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| 2-7-07: Son of Holt Bill: TechnoElect... |
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Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 605
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 5 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 12:36 pm: | 
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By Nancy Tobi - Chair, Democracy for New Hampshire
You can keep arguing the merits of this audit method or that, this paper trail or that, but the Holt Bill has two poison pills in it that can not be argued away:
1) huge unfunded mandate for text-to-audio conversion technology
2) consolidation of Executive power and control over Federal elections.
We must fight this treasonous bill -- and if giving the President control over elections that elect the President is not treasonous to American representational democracy, what is? -- and call it for what it is: ANTIDEMOCRATIC.
It is bad enough that the authors of this bill, two years following the NASS resolution to sunset the Election Assistance Commission (EAC), and after more than a years' worth of activist pleadings to get rid of this growing little monster, the EAC, cement it as a permanent Executive agency in his new bill.
Bad enough that the authors of this bill are comfortable handing over control of federal elections to the White House. This is treasonous in and of itself.
But on top of this unseemly and anti democratic motion, the new Holt bill insinuates a whole new technoelection industrial toy into every polling place in the nation.
In the language of this bill, the new accessible voting system
"'(I) allows the voter to privately and independently verify the content of the permanent paper ballot through the conversion of the printed content into accessible media"
Do you want to know what this intentionally benign and vague language means, and the events that led to it being inserted into the Holt Bill? If you ask Holt's office why this mysterious new requirement is in their bill, they're liable to say, "why, it's in the EAC 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG)." So let's take a look at what all of this means, and where it comes from.
First, to understand exactly what Holt's vague and, dare I say it, opaque, language is talking about, just look at Tubbs Jones"Count Every Vote" Bill (HR939). This bill was originally endorsed and heavily promoted by PFAW, and had been viewed by Holt's office as competition to their own piece of legislation.
Keep in mind that there is the chance that proponents of this crap, such as Holt, Hoyer, and PFAW, may actually believe that in order to get votes from voters who are illiterate, non-English speaking, or whatnot, they have to create a multimedia voting booth - complete with picture, sound, multiple languages. In other words, at best, this is another road to boondoggle paved with good intentions. At worst it is a cynical ploy to further enrich the evoting industry and destroy our democracy.
Anyway, the Tubbs Jones bill spelled out the meaning of "conversion of printed content into accessible media" very clearly, making it possible for the average citizen to grasp exactly how much of a high tech boondoggle this tect-to-audio conversion concept is. HR 939 details the multimedia extravaganza that the Holt Bill is referring to as "accessible media" is and puts it like this:
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h109-939
quote:'(B) VERIFICATION REQUIREMENTS- Any direct recording electronic voting system or other voting system described in subparagraph (A)(iii) shall use a mechanism that separates the function of vote generation from the function of vote casting and shall produce, in accordance with paragraph (2)(A), an individual paper record which--
'(i) shall be used to meet the requirements of paragraph (2)(B);
'(ii) shall be available for visual, audio, and pictorial inspection and verification by the voter, with language translation available for all forms of inspection and verification in accordance with the requirements of section 203 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965;
'(iii) shall not require the voter to handle the paper; and
'(iv) shall not preclude the use of Braille or tactile ballots for those voters who need them. The requirement of clause (iii) shall not apply to any voting system certified by the Independent Testing Authorities before the date of the enactment of this Act. '(C)
REQUIREMENTS FOR LANGUAGE MINORITIES- Any record produced under subparagraph (B) shall be subject to the requirements of section 203 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to the extent such section is applicable to the State or jurisdiction in which such record is produced.'
That's right folks. A voting booth with audio, visual, pictorial, capabilities. The possibilities are endless. If I am musically inclined perhaps they can convert my ballot to a symphony too.
And of course, it is no accident that this language appears in the newly revised Holt Bill. In fact somebody has been planning this for some time now. We can trace its origins back at least a year and a half. We even know many of the players. We know, for instance, that PFAW lobbied hard for inserting the conversion technotoy into the Holt Bill. In fact, a December 2006 draft verions of the bill did not even contain this provision. Many reviewers of the draft legislation didn't even know about it. It only appeared very late in the drafting process, just in time to be released to the public in February and to defuse any competing support for HR 939. Tubbs Jones, in fact, is now a cosponsor of the Holt Bill.
But lobbyists alone do not legislation make. We can therefore assume that there is some industry maven rubbing his hands with glee at his impending entrance into a multibillion dollar technoelection industry.
What is clear is this: somebody stands to make a bundle off this thing, and on top of that its implementation will succeed at further obscuring the integrity of the paper ballot and our democratic processes. So let's follow the historical timeline for the new technoelection dream toy.
TEXT-TO-AUDIO TECHNOELECTION TOY TIMELINE:
August 2005
The EAC Standards Board meets to review the recommendations for the 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG), which will become the basis for federal recommendations, testing, and certification of e-voting equipment.
