Voter Database Glitches Could Disenfranchise Thousands

[KeepItReal]

Source: Wired

Electronic voting machines have been the focus of much controversy the last few years. But another election technology has received little scrutiny yet could create numerous problems and disenfranchise thousands of voters in November, election experts say.

This year marks the first time that new, statewide, centralized voter-registration databases will be used in a federal election in a number of states.

The databases were mandated in the 2002 Help America Vote Act, which required all election districts in a state or U.S. territory to consolidate their lists into a single database electronically accessible to every election office in the state or territory.

But the databases, some created by the same companies that make electronic voting machines, aren't federally tested or certified and some have been plagued by missed deadlines, rushed production schedules, cost overruns, security problems, and design and reliability issues.

Read more: http://www.wired.com/politics/onlinerights/news/2008/09/voter_registration?currentPage=1

---

These GOP-Run election companies *stay* one step ahead in terms of new ways of keeping Democrats from having their votes count.

With this "database" they seem to be gunning for absentee ballots, also.

They misdirect the media with fake Democratic "Voter Fraud" while the GOP performs mass election fraud/theft.

[annabanana]

1. BIG -keep this KICKed- from me!

They CAN'T win without cheating and they know it. Therefore they will push every single method and they will push it hard.

It will be vote-flipping on the paperless DREs . . .
It will be Democratic neighborhoods shortchanged on the number of available machines . . .
It will be electronic tabulators that gather results from optical-scan machines . . .
It will be caging the *deployed*, the *foreclosed on*, the *absentees* and *college students*

And one of the newest, most insidious caging "opportunities"..
People whose name appear differently on different official data-bases..

Oh Married Ladies out there? . . Is your name hyphenated on your state driver's license and NOT hyphenated on your federal tax forms?.. Are there any official databases that you never bothered to change to your married name? All of these could be reasons for your name to be dropped from the voter roles.

Asian Americans? How many ways have you had to "adjust" your name to fit into the "Middle initial" protocols of Western computer forms? You may have voted at the same location for YEARS and suddenly find your name missing this year.

While the Republicans have been distracting us with false cries of "Voter Fraud" (as if millions of undocumented aliens are going to risk everything by showing up for something like a National election when they are afraid to report being robbed) they have been screwing us with large scale election fraud for years.

I was heartened to hear that the Obama campaign was fighting some election fraud but there is MUCH MORE to battle.

[eagertolearn]

35. We all know this and how can republicans who are honest law abiding

citizens go a long with this. I see many of the religious groups blindly supporting the GOP and all I can think is that all these people have been brainwashed. Many have that zombie look...it's enough to give me nightmares! The election fraud is why we have to win by a lot. Why haven't we taken care of this yet? When we get Obama and everyone else in this has to be one of the first things they do...Secure our elections so we can have a real democracy!

[Politicalboi]

45. Some brainwashed

And some who don't care that they steal elections if they can get what they want. I think to prevent all this voter fraud is to have a Dept of Elections Office. It could be run like a DMV and people have a week to vote in a building that is monitored and doesn't require ID but a fingerprint. Those who can't drive in could be sent an official ballot that will be either mailed or taken back by your postal carrier and counted. This should stay on the Federal level. I mean you can't run a post office out of your house so polling places should stay on a Federal level at all times and monitored by all parties.

[clear eye]

49. States rights prevents that but there is another way

to make things fairer. There can be a federal law mandating that the BOEs everywhere be civil service positions, from the top director right on down (removing that duty from the SOS), and that precincts either use mechanical lever machines (the safest--eliminates tabulating machines), or hand-counted ballots--(old-fashioned forms of vote theft have then to be dealt with, like laws requiring ballots to be counted at polling places immediately after polls close, and strict chain of custody for ballot boxes for recounts).

