Election Reform, Fraud,& Related News Thursday 6/8/2006

Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News June 8, 2006

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:hi:

A Foot in the Door of the Voting Booth

By ELLEN ROSEN
Published: June 8, 2006

With midterm elections only months away, state and local officials nationwide are in the midst of a somewhat troubled transition to electronic voting systems. Two newcomers hope that the security and reliability problems that have emerged will give them a leg up.

The upstarts — AutoMark Technical Systems and Avante International Technology — evolved from the inspiration of two entrepreneurs. AutoMark began with Eugene M. Cummings, a Chicago patent lawyer who conceived a system to assist the disabled in voting. Avante sprang from the persistence of a New Jersey entrepreneur, Kevin Chung, who devised an electronic voting system after he witnessed the troubled presidential election of 2000.

For these men, the immersion in a new and largely unfamiliar industry has been something of a quixotic journey. "We earned our M.B.A. the hard way," said Joseph Vanek, another Chicago lawyer who is co-founder of AutoMark. "But we conceived an idea, made a product and brought it to market."

Mr. Vanek and Mr. Cummings started down their path when a high school friend called Mr. Vanek about an acquaintance who had invented a collapsible ballot box.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/business/08sbiz.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

Feds: Wisconsin can't use Social Security numbers to vote

By TODD RICHMOND
Associated Press Writer

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Wisconsin voters who register at the polls can't swap their Social Security numbers for their driver's license number if they were issued one, the U.S. Department of Justice said.

The federal Help America Vote Act requires anyone who registers in a federal election to show a valid driver's license number or provide the license number. If voters were issued a license but forget to bring it they can't vote until they produce it or provide its number.

Voters who were never issued a valid driver's license can substitute the last four digits of their Social Security numbers.

But the state Elections Board voted 6-3 in May to allow voters who have driver's licenses to substitute their Social Security numbers if they forgot to bring their licenses to the polls and can't remember the number.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/W/WI_VOTER_IDENTIFICATION_WIOL-?SITE=WIMIL&SECTION=STATE&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

June 13 run-off expected to run more smoothly
By Anna Mathews, Carroll County News

BERRYVILLE - Election results from the upcoming June 13 run-off are expected to be tabulated in a timely matter, say local election officials.

That is far different from what was experienced after the May 23 primary when election officials worked into the wee hours of the morning tabulating results.

Carroll County was one of several counties in Arkansas that compiled its votes without the benefit of a new election results software system that was promised - or an Election Systems & Software (ES&S) representative that was also promised.

According to Carroll County Clerk Shirley Doss, neighboring counties, such as Madison, Benton and Washington, experienced few election eve problems because they did have ES&S representatives on hand to tabulate results with the new software system.

http://www.eurekaspringstimesecho.com/articles/2006/06/07/news/mw1.txt

Glitches aplenty, low turnout at polls in Stanislaus County
Ballot count delayed by computer problem

By LORENA ANDERSON
BEE STAFF WRITER
Last Updated: June 7, 2006, 08:57:46 AM PDT

Light voter turnout didn't help Stanislaus County get election returns flowing freely or early Tuesday night.

Though the county clerk-recorder's office was so quiet staff members had time to start preparing absentee ballots that came earlier in the day, election results stalled after 8:30 p.m.

Just before 11 p.m., ClerkRecorder Lee Lundrigan said there had been a problem uploading a ballot card into the computerized counter. The staff member trying to upload information hit the computer's mouse twice, creating a miscount.

"Instead of undoing it, I insisted they take the count back down to zero," Lundrigan said. That meant starting from scratch on that computer's count.

http://www.modbee.com/local/story/12285168p-13021360c.html

A few county polling locations open late due to missing equipment or incorrect ballots

By: North County Times wire services -

SAN DIEGO -- A few of San Diego County's 1,646 polling locations opened late Tuesday due to problems related to missing equipment or incorrect ballots, county Registrar of Voters Mikel Haas said.

