Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Sunday, Feb. 5

All members welcome and encouraged to participate.

Link to previous Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x411868

All previous daily threads are available here:

http://www.independentmediasource.com/DU_archives/du_2004erd_el_ref_fr_thr_calenders.htm

Voting machine firm's past questioned
County considers Diebold because it promises timely delivery

Sunday, February 05, 2006

By Jerome L. Sherman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Diebold Inc., a multibillion dollar company that soon may sell 5,600 touch-screen voting machines to Allegheny County, has seen its share of public relations nightmares.

In 2003, then-chief executive officer Wally O'Dell -- a top fund-raiser for President Bush's re-election campaign -- sent out a letter to Ohio Republicans promising that he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the President next year."

Over the next several years, some computer experts and election officials pointed out potential security flaws with the company's machines, and cries of conspiracy and fraud circulated in the press and on the Internet.

Diebold, based in North Canton, Ohio, reacted by ordering all employees involved with its elections division, including Mr. O'Dell and other top company officials, to refrain from participating in any political activities beyond voting. Its machines also performed just as well, if not better, than those built by competitors.


...snip

"Obviously we've read a lot of the allegations that people are talking about," Angela Chan, the department's deputy director, told the elections board last week. "Obviously we cannot base our decision on hearsay or what's on the Internet."

But, until this new generation of voting machines holds up in several elections, doubts will linger. There have been no reported instances of fraud. That doesn't comfort some people, like Verified Voting's Dr. Dill.

"It would be very, very hard to prove," he said of potential attempts to tamper with elections. "Every computer scientist I talk to reports a queasy feeling when voting on these machines."

More: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06036/649814.stm

Leon, Union ordered to return federal voting-machine funds

TALLAHASSEE -- Two Florida counties have been ordered to give back federal money they received to provide disabled-accessible voting machines in each precinct because they didn't get the machines in time.

Leon County, which includes Tallahassee, and rural Union County in north-central Florida, were notified Friday by the state Division of Elections that they must return the money.

For Leon County, it means the loss of $564,421; Union County has been ordered to return just under $50,000.

The money was meant to help the counties comply with the federal Help America Vote Act, which requires at least one voting machine on which disabled people can vote without assistance in each precinct.

Union County has since notified the state that it has a contract for such machines, but hasn't gotten them yet. The county's elections supervisor, Babs Montpetit, didn't return a call for comment.

Secretary of State Sue Cobb told both counties in a letter Friday, however, that even though they may be still trying to get the machines to comply with the law, the money still must be returned because they didn't meet a Jan. 1 deadline for having them.


More: http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/state/orl-votingmachines006feb04,0,553328.story?coll=orl-news-headlines-state

There are no reports of undiscovered fraud in any election in America that used electronic voting.

Every vote counts - the question is how to count them

By TAMELA BAKER
tammyb@herald-mail.com

ANNAPOLIS -
It's a fundamental American privilege, but in the politically charged world of election-year lawmaking, even the simple act of voting has sparked sharp disagreements between the parties in the General Assembly.

It started with a number of election law changes approved last year by the General Assembly, but vetoed by Gov. Robert Ehrlich. The changes included allowing five days of early voting and letting voters cast "provisional" ballots in other precincts besides their own, anywhere in the state. The General Assembly overrode the governor's vetoes early in this year's session.

While the official arguments for the changes were to provide more opportunities for citizens to vote, opponents sensed the real reason had less to do with who was occupying voting booths than with who was occupying the governor's mansion. They feared the changes would allow people to vote early and often - and defraud the upcoming election.

...snip

But other changes loom that could affect this year's elections.

Although the state recently spent millions to install touch-screen voting terminals throughout the state, several bills offered this year would require "paper trails," allowing voters to review a paper receipt of their completed ballots.

Proponents argue that paper trails would protect elections from mistakes and fraud; opponents say Maryland voters aren't particularly worried about the integrity of the state's elections and that changing the system now would create more problems than it would solve.


