WA State moving closer to mail-in ballots

Both the House and the Senate in WA State have passed bills to change WA State election process to mail-in ballots. The bills differ, so the House and Senate will need to agree on a version to enact as legislation.
I admit to mixed feelings on this one. I like the idea of taking the Sequoia machines out of the mix and am concerned about the strong call for Voter ID going on here now, which I think is aimed at disenfranchising minority, disabled and, perhaps, student voters. This could help with those concerns. Of course, a lot would depend on how tabulation is handled.
Any thoughts on this, especially from you Oregonians since you have the most experience with this system?


http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/216208_elections16.html
House OKs mail-only elections
Democrats, Republicans disagree on security of such a system

All elections in Washington state would rely on mail ballots only, beginning in 2008, under a bill approved by the state House yesterday.
~snip~
The Senate earlier approved the original version of Reed's bill. Both houses ultimately would have to agree on a single version to send it to the governor to be signed into law.
~snip~
The state GOP opposes voting by mail.
~snip~
State Democratic Party Chairman Paul Berendt said his party favors mail voting because it increases participation and security.

election fraud by mail.

the real question is whether crime pays really small (ONE vote at a time for purchased ballots or stolen ballots in vote by mail) or whether crime pays handsomely (hundreds or thousands of ballots via a single hack, etc., with no paper records).

If one is concerned about the mailman, you've got two weeks and mail is certainly not the only option.

If you want total security (and can't take the above small risks that create lots of witnesses in general) then you will end up with a system that has such high security at the polling place that it will suppress voters.

and you will never know where it ends up.

Spectrum print and graphics is handling your ballot.

You are the info man and you know I respect all you've done in this area.

On another note, how are you feeling? I got a get well card for you, but I need to get in gear and actually mail it.

Oh, and did you see the pics from Jan 6th that Selmo posted? Nice to have the evening pics of the get-together.
Here's a link: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=341576&mesg_id=341576

Jeff Dean and John Elder worked right after they got out of the WA State Prison system.

If the voter deposits a paper ballot in a lock box at a precinct then it is possible to have a totally transparent system from the start of the chain of custody to the end. The entire process can be observed by political parties and by citizens from start to finish.

How can you observe the ballots from start to finish if they have to pass through the post office? How can anyone know that all the ballots that went into the tunnel come out the other end?

Since known demographic patterns are already being abused for vote suppression purposes, what is to stop a party from placing agents as employees of the post office in the areas where they would like to suppress votes and then having those agents "lose" some ballots here and there?

This is not a theoretical problem since here in S. Florida there were tens of thousands of absentee ballots that never arrived even though they were supposedly mailed.

and other security measures, with secure logs of who is issued a ballot (registered voters only)

Then if we take most of the "mail" out of mail-in voting with various secure drop off places, you can still cheat the system but the important point is that the payoff is one vote or so at a time, and generally you can have circumstantial evidence if not eyewitness evidence of the problems or irregularities.

TRANSPARENCY: Wait a second! The filling out and the casting of the ballot on a "nontransparent" basis is the ONE THING ABOUT ELECTIONS that is SUPPOSED to be secret and non-transparent!!

Ballots counted by hand at precinct. Distributed computing using the original OS (human brain).
Moving away from precinct level pretty much ensures the machines keep counting.

Hey suffragette how are you doing? :hi:

and random audits would be a great change whether we go to mail-in or not.

I'm doing ok glitch. How are you? Are you going to the rally/march on March 19?

going to the Biodiesel Forum on Phinney.
So I'll be running around a bit. I am going to have a sign saying something like "If U.S. votes were truly counted we wouldn't be in Iraq" with a link for the curious. Haven't decided which link to point to.

Do you want to pick a spot and time and meet at the rally?