One more time - TABULATORS

[Sandy_0]

There are a TABULATORS made by a number of different companies, but they all worked this way. The kind of ballot didn't matter. It could have been paperless electronic (which does have problems of its own), punch card ballot, optical scan ballot, provisional ballots (many of which were not counted at all), other paper ballots, absentee ballots, military absentee ballots etc. ALL BALLOTS! The ballots were counted locally, in each precinct. Those totals were then sent to the central TABULATOR in each county from all the precincts. The totals were then tallied by the TABULATOR all of which are regular computers with a windows OS and if you have ever worked with a computer, you know how easily the final tabulation would have been manipulated. Some systems were remotely controlled, others had a default set for Bush that would kick in after a predetermined number of Kerry votes. All were connected to modems and could be hacked. No matter what method was used, the totals could be changed, and according to the unaltered exit polls, were changed without leaving a trace to the untrained examiner or election observer. These TABULATORS tallie as many as two million votes at a time. These tallies are what were given as the final number of votes. Basically, as the exit polls were being taken, the local precincts were able to add up the number of votes for each candidate and at that point the exit polls and the results agreed. It wasn't until the individual precincts sent their results to be tallied by the Central TABULATOR that a descrepency occurred between the results and the exit polls.

Now, with all forms of ballots, with the exeption of the paperless touch screen voting machines, there are still ballots that can be recounted by hand. If those raw figures from each precinct are collected without their going through the Central TABULATOR, the true results can be discovered.

TABULATORS didn't just affect the outcome of the presidential race but those the house and senate as well. There was no mandate for any of the candidates. There was only what the TABULATORS in thirty states presented. The TABULATORS decided the election.

[jen4clark]

1. Include this info anytime you write your senators or reps

Thanks for posting this Sandy! Whenever I write to my senators or reps, I include mention of the GEMS Tabulators. When I've signed the various Vote Reform Petitions, I go to the congress site and write the sponsors and tell them about the GEMS. None of the vote reform bills have a word about the Tabulators!!! Nothing else will matter if the machines counting the votes are rigged. They either don't get it or they're in on it and it's beyond our control.

Here's the details of Hillary's bill:
http://www.friendsofhillary.com/home.php


Here's where you can sign her petition for "Count Every Vote Act of 2005":
http://www.friendsofhillary.com/CountEveryVote/

And here's where you can write her directly to tell her about the GEMS Tabulators:
http://clinton.senate.gov/email_form.html

[Amaryllis]

9. I figured that when the Holt bill says voting systems, that includes

tabulators! Oh my god. Does it not? A tabulator is not a voting system...

`(8) PROHIBITION OF USE OF UNDISCLOSED SOFTWARE IN VOTING SYSTEMS- No voting system shall at any time contain or use any undisclosed software. Any voting system containing or using software shall disclose the source code, object code, and executable representation of that software to the Commission, and the Commission shall make that source code, object code, and executable representation available for inspection upon request to any person.

`(9) PROHIBITION OF USE OF WIRELESS COMMUNICATIONS DEVICES IN VOTING SYSTEMS- No voting system shall contain, use, or be accessible by any wireless, power-line, or concealed communication device at all.

`(12) PROHIBITING CONNECTION OF SYSTEM OR TRANSMISSION OF SYSTEM INFORMATION OVER THE INTERNET- No component of any voting device upon which votes are cast shall be connected to the Internet.'.


http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c109:1:./temp/~c109Wu36Lv:e1765:

[Wilms]

2. Good subject.

Do you have any links to offer??

With all the justifiable concern over DRE's, and other issues, I'm afraid tabulation is not being addressed.

Indeed, as mentioned in the 1st reply, I've not seen anything in any of the bills being introduced that specifically address "tabulation".

There are references to "voting systems". But I think, that may only cover "voting", and not the "counting".

Thanks for bringing up the subject...

(Really hard post to read, though. Sorry. I dig the use paragraphs.)

[dogindia]

3. gosh...remember Bev Harris and Howard Dean doing a hack on tv

where they hacking the GEMS?

