Project Mythbreaker in Iowa: DELIVERED!
This report came in today from Dr. Alta Price of Bettendorf, DFIA’s Project Mythbreaker coordinator:
Democracy
for Iowa has now coordinated delivery of "Myth Breakers for Election
Officials" to all 99 Iowa Counties, as well as to Chet Culver's office.
As far as I can tell, we are the only DFA group to have undertaken such
an ambitious project to ensure fair elections in their state. Check out
the first website below to see us listed as the contact group in Iowa.
The second website is my personal favorite. Look at all the little gold
stars we got! LOL
List of organizations in each state
http://www.votersunite.org/info/groups.asp
Status of Iowa
http://www.votersunite.org/takeaction/kickoff-participantsIA.asp
Alta Price
And boy, did Alta ever earn us those gold stars! In case you didn’t get the chance to read our report to DFA which was posted on Blog for America two weeks ago, here’s the rest of the Project Mythbreaker in Iowa story:
Our next big project, [begun in April,] was through the non-partisan fair elections organization VotersUnite! VotersUnite! is run by Ellen Theisen, former Executive Director of VerifiedVoting.org. Ellen has written the quintessential handbook on the subject of touch-screen voting, called Myth Breakers for Election Officials,
so Democracy for Iowa set out to print out and hand-deliver a copy of
this tome to the county auditor in each of Iowa’s 99 counties.
We had our big launch and got some press coverage
thanks to Alta and her press release. [At that point, we had
delivered to 19 Iowa counties.] In the end, Alta decided to go
right to the source: The Iowa State Association of Counties (ISAC)
Summer School. She printed up 100 copies [since the materials had
been updated 3 times since we first set out delivering the booklets]
along with the more recent findings about the ES&S system flaws,
and had them delivered directly to the registration desk at the ISAC
meeting with the help of the Scott County Auditor, Karen Fitzsimmons,
and the Deputy Auditor of Clinton County, Betsy Smith. Alta had
labeled each booklet with the name of the county so we could track
them. Ultimately, we only received 12 of the booklets back, and
heard reports that no one was listening to the speakers because they
were too engrossed in reading Myth Breakers! [And, as Alta reported
above, the remaining booklets have now been shipped off to the election
officials in the appropriate counties!]
Well done, Alta! We are so proud of all your hard work and your determination to make a difference in Iowa.
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Tuesday, August 24
Project Mythbreaker in Iowa: DELIVERED!
by
Linda Thieman
on Tue 24 Aug 2004 12:57 PM CDT
Saturday, August 21
Call to Action: Insist on Hand Counted Paper Ballots for Federal Offices
by
Linda Thieman
on Sat 21 Aug 2004 11:06 AM CDT
Call to Action: Insist on Hand Counted Paper Ballots for Federal Offices
A Message from VotersUnite! in partnership with the National Ballot Integrity Project Write to Senators Harkin and Grassley and to your representative in Congress and ask them to support the Federal Paper Ballot Act of 2004. Federal Paper Ballot Act of 2004 (1) All votes for federal offices shall be cast on paper ballots. (2) All votes for federal offices shall be hand counted at the polling places where the votes were cast, and the manual count shall constitute the official count of the votes. (3) Manually-tallied precinct totals for all federal offices shall be prominently posted at the polling places before the ballots are transported to the central facility. (4) In any jurisdiction where votes for federal office are also counted by machine, the machine totals for federal offices shall be posted at the location where the votes are machine-counted. (5) All absentee votes for federal offices shall be counted by hand, and the totals shall be posted at the central election office. (6) This act is effective on the date of enactment. Insist that your legislators understand ... ... a questionable, unauditable election in November could lead to massive court challenges and tear the country apart. ... an electronic federal election will result in a national crisis in November, regardless of the election outcome. ... it is the responsibility of Congress to avert a national crisis. This legislation will avert that crisis. ... you will not cast your vote for them in November unless they support this legislation. Insist that they introduce and support the Federal Paper Ballot Act of 2004. Click here for Senator Tom Harkin's email form. Click here for Senator Chuck "I vote with the junta" Grassley's email form. Click here for the form to write your representative in Congress. Just enter your zip code to get the webform of the right dude. Friday, August 20
Emergency Measures to Protect the 2004 Vote Count
by
Linda Thieman
on Fri 20 Aug 2004 12:13 PM CDT
Emergency Measures to Protect the 2004 Vote Count
