.

And living in a state that has all hand marked, machine counted paper ballots, I want ANY bill that mandates ANY kind of audit, because right now we have none. We need to slap our Secretary of the State up with a federal mandate because she aint going to do it otherwise.

And as many states have adopted more paper ballots and/or receipts, having some kind of federal mandate would be good.

So I'm right there with you on hammering Holt for calling using the term "ballot" loosely. In fact I think it might even be a legally incorrect use of the word and I wouldn't be surprised if the lawyers force them to reword it before it's voted on. We should do everything we can to try to make that happen. But personally I would not throw the baby out with the bathwater. Anything that forces my Secretary of State to get off her butt and do an audit, that will make me feel a little better than I do now.

having said all that, I have not examined the new bill yet and I would like to do that. Do you have a link?

peace
gary

[Land Shark]

11. garybeck, the studies showing that people do not check their paper

are studies involving election circumstances. If you find my grocery store receipt example imperfect you are free to discard it but you are still left with the election studies on the same point.

YOu speak in terms of how some things in the bill will make you feel "a little" better. There's truth in that. But if this congress is the doctor, and a competent doctor would know FULL WELL how to make you fit as a spring chicken in one fell swoop, but that congressional doctor instead gives you a couple of little things that make ya feel just a little better, and charges you $4 billion, while deceiving you about your ballots, just EXACTLY HOW GOOD do you REALLY feel?

[garybeck]

12. Well, since you ask.

There has not been any study of how many people check their paper receipts, after a massive campaign to educate people of the importance of this. And, does the study you reference have a sign next to each voting machine reminding people that they should check it?

In terms of your contention about "feeling better." When I say it makes me feel a little better, that is what I mean. It's not based on some kind of misunderstanding of what is happening. It is because I understand what audits are and I know what it feels likes to live without them, and with them. We had one last november here and it was not perfect but it was a significant step in the right direction.

Personally I am not so concerned about the public's conception and their false sense of security. I'm more concerned about MY understanding of the security of the election system and whether or not I think it's getting better, and what MY level of voter confidence is, based on what I know.

The truth is, we've lived with a public's false sense of security for years now. That's old hat and worrying about it is not going to cloud my view. If we get any kind of federally mandated audit, i will be pleased. (maybe that is a better word than "feel better?") will I be completely satisfied? well I'd have to see more about how the audit is conducted, but probably not. Will I give up the fight? No, and I don't think others will either.

One thing I know. We need audits. It's another spotlight on the system, another way to find anomalities. It might not be a bright enough spotlight, the way it's worded, at least in the current Holt bill. But just look at what people have found even without any audits, just looking at election results, and how this has changed the discourse.

hypothetical question:

Let's say the current legislation mandates some form of paper - either ballot or record. the two options are opscans or DRE with VVPAT. But there is no mandated audit... Paper trails or ballots, but no audits.

Now let's say you are given the power to add one new mandate to the law. You can choose between mandated audits, or mandated paper ballots. In other words, DRE/VVPATs would become illegal and everyone would have to use real paper ballots. But then you don't get the mandated audits. Which is more important to you - the audits or the ballots?

In my mind the audit is more important. I would take mandating the audits first, still allowing VVPATs. Why? Because then, there is something we can do. We can raise awareness about validating your VVPAT and we can get more people to do it and it would have an affect. On the other hand, if paper ballots were mandated, but there was no audit, there is nothing we can do. There could still be bad code on the machines counting the ballots and with no audit we'd never know and there would be nothing we can do about it.

So I say it's all about the audit. Let's make sure every election is both AUDITABLE and also AUDITED. Let's get some kind of audit in there, the best one we can, and then let's work on improving it.

I believe there are some who are so opposed to VVPATs that they think if they can just get opscans, they'll be a lot better off. THAT to me is a false sense of security, because without audits, you're still in the dark.

peace

[Febble]

15. Very nicely analysed

but the reason I think it is vital that the paper record not only has the status of a ballot, but that voters are alerted to the fact that the paper record has the status of a ballot, is that if it doesn't, the paper records (the things that are recounted/audited) may actually be a less accurate reflection of the voters' intention than the electronic tally. I'd like to see it impossible for any electronic tally to be incremented unless the voter has checked that the paper record is correct and legible. Otherwise people could continue voting on machines with a stuck printer, and the audit would not reflect their votes.

So I think that paper ballots are key to a valid audit. It is vital that an electronic tally cannot be incremented UNLESS the voter has validated the paper, which then becomes a ballot.

Don't you think?

Then of course there's the issue of the chain of custody of those ballots....

[Land Shark]

19. Everyone assumes that the silly sign "INFORMS" the public of something, but

what really happens is that in a courtroom it tends to be presumed that everyone perfectly reads and understands the sign, because in court they're either not focussing on it in which case it's not a problem or they ARE focussing on it, in which case the sign is "clear" it's in "bold" and so on.

But the reality is that many members of the public don't see the sign, many don't read it, if they read it they don't understand the significance of it, and even if they understand they may not execute their own understanding properly, for a variety of reasons including but not limited to forgetfulness.

"MASSIVE PUBLIC EDUCATIONAL CAMPAIGN". Garybeck you referred to the effect of this bill after a massive public educational campaign...

I can think of one campaign of education as a sample. It's taken YEARS. It's the effort to educate the public about why we must have paper BALLOTS as legislative language not paper trails. Garybeck I think you were a part of that educational campaign as very many of us were, and more important than average in that effort, by far...

