Balya takes on the Tribune Review

[wisteria]

in a letter to the editor. Now you might think they would have allowed him to do an op-ed, but we know the Tribe wants to keeps its reader ignorant. But, if anyone living in or around Westmoreland County could post this to their Facebook page or even just give it a thumbs up, that would be great. We need to let people know how onesided that paper is.


Commissioner Balya bemoans Trib

After reading another "Lance" involving Westmoreland County commissioners in "Greensburg Laurels & Lances," I'm wondering just how idiotic the Trib's editorial staffers may be. For all the years they've written about Westmoreland County government, one would think that they might have a "working knowledge" of how the county's budget works.

Local property taxes make up 25 percent of our budget. The bulk of the remaining 75 percent comes from the commonwealth. Commissioner Charles Anderson's grandstanding 1-percent ($3.2 million) across-the-board cut could have resulted in a further reduction in funding from the commonwealth of $1.8 million, not savings of $3.2 million to county taxpayers.

Our spending is directly related to what we receive from the commonwealth. We would have simply been digging a deeper hole in the county budget.

While the government-hating Trib crows about Gov. Tom Corbett's budget, Pennsylvanians are quickly finding out that pandering to the super-wealthy hurts working families. And, sadly, the editorial staff at the Trib continues to show its ignorance of how the county budget operates.

Tom Balya

Greensburg

The writer, a Democrat, is a Westmoreland County commissioner.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/opinion/s_730132.html

[femmocrat]

1. Unfortunately, Mr. Balya is not running for re-election.

I wish he would run against Tim Murphy!

He deserves a kudo for taking on the Trib, though.

[demodonkey]

2. Sadly, Tom Balya did not "get it" nearly this well when he purchased voting machines in 2006...

Despite hundreds of citizens and experts urging them to do otherwise, the Westmoreland County Commissioners led by Tom Balya chose to spend our HAVA grant on one of the most expensive and vulnerable* voting machines, a paperless touchscreen Direct Recording Electronic (DRE.) And although I strongly believe that we otherwise have a great Election Bureau in Westmoreland County, this problem is serious and remains a threat at every election. It's a threat in all 50 of our 67 counties that chose DREs over a voter-marked paper ballot based voting system.

Many computer scientists estimate that DRE voting machines will have a useful lifespan of 7-10 years. Five years of that time are are gone; these machines have been in use since early 2006. Already there are anecdotal reports of DREs in various locations in PA and other states having more vote switching (calibration?) problems, as well as anomalies in the number of votes on the machines compared to the number of voters who signed the pollbook.

Sometime during the service of our next group of Commissioners it is quite likely that the county will be facing replacement of this aging voting system. Planning and budgeting for this important replacement should be in the works now, or very soon. And it is crucial that a better and wiser choice is made this time.

A voting system that uses voter-marked paper ballots is not only http://blog.verifiedvoting.org/2010/12/13/1299">much cheaper to operate, it will allow the county to fully and meaningfully comply with current Pennsylvania law regarding auditing and recounting elections (the DREs do not.) With paper ballots available for human beings to audit and recount, our elections will not be totally at the mercy of the proprietary software in the electronic voting machines.

Fair and accurate elections are at the core of everything we do in our democracy. Running fair and accurate elections are one of the most important things a county does. It is important to educate all candidates running for County Commissioner (not just in Westmoreland, but in ALL 50 Pennsylvania counties that use DREs) about this urgent issue, and ask them where they stand on replacement of DRE voting systems with more economic and secure voter-marked paper ballot based systems.


*Numerous computer scientists report that an attacker with minimal skills and as little as 15-30 SECONDS of access can compromise DREs; tests done for the Ohio Secretary of State showed that Westmoreland County's model can be compromised by inserting a Palm Pilot and a small magnet into the face of the machine (could even be done by a voter while voting!)

[wisteria]

3. Thanks for the information, it concerns me that our machines can be compromised so easily. n/t

[jdm9955]

21. +1

[bals]

4. Response to voting machine issue

I appreciate the kind words with regard to my letter to the
Local right wing newspaper.  But I want to clarify this issue
with  voting machines.  We were handed with HAVA because of
Congress' feeble reaction to the stealing of the 2000
Presidential Election.  We would have stayed with the
virtually tamper-proof lever machines, but we didn't have a
choice.  We had to purchase one of the approved brands of
machines, and after our technical people evaluated the
choices, they recommended the type we acquired. 

