Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Sunday 10/09/05

[Melissa G]

Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Sunday 10/09/05

All members welcome and encouraged to participate.

Please post Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News on this thread.

If you can:

1. Post stories and announcements you find on the web.

2. Post stories using the "Election Fraud and Reform News Sources" listed here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x371233

3. Re-post stories and announcements you find on DU, providing a link to the original thread with thanks to the Original Poster, too.

4. Start a discussion thread by re-posting a story you see on this thread.



If you want to know how post "News Banners" or other images, go here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=371233#371391

Link to previous Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News thread:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x396401

All previous daily threads are available here:
http://www.independentmediasource.com/DU_archives/du_2004erd_el_ref_fr_thr_calenders.htm





Please "Recommend" for the Greatest Page (it's the link just below).

[bleever]

1. Just gotta mention that all the other scandals make the theft of the 2004

election more likely than ever to see the full light of day.

People will talk. People will have to turn on each other.

And we will keep working and asking.

:thumbsup:

[EFerrari]

4. Yes, we will.

:hi:

[Melissa G]

2. We are looking for New Volunteers to help Be The Media!

We are looking for folks to pull regular shifts or just substitute.

We are looking for folks to post articles...

We are looking for folks to just nominate the daily news thread when they see it..

Decide what works for you and help Be the Media!!!

Check out the link below if you can help us out!!!



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x396300

[Melissa G]

3. The Case Against Tom DeLay:

The Case Against Tom DeLay:
What has Happened to Grand Jury Secrecy in Texas?
By John W. Dean
Findlaw

Friday 07 October 2005

What is one to make of the criminal charges against Tom DeLay?

I spoke with several knowledgeable Texas lawyers, of both parties, about the case against DeLay; they were willing to speak, but only off-the-record. Or, as one put it, "Who in hell wants to get in the middle of a fight between a polecat and a skunk?"

(I don't like unidentified sources. But I will use them in this column, only because they are sharing nothing more their expertise, no inside information. They were offering their professional "speculation," if you will.)

There is no speculation, however, by the grand jurors who have spoken out in this case; they are familiar with the evidence prosecutors must have adduced, before them, to convince them to indict. And what they are saying appears dangerously close to breaking their oaths of secrecy.

http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/100805Y.shtml

[Melissa G]

5. Voter-registration total doesn't add up

Voter-registration total doesn't add up
Saturday, October 08, 2005
Sam Fulwood III
Plain Dealer Columnist
Wait, let's try this again.

Thanks to Algorem for the post and DU discussion here
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x396442

I wrote in Thursday's column that 53,504 people - a measly 16.3 percent of 327,978 registered Cleveland voters - bothered to cast a ballot for one of the eight candidates in the mayoral primary.

In unambiguous language, I chastised city residents for an "embarrassing dereliction of civic duty and responsibility." I said there is no excuse when five of every six voters in the city don't vote.

But I overlooked something very important. Take a hard look at the numbers that the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections released after Tuesday's primary.

How could there be nearly 328,000 people registered to vote in Cleveland?

Just a couple months ago, the U.S. Census Bureau reported the city's total population at 458,684.

Logic and common sense say the numbers don't tally. After all, more than 150,000 of the city's residents are under age 18 and too young to vote.

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/sam_fulwood/index.ssf?/base/opinion/1128764254108151.xml&coll=2

[GuvWurld]

6. Kicked/Nominated (eom)

[Melissa G]

7. Invisible Ballots, Confirming Our Worst Fears About Democracy in Decline

Invisible Ballots, Confirming Our Worst Fears About Democracy in Decline
by Anthony Wade


http://www.opednews.com

October 8, 2005

http://invisibleballots.com/

No matter how honest and forthright you or I may be, history has proven one inescapable truth about the human condition. Given motive and opportunity, many people will choose to take whatever short cut is available, to achieve their objectives. Translation, they will cheat. One of the hallmarks of our democracy has always been free and fair elections. That hallmark is in grave danger as we enter into a cyberspace method of voting. The documentary, “Invisible Ballots”, investigates this growing crisis.

The history of these changes to our voting systems was birthed during the “pregnant chad” debacle following the 2000 presidential election. Images of people holding up punch cards to the light to interpret the intent of the voter frightened the electorate and the push toward computerized ballots was on. Invisible Ballots correctly points out however that Florida was an aberration, not a microcosm of our voting system. Nonetheless, soon an unholy alliance was born between voting machine companies and governmental officials, where ridiculously expensive voting machines were now being mandated in the country through the Help America Vote Act, which unfortunately does very little to actually protect America’s votes. Thus, in just five years, we have gone from being unable to divine our votes, to being unable to trust them.