Well that major educational investment just got dealt a major setback didn't it? After assuming that paper "ballot" language is our bullet of clarity, now that rhetorical clarity just got shot to heck, didn't it?

without a new massive public educational campaign about the deceptive use of the term ballot, like I'm starting in a small way here, ALL OUR PAST EFFORTS ARE NOW USED AGAINST US in some way. The "power of the ballot" (so to speak) is now used AGAINST US, our own prior educational campaign is boomeranged. Our language co-opted.

Now Garybeck, with an enormous amount of respect I must nevertheless risk a bit of sarcasm. We all believed in the power of the word "ballot" and now it gets used deceptively. And above I see you saying things to the effect of "I know we need an audit..." AUDIT is the next magic buzzword we've all been educated to believe in, and the audit language in Holt is also pure bullshit. It bases sample size on winning percentage, not on precinct size or population size or any other statistically relevant indicator. As you know, in ELECTRONIC elections, once I undertake to cheat, I can just as well make the margin 2.01% as 0.99%, but that would be the difference between a 3% audit and a 10% audit. But even that 10% audit won't work in Wyoming as I understand it (perhaps febble will address the state of the art on that one)

In any case, I've made some points about audits, about who performs them and about the lesson of Arthur Anderson and Enron ("audits" require TRUE outside objectivity). No audit proposal I know of is taking the lessons of Arthur Anderson seriously. Do you think I am out to lunch here in saying that the government can not audit itself under conditions where it's getting its money power and legitimacy from elections?

[Febble]

24. Well, thanks for the invite...

but I'm nowhere near state of the art. I shall attempt to comment, nonetheless...

Now Garybeck, with an enormous amount of respect I must nevertheless risk a bit of sarcasm. We all believed in the power of the word "ballot" and now it gets used deceptively. And above I see you saying things to the effect of "I know we need an audit..." AUDIT is the next magic buzzword we've all been educated to believe in, and the audit language in Holt is also pure bullshit. It bases sample size on winning percentage, not on precinct size or population size or any other statistically relevant indicator. As you know, in ELECTRONIC elections, once I undertake to cheat, I can just as well make the margin 2.01% as 0.99%, but that would be the difference between a 3% audit and a 10% audit. But even that 10% audit won't work in Wyoming as I understand it (perhaps febble will address the state of the art on that one)

I'm not going to comment on the current Holt bill, because I haven't read it. But I do think that there are a few things that are vital in any bill that aims to improve election integrity.

• That the actual, legal ballot should be in some permanent, voter-verified medium, that can be independently re-counted, whether or not the initial count is done by hand.
  
  
• That where a vote is cast on an electronic machine, that incrementing the tally should be impossible unless there is a printed ballot (i.e. a jammed printer should disable the tallying process) and that the voter should have to confirm that that the paper ballot legibly conveys his/her voting intentions before the tally is incremented.
  
  
• That the chain of custody of the ballots should be assured between the casting of a ballot, the initial count, and any recount/audit.

That's not all, of course, but it's a start. So, on to audits:

I don't consider any counting method either reliable or incorruptible. Our UK system is pretty good, which means that election fraud has to be targetted on the ballots themselves (stealing postal ballots; stealing voter cards). It is pretty hard to stuff ballot boxes, lose ballot boxes (though it occasionally happens by accident), or deliberately miscount the votes. However, our system is fast, and conducted at constituency level (30,000-40,000 voters) under the scrutiny of candidates; members of the public; bipartisan scrutineers; the "recording officer"; TV cameras. The counting itself is done by skilled tellers, usually bank tellers. Our votes are simple (one race per ballot; rarely more than one race per election).

I don't know how secure you could make hand-counts with your system. It would certainly have to be a very different system from ours, and I can't see an obvious way in which you could ensure the kind of transparency and scrutiny we are able to give the process here. For this reason, I think that some kind of quality control audit is essential. And the essence of any quality control audit is that what is audited must be randomly selected and the selection must be unpredictable.

So I would certainly like also to see written into EI legislation:

• Mandatory random quality control audits that must be random and unpredictable.

So now we come to the nuts and bolts: what kind of audit would give how much confidence in a result?

There have been a great number of suggestions; frankly I'd rather not see a method mandated at federal level, because inevitably what may sufficient for one state will be totally inadequate for another. I think at this stage, I'd rather see a federal requirement for a confidence level, and let states sort out the best way of getting that confidence level given the precinct Ns, voter Ns, machine Ns, race Ns, county Ns etc in each state. But my own view is that I am more taken with audit protocols in which either precincts or machines are sampled, and ALL ballots cast those precincts/on those machines are manually counted, and checked against the initial count, than those in which a sample of votes is taken from ALL precincts, and compared with the aggregate total from the initial count. The reason being that the primary purpose of an audit is not to determine, to within a margin of error, whether the first count was correct, but to determine, with a a high degree of confidence, that the counting system was accurate. These two things are not the same, and one way in which they differ is that machines (and hand-counts) can (and, in the case of machines, do) have a specified accuracy. If a manual recount finds tha the initial count is outside that specificied accuracy, a full hand recount needs to be triggered, IMO. This would be much more difficult if the audit protocol merely demanded that the result should be within some fairly generous MoE. So the next thing I would want to see in federal EI legislation is:

• clear specification as to what constitutes a failed audit
  
• full manual recount of the race in question in that event

The last issue is the size of the margin. Actually, I do think this is relevant in a first-past-the-post race. If you want this legislation to be workable, it has to be doable. There are two broad strategies for stealing an election: you can salami slice a few votes everywhere; or you can steal a larger number of votes in a small number of precincts, in which latter case, your best target will be large precincts (where there are more votes to steal). However, the problem with the latter strategy (for the fraudster) is that if you attempt to steal too many votes, the results are going to look pretty anomalous. The correlation between Bush's voteshare in 2000 and in 2004 in the NEP precincts was about .95. So to avoid obvious anomalies (and any legislation should provide for specific recounts of anomalous precincts/races/counties) the fraudster will have to spread himself a bit thinner. And this is where a decent audit protocol comes in.

