BBV - Mikulski sees voting problems firsthand

[harmonyguy]

Takoma Park, MD, Sep. 13 (UPI) -- Sen. Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., tested an electronic voting machine at a Maryland folk festival and the device failed to accurately record her vote.
(snip)
The three-term senator, who was already considering sponsoring a bill to require such machines provide a paper receipt, tried to vote "no" on a question on a sample ballot, but the machine said she voted "yes."

"She pushed one answer and the opposite answer popped up, Stan Boyd, a Silver Spring, Md., election judge told the Baltimore Sun. "She can see for herself that the machines does not work right. I was so amazed."

http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20040913-075644-6360r.htm

[Hawkeye-X]

1. Warning. Moonie Times is a source.

Find another source, quick!

[Ruby Romaine]

2. here!

http://www.nbc4.com/politics/3725854/detail.html
http://www.baltimoresun.com/services/site/premium/access-registered.intercept
http://www.wjla.com/news/stories/0904/172671.html

[Andy_Stephenson]

3. I just talked to the Senator's aide...

and it is for real.

I also educated her on paper ballots as opposed to trails and reciepts.

[BevHarris]

4. Despite this testimony, the MD judge said there had never been problems

he also said Diebold was the most secure system there is.

Thanks, HG, for the info. Good catch.

Bev Harris

[ParanoidPat]

5. BWAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.....

.....HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! BWAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA choke, snort, cough cough, gurgle, snicker. :evilgrin:

I just LOVE honest demo's! :)

:kick:DIEBOLD Wrong but easy!:kick:

[Andy_Stephenson]

7. Yes indeed...

they instill so much confidence.....

:rotflmao:

[ParanoidPat]

6. Kick!

:kick:

[harmonyguy]

8. ABC picks up the story....

Md. Senator Sees Error by Voting Machine
Senator Gets First-Hand Experience of Potential Touch-Screen Voting Problems

http://abcnews.go.com/wire/Politics/ap20040913_941.html

[Andy_Stephenson]

9. Sweet!

they are finally listening.

[annabanana]

11. We should hope that CBS picks it up..

They seem to have more cojones than the other networks.

[fudge stripe cookays]

10. Stan Boyd is a hero...

for getting the machine out and available for a news crew to examine.

If this man is arrested or otherwise hassled, we all need to be standing up and writing, calling, whoever we need to to protect him.

What a guy.
FSC

[cthrumatrix]

15. kick

[Southpaw Bookworm]

12. A DU thread

on the same topic:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=2354979&mesg_id=2354979

[cthrumatrix]

13. that's just down right scary.... where is Elliot Spitzer ?

[DubyaSux]

14. Another hysteria incident bites the dust...

A couple of observations from the non-tinfoil-wearing crowd...

"Stan Boyd, 63, a retired teacher, said he was giving CBS access to the machine because he believed it might have malfunctioned during a weekend demonstration with Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.), a view the senator does not share, according to a spokesman."

Mikulski does not beleive the machine malfunctioned.

"A Mikulski spokesman told the newspaper the problem could have been caused by Mikulski, who may have accidentally brushed the "yes" button and not have noticed. The spokesman said this also suggested the sensitivity of the machines could be a problem."

Mikulski is stating unequivically she may have actually made that vote.

The sensitivity problem? Maybe legitimate and warrants investigation.

The evoting boogieman hiding under your bed? As usual, completely bogus. More hysteria shown to have no basis.

edited to add from the cbs source:
"The machine would have let the senator correct the error by pressing "yes" again to clear it and then pressing "no" again, Morrill said. But she did not do that."

[Andy_Stephenson]

16. Are you Mark Radke?

or Tom Swidarski?

[DubyaSux]

18. No...

I am just someone who pays attention to the evoting hysteria because I don't want YOU screwing up our system and having the dumbass-in-chief we have now back in charge. You people are not helping to improve the process - you are trying to force YOUR process down our throats by using a George Bush tactic - fear.

You have twisted legitimate concerns into a campaign that screws us over in the long run. And frankly, that pisses me off.

But if you want to beleive I'm some activist or whatever, fine. Just make sure you send me the royalties from the money you make over this crap.

[DubyaSux]

20. But anyway...

...please comment on Barbara A. Mikulski pressing a wrong button and not undoing the vote as she's allowed to do, while you people call it "missing a vote" and the machine malfunctioning.

I'm very curious how you justify this hysteria fit you're creating.

[ParanoidPat]

17. Hey, DubyaSux, have you ever heard of US-CERT?

http://www.uscert.gov/cas/bulletins/SB04-252.html#diebold :evilgrin:

[DubyaSux]

19. Sure...

Yep..I know what it is. And the threat is listed as "medium".

Why is that? If it could destroy all life as we know it, why isn't it "high"? Why does it say: "We are not aware of any exploits for this vulnerability".

I'd like to see the written response from whoever does these cert things to these questions just out of curiousity.

[ParanoidPat]

22. Easy answer.....

.....the POC (Proof of Concept) exploit hasn't been released 'into the wild' yet. IOW, the little 6 line VBS script has not been posted on the Internet. They also have not been present at a demonstration or received a copy of it to verify that it works.