[Wilms]

4. That was before my time (here).

And while I've read a bit here about the ballot scanners, little about the tabulators.

That worries me a lot. And it's why I was glad to see the subject threaded.

[jen4clark]

10. Have a word document from my tabulator expert friend

Wilms or anyone who can help:

My friend doing the research on the Tabulators doesn't post here, so she sent me what she has so far in a word document. I don't know how to post it or if it's allowed here? Please advise! Thank you! Here's what she says about it:

But I've been sending out my Tabulator chapter of my piece to a few people now, it seems popular.

I know it's going to Rush Holt who I believe had the most comprehensive Bill in the House for election reform because he mentions software code and making it Open Source. No one else seems very aware on this. I will attach my GEMS pages to this and you can see if it's appropriate to post. I caution it is NOT final draft ready yet and I have much more on Diebold and other companies that is applicable, but hate to release what is still in progress. I've double and triple checked most everything and want to be sure I'm not getting anything incorrect, ya know! It's important to be accurate with a controversial topic like this. The ES&S tabulators are just as bad--IT'S NOT JUST GEMS!!! DO NOT INSIST ON ONLY GEMS or we're stuck with Sequoia and Triad and ESS Tabulators-- same game. So avoid brand naming it when you critique, OK? Just refer to the Central Tabulators or Central Servers. - ms in la

[Wilms]

11. SolarBus comes to mind as a place you might publish

<http://www.solarbus.org/election/index.shtml>

This may be the email for Gary Beck.

[email protected]


How long is the piece? I'd guess a page or two could be post right here.


But I agree. Having facts straight is a good thing. Mark it as a "DRAFT". If Gary posts it, put up a thread about it, with a link, and ask people for help with it.

[Zan_of_Texas]

12. Please send your friend this article re remote access

EVEN A REMOTE CHANCE?
by Pokey Anderson
January 10, 2005

http://www.votersunite.org/info/evenaremotechance.htm


Imagine sitting in your favorite easy chair with a remote control, and being able to just push EJECT and get George Bush out of office. Or, let's say you're on your laptop, and you can dial up a regime change. "Hmm," you say, "I'm feeling like blue today. Blue is a nice color. I think I'd rather have Kerry for president." Let's say you're up late, it's November 2nd, you see that Kerry is losing in Ohio, and you say, "the HELL with that!" So, with your laptop, you dial into the tabulator for, let's just say, 41 of 88 counties in Ohio. And, you switch 14 votes per precinct from Bush to Kerry. Voila. Kerry wins.

Could that happen? Or, um, the other way around -- Kerry is winning, and someone dials in and changes a dozen or so votes in each of roughly half the precincts in Ohio, and VOILA, Bush wins Ohio. (A flip of a dozen votes in 5000 precincts would result in a net change of 120,000 votes in Ohio, more than the current margin separating the two candidates.)

Remote control of elections? Science fiction, right? Start playing the Twilight Zone music? Not exactly.


DIEBOLD - Hack Testers Waltz In

Let's look at a test that was done for the State of Maryland on the Diebold equipment. The testers used actual Diebold election equipment and, after a week's study, attempted to hack and manipulate it. The newspaper report <http://www.sunspot.net/news/local/bal-te.md.machine30jan30,0,4050694.story?coll=bal-local-headlines> said they were nearly "giddy" with their success.

MORE

[jen4clark]

13. Thank you both!

I'm sending the link to this thread to ms in la so she can see your responses/article and will leave it up to her about posting her pieces. Thanks again!

:hi:

[Wilms]

18. Here's a bit of info.

It's poorly written, as you'll see. Everyone is confused because of bad terminology usage.

Disclaimer for the Mods: What I'm pasting was all bunched into a couple of paragraphs without the headings I added.


From: An Unofficial Guide to the Presidential Election 2004

OPTICAL SCAN EQUIPMENT

Lets look at optical scan models from three suppliers; Diebold, ES&S, and Sequoia Pacific.

There are two primary types; precinct and central.