"Nothing out of the ordinary," Haas said. "As far as the voters go, few if any were impacted or inconvenienced as far as we could tell."

The problems were typical of a complicated primary in which ballots vary from city to city, he said.

"It's not a general election where everyone is voting the same ballot," Haas said. "This one can be a little bit daunting."

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2006/06/07/news/sandiego/18_04_556_6_06.txt

Off to the Greatest Page. :hi:

:hi:

I wish I had as much time to devote to this forum as it deserves, and that you all deserve for your tireless work. It was the first place I came when found DU, and it's where I've met some very wonderful people who helped me realize that I wasn't crazy (at least about the stolen elections.

:yourock:

Ashburn Calls For Voting Investigation

POSTED: 11:45 am PDT June 7, 2006
UPDATED: 6:42 pm PDT June 7, 2006

SACRAMENTO -- Although Sen. Roy Ashburn, R--Bakersfield, ran unopposed in Tuesday's elections, he's now calling on the state secretary of state to investigate the voting snarl in Kern County.

In a news release on Wednesday, Ashburn said he called Secretary of State Bruce McPherson and expressed concern over Tuesday's delays.

"It is unconscionable that in this day and age any American voter would be turned away from a polling place," said Senator Ashburn in the news release. "If there are problems with the system that is in place, then we need to know about it immediately."

Early-morning voters waited in line as long as 40 minutes to cast their ballots after county election officials said some voting cards were not properly encoded for the electronic voting machines. Some voters simply left their polling places because of the problem.

http://www.turnto23.com/news/9336155/detail.html

Ghosts in the machines plague local polling places
BY Staff Reporter
Published: Wednesday, June 7, 2006 3:55 PM CDT
E-mail this story | Print this page

RUTH JUSTIS/rjustis@ridgecrestca.com

Many Ridgecrest residents who set out to cast their ballots in the Primary Election were stymied by software problems. Some of the encoded cards, which enter the voter's personal information in the voting machine, were left over from a previous election and would not work in the electronic voting machines.

“It is both bad and good,” said Elections Field Representative Debbie Johnston. “It caused some problems while we got more of the good cards delivered to Ridgecrest, but on the other hand, it demonstrated loud and clear that the safety measures work.”

The Kern County Sheriff's Department delivered 40 more memory cards via helicopter to Johnston and her husband, Ed, who were in the valley to troubleshoot any problems at the local polls. The couple then visited each polling place - Kerr McGee Center, First Baptist Church, Calvary Assembly of God, St. Michael's Episcopal Church, and Inyokern Baptist Church - to make sure each had an adequate supply of cards.

“We have 101 cards in the valley, so over half were fine. Inyokern had a problem first thing this morning - all they had were old cards. But they were able to get underway when workers from the polls at Kerr McGee Center delivered some cards to Inyokern,” said Ed Johnston.

http://www.ridgecrestca.com/articles/2006/06/07/news/election_results/ele05.txt

Glitch delays Web posting of vote tallies

05:48 AM PDT on Wednesday, June 7, 2006

Gail Wesson The Press-Enterprise

Glitches with a redesigned Web site caused the San Bernardino County registrar of voters office trouble in posting results after polls closed in Tuesday's election.

The county posted absentee ballot counts soon after the polls closed at 8 p.m., but its site went down soon afterward. It took nearly two hours to fix.

Registrar Kari Verjil attributed the problems to a new Web design ordered by county supervisors that was supposed to make it easier for site visitors to view individual election results. Rather than forcing viewers to scroll through a complete tally of all elections, Verjil said, the site was supposed to let people tailor results by indicating which races they were following.

