The fundamental right of a democracy is quite simply government by the people, of the people, and for the people. Rights are not negotiable. They are absolute. The democratic experiment was designed to reverse the history of tyranny wherein rulers held rights and people held only privileges granted by those rulers. In this new democracy, the people would hold the rights and the government,servant to the People, would be granted the privileges that could be revoked by the People.

Our vote is the means by which we exercise that authority over our public servants - the government. The people are masters of both Congress and courts, not to overthrow the constitution, but to overthrow the men who pervert it! — Abraham Lincoln

It should go without saying that since elections are our mechanism for asserting our authority, the people are the only ones who must have authority over their own elections. Once we permit the servant-government to control the counting of the vote, as we have under HAVA, We the People can no longer insure the integrity of our votes and cannot expect to remain self-governing.

The Founders recognized:

Even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny. – Thomas Jefferson.

This has now come to pass. We were not asked if we would surrender our right to control the single means by which we preserve our independence, it was decided for us. Our votes are now counted secretly by machines. We can no longer supervise the counting of our votes, the government having handed that function over to private voting machine companies. The government, under HAVA, has stolen our right to control our own elections and hence our ability to hold the government as a servant to the People.

The Declaration of Independence provided that our inalienable rights should be secured by the government: The very government which has decided it alone will determine how the votes that elect it are to be counted. We the People are now shut out of the process and have lost the means to effectuate our Declaration of Independence.

For as long as HAVA has forced us to vote on these computerized voting machines, those responsible for the testing and certification of these machines have made sure that accountability for the functioning of the machines would be non-existent. First as members of the National Association of State Election Directors (NASED), charged with control, selection and oversight of the voting machine test labs, as well as members of the Election Center - a group which actively colluded with the voting machine industry to convince the public to accept these machines - Donetta Davidson, now Chair of the EAC, and Thomas Wilkey, now Executive Director of the EAC, have been there creating the appearance that these machines are tested, certified and secure. This is our EAC! See A Return to Sanity – Why We must Eliminate Computerized Control of Our Election System, http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_andi_nov_070225_a_return_to_sanity__96.htm  & Halting Holt, http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_andi_nov_070322_halting_holt_thought.htm

We should no longer be surprised that people who fail to perform are those who are rewarded and promoted. That is how this Administration perceives the role of government.