We are confident we have secure machines. They are stand-alone
machines and their integrity is protected.  To suggest paper
offers more security ignores the history of voting in this
nation and the fact that a receipt to a voter doesn't mean
that is how the vote would be recorded.  We moved away from
paper ballots in the 1960s because of the potential of fraud. 
If someone wants to cheat, they'll find a way.  Florida in
2000 is evidence to that reality.  We need to elect honest
people, committed to keeping our democracy functional, and
sadly that isn't happening enough.    

[blue neen]

5. Thank you for the information on the voting machines.

Please keep up the letters to Scaife's rag. Why can't we find someone to print a decent newspaper in this area?

Scaife's paper is the main newspaper in practically all of southwestern Pennsylvania...and people actually wonder why this area has a Democratic voter registration edge but votes Republican! Scaife is controlling the message here in PA.

[Divernan]

6. Welcome to DU & particularly the Pennsylvania state forum

Hope you can find the time to check in regularly and give us your feedback on the many serious issues facing the Commonwealth and its citizens/residents.

[femmocrat]

7. Welcome to DU, "bals".

Please come back often! Your input is greatly appreciated here. :hi:

[Bunny]

8. Welcome to DU, Commissioner.

As a long-time resident of Westmoreland County, I was sorry to see the lever machines go. I'll take your word that our electronic ones are as reliable as these things can be. Please feel free to weigh in here with any other information you may have, particularly in response to Governor Corbett's budgetary axe-wielding, as well as any updates you may gather on his prolonged honeymoon with Mr. Marcellus Shale. They make a cute couple, don't they? :eyes:

[bals]

9. Commonwealth of PA

I'm very concerned that Corbett's budget is going to be
extremely painful and if we reduce our investment in
education, we will only serve to further impede true progress
in Pennsylvania. But it should come as no surprise because if
people listened to what Corbett said during the campaign, he's
doing what he said he would. The fact that the Republicans
also control both legislative houses should give
Pennsylvanians a true taste of what the Republican Party
stands for today, both here and across the nation. 

Corbett also made it clear he was bought for (rather cheaply)
by the natural gas industry and his appointments so far
reflect his commitment to his benefactors.

The consequences of the proposed budget for counties and
municipalities is not good either as we'll continue see
cost-shifting to local governments for the services people
have come to expect.  It will be interesting to watch how much
pressure the Republicans in Harrisburg get from Republicans
back home that will be left trying to fund a growing expense
for services and education.  

To sum it up, we live in a fantasy world where Republicans
(and sadly many Democrats) have been duped into believing they
can have everything for nothing, the government is bad (even
though most people NEED their government for some type of
service), and what is good for corporate America is somehow
good for them             

[Bunny]

11. Cost-shifting to local governments will create an interesting dynamic between the locals and the

Legislature. Your last paragraph really says it all. How did we get to this point? Thanks for the information.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

10. Famous Last Words: "We are confident we have secure machines."

If I were you, I wouldn't want to be quoted saying that, because one day, those machines will screwup, have a massive under vote or flat out lose votes and people will ridicule and blame you for supporting unreliable, insecure, un-auditable, non recountable easily tampered with poorly designed voting "computer".

Oh boy, you have the paperless "I dont Votronic" machines. Whoopie, like those that had the massive 18000 undervote in the FL 13 congressional district.

Sarasota: Could a Bug Have Lost Votes?
http://freedom-to-tinker.com/blog/felten/sarasota-could-bug-have-lost-votes

The officials in North Carolina told us that they had "faith" in the paperless electronic voting machines in 2004. Hah! Here's the lesson we learned in 2004.