I expect that to happen very shortly. :evilgrin:

(Calm down Agent Mike, I'm only talking about the CERT verification not the 'releasing it' part! :hi: )

Just off hand, how much of a threat level do you feel is acceptable when choosing the 'leader of the free world' and Commander in Chief of the most powerful military on the planet? The voting machines can't "destroy all life as we know it" but the wrong people mistakenly put into a position of absolute power like that certainly can. Think about it. :)

Would you trust your bank account to a system that has a "medium" threat that you could lose all your money without any way to prove it was ever there?

[harmonyguy]

21. Hysteria, Boogiemen , Missing a Vote, Destroying all Life

So have you considered the source of this hysteria, as you call it?
Of course you are free to consider whatever you want to be hysteria, but I certainly don't see any of the regulars here perpetuating what you appear to call hysteria.

Without a doubt, many here feel so passionately about this topic that there will be times when in their eagerness to spread news reports as quickly as possible, they may add commentary which you feel is not appropriate to the cause, but that is only natural in an open forum such as this, just as your additional comments like "missing a vote", "evoting boogieman", and of course "destroying all life as we know it" are to be expected in your eagerness to spread whatever it is that you're trying to spread.

If you truly feel that "legitimate concerns are being twisted" here, perhaps you could articulate just what you think ARE the legitimate concerns, without all the hyperbole. Maybe you'll be able to shed light on some aspect of the whole issue that hasn't previously been considered. Now THAT would be a positive contribution.

Perhaps I'm reading too much into all this, but it seems that whatever it is that you're trying to contribute to the discussion is getting lost in amongst your rather-frenzied postings.

HG

[DubyaSux]

23. The source of the hysteria?

Bev Harris and Co.

Avi Rubin spread this trash and while on the advisory board of VoteHere.com, a Diebold competitor, wrote a scathing report that was quickly debunked by SAIC and later, mostly by himself. He volunteered as a poll worker in Baltimore where is was coldly received, and got his lesson in life. He admitted most of the stuff he was afraid of could not happen due to the diligence of both republicans and democrats working the polls.

These people act as if no protocols exist to manage an election. With no protocols, ANY election can be "fixed" regardless of what technology is used. Paper elections just make it easier. Bev Harris and Co. are demanding the removal of evoting equipment and going back to paper. That is utterly absurd. If you can't trust someone not to hack a computer, how will you trust them to count votes properly? Paper receipts? another joke. If it's so easy to manipulate an election, how easy do you think it will be to print out a bunch of bogus receipts and blame it on the computers?

The flaws to the anti-evoting argument are astounding. But most astounding - and highly offensive to me - is the assumption that the good democrats part of this process are either too stupid or too inept to stop this "conspiracy". The evoting companies might be owned by the lowest of freeper lifeforms, but it preposterous to assume 100% of the employees working for all those companies are evil republicans.

Most cynics have given up the fraud aspect. Legitimate concerns? Plenty: Hardware reliability. Poll worker training. Clear procedures in dealing with problems. Complacency (not changing default passwords). There are a few where Bev Harris could help. But that's not her motive. Her money is in being part of the problem, not being part of the solution.

My dog in this hunt is getting all the votes counted. I don't want Bush in office for another 4 years. So, I don't want undervotes, overvotes, and all that other crap. I don't want the election decided on pregnant hanging dimpled chads. Undervoting and overvoting account for .07% of the votes with evoting. It's roughly 7% with paper. If you truly wanted every vote to count, you would be in FAVOR of evoting, not against it.

Evoting is not perfect. No voting system we have is perfect. Any election can be rigged no matter what the technology is if it's not controlled by a process. And almost all of Bev Harris' claims leave out that process. THAT is why nobody is paying that much attention to her when she tries to make her case. She is basically insinuating that poll workers are stupid and dishonest. She is insinuating that half the employees working at the evoting companies are stupid. She is insinuating (assuming half are democrats and half are republican) that half the employees working for all the evoting companies are criminals willing to go to jail to perpetuate felonies.

The evoting machines are not connected to the internet. They do not have input devices - other than the touchscreen (keyboard, mouse, etc) - attached to them. The source code for these machines do not reside on any of these systems. The votes are encrypted and stored randomly at MULTIPLE locations of the computer. The ballot is saved so that it CAN be reprinted later for recount. The list is endless.

Evoting may not perfect, but it's better than what we have so far. It's not better if you believe in everyone either being a criminal or stupid, and that's where we part ways.

Here's the bottom line: It's much easier to rig an election with unskilled people using paper technology rather than highly skilled programmers and technicians trying to rig evoting. The paper ballot is simply a stupid idea and not well thought out. Sure, you can verify your vote, but anyone can either erase the ballot, put the ballot in their pocket, simply count the ballot differently, etc etc etc. I can't vote in secret anymore. That is NOT an improvement. Printing out receipts is a joke. If you can rig an election, how easy do you think it will be to print out tons of bogus receipts? And besides, I don't want to stand in line for two hours waiting to vote because of printer problems. Maybe I will, but I don't know many who will. We have a hard enough time getting people to the polls with making them wait two hours to vote or having you people scare them away because they think their vote will be stolen.

I'm a nobody in this issue, but I pay attention. And I know many of you are being played for suckers by Bev Harris. You're smart and could do some real good in helping our voting process, but instead you are helping derail a better process in favor of a completely stupid one. Fortunately, you won't succeed. Most of us are not resistant to change as some of you and do not stand to gain in Qui Tam lawsuits.

I want Bush out so bad, I can't stand it. And I want you people to get out of the way of making that happen. You are not helping.