Unreliable elections still happening in Florida, Supporters of Democracy take note

On Mon, 29 Mar 2004 16:58:11 +0000, alohacyberian wrote:

"Chris the Liberal" wrote in message
om...

I would never trust a touch-screen voting machine, for there is no
way to verify the results.

Yes, the results can be verified provided the selections are printed out on a
sheet of paper for checking after balloting. KM

That depends on what's being counted.

If the votes are being stored electronically, there's nothing stopping the
machine from simply recording a vote for one candidate while printing a
receipt with another name.

However, if the printed receipt *is* the ballot, then most (but not all)
of the security concerns go away.

--
Benjamin Geiger My real email address isn't a _spamtrap.
WDW 4/6/03 - 4/6/04: Anytime I want! Hooray being local!

"Benjamin Geiger" wrote in message
news
On Mon, 29 Mar 2004 16:58:11 +0000, alohacyberian wrote:

"Chris the Liberal" wrote in message
om...

I would never trust a touch-screen voting machine, for there is no
way to verify the results.

Yes, the results can be verified provided the selections are printed out
on a
sheet of paper for checking after balloting. KM

That depends on what's being counted.

If the votes are being stored electronically, there's nothing stopping the
machine from simply recording a vote for one candidate while printing a
receipt with another name.

However, if the printed receipt *is* the ballot, then most (but not all)
of the security concerns go away.

Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the problem?

On Tue, 30 Mar 2004 19:46:05 GMT, "Jerry Okamura"
wrote:


Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the problem?

I we're going to have all those paper ballots counted, let's do
it the simple way and go back to paper ballots.

************* DAVE HATUNEN ) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *

It seems to me that people from every place but Florida are trying to tell
Florida how to count their ballots. Worry about your own state and let
Florida worry about theirs.


"Hatunen" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 30 Mar 2004 19:46:05 GMT, "Jerry Okamura"
wrote:


Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get
a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we
submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where
every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that
there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the
problem?

I we're going to have all those paper ballots counted, let's do
it the simple way and go back to paper ballots.

************* DAVE HATUNEN ) *************
* Tucson Arizona, out where the cacti grow *
* My typos & mispellings are intentional copyright traps *

On Tue, 30 Mar 2004 19:46:05 GMT, "Jerry Okamura"
wrote:


Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the problem?

Basically, this is _THE_ solution.

When the voter pushes the "I'm done" button, the printer prints a
paper ballot which the voter examines. If it's OK, the last action is
pushing the "Cast my ballot" button; otherwise the voter takes the
ballot to the election clerk and says "Screw-up" and the process
restarts. The electrons are used for counting, but the paper is the
final arbiter.


(change Arabic number to Roman numeral to email)

On Wed, 31 Mar 2004 00:03:55 +0000, Frank Clarke wrote:

When the voter pushes the "I'm done" button, the printer prints a
paper ballot which the voter examines. If it's OK, the last action is
pushing the "Cast my ballot" button; otherwise the voter takes the
ballot to the election clerk and says "Screw-up" and the process
restarts. The electrons are used for counting, but the paper is the
final arbiter.

Except the paper will never be counted unless the electronic vote is
extremely close, and if the machines are rigged, the electronic vote will
never be close...

--
Benjamin Geiger My real email address isn't a _spamtrap.
WDW 4/6/03 - 4/6/04: Anytime I want! Hooray being local!

On Tue, 30 Mar 2004 19:46:05 +0000, Jerry Okamura wrote:

Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the problem?

The electronic votes are useless, since the paper still has to be
counted. If you're going to count the paper ballots anyway, why bother
with the electronic device?

Ideally, the touchscreen device would serve solely as a device to print
paper ballots. It wouldn't need to keep any electronic votes or have an
electronic audit trail; every vote is stored as a unique piece of paper.
The ballot box could simply be a scanner; it would pull in the ballot,
check for valid OCR text (two adjacent holes in a punch card look similar,
but "John Kerry" and "George Bush" are completely distinct), and if it's
not found or invalid, spit it out and complain. (The mark-the-oval system
does something similar, except it looks for the darkened oval.)

--
Benjamin Geiger My real email address isn't a _spamtrap.
WDW 4/6/03 - 4/6/04: Anytime I want! Hooray being local!

"Jerry Okamura" wrote in message
...
"Benjamin Geiger" wrote in message
news
On Mon, 29 Mar 2004 16:58:11 +0000, alohacyberian wrote:
"Chris the Liberal" wrote in message
om...

I would never trust a touch-screen voting machine, for there is no
way to verify the results.

Yes, the results can be verified provided the selections are printed
out
on a
sheet of paper for checking after balloting. KM

That depends on what's being counted.

If the votes are being stored electronically, there's nothing stopping
the
machine from simply recording a vote for one candidate while printing a
receipt with another name.

However, if the printed receipt *is* the ballot, then most (but not all)
of the security concerns go away.

Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we
submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the problem?


Yes. That's precisely what I meant. The count would be electronic unless a
recount were demanded by one of the the candidates, in which case the paper
ballots would be counted. KM
--
(-:alohacyberian:-) At my website there are 3000 live cameras or
visit NASA, play games, read jokes, send greeting cards & connect
to CNN news, NBA, the White House, Academy Awards or learn all
about Hawaii, Israel and mo http://keith.martin.home.att.net/

"alohacyberian" wrote in message
...
"Jerry Okamura" wrote in message
...
"Benjamin Geiger" wrote in message
news
On Mon, 29 Mar 2004 16:58:11 +0000, alohacyberian wrote:
"Chris the Liberal" wrote in message
om...

I would never trust a touch-screen voting machine, for there is
no
way to verify the results.

Yes, the results can be verified provided the selections are printed
out
on a
sheet of paper for checking after balloting. KM

That depends on what's being counted.

If the votes are being stored electronically, there's nothing stopping
the
machine from simply recording a vote for one candidate while printing
a
receipt with another name.

However, if the printed receipt *is* the ballot, then most (but not
all)
of the security concerns go away.

Not sure if this is going to work, but.... Let us say that we have
something like a touch screen voting system. Let us then say that we
get a
printout of our selection. After we cast our vote electronically, we
submit
a paper copy of our selection, just like we do now when we complete our
ballot. The paper copy is then sent to some processing center, where
every
paper ballot is counted to verify the count. Let us further say that
there
is a way to electronically compare what we did when we cast our vote
electronically, to the paper ballot vote. Doesn't that solve the
problem?


Yes. That's precisely what I meant. The count would be electronic unless a
recount were demanded by one of the the candidates, in which case the
paper
ballots would be counted. KM
--

Doesn't matter. Florida *still* does not have its act together - look at
what happened in Panama City when they nominated Dick Gephardt in the
Democratic Primary and he wasn't even running!

There are way more problems than the touch-screen voting - provisional
ballots getting counted when they're not supposed to be; absentee ballots
that are picked up by total strangers, such as Republican/Democrat party
workers, to be turned in (yeah, right); voter registration BY MAIL that
allows people from all over the country to vote in Florida elections,
including their DOGS; total votes in precincts that exceed the number of
registered voters - the problems go on and on and on.

The whole Florida voting system is screwy. Don't be surprised when November
is Election 2000 Redux.

Lynn

"Lynn Ditto" wrote in message
...
The whole Florida voting system is screwy. Don't be surprised when
November
is Election 2000 Redux.

Lynn



It's worse than that - when you do register they *ask* you if you are a
citizen, you do not have to show proof. At the polls, you are not required
to show ID. We look forward to another exciting and embarrassing November.

Chris