Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Sunday 10/16/05

[Mnemosyne]

All members welcome and encouraged to participate.

Please post Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News on this thread.

If you can:

1. Post stories and announcements you find on the web.



2. Post stories using the "Election Fraud and Reform News Sources" listed here:


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x397093



3. Re-post stories and announcements you find on DU, providing a link to the original thread with thanks to the Original Poster, too.



4. Start a discussion thread by re-posting a story you see on this thread.







If you want to know how post "News Banners" or other images, go here:



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=371233#371391

Link to previous Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x397112




All previous daily threads are available here:

http://www.independentmediasource.com/DU_archives/du_2004erd_el_ref_fr_thr_calenders.htm











Please "Recommend" for the Greatest Page (it's the link just below).

[Mnemosyne]

1. New Hampshire: What was DeLay's money for?

AP reports: Democrats say three donations made to the New Hampshire Republican Party just before Election Day 2002 raise troubling questions about who paid for a scheme to jam phone lines set up to get voters to the polls.

Rep. Tom DeLay's political action committee, Americans for a Republican Majority, gave $5,000 to the state Republican Party on Nov. 1, 2002, four days before the election in which Republican John Sununu won his Senate seat by defeating former Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen.

Four days earlier, the state party received $5,000 each from two Indian tribes represented by Jack Abramoff, a lobbyist with close ties to DeLay. Together, the three donations nearly equal the $15,600 Republicans paid a telemarketing firm to make repeated hang-up calls to the Democratic phone banks. -

http://www.votelaw.com/blog/

[Mnemosyne]

2. Oregon Top-Two Proponents Re-Write their Initiative

On October 12, the Oregon proponents of a “top-two” election system submitted a new version of their initiative. “Top-two” means an election system in which all voters get the same primary ballot, and that primary ballot lists all candidates for an office, regardless of party. Then, only the two highest vote-getters can ever appear on the November ballot.

Washington voters passed a “top-two” system last year, but this year a U.S. District Court declared it unconstitutional. Washington is appealing. In the meantime, the Oregon proponents have now changed their version of “top-two”. The new Oregon initiative will say that political parties have a right to tell elections officials which candidate or candidates for any particular office may have the party name printed next to the candidate’s name, on the ballot.

Presumably, if the new Oregon version passes, major and minor parties alike would then set up nominating conventions, and only the candidate chosen at the convention could have that party’s name on the primary ballot.

The new version does nothing about the other legal problem for “top two”, which is that congress passed a law in 1872 telling the states that they must hold congressional elections in November, with any run-off to be later than November. Furthermore, US Supreme Court ballot access jurisprudence says that candidates for Congress cannot be kept off the November ballot if they have a modicum of support and if they hold the qualifications to be a member of congress, and if they have not sabotaged their own political party by “sore loser” behavior. “Top two” would require candidates to have voter support of approximately 30% to be listed on the November ballot, far too high to be constitutional.

http://www.ballot-access.org/

[Mnemosyne]

3. Internet Voting Alive and Well in Europe

Election Updates

New research, analysis and commentary on election reform, voting technology, and election administration.

Internet Voting Alive and Well in Europe


Many people have written off Internet voting. After the Department of Defense cancelled SERVE and the critiques of electronic voting became quite intense, little thought was given to this form of voting technology.

However, the Internet voting environment in Europe is much more dynamic than in the United States. Right now, Internet voting is being done nationwide in Estonia. Articles in EurActiv.com and the Associated Press discuss the system and its functionalities. The Estonian system is just one part of a larger e-government system that provides all residents with a digital signature on a key card that is used for a person to authenticate themselves (in conjunction with a PIN) for a wide array of government services, like filing taxes. The government in Estonia has been quite supportive of expanded e-government, obviously, and with 1.3 million voters, they are at a scale that allows them to conduct full trials of e-voting that would be equivalent to testing it in a medium to small state here in the U.S.

As the Financial Mirror describes the system:

The proposed e-voting process is relatively simple: you sit at a computer, slide your ID card through an electronic reader which calls up a special election website showing candidates in your constituency, and then select one with the click of a mouse. To confirm your choice, you must enter a PIN number - and that's it. The biggest difference compared to a paper ballot is that the voter can think over his decision and change it a countless number of times before the polls close. Alternatively, he or she can go into a polling station and fill out a traditional ballot slip - thereby canceling the e-vote.

