Cynical Nation

Agreed, Barry.

And if one does need an ID card, how do they prove who they are in order to get that ID card?

I couldn't agree more. A free ID card is not a burden or obstacle of any kind.

I would further suggest that citizens be allowed to opt-out of ballot secrecy and have their ID and vote published to the public. If you want to keep your vote a secret, fine. I would like to see my vote and others like me published, which would be 90% of voters, and then the vote could be completely verified.

Sorry, none of anyone's beeswax who I vote for.

Finding out who voted is, I think, as simple as going to your local town clerk to see whether someone showed up to the polls.

I would opt out. As long as people still have the option to keep their ballots secret, I think it's a good idea. These days I'm more worried about my vote not being counted than being politically persecuted for voting the wrong way.

I'll stick to the secret ballot system, thanks.

Electronic voting can be made auditable, and if you look up HR 550 (which has 213 co-sponsors in the House, in addition to its sponsor), you'll see a bill that takes quite a few significant steps in that direction.

I'm all for ensuring the legitimacy of voters' eligibility, and voter IDs sound like a good idea. I don't know what the objections might be beyond the "poll tax" issue, which seems to be covered in this proposal. I'm not up on this legislation or the arguments surrounding it. I don't think fraudulent voting is a terribly big issue, though it is certainly not something I condone. I suspect that it is far easier to change an election result by electronic means than it is by the use of fraudulent voters.

there is no perfect solution. you're going to get complaints of manipulation whether you count votes with humans (Florida 2000) or with Diebold (2004 election). Even the paper receipt thing doesn't make sense since those can be obviously be faked.

The Voter ID was/is EXTREMELY controversial here in Georgia with the split along the same dem/repub line. Those poor old black folks (ooh the trifecta!) happen to live nowhere near a DMV where they can get an ID so now the governor is waiving the ID fee and sending out a stupid ID Van to issue IDs.

Oddly, they are not finding many desperate would-be voters because no one from the government has found them to tell them they need to get one. We need more funding for the Department of Notification of Important Things.

> I suspect that it is far easier to change an election result by electronic means than it is by the use of fraudulent voters.

I seriously doubt it. It would be extremely difficult for me to hack a Diebold machine without a lot of help from the inside, despite being a computer professional myself. OTOH, I could easily vote in any Manhattan precinct I wanted to, despite being legally registered in NJ.

I'm not a Republican, but I worked the GOTV program for Bush in '04. We can tell you almost by name who voted for Bush in Ohio. The Friday before the election, our final count had Bush ahead of Kerry by about 94,000 votes. When the dust settled and we were up 114,000 votes we went back to our database for some post-election analysis. We came to the conclusion that we got almost exactly the number of votes (for Bush) as we anticipated, but the Dems got 20,000 less than they expected.

Now, before you draw the conclusion that this is evidence of voter fraud or hacked machines, note that 20,000 more Kerry votes would not have made a difference. More importantly, we got the numbers we got because we worked our districts very, very hard, and very, very effectively -- as I said, we can probably tell you by name who voted for Bush.

We can also tell you pretty much how and where the Democrats screwed up in Ohio (hint #1: While the Dems were extrapolating likely voter turnout using sophisticated statistical models, the Republicans were going door to door counting noses), but that's not the point. As long as the Democrats can't get their ground game right, the Republicans don't need to hack the machines or jimmy the count. They will turn out more of their voters, and will be better prepared at the polling stations.

(hint #2: On election night, when the TV networks were showing scenes of long lines in Democrat districts and no waiting at Republican polling stations, we got the word to direct the neighborhood organizers to use those scenes to convince Bush supporters that their votes were desperately needed -- even though we knew perfectly well that what the television cameras were actually capturing was the better training, provided at GOP expense, to election workers in Republican voting districts.)

The Democrats can't beat the Republicans with voter fraud or machine hacking because the Republicans always know, with amazing precision, who voted for them. The Republicans don't need to hack the machines for the same reason. I guarantee you that if -- and this is looking increasingly unlikely -- the Republicans lose this year, there will be less soul-searching than database searching going on at 310 First Street.

"I don't think fraudulent voting is a terribly big issue, (DBK)...Really?