Good top-level civil service people should make a good faith effort to promote state laws preventing people from being thrown off the rolls because they put their middle initial on their driver's license but not on their voter registration application or vice versa, or similar normal discrepancies. The people need to make sure their state legislatures pass those laws. Of course Election Day needs to be a national holiday so that there will be more people available to monitor polling places and so delays at the polls or an error with a registration won't result in disenfranchisement of most voters due to needing to return to work.

[gademocrat7]

2. k & r

[Judi Lynn]

3. Kicking.

:kick: :kick: :kick: :kick:

[tom_paine]

4. NOT GLITCHES!

When all the "glitches" advantage one side and disadvantage the other...THEY ARE NOT GLITCHES!

And the Bushies don't "misdirect" the media. At the editorial and upper-level decision making levels, they KNOW what their job is, or it is internalized so deeply they don;t have to "know" it with their conscious minds.

Bushie Conventional Wisdom + Bushie Political Correctness = Bushie False Reality Generating Machine

Living here these last eight years, and studying "on the ground" diaries of the Rise of Hitler and the Nazis, I can now say conclusively that most probably DON'T know exactly what they are doing, who they are REALLY serving.

Like Dick Gregory and the mountain of of "journalists" who's "Conventional Wisdom" is now programmed with It is not the journalists' responsibility to debunk lies, the whole point of Bushiganda and every other piece of Deep Penetration Advertising is to change people and societies at the subconscious level, without them ever realizing they were changed (most dramatically, usually) and thus unable to defend against it or even think about it.

And it works as well as anything Hitler or Stalin did. With as mendacious goals, if not as violent, and wild, continued success.

No, not glitches. But just TRY to gain access to a place, a "voice", which might allow you to say that in public to 50,000 people or more. Just you try! Or try to get interest, considering the mountains of exposed evidence already publicly available, let alone what could be uncovered by a fully empowered LE investigation, is a Law Enforcement Investigation of any of it.

:rofl:

A Jew would have better luck trying to get on a Nazi Radio Station. A Jew would have better luck trying to convince the Gestapo of launching an investigation into the beatings of Jews.

[bertman]

25. David Gregory, tom_paine. But I remember Dick Gregory, too. (-:

And, of course you're right about this.

I'll say it once again, the Dems are acting like this is going to be overriden by massive voter turnout. NOT.

They'd better start getting a laser focused on this right now; otherwise, it's another "win" for the Neo-cons.

[Bluenorthwest]

31. You mean David Gregory

Dick Gregory is a hero of truth, to be blunt about it, and his voice has been raised during this election cycle for our nominee, Barack Obama. Of course.

[tom_paine]

42. Yes, I meant David Gregory. LOL

Sorry for the insult, Dick Gregory, wherever you are...

[Window]

5. K/R.

[spooked911]

6. goddammit, this is frustrating

we seem powerless to do anything about it

[DCKit]

7. I think our only defense is to get every single Dem to check...

to see if they're going to be able to vote in November.

They build the machines, they keep the lists. What's next, casting our votes for us? Oh, wait, they don't need to since the other two are covered.

[mnhtnbb]

8. How the Repubs plan on stealing yet another election.

[aquart]

9. Surprisingly, all Democrats.

Right?

[d_b]

12. Right.

Damn those 'glitches'.

[Zorra]

65. Yeah, isn't that the most amazing coincidence?

It's almost as if republicans were deliberately rigging the machines to disenfranchise Democrats.

Gosh, maybe Harry and Nancy can write some strongly worded letters to try to prevent this from happening.

[tbyg52]

10. K&R nt

[iamjoy]

11. And With No Match No Vote

they are enforcing this law in Florida. If the information on your voter's registration doesn't match your state ID, you don't get to vote. So, if some one makes a mistake filling out their voter registration form, has poor handwriting (a "1" that looks like a "7" for example) or if the person doing the data entry makes an error - that person can't vote.

You can be sure the GOP will be enforcing this in Democratic leaning precincts more than Republican.

[Triana]

13. Yes. That's why the GOP likes those voter cleansing lists...

...just for that reason: to disenfranchise thousands of Democratic and miniority voters.