The people interviewed in the documentary are not partisan operatives, nor unreliable alarmists. They are real people, experts, PhDs, and computer programmers, who have lived these problems for years now, trying desperately to get the word out. They weave a compelling story about vote fraud and the vulnerability of our current systems. Essentially there are two problems that can occur in any election. The first is error, as people are inherently human, and prone to mistakes. The second problem is fraud and as history has shown, it is a realistic concern. To not admit these two problems can and do exist in every election is simply inane.

Once you establish these two simple truths, the question becomes what can we do to reduce these threats and check to ensure they have not occurred. The core of the problem with computerized voting is that you will never know if either of these has ever occurred. The reason why is that the ballot, the record of who you voted for, is now invisible. It is stored electronically in cyberspace where it can be changed, manipulated, or simply never even be registered. The documentary talks with computer experts who detail very simple ways of introducing malicious code into the source code, designed to change the results. The source code for these companies is not made public by claiming it is “proprietary information.” Nonsense. If you want to deal with the government and receive contracts, you should be mandated to have your source code exposed for inspection to ensure the validity of any election.
Invisible Ballots discusses the many security flaws discovered already in the machines, the cost-prohibitive nature of the machines, and the unsavory criminal records of many of the top players in the computer voting machine realm. Would you want someone with felony convictions for fraud designing and selling voting machines to your state? Well, it already is happening. Do you want voting machines that accidentally lose 16,000 votes? Well, Diebold has now admitted that is exactly what happened to Al Gore in Florida in the 2000 election. Those 16,000 votes would mean this country would never have seen the Bush administration.

http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_by_antho_051008_invisible_ballots__c.htm

[Melissa G]

8. The Fight for American Democracy Continues...

Bradblog...


The Fight for American Democracy Continues...
Whether Those Who Hate America and Democracy Like it Or Not.
PLUS: A Song to Fight for Democracy By...
{Blogged by Brad on the road...}


The fight for democracy in America -- even as we still scratch our head with continued wonder that a "pro-democracy" movement is actually necessary in the United States of America in 2005 -- continues to be a difficult one. But the fight is well worth it. Even as our victories tend to come in small, but continually accruing pieces.

We're not supposed to be talking about this issue at all, 11 months after November 2nd, 2004...and yet more and more are doing so every day. The Mainstream Corporate Media may not get it yet. But the ranks of great patriots who give a damn about their country continues to burgeon as the noise in favor of an accountable democracy increases every day due to the folks like the good readers of The BRAD BLOG who take their civic duty to heart.

Here are just a few of the latest positive signs in the continuing fight for a free, fair, verifiable and transparent democracy that many would prefer we simply didn't even discuss. We will continue to do so nonetheless. The burden is well worth carrying. The rewards for doing so are well worth the effort.

Debra LoGuercio, editor of Winters Express and columnist in Daily Republic and elsewhere, makes it a hat trick with her third column in as many weeks on our tenuous Electoral System. She was haunted by the siren sounded by our first article on the Diebold insider we dubbed DIEB-THROAT, who alerted us to the Dept. of Homeland Security website where a Cyber Alert was issued last year prior to the election about the vulnerability to hackers in Diebold's central tabulator software. That vulnerability has, by Diebold's own admission, never been addressed.

http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00001903.htm

[Melissa G]

9. Voter precincts expected to increase

Saturday October 8, 2005
Voter precincts expected to increase
By TARA REILLY



[email protected]


WASHINGTON COUNTY


Washington County's population growth is affecting more than schools, roads and home prices.


Washington County Board of Elections officials say they're anticipating a 12 percent increase in the number of registered voters for the 2006 election, a trend that's expected to continue beyond 2010.


More voters mean more voting machines, more precincts and more election judges, which means the Election Board will need a bigger budget.


snip

With about 9,900 new voters anticipated from 2004 to 2006, the Election Board will need four new precincts, possibly 30 additional voting units and eight new chief judges for the 2006 elections.


"This is probably the most we have to do at one time," Election Board Director Dorothy Kaetzel said Friday.


http://www.herald-mail.com/?module=displaystory&story_id=121546&format=html

[Melissa G]

10. State tests out e-voting system

State tests out e-voting system
Voting-machine makers to hand over software for security review
By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER



California is putting the tools of democracy to perhaps the most rigorous testing of any state, ordering voting-machine makers to surrender their proprietary software for security reviews and supply dozens of their machines for mass, mock-election tests.
In memos this week to voting-machine makers and local elections officials, Secretary of State Bruce McPherson laid out requirements and ordered the creation of a new office, led by a savvy computer technician, devoted to putting voting machines through their paces before California voters use them.