In the link here you will find the resolutions from the EAC Standards Board August 2005 meeting, in which they recommended removing all language referencing text conversion from the Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG):
http://www.bbvdocs.org/EAC/Standards-Board-Final-Resolution-As-Amended.pdf
Remember that the Standards Board, unlike the Commission stacked with partisan hacks, is a 50-state representational body of top state and local election officials. You know, people who actually UNDERSTAND how elections work.
Well, the attached resolutions came about following the Standards Board review of all references to sections identified with the numbers 2.2.7.xxx in the 2005 Draft VVSG. These sections all referred to the text conversion guideline,which had been inserted into the draft VVSG that the Standards Board had reviewed. As you can see, per the Standards Board recommendation, the text-to-audio conversion guideline was to be removed from the VVSG.
The Standards Board made this recommendation because they understood the financial cost of this guideline (expecting every polling place in the country to have a device to convert text to digital media, and that it would compromise the integrity of PAPER BALLOT-based election systems.
However, oddly reminiscent of its appearance late in the game during the drafting of the 2007 Holt Bill, the text conversion guideline had mysteriously been reinserted into the VVSG that was released and approved by the EAC in December 2005.
We can't say for sure how this happened, but we know that, by the EAC's own rules, Executive Director of the EAC, Tom Wilkey, had the final authority on what would be included in the released version of the VVSG. So it would appear that 110 Standards Board members decided one thing, and one EAC Executive Director decided another.
And democracy loses.
December 2005
http://www.eac.gov/VVSG%20Volume_II.pdf
So when the VVSG 2005 guidelines were released, here is how the text-to-audio guideline magically reappeared:
quote:4.7.4 Availability Test The accredited test lab shall assess the adequacy of system availability based on the provisions of Volume I, Section 4.
As described in this section, availability of voting system equipment is determined as a function of reliability, and the mean time to repair the system in the event of failure. Availability cannot be tested directly before the voting system is deployed in jurisdictions, but can be modeled mathematically to predict availability for a defined system configuration. This model shall be prepared by the vendor, and shall be validated by the accredited testing laboratory.
The model shall reflect the equipment used for a typical system configuration to perform the following system functions:
For all paper-based systems: Recording voter selections (such as by ballot marking)
Scanning the marks on paper ballots and converting them into digital data
February 2007
The requirement appears in the new Holt Bill. An unfunded federal mandate that every polling place in the United States purchase and use a new technological device that will convert ballot text into digital data to be converted into "accessible media". Does such a product exist? We would guess that somebody's been working on it, or the requirement wouldn't appear in the February Holt Bill. Has it been tested? Is it certifiable? Since the product didn't exist when the EAC's own federal e-voting testing and certification requirements were devised, the answer has to be no.
So the Holt Bill is mandating for the 2008 elections that every polling jurisdiction, with already limited funds for healthcare, education, and roads maintenance, invest several thousand dollars into an untested, uncertifiable technological device, that will convert the durable, human readable ballot into digitized data, which will then, if we have faith in the programmer, convert it into all kinds of other media. Additionally, our election officials, trained and skilled in running elections, will now be converted themselves into Information Technology (IT) project managers, spending the next two years developing specifications and requirements for a whole new technoelection toy to work within the unique and specific ballot design requirements for their jurisdiction.
For our next act, Tom Cruise will play the part of the Presidential candidate in row A, Jennifer Garner will play the part of the Presidential candidate in row B, and Elton John will sing the ballot to the tune of Goodbye Yellow Brick Road.
Is this any way to run a democracy?
That's it. The latest technoelection timeline brought to you by US Congressman Rush Holt, PFAW, and some as yet unknown evoting industry baron.
God bless America. Land that we love. Fight on my fellow Patriots. This can not stand.
Article by Nancy Tobi, Chair, Democracy for New Hampshire and co-author of "Request by Voters" letter, a plea to Holt and the co-sponsors of his HR 550 bill to consider democratic modifications and accountability features in the modifications to this bill. "Request by Voters" was signed by 1500 individuals and organizations. Our voices were ignored.
PERMISSION TO REPRINT GRANTED |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 606
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 12:40 pm: |
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There appear to be only two products that can produce the technoextravaganza text converter: the AutoMARK, which sells for over $6000 -- and to have one in each of the 185,000 precincts, well, you do the math.
The other product is made by Populex. Now, take a look at who's on the Board of Populex: Frank Carlucci.
http://www.populex.com/Advisory.htm
Carlyle Group.
Unacceptable.