The sample size needs to be large enough to catch a small number of precincts with large miscounts, and thorough enough to catch a large number of precincts with small miscounts. However, it need not be larger than necessary to catch the minimumum number or precincts required to overturn the race. And this is where the confidence level comes in. So the last ingredient in my dream federal EI legislation would mandate:

• a confidence level of 99.5% (or greater) that the count was sufficiently accurate that the right result was declared and
  
• the right of any candidate or interest group to have anomalous precincts/counties recounted

Well, you asked for my opinion....

[Land Shark]

26. C'mon Febble are you actually thingins this through? the more you cheat the smaller the sample size

for the audit because it is based on winning percentage.

At least you have to admit that this sends an unfortunate message to cheaters.

So, as long as I'm willing to cheat big, I know my audit percentage is 3% of precincts. One can calculate then how much and in what styles one can cheat. Can you do this math, Febble, for us, and pursue it with the same vigor in which you are gamely trying to defend the new Holt bill you've not read?

I'm also asking you and Garybeck to respond to my Arthur Anderson point: that even outside auditors as big as a huge accounting firm lose their objectivity when they also have consulting fees at stake because they have an incentive to keep the client happy, and for the same taken government auditors have an incentive, and a strong one, to keep their fellow government servants happy, funded, etc. That incentive is significant in all cases but it is especially strong when the elections officials or other government officials are appointing the auditors, as with the new Holt bill's committee of 7 or more to oversee audits...

More on the problem of govt recounting itself or auditing itself in discussion of the recent convictions in Ohio for recount rigging here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x465777

[Febble]

27. I'm not following:

"the more you cheat the smaller the sample size for the audit because it is based on the winning percentage"?

Could you explain? And could you explain why you infer that I am "gamely trying to defend the new Holt bill {I}'ve not read"? I'm not defending the new Holt bill. I laid out what I think a good bill should do, and I've defended the warning notice you cited from the new Holt bill.

I didn't mention any percentage, apart from a possible confidence threshold (99.5%).

It would help if you read what I did write, not what I didn't.

[Land Shark]

29. ok, garybeck writes favorably of Holt generally and you say that's a good analysis

you admit you defended the warning notice in the new holt bill but suggest above that you are not defending the new holt bill (?) and that i'm not reading what you write...

whatever. Technically you did not defend every aspect of the Holt bill, only the major point of my post on the Holt bill, so I'm supposedly not reading your stuff.

The more one cheats the lower the audit percentage:

if the winning percentage is less than 1%, you audit 10%
if the winning percentage is 1-2% you audit 5%
if the winning percentage is 2% or more, you audit 3% of precincts

thus, the more you cheat, the less they audit.

However, if there is a automatic recount provision in STATE law based on winning percentage, then this audit won't apply at all. (just in case there's something you like about the above audit, it won't apply in many states)

Marked "final" but date is 2-5-2007. They could change something
before the press conference tomorrow.

I think more than one person told/asked Holt's office to talk to me before the bill but they did not or they refused, one or the other. The only link sent to me where the bill is online is here:

http://www.blackboxvoting.org/HOLT_2-5-07.pdf

[Febble]

32. What I read, Land Shark, was your post

and I disagreed that the warning you cited as being part of the bill was a bad thing. I think it is a good thing. So I'm saying that I think that any bill should include language that mandates that kind of warning. Actually, if you'd read my post, you'd say I was asking for more - that it should not be technically possible for any voting equipment to increment the vote totals unless there a paper ballot (yes, ballot) has been printed, and the voter has authorised it as representing his/her choices correctly.

And I do not support percentage audits. We have been round this a number of times. Statistical power depends on sample size not percentage. Yes, you need a smaller sample size for the same degree of confidence for a larger margin on the initial count. But SIZE MATTERS. Not PROPORTION. As they say.

So if the Holt-bill-I-have-not-read specifies proportion, then I think that is wrong. I did not say it was right. I said the warning was right.

[Land Shark]

36. WARNING: DO NOT READ THIS MESSAGE whatever you do.

The WARNING should be ON THE BILL's cover page and in the mailboxes of every voter BEFORE the bill is passed. Isn't that a much more relevant warning to support? Instead, one has to be a close reader and understand elections fairly well to even pick up on this kind of stuff.

on edit: NOW, does anyone reading this message believe that warnings really work all of the time. ; )

[Febble]

41. That's silly

I accept that you don't want any bill that doesn't make electronic vote counting illegal. That's fine. But GIVEN that the bill doesn't make electronic vote counting illegal, and there are some perfectly decent people who don't find that either practical or even desirable, then what that warning does is make people aware that when it comes to an AUDIT of the electronic tally, their PAPER RECORD will be taken as their final word on who they intended to vote for. In other words it will have the status of A BALLOT and should not be dismissed. If it doesn't reflect their intentions, and the electronic tally does, an audit (or a recount) will not reverse their actual intentions.

