Newsweek: Four More Years to Finally Get it Right [View All]

[smartvoter]

Four More Years to Finally Get It Right

In the new devices, a voter has no way of proving that his or her choice is reported in the final tally

Greg Mably for Newsweek
Election '08: 'The issue is voter confidence'
By Steven Levy

NewsweekDec. 6 issue - Almost a month after the presidential election, I'm still getting missives from people who insist that things don't smell right. They draw on a litany of irregularities that are well-circulated in the blogosphere, the Blue States and maybe even subterranean corners of the Red nation. Some are of the dead-canary-in-the-coal-mine variety, like the computer in Ohio that delivered Bush 4, 258 votes when only 638 humans actually cast ballots. Others are more sweeping, like the charges that e-voting peculiarities could have somehow lost Kerry 260,000 votes in Florida. Not all of these people charge fraud, but clearly many believe the worst. And if they go to the popular blackboxvoting.org site, a headline assures them IT'S OK TO SAY THE F-WORD.

It would be easy to dismiss this bunch as a society of paranoids. Indeed, their complaints seem beyond the pale when key e-voting critics claim that despite some problems, there's no evidence that the outcome was affected. Anyway, at this point, even pictures of Karl Rove personally hacking Diebold machines wouldn't budge the incumbent from the White House. Is it time for these folks to shut up already?

To the contrary, their curmudgeonry serves an important purpose.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6595385/site/newsweek/