North Carolina's ballot blues by Joyce McCloy
The News & Observer
Opinion: Point of view
Winston-Salem — We've got a problem
"North Carolina has the worst election problem in the country right now."
Computer scientist Dr. David L. Dill of Stanford University
"A Florida-style nightmare has unfolded in North Carolina in the days since Election Day, with thousands of votes missing and the outcome of two statewide races still up in the air."
AP Newswire, November 13,2004

Our key decision-makers are ignoring the seriousness of the problem
"Except for the lost votes in Carteret County, Gary Bartlett, executive director of the North Carolina State Board of Elections, called the problems 'easily remedied and lessons learned.'"
AP Newswire, November 13, 2004

November 26, 2004 — North Carolina's election problems will not be that easily remedied. This year's disaster shows that many election workers are in over their heads.

Problems with voting machines, central tabulators using outdated and secret software, registration confusion, poll worker training, provisional ballots and absentee ballots are not easily remedied.
Add to all this the lack of a voter-verified paper ballot and you have no disaster recovery plan.
This is the case with more than 40 counties using touchscreen or "dial a vote" machines. The security of their votes depends on the software, source code and hardware of the voting machines. Election workers' ability, or lack thereof, to operate and troubleshoot the machines can affect the security of the votes as well.

• Lost: 4,500 votes in Carteret County — paper ballots verified by voters and retained by the election officials would have saved these votes.
• Omitted: an entire precinct of 1,209 votes in Gaston County.
• Missing: 12,000 more votes in Gaston County not reported. The election director hired a voting machine technician to upload the county vote totals and did not oversee the process.
• Bamboozled: Guilford County bought vote-tabulating software that used outdated technology and with insufficient vote storage. As a result, Guilford County's public vote totals for president were off by 22,000 votes.
• More votes than cast: Craven County reported 11,283 more votes for president than cast, voting with the same software as in Guilford County.

The State Board of Elections has relied on the advice of voting machine salesmen and turned a deaf ear to the good advice and warnings of computer scientists.

Voting machine salesmen gain access to some election officials via a private organization called the Election Center. This organization's mission is to educate and inform election officials, yet it admits to accepting money from voting-machine companies. The Election Center hosts conferences for election officials at which salesmen provide parties, prizes and even a dinner cruise on the Potomac. North Carolina's director of elections, Gary Bartlett, sits on the board of directors of the center.
Continued computer breakdowns and miscounts prove the need for a voter-verified paper ballot. This is not a receipt but a paper printout of the ballot, to be verified by the voter and kept by the election officials in case of recount, audit or computer breakdown.

The State Board of Elections can do the right thing by consulting computer scientists to recommend real requirements for our voting systems. It should also allow sufficient time for a thorough review by outside experts, to ensure that North Carolina's voting system is the most secure and trustworthy in America.

Joyce McCloy is coordinator of the North Carolina Coalition for Verified Voting.

http://www.ejfi.org/Voting/Voting-124.htm#blues

[bals]

12. voting machines

I am curious,  have you ever been through the process of
acquiring machines? Better yet, have you ever been through the
election process? I've been through four elections over the
last sixteen years. Three of them were with with lever
machines and the last with the touch screens.  I cannot speak
to what has happened other places, but in our county, the
votes get counted.  ES&S  didn't schmooze us to get us to
buy their machines.  The Feds certified certain machines, 
then the states did, and we had to select from one of about
seven varieties approved by the Commonwealth of PA. 

We had a committee of citizens plus our IT folks evaluate the
machines.  We have 800 STAND ALONE machines they are NOT
networked.  So to compromise them, someone would have to gain
access to all of our machines.  If you are suggesting we as
public officials have the totals compromised, I truly resent
that. I am puzzled by this trust in paper. Do I have to remind
you of the history of voting with paper ballots in this
country? That is why voting machines were created in the first
place.   

The bottom line is; our election process is only as good as
the people conducting elections.  We've all lived through the
stealing of a Presidential election.  Instead of outrage, most
of the public and the media thought that Gore should just give
up to keep order.  Remember there really wasn't much of a
difference between Gore and W. I'm more concerned who is
winning elections.  And if you want the machines changed, get
Congress to change them....that is who compelled us to comply
with HAVA.   

[demodonkey]

13. Oh my goodness "Bals," what you're saying here about voting machines is just not true.

Please, please, please learn more before you say more.