To spin this as "fraudulent" and "deceptive" is to turn language on its head. What would be "fraudulent" or "deceptive" would be to give people the impression that the electronic tally had the status of a ballot, when in fact, it is the paper that will trump the electronic tally in the case of any difference between the two.

edited for typo

[Land Shark]

45. As a practical matter, using objective methods of counting, the paper will rarely count

so that is one main reason why the bill is fraudulent and deceptive.

Remember, if the STATE law has a recount based on a winning percentage concept, then the hold "audit" doesn't apply at all. Well, that recount in Florida and Ohio would be a

machine recount,

so long as memory serves me which is that the recounts in those states are based on winning percentage (they are definitely machine recounts in FL). Thus, no paper gets ever gets counted in those states (for DREs) and the same fraudulent programming operates in the opscan recount so we all move on with life "happy".

Blackwell, were he still in office, could draft a regulation that says "if the winning percentage is less than 99%, there shall be an automatic recount of the DREs by reprinting the results printouts, provided that $100,000 per county shall be due and owing from the losing candidate though this shall not affect the right to the automatic recount or its execution, unless the losing candidate publicly and in writing concedes the race and waives automatic recount rights under this section."

Many regulations or laws less ridiculous than my example (some already in effect) will have the same effect of defeating the holt "audit" requirement and ALSO defeating the goal of a meaningful recount (because they are machine recounts or DRE "recounts")

Except for the occasional close race, the audits will be 3% of paper ballots ASSUMING ANY AUDIT AT ALL APPLIES which in many states it won't. So the bottom line is that the actual number of paper ballots ACTUALLY COUNTED, expressed as a percentage will be less than 3%, in all likelihood, and probably much less, unless there are a high number of close races triggering the somewhat higher precinct audit percentages under Holt, and these have to be enough in number and volume to swamp all the states that won't have Holt federal audits at all - only state "automatic" recounts, defective as they are, generally speaking.

Because the percentage of paper ballots actually counted will be so low, and actually will be ZERO as to some of the races in many states with existing or future automatic recount provisions in state law, the HOLT sign will be MISINFORMING and MISLEADING people.

In a state with automatic machine recount statutes, the sign should say that the paper ballot is the ballot of record for recounts and audits, but only if the race is NOT close!!!!! REPEAT FOR CLARITY: Your PAPER BALLOT DOES NOT COUNT IF THE RACE IS CLOSE YOU DUMB CITIZEN!!!! Now there's some truth-in-legislation.

Oh

My

God.

Under the new holt bill, assuming it's ok to even call it a paper "ballot", your paper ballot counts, but only if the race is not even close, and if it's not a close race, we will only count 3% of those little buggers you put so much of your faith in.
Are we comfortable with the Enron-audit provisions of this bill not applying EVEN TO FEDERAL RACES in many states - those with "automatic" machine recount provisions based on winning percentages (which often attach HUGE price tags $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ to the recount "rights"?) (to be "automatic" they will not require payment UP FRONT, they'll just bill and sue you instead.)

I am telling you the new Holt bill's a fraud.

Read it AND analyze it fully. I wish we could form a jury of some sort and really focus on this, then have a vote because it eliminates idle competition and, while you do serious analysis sometimes, your participation here, having not read the bill, is in fact idle.

How about this section:

‘‘SEC. 327. EXCEPTION FOR ELECTIONS SUBJECT TO AUTO
MATIC RECOUNT UNDER STATE LAW.

‘‘This subtitle does not apply to any election for
which a recount is required automatically under State law
because of the margin of victory between the two can-
didates receiving the largest number of votes in the elec-
tion. Nothing in the previous sentence may be construed
to waive the application of any other provision of this Act
to any election (including the ballot verification and audit
capacity requirements of section 301(a)(2)). (emphasis added)

The bill is an abomination and those who haven't read it should not defend it, or risk being perceived as defending. Just my own personal opinion.

[Febble]

48. Perception:

The bill is an abomination and those who haven't read it should not defend it

And I didn't.

or risk being perceived as defending.

I have long ago given up feeling responsible for how people perceive my position. I try to be as clear as I can. If people read something in that isn't there, then, frankly, that's their problem. Similarly, if I misunderstand someone else, it's mine.

Just my own personal opinion.

[Land Shark]

53. well i took back the highlighted comment before I saw this

I was trying and failing to be funny and realized it wouldn't be perceived as funny. (change made when I repeated the same general text in a new OP)

However, why don't you eliminate all problems of perception and post a critique of the bill ( you can separately post your praises, if you wish). "Flow some power" to the anti-Holt 2 "camp" and I will change my perception of your effect. I'll still think it's an abomination however.

[Febble]

56. Well, I'm not going to do that

because I'm not a lawyer, and so I'm not a good judge of whether the bill either does what it says on the tin, or whether it's even claiming to do what I think ought to be in the tin. So what I did instead was to post what I thought legislation ought to do. We can talk about that, if you like, and then you can tell me if Holt does any of it. Also, do you have a link to the current draft?

If you were trying to be funny, that's fine. Sorry I didn't get it. These things come in handy sometimes:

:) :) :) :) :)

Cheers :)

Lizzie

[Land Shark]

63. Febble when I am writing to you or thinking of you I am always smiling

So I'm very much afraid that use of smilies would also be ambiguous.
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

[Febble]

64. Like this?

;)

[Land Shark]

67. Tis True, the biggest smiles are always for the camera (or the cameraMAN!)

:) :)

[Febble]

33. And of course, I also read garybeck's post

and I thought his analysis was good, as I said. That does not imply that I am "defending" the current Holt bill which I have not read any more than I was completely agreeing with gary (I think ballots are important).

