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December 7, 2005
Invisible Ballots
By Michael Youther
It doesn’t matter what your political position is on anything, if your vote doesn’t count. --Bev Harris, founder of Black Box voting, Invisible Ballots
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I recently watched a documentary called “Invisible Ballots”. In it, investigative reporters, election reformers and computer scientists offer a compelling argument against the use of paperless electronic systems in our elections. Invisible Ballots should be required viewing for all election officials—especially those who make purchasing decisions.“Two Republican dominated corporations, Election Systems & Software (ES&S), and Diebold Voting Systems, now control 80% of the vote count in the United States” --Lynn Landes, Portland Independent Media Center, 8/24/03
“There is a stampede to spend millions (actually billions) of tax dollars before the January 1st deadline and there is little guidance on what to buy or how reliable it is. Defying all logic, the guidelines will come out after January 1st. In the biggest irony, at the same time that some municipalities are making big purchases, others who already had problems with these machines are discarding them.” --Joan Brunwasser, election reformer, 11/21/05 (If you or your group would like to see the documentary, Invisible Ballots; email Joan at CountEveryVote@gmail.com
In Scurry County, Texas an incorrect ballot program caused a suspicious landslide victory for two county commissioners. When the ballots were counted by hand, the opposition candidates won by large margins. (Houston Chronicle, 11/8/02)
“In the 2002 election, brand new computer voting systems used in Florida lost over 100,000 votes due to a software error. Errors and irregularities were also reported in New Jersey, Missouri, Georgia, Texas, and at least 10 other states.” --Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ), press release, January, 2003
The 2003 election in Boone County, IA, the electronic vote-counting equipment indicated more than 140,000 votes had been cast in a county with only 50,000 residents.
In Franklin County, Ohio election, the electronic voting machines gave Bush 3,893 votes in a precinct where only 638 voters cast ballots. (Akron Beacon Journal, 11/5/04)
In Mercer County, Pennsylvania, a touch-screen voting machine recorded only 51 votes for president out of 289 ballots cast. (Vindicator, 11/6/04)
In Jasper County, South Dakota, election officials noticed that there were 1500 more votes recorded than 298 voters who actually cast ballots. (Carolina Morning News, 7/19/04)
Four and a half months after the 2005 election in Medford, Wisconsin, a consulting firm discovered that ES&S had programmed the optical scanners incorrectly and more than a quarter of 2,256 ballots cast had not been counted. (Marshfield News-Herald. 3/12/04)
In Cobb County, Georgia, the final tally showed that 285 ballots were completely blank. The margin of victory was less than half that number. (Marietta Daily Journal Online, 9/29/05)
“Incorrect software programming has now been identified in over 100 elections, often flipping the race to the wrong candidate, even when the election was not close. No one knows how many elections have actually been misprogrammed, and as we eliminate paper ballots, no one will ever know.” --Bev Harris, author of Black Box Voting: Ballot-Tampering in the 21st Century, BuzzFlash Interview, 10/1/03
“An MIT/Cal Tech study done in 2001 shows that manually counted paper ballots are the most accurate system out of the 5 systems used in the last 4 presidential elections. They are totally verifiable, and first-world nations across the globe still use them, including Canada which counted their last presidential election in four hours.” --Victoria Collier, t r u t h o u t.com, 10/25/03
It doesn’t matter what your political position is on anything, if your vote doesn’t count. --Bev Harris, founder of Black Box voting, Invisible Ballots
Mick Youther is an American citizen, an independent voter, a veteran, a parent, a scientist, a writer, and all-around nice guy who has been roused from a comfortable apathy by the high crimes and misdemeanors of the Bush Administration.