But, Verjil said, technicians in her office couldn't get the site to accept election results as they came in. About 9:50 p.m., officials reverted to the scrolling system, she said.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/sanbernardino/stories/PE_News_Local_D_webbpaper07.18825896.html

Possible record lows at the polls, but workers swamped with ballots
RESULTS DELAYED; UP TO 2 MILLION ABSENTEE VOTES NEED VERIFYING
By Brandon Bailey and Julie Patel
Mercury News

Election officials were girding for a long night of counting ballots in some parts of California on Tuesday, including Alameda and Los Angeles counties, even though the low turnout produced few delays or significant problems at most polling places.

Part of the problem was the huge number of absentee ballots taken out by voters before Tuesday's election. Statewide, officials said 1.6 million absentee ballots were submitted early enough to be verified and counted Tuesday, but as many as 2 million more had not been processed as of early Tuesday night.

Some analysts had predicted the late absentees could change the outcome of some close races, after poll workers finish the painstaking process of checking signatures and verifying their authenticity. But election officials said it was impossible to predict the effect.

In Alameda County, election staffers were planning to work through the night, manually feeding more than 200,000 paper ballots through just 60 optical scanners. Those were all the scanners that officials were able to scrounge from another county, after a last-minute decision to shelve Alameda County's trouble-plagued touch-screen voting machines.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/local/states/california/northern_california/14759553.htm

Problems riddle election, 8:30 a.m.
Nick Juliano
Published Wednesday, Jun 7, 2006

STOCKTON — Computer glitches, election worker errors and the unexpected departure of several poll inspectors hampered early voting efforts in Tuesday’s primary election, causing some polling places to open up to three hours late and sending an unknown number of voters away without casting their ballots.

Elections officials said most of the issues had been resolved and polling locations were operating normally by midday, but at least a dozen of the county’s 333 polling locations opened late.

“This morning was ugly; it’s not the way I wanted to start today,” San Joaquin County Registrar of Voters Deborah Hench said Tuesday evening just before polls closed.

After the polls closed, dozens of poll workers waited more than 45 minutes to return their machines to a receiving center at Christian Life Center off Hammer Lane, said Rachel Regnart, a poll worker.

http://www.recordnet.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060607/NEWS01/606070321/1001

Missing volunteers, new machines cause delays
By Melissa Dahl
News-Sentinel Staff Writer
Last updated: Tuesday, Jun 06, 2006 - 08:33:56 pm PDT
Comments(9)

Voters had to be turned away from some polling sites and sent elsewhere Tuesday after absent volunteers and confusion with touch-screen voting machines caused problems across San Joaquin County.

One polling station in Lodi was even closed for most of the morning after the inspector failed to show up with the necessary equipment.



Tuesday's primary election was San Joaquin County's first to rely entirely on touch-screen voting machines, which are similar to ATMs, and the transition was marked with a few hang-ups.

Deborah Hench, San Joaquin County registrar of voters said the election has been one of the hardest she's had to organize with delays and confusion at polling locations throughout the county. The difficulties were partially because of lack of staffing; at least six inspectors quit after 5 p.m. Monday, Hench said.

http://www.lodinews.com/articles/2006/06/06/news/0a1_problems_060606.txt

Touch screen machines had a few problems
By Jed Chernabaeff
Staff writer

Rich Sigmund strolled into his usual polling place off Cypress Avenue on Tuesday morning with the expectation of using one of Tulare County's new touch screen voting machines.

Sigmund said he was left voting the old-fashioned way: marking a paper ballot.

" couldn't get the touch-screen to work," Sigmund said. "They gave me my paper ballot back."

In an effort to comply with federal law and assist disabled voters, Tulare County supplied a touch screen voting machine at each of its 75 polling stations. But, as in Sigmund's case, there were some difficulties.

http://www.visaliatimesdelta.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060607/NEWS01/606070341/1002

Voter Turnout Low; Write-ins, New Voting System Slows Yolo Returns

Written for the web by Elizabeth Bishop, Internet News Producer

Voter turnout in California's primary election was estimated at approximately 28 percent Wednesday, ranking Tuesday's vote as the lowest turnout for a statewide election in 60 years, according to the California Secretary of State's Office.