I do wish you would get out of this "s/he who is against us is not with us" mentality, Land Shark. I mean it's all very Sharky and all, but it doesn't sit too well with the United Nations bit.

Just sayin'

[Land Shark]

39. it's not a "with us vs against us" analysis. Just pointing out that

you defended the Holt bill, and your correction, in effect, is that you defended a part of the Holt bill.

it's a mistake, I think, to conclude that I can't handle someone defending a position other than my own such that i've broken down into a "with us or against us" mentality. That is, I think, unfair to say. There's no fundamental "with us or against us" stuff, in another reply I emphasized our fundamental agreement (in my mind at least) that the system leaves "serious opportunities for corruption" (your wording). You've also agreed, elsewhere, that there's no basis for confidence in american election results. We're on the same side febble, it's just that in a misguided attempt to appear fairminded you make points in favor of the Holt bill that don't hold up. But in a larger sense we do agree.

this is like the United Nations in that you are from another country and you are always challenging my interests and competing to win on the "world" stage of debate here. I've not begun to form an army nor accused you of harboring terrorists. it's going quite well.

[Febble]

43. I did NOT defend

the HOLT bill. I defended the principle of that warning notice. OK, I'll let you off the "with us or against us" charge, and instead level the charge of over-generalisation. Supporting a warning notice is not the same as supporting a bill. I want to see a good bill. I laid out clearly what I think should be in a good bill. I did not mention Holt except to say I had not read it. I do not think a federal bill should mandate minimum percentages. I think it should mandate a high confidence threshold.

I do not make points "in a misguided attempt to appear fairminded". I make points that I consider good points. I hope they are fair. But my post was not intended to throw a bone to Holt. It was intended to point out that if any audit protocol is to be mandated it is imperative that voters understand that the paper is the legal entity (i.e. the ballot) not the electronic tally. I think it should be made technically impossible for the tally to be incremented without a paper record, and the voter's express confirmation that the paper record reflects his/her voting intentions. That is why I think the warning is important.

Lastly, I am not trying to "win" any debate. As I've said before, I have absolutely no interest in "winning" any argument, least of all with you. My motivation in participating in the debate at all, is simply because, as you say, I am "on the same side" as you - I want to see election integrity in America. I used to think that HCPBs were the way to go (they work for us). I am now persuaded (not necessarily in perpetuity) that good random audits are a more realistic goal, and perhaps the least corruptible solution. HCPBs are not a panacea for election ills, as any glance around the United Nations will reveal to you.

[Name removed]

52. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Febble]

31. OK

Let's take, for the sake of argument, DC in 2004. Kerry one the EC vote. If we want to ensure that Bush was not the victim of pro-Kerry fraud, we postulate that to overturn a true Bush win, the pro-Kerry fraudsters would have had to have stolen about 180,000 votes. To do this, they would have had to have stolen votes in a large number of precincts. An audit sample size needs to be large enough to detect a small percentage of corrupt precincts with a high degree of confidence. So, clearly, if the minimum proportion of corrupt precincts required to overturn the vote is large (as in a state with a large official margin for one candidate) then for a given degree of confidence, the sample size needs to be smaller than in a state where the margin was small, and a larger minimum proportion of corrupt precincts would have been required to overturn the result.

However, the other danger is that the fraudsters did not concentrate their fraud in a small number of precincts, but actually spread it thinly over a large number. This is why, to my mind, audit protocols that require an full recount of the audited sample of precincts (or machines) have the edge, because the tolerances in such a recount can be very tight. Not only that, but even if every single precinct or machine that was recounted came to within a vote or two of the initial count (and within the specified tolerance of the machine) then you could still apply a chi square or a sign test to find out whether the errors were significantly (to your required confidence level) more likely to benefit one candidate rather than the other. If not, you would suspect fraud, and start prosecutions, even if the size of the effect was insufficient to overturn the result.

Prosecutions should follow whatever the margin. The margin merely tells you how the minimum proportion of precincts required to overturn the race.

[eomer]

47. I don't think a DRE will ever work.

• That where a vote is cast on an electronic machine, that incrementing the tally should be impossible unless there is a printed ballot (i.e. a jammed printer should disable the tallying process) and that the voter should have to confirm that that the paper ballot legibly conveys his/her voting intentions before the tally is incremented.

But the mechanism used to make it impossible to increment the tally unless there is a printed ballot should not be just some function in the software of the same machine (DRE) that will both ask the voter to confirm the printed ballot and then increment the tally, all in software. Because that kind of a mechanism would be invisible to citizens and would therefore not serve any purpose when you think about it.

The only way I can think of to make your impossiblity mechanism transparent and verifiable to citizens is to have the paper come physically out of the touchscreen and be physically delivered, by the voter's hands, into the counting mechanism. But that changes the touchscreen from a DRE into just a ballot marker.

Unless there's some other way I haven't thought of to make the impossibility mechanism transparent and verifiable, then I am effectively in the camp with Gary and Paul (edit: on this particular point). The first count would be of paper ballots, not of electronic votes.

So I would propose a friendly amendment to your second bullet to take it a step further and make the paper ballot come out of the printing device and then be physically delivered by the voter into the tally device.