[bean fidhleir]

14. And the Dem majority in Congress? What are they doing about it?

What have they EVER done about it?

What are Obama and Biden doing about it?

People, 99 times out of 100 these days, a "(D)" means "(DINO)", not "(Democrat)".

[RoccoR5955]

24. What can the Dems do about it?

The Republicans will filibuster anything that they don't agree with in the Senate. They have filibustered a record 77 times in this session alone. Here's a link to follow: http://voteforamerica.net/editorials/Comments.aspx?ArticleId=21&ArticleName=Senate+GOP+Sets+Filibuster+Record

[bean fidhleir]

37. So what? That's an excuse for the Dems to sit on their asses?

[Anexio]

15. What does "DISENGFRANCHISE" mean, anyway?

I hear this term thrown around all the time. Does it mean "I dont feel my vote is going to count so I'm not going to bother to vote?"

Sounds to me like "disenfranchised" means the same thing as discouraged.

How about these so called disenfranchised voters make sure that they are registered, then on voting day they go vote.

Try not to show up at the polls on election day without registering and expect to vote, Hear that Jacksonville, FL?
Get your ID in order so that what it says on the ID matches where you actually live.
Get informed about the candidates and not just the two people running for President. Every precinct in America has more to vote on than just the POTUS. Who's running for Sheriff? Who will be your next Senator or State House Representative? Got any referendums on the ballot?

GET REGISTERED AN GET INFORMED PEOPLE!

[bettyellen]

70. registering doesn't guarantee that you'll be allowed to vote in quite a few communities....

my local poll used to send me to te wrong boook every single time, saying i wasn;t registered. they didn;t like newcomers voted.
everyone else thought they were simply fuck ups, but they were bought. i had hundred of people I registered pulled out of the books, had to cab it to county to get a court order.
and haven;t you heard of challanging? to some, it;s a sport. and all of this is by design- and it works because people like you think it;s so simple.

[dixiegrrrrl]

16. Story reports a huge error rate.

"The Social Security Administration has acknowledged that matches between its database and voter-registration records have yielded a 28.5 per cent error rate."

like over 1/4 of the names?????????

The only way to combat this is to join/find/volunteer with election people at the community level to have voters check their registration status.

[KeepItReal]

19. That error rate is large *on purpose*. I'm a database programmer.

This is a new way of creating "Purge lists" like they did in Florida. The company (GOP run, of course) would use the vaguest criteria to generate a list of "felons" who were not allowed to vote.

Instead of doing an EXACT match on First Name, Middle Name, Last Name and Social Security Number, these clowns would do something like match using Last Name, First 3 Letters of First Name and *no* Social Security Number. So felon "Joseph J Brown" = citizen "Joseph R Brown" = citizen "Josephine Brown" and neither regular citizen is allowed to vote. Get it?

Using SSN alone would have been fairly precise, right? These folks aren't trying to be accurate, they are trying to prevent as many people from voting as possible.

Remember, if you show up at the polls and your name is not "on the list", you get a provisional ballot, which probably won't be counted in time (if at all) in that election.

[paparush]

22. WHERE NAME_LAST LIKE '%son%' AND AFFILIATION = 'DEM'

goodbye voters.

[barbtries]

17. that's right

they have ways to fuck with this i couldn't have dreamed up in a thousand years. such is their despicability.

[mcollier]

18. This truly scares me

There is no explanation for not having failsafe measures to ensure voter transaction accuracy. If banks can account for transactions by the millions a day, certainly the government can do it. We Must Demand It.

