if you go with Ensign, this is what you get...

[Kevin Spidel]

The Republicans on Voting Reform:
http://www.spidel.net/GOPonVoterFraud.pdf

[Kevin Spidel]

1. An excerpt....

Steven Duffield of the Senate Republican Policy Committee emails: The Senate Republican Policy Committee has released a new Policy Paper, "Putting an End to Voter Fraud: the Need for New Federal Reforms." It argues for voter identification requirements at the polls, adjustments to the “Motor Voter� law so that states can protect against fraudulent and duplicate voter registrations, more protections to ensure that only Americans vote in American elections, and greater examination of fraud risks in early and absentee voting.

The executive summary of the plan contains the following points:

First, Congress should require that voters at the polls show photo identification.

Second, Congress should examine the integrity of the voter registration process and the ongoing failures of states to maintain accurate voter lists.

Third, Congress should examine the extent to which early and absentee voting increases the likelihood of fraudulent votes being cast.

No election-related legislation should proceed in this Congress unless these issues receive a thorough examination

[Time for change]

2. This is really sickening n/t

[teddyk23]

3. someone explain to me...

How it responds to Ohio for the Repugs to find more ways to disenfranchise eligible voters? Never mind. My question answers itself.

[Wilms]

4. Oh. But they dooooooo.

From page 4:

"If photo identification is truly unavailable (and systematic study would be required to establish whether it is), then local and
state authorities may wish to take steps to ensure better access, not only for voting purposes but to help citizens better contribute to and benefit from mainstream civic life."


Well, I feel reassured.

[Amaryllis]

5. What does this have to do with Ensign? It doesn't mention his bill.

[Wilms]

6. What Ensign bill?? There isn't one...yet. n/t

[Wilms]

8. I got that wrong...

Here is Ensign, (link to text below):

<http://capwiz.com/pdamerica/issues/bills/?billnum=S.330... >


No required audits though...

`(iv) The individual permanent paper records produced under clause (i) shall be used as the official records for purposes of any recount or audit conducted with respect to any election for Federal office in which the voting system is used.'.


Conyers mentions required audits but seems non-specific...

`(b) Audits- The standards issued under subsection (a) shall provide for partial audits of the results of elections using the records produced pursuant to section 301(a)(7), and shall provide that those records shall be used for the official count of votes in the event that the tallies derived from the records differ from the tallies otherwise derived from the voting system used in the election involved.'.


Holt is very specific, hand counted audits...

SEC. 5. REQUIREMENT FOR MANDATORY MANUAL AUDITS BY HAND COUNT.

(a) Mandatory Audits in Random Precincts-

(1) IN GENERAL- The Election Assistance Commission shall conduct random, unannounced, hand counts of the voter-verified records required to be produced and preserved pursuant to section 301(a)(2) of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (as amended by section 2) for each general election for Federal office (and, at the option of the State or jurisdiction involved, of elections for State and local office held at the same time as such an election for Federal office) in at least 2 percent of the precincts (or equivalent locations) in each State.

(2) PROCESS FOR CONDUCTING AUDITS- The Commission shall conduct an audit under this section of the results of an election in accordance with the following procedures:

(A) Not later than 24 hours after a State announces the final vote count in each precinct in the State, the Commission shall determine and then announce the precincts in the State in which it will conduct the audits.

(B) With respect to votes cast at the precinct or equivalent location on or before the date of the election (other than provisional ballots described in subparagraph (C)), the Commission shall count by hand the voter-verified records required to be produced and preserved under section 301(a)(2)(A) of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (as amended by section 2) and compare those records with the count of such votes as announced by the State.

...

[Amaryllis]

9. See verified voting analysis of why they support Ensign:

http://verifiedvoting.org/downloads/VIVA_2005_letter.pd...
The standard statement has been "It only does one thing but it does that well". Requires voter verified paper ballots to be the ballot of record. Andy supports it. It has biparitisan support and is the only one that stands a chance of passing in time to prevent hundreds of thousands of paperless DREs from being purchased. Doesn't mean we don't still work for the other bills, but they will take far longer and unless we get a massive grassroots effort sufficient to impact repub obstruction they won't pass.

[Wilms]

11. All the 'standard statementings' (if you will) are what have me concerned

As do unanswered question I've posted on these issues.

I long ago read the link you provided, and the companion piece on Dodd.

Both billed as "Analysis", neither was. For Ensign, an endorsement, not entirely undeserved. For Dodd, , while not entirely undeserved, either. But two very different treatments nonetheless, which turned me off, I admit.


Meanwhile, Ensign's bill is billed as sparing us DRE's and TouchScreens. What don't I get??? The bill says DRE's and TouchScreens need to produce paper. The paper is used IF you get a recount. There is no mandate for auditing. Again, no mandate for auditing.

Dodd, would allow a machine that, at voter option, would produce only an electronic record, though otherwise...a paper ballot. It's not great, but it's "voter option" that eliminates the paper. And it's that option that can enfranchise millions of voters. How many of these machines would be deployed?? (I'm interested in a 'modular' system that produces a paper ballot that can still be Voter-Verified regardless of disability, or at least, an auditing system that would dissuade hackers from targeting these machines.)

Holt/Conyers machines, also must print a paper ballot except as Dodd allows. And...it includes MANDATORY AUDITS. Plus, Holt deals with security issues, and as I read HAVA (thank you for pointing ), it includes the TABULATION. (I don't see that elsewhere, yet. Clinton, Graham, and Boxer's, 108th legislation, originally had some safeguards that got yanked in committee. A real "WTF was that about?".)


To be complete, there are the "proposed" timetables (with Ensign the most attractive in ambitiousness). But the realities of deploying equipment nation wide may suggest this too, a debatable point.


If I got bits of this wrong I'd welcome anyone that might disabuse me of incorrect notions. But, the standard-statement-sloganeering or and 'move along, nothing to see here'-like treatment, doesn't compel me...positively, anyhow.


While Ensign may be supreme with regard to best hope of passage, that claim is in addition to other claims about Ensign, Dodd, and Conyers, that I can't get to mesh with facts.

[sacxtra]

7. It is republican cruft.

They want EVERYONE to have a NATIONAL ID.

So they can CONTROL YOUR LIFE.

REMOVE

electronics
electricity
digitized data
and those loosey goosey freaking insecure networking.

if your really "progressive" then PROGRESS! not the opposite.

An overhaul of where electronics, electricity, digitized data, and networks are used is LONG FSCKING OVERDUE! Not JUST IN VOTING!

Hell they can't even secure databases!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DAMN.

PAY UP BIATCH!

EAT THAT BAY-BEE!!

[rumpel]

10. repubs completely ignoring software and machine issue, twisting the matter

again, and make it look like voters are doing something wrong.

write congress that this is not acceptable.