[Febble]

49. I'd be happy with that

indeed I'd like to make the bill's language effectively outlaw DREs ;)

[garybeck]

30. well many I've talked to seem to agree

there is a mathematical basis for basing the sample size on the winning percentage. the theory goes... if someone stole an election, that would mean that they lost in reality, and won in the results. so, if they did that, the greater the margin of victory, the more stolen votes there are in the system, and the easier it is to catch, and thus the smaller sample size required. in other words, if someone alters the results to make themselves win 75% of the votes when they really lost 49-51, a relatively smaller sample size is required to find evidence of fraud. On the other hand, if they lost in reality 49-51 and changed the results through fraud to win 51-49, then a larger sample size would be needed to catch them.

this makes sense to me. the only thing that bothers me is that the ultimate goal is just to make sure the correct winner is placed in office, not find any evidence of fraud, whatever it is. In other words if there was "vote trimming" that did not affect the winner of a particular race but had national implications, this sort of sample sizing would not be directed at finding such problems. as well, there could be a variety of computer glitches (not fraud) that could have random affects on the election results, and this likewise would not be aimed at finding such problems. having said that, if the goal is to put the right person in office, I do understand the idea of changing sample size based on several inputs, including margin of victory.

peace

[Land Shark]

34. a "basis" for doing something doesn't mean it's justified in this particular expression

garybeck wrote:
{"many" have said} there is a mathematical basis for basing the sample size on the winning percentage. the theory goes... if someone stole an election, that would mean that they lost in reality, and won in the results.

ANSWER: No, it would not. If you're going to be precise, the cheater may have won by 1% and had a 1% thumb on the scales to help bolster that incredible get out the vote effort the campaign had but not to be too obvious -- just to impose a supermajority requirement on the opponent you might say. Your later comments on vote trimming recognize this, but it doesn't seem incorporated into your general rule here.

garybeck wrote: so, if they did that, the greater the margin of victory, the more stolen votes there are in the system, and the easier it is to catch, and thus the smaller sample size required. in other words, if someone alters the results to make themselves win 75% of the votes when they really lost 49-51, a relatively smaller sample size is required to find evidence of fraud. On the other hand, if they lost in reality 49-51 and changed the results through fraud to win 51-49, then a larger sample size would be needed to catch them.

ANSWER: Wrong, but sometimes somewhat true. This justification smells of government - let's do the minimum work we can possibly justify. Especially when the integrity of the entire nation's political system is at stake, this is a particularly persuasive argument to bureaucrats?

Even though as the MS Supreme Court noted the integrity of our Republic is ONLY as strong as the integrity of the elections, we've always got to have either a defective formula, or else dance as close to the edge of Cliff Defective as possible. Why? Dancing into the arena of the debatable guarantees litigated elections!

Nobody is answering my auditing argument concerning these election audits being just like Arthur Anderson "auditing" Enron. The government appointed auditors have big conflicts of interest, just like Arthur Anderson had, only bigger.

Because the election "burglar" always moves to the unlocked window to exploit it, "somewhat" better doesn't cut it Garybeck -- it still leaves unlocked windows.

Maybe some of us are fighting off the idea that one has to continue to live with dissatisfaction, depression and/or outrage based on our congressional responses to this problem, but facts, as they say, are stubborn things.

[garybeck]

38. c'mon

people are allowed to disagree. i hear your outrage. but it would be nice to throw in a little "I think" and "in my opinion" every once in a while. Just because I don't agree with you on everything doesn't make me "wrong." I have talked to mathemeticians and statisticians who agree on the principal of having a variable sample size based on margin of victory. It is not "wrong." You might not like it for one reason or another, and those reasons may be valid. But it is not "wrong."

[Land Shark]

42. elections are mutlidisciplinary and the facts that make this winning% principle mostly wrong

come from OUTSIDE MATHEMATICS AND STATISTICS. Namely, it comes from the reality that tabulator fraud, for example, a function of knowing elections systems and fraud methods that are outside the domain of the expertise of mathematicians, makes winning percentages infinitely variable. In Kentucky, they cheated to make not only a victory in a previously VERY close race between the same two candidates, but to win by more than 2 to 1. The court would not even ALLOW a contest to be filed because of a 'winning percentage' statute that barred any such contest if the win is by 2 to 1 or more. (that wasn't an audit statute but shows the danger of basing things on winning percentage).

If you were here visiting me now, or at any time, you'd not be able to take a picture of me showing "outrage." I'm just saying that SOME people, I can't be sure who, do not enjoy risking that sort of feeling being a part of their experience because they don't enjoy it's stressfulness and so will argue themselves out of being outraged even on a subjective, interior level. This is one big reason why revulsion against some things doesn't sweep the nation like many activists think it ought to, and activists are not immune to the same defense mechanisms.

Unless I am quoting something, just like everything anybody else says, whatever i write is indeed by definition my own opinion or thought, unless i've inadvertantly plagiarized or something. Therefore, your request for me to appear to weaken my own arguments by peppering them with "i thinks" or "in my opinions" in order to expressly state that they are merely my own personal opinions is hereby DENIED. But have a good day anyway. : )

[Febble]

44. Just because one law

disallows recounts where the winning margin is large doesn't mean that "winning margin" has no place in an audit protocol, as you will see if you read my other post. Yes, it's math, but it's easy math, and scarcely even statistics. If the margin in votes between the candidates is large enough to require corruption in a minimum of x% of precincts to be overturned, then your sample size only needs to be large enough to detect corruption in more than x% of precincts, for your given confidence level. The only "message" it sends to a cheater is:

"if you are going to steal 100,000 votes, you are going to have to steal them in enough precincts that we will catch you with our audit protocol. And don't think about spreading them out more thinly so's we won't notice, because we are going to randomly sample precincts everywhere, and if any of those are out by more than a smidgeon we will know what you are up to".

edited for clarity. I'd hate to be misperceived ;)

[garybeck]

28. clarifying the term "BALLOT"

I think this will make it clear. A while ago I was obsessed with this and I talked to several lawyers and did quite a bit of research on it.

a ballot is what is counted. period. that's it. simple as that.

