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Kathy Dopp
Message Kathy Dopp
Marc Baber wrote: I tend to agree with Paul-- paper ballots are simple to explain > and have widespread grassroots support. > > > > Mark and Paul, > > We all agree with you. Almost all of us who began election integrity > work 2 or 3 or more years ago, actively fought against DRE adoption > and want DREs to be used as boat anchors or recycled in some > environmentally friendly fashion. > > However, our foremost goal is to ensure election outcome integrity - > i.e. make sure that the right people are sworn into office following > all future elections. > > If we force states to adopt measures like sufficient manual audits to > ensure accurate election outcomes, states will quickly see how costly, > time-consuming and untrustworthy DREs are. > > The US Congress cannot mandate that states throw away their shiny new > toys and the HAVA bill did not outlaw any type of voting system > because that would be unconstitutional. > > For the purpose of ensuring election outcome accuracy, HR550, as > written in the last Congress, is insufficient, counterproductive and > urgently needs to be fixed. > > eg. some HR550 audit flaws included: > > 1. insufficient 2% federal audits would not detect vote miscount that > could cause wrong election outcomes in a large amount, if not a > majority, of races > > 2. audits controlled by the US EAC which is probably unconstitutional, > but also puts audits in the hands of the currently hopelessly > incompetent unqualified group > > 3. federal audits could interfere with state and county-level audits > that were sufficient, like the audit that NM may be putting into place > soon. audits need to be designed at the state level at a minimum, and > preferably at the county level. > > 4. nothing was written into HR550 that would make the federal audit > transparent or verifiable to the public, so it could easily result in > a procedure that could be easily manipulated > > I am half-way between Paul's purists and strategists groups because I > am wholly against the Holt bill as it was written (better to have no > legislation at all). Yet by rewriting Holt's audit provision to make > it verifiable, adequate, and transparent, would soon result in > hand-countable voter verified paper ballot optical scan voting systems > IMO. > > As far as adding printers to DREs like those in MD and GA, my > understanding is (correct me if I'm wrong) that the vendors have > already said it would not be possible or would be outrageously > expensive, and so passage of federal legislation requiring VVPATs in > federal elections would, in MD and GA and perhaps parts of PA, etc. > cause paperless DREs to be scrapped and optical scan systems to be > adopted because, as you point out, they are much less expensive. > > An effective way to force out DREs (besides requiring sufficient > verifiable transparent manual audits) would be to only provide funds > for optical scan paper ballot systems for meeting the new requirement > for VVPATs with every system. > > Another way to force out DREs would be to require a technically > competent US EAC TGDC with backbone, because then the federal > voluntary standards for security could be improved and the EAC and > NASED stopped from approving systems that do not meet even the current > lax standards, all current DRE systems are already technologically > obsolete because they use no modern security technology (deliberately?). > > There are probably more indirect common-sense measures that you can > think of which would result in states' scrapping DREs. > > We all agree. > > Best, > > Kathy
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Founder and President of US Count Votes, dba The National Election Data Archive and volunteer for honest, accurately counted elections since 2003. Masters degree in mathematics with emphasis on computer science. Has written numerous academic and (more...)
 
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