With several provisional and absentee ballots left to be counted, the final tally could finally reach as high as 31 to 33 percent. Either way, the primary vote seems likely to fall below the 34.6 percent voter turnout in 2002, the lowest percentage of the electorate to cast a vote since 1946.

Meanwhile, it will be at least a week before voters in Yolo County know the results of a number of measures and candidate races. The county registrar's office encountered problems with the new optical scanning system which slowed the counting process.

This was the first election in which the Kodak machines were used. A number of test runs had been conducted, but they failed to pick up problems triggered by write-in candidates. Whenever a machine used to count ballots encountered a write-in, it stopped. "Our system demands that we stop counting, look at an image of the ballot and make a decision on the write-ins," said Yolo County Registrar Freddie Oakley.

http://www.news10.net/storyfull2.aspx?storyid=18026

Voters shun touch-screen machines

By MIKE GENIELLA
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

UKIAH - Only a small number of voters Tuesday used 22 new touch-screen computer voting machines in place for Mendocino County's primary election.

"We received few requests," said County Clerk-Recorder Marsha Wharff.

Nearly all voters chose to use the standard paper-based optical-scan voting machines.

Wharff said the new touch-screen units were available for any voter who asked to use them. The touch-screen units are required under state and federal disability laws.

http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060607/NEWS/606070343/1033/NEWS01

Voting goes on without a hitch
Acting registrar takes helm for first time
Herald Staff Report

Monterey County elections officials reported a glitch-free day on Tuesday.

The primary election was the first test for acting Registrar of Voters Claudio Valenzuela, who was rushed into the job following the abrupt resignation of longtime registrar Tony Anchundo less than three months ago.

"I really think it went very well," said Valenzuela.

Elections officials on Tuesday reported few problems from the 90 election sites throughout the county, and the vote tabulation from the Elections Office was running smoothly as of presstime Tuesday night.

http://www.montereyherald.com/mld/montereyherald/news/local/14759376.htm

Watchdog group rejects election results, calls for hand count
by Rebecca S. Bender, 6/7/2006

The Voter Confidence Committee didn’t need to wait for the last few hours of voting to wrap up Tuesday night; it had already deemed the election results invalid.

“We’re being asked for blind trust,” said VCC founder Dave Berman. “Without verifiable information, election results are all hearsay.”

The watchdog group’s lack of faith in the process stems from the electronic, optical scan machines that tally residents’ votes.

When a voter feeds a ballot into one of the Diebold machines, critics assert, the information on that ballot is translated into programming language – language that the company claims is a trade secret, and therefore not subject to public scrutiny.

http://www.eurekareporter.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?ArticleID=11962

:yourock:

une 06, 2006
Not OK In The OC

Orange County CA voters "reported malfunctioning voting machines and technical glitches" this afternoon, according to the Orange County Register's afternoon update. Shirley Filadelfia, a voter, told the Register that the machines at the San Juan Capistrano Community Center were broken at 12 p.m. PT. She said there were paper ballots available for Dems, but none for GOPers. Filadelfia said the machines were working again by 2 p.m. local time.

Lee Demson said machines were functioning perfectly, until the paper record printing on the side wouldn’t show how he voted a ballot measure. He wound up voting on a paper ballot, because the machines had to be shut off for repairs.

Registrar of Voters spokesperson Brett Rowley said the glitches were not above normal for a primary. The Registrar of Voters is sending out a troubleshooting team to address the problems, he said. Rowley said there are 6 rapid deployment teams traveling around Orange County to respond to voting problems.

http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/archives/2006/06/not_ok_in_the_o.html

Another Election Day, Another Day Of Broken Vote Machines

From Undernews, compiled by Prorev.com Editor Sam Smith

ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER - Voters throughout the county reported malfunctioning voting machines and technical glitches Tuesday afternoon. Shirley Filadelfia said none of the voting machines were working at her voting site, the San Juan Capistrano Community Center at noon. She said there were paper ballots available for Democrats, but none for Republicans. She asked the poll workers to call her when the machines were fixed. "There's some voting irregularities -- only the Democrats were being allowed to vote," she said. "My concern is how many people went there today and weren't allowed to vote because of this.". . .

