Joyce McCloy of NC Coalition for Verified Voting continues the discussion on MoveOn and the Hand Counted Paper Ballot debate.
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MOVEON
Moveon - yes it would be nice if they really were interested in bringing
election integrity to the forefront of the nation, perhaps by "putting their back into it" for a
change.
The message sent out by Moveon showed an absolute cluelessness-
they say their goal is to "help state election officials" lobby for verified
voting. (who, Cathy Cox or Linda Lamone?)
Moveon has over 3 million members, and if half give $10 each, then you can see,
this is a money making venture for them. $150 K to "house parties" and "video
viewings" and the remaining $1.35 Million to whatever they want to spend it on..
Sending money to moveon is about like contributing to a John Kerry for President
in 08 campaign, and hoping that "this time, he really will honor his promise" to get all of the votes
counted.
Like Bush says - "fool me-ee-e once, uh-uh shame on meee, fool me tt-t-twice,
uh-uh-uh-ya ya can't fool me twice - heh hee hehh hehhh!
NC Verified Voting does not take in money, and pretty much we are just
monitoring the implementation of getting new voting systems out to our counties. We have a majority of
counties choosing optical scan and Automark, and lesser number with the toilet paper ballot. We hope to wean
them away from the TPB after they deal with the difficulties that arise. Diebold did flee our state,
and that has to embarass their touchscreen manufacturing facility in Lexington, NC. One down, more to go.
Who is worthy of your donations? www.VoteTrustUSA.org , www.VerifiedVoting.org ,
www.EFF.org
and www.BradBlog.org , all who have assisted individual states tremendously.
None of these are well funded, and each are tireless and selfless in the practical help they provide.
You will see the results of your donations.
Further, any Florida election reform group can use help. : O Cause they are Florida.
PLACEMENT/ YOUR "CARTERET MOMENT"
Now is the time to build your foundation, your plan, your argument, your
strategy.
BEFORE the "trainwreck". Most people have read John Gideon's article about the
upcoming "Trainwreck", if not
go to www.votetrustusa.org or www.bradblog.com
Will you be ready in time for the "Trainwreck"?
You will soon have a grand opportunity to be listened to, if you have built a
creditable message that is well packaged and documented.
When the big "Trainwreck" comes, this is what I would call your "CARTERET
MOMENT". (Like a Kodak Moment)
A "Carteret" is my phrase for a turning point moment - for North Carolina, our
turning point was when 1 machine in Carteret County North Carolina lost over 4,400 votes, which
could not be retrieved in any way, or recounted, since this was on paperless machines.
Now is the time to get your message, studies and documentation ready.
STRATEGERIE
HCBP Advocates must do the work themselves - for the serious HCPB organizations
or advocates -
there isn't time to wait for the creation of yet another non profit
organization. (Non Profit is a mis nomer anyway).
Asking someone else to do the work is not going to pan out.
HCPB must address the 4 A's, Accuracy, Affordability, Accessibility and
Acceptability. This has to be done just as you would in a business plan. It doesn't take an MBA, just someone who thinks
logically.
Accuracy -
has already been documented by the CalTech study and some individual states have
made the effort to study their own data as well. In NC, we only had 3 HCPB counties, and
they are extremely small, atypically small, in that they have less than 6,000 registered voters (about the
size of 2 or 3 large precincts).
CalTech 2001 study -
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/docs/caltech_mit_report_version2.pdf2004 Undervotes by technology in NC -
http://www.cs.duke.edu/~justin/voting/totals.html
Affordability -
studies comparing optical scan and DREs have been done in Florida and North
Carolina, providing documentation of net annual expenditures. These studies show what a
county can expect to pay per voter per year to operate an elections department. Elections
Departments are open year round, and have other expenses besides the cost of election day.
To show affordability, it is essential to show that how the cost to run a HCPB
county compares to the cost to run a OS or a DRE county. Similar size counties should be compared
if possible.
I have not seen a study of actual net annual expenditures for HCPB anywhere.
Here is my study of OS verses DRE in North Carolina, and how I obtained the data
-
http://www.ncvoter.net/affordable.html
Accessibility -
the answer to how voting will be accessible in a HCPB county, and what it will
cost, must be addressed to provide a complete answer to how HCPB is a viable answer.
A viable option must be provided, must be included in the plan.
Acceptability -
show how HCPB can be done in a reasonable amount of time, and what constitutes
a reasonable amount of time. Provide examples of how HCPB is quicker (and more
sure) than say running an election on electronic voting machines in Chicago (a few weeks
ago), or on electronic voting machines in Texas (this is an annual recurring theme),
or North Carolina in 04.
With the messups this year, some from previous showing how election contests
went on for months without being settled (like in NC for Commiss of Agriculture)
it would be possible to offer a solid argument in favor of HCPB, and to make
it seem a reasonable thing to do.
*Disclosure - Being right is not enough - You will never ever win just by
stating that you are right, or citing some part of the constitution that you believe mandates
HCPB. If you want to be successful, you have be be able to prove your point,
and also give your legislators creditable and reasonable information that they
can use to validate their decisions in favor of HCPB.
This doesn't take money to do, it takes time and hard work.
I recommend obtaining at least one credentialed computer scientist at some point
of the way.
The key is to get ready now, so you can be ready for the "train wreck".
We did well in NC because we were warning them in Jan 2004, plenty of time
before our "Carteret" or our "Trainwreck". Then, the story was "We told you so".
Regards;
Joyce McCloy
Founder, NC Coalition for Verified Voting
jmc27106@earthlink.net
www.ncvoter.net
Submitter: Joan Brunwasser
Submitters Website: http://www.opednews.com/author/author79.html
Submitters Bio:
Joan Brunwasser is a co-founder of Citizens for Election Reform (CER) which since 2005 existed for the sole purpose of raising the public awareness of the critical need for election reform. Our goal: to restore fair, accurate, transparent, secure elections where votes are cast in private and counted in public. Because the problems with electronic (computerized) voting systems include a lack of transparency and the ability to accurately check and authenticate the vote cast, these systems can alter election results and therefore are simply antithetical to democratic principles and functioning.
Since the pivotal 2004 Presidential election, Joan has come to see the connection between a broken election system, a dysfunctional, corporate media and a total lack of campaign finance reform. This has led her to enlarge the parameters of her writing to include interviews with whistle-blowers and articulate others who give a view quite different from that presented by the mainstream media. She also turns the spotlight on activists and ordinary folks who are striving to make a difference, to clean up and improve their corner of the world. By focusing on these intrepid individuals, she gives hope and inspiration to those who might otherwise be turned off and alienated. She also interviews people in the arts in all their variations - authors, journalists, filmmakers, actors, playwrights, and artists. Why? The bottom line: without art and inspiration, we lose one of the best parts of ourselves. And we're all in this together. If Joan can keep even one of her fellow citizens going another day, she considers her job well done.
When Joan hit one million page views, OEN Managing Editor, Meryl Ann Butler interviewed her, turning interviewer briefly into interviewee. Read the interview here.
While the news is often quite depressing, Joan nevertheless strives to maintain her mantra: "Grab life now in an exuberant embrace!"
Joan has been Election Integrity Editor for OpEdNews since December, 2005. Her articles also appear at Huffington Post, RepublicMedia.TV and Scoop.co.nz.