Record number of US voters may cast paper ballots

[tannybogus]

SAN DIEGO (AP) -- Come November, more Americans might cast their ballots on paper than in any other election in U.S. history.

That wasn't supposed to happen. If everything had gone according to the government's $3 billion plan to upgrade voting technology after the hanging-chad fiasco in Florida in 2000, that sentence would read ''electronic machines'' instead of paper.

Instead, thousands of touchscreen devices are collecting dust in warehouses from California to Florida, where officials worried about hackers and fed up with technical glitches have replaced the equipment with scanners that will read paper ballots.

An Associated Press Election Research survey has found that 57 percent of the nation's registered voters live in counties that will be relying on paper ballots this fall.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Paper-Voting.html

I think this is good news.

[WCGreen]

1. I've been using a paper ballot for years now...

I always vote Absentee...

[HockeyMom]

2. County where I live in Florida

is going back to paper. They were using touch screens. I think it is going to be different all over Florida. It's up to each county to decide themselves.

Interestingly, I live in a REPUBLICAN area. lol This might just come back to bite them judging from all the Obama stickers I have seen.:evilgrin:

[spin]

3. In Florida, I have the option of voting on an absentee ballot...

It's quick and easy and I've been doing it for years. I don't even have to be absent, the ballot arrives at my home in the mail.

[unc70]

4. Article is mostly negative towards paper ballots

I just saw this article elsewhere and noticed its negative slant.

"it exacerbates this bigger issues of paper"

"The return to paper creates extra stress on an already-strapped election system. Cash-poor
counties will have to spend tens of millions of dollars printing ballots. Voters, many of them
first-timers, may wind up confused by the ballot formats and frustrated by long lines of people
waiting to use the scanners. And counting all the paper could hold up the results of the election."

"A lot of officials are in damage-control mode because they're going to try to limit the problems
of switching to paper," said Mike Alvarez, an expert in voting technology at Caltech in Pasadena.
"You will have ballots not showing up, being printed wrong, the litany of mistakes voters make
with these ballots, and then there's incredible pressure in a crowded polling place for people who
are trying to make their decision."


AP strikes again. So remember to be afraid of paper ballots.