"We can do it, and I think we should do it," McPherson said Friday.

The move comes as huge sums of federal and state money are feeding voting-system purchases nationwide, and manufacturers increasingly are supplying high-tech computers to record and count the vote.

"I think we need to take some fundamental steps to ensure theaccuracy and integrity of the voting process," McPherson said.

snip
"To see those screen freezes firsthand is important for understanding how vulnerable these systems are to error and fraud," she said.

http://www.insidebayarea.com/argus/localnews/ci_3098948

[Melissa G]

11. County plans tax hike to cover costs

(Paper and Pencils are a lot Cheaper!!!)


County plans tax hike to cover costs
2006 spending blueprint would give more revenue to sheriff’s office and road and bridge
By DAKOTAH M. DAVIS
Taxpayers must dig a little deeper into their pockets to cover $670,000 in increases in the 2006 county budget, officials said this week.

New housing and other construction starts are mostly responsible for a higher valuation that could help soften the blow of the bigger budget, said county administrator Leroy Alsup. The higher property values will bring in $294,000 in extra tax dollars.

A mill levy increase of about 2 mills will raise an additional $375,000, budget records show. One 2006 mill is equivalent to $191,772. In 2005 one mill equaled $183,320.

The increase means taxpayers with homes worth $60,000 will pay an extra $13.80 in 2006 property taxes, according to the treasurer\'s office. Those with $100,000 homes will pay $23 more.

http://www.winfieldcourier.com/w051008/Sat3.html

[Melissa G]

12. Panel: E-voting vulnerable

http://www.zdnet.com/

Panel: E-voting vulnerable
By Anne Broache, CNET News.com
Published on ZDNet News: October 7, 2005, 2:34 PM PT


GAITHERSBURG, Md.--Overlooked bugs and malicious code pose a plausible threat to software on electronic voting machines, a panel of election experts said Friday.

At a conference held by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, part of the U.S. Commerce Department, election officials, computer scientists and academics weighed in on steps that should be taken before, during and after elections to protect the voting systems against software-related problems. Voting has gone increasingly electronic during the past couple of election cycles, but the devices remain without national, uniform security standards.

snip
"All of you running voting systems now are assuredly running software that has bugs in it--presumably in most cases not malicious--but software is buggy," Ron Rivest, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told the audience, composed largely of election officials from various parts of the country.

snip


"If you spend three hours with a voting system, you can figure out how it works and you can replicate it yourself," Shamos said. "I think we need disclosure."

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-5891237.html

[Melissa G]

13. Jesse Jackson keeps hope alive

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/

Jesse Jackson keeps hope alive

At 64, he still proves he's `somebody'

By Don Terry

Chicago Tribune


The ice pick-thin woman in noisy stiletto heels click, click, clicks across the polished floor of the Fox News building, the ministry of information for the American Right. She is wearing skin-tight jeans. Stylish or starving, it is hard to tell from down the hall on this hot July night in New York City. As she approaches the tall black man who has just entered the lobby, a smile of recognition spreads across her perfectly geometric face. Even in the heart of conservative country, people get excited when he appears in their midst.

``Ann Coulter,'' she says, extending her hand to the former college quarterback and two-time presidential candidate. ``It's so nice to see you in person.''

The Rev. Jesse L. Jackson smiles back at the liberal-bashing conservative pundit and says it's nice to see her too. Then the brief moment of detente is over, and Coulter clickety clicks away. Jackson watches her push through the glass doors and out into the steamy Manhattan street, his thumbs hooked in the vest pockets of his three-piece suit like Abe Lincoln contemplating his next move against the Confederacy. ``She sure doesn't dress like a conservative,'' he says, arching his eyebrow and stepping into the elevator that whisks him to the last appointment of this typical 15-hour day far from home, a TV appearance on ``Hannity & Colmes.''

``The Reverend,'' as even his children call him, turns 64 on Oct. 8. But age has not sated his wanderlust or his relentless quest for justice and somebodiness. He works as hard as ever on a few hours' sleep to keep hope alive and the airline industry in the black. His mailing address is a large old house in the Jackson Park Highlands neighborhood on the South Side, but the place where he does most of his living is the sky. As one aide put it, ``The Reverend takes planes like other people take taxi cabs.''

