    
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 11034
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 4 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, April 30, 2010 - 1:20 pm: | 
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An article appeared in a local Green County (Ark.) newpaper under the headline "Good to Vote Electronically." I will excerpt and link the article below; basically it is one of the hundreds of "L&A Test Shows Machines Count Votes Properly" bits that we see appearing all over the US during election season.
We are beginning to make headway in framing election integrity issues as Freedom of Information matters, and issues of public control. It is no longer just me, Nancy Tobi, Paul Lehto, Kathleen Wynne and the nation of Germany. I am seeing more and more election integrity advocates picking up the ball to introduce these concepts to other local and national groups.
Job one is to build the foundation for real, meaningful reform by developing public awareness of elections using a human rights framework. Until that foundation is built, we will find it very difficult to get court judgments or legislation to restore public controls for public elections.
This begins with the "each one teach one" approach. I wrote personally to the reporter and also posted at the Paragould Press site. Just take the bull by the horns and jump right in when you see an opportunity near you! I am generally available by phone to help you with messaging if you wish to network with other organizations on this.
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Paragould Daily Press - April 30, 2010, by John Griffith
Greene County’s electronic voting machines and ballots are functioning correctly and are ready for early voting, the election commission said Thursday following a successful public systems test. . . .
http://www.paragoulddailypress.com/articles/2010/04/30/local_news/doc4bda4127755
Good to vote electronically
Election commission certifies electronic voting machines
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MY RESPONSE:
Dear John,
Headlining an article "Good to Vote Electronically" could be called editorializing and it could be called propaganda, but it is not appropriately called news. Perhaps someone on your editorial staff wrote the headline.
Though the headline may have meant "the machines are 'good to go' it appears to assign a value judgement, "electronic voting is good."
Voting rights advocates would disagree. Voting electronically conceals two essential steps from the public: It conceals whether the votes you cast are actually the same as the votes the computer counts, and conceals the actual counting itself from the public. For these reasons, Germany has banned this type of voting, its high court ruling that concealing essential election processes from the public is unconstitutional.
The tests described in your article are not proof that the machines will count accurately on Election Day, or that they cannot be adjusted or manipulated by those with inside access. The redundancies you list are not particularly protective, because the public, and usually the candidates and their attorneys, can never look at the so-called redundant copies to prove they are in fact the same, and even if they were these redundant systems can be adjusted to match each other.
I hope you consider a different framework for examining election systems, through the lens of human rights. We have an absolute, inalienable right to freedom, and we are not free if the public lacks controls over its own government. While we may FEEL like we have control, through the voting booth, if in fact a set of insiders controls essential processes and conceals them from the public, this is actually a transfer of power from The People to a small set of government insiders or the vendors they select.
These are serious issues; you may agree or disagree, or want more time to think about it or discuss how concealed processes erode the foundation of democratic systems, but in any event, headlining an article "Good to Vote Electronically" would put you in the category of those who believe concealing essential public election processes from the public is "good."
And when you think about it, that would be membership in an unwholesome list.
Bev Harris
Director - Black Box Voting
http://www.blackboxvoting.org
A national, nonpartisan nonprofit voting rights organization
Paragould Daily Press - April 30, 2010, by John Griffith
Good to vote electronically
Election commission certifies electronic voting machines
Published: Friday, April 30, 2010 12:11 PM CDT
Greene County’s electronic voting machines and ballots are functioning correctly and are ready for early voting, the election commission said Thursday following a successful public systems test.
“It was successful; all candidates running are on our ballot,” commission chair Paulette Parker said.
“During tests, all votes for candidates were accounted for,” said commissioner Don Farmer.
Parker said the L and A test, short for logic and accuracy, is a diagnostics test of a machine’s capability to correctly record and tally votes. . .
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FOR MY BBV FRIENDS - A small P.S., and please don't distract the topic by posting about this (you may e-mail me privately of course). I have temporarily been sidelined due to cancer surgery. I am still somewhat limited in what I can do, as sitting is painful for long periods of time following abdominal surgery, but they caught it in time, very early stage. I have been blessed and my prognosis is excellent, and I am taking better care of myself now. No chemo! I will be back full time on Monday. Lotta catching up to do. |