More: http://www.herald-mail.com/?module=displaystory&story_id=130349&format=html

Voters need paper record

Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 02/5/06

You are in for a surprise on the next election day. When you walk into the voting booth, instead of the familiar mechanical lever machine, you'll see a brand-new computer system. After a bit of confusion, you'll figure out how to select your candidates and cast your vote. And as you walk out of the booth, it may hit you: How do you know that the computer recorded your vote correctly? You don't. And if a recount is needed (remember the last 12th Assembly election?), what is there to recount? Nothing.

You get a receipt when you shop at the supermarket, so you can check that you were charged $1.49 and not $2.49 for that quart of milk. Same when you get cash from an ATM. But when you cast your vote, this most basic act in a democracy, you have no idea if your vote went to Ms. Jones or Mr. Lee or was counted at all.

Fortunately, there is a bill in Congress to avoid this surprise, but it needs your help. Under this bill, voting machines would have to print out a paper ballot with your selections, let you verify them, then save the ballot in case a recount is needed. The bill, HR-550, was proposed by Rep. Rush Holt, D-N.J. Almost 160 members of Congress from both parties have signed on to the bill, but more are needed to get it moving.

For some strange reason, none of the Republican congressmen from New Jersey have co-sponsored it. Maybe they forgot President Ronald Reagan's urging to "trust but verify." Let's give them a gentle reminder, lest we be surprised by the outcome of the next election.

Boris Kofman

RED BANK


Link: http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060205/OPINION/602050351/1032

Polls need tech-savvy teens
Cumberland offers $115 and day off school for election help

Sunday, February 05, 2006
BY MATT MILLER
Of Our Carlisle Bureau

CARLISLE - Cumberland County officials are seeking local high school students who want to earn $115 and get a day off school, some computer time and a close-up look at the electoral process.

They are recruiting teenagers 17 and older to be clerks at polling places on Election Day, starting with the May 16 primary, when the county will activate a new electronic voting system.

"This seems like a good time to introduce a new generation to the nuts and bolts of the democratic process," said Jerry Wilkes, the county's information management and technology director.

Besides, Wilkes said, the average 17-year-old knows a lot more about computers than the average 50-year-old.

More: http://www.pennlive.com/news/patriotnews/index.ssf?/base/news/1139134888251190.xml&coll=1

Carlisle plans re-vote on fire/EMS levy
Tuesday election will decide fire/EMS issue

CARLISLE — Voters will have another opportunity Tuesday in a special election to decide whether the city should have a combined fire and emergency medical services department with 24-hour staffing or continue as a volunteer fire department.

This is the second time in three months this levy has been before voters. Last November, the levy was narrowly defeated.

But those election results were set aside due to voting irregularities from the new electronic touch screen voting machines.

More votes were cast than there were registered voters in the city’s Montgomery County precinct. The city contested the results, and the Montgomery County Common Pleas Court ordered Tuesday’s special election at Montgomery County’s cost.

Voters on the Warren County side of the city will be using new optical scan voting machines.

More: http://www.middletownjournal.com/news/content/news/stories/2006/02/05/MJ020506CARLISLE.html

Haiti's identity emerges as election draws near

BY TIM COLLIE
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti - Marie Therese Simplice awoke at dawn Tuesday and walked five hours through some of this city's most dangerous neighborhoods to get the card needed to vote in Haiti's elections next week.

But the desire to vote wasn't what drove Simplice to get the card. She wanted something to acknowledge the 54 years she's lived in this impoverished country of her birth. "The election is important, but it's this card I really need," said Simplice, a widowed street vendor, as she stood in line with hundreds of others outside the country's elections headquarters. "Everyone told me that if you're going to do anything in life, you need this card."

...snip

Like a basic ATM card, the laminated voter card can store reams of data about an individual, Pradel said. Each has the photograph and fingerprint of the voter, which are to be inspected by poll workers on election day. Because many of Haiti's parties worried about electronic manipulation of votes, the cards will not be read electronically.