[mak3cats]

20. K & R (n/t)!

[yellerpup]

21. Get the lawyers on this ASAP.

Along with programming experts to explain it and fix it quickly. K&R! :dem:

[clear eye]

51. Sorry, but w/ the laws we have now, it can't be fixed

not at all in states w/ a R-SOS, and only limited damage control can be done in states where the SOS is a Dem. The party affiliation of the county BOE commissioner matters as well. The law was intentionally designed to allow fraudulent enforcement--the R's wouldn't vote for it until it did. With the current law, the only thing that would make the R's think twice about what they're doing would be something that Dems, who are basically law-abiding, wouldn't do, and that would be to retaliate in kind. So real reform has to wait until 2009. The Dem Party Platform is woefully inadequate in its promises on this issue. Even PDAmerica doesn't go further. Don't get me started on them. They have no actual set of reforms they stand for so a candidate can say they are for a single-payer health care knowing that if the party stands behind the Obama plan, hell will freeze over before that happens, and have terrible positions on all other progressive issues and still join the Progressive Caucus in Congress. It will take a roar from the rank and file the likes of which has never ocurred before to get the necessary reform. With the media blacking out protest, it would take something like a general strike.

[yellerpup]

68. With the way the earth is shaking right now

with the stock market in a spin, etc., I can see a general strike happening. I can see an even bigger demonstration if this election is stolen. I can see taking it back. Hi, neighbor! :hi: Thanks very much for filling in the details.

[clear eye]

74. Would be beautiful, wouldn't it? n/t

[lonestarnot]

23. This should be pinned to the front page through November 2!

K & R!

[Left Brain]

50. Yes, I wholeheartedly second that

and I logged in just to say so.

Skinner, what say you? An assurance that this information is exposed to everyone, member or not, who comes to DU between now and the elections.

Nothing -- NO-THING -- is as big an issue as this. Because without the integrity of the vote, the assurance that no one is denied their right to vote, that all votes will be counted and counted correctly, we can kiss all of our other hopes and dreams for change and for justice in this country goodbye.

[RoccoR5955]

26. It's time to scrap these electronic voting machines, AND the databases...

We never needed them before, why do we need them now? That is unless, as the Republicans believe, there has been "widespread voter fraud." Now how do they figure this if they have been winning, unless THEY are the ones doing it?

No matter, we have to get out the vote, because historically the more people that vote, the more Democrats get elected.

[Javaman]

27. 8 years later, 4 years later...what has really changed? not so much. nt

[EFerrari]

46. Things have changed. They've gotten much worse

and especially after they passed HAVA and mandated these digital voter reg databases.

[TooBigaTent]

28. If the system is run by and for the benefit of one side, the other side has to take actions

that counter and negate the advantage the pukes give themselves.

The reality is that you win elections by having more votes than the enemy. That can be accomplished by increasing your total and decreasing the other side's.

There are two fronts in this war:

1) Education and effort to get and keep our voters legit. Yeah, this should not be necessary but the reality of today's Amerika is that the election process is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the GOP.

2) Since we do not have the capability of doing the same kind of voter suppression, other tactics are necessary. I will leave it to your imagination to come up with ways to even the battle.

[clear eye]

53. If the tabulating machines are programmed to flip results in precincts

when they hit a certain % for Dems, our larger margin will just be flipped to increase a Republican theft. Sorry, but that line of thought is just something many people use to make themselves feel less helpless. We need to pursue election law reform w/ a single-minded fervor that no Congressmember will dare ignore. And we'd better educate ourselves quickly about what needs to be done--hint, mandatory paper ballots everywhere is not nearly enough.

Reading BradBlog is a start.

[Botany]

29. vote early or on paper if possible

in Ohio vote on paper .... stay away from those machines ...
In Ohio Sec. of State Jennifer Brunner is suing Diebold over
this crap .... these are not glitches or software mistakes but
just the machines doing what they were programed to do.

[Doctor_J]

47. Early votes and mail-ins tend to get "lost" in Dem precincts

need to think more aggressively, if you know what I mean.

[Botany]

62. Get in touch w/ your state dem party and ask them .....

.... what kind of "election protection" do they have in place ....
if the answer is no ask to speak to the state party chair and
ask about election protection too.

Call the national Dem Party HQ and ask to speak to whomever
is in charge of vote integrity for your state.

In 2006 we flipped Ohio doing this stuff .... we still had races
stolen but we got Gov., A.G., U.S. Senate, and Sec. of State.