If you get the chance, you should check out Votescam: The Stealing of America
by James M. Collier, Kenneth F. Collier

http://www.amazon.com/Votescam-Stealing-James-M-Collier/dp/0963416308/ref=sr_11_1/103-3539468-2619845?ie=UTF8

It's a great book and it paistakingly documents the longstanding practice of voter fraud, election-rigging.

"While the Dems were extrapolating likely voter turnout using sophisticated statistical models, the Republicans were going door to door counting noses), but that's not the point. As long as the Democrats can't get their ground game right, the Republicans don't need to hack the machines or jimmy the count."

Same thing happened in NYC.

The first Dinkins Vs Guiliani's election was very, very close.

In that election, which Dinkins won, there was widespread reports of voter fraud and in many spots dead people managed to vote.

In the second election (Guiliani's first win) the Guiliani campaign used NYPD & FDNY volunteers to monitor polling places throughtout the city, but especially in minority aread.

You can send in your own poll watchers to any polling place in NYC, so long as they don't engage in any electioneering.

The result was that far fewer votes were counted for David N Dinkins - I guess the dead can't vote in the presence of poll watchers.

Guiliani won by a fairly large margin.

They eliminated a lot of voter fraud by merely providing an impartial poll watching presence.

Really? You couldn't hack a Diebold? Everyone else can!

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=diebold+hacking

"I am convinced that an eighth-grade student could do it" ...

I has been demostrated repeatedly that the machine can be hacked without a trace.

Also, it is senseless to point to Democratic voter fraud without mentioning the strong Republican inclination (Florida for example) to "accidentally" use bogus lists of "felons" to deny legal votes, moving polling places at the last minute, last minute detours, police intimidation, and other forms of interference to suppress voting in Democratic strongholds.

I've worked on several Republican campaigns. Both sides cheat. Unchecked, Democrats have the edge no doubt, but Republicans cheat too if nobody is looking.

A friend and I had the job of trying to stop the same busload of voters, with inner city thugs as escorts, from going to every precinct downtown and voting 30 times each. The thugs would go in and intimidate the poll workers (if necessary, some poll workers were happy to help in election fraud).

> "I am convinced that an eighth-grade student could do it" ...

Yeah, if the eighth-grader had already written and tested the malicious code to introduce, which in turn would require a an intimate knowledge of the system's proprietary API, and if he were able to gain access to the machine, take it offline, and futz around with it for a while then, sure, he could "hack" it. In practice, however, those are pretty big "ifs" for school kid to overcome.

I particularly like this quote from the link Bailey was kind enough to provide (emphasis added):

"Thompson couldn’t hack into the system from the outside. So Sancho gave him access to the central machine that tabulates votes and to the last school election at Leon County High."

"I particularly like this quote from the link Bailey was kind enough to provide (emphasis added):

"Thompson couldn’t hack into the system from the outside." WF)

Barely has an enchanting habit of posting things that refute the very points he's trying to make.

It's sort of a public service, really.

He wasn't able to hack it from the outside, but others were, if you had bothered to check all the links.

Somebody will have access to the main system, right? The guy wrote sent five instructions and changed the vote. That would take about 30 seconds, right?

This was WORSE than hacking the individual units. The was the MAIN system that tabulated ALL the votes. An election can be stolen with 30 seconds access to a single computer.

I work on a military contract -- weapons systems, actually -- and we have this magnet for trashing hard drives. I bet I could "hack" one of the polling place units with that, no problem.

There is no paper trail. You don't have to get into the box. All you have to do is corrupt the data.

I wonder why the neocons are so VERY protective of their little election theft box. Sure, every vote MUST have an ID, but on the other hand, but OMG! No paper trail PLEASE!

Bush would have lost both elections with a good paper trail.

You know it neocons, that is why you fight for a non-accountable system for non-accountable criminal traitor chimp Prez.

"You know it neocons, that is why you fight for a non-accountable system for non-accountable criminal traitor chimp Prez." (BH)
"the House has just passed HR 4844, which takes the no-brainer step of requiring voters to demonstrate that they are, in fact, who they say they are. Unless we make some reasonable effort to restrict voting privileges to legitimate voters, all other talk about "voting integrity" is moot. Asking for valid identification does not, frankly, seem like a very onerous burden to bear in pursuit of fraud-free elections.