With precinct tabulators, the voter inserts ballot and receives immediate overvote/undervote notification. These model are located at the actual voting place and are unlikely to be networked though they may be equipped with modems, either wired or wireless (Wi-Fi). Illegal software would likely be loaded into these models prior to their move to the precinct.

With central tabulators, ballots are counted centrally, away from the voters. Therefore the voter receives no overvote/undervote notification. This model is more likely to be networked and are certainly modem accessible with the possibility that illegal software can be loaded remotely just prior to counting. Further, these models are all PC based.


ES&S has two primary optical scan types.

The ES&S Model 100 (110?) precinct tabulator appears to be PC based and has two PCMCIA slots and RS232 ports for insertion or attachment of wired or wireless (Wi-Fi) modems.

The second is the PC based ES&S Model 150, 550 and 650 central tabulator.


The Sequoia Pacific Eagle Precinct Optical Scan has an optional modem. The Sequoia Pacific 400C also known as the IV_C Central Optical Scan is a PC based unit that also serves as the vote tabulator machine and can be networked.


The Diebold AccuVote OS is a precinct optical scan unit and is not networked or modem equipped. Diebold's central tabulating unit is the GEMS which is PC based and does not include centralized optical scanning.


GEMS is also used to tabulate counts from the Diebold AccuVote TS DRE.

From:

http://www.mutanteggplant.com/ElectionGuide.htm

[jen4clark]

6. That's why I was so happy Dr. Dean got DNC Chair!!!

He knows first hand what the Tabulators can do! If he doesn't address the problem things are further gone than than I want to believe!

I'm trying to contact a friend who's been doing extensive research on the GEMS System so she can post some of what she's got so far. She's documenting it all with links. It'll set your hair on fire!!!

[papau]

5. I agree as to the Tabulators being a source of massive fraud- but I do not

believe that one can say the exit polls abd the precinct counts "agree" -

To make statistical sense, the exit poll data must be put through a stratified model of the population (that is why it is called stratified sampling).

The model used usually ties the exit poll tightly to the final data - in this case the adjustments to the model needed to get close to the "Final" real vote imply a population that was voting that no one except main stream media and GOP appologists can accept as reasonable.

For instance independeant Hispanic org. polls totally contradict the final model and what it says about Hispanic voting.

You just do not get that kind of difference in an exit poll - an exit poll is BETTER than the usual pre-election survey since the part of the model that guess at the percentage of a given group will actually vote - the likely voter pool - is replaced by the 100% accurate fact that these folks DID vote.

So your statement "Basically, as the exit polls were being taken, the local precincts were able to add up the number of votes for each candidate and at that point the exit polls and the results agreed." may need some reworking!

:-)

But your point about electronic communications is valid - as the tabulator changes the numbers for a precinct, it can easy have the computor on the other end change the numbers AT THE PRECINCT so that the two sets agree. Such games would only show up on a paper audit, And if you cheat Big Time, the law prevents you from getting an audit without going broke because the race is jusy not "close enough" to justify the State paying the expense.

[Sandy_0]

7. Someone asked for a link

This is a detailed explanation of the technical side of the issue. It's all spelled out.

http://www.chuckherrin.com/hackthevotedemo.htm

[sacxtra]

8. Please Help.

I am working on this.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3131191

[Trish1168]

14. Thankyou for the heads up on TABULATORS

How do we fight this one state by state?

I have an idea and I would like to know if its crazy.

I think that votes should be counted at the precinct level, and then the town can added them up (the old fashioned way...with a calculator) and then votes should be POSTED ON THE INTERNET on the town web page prior to being called in to the state. This of course would be performed in a bipartisan-open to witnesses way. This way, NO TABULATORS....everyone gets the results at the same time. The vote totals have to be signed off and witnessed at the town level. Its very public and very open.

Can the FEDS force tabulators on us? Did they force tabulators on us in HAVA? Or is this the result of the one stop shopping with the Diebold - Es&s machines?