Carlucci graduated from Princeton University in 1952, where he roomed with Donald Rumsfeld, and attended Harvard Business School in 1954-55...Carlucci was Deputy Director of the CIA from 1978-1981, under CIA Director Stansfield Turner. Carlucci was deputy defense secretary from 1981 until 1983 [1], national security advisor from 1986 until 1987, and defense secretary in 1987...Carlucci served as chairman of the Carlyle Group from 1992-2003, and chairman emeritus until 2005. Carlucci is Chairman of Envion USA, and former director of Wackenhut. He is a senior member of the Frontier Group, a private equity investment firm founded by Sanford McDonnell and David Robb. Carlucci is an Advisory board member of G2 Satellite Solutions and the Chairman Emeritus of Nortel Networks.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Carlucci |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 607
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 12:55 pm: |
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And take a look at this on Tom Wilkey:
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4119 |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3618
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 12:57 pm: |
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Nancy, thanks for this brilliant work.
Very illuminating. Very sobering.
This has got to be stopped. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3619
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 12:58 pm: |
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Is there supposed to be an active link in Nancy Tobi's post? (The pdf file mentioned looks as if it was originally an active link.)
From BBV: Thanks for catching that. Fixed.
this is the correct link |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 608
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 1:57 pm: |
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What would Thomas Jefferson say?
 |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3620
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 2:10 pm: |
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Michael Richardson's expose on BradBlog of the EAC's Tom Wilkey is a real doosey. Thanks for the link Bev. |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 610
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 7, 2007 - 3:18 pm: |
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Posts on prohibiting undisclosed software moved HERE: http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/46591/46613.html
This thread is about:
1) Text conversion techno-extravaganza
2) Cementing the little monster -- the EAC -- into place, handing control of federal elections over to appointees of the White House.
We have a busy forum today, just trying to keep house.
 |
Ben Olasov
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Benolasov
Post Number: 2
Registered: 07-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 8, 2007 - 3:30 pm: |
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Bev,
What's especially concerning about this isn't just the number and severity of the flaws - or the cost, it's the lack of anything resembling a meaningful public debate on the issues. Specifically, why isn't the review process for a bill like this /required/ to engage election integrity advocacy groups like BBV in the first place?? Just basic common sense says you want to know about any design flaws in the bill /before/ it comes up for a vote. This is like starting a large-scale construction project without doing an environmental impact study - only worse. Is anyone pushing for change in the protocol for reviewing bills like this? |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 624
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 8, 2007 - 5:44 pm: |
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Ben, a very insightful comment.
Any normal business endeavor involves, say, doing a pilot study before you roll it out nationwide on a single mission-critical day.
And one of the reasons, I think, that this bill is so flawed is that Holt decided to limit input to a specific faction and keep the text of the bill a secret from the citizenry until it is too late to amend. Obviously, that caused him to put forth a defective bill, but more than that -- it reflects badly on the concept of an open government. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3627
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 4:48 am: |
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Re: Ben and Bev's wise observations--
One would certainly want a prototype/pilot project for any kind of product/service/system.
More importantly, Ben is talking about the need to have broad stakeholder input during the bill development process. A major flaw of any R&D process is if you don't find out ahead of time what the customers want/require, and then keep in touch with customers for feedback during the product/service/system design process. The development of legislation should function similarly.
What seems to happen is that:
1) There is no desire to get broad input
2) There is no desire to try "solutions" out with a range of independent election officials, voters, etc. before introducting legislation requiring certain "solutions"
3) Some key players have undue influence on the bill design process (Like Wilkey re-inserting language/technology that the Advisory Board had specifically removed)
4) Lack of transparency in the bill design process
5) No desire to have transparency in the bill design process
It's that last item that is the most fundamental problem. Everything else comes from that.
The facts now coming out about the Holt bill revision process give the impression that the whole bill design process is fundamentally tied to some kind of vested interests that are not in synch with the broad public interest of holding fair elections. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 1177
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 5:51 am: |
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All of this stems from this being a hot potato that they want to primarily get rid of, and not fix, as fixing it is a can of worms. If these people are approached quietly (at first) it may be possible to both get a good bill and get them good PR. Whether we like it or not, a good deal of effort has been put into identifying people who are for elections/voting reform as the nutcase/tinfoil fringe, and it has largely been successful. Since it has, transparency in this process leaves legislators vulnerable to accusations of listening to the nutcase/tinfoil fringe.
What needs to be designed is a bill that can be handed to these 'upright, respectable' people that has universal enough appeal that the 'mainstream' groups (the League of Women Voters, the DNC, maybe even the RNC?, the governor of Florida, etc) can get behind it and give this the 'respectability' these people need for cover. I hate that it's this way, but it is. Let's recognize it, and work through it. It is possible to be honest and discreet. |
Bev Harris
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Site_admin
Post Number: 625
Registered: 10-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 5:55 am: |
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As mentioned here before, to succeed, the bills need to address one thing at a time. The omnibus bills are dangerous. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 1178
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 6:07 am: |
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All of this stems from this being a hot potato that they want to primarily get rid of, and not fix, as fixing it is a can of worms. If these people are approached quietly (at first) it may be possible to both get a good bill and get them good PR. Whether we like it or not, a good deal of effort has been put into identifying people who are for elections/voting reform as the nutcase/tinfoil fringe, and it has largely been successful. Since it has, transparency in this process leaves legislators vulnerable to accusations of listening to the nutcase/tinfoil fringe, if they do listen to us.