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/living/religion/12845125.htm

[Melissa G]

14. Hart InterCivic Optical-Scan Has A Weak Spot

Hart InterCivic Optical-Scan Has A Weak Spot

Thanks to John Gideon for the post and DU discussion here
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x396467

By John Gideon,
Information Manager for VotersUnite.Org and VoteTrustUSA
05 July 2005
Late in November of 2004 a machine recount was done, by law, in the state of Washington, due to a close election between two candidates for Governor. This recount was to be a complete recount of all optical-scan and punch card ballots using the same machines that had counted the ballots earlier in the month. The software was changed, in nearly all counties, to cause the machines to read only the governor’s race.

Two Washington state counties use Direct Recording Electronic voting machines as their primary voting system. Optical-scan machines are their secondary systems, though they are used to count a majority of the votes in these counties due to the high percentage of absentee and vote-by-mail voters. The recount of the DRE machines was done by re-running the report tapes from the machines.

Yakima County uses Hart InterCivic eSlate central count optical scan and DRE systems. The optical scan system uses a Kodak scanner that scans the ballots, and then the ballot images are analyzed by the eSlate Ballot Now software and tallied.

Unfortunately, Yakima County made the decision that they would not re-scan their ballots for the machine recount. The decision was made at the county level, at least, and possibly at the state level, that it would be alright to simply re-analyze the ballot images previously generated by the scanner.

http://www.votersunite.org/info/yakimaproblemreport.asp

[Melissa G]

15. Mark your calendars, Next Friday 10/14 Freeman v Mitofsky

Thanks to texpatriot2004 for the post and DU discussion
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x396492


Mark your calendars, Next Friday 10/14 Freeman v Mitofsky
Edited on Sat Oct-08-05 10:36 PM by texpatriot2004

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=54651

PHILADELPHIA, Oct. 6 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Two experts face-off in lively lectures and discussion about the utility of exit polls when compared to official counts, the potential for election fraud and the role of statistics in adjudicating critical issues of public importance. The University of Pennsylvania's departments of Center for Organizational Dynamics and Political Science and the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Statistical Association (ASAP) will host the debate.

Like most politically savvy Americans, Steve Freeman Ph.D., was glued to the television on election night, 2004. As he poured over exit polling data on CNN's website, he was fairly confident John Kerry was in the lead by a projected 5 million votes. But after all the votes were tallied, especially in the battleground states such as Ohio, the final tally swung well beyond the exit poll's margin of error to favor the President.

But unlike most Americans, Freeman holds a Ph.D. in Organizational Studies, and is a Visiting Scholar at Penn's Center for Organizational Dynamics where he teaches research methods, including polling. His natural curiosity and academic diligence led him to research the issue in as much detail as possible, and the results appear in his forthcoming book on the matter titled, Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? to be published next month by Seven Stories Press. His thesis is that the official explanation for the difference between exit poll and official results ("Within Precinct Error" or WPE) -- that across the country Kerry voters participated at a higher rate -- is unsupported by the data. Instead, the WPE is statistically significantly correlated with election administration variables such as Republican gubernatorial control, state electoral importance and voting technology. These relationships are inconsistent with theses of polling bias, but consistent with theses of electoral fraud.

In direct counterpoint, Warren J. Mitofsky, a fellow of the American Statistical Association, and President of Mitofsky International, which conducted the exit polling for the 2004 election on behalf of the National Election Pool, believes Freeman's view regarding election fraud is not statistically accurate. Mitofsky contends that such "conspiracy theorists" after the election mistakenly claimed the exit polls validated their claim. He believes there was no evidence in the exit polls to substantiate these claims. Instead, he contends that on election day the misinformation about the exit polls was spread by inexperienced people trying to make sense of complex statistical data. Mitofsky is currently writing a book on exit polling.

[Wilms]

16. Equal Vote: Electionline on Recounts

Saturday, October 8

Electionline on Recounts

Electionline.org has released this report on recounts. Entitled "Recounts: From Punch Cards to Paper Trails," it places particular emphasis on the rules regarding voter-verifiable paper audit trails in those states that require them.

snip

There are a couple of problems with this. One is that the little research that exists suggests that many voters won't actually check the VVPAT records. See here for my prior post on research that Ted Selker of MIT has done on this.