[Peace Patriot]

15. Trish1168, that's a good suggestion. What we need is some...

...verifiable, concrete reality (human beings, paper, watchful eyes) intervening between the vote cast and its ultimate fate in the central tabulator. A watched over count at each precinct and immediate posting at a local or town web site--and also a paper posting outside the polling place--would do it, in some voting systems. But it would have to be a hand count of voter verified paper ballots. (With some machines, there is NOTHING to count--no paper--and the votes are already long gone into Wonderland.)

------

The following bothered me, too, in the main post:

"Basically, as the exit polls were being taken, the local precincts were able to add up the number of votes for each candidate and at that point the exit polls and the results agreed. It wasn't until the individual precincts sent their results to be tallied by the Central TABULATOR that a descrepency occurred between the results and the exit polls."

---

If the precinct vote counts were different from the end result in the central tabulator--and one set of numbers (precinct) parallels the exit polls, and the other set (central tabulator) does not--then it would be all too easy to cry fraud. We would then have had THREE sets of numbers, two of them agreeing and one not (the central tabulator).

I was going to ask you for documentation on this, but I think it may just be a slip of the pen. (Or am I not connecting the dots here? Is this what UScountvotes has been talking about, when they say they are going to check the entire election down to the precinct level? In other words, do records currently exist of what may be the correct results of the election, but no one is checking them--maybe because people don't have the resources?)

What happened to the CORRECT precinct data? Was it altered by the central tabulators in a back-assing covering loop?

Or does it exist--and is just sort of gathering dust in some gov't office? (Of course, with the paperless sytems, it doesn't exist in any concrete form--I mean other kinds of voting.)

There have been a number of studies of paper ballots vs. electronic voting studies, showing a distinct skew to Bush in electronic voting.

Here are the three I know of:

Nine Ph.D's from leading universities call for investigation of 2004 Election--found 1 in 10 million odds against Bush win, on exit poll data; and a skew to Bush in electronic at the precinct level (5 pg. report):
http://uscountvotes.org/ucvAnalysis/US/USCountVotes_Re_Mitofsky-Edison.pdf

Florida: 130,000 to 230,000 phantom votes for Bush--paper vs. electronic voting:
Dr. Michael Haut & UC Berkeley statistics team: http://ucdata.berkeley.edu

Democratic Underground (ignatzmouse):
(North Carolina: absentee ballot vs. electronic, inexplicable 9% edge to Bush in electronic:)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x45003
(also at:) http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/12/233831/06


And, of course, TruthIsAll's studies here at DU: (not a comphrehensive list)

Part 1
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1316010

Part 2
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=1358806

Part 3
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x197878

Democratic Underground (TruthIsAll): The Time Zone Discrepancy
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x318693

-----

I don't know the answer to the question: Can the feds force central tabulators on us? I think the BushCons think they can do anything they please.

[BillORightsMan]

16. Paper Pen & People!

I'm guessing this is why OH SOS Blackwell wants all precincts to use optical scan machines: so he can consolidate his fraud!
But here's my two cents: Whe use expensive machines at all?



I've been thinking about this awhile now. We need complete and total trasparency in our voting process. Here's my suggestion:

****PAPER, PEN & PEOPLE****
1. Paper and pen is the obvious choice for casting ballots.
2. Instead of having appointed people, there should be a pool of all registered voters, that are picked AT RANDOM, much like the way jurors are picked. (Perhaps BOE officials should be elected, too!)
3. Add to this that companies MUST give employees PAID days off for training and working Election Day. It's OUR Republic and OUR democracy! Let the voters run their own elections! Tell me, what red-blooded, patriotic American wouldn't take two PAID days off work to ensure their democracy is working? Give the voters OWNERSHIP of the PROCESS! Power to the People!
4. This would also include no funny black boxes counting votes: Paper and pen and hand counting. This is how they STILL do it in Canada! No more republican-backed companies (ES&S, Diebold, Sequoia, TRIAD, et. al.) getting a WAD of OUR TAX $$$ on bogus, insecure machines and stealing our elections! Use Web-Cams to monitor the voting and counting, too.
5. Each precinct can use a simple adding machine with a triplicate paper tape. They FAX their results to the BOE of their county. The same process is repeated for counties to report totals to the state BOE. Instant Paper Trail!