Already postponed four times, Haiti's first elections since the ouster of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide two years ago now look like they will be held on Tuesday. Registration of voters and the distribution of the hi-tech cards have been chief reasons for the delays.


More: http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/world/13793529.htm

The GOP & blacks

By Peter A. Brown
Sunday, February 5, 2006


This year we may learn more about why so many black Americans see Republicans as their enemy and whether there is anything the GOP can do about it.

There are serious black Republican candidates for governor in Pennsylvania and Ohio. How they fare -- among black voters and conservative whites -- will tell us about 21st-century politics in an increasingly racially diverse country.

Democrats say their typical 90 percent of the black vote stems from the GOP using racially tinged issues to win white voters -- three-fourths of the national electorate.

Republicans argue, and the polling supports this view, that blacks see a larger role for government than do whites while the GOP more favors private-sector solutions.

In Pennsylvania and Ohio we will see if the heavily white GOP rank and file will back credible blacks who share their philosophy and, perhaps, whether a serious black Republican candidate can get more than a smattering of black votes in November.

For almost two decades, national GOP leaders handpicked black sacrificial-lamb candidates in races no Republican could win. Those candidates generally got the 10 percent to 15 percent of the black vote white Republicans garner.

But 2006 may be different.

Ken Blackwell in Ohio and Lynn Swann in Pennsylvania lead polls of Republicans in advance of spring primaries. Both are mega-swing states where the governorship is what matters since the chief executive controls patronage, judicial appointments and multibillion-dollar budgets.


More: http://pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/opinion/columnists/guests/s_420337.html

COMMENTARY: Republicans and blacks

THOMAS SOWELL

A promising new black political figure is emerging in Ohio — Ken Blackwell, a solid, pro-life conservative who has fought for lower taxes. He is seeking the Republican nomination for governor of Ohio and polls indicate that he has substantial support.

Unfortunately, Ohio's Republicans are a lot like Ohio's Democrats — both are for higher taxes. On this and other issues, Blackwell is described in the current issue of City Journal as "often at war with his own party as well as the Democrats."
...snip

It is not rocket science to see that whatever chances the Republicans have of making inroads into the black vote are likely to be better among more conservative blacks.

Black religious groups opposed to abortion or homosexual marriage are an obvious group to try to reach. So are black business owners or military veterans.

Does anyone think that President Bush's awarding a Medal of Freedom to Muhammad Ali was likely to appeal to such groups? Yet this continues a pattern in which Republicans have tried to approach black voters from the left.

...snip

Ken Blackwell's candidacy for the Republican nomination for governor in Ohio is a golden opportunity for Republicans, not only in that state but on the national political scene as well. Still, Mr. Blackwell would do well to watch his back.

Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His Web site is www.tsowell.com.

More: http://www.vvdailypress.com/2006/113897697959321.html

Principle Trumps Color

by Salena Zito
Feb 5, 2006


Lynn Swann, Michael Steele, Condi Rice and Ken Blackwell face the same handicap every morning when they look in the mirror. They're Republicans, but they're not supposed to be. Who made that rule? Democrats?

When they contemplate their reflections, they are looking into the eyes of card-carrying members of the party of home ownership and opportunity. That's content of character. Isn't that how Dr. King would judge them? Isn't that how you should judge them?

These are the new "A" team of the Republican Party. Not for the black of their skin, but for their values.

...snip

But how else can they run? They're black. Wouldn't be quite the problem, though, if they were running as Democrats loudly touting their "blackness."

As Republicans, are they pioneers? Not exactly. The first black Republican to become a U.S. senator was Hiram Rhodes Revels of Mississippi, who took office in 1870.

The gap, however, has been too long and too wide since then.


...snip

The success of these and other black Republican candidates should not be measured just on whether they win their seats but on how successful they are at invigorating the Republican base and attracting a new urban voting bloc.

