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ALSO VISIT
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FEAR NOT THE ACT OF VOTING (FEAR ITS BEING WILLFULLY DIMINISHED)
1 November 2004 51.3% of the voting age population of the United States took part in the 2000 presidential vote. That was 3.8% less than in 1992, and 11.8% lower than in the 1960 presidential election. But in between, there has been a consistent pattern of turnout under 60%, a disturbing if enigmatic aspect of American political life. Some have said it means the US is a democracy without the people. And polls show that a significant majority of American citizens believe the government does not represent their interests. As such, there is an urgent need to understand the psychological motivations for resisting the right to choose one's government. [Full Story]
31 October 2004 The state of Florida is still struggling to overcome its mercilessly complex and disorganized voting system, which failed in 2000, leading to the Supreme Court's intervention in the vote count and effective deciding of the Electoral College vote. That system has continued to be plagued by problems ranging from confusing ballots, to law-abiding voters being wrongfully "purged" when their names appear on lists of convicted felons stripped of the right to vote, to accusations of deliberate election fraud. During the last month, international observers, election experts invited by Democrats and by independent organizations to monitor the integrity of the November elections, reported that Florida's electoral system would not be prepared to produce a legitimate or fair democratic election... [Full Story] ALL THAT WE DON'T KNOW: THE PURPOSEFUL FOLLY OF POLLING We are hearing constantly that the Republican National Convention has yielded a political windfall in public opinion for President Bush, with polls shifting from a Kerry lead of 3 to 5%, to an astonishing Bush lead of 11% in a post-convention poll. But this is not the whole story. According to CNN, as reported today, polling data put Bush ahead by 3% prior to the convention and by 5% afterward, a bounce of only 2%... the smallest increase in polling for an incumbent since before Richard Nixon's presidency... [Full Story] MORE THAN HALF OF FLORIDA VOTERS DENIED VERIFIABLE BALLOTS 15 counties in Florida, which include more than half of the state's registered voters, will use touchscreen voting machines which produce no paper trail and allow the voter no verification that their vote was cast accurately. Anecdotal reports suggest voters are turning to absentee ballots in order to secure the right to a paper ballot and to recountability. An estimated 48 to 60 million voters nationwide will cast votes on machines that offer no verifiable or recountable paper trail. [For more: ABC]
FLORIDA'S LOST & FOUND ELECTRONIC VOTES The Supervisor of Elections for Miami-Dade County, Florida, announced Friday that her office had recovered missing electronic records of touch-screen votes from the 2002 primary elections in the race for Florida Governor. The records had been reported lost, after a series of computer crashes appeared to have wiped out the electronic files containing the record of the votes. [Full Story] EAC RECOGNIZES NEED FOR "ENHANCED SECURITY MEASURES" IN TOUCHSCREEN BALLOTING The Election Assistance Commission, set up by the 2002 Help America Vote Act to provide nationwide oversight of election processes and to seek to prevent any debacle resembling the 2000 Florida recount, has voiced support for "paper verification" and "enhanced security measures" to guarantee legitimacy of touch-screen votes. For some time, verified voting activists have been troubled by the unwillingness of members of Congress to support legislation to require a paper record of electronic votes until the EAC makes its recommendations. [Full Story]
191 CONGRESSIONAL SIGNATURES URGE RIDGE TO STOP POSTPONEMENT OF ELECTION This week, Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) circulated a petition among her colleagues in Congress, which called for an immediate halt to all planning for postponing the election. Within the first hour, it had 100 signatures, and was ultimately signed by 191 members of Congress, including Ms. Woolsey. Only 1 Republican member signed the petition, which again has raised concern among observers... [Full Story] ACLU WARNS OF LOOMING DISENFRANCHISEMENT, POLLING IRREGULARITIES IN FLORIDA The ACLU is reporting that current processes underway to prepare for November's elections in Florida are likely to cause many of the same incidents of disenfranchisement that turned thousands of voters away with no remedy in 2000. The State of Florida has said it cannot guarantee that information used to erase 40,000 names from the state's voter registry was accurate. Despite this shortcoming, the State ordered all county supervisors to begin the "purge" of names said to belong to legally disenfranchised felons, without any instruction reminding them of their legal obligation to ensure that the names actually match felons who have been barred from voting. [Full Story] ELECTRONIC VOTING MACHINES FAIL IN PRIMARIES
5 March 2004 As the United States shifts as much as 20% of its balloting devices to electronic voting systems, new doubts arise about the integrity, security and fairness of the systems being implemented. In the "Super Tuesday" primary vote across 10 states, serious glitches occurred, erasing and preventing votes: 10% of machines in San Diego county experienced technical problems; 1 in six voters in Alameda county were turned away by machine glitches. The CEO of Diebold, which makes most widely used electronic balloting machines has declared partisan allegiance and his desire to "deliver... electoral votes to the president" in 2004. [Full Story]
29 January 2004 Since the 2000 presidential election, and the revelation of flaws in the Florida process, the nation has moved toward new balloting techniques. Today, an article in the New York Times reported that a "Red Team" security test conducted for Maryland's legislature revealed troubling security gaps in the state's new electronic voting system. The test demonstrated a wide range of rudimentary tactics that could be used to taint or even steal an election. Over 100,000 votes were lost in Florida's 2002 elections, "due to a software error". VerifiedVoting.org recommends a Google News search for "electronic voting", to locate a wide range of newspaper reports on the subject. [Full Story] |
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