[clear eye]

54. That is good advice for people voting in states w/a Dem SOS

although the tabulating machines that consolidate even paper vote tallies are suspect. If your state has an R-SOS, prayer would be as effective as anything.

[Botany]

63. Landslides can not be flipped.

[clear eye]

73. Supporting evidence? n/t

[valerief]

30. Kick

:kick:

[stlsaxman]

32. Demand a Paper ballot at the poll.

[bdamomma]

34. exactly, what is wrong using paper for our ballots

these machines must go, mark your X here how hard is that.

[elocs]

38. I do use a paper ballot that is counted by optical scan.

On the ballot I use a marker to connect the lines that are beside the name of each candidate. Each voter has a ballot that can be easily recounted if there is a need. Last spring here there were a couple of local races that were decided by 1 or 2 votes and it was a simple matter to recount the votes.

Voters are going to be disenfranchised in one way or another and we need to do our best to stop that, but our best way at this time to combat that is to register as massive a number of voters as possible to overwhelm any disenfranchisement.

[clear eye]

56. Please. IMPORTANT. View this video on how machines using a paper trail can be corrupted.

<http://www.cs.ucsb.edu/~seclab/projects/voting/#video>

Similar things can be done to the machines tabulating optical scan ballots, and there have been instances that have convinced experts that they have been done. In Florida hand-counts are outlawed except "in special circumstances". If the law in one area requires a hand count when results are close, all that has to be done to avoid detection is to make sure the theft is really large, like it was in Max Cleland's Georgia Senate race.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

41. ...

[high density]

33. There should be a national law that allows people to register on the day of the election

It would make all of these issues moot.

[norepubsin08]

36. NATIONAL CHECK IF I CAN VOTE DAY

This is one of the reasons America in Solidarity and the MICAH Project in Tacoma, Washington are asking every liberal blog and web site to declare October 1, 2008 as NATIONAL CHECK IF I CAN VOTE DAY. By doing so you issue a call via text, phone or email to all your supporters and subscribers and urge them to check on their voting status. Also from now until October to you send this along to all your friends and supporters. It's a small step, but one that could potentially save us a lot of votes. For more info write to [e-mail] or [e-mail] In Solidarity-Mike Collier

[clear eye]

57. Excellent n/t

[norepubsin08]

60. Hi clear eye

please spread it around!! there is a post about this started at 8:17 this morning that explians it in further detail-Peace-Mike C

[Lefta Dissenter]

39. Wisconsin is a huge target

http://www.madison.com/tct/news/304606

"A lawsuit filed by the state attorney general Wednesday has the potential to slow down voting lines in what promises to be a staggering turnout for the Nov. 4 election, local voting officials said.

"It will disenfranchise voters. That's what we're concerned about," City Clerk Maribeth Witzel-Behl said.

Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen, a Republican, filed the lawsuit Monday in Dane County Circuit Court to get ineligible voters off the rolls. It calls for a court order mandating the Government Accountability Board to cross-check voters who have registered since Jan. 1, 2006, when federal Help America Vote Act legislation required that states implement a voter database to cross-check voter registrations with Department of Transportation, criminal and death records."

"The Progressive group One Wisconsin Now called on Van Hollen to recuse himself from any legal action connected to the general election because his role as GOP presidential candidate John McCain's statewide campaign co-chair constitutes a clear conflict of interest."


Read lots more at the above link. Also see the Elections Board responses at
http://elections.state.wi.us/


...oh, also while you're there, read the elections board letter (dated Sept 16) regarding the bullshit absentee requests that are being sent out by the republican party... :grr: but that's a whole 'nother thread!!!

[dragonlady]

40. Much depends on how your state chooses to treat differences in data

In Wisconsin, it has been found that about 20% of new voters don't match precisely when the registration form is matched against the driver's license database. Differences in middle name versus initial and errors in data entry are the most common reasons. The state board that oversees elections decided that if the local clerks can't track down and solve the reason for a discrepancy, the voter will still be allowed to vote. and not just with a provisional ballot either. They are deciding to err on the side of the voter's right to cast the ballot instead of a strict interpretation to prevent supposed "voter fraud." One impetus for this may be that a test of the system with the names of the six members of the board turned up four mismatches. They saw in a personal way what can happen.