Everything is not all wine and roses in Europe with Internet voting. In the UK, Internet voting trials scheduled for 2006 are being postponed because of concerns about fraud that arose in all-mail-paper balloting this year and last, and because small-scale trials have been expensive in the past.



http://electionupdates.caltech.edu/blog.html

[Mnemosyne]

4. Recounts: From Punch Cards to Paper Trails

I didn't find this on search. Hope it's not a dupe.



Recounts: From Punch Cards to Paper Trails
electionline.org’s 12th Election Reform Briefing reveals that 25 states will require the use of paper trails in time for the 2008 presidential election, and of these 15 states will use them as the official record in a recount of votes. How or if they would be used in recounts -- and how difficult that process might be -- are questions many states still need to answer.

report here:
http://www.electionline.org/Portals/1/Publications/ERIPBrief12.SB370updated.pdf

[Mnemosyne]

5. Iraqi Charter Seems Assured of Passage

By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press Writer 8 minutes ago

BAGHDAD, Iraq -
Iraq's constitution seemed assured of passage Sunday despite strong opposition from Sunni Arabs, who turned out in surprisingly high numbers in an effort to reject it. The U.S. military said five American soldiers were killed by a bomb blast west of Baghdad on referendum day.


The constitution's apparent victory was muted, though, by the prospect that the result might divide the country further.

Rejection seemed more unlikely based on initial vote counts in the three key provinces that Sunni Arab opponents were relying on to vote "no" to defeat the constitution.

The last of those provinces, Diyala, supported the draft by 70 percent to 20 percent, with 10 percent of the ballots rejected as irregular, said Adil Abdel-Latif, the head of the election commission in Diyala.

more:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051016/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq

[Mnemosyne]

6. Little Violence As Iraqis Vote on Charter

Little Violence As Iraqis Vote on Charter


By LEE KEATH, Associated Press WriterSat Oct 15, 6:22 PM ET

Sunni Arabs voted in surprisingly high numbers on Iraq's new constitution Saturday, many of them hoping to defeat it in an intense competition with Shiites and Kurds over the shape of the nation's young democracy after decades of dictatorship. With little violence, turnout was more than 66 percent in the three most crucial provinces.

The constitution still seemed likely to pass, as expected. But the large Sunni turnout made it possible that the vote would be close or even go the other way, and late Saturday it appeared at least two of a required three provinces might reject it by a wide margin.

Washington hopes the constitution will be approved so that Iraqis can form a legitimate, representative government, tame the insurgency and enable the 150,000 U.S. troops to begin to withdraw.

After polls opened at 7 a.m., whole families turned out at voting stations, with parents carrying young children, sometimes in holiday clothes. Men and women lined up by the hundreds in some places or kept up a constant traffic into heavily bunkered polls, dressed in their best in suits and ties or neatly pressed veils — or in shorts and flip-flops, weary from the day's Ramadan fast.

more:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051015/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq&printer=1

[Mnemosyne]

7. Miers' testimony in the Dallas voting rights case

Sunday, 16 October 2005
Miers' testimony in the Dallas voting rights case

AP reports: Miers' comments were a brief moment in lengthy testimony during a lawsuit in federal district court in Dallas. Black leaders challenged the way city council members were elected in Dallas. Miers had been elected to the council in 1989, just as the battle over racially charged redistricting plans was heating up. The lawsuit led to a court-supervised redistricting plan that enlarged the council from 11 to 14 seats.

Miers testified that the city should keep some at-large seats whose members were elected by voters citywide, not just from small districts. Black leaders opposed at-large districts, viewing them as a tool to limit minority representation.

Miers said at-large members can consider the entire city's interests while politicians elected from local districts must also consider the interests of their own district.

Miers said, however, that one drawback of at-large seats was that many successful citywide candidates came from north Dallas, which is predominantly white and more affluent than south Dallas.

more:
http://www.votelaw.com/blog/

[Mnemosyne]

8. Video: Vote Count Underway in Iraq

http://www.cnn.com/video/

[Wilms]

9. Would you trust a bank that refused to issue ATM receipts?

People for Fair Elections:

Thanks to garybeck:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=397152&mesg_id=397152

[Wilms]

10. OH: Diebold critics keep up protest of voting machine pick

Sunday, October 16, 2005
Julie Carr Smyth
Plain Dealer Bureau
Columbus

-- With less than a month to go before another general election, a determined core of protesters refuses to relent on the perceived risks of Diebold Election Systems' voting machines.