So in the case of DRE/VVPAT:
if there is no audit or recount, the electronic ballot is the ballot.
if there is an audit or recount, then the paper record *becomes the ballot of record*

then, and only then, can that paper record be called a ballot.

that is why Holt can use the term ballot, in that case because his sign is talking about "if there is an audit or recount." then he is correct, that "thingy" is a ballot.

but if there is no recount or audit, that thingy is NOT a ballot.

[Febble]

35. I take your point

if you do audits of electronic counts, then what you have is an electronic estimate of the total number of ballots for each candidate, that is then checked by audit for probable accurate. You still have ballots. What you don't have is an actual count of them. You have an estimate.

I'm not sure that's all bad though. I'm still seriously bothered by the opportunities offered for corruption in such a complex electoral system as yours. Scotland is moving to optical scanning because it is also moving to Single Transferable Vote for its regional parliament, and this will make secure hand-counting more difficult. Maybe not impossible, but I'm not convinced that a well audited electronic count of paper ballots is less secure than a long-drawn-out hand count of a complex ballot. I do think that electronically incrementing the count simultaneously with the production of a (potential) ballot is far less good than that, and I hope we don't end up with DREs. But I don't think we will, if only because I think that if a decent audit protocol is mandated in the US, DREs will be shown up for the crap they are, and out they will go.

[Land Shark]

37. well, we agree on the following quote, and to me it ends the important part of the argument

Febble said: "I'm not sure that's all bad though. I'm still seriously bothered by the opportunities offered for corruption in such a complex electoral system as yours."

Yes. Just as I said with the burglar-moving-to-the-unlocked-window argument elsewhere in this thread, the fact that the bill leaves us (even those inclined to more favorably consider the bill, like Febble) "seriously bothered" by the opportunities for corruption, means that we are in agreement on the basic NATURE of the facts, even if we get bogged down in too many particularities.

This is another false solution or "false alternative" as GuvWurld has written.

[Febble]

46. I will always be seriously bothered

by the opportunities for corruption in any electoral system. Even if you moved to HCPB, I would still want to see random audits.

[Land Shark]

54. For the nth time, WHO should perform the audits? Govt audits itself???

please answer. As I've argued the Ohio recount rigging convictions show, presumed Democrats couldn't be trusted not to rig a recount that could only benefit the Democratic candidate, because the forces of CYA and not embarrassing one's fellow govt friends trumps the desire for greater accuracy.

Do you think these Arthur Anderson-style audits are a good feature? Your indulgence in specifically responding to the question of government auditing itself would be sincerely appreciated.

[Febble]

57. Well, who do you suggest conduct HCBPs?

Same problem. Either you elect people to conduct elections, or you rely on unelected people to conduct elections. I'd rather have elected people conducting elections myself (which is why I don't like voting machine manufacturers conducting elections).

But I think your Enron analogy is flawed. Elected representives have a vested interest in fair elections, not in unfair elections. One party might have a vested interest in unfair elections - which means that any oversight of elections has to be bipartisan.

"I cut, you choose."

[Land Shark]

60. well Holt II provides that entirely APPOINTED people do it, not elected

The bill could, at a minimum, provide that any constituted group of citizens could do a recount or audit (perhaps after or concurrent with "official), it could clarify that rights of citizen observation exist, it could amend FOIA to make sure that citizens can get any and all info about elections, it could provide that the citizen-scrutineers would be elected (as you suggest) only by a special hand counted paper ballot cast into an old box. I don't vouch for the completeness or sufficiency of any of these ideas but they would be steps to take in what others would recognize is the right direction.

[Land Shark]

65. The link to the bill

http://www.bradblog.com/Docs/HoltBill_FinalDraft_020507.pdf

[kster]

9. Holt is a grown man but he does not get it,

"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time".

http://www.forcounsel.com/productDetails_c.asp?productid=N910

[nicknameless]

10. Ugh!!!

In the famous (paraphrased) words of Dan Aykroyd, "Holt, you ignorant slut."

How pathetic that they Still... Just. Don't. Get it!!!

K&R

[Febble]

13. Land Shark:

If the paper record does indeed "SERVE AS THE VOTE OF RECORD IN ALL RECOUNTS AND AUDITS" then it is, indeed a "ballot".

That is precisely what it should be, and it can only be so if people check that it reflects their intentions.

There may be problems in the new Holt bill (I think there are) but this would seem to me to be an essential component of any bill.

What is more, if the paper record is going to be fit for the purpose, then it has to be of a form and construction that allows "recounts and audits" to be done - i.e. legible, robust, and probably flat.

This sounds like an excellent requirement to me.

[Land Shark]

23. So you do NOT think that people EXPECT a ballot to be counted the FIRST TIME???

Not to "hava" a 3% to 10% chance of being counted?

Your point is that because you've found a technical argument that might make it a "ballot" in some technical sense, that this makes the fact that the average reasonable citizen will be deceived ok? (I've already granted, in effect, above or below that the sign is probably sufficient to remove any easy legal argument that there is deception, but the only thing I care about is what the average citizen IN FACT experiences.

A careful reading of garybeck shows a different perspective of whether he PERSONALLY will feel better given his understandings... I think that is not the relevant standard, nor is the relevant ]ddemocratic standard what a court would likely rule. The relevant democratic standard is what We the People in fact experience and understand as the citizens go through the voting experience.