A Message from VotersUnite! in partnership with the National Ballot Integrity Project Protect the 2004 Vote Count! Transparency means that ALL election processes can be observed by ordinary people - that people can observe the process of counting votes, not just observe computers processing votes. Transparent procedures will: - Increase the likelihood of an accurate vote count. - Avert a questionable federal election and national crisis. - Reduce the potential for legal challenges to the elections in November. Meet with your county leaders and propose that votes for federal offices be manually counted as an emergency measure to protect the accuracy of the vote count and protect the county from legal challenges. Emergency Measures To Protect The 2004 Vote Count These measures will help assure voters that votes were counted correctly and will help protect counties from potential legal challenges to their elections. Please work to implement them in your county. a. All votes for federal offices will be counted by hand, in public view, at the polling place before they are transmitted or transported to a central facility. b. Precinct totals will be prominently posted at the polling place before the ballots are transmitted or transported to a central facility. c. Ballots may be counted and aggregated electronically, in addition to the hand-count. However, in any case where a discrepancy exists, the hand-count will be considered the official result. Talking Points *Both major parties are forming networks of lawyers ready to challenge questionable results. By conducting a manual count of votes for federal office, counties can protect themselves from potential legal action. *Voter-confidence is at an all-time low. By doing this manual count, they can assure their constituents that the votes have been counted correctly. *It would take less than an hour in each precinct and could potentially save the county hundreds of hours defending themselves in court or confirming results by doing full recounts. *In paperless precincts, it would require nothing more than the addition of simple, inexpensive ballots able to handle a maximum of four federal offices. The cost might be as low as 5 cents a ballot, if they were printed at a local printer on cheap paper. For additional procedures for optical scan voting machines, click here. Tomorrow, Blog for Iowa will go into detail about how you can contact your Senators and your Congressman about this issue. Thursday, August 19
Krugman: Saving the Vote
by
Linda Thieman
on Thu 19 Aug 2004 12:31 PM CDT
Krugman: Saving the Vote
by Paul Krugman, New York Times ...Much of Florida's vote will be counted by electronic voting machines with no paper trails. Independent computer scientists who have examined some of these machines' programming code are appalled at the security flaws. So there will be reasonable doubts about whether Florida's votes were properly counted, and no paper ballots to recount. The public will have to take the result on faith. Yet the behavior of Gov. Jeb Bush's officials with regard to other election-related matters offers no justification for such faith. First, there was the affair of the felon list. Florida law denies the vote to convicted felons. But in 2000 many innocent people, a great number of them black, couldn't vote because they were erroneously put on a list of felons; these wrongful exclusions may have put Governor Bush's brother in the White House. This year, Florida again drew up a felon list, and tried to keep it secret. When a judge forced the list's release, it turned out that it once again wrongly disenfranchised many people - again, largely African-American [Democratic voters] - while including almost no Hispanics [Republican voters]. [Monday], my colleague Bob Herbert reported on another highly suspicious Florida initiative: state police officers have gone into the homes of elderly African-American voters - including participants in get-out-the-vote operations - and interrogated them as part of what the state says is a fraud investigation. But the state has provided little information about the investigation, and, as Mr. Herbert says, this looks remarkably like an attempt to intimidate voters. Given this pattern, there will be skepticism if Florida's paperless voting machines give [pseudo-]pResident Bush an upset, uncheckable victory. [Skepticism? That's got to be the understatement of the century.] Congress should have acted long ago to place the coming election above suspicion by requiring a paper trail for votes. But legislation was bottled up in committee [meaning, the Republican chair of the House Admin Committee intentionally prevented it from going to the floor for a vote], and it may be too late to change the hardware. Yet it is crucial that this election be credible. What can be done? (more) Free Registration Required Tomorrow, Blog for Iowa will offer up some suggestions about what you can do right here at home to ensure accurate and fair elections. [My comments are in italics above.] Thanks to JoyAnn in Cedar Rapids for alerting Blog for Iowa about this article. Wednesday, August 11
Maryland Election Official Tries To Shut Down U of Iowa Webpage
by
Linda Thieman
on Wed 11 Aug 2004 11:00 AM CDT
Maryland Election Official Tries To Shut Down U of Iowa Webpage
According to an email obtained by Blog for Iowa, Dr. Douglas W. Jones, Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Iowa and nationally-renowned expert on electronic, paperless voting and computer security, was informed yesterday that the U of I Director of University Relations, Steven Parrott, had received a request to remove a U of I webpage created by Professor Jones. The request came from a staff member of the Maryland State Board of Elections, State