Who knows? Maybe in 2006 a whole new crop of people, black and white, will look in their mirrors every morning, staring into the faces of card-carrying members of the "Party of Lincoln."

Salena Zito is a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review editorial page columnist


:puke:

Link: http://www.postchronicle.com/commentary/article_2125593.shtml

GOP foes harden abortion positions
Blackwell, Petro now against procedure in almost all cases

Saturday, February 04, 2006
Joe Hallett
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH


The two Republican candidates for governor have altered their positions on abortion and now would foreclose almost every option for a woman to have one, including if pregnancy was the result of rape or incest.

Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell and Attorney General Jim Petro, locked in a fight for the GOP’s conservative base and for a coveted endorsement by Ohio Right to Life, made it clear yesterday that they have deepened their hard-line stances against abortion.

Long an opponent of abortion rights, Blackwell would preclude abortion even if the life of a mother is at stake. In his 2002 re-election campaign, Blackwell took a position to permit an abortion if it were necessary to save a mother’s life.


More: http://www.columbusdispatch.com/news-story.php?story=dispatch/2006/02/04/20060204-A1-03.html

As Alito takes Supreme Court seat, Ohio GOP guts election protection

By Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman
Online Journal Guest Writers

Feb 3, 2006, 16:06

Ohio's GOP-controlled legislature has passed a repressive new law that will gut free elections here and is already surfacing elsewhere around the US. The bill will continue the process of installing the GOP as America's permanent ruling party.

Coming with the swearing in of right-wing extremist Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, it marks another dark day for what remains of American democracy.

Called HB3, the law now demands discriminatory voter ID, severely cripples the possibility of statewide recounts and actually ends the process of state-based challenges to federal elections -- most importantly for president -- held within the state.

In other words, the type of legal challenge mounted to the theft of Ohio's electoral votes in the 2004 election will now be all but impossible in the future.

...snip

Finally, and perhaps most astonishingly, HB3 eliminates the state statutes that have allowed citizens to challenge the outcome of federal elections within the state. After the 2004 election, election protection advocates filed a challenge to Bush's victory. Their attorneys were attacked with an official attempt to levy sanctions, and then were thwarted from an effective suit when GOP Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell locked up the state's voter records.

But HB3 would now entirely eliminate any possibility of a state-based legal challenge. The only alleged recourse for those wishing to officially question the vote count in a presidential, US Senate or US House race in Ohio would be at the United States Congress. There is now no recourse whatsoever on the state level.

More: http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_475.shtml

05:04 PM EST 0:47 (est.)

Speech

The Dictionary of Republicanisms

Vanden Heuvel, Katrina, Editor,

Katrina vanden Heuvel talked about her book The Dictionary of Republicanisms, published by Nation Books. The book is a compilation of definitions provided by the author and the participants of an Internet campaign for some of the terms used by Republicans and the current Bush administration. She charges that Republicans do not say what they mean or mean what they say.

During her presentation she offers definitions such as election fraud being "counting every vote" and accountability as "never having to say you're sorry."

http://inside.c-spanarchives.org:8080/cspan/cspan.csp?command=dprogram&record=547833750

http://inside.c-spanarchives.org:8080/cspan/schedule.csp


Discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x411987

Important Books, Videos, and CD's about the 2004 Ohio Election

February 2, 2006

by Ray Beckerman

In view of the iron-fisted control of all three of the nation's branches of government, as well as the "fourth estate", the press, by a single political party, I have felt that this dark page in American history would need to be examined by the historians. Well, the history is starting to be written now. Here are some books, videos, and CD's which have come out to tell the story.

The truth can be suppressed in the short run, when government and the press are in league, as they were in Germany from 1933 to 1945, and as they are today, but ultimately the truth will be known and will be told.

snip

http://fairnessbybeckerman.blogspot.com/2006/02/important-books-videos-and-cds-about.html


Discussion

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x411984