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Grex > Agora47 > #221: The Fall 2003 Electronic Voting Item | |
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| Author |
Message |
| 25 new of 54 responses total. |
jp2
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response 9 of 54:
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Dec 16 20:12 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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rcurl
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response 10 of 54:
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Dec 16 20:48 UTC 2003 |
It certainly does! And the "secret ballot" is not "poor policy", in my
opinion. Laws give us (and take away) "rights". How else can rights
be established?
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jp2
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response 11 of 54:
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Dec 16 21:04 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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rcurl
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response 12 of 54:
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Dec 16 21:08 UTC 2003 |
Somebody made it up. They were people that wanted certain rights, and they
said so in word and deed. That's how they got the rights they wanted.
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jp2
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response 13 of 54:
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Dec 16 21:10 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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rcurl
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response 14 of 54:
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Dec 16 21:39 UTC 2003 |
Of course not. Who said anything about "mistakes"? The Supreme Court
established a right that was previously unsettled. How about not putting
words in other people's mouths?
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willcome
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response 15 of 54:
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Dec 16 23:20 UTC 2003 |
How about not putting babies in garbage cans?
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tod
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response 16 of 54:
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Dec 16 23:29 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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jp2
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response 17 of 54:
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Dec 16 23:45 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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rcurl
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response 18 of 54:
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Dec 17 02:51 UTC 2003 |
Why not? The Constitution gives the Court that power. You apparently do
not know that everything that is and will be possible is not mentioned
in the Constitution. Hence only the guidelines and principles of the
Constitution are there to guide the Court in resolving new questions.
That is what they did.
You sure make yourself sound stupid with insisting that you "win" in
every response.
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jp2
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response 19 of 54:
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Dec 17 03:12 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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willcome
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response 20 of 54:
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Dec 17 03:49 UTC 2003 |
(trolls)
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gull
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response 21 of 54:
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Dec 17 14:29 UTC 2003 |
Re resp:8: Well, when the major electronic voting machine companies are
controlled by Republican partisans, and people in high positions in
those companies talk about hoping to deliver a victory to the Republican
candidate, don't people have a right to be suspicious? Espcially
considering those companies have repeatedly refused to let anyone
examine their source code or test their machines?
How would you feel if the situation were reversed, and Democrats were
controlling the voting systems and refusing to let anyone else see how
they were run?
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jep
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response 22 of 54:
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Dec 17 20:14 UTC 2003 |
re resp:21: David, believe it or not, I am no more in favor of
Republicans taking elections through voting machine fraud than you. I
would not gain from such a scenario, and don't believe the country
would gain. I am inclined toward the right, and to vote for
Republicans, but yet I believe there are principles more important than
victory for conservatives and the Republican Party.
If the situation were reversed for you, do you think you'd be in favor
of the Democratic Party stealing elections? I would hope and expect
not.
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other
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response 23 of 54:
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Dec 17 20:47 UTC 2003 |
The fear held by rational people concerned about this issue,
generally speaking, is not that the Republicans will rig elections,
but that there will be no way to determine with certainty that they
didn't. Until and unless this concern is addressed properly and
ubiquitously, electronic voting should not be adopted.
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twenex
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response 24 of 54:
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Dec 17 20:49 UTC 2003 |
In the interests of fairness, perhaps one should say "...certainty
that they or the Democrats didn't.".
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other
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response 25 of 54:
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Dec 17 20:52 UTC 2003 |
You could just as well say that, but it is adequately implied.
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tod
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response 26 of 54:
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Dec 17 21:01 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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jmsaul
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response 27 of 54:
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Dec 18 00:52 UTC 2003 |
At this point, the companies have been so sloppy with the machines that even
if they do work with the Republicans to rig an election, there will be
reasonable doubt because anyone with access to the machines could have done
it. If the outcome is challenged, we'll probably wind up with another "it's
best to leave well enough alone" ruling like the one for the presidential
election in 2000.
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gull
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response 28 of 54:
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Dec 18 04:29 UTC 2003 |
Re resp:23: Yes, exactly.
Re resp:27: Quite possibly. I think if there are any irregularities in
this election, and Bush is the winner, there will be a lot of pressure
from the executive branch to gloss over any problems "for the good of
the country." (If a Democrat is elected and there are irregularities,
we can expect a long, drawn-out investigation, I'm sure.)
Some points to consider:
1. Vote fraud (by either side) is not exactly unheard of. We're not
talking about something new in concept here, just on a larger scale.
2. Diebold and other electronic voting companies have refused to let
anyone outside the company review their source code. Why? What are
they hiding?
3. There is no auditing capability on most electronic voting machines.
There have already been cases of machine malfunctions that were only
caught because they produced obviously incorrect numbers -- for example,
more people voting than are registered in a precinct, or a negative
number of votes. If the errors had been more subtle, they would NEVER
have been caught.
4. Diebold his vigorously resisted requests to add auditing capability.
The more they resist, the more it looks like a deliberate decision
instead of a design oversight.
Odds are there's no conspiracy afoot, but if you add up all the above
factors it does smell a little funny. What troubles me, though, is that
there is currently NO way we can ever know if tampering or malfunctions
have occurred. And very few people seem to particularly care.
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jep
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response 29 of 54:
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Dec 18 14:45 UTC 2003 |
I think Diebold, like all software makers, wants to protect it's source
code for business reasons. My company wouldn't allow it's source code
to be reviewed externally, any more than Microsoft would or Oracle
would. It's pretty radical to insist that Diebold must be trying to
fix elections because they follow a standard business practice of their
industry.
I agree there has to be auditing for electronic voting. That omission
would be a severe oversight that has to be corrected before I'd be
comfortable with electronic voting.
It seems likely to me that Diebold doesn't want to add it *for free*.
If it wasn't part of what they were contracted to provide, then that
would be understandable. If they fulfilled specs, and then auditing
was brought up later, it's unfair to accuse them of not providing what
they were supposed to.
Are they refusing to discuss additional contracts to provide for
auditing to be added? If they're turning down business, then I could
see a reason to be suspicious and think "conspiracy". I haven't seen
any statements from you or anyone else stating that to be the case and
so I assume it's not.
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gull
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response 30 of 54:
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Dec 18 14:58 UTC 2003 |
I'm not sure if they've outright refused, but they've made vigorous
attempts to downplay the importance of auditing. And see their
statement above that they hoped a Republican governor would get elected
and stop Maryland from insisting on paper audit trains.
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scott
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response 31 of 54:
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Dec 18 15:01 UTC 2003 |
The precedent does exist in computerized slot machines, though. That's why
I'm not surprised that Nevada is the first state which seems like it
understands the issues completely.
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gull
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response 32 of 54:
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Dec 18 15:19 UTC 2003 |
I would feel pretty confident about the security and accuracy of any
voting system that the Nevada Gaming Board had approved. They've been
dealing with similar issues for years.
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jp2
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response 33 of 54:
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Dec 18 15:40 UTC 2003 |
This response has been erased.
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