Did Anonymous really Save-the-Vote in Ohio? .... REALLY???

[JohnnyRingo]

148. Your unfounded fear of technology is clouding your view.

While there was some question about the 2004 election (the 1st year for the electronic voting here in Ohio) the newly elected democrat governor Ted Strickland demanded all machines use a paper trail to confirm the count. This has been the standard since 2006 (remember '08 when Ohio went for Obama?). Today, there is a paper ballot produced for every voter. Many of those who claim Rove had a "man in the middle" hack or some RF vote flipping are using news reports or conspiracy theories from 2004.

Some, like the Diebold Accuvote TSx print the vote right before the voter's eyes as it is cast. The voter cannot leave the machine before the printing is completed.

Others, like several models of the optiscan by ES&S use a hand marked ballot that is scanned into the machine to be tabulated. The ballot is put in a locked steel box for return to the county BOE

The Hart machine is also an optical scanner type machine that requires the voter return his hand marked ballot to the poll worker.

In each case, the paper ballot is stored at the county BOE for (I think) two years in case of a dispute or recount. In all cases, the machine is reset for the next election and becomes irrelevant. If someone hacks the machines and alters the digital count, the verified paper trail is accountability that cannot possibly be altered.

If there's any credibility to the theory that Rove or someone else changed the digital count, one only needs do a hand count audit at one suspect county and get probable cause that the election has been subjected to fraud. That sounds like a very high likelihood that the perpetrators of such a foolish plan will be caught, and even Rove isn't that arrogant. I won't even go into the logistics and large number of plumbers needed to visit and alter every voting machine in each of Ohio's 88 counties. The number of people with the clearance to drop in at a county BOE and work on their machines is so few that someone would really have to put their ass on the line for Karl Rove.

Here is a link to the three types of voting machines in Ohio and how they work. You'll notice that in every case the paper ballot is returned to the poll worker or rolled up into the machine to be removed at the end of the day, The paper ballot is then locked in a steel box for return to the county BOE when the polls close:
http://www.sos.state.oh.us/SOS/Upload/elections/votingsystems.aspx?page=25056#

None of the machines are connected to a network for internet hacking. There's no login and a wall outlet is the only connection in every case. If you don't like a paper ballot that is either marked by hand or printed by a machine (right before your very eyes) and stored under lock and key in 88 different locations, what form of voting do you like?

Karl Rove is smart and somewhat evil, but he's not a James Bond villain. That's why he focused on misleading commercials and suppression.