They are expected to continue to barrage Cuyahoga County elections officials with questions about the county's chosen machine maker at a hearing Monday -- though they are fighting a decision that has already been made.

They don't expect to be welcomed.

"Be prepared to be demeaned, ridiculed and criticized," activist and Case Western Reserve University mathematics lecturer Victoria Lovegren warned in an e-mail to fellow Diebold critics. "Be prepared to be told that you are impugning the integrity of the board. Be prepared to be asked to Prove It!' "...

snip/more

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/112945506310060.xml&coll=2

Thanks to Algorem:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x397186

[Mnemosyne]

11. Ballots are far from cast

By JAMES M. ODATO, Capitol bureau
First published: Sunday, October 16, 2005

Robert Witco, sporting a business suit, conservative tie and wing tips, fires into his sales pitch for replacing New York's old lever voting machines with elections equipment never before seen in America.

"We're so far ahead of our competition," says Witco, unveiling the LibertyVote machine he thinks every election district in New York could use.

In a spiel he has given countless times this year for elections officials across the state, Witco, 40, talks about the ease of using and storing his compact, computerized machine, the ability to scroll to English or Spanish, and soon, Mandarin, and the reasonable cost -- about $7,000 per unit.

"It folds into a suitcase," he says, adding that his competitors' machines are bulky -- weighing about 300 pounds -- and more complicated. And the Liberty is one of only a handful certified by the National Association of State Election Directors under the latest federal standards.


more:
http://timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=409409&category=CAPITOL&BCCode=HOME&newsdate=10/16/2005

[Mnemosyne]

12. ID card scanning system riddled with errors

Hi-tech equipment could misidentify one in 1,000 people, say experts
By Marie Woolf, Francis Elliott and Sophie Goodchild
Published: 16 October 2005

One in 1,000 people could be inaccurately identified by the hi-tech scans being planned for national ID cards, experts have warned.

The Government is planning to use face, iris and fingerprint scans to identify people on ID cards. But studies have found that being scanned in the wrong type of light or in shadow could lead to an inaccurate ID, because biometric technology is flawed.

Internal reports for the Government warned that manual labourers whose fingertips are worn or nicked, could find their fingerprints are not recognised. Men who go bald risk being identified as someone else, experts say. Pianists, guitarists and typists - whose fingerprints can be worn down - could also face inaccurate readings.

Government trials have found that the biometrics of black, elderly and disabled people have a higher chance of being incorrectly matched against their true ID. People with eye problems also have a relatively high chance of inaccurate identification.

more:

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/article320003.ece

[Wilms]

13. Federal grant aims at e-voting system reforms

From the Oct. 12-18, 2005, issue

Federal grant aims at e-voting system reforms

By Joe Baker, Senior Editor

Efforts to reform the American election system continue. In August, the National Science Foundation (NSF) announced it was awarding a grant of $7.5 million to a team from Rice University and five other prestigious research institutions to evaluate flaws in the current electronic voting systems.

Dan Wallach, an e-voting expert, was quoted in an NSF press release as saying: “It’s no exaggeration to say that voting systems are one of the pillars of democracy. The basic question is: ‘How can we employ computer systems as trustworthy election systems when we know computers are not totally reliable, totally secure or bug-free?”

In voting,” said Wallach, who is an associate professor of computer science at Rice, “this is complicated by the fact that potential adversaries include everyone from the voting system designers, election officials and voters, to political operatives, hackers and foreign agents.”

snip/more

http://www.rockrivertimes.com/index.pl?cmd=viewstory&cat=2&id=11355

[Wilms]

14. US Embassy in Venezuela revokes visa of Smartmatic (Sequoia) owner

US Embassy in Venezuela revokes visa of Smartmatic owner

From | Descifrado

16.10.05 | Antonio Mujica, CEO of Smartmatic, got very upset Friday morning whilst trying to renew his US tourist visa. The entrepreneur waited a good while before being called by a US Embassy's consular official, who informed him that his visa had not been approved. Mujica, very crossed, requested, in English, explanations as to the reasons for it. He argued that he was legal, that he had an important company in the USA and that he had to travel with urgency to that country.

The American Consul's rejection was categoric as a very disturbed Mujica left the embassy without uttering any words in Spanish or English.

snip/no more

http://www.vcrisis.com/index.php?content=letters/200510160629

Thanks to JohnGideon for providing the background and link:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x397313