Lee Demson in Seal Beach also said voting machines were broken at his site. Machines at his voting site were functioning perfectly, until the paper record printing on the side wouldn't show how he voted on Measure A. "I'm just a computer geek that happened to vote and I tried reading the print and Measure A wasn't coming up," Demson said. "It lists your yes or no and who you voted for. But on Measure A, there was nothing from Measure A." He wound up voting on a paper ballot, because the machines had to be shut off for repairs. . .

Cori Tanner opened up the voting station in a residential garage in Coto de Caza and was operating by herself for most of the morning. Tanner, a veteran poll worker who has helped out during elections for ten years doubts she'd ever work the polls again. . .

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0606/S00090.htm

Hand-counting delays results in Alameda County

Rick DelVecchio, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, June 7, 2006

Alameda County election workers were hand-counting some 200,000 ballots late Tuesday, and county officials said the job would take hours to finish -- long enough to delay close gubernatorial and Oakland mayoral contest final results until late this morning.

In a counting room on the third floor of a county office building, 60 workers wearing orange safety vests were feeding ballots into scanning machines one at a time.

"We're hoping to be done by noon," acting Alameda County Registrar Dave MacDonald said.

The delay was triggered by the county's decision in March to get rid of its high-tech, touch-screen voting machines, which were widely criticized because they couldn't produce paper records.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/06/07/MNG2UJ9UOA1.DTL&hw=California+primary+voting&sn=068&sc=218

Alameda County handcounting is slow and bad; the rest of the state did just fine.

:puke:

State board OKs funds for early voting
Fearing more delays, Ehrlich says yes to first wave of devices
By Andrew A. Green
Sun Reporter
Originally published June 7, 2006, 9:43 PM EDT
ANNAPOLIS // The state Board of Public Works approved a $2.4 million contract Wednesday for new computer equipment that elections officials say is crucial to administering early voting this year, despite continued reservations by Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.

Ehrlich reiterated a host of complaints about early voting -- which will allow selected polls to open five days before the primary and general elections -- and other election laws passed over his vetoes by the Democratic-led General Assembly. The governor said the measures are "a joke" and "an invitation to fraud."

But faced with state and local election officials who said delaying or rejecting the contract with Diebold Election Systems would jeopardize their ability to administer the balloting this fall, Ehrlich voted reluctantly for it. He said, however, that he would continue to support a petition drive aimed at overturning early voting, as well as court challenges to the new rules.

"We're going to vote favorably on this, obviously, because we have no other option," Ehrlich told state Elections Administrator Linda H. Lamone at the board meeting. "You'll do the best you can, I know you will, but you'll get instructions, I suspect, from the courts."

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/politics/bal-votingstry0607,0,3500194.story?coll=bal-local-headlines

State gives Detroit $116,000 for vote list purge
6/7/2006, 10:11 a.m. ET
The Associated Press

DETROIT (AP) — Secretary of State Terri Lynn Land is paying the city about $116,000 to cover the cost of checking and purging its voter registration rolls.

Land was to present a check to Detroit City Clerk Janice Winfrey at a City Council meeting Wednesday, Land said in a news release.

The Michigan Department of State has used money from the federal Help America Vote Act to pay $361,000 to local clerks for the cost of mailing new voter cards, the statement said. It said the mailings are the main tool for authorities to update voter registration lists and remove those who no longer live at their addresses of record.