Westmoreland County has been and still is blessed with a wonderful, dedicated Election Bureau. I don't think anyone is impugning their integrity or accusing our county officials of compromising vote totals. But the fact is, the paperless Direct Recording Electronic machines Westmoreland County purchased in 2006 under HAVA have a history of failures, lost votes, missing votes, and many problems. Westmoreland County has been very very lucky, perhaps at least in part because our Election Bureau staff is careful and is so good in their work. But even with good operators, these machines can and do still fail. When failures have happened in other places, there have been some real problems because Direct Recording Electronic voting machines are totally software-dependent. By that I mean even though votes are supposed to be saved accurately by the hardware (which may not always happen) there is no possible way to count or recount them without using the voting system software. Voter-marked paper ballot based voting systems are considered software-INdependent because in addition to being scanned by computer the ballots can be hand counted and audited outside their voting system's software.

Now as to what you said in your post above -- PLEASE learn this: Not being networked absolutely does NOT mean that voting machines are secure. There have been numerous studies by world-renowned computer scientists that have shown that electronic voting machines can be compromised without being networked. And as I am sure you know, if a virus or something like that is placed into one machine it can potentially spread to every machine in a county.

Please watch this short excerpt from a speech by Patrick McDaniel, who is a professor in the Computer Science department at Penn State Main Campus. Dr. McDaniel was the leader of one of the research teams that tested voting machines for Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner. WATCH THIS VIDEO. It takes three minutes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8EvYi5iyobs

Here is a photo from Dr. McDaniel's team report to Secretary Brunner, showing a Palm Pilot and a magnet being used to emulate a "personal electronic ballot" PEB device on an iVotronic (same machine we use in Westmoreland County.) This is the attack in progress. It does not take much. This could be done by a voter with a little programming knowledge, while voting, or someone could access a machine while it is lying around in a fire hall, church, school, etc. before or after an election. And if a PEB is emulated by a Palm Pilot and a magnet, it can allow enough access for someone to erase votes, install malware, change election results, or whatever.



Here's an article:
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2007/12/report-magnet-a/

And here's the full EVEREST report -- please read it, especially the section of the report done by the Penn State team:
http://www.sos.state.oh.us/Text.aspx?page=4519

This is only a tiny tip of the iceberg in terms of information and reports that are available from scientific, reliable sources, all saying how dangerous software-dependent voting machines can be.

Now about paper ballots -- please, please learn more about this too. Over 60% of United States voters cast paper ballots on optical scan voting systems last year, and the number of jurisdictions switching to paper ballots and scanners is growing all the time. A modern, precinct count optical scan voting system is totally unlike the old "Boss Tweed" era ballot boxes being stuffed and counted in smoke-filled back rooms. Modern optical scanners have a lot of safeguards that didn't exist in the 19th and 20th century. Perhaps biggest safeguard is that we can get a vote count, audit, or recount in two completely separate ways -- on the scanner, AND/OR completely outside the system and its software with a count using human eyeballs. Incidentally, a statistical sample audit of elections using a method different from the original count is required under current PA Election Code at 25 P.S. § 3031.17 but right now the 50 DRE counties in Pennsylvania can't really follow this law because there is no way to count their votes outside of their machines' software.

For the time being, Westmoreland County has the machines we have. But as I said in my earlier post these touchscreens have an estimated life of 7-10 years and five years of that time are gone. So whether or not there is federal money (which is unlikely given the problems in Congress right now) it is time we start planning for replacing our voting machines. It is important that Westmoreland County's incoming Board of Commissioners takes this issue very seriously and works voting system replacement into their future budgets over the next few years. Our elections are too important to risk waiting until these voting computers are past their useful lifespan. And when the time comes for replacement, this time we need a new voting system that is both software independent and voter-verifiable as well as one that is the most cost effective for our taxpayers.

[bals]

14. You remind me of "Chicken Little"

Someone can "hack" into any kind of electronic system IN THE WORLD. Why do you continue to try to cast aspersions on the integrity of our election process? If those type machines have lost votes it hasn't been in the elections we've conducted with them.

None of our IT professionals liked the paper scanning systems, neither did the members of the public that participated in the recommendation process. Maybe we all should have just deferred to your choice?

