How do we fight Black Box Voting????

[Milo_Bloom]

I understand getting the provisional ballots counted and hopefully they will be enough to win it for Kerry, but what about what happened in Florida.

Exit polls shows it for Kerry and * wins it by 5 points? Hell no. With 20 million NEW voters in the election * may win the popular vote? HELL NO! Moveon, ACT, VFC, Rock the Vote, Michael Moore all working hard to sign up new voters and they broke for Bush? HELL NO!!!!

Something stinks WAAAAY beyond 150,000 --> 600,000 extra votes to be counted in Ohio, but how can we fight phantom votes vanishing into the ether?

What is the strategy? How do you fight something you can't see?

A big part of this fight is going to be convincing enough people in this country that we have the RIGHT to fight. They are going to see the popular vote, the EV and think "there go the dems again, trying to fight election results".

We need evidence... LOTS OF EVIDENCE. As I discovered earlier, CNN has been changing their exit poll results to reflect the actual vote counts. We need as many of those exit polls from BEFORE they changed them. The very fact that they changed them suggests something stinks.

Michael Moore will be there for us, but we are going to need to supply him with information and evidence!

Is there any way we can organize an effort to gather all the evidence we have that something fishy is going on beyond that gut feeling and the basic knowledge that there is NO WAY ON EARTH * GOT >50% of the vote!!!

[awgoodkitty]

1. demand modem records

demand hard drives.

And don't vote on those damned things.

[Matilda]

3. I think it says in the company's contract with the state

that only the company has access to the records.

Is it possible that a court could over-rule that? (Although I don't
suppose a court in Florida would).

[awgoodkitty]

8. oh God, this is insane!

Any state that agreed to that should be sued.

[lanparty]

15. Doesn't matter ...

A hard drive can be zeroed and rewritten with no trace of the original file. A

[phiddle]

2. State by State, county by county

[gumby]

4. Excuse me,

but YOU can't demand anything in Bushworld.

Sorry to be the snit of reality.

[ethereal]

7. Paper Receipts

We must ORGANIZE and fight for paper receipts for every vote cast. If I can get a receipt for a $10 withdrawal, by God, the technology exists to get a receipt for my Presidential vote.

[Chicago Democrat]

5. Sauron wins in Middle Earth

Sauron wins in Middle Earth
Hey everyone buy an Escalade
Fuck mother earth
rape your mother
and poison your children
damn you forever suburban fat white man

[0rganism]

6. We physically destroy any and all DRE machines that lack paper-trails

We hunt them down and crush them with a sledge hammer.

That is the only way.

[Ohio rules]

10. WTF ? get a life nt

[Ohio rules]

9. Ohio is a puch card voting state

This is the state of the hard copy receipt

[DARE to HOPE]

11. Here's an idea that would be possible--

I haven't seen the final numbers for New Hampshire. But didn't the numbers end up VERY CLOSE after the exit polls showed Kerry 11% ahead?

There are not that many people in New Hampshire. If they selected the most respected people in their state to count the vote, then have them all vote once more, just for President. Have them vote on a single piece of paper, write either Bush or Kerry (or Nader) and then count them BY HAND.

Then--compare these results with the exit polls. That would constitute PROOF of tampering if these results were so very different from the numbers they got today.

One state, with a good reputation, would give the reason for doing other states that are in question over again. This is too important. We CANNOT give up THIS TIME!!

God lead us all.

faith_hope_love

P.S. There are SO MANY numbers that do NOT add up this time.

[illuminaughty]

12. The numbers don't even come close to adding up

I'm interested in seeing what poll watchers have to say tomorrow.
My precinct in K.C. had a huge turnout. African American and young.
It was like that all over the city. Never have seen anything like it.

I can't speak for everyone at MoveOnPac but this doesn't pass the smell or the global test. IT IS BULLSHIT. We must fight.

[mulethree]

13. wide open source code is necessary

If you get paper trails then you do some random audits to compare paper trail to electronic total - not just useful for recounts - they're key for auditing and real-world testing.

But you still need the code published to find those bugs where a Bush vote is showing up when Kerry is selected and so forth. It won't just be double checked but checked 10,000 times over for the bragging rights of having found a new "bug". Don't use MS Access or any of that crud except some multi-platform GUI portability package.

Putting names on a screen, with some exclusive-or logic, and tallying the results, is a Junior-high-school programming exercise.

Then each election differs just by a ballot file with the information on races, ballot initiatives, candidates and x-or conditions and you post that for scrutiny as soon as the ballot-access deadlines come.

[lanparty]

14. Challenge the validity of e-ballots ...

OK, here is the strategy. Challenge ALL votes on pure electronic voting machines because THERE IS NO PROOF of the marks and choices that the voters made!!!! I seriously shit you not!!!!

Florida Election law states that elections within a certain margin MUST be recounted. In the event of a recount, there is NOTHING to canvass, there is only a COUNT!!! A record in a database does NOT constitute a ballot!!!!

In essense the act of voting on an electronic voting machine SPOILS one's vote because their is no physical record of it that can be examined and verified!!!!

If the strategy works, offer a deal to allow these voters who are affected to use "provisional" ballots since their votes were spoiled beyond their control!!! If not, just blank out the results of BBV since it cannot be examined! Nor can the procedures used to mark and store the ballot be testified to by election workers. They didn't see it happen. Nor did they see any ballots being placed in a ballot box. They CANNOT testify since they have NO IDEA what is going on inside those boxes.

If you drag in a programmer to testify what happened in the boxes, he cannot tell you. He only knows about the code he wrote. He cannot testify as to the condition of the "machine" (in this context a machine is a set of software programs inside a generic computational device (computer)) since he wasn't their to witness it. The actual machine is no proof since a machine can be completely changed with ZERO proof as to that change.

Beyond this, the voter has no way to tell if their choices were properly recorded. They did NOT see any marks being recorded. They did not see their e-ballot placed in the virtual ballot box. The ONLY possible record of the voters intent is a sworn affidavite of the voters intention!!!!

e-ballots are NON-Ballots!!! They don't exist. Unless they are recorded and verified on paper by the user, they are simply a COUNT. The ballot itself only exists briefly on a computer screen and is subsequently destroyed by the machine that created. The only remaining artifact is a COUNT!!!!!!

[DARE to HOPE]

16. YES!! Send it to Kerry!!

They need to hire a good statistician and hear testimony on BBVs for the public to understand this. Then fight it on the basis of Florida's law, with the Florida Supreme Court to back us.

[KRose]

17. Every state should pass laws requiring paper trail!!!!!!!!

Democrats should - push for ballot inatives and representive sponsored laws that force computer voting machines to provide a paper trail - one to the voter - one to the polling place, and one to the Secretary of State. We can't win an election unless we are sure that the election is fair!!!!!!!!!!