If a voter card is returned as undeliverable, the clerk sends a notice to the voter's last known address. Those who fail to respond and fail to vote in the next two federal election cycles are removed from the list.

http://www.mlive.com/newsflash/michigan/index.ssf?/base/news-35/1149690258293620.xml&storylist=newsmichigan

Rough debut for voting machines

By: Susan Montgomery and Tim Kalich, Staff Writers 06/07/2006

Problems ranging from improper programming to battery failure plagued the launch of the new touch-screen voting machines in Leflore County during the Democratic primary Tuesday.

At five precincts, pollworkers offered paper ballots to voters because of machine malfunctions.

However, machines were working at these by the middle of the day.

Leflore and Jackson counties were the only two that had widespread problems with the Diebold Election Systems equipment, according to David Blount, communications director for the Secretary of State's Office.

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16751410&BRD=1838&PAG=461&dept_id=104621&rfi=6

Error slows vote-counting process in Cascade County

Vote counting slowed in Cascade County Tuesday night because of a procedural error and strong absentee voting. The delay is expected to push final, unofficial returns into the wee hours of Wednesday morning.

About 9 p.m. Tuesday, a county worker neglected to “zero out” one of two county voting machines, according to Clerk and Recorder Peggy Carrico. Zeroing out helps ensure that ballots are counted only once.

The county released 2,725 absentee ballot totals at 8:50 p.m. Tuesday, representing about two-thirds of absentees cast.

But as additional absentee ballots were counted, totals did not appear to jibe with earlier figures.

http://www.greatfallstribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060606/NEWS01/60606011

Possible P.G. voting problems probed
Thursday, June 08, 2006
By CHRISTOPHER WEIR
Staff Writer

PENNS GROVE -- The Salem County Prosecutor's Office announced Wednesday it is conducting an investigation into possible voting improprieties in Tuesday's Democratic Primary Election in the Borough of Penns Grove.

Salem County Prosecutor John T. Lenahan said his office was contacted Wednesday by the Salem County Board of Elections and informed of several possible problems with the Penns Grove Democrat primary.

"The Board of Elections brought to our attention several possible improprieties which we will be investigating vigorously in the next several days," Lenahan said.

"Unusual" has been the word that several county officials have used to describe Tuesday's Democrat primary in Penns Grove in which the outcome was determined by a large amount of absentee ballots that were cast.

http://www.nj.com/news/sunbeam/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1149754889309540.xml&coll=9

Senate Approves Legislation to Improve Voter Rights
Erica Wong 06/07/2006 1:36 pm

New legislation has passed the New York State Senate that will make it easier for disabled voters to get to the polls.


In the first of two bills proposed by State Senate Elections Committee Chairman John J. Flanagan (R-East Northport), $10 million will be allotted from the State budget to allow localities to purchase and install voting machines accessible to the disabled.


In addition, another piece of legislation that passed the state Senate will provide another $7.7 million in Federal funding, due to the county's compliance with the terms of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA).


States must allocate 5% in matching funds in order to receive funding from the federal government needed to implement new voting guidelines, according to HAVA's federal requirements. This piece of legislation would help cover this 5 percent allocation and prevent taxpayers from covering additional costs themselves.

http://www.longislandpress.com/?cp=162&show=article&a_id=8756

Thursday, June 8, 2006


Elections office fills vacant director post
Michigan man expected to start in July

By James Romoser
JOURNAL REPORTER

After a search process that lasted four rocky months, the Forsyth County elections office is getting a new director.

Rob Coffman, now the elections director in Genesee County, Mich., will be the new director in Forsyth, taking over an office that has suffered from recent staff turmoil and voting complications during last month's primary election.

Coffman was unanimously chosen by the three members of the Forsyth County Board of Elections and was approved yesterday by Gary Bartlett, the state elections director.

Reached at his home in Michigan yesterday, Coffman said that he will likely start his new job next month.

http://www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ%2FMGArticle%2FWSJ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1149188327310

Group says vote tally unreliable

By Lara Brenckle
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Wednesday, June 7, 2006

A voting rights group on Tuesday accused Allegheny County of using in the May 16 primary electronic voting equipment and software that was not certified by the state.