House Democrats, however, opposed the measure 192 to 4. I'm sorry, but I think that's embarrassing and pathetic. I don't see a single legitimate argument to justify the Democrats' lopsided rejection of this measure. (Barry)
192 to 4...the idea that Republicans favor paperless electronic voting machines must be another baseless opinion of yours, you mistake for a fact.

At any rate, this would seem to show otherwise, "A week after the primary election was plagued by human error and technical glitches, Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) called yesterday for the state to scrap its $106 million electronic voting apparatus and revert to a paper ballot system for the November election."

(Thursday, September 21. 2006)

http://blackboxvoting.com/s9/

Bush would have lost both elections with a good paper trail.

Bullshit.

Very succinct, accurate and well put CRB.

JMK is wrong. I don't even read what he says anymore.

I think Bailey is wrong, but I don't know because I don't read what he says anymore.

Can somebody read his post and tell me whether he is wrong or not? Thanks.

I didn't read his post either, but a statistical sampling of his previous comments allows me to say with a 99.7% certainty that it was wrong anyway.

If you are trying to hurt my feeling it won't work, because I don't read any of your posts anymore.

Clinton kicked Wallace's ass, just like he kicked ass on all the Repulineocons time after time.

That is why you all hate him.

Don't bother responding, because I have you all on ignore.

LOL, stupid is as stupid does.

OK, can anyone find the obvious difference in these three posts?
"I think Bailey is wrong, but I don't know because I don't read what he says anymore.

"Can somebody read his post and tell me whether he is wrong or not? Thanks." (WF)
If you are trying to hurt my feeling it won't work, because I don't read any of your posts anymore." (BH)
HAS READ THEM!

The line, "If you are trying to hurt my feeling..." implies an implicit knowledge of the posts he claims not to have read.

Par for the course for a self-proclaimed "Conservative" who supports one of the more Liberal Governors of Michigan in recent memory, while assailing a true Conservative icon (John Engler) and one of the architects of the wildly successful Welfare Reforms that went national when Newt Gingrich & Co. took over Congress in January of 1995.

And for the record WF, yes Bailey's post was wrong as CRB pointed out.

Barely Hanging claimed a "paper trail would've over-turned both the 2000 & 2004 elections."

Even the contested 2000 election, which centered around a Florida recount, was a legitimate Bush win...even the NY Times acknowledged that "Bush won the legal recount."

The U.S. SC merely upheld Florida State Law that banned hand recounts of machine ballots...but as the NY Times (I KNOW, a "discredited source") has acknowledged, Bush won the hand recount hands down.

I can't help it, I just love it when Liberal extremists contradict themselves.

What appears to be a "contradiction" to a retarded person is common sense to the more intelligent, JMK. While your single stranded DNA labors to flop out of the shallow end of the gene pool and join reality as experienced by those with a functioning neocortex, you continue to blither on like Sean Hannity on meth.

I didn't say I supported Granholm at all. I merely pointed out the obvious corruption of a horrible do-nothing Republican governor who failed to axe the Single Business Tax that you whinge on about during his THREE TERMS, with a Republican congress.

Instead, he pandered to the insurance companies that bribed, I mean supported his campaigns.

Also, when you constantly characterize the New York Times as nothing but lies, by what logic can you use the same paper in buttressing your noodle-firm non-points? Is the New York Times the standard of proof now?

Again, JMK, you have me confused with the mythical "Liberal extremist" that haunts your dreams and makes you so afraid. I never said a word about the New York Times. I certainly don't read it.

You ignorantly assailed John Engler and inanely lauded Jennifer Granholm.

You were wrong and couldn't refute a single one of the facts that I brought up - especially that under Engler something that has neither happened before nor since, HAPPENED - Michigan's unemployment rate was BELOW the national average during his tenure.

"(W)hen you constantly characterize the New York Times as nothing but lies..."

Wrong again!

What I said was the NY Times is a discredited source, and the likes of Jayson Blair and Walter Duranty both proved that, so have the editors that allowed, even encouraged the promulgation of that fictionalized news.

I quote organs like that and the WaPo and the NY Times with caution and make sure that the stories I quote from such sources are independently corroborated.

Barely, you're about as "Conservative" as Link Chafee or Ted Kennedy, that is to say, not at all.

"...(T)he New York Times...I certainly don't read it."

No kidding!

It seems as though you don't read much at all.

I do read the NY Times (with caution), the WSJ, IBD, etc.