What needs to be designed is a bill that can be handed to these 'upright, respectable' people that has universal enough appeal that the 'mainstream' groups (the League of Women Voters, the DNC, maybe even the RNC?, the governor of Florida, etc) can get behind it and give this the 'respectability' these people need for cover. I hate that it's this way, but it is. Let's recognize it, and work through it. It is possible to be honest and discreet. Would we get the credit? Hell, no. Would we get the bill? Maybe. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 1179
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 6:09 am: |
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Sorry for the duplicate post. I disagree that a good omnibus bill is dangerous. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3629
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 8:33 am: |
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Why not develop a number of separate bills? Keep things simple and clear--and prioritize them. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3630
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 8:33 am: |
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E.g. first one could establish citizens' right to observe and record elections, and right to receive election information that is complete and timely.
(Message edited by Catherine_a on February 09, 2007) |
Bob Fleischer
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rjf7r
Post Number: 107
Registered: 09-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 10:41 am: |
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Brant, re "What needs to be designed is a bill that can be handed to these 'upright, respectable' people that has universal enough appeal that the 'mainstream' groups ... can get behind it and give this the 'respectability' these people need for cover. I hate that it's this way, but it is."
Interestingly enough, I just had a private correspondence with an EFF staff member, and the way he defends their decision to support Holt II, it seems that they think that that is what they have done, that this is be best politically feasible bill. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 1180
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 1:20 pm: |
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quote:Why not develop a number of separate bills? Keep things simple and clear--and prioritize them.
The problems with this are the following:
What will happen then is what has happened with the Holt Bill, many mentions of doing what is locally customary with paper ballots. (No uniformity, no consistency = no reliable protection).
Also, since ballots are left with the elections officials, you're dealing with the "buying on credit at the company store" problem (they get to keep all the records and are first (and often last arbiters) of what is correct procedure, thereby, through deliberate or sloppy practice or poorly written law, can leave a loophole that you can drive Blackwell's trucks through.
I think that the less you can see the whole plan at one viewing, the more likely it is to get screwed up.
An old axiom is that to really screw something up takes a committee. If you separated this into a bunch of bills that are each open to interpretation separately, then I think we can update the saying to: "To really screw things up takes a committee, to screw it up worse than that, use several committees".
Some things, if written plainly enough can be done separately. The right to watch ballots be counted is a good one to do separately, provided you have a bullet-proof definition of ballot in the legislation. If you don't have the definition of the ballot well enough defined, it can be meaningless. (And for the record, however you make that ballot show choices/get choices recorded on it, I think it needs a physical, individual, probably paper ballot.)
Preaching to the choir, it is a good analogy to liken current, poorly thought out balloting protocols to a house of cards. They just aren't coherent. Many assumptions go into the idea that the house will stand. If any one of these ideas is sufficiently attacked or challenged, the house goes down. Every different bill is an attack point and to be fair, every part of every long bill is an attack point as well. But, if you modify one of several bills in a way that leaves a loophole because of the interdepancies with other bills, isn't it less likely to be spotted/publicized/corrected? I think so.
I think some parts of this can be separate, but you've got to be damn careful of the wording. |
Ben Olasov
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Benolasov
Post Number: 3
Registered: 07-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 9, 2007 - 3:05 pm: |
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from Catherine
"Why not develop a number of separate bills? Keep things simple and clear--and prioritize them."
It seems like one major source of problems is that a bill will start off with standards that seem to suggest a particular implementation instead of an abstract performance specification. If people were to sign off on a set of requirements for what they want to achieve, e.g. "No implementation may be designed in a way that inherently conceals any part of the vote counting process from the voter", I'd imagine it would make it a lot harder to get things wrong.
(Message edited by benolasov on February 09, 2007) |
Jim Eldon
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Vegsledman
Post Number: 28
Registered: 12-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 10, 2007 - 11:01 am: |
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Catherine,
Your 5 points above are an excellent summary of the nontransparency of just about ALL regulatory processes. Do you mind if I use that statement elsewhere ? Respond privately at jimreldon@yahoo.com if you'd like the details. Thanks.
Jim |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3648
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 10, 2007 - 6:14 pm: |
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Hi Jim,
Sure, go ahead. I agree that these are widespread problems.
In Europe they are developing requirements for public participation in decision-making processes (Aarhus convention--which all the EU countries have now signed, except for Ireland). You might find it of interest. |
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