The county Department of Elections is investigating and will present a report on the allegations and results from the primary at the Board of Elections meeting Monday, when the board is scheduled to vote on certifying the election.

Five members of the Allegheny County Chapter of VotePA, a statewide volunteer group that advocates secure and accessible voting, told County Council the primary's results cannot be trusted.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/cityregion/s_457000.html

:yourock:

New voting machines on the way

By Michael Erskine
Contact
June 8, 2006
They are being billed as simple and easy to use. They kind of resemble touch-screen ATMs.

But there will be no trial run for the 1,500 new touch-screen electronic voting machines that will usher in a new era of voting technology in Shelby County.

Election officials had hoped to have them ready for the May county primary, which historically has low turnout, but the machines were not purchased in time.

So they will debut during early voting for the Aug. 3 general election and primaries as voters tackle the longest ballot in the history of Shelby County.

"This is where the rubber meets the road for the new system," said James Johnson, the county's election administrator, who is helping oversee the training of poll workers and the public on the new machines.

http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/local/article/0,2845,MCA_25340_4758327,00.html

All Virginia voting will be electronic
State has used federal help to convert to optical-scan and touch-screen machines

BY TYLER WHITLEY
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

Jun 8, 2006

For the first time, on Tuesday every voter in Virginia will be able to vote on new electronic voting machines.

Aided by $69 million in federal money, every locality has been able to replace punch card, mechanical lever and paper ballots with either touch-screen or optical-scan machines.

The federal money was provided under the Help America Vote Act, enacted by Congress in 2002 after the 2000 presidential election fiasco in Florida.

All the voting precincts in Virginia will be open Tuesday to allow voting in a U.S. Senate Democratic primary. In addition, there is a Republican primary in the 8th Congressional District and a Democratic primary in the 11th Congressional District.

http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD/MGArticle/RTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1149188321643

To hisses, county buys voting gear
By Erica Meltzer
Arizona Daily Star

Tucson, Arizona | Published: 06.07.2006

To the sound of hisses and boos from the audience, the Pima County Board of Supervisors voted 3 to 2 to buy voting equipment from Diebold Elections Systems.

The county is buying the machines with $2 million in federal money to comply with the Help America Vote Act, which requires that the disabled be able to vote in private without assistance.

Critics say the machines are too easy to tamper with and could lead to election fraud.

As part of a motion made by Supervisor Ramon Valadez, county election workers will do their own tests on the machines, and the supervisors will vote again on whether to use the machines in the September primary.

http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/132542

The Power of One and "Invisible Ballots"


by Gail Jonas

http://www.opednews.com

The Power of One and “Invisible Ballots”

I had never heard of Joan Brunwasser or “Invisible Ballots: The Temptation for Electronic Vote Fraud” on February 26, 2006.

However, I was a “read-every-page" subscriber of YES! Magazine, and that evening I saw an article in the Spring 2006 issue about “Invisible Ballots.” A blurb at the bottom described Joan’s free lending library of this documentary film. At 5 the next morning I e-mailed Joan to find out more about it. She responded immediately.

The bottom line: Joan’s enthusiasm and wonderful lending library for “Invisible Ballots” inspired me to get the film and spread the word about it.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_gail_jon_060606_the_power_of_one_and.htm

06.08.2006
Press Finally Discovers Coulter 'Voter Fraud' Story (8 comments)
READ MORE: 2006, New York Times, George W. Bush

It's taken five months, but the traditional media are reporting on the dispute that Palm Beach County has had with Ann Coulter's vote since February. The KRT wire has picked up the story from the New York Daily News:

Election officials in Palm Beach County, Fla., are reportedly investigating why Coulter voted in the wrong precinct in a local election in February - even though a poll worker tried to stop her.

Knowingly voting in the wrong precinct is a felony in Florida, and Coulter has hired a former U.S. attorney to defend her there.

