Nickolaus changed software program before April election breakdown

[hue]

http://www.jsonline.com/news/waukesha/nickolaus-changed-software-program-before-april-election-breakdown-vl62uqt-162003205.html

Sometime after final testing of Waukesha County's election software - but before the April election - County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus mysteriously changed something in her office's computer programming, according to a consulting firm's report released Tuesday.

Only Nickolaus knows what she did. The consultants can't figure it out, and she's not talking.

But whatever she did, it caused a breakdown in reporting election results that will cost county taxpayers $256,300 to fix, the report says.

And that's not the only money that Waukesha County will have to spend to get its election systems operating properly, County Executive Dan Vrakas said Tuesday.

Aging hardware is out of compliance with federal standards and nearing the end of its useful life, the report says. That equipment was supposed to be replaced in 2009, but Nickolaus killed the project because county purchasing officials wouldn't let her award a no-bid contract, said Norm Cummings, county director of administration.

Now Vrakas and the County Board will need to spend unknown amounts of money in the 2013 and 2014 budgets to replace that equipment before the 2014 gubernatorial election, Cummings said.

[Scuba]

1. Kathy is overworked, and really needs an extended stay at the Graybar Hotel.

[hue]

2. *sigh!* It's a never ending litany of transgressions (truth be told crimes) that she is never..

held responsible for!!!

[sybylla]

4. I have to say this one does puzzle me.

I mean, I can see how she could squeak by not facing legal charges in the past. But I thought once the public testing of election equipment was completed in the days before an election, you could not touch the effing machines until it was time to set them up on election day.

The whole point of the public testing period was to demonstrate to the public that the machines, set up as they would be used on election day, were functioning as designed. I can't believe that fucking with them in between isn't a clear violation of at least one election law.

[mojowork_n]

6. If an e-voting machine is plugged in and powered up...

...you don't necessarily have to be in the same room or building
or even the same zip code, to 'eff with one of them.

The whole point of the public testing is to provide a dog and pony
show.

[yourout]

7. Wifi and Power line communication would allow one person to completely doctor election results......

without mandatory hand audits of ballots.

The only way one could be relatively sure of the results would be a state wide random 5% hand audit of the ballots themselves.

[mojowork_n]

8. It's worse than that.

Command Central units come with two ePROM's, the chips that store
the operating software.

One ePROM is for all of the testing, training, etc.

The second is for the actual election.

That's like having a car with two engines. The first engine is the one
the salesman fires up for every "test drive." But then the one you
would have to use would be the second, the one for actual operation.

Would you buy a car like that? The machines were 'sold' through a
two for one swap, to 46 Wisconsin counties. Two brand new Command
Central touchscreen units (the kind that leave no paper trail) for every
used optical-scanning unit. That's the kind that leave a paper ballot
trail for hand audits, which were shipped back to the 3-person company,
Command Central, operating out of a St. Cloud, MN strip mall.

http://www.thomhartmann.com/forum/2012/06/emergency-%E2%80%94-please-read-%E2%80%94-serious-wisconsin-vote-hack-issue

(Sorry, the original link to the Wisconsin Citizens Media Coop story
that carried that report is down tonight, as is their whole website.)

[midnight]

9. That is why Ireland got rid of them.....

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=9390

[sybylla]

10. Doesn't matter if it's become a dog and pony show.

My point is that to overtly fuck with a machine between the test and the election would have to be a violation of law. So if the consultants can prove it, and prove who did it, maybe we can finally get the bitch charged with a fucking crime.

But feel free to post run-away conspiracy theories that have nothing to do with my point...

[mojowork_n]

11. Oops.

Didn't mean to step on your toes, or cross whatever line you suppose I crossed.

Nickolaus didn't 'overtly' eff with anything. An 'adjustment' needed to be made to the
vote tabulation for the primary, because Nickolaus had ignored earlier instructions to
consolidate vote totals according to congressional apportionment.

That's what it said in this morning's paper, anyway.

No argument that Nickolaus is a partisan flunky who's abused her authority as
County Clerk.....

But my reason for posting what I did wasn't to try and over-analyze what happened
in that April primary, or what may or may not happen with the "consultants" investigation
of Nickolaus.

Electronic voting has been abandoned in most of Europe for a reason. Machines very
similar to those we continue to use were sold for their junk scrap value just last week, in
Ireland. Switzerland manages to get their hand count of paper ballots in national elections
completed in six hours.

It would be wrong -- in so many ways -- to keep ignoring that larger "process" question,
or to let Nickolaus serve as a scapegoat and assume getting 'the bitch charged with a
fucking crime' will even contribute to raising awareness on the issue of election integrity.

The only way to do that is to insist on an open, bi-partisan hand count of paper ballots
that were tabulated by optical scanners. Every time there's an opportunity to do so.
That's what these folks are working for:

http://wisconsinwave.org/

I'm disappointed -- crushed, even -- that it all strikes you as run-away conspiracy thinking.
But it's even more disappointing to see odd math totals coming up, so many times, in
election after election, when people try to do the numbers on "who won, why" after the
fact, and it's one head scratcher after another. And there's no larger public outcry, or
support in the media, to try and get away from the reliance on faith-based voting.

Just because very few people have any idea how voting machines work, or how wrong it
is to trust any microprocessor that's made to be networked. People just assume they're
like ATM's but they're not. They don't cost nearly as much, don't give you a paper receipt
or verification, and have completely unnecessary design flaws, like the Command Central
machines that come with an extra eProm and are totally opaque, when it comes to recounts.

[bobthedrummer]

12. Karl ROVE had a squad of young women similar to La Femme Nikita like Susan Bonzon RALSTON

these professional Rovian ladies were discussed at the old DU in a Friday's Child thread

For the record and in keeping with what we know, so far, here are Karl's girls (started 3-31-07)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x548152

You still in Milwaukee, mojowork_n?

[mojowork_n]

13. I'm not following, or I maybe need to click for the back story,

...is this a comment on Ms. Nickolaus? Say what?

[bobthedrummer]

14. Click for deep politics involved avoids confusion, + are you still living in Milwaukee (+John Doe)

[mojowork_n]

15. Yup, down here in Miltown still.

Found a link to one your Nikita's:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Susan_B._Ralston

[Blue Owl]

3. There is no way these vote totals can be considered "accurate"

No. Fucking. Way.

So transparently obvious that Scott Walker once again wins by cheating, stealing, and lying.

[Homer12]

5. It brings into question all the vote counts

That she has over-seen.

I hope the DA get's in on this it is a sure sign of tampering and electionering.