Forget Fighting Diebold on the vote Front. Dump the Brand... in Banks and ATMs
Tell your bank, your convenience store to dump Diebold
I can't imagine that the voting business is anywhere near as big a part of Diebold's marketing mix as bank teller and money access machines are.
I went to the local convenience store and decided to get some cash. Lo and behold, it was a Diebold machine, And guess what. It gave me a paper record... all for no charge.
It happens that this machine is owned by the company I bank with.
I KNOW that companies are much more responsive than legislators and the people who make decisions about voting technology, as wrong as that is.
The fact is, I don't trust Diebold. I don't trust them with my votes and I don't trust them with my money or my record keeping. I don't want to do transactions on Diebold. How dare they use Diebold.
I am going to my bank and telling them I am outraged that they put me in the situation of using a piece of equipment manufactured by a company that millions of Americans consider the most untrustworthy technology company.
Why should I do business on a piece of equipment built by a company that I absolutely detest?
Why would any person who cares about the safety of electronic voting use a Diebold machine for their banking?
Now, I am going to my bank. But I don't want to do it alone. I want to go with thousands, or millions of other people. I want to stand in front of branches of my bank where there are a lot of people, with signs saying that they use equipment that is bad for America, bad for Democracy.
Now, if a lot of people do that, maybe my bank will make a statement that they will stop using Diebold equipment, that they will dump their Diebold equipment.
This approach would work better if we can find another ATM company that makes voting machines that are trustworthy, that do provide paper records. Let banks know we want THEM to lobby for trustworthy voting. They can do that by contributing to voting integrity organizations.
WE have power we are not using. We can do things we've never done. We must, to save democracy.
Rob Kall is executive editor and publisher of OpEdNews.com, President of Futurehealth, Inc, inventor . He is also published regularly on the Huffingtonpost.com. He is a frequent Speaker on Politics, Impeachment, The art, science and power of story, heroes and the hero's journey, Positive Psychology, Stress, Biofeedback and a wide range of subjects. He is a campaign consultant specializing in tapping the power of stories for issue positioning, stump speeches and debates. He recently retired as organizer of several conferences, including StoryCon, the Summit Meeting on the Art, Science and Application of Story and The Winter Brain Meeting on neurofeedback, biofeedback, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology. See more of his articles here and, older ones, here.
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-While I'm registered as a Democrat, I consider myself to be a dynamic critic of the Democratic party, just as, well, not quite as much, but almost as much as I am a critic of republicans.
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It is very heartening to see a call to action that is likely to be effective and that can be achieved by ordinary people without much effort.
I'm with you, Rob. The next time I see a Diebold ATM I will inform the management that I'm not willing to use those machines. Then I'll go home and send them something in writing, and tell my friends to do the same. We don't have to beg politicians to decertify Diebold voting machines. All we have to do is stop using Diebold ATMS and they'll soon be out of business. And once the politicians see how unpopular Diebold is, they'll be afraid not to decertify their voting machines.
Peaceful, positive, direct action is always the best way to get things done.
by
Mark E. Smith (21 articles, 30 quicklinks, 98 diaries, 1310 comments)
on Monday, May 8, 2006 at 10:02:40 PM
I live in New Zealand and last month I went to open an account at 'KiwiBank', the government-supported alternative to overseas-owned banks, when I saw they used Diebold cash machines. I expressed my utter disgust to the teller in as polite a voice as possible, but with enough volume to make sure everyone in the bank heard me - I used the US voting debacle as my platform and included my disbelief (;-)) that the NZ government would use such dodgy equipment. Next time I pass another branch of this bank, I'll give a repeat performance; sometimes the only was to get a message across is by direct action. Thanks for the article, Rob,
Stix.
by
Stix (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 3 comments)
on Tuesday, May 9, 2006 at 1:01:06 AM
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