I'd add that IF we MUST use ANY electronic tabulation, that it be OPEN-SOURCE code, available to the General Public for review. (Australia uses this now.) Hardware would also have to be scrutinized, since WiFi can easily be incorporated in any electronic device - takes about three chips. BUT Paper Pen and People should be the way of the day! Any electronic machine (especially the central tabulators) can break down or be hacked, no matter how secure!

Lastly, Election Day should be a NATIONAL HOLIDAY. Many democracies around the world give everybody a day off to vote. Ditto that for the primaries. No more IA & NH picking candidates. The demographics of these two states do not represent an accurate cross-section of America. Dump tradition and let's move on to a better, fairer system of regional or same-day primaries.

imbillorightsmanandiapprovethismessage

[Wilms]

17. Stunning. And your first!

Welcome
:)

[BeFree]

21. That's too simple, Bill

This world needs to be complicated and tech-no-logic-ly confounded.
Where's the fun, or the profit, in hand counting? What you suggest is a conservative tradition that we libs should be dead set against.

*************8

Yeah, sarcasm.

Paper and pen is the only way to run a democracy. At the very least, even with open source codes and all that jazz, the federal offices should all be counted the same way, under the same rules, from ballots on the same kind of paper marked with the same kind of pen. Simple. We do that and I'll have trust in the elections once again.

[Sandy_0]

19. Hey guys!

I only posted that description of the way the TABULATORS contributed to the election fraud. We needed a simplified way of getting the attention of the people who can do something to straighten out our election system. It's meant to be easy to read, not to be precise. That link I posted above is detailed and accurate, but not likely to cause legislators to take the time to read and absorb all that information unless we can grab their interest with an outline. That's what I was trying to do with my opening post.

If any of you want to change it around, or manipulate it in any way to use in writing letters or email, I would be very happy about it.

[Dread Pirate KR Read]

20. Arrh,...they be the worst o'Pirates! ;/

I'd be interested at who be manning the keyboards too,....during Ohios lockdown,...fingerprints will still be on it, fer'sure...

[Carolab]

22. That's what I keep saying!!!!

"Now, with all forms of ballots, with the exeption of the paperless touch screen voting machines, there are still ballots that can be recounted by hand. If those raw figures from each precinct are collected without their going through the Central TABULATOR, the true results can be discovered."

Unless we HAND COUNT PAPER BALLOTS AT THE PRECINCT LEVEL we WILL ALWAYS BE HAD by the machines!!!!!!!

[RageKage]

23. Thats how we do it in Canada.

The ballots are hand counted on election night at each poll, by pollworkers, with observers from each candidate (in practice each observer moniters counts from a few polls). Then the official results are taken by Elections Canada, but the canditates' representatives from each poll are able to call in the results to their district headquaters.

Not only does this allow every party to know the precise results of every poll on election night, it gives them a lot of detailed (and accurate) data about where they are, and are not, getting their votes.

[capi888]

24. Thanks Sandy for posting this....

We must keep this is the forfront, so people realize its the Tabulators that are voting for our ELECTED OFFICIALs....not the PEOPLE!

[Igel]

25. Doesn't matter if the tabulator is a Windows machine or

a flesh and blood human.

Given that NY counties plausibly use Excel or even a calculator for tallying its votes, there's no getting around the fact that it's a person or persons doing any rigging ... the split dem/repub county BOEs. S/he/they can fudge the Excel cell values ... s/he/they can fudge the numbers written on a piece of paper.

[Number_6]

26. Kick! Kick later

Maybe nominate for Greatest. Everyone needs to see this. It's
what I think too...What percentage of American votes went through
tabulator machines? They are as black as any boxes can be. Open
source may not be enough, by the way, if the compiled code inside
a machine happens to have morphed from the compiled code which was
made from that open source code which was shown to everyone.