[Febble]

25. No, it's not a "technical" argument at all

it's absolutely essential. Unless the paper record is regarded as "the ballot" then all subsequent counts of the "ballots" will be useless. What I DON'T want is people continuing to vote on voting machines after the printer has jammed or run out of ink. The electronic count should be regarded simply as a tally of ballots cast. The actual ballot needs to be the vote.

And if this is to be the case it is VITAL that voters are CLEAR that their BALLOT is the paper, not the electronic tally. To fail to inform them of this is to risk making any subsequent count of the paper invalid.

Now, I'm aware that your own view is that the electronic count is irrelevant, and that the only count of the ballots should be a full hand count. For reasons I have just given in a different post, I think this is unlikely to work in the near future in the US, and I'd rather have a workable fix now.

But I do think that to regard the wording of the warning as deceptive when in fact it makes clear that the electronic count is NOT the vote and the paper IS, seems - well, a bit contrarian to me.

I also think that if legislation required a random manual audit of BALLOTS and that if the manual audit did not equal the electronic count, that a complete hand count would follow, you would very rapidly find that DREs were ditched. They are clearly not capable of the degree of reliability that would pass a decently stringent audit.

[loudsue]

14. Good grief!! What is it about crooked elections that our

"elected" officials don't understand??? Unless they close every conceivable loophole on the possibility to falsify elections, SOMEBODY is going to be trying to cheat! THAT is what has brought this to the fore in the first place.... that's why there IS a "Holt" bill!!

We want secure elections, NOT elections that LOOK secure on the surface, or on a poster message in front of the voting booth. Window dressing.

Thanks for the heads up on this Land Shark. This "fast track" they're on to passing this bill needs to be stopped in its tracks. We need to hold a seminar in congress on what constitutes a secure election.

:kick::kick::kick:

[Senator]

16. OK, Everyone --- Here's His Form ---- Attack

http://holt.house.gov/contact.shtml

I intend to just ask him why. Why won't I be confident in elections results, even if his bill passes as it is now? Why can't he just call a ballot a ballot? Why can't they just be counted? Why can't that result be audited and recounted by anyone who wants to -- with confidence that the result will be the same? Why is there confusion, or disagrement, or concern about a pricetag on something so simple and necessary?

--

[Land Shark]

22. Good questions. And WHY does Holt think that unless we follow the Arthur Anderson rule

of letting the government audit itself and pretending that's totally good, our approach is somehow not "politically realistic"?

DOes the Congress really mean to insist, on pain of ridiculing our "realism", that if it does not get its way of continuing readily and easily corruptible elections, it will simply refuse to enact any changes in law?

[rock]

17. You're right. It's not a ballot

The ballot is the electronic or whatever vote that is first counted. In the recount they propose to count a copy of the ballot. A manual copy, no less. In theory, every manual copy could be different from it's electronic counter part (pure chaos).

[Land Shark]

20. They do in fairness propose some legal fiction language to partly address the chaos

by putting the burden of proof, PRECINCT BY PRECINCT, to show that paper has been compromised on the one who wishes to challenge the paper. Here again, though that sounds good, if the studies hold up that ballot paper receipt-stuff is not checked by all that many, that DOES tend to prove that every single precinct has compromised paper. Proving that the entire class is compromised is equivalent to proving it precinct by precinct. Even if one disagrees with that assertion, this presents an issue that will be litigated and decided in a court, which is not what's intended with elections, one hopes that the audit or recount proceeds to a reliable answer that is accepted without litigation.

[BeFree]

51. Two ballots?

It seems as if they want two ballots. Why do I get the idea this sounds similar to two sets of books?

Aren't two sets of books the criminal's most widely used MO?
(Method of Operation)

[stellanoir]

18. Why did I just get an earworm of

"Stop Making Sense" . . . ? LOL

K & R'd

[Land Shark]

21. Instead of "I Voted Electronically" stickers we will need a new sticker that says

STICKER

"I voted electronically but for audit and recount purposes I checked a paper printout every bit as carefully consistent with Congressional direction to me under the Help America Vote Act, as amended in 2007 by the Holt Voter Confidence and Accessibility of 2007, codified in Title XLII of the United States Code, subsection xxx....."

[garybeck]

40. the correct language would be:

The PAPER RECORD will serve as the BALLOT OF RECORD in the case of an audit or recount.

[Febble]

50. Cool. n/t

[Land Shark]

55. "...in the case of an audit or recount but not if the race is close and an automatic recount

applies in your state based on this close winning percentage and you're voting on a DRE, in which case we will recount the electronic ballots and the joke's on you, dear citizen."

TO be accurate, since the same sign will hang across the nation, it would need to say something like that.

[Febble]

58. You will have to explain your problem

with the automatic recount clause. Are you saying that the Holt bill as currently drafted would mean that random manual audits would NOT be required in states with close elections and there is an automatic recount law?

[Trillo]

61. Thank you.

I always look forward to your posts, though I likely miss a few of them.

I've got this terrible thinking that we haven't had anything resembling a democracy for many years. Instead, just a republic of representatives that are forced to shill for corporate to get elected or reelected, and, of course, a supreme Unitary Executive CEO to call all the shots.

If there isn't honesty in the vote count, then we haven't come together as a people and agreed upon nearly anything. How many years of deceit?

Myself, I now want to be able to "see" and "observe" my vote actually being counted, as well as observe others' votes being counted, even help count it at my local precinct!

[In Truth We Trust]

66. Hand Counted Paper Ballots NOW! Nothing more and Nothing less! nt

[Kurovski]

68. Kick.(nt)