If a "virus" can be put into the software of the system we are using, why couldn't one be put into the software that reads the scanned ballots? You say the ballots can be manually counted, but there would be no reason to unless the equipment failed. Maybe it would just alter the vote count and who would know?

By your reasoning, every election in every state that uses these machines is somehow compromised. Then we might as well all stay home because these machines won't be replaced any time soon in the political/economic climate we are in.

[demodonkey]

15. Chicken Little?? Oh for pity's sake.

Come on bals, you are better than this.

Our neighboring Ohio Secretary of State commissioned an in-depth scientific study about voting machines, and OH uses the same machines we do. This study was done in part by high-level academic teams of computer scientists from two of the best universities in Pennsylvania. The study's results showed the voting machines are poorly designed and have some very serious security flaws.

As a concerned citizen and a fellow elected official and party official, I posted these scientific results and asked you to read them and pay attention to them. Somehow that makes me "Chicken Little?" Geesh.

NO ONE is trying to cast aspersions on the integrity of our election process in Westmoreland County. Especially me. As I have said repeatedly in this thread and publicly, I think our Election Bureau is excellent. I have always believed the Westmoreland County Election Bureau cares greatly about their work and they do a great job. But unfortunately, no matter how great our election people and process are in Westmoreland County, the voting machines chosen in 2006 are in fact unverifiable and software-dependent. As long as they are in use there will be risk of a really bad election fiasco.

If those type machines have lost votes it hasn't been in the elections we've conducted with them.

Not so. Don't you remember Westmoreland County got national attention in 2006 when the vendor ES&S misprogrammed the date and time of the election onto every machine we had? Thinking the election should be over already, the machines asked to close the poll EVERY SINGLE TIME a Westmoreland County voter was admitted to vote that day and this required a pollworker to do a two-step override to keep the election going. Pollworkers did not expect this when they opened the machines that morning, some machines got closed meaning in some polling places voters were unable vote for an extended time, and in some cases emergency paper ballots were missing or inadequate in number. A number of voters were turned away or left without voting. Every single one of those voters who was unable to come back definitely lost their vote because of the iVotronic machines.

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/election/s_478760.html

None of our IT professionals liked the paper scanning systems, neither did the members of the public that participated in the recommendation process.

The truth is that paper ballots and optical scanners were never seriously considered in Westmoreland County. The Commissioners spent somewhere around $50K of our Help America Vote Act money for a consultant to do RFIs for four voting systems -- and every single one of those four was a DRE. As far back as November 4, 2003 Westmoreland County election officials were quoted in the press as looking primarily at touchscreens to comply with the Help America Vote Act. (See the fifth paragraph from the end in this link.)

As far as these alleged "members of the public that participated in the recommendation process" the public never knew and still doesn't know exactly who these "members of the public" were, how they were appointed or chosen, when/how they met, who had input or access to them, or what they were told and by whom they were told it (vendors? others?) It was never made clear to the public or press what this so-called recommendation process actually was. This was a very uncharacteristic lack of transparency for Westmoreland County and it did not inspire the confidence of our citizens and voters.

Maybe we all should have just deferred to your choice?

Not necessarily, but maybe you should have been more open and transparent about the process. Maybe you should have held a public voting machine fair like so many other Pennsylvania counties did. Maybe you should have listed more respectfully to the many concerned citizens who showed up at Commissioner meetings in late 2005 and early 2006 in support of a verifiable voting system. Many of these citizens, including a good number of prominent Westmoreland County Democrats, expressed concerns to the commissioners about paperless e-voting, and/or asked them to consider paper ballots and scanners. NOT ONE citizen spoke out in favor of paperless DRE machines at any of these meetings. But DREs were chosen anyway and many people felt that the citizens were blown off and not taken seriously. You probably don't want to hear this, but it is the truth.

If a "virus" can be put into the software of the system we are using, why couldn't one be put into the software that reads the scanned ballots?

Yes, of course that could happen with the scanners, but the paper ballots would be available to hand count separate from the software and the hand count would show the voters' intent.

You say the ballots can be manually counted, but there would be no reason to unless the equipment failed.