Moving the story into the mainstream was Alan Colmes on Wednesday's Hannity & Colmes. Excuse me for editorializing if I call the exchange disingenuous:

COLMES: You're talking about godless liberals not having values, not being values people. In light of that you've been in the news a little bit lately, accused by election supervisor Arthur Anderson in Palm Beach of voting in the wrong district and not answering a registered letter that they sent to you. And they say that you might have committed a felony. So could you address those charges and tell us what happened?

COULTER: I think the syphilis has gone to their brains.

COLMES: Is that what it is?

COULTER: Yes.

COLMES: Did you knowingly vote in the wrong district?

COULTER: No..... No. I live in New York. And I'm not going to tell you anymore about where I live, Alan. ....

COLMES: You didn't knowingly walk into the wrong district?

COULTER: Correct.

COLMES: And did you -- is there a reason you didn't respond to the authorities when they sent you a registered letter?

COULTER: This is all false, I'm telling you. You've got -- I mean, the "Treason Times" may hate America, but they're at least accurate. When you go to the bush-league newspapers, you get all the venom of the New York Times, but they're all retarded.

Blurting that out on a national TV show has finally got the rest of the media's attention. Jose Lambiet at the Palm Beach Post (scroll down for second item), who's been on the story from the very beginning, reported on the registered letter and retaining the lawyer last week. There's no shortage of documentation to back up the "bush league" newspaper: Ms. Coulter's sworn voter's registration form and appraisal of her Palm Beach property, retained on line by the BradBlog, which has also been tenacious on the story.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nellie-b/press-finally-discovers-c_b_22511.html

(Does the Dispatch have the same "D" as Disney or is it just me?



:shrug: )

Democratic legislative leaders want Blackwell to quit
He can’t supervise fall election and be a candidate, they say
Thursday, June 08, 2006
Catherine Candisky
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

The two top Democratic leaders in the General Assembly have urged Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell to resign, arguing that he cannot oversee this year’s election while running for governor.

Sen. C.J. Prentiss, of Cleveland, and Rep. Joyce Beatty, of Columbus, said yesterday that Blackwell’s implementation of a recently enacted election law is hindering efforts to register voters.

"Ken Blackwell can’t be trusted to fairly administer this year’s election," Prentiss said in a statement.

Blackwell, the Republican candidate for governor, "is allowing his personal interest to guide his decisions as secretary of state," she said.

http://www.dispatch.com/?story=dispatch/2006/06/08/20060608-D8-00.html

:rofl:

K&R

Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Board ROCKS!!!

Kerry on the lost election: "I know we screwed up"
Posted by Jan Frel on June 8, 2006 at 3:28 PM.

From Fark, I found this account from the Hollywood liberal who recounts what was said in an off-the-record meeting Sen. John Kerry conducted with a group of bloggers:

The meeting was off the record so no one took any notes or recorded what was said. The first question went straight to the point, about how pissed off so many Democratic voters, are about what happened with the election, and also that it seemed like most Democrats in Congress had no idea how bad the situation was. Kerry responded by dropping the whole political routine and speaking like he was off the record to a bunch of people that already know what’s going on anyway. "Look I know how bad things are, I know that people are pissed off, I know we screwed up."

There's more in there, but this left me wondering if Kerry himself believes that it was the 60,000 votes in Ohio that cost him the election, or if indeed it was him and his campaign.

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/themix/37318/

Voting in Massachusetts: Problems and Prospects, Boston, 6/11, 6PM

This Sunday, John Bonifaz will be a part of "Voting in Massachusetts: Problems and
Prospects," a lively discussion on the state of our democracy and electronic voting in the Commonwealth.

The forum (view the flyer in English and Spanish) is June 11, 6 p.m., at Arlington Street Church in Boston and is sponsored by MA Citizens for Voting Integrity.

View all Bonifaz events and appearances at http://www.johnbonifaz.com/calendar