The other problem is that, if only a small percentage of paper records (say 1 or 2% of ballots) are recounted, it's not likely that errors will be detected, at least for local and regional races. As an example, Andy Neff ran the numbers for a California congressional race. He found that if 10% of the votes were changed -- more than enough to alter the result in a reasonably close race -- then a 1% recount has only about 40% chance of catching it. While I'm no statistical expert, and thus can't confirm the accuracy of Neff's calulations, I've yet to see anything that shows them to be wrong. If he's right, or at least in the ballpark, it means that a 1% recount of VVPATs will be of limited effectiveness in catching malicious software that might turn an election. And this is aside from mechanical problems such as paper jams, and from the logistical problems of counting all those strips of paper.

snip/more

http://moritzlaw.osu.edu/blogs/tokaji/2005/10/electionline-on-recounts.html

[Melissa G]

17. Bush in 2nd-term slump

Bush in 2nd-term slump

By BOB KEMPER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 10/09/05
Washington — Hurricane Katrina, devastating the Gulf Coast and swamping President Bush's image as a steady and decisive leader, proved to be only the first squall in a perfect storm of criticism, investigations and indictments that has pounded Bush's presidency for two months and counting.

Rocky second terms are common for presidents. But since the start of Bush's less than a year ago, his White House, renowned for its strict discipline and political prowess, has been so stunningly off its game that even some of his most loyal allies are angry and worried.


"No president in modern times has suffered this kind of political decline so quickly after re-election," said Thomas Mann, a presidential scholar at the Brookings Institution in Washington. "It's a little hard to see how he digs out of this and goes on."

The war, soaring gas prices, a series of investigations and indictments and missteps in managing national crises have sapped Bush's political strength and put his approval ratings at an all-time low.



http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/stories/1005/09bush.html

[PeterPan]

18. Help Derail Feeney's HR 3910 and Support Holt's HR 550

All in one easy email/petition action

http://www.congressweb.com/cweb4/index.cfm?orgcode=VTUSA&hotissue=1

Use It or Lose It, For Democracy, the Time to Act is Now!
by hedda_foil
http://votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=176&Itemid=30

Well, it's happened exactly as we feared. Rep. Tom Feeney of Florida has introduced a bill that combines the worst of the Carter-Baker recommendations for Voter ID and meaningless VVPR. The Orwellian title of HR 3910 is Verifying the Outcome of Tomorrow's Elections Act of 2005 (VOTE for short). Its paper record requirement lets the States decide what significance the paper has – if any. The Voter ID section requires a government-issued photo ID to vote in person, or a copy of it to vote by mail, per Homeland Security (read REAL ID) guidelines.

HR3910 could have the effect of disenfranchising millions of elderly, poor, minority and disabled voters, who lack the time, means, or physical ability to make the long trek to wait in long lines at the Department of Motor Vehicles to obtain the only type of ID that will qualify them to vote. At the same time, by conflating the questions of Voter ID and VVPRs, it would stifle the debate about the need for verification of the vote totals from electronic voting systems

Some activists have already commented that we need to stop the Voter ID provisions of 3910. This misses the point – everyone concerned about transparent, fair, and accurate elections must fight this entire bill with everything we have. We cannot allow our forces to be divided, and we cannot give up one cause for the other. Every voter must be able to cast his or her vote without the undue burden of obtaining a government-issued photo ID and every vote must be recorded and counted accurately and transparently. Democracy demands no less.

The only solution is a two-pronged strategy that goes on the offensive against the insupportable Feeney Bill, while urging Congress to immediately pass Rep. Rush Holt’s Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005 (HR 550) as written.

HR 550 will ensure that the voter verified paper ballot is legally considered the official record in the event of a recount, challenge or discrepancy, and that independent audits of the voter verified paper ballots are performed to check the accuracy of the vote count. HR 550 already has the bipartisan sponsorship of 157 Members of the House of Representatives.

There is nothing more important for any of us to do today than to write your Representative demanding that the Holt bill be immediately passed as written, and that the Feeney Bill be stopped in its tracks.

Please Click here
http://www.congressweb.com/cweb4/index.cfm?orgcode=VTUSA&hotissue=1
NOW to send an email to make sure your voice is heard. At the same time, your name will be added to a petition, urging the passage of HR 550 as written, which will be delivered to the members of the House Administration Committee, who are responsible for both of these bills. Without so much as a means to send an email to the Committee’s office, the Committee traditionally operates with little, if any, citizen input. It’s time to put a stop to that!

It’s up to us to make our voices heard by signing the Congressional E-Mail/ Petition, calling your Representative and the Members of the Administration Committee, and asking everyone you know to do the same.

Democracy demands it of us. We can do no less.