RIGHT NOW, today, the Pennsylvania Election Code at 25 P.S. § 3031.17 mandates that counties perform "a statistical recount of a random sample of ballots after each election using manual, mechanical, or electronic devices of a type different than those used for the specific election." This isn't an extremely strong audit but it would in all probability serve to detect a bad malfunction, gross fraud, or misprogramming of the type caught by the optical scan system in Pottawattamie County IA. Going forward, we need to work for stronger audits of elections in Pennsylvania but unfortunately until all 67 Pennsylvania counties get on the national bandwagon and get paper ballots that provide something TO audit, our fifty paperless DRE counties -- including Westmoreland -- can't even comply with the Pennsylvania law that is already on the books.

Maybe it would just alter the vote count and who would know?

If our current paperless iVotronics get a virus that altered the vote count, chances are we WOULD never know. The wrong candidates would simply get elected. And even if the results were suspicious, with paperless iVos there absolutely would be no way to know for sure that the results were wrong. We are at the complete mercy of the ES&S software. With scanners, there are paper ballots that can be hand counted. We could follow the current PA Election Code and audit our results which would have a good chance of catching the problem.

By your reasoning, every election in every state that uses these machines is somehow compromised.

Absolutely NOT TRUE. I never said, and I don't believe, that elections in every state using DREs are compromised. But elections every place using these machines are AT RISK, including Westmoreland County. Unnecessarily at risk. There are available paper ballot voting systems that are more secure, more accessible, more auditable and more recountable -- and cheaper to operate to boot.

Then we might as well all stay home because these machines won't be replaced any time soon in the political/economic climate we are in.

Well, I never said people should stay home... Everyone should vote. But as I said before, these machines are going to reach the end of their expected useful life in the next two to five years. Keeping any county property beyond its useful life is not responsible -- it's not fiscally responsible and it's not responsible in terms of good management. It is imperative that the next group of Westmoreland County Commissioners pays attention to this and plans for the orderly replacement of these voting machines before we have real problems in a big election.

Let me ask you something. If our county purchased some road paving material with a certain lifespan and you thought the stuff was OK, and in then in the meantime there were bad wrecks in other states on this same road surface while scientific studies showed this particular road surface is quite dangerous -- if Westmoreland County was lucky enough to get by without a wreck would you support the county keeping our roads paved with this stuff past its lifespan? Would you call citizens and other officials who recommended repavement of these roads with a safer material "Chicken Little?" Or would you do the responsible thing as the roads got older and older, and work repavement with a safer material into the county's budgets to remove the danger before we had a deadly crash?

Let's pay attention to our voting machines before we have that deadly crash on the road to democracy.

[bals]

16. Interesting recollection

I find your recollection of events with regard our voting machines very interesting. First of all, over the years I've never had much communication from anyone other than you on this issue. I will go back to our meeting minutes to review how many people spoke out about the issue in general.

There was no secretive process involved as the commissioners had no incentive to choose one type of machine over another. Our requirement was that we had to choose one of the machines the Commonwealth had approved. If I recall we tried to get a diverse group of ordinary people, not ones with an agenda. I'm not arguing about any studies. But I do have confidence in our IT people and if they were fearful of this equipment, they would have spoken out too.

As for people losing their vote, you are stretching it with the example you used. The machines didn't lose votes that were cast.

As I said, the machines you favor can be compromised too and your rationalization for hand-counting misses my point. If someone wants to compromise the results , it can be done and there would not necessarily be any evidence of a need to question the results.

Your example of paving material is a stretch too. Unsafe road material could be a matter of life and death. What you are disputing is our choice of voting machines off a list of machines approved by the state and federal governments.

[demodonkey]

17. I will save you the trouble of looking up your minutes, bals....

On December 29, 2005 there were four speakers listed as being heard -- all against paperless DREs. One of those speakers was me. On that particular day there were also several rows of concerned citizens in the audience who did not speak. As I recall, prior to the meeting the citizens were asked to have representative speakers in order to save time. If I knew that someone was going to attempt to marginalize our efforts over five years later, in retrospect I think we would have insisted that everyone who wanted to speak that day should have done so.