Unfortunately, the Republican attorney general has filed suit against them to force them to check registrations all the way back to the beginning of 2006 (they had ordered checks only starting this summer). All that extra work for state and local staffs would throw the system into chaos, especially if the mismatched voters were also excluded from voting. We do have registration at the polls, but having to reregister all those people on election day would create hassles, long lines, voters having to leave before voting, etc. What Republicans would like to see.

[L0oniX]

43. Truth Justice and the American way ..er I mean the repuke way...

which is cheat, steal, lie, deny, obstruct, molest children and make total hypocrites out of themselves and smile while they are doing it.

See list of GOPedofiles: http://journals.democraticunderground.com/L0oniX/7

[fed_up_mother]

44. K&R

[wvbygod]

48. I read the whole article but missed where any party was blamed

>These GOP-Run election companies *stay* one step ahead in terms of new ways of keeping Democrats from having their votes count.

Where was this mentioned in the article?

[clear eye]

59. What is written below the line is the OPer's commentary.

SOP

[barbtries]

52. not glitches

doing exactly what the motherfuckers want them to do.

[truthisfreedom]

55. It's time to disqualify the GOP from running in races if they can't produce machines that are trust-

worthy. PERIOD.

[Kurovski]

58. K&R

Get ready for the PUMA voters alibi for this latest election theft: all the "gals" for Senator Clinton voted for Palin & Grandaddy at the last minute :eyes: Hopefully it will be a failed attempt. Hopefully Obama and Biden will stand up to any bullshit.

[Imagevision]

61. Repugs pulled this crap 1n 00-04 elections, 8 years later it's still an ace in the hole for them!

[Triana]

64. KICK....this is FAR FAR too under the radar...

...it OUGHT to be front page news!!

[apnu]

66. What else is new?

Everybody (in the M$M, not here) missed the Ohio boat in 2004. Plus all the fun and games in CO. I'm not surprised, the media *sill* doesn't want to cover this story until its after the fact.

[Hekate]

67. They're not "glitches", dammit! They are deliberate encoding crimes!

:argh:

Hekate

[KeepItReal]

75. Precisely.

"Glitches" are when your hard drive crashes...not when 1 + 1 = 4 on a PC screen.

[OakCliffDem]

69. Everybody needs to verify their voter registration

[Zhade]

71. Thousands? When ONE person is disenfranchised, EVERYONE is disenfranchised.

How can you feel your vote counted when you even *suspect* someone somewhere had theirs stolen from them?

[bluedem77]

72. History repeats itself

I've said it all along: Nothing has been done to correct the problems seen in 2004 in Ohio and other locations. Paper trail is necessary and has not been made mandatory. We are in for a rude awakening if nothing is done.

[Qutzupalotl]

76. Check to see if you're registered here: voteforchange.com

http://www.voteforchange.com/

If you're not, sign up!

[newburgh]

77. Oh, Now the Democrats are going to pay attention to this- well it's too late!

and bradblog's just been blowing hot air. Pathetic Democrats- including Kerry and his missing election defense fund millions- have done nothing about this. If they lose this chance because of the screwed up overpriced unaccountable computer voting systems- they deserve it! and more likely are a part of it.

Simple, if Democrats were serious about caring about election fraud, we'd have a Constitutional amendment GUARANTEEING the right to vote! Seems Cynthia McKinney is the ONLY presidential candidate even talking about it. Without verifiable elections this whole democracy is a fraud.

[zeos3]

78. K & R

[chknltl]

79. 'nother KnR Thanks too! eom

[jeff30997]

80. Let's make a prediction:

2008 Presidential Election Result:


Barack Obama: 49%

Johnny McCheat: 666%