On February 9, 2006 there were an additional four speakers listed, all different people but again all presenting serious concerns about the paperless DREs you chose. FYI I wasn't there and didn't even know about this group coming to speak that day, so I don't know how many others were present who did not actually speak.

Again -- I can find no record of any citizen ever speaking in favor of paperless DREs on ANY day.

One of the people who spoke on February 9 wanted to know how the decision to purchase these machines was made. This should make it clear to you that the process was never fully made public. If you actually asked a "diverse group of ordinary people" to help choose the machines, the point is NO ONE EVER KNEW WHO THEY WERE OR HOW THEY WERE SELECTED. There was never anything mentioned in the press or posted on the county website as to the voting system selection process you were taking. I am sorry, but to me that is secretive -- a very uncharacteristic lack of transparency for our county. And when you say you wanted ordinary people "not ones with an agenda" sorry again, but I have to take that to mean people that could be easily swayed to the "correct" choice and who were not into asking questions, especially given the overall lack of public knowledge about the whole process.

As for people losing their vote, you are stretching it with the example you used. The machines didn't lose votes that were cast.

Oh, brother... Do you think that the Westmoreland County citizens who were turned away and didn't get to vote that day would say it is "stretching it" to say that they lost their vote? It sure sounds to me like only the ones who were lucky enough to get their hands on one of your machines must have mattered. And that's OK with you? Well I'm sorry, but I happen to think that EVERY SINGLE VOTE IS PRECIOUS. I was on the ground in Ohio for most of December 2004 as one of the nine regional coordinators for the Presidential Recount. I saw all kinds of crap there and I will go to my grave knowing that Kerry won that election -- especially after I actually met a few of the thousands of voters who were turned away, had to leave, were challenged onto provisional ballots that were never counted, etc. I cannot tolerate an attitude from anyone that not counting votes is somehow OK if only a few votes are missing, if a problem is not big enough to change the election result, etc. etc. etc. Our officials must do everything they can -- everything -- to make sure that every vote possible is cast and is counted as cast.

As I said, the machines you favor can be compromised too and your rationalization for hand-counting misses my point. If someone wants to compromise the results , it can be done and there would not necessarily be any evidence of a need to question the results.

Of course any election can be compromised, but as I said with a paper ballot based voting system it is harder to do so -- especially if we followed the current PA election laws and conducted an audit using a different counting method. There is no perfect voting system, but some voting systems are harder to compromise than others. Shouldn't we want one of the best voting systems for our county's voters, not one of the weakest? And exactly what is wrong with advance planning for the orderly replacement and improvement of voting machines as our current touchscreens reach the end of their useful lifespan?

Your example of paving material is a stretch too. Unsafe road material could be a matter of life and death. What you are disputing is our choice of voting machines off a list of machines approved by the state and federal governments.

Miscounted elections are most certainly a matter of life and death. If GW Bush had not been improperly (s)elected in 2000, and again in 2004, how many hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, would not have died in his needless wars? How many American soldiers and innocent civilians in the war torn areas died because of those wrong election results? In the meantime, how many people have lost their jobs, homes and families because of policies originating with GW Bush? How many have died from lack of healthcare and even food, while Bush's corporate buddies still to this day get fatter and richer all the time?

Elections are at the core of everything we do in this country and if you cannot see why it is crucially important for them to be as free, fair, accurate, and secure as possible... well I am truly sorry for you, bals.

[bals]

18. Thank you and I'm done arguing with you

For anyone else that would bother to read this, it should be clear that we have 250,000 registered voters in the county we are discussing. This ONE individual has been harping on this topic for more than five years. NO ONE else has even talked about it in years. Yes there were four people that spoke at two meetings. And even if two rows of people spoke at a public meeting, does that mean they speak for anyone other than themselves? What percentage of 250,000 voters do you speak for?

As for the road material example; if someone like you told me it was dangerous, and professionals were telling me it was fine, I'd have to go with the professionals.

But I don't need you lecturing me on elections. I've lived through them. To do my job correctly, both administratively and politically, it must become one's life. So the stuff you like to pontificate about, I must live with.

And I've seen the bad karma our nation has experienced since we allowed the 2000 Presidential Election to be stolen. So quit acting like anyone that disagrees with you on the voting machines has been duped.

But this discussion reaffirms why I'm getting out. Do you realize how many decisions we have made in county government since 2005? Yet, you who are suppose to be an activist in my party, instead of getting some perspective and moving on, just want to keep whining about a decision you aren't changing. You should put as much energy into actually helping Democrats, instead of lecturing them over a decision made years ago that you somehow can't get over.

[demodonkey]

19. Harping? Whining? Pontificating?

This is what a Westmoreland County official calls concerned citizens' attempts to participate in county government? This is what is said about someone who respectfully points to proven scientific evidence that shows our voting machines have major security flaws, then suggests that our next group of Commissioners should pay attention to this problem and begin to budget for the replacement of this old voting system with something better?

Really?

Pardon me, I thought citizens in a democracy are supposed to address their elected officials with concerns. I didn't realize that everyone should stop whining, shut up, and vote the way we are told.

FYI, I've lived through a lot of elections too. I've been a candidate, and I've served our county on the ground as an official in my precinct since at least 1992 running both lever and iVotronic machines. So the election equipment you like and chose, I must live with. And I'm on the front line, in front of actual voters in the poll. In the meantime, I've been quoted about elections and voting machines in both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. I have been invited to participate in election reform policy planning by the US Senate Rules Committee in Washington D.C. I've testified before the Governor's Task Force on Election Reform, the PA Senate, and in federal court before the United States District Court of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. This has become MY life.

But all that said, every link I provided you was to information provided by nationally respected "professional" scientific experts who back up what I am saying. So you don't have to simply rely on "someone like me."

You claim that Westmoreland County has 250,000 voters. Actually that number as of last Monday April 18 was 231,931 but close enough. Do YOU claim to speak for all those voters? What percentage of them DO you claim to speak for?

Last week 42 Westmoreland County voters left the Democratic Party and joined the Republicans. Only 17 went the other way. Not a good trend. So I spent three hours this evening at a Democratic group meeting, working on plans to revitalize our party in this County this year. Didn't see you there.

Oh and BTW, while I was paying my check the manager of the restaurant where we met told me that he has never trusted the touchscreen voting machines.

"A paper ballot would be a lot better," he said.

[bals]

22. concerned citizen???

Yea so what came out of your meeting? Are you going to keep Democrats in our party by telling them their voting machines are no good and their vote might not be counted? That should be a good recruiting tool.

This is what elected D's put up with from supposed supporters. Wonder why the rest of them aren't communicating on this site? I came upon it because someone was kind enough to acknowledge a letter I wrote to the Tribune Review.

All I've gotten since then is crap from the one and only person that continues to whine about the voting machines. I'm not kidding, no one is dwelling on this issue but this one individual.

I've always show compassion and respect to those in need but I don't take crap from people just because I'm elected to office. I'm elected to manage county government and there is far more too it than this single issue.

[tech9413]

20. Dear bals, my repsone to your naive viewpoint comes from

a 30 plus year background in electronics. Having worked for a vendor that installed and serviced systems paid for by public money, I can tell you with almost absolute certainty, the county will spend ever increasing amounts for service and maintenance of these machines whatever the type.
Working for an exclusive vendor for the equipment manufacturer, I spent years dealing with customer problems when the manufacturer knew of the problem. The "errors" were denied or dismissed repeatedly until WE could provide substantiation of the problem. This was at best difficult due to the minimal training and lack of complete access to the software. This was common with basically all the manufacturers I dealt with. For a publicized example think Toyota/unintended acceleration.

Beyond the technical difficulties, it just seems beyond foolish to waste so much money to do such a simple task. As someone with a technical background, I know enough to know that I can't in any way verify that results are accurate either by error or system manipulation. The average voter is even more in the dark.

Just look at the recent Wisconsin judicial race Kloppenburg/Prosser. Two days after the election an election official magically finds another 14,000 votes that appear to change the results of the race. there will be no way to verify the results of the results without a hand recount or expensive technical and statistical support.

If you are truly that trusting, perhaps I could advise you, for a fee, on your financial investments. I'm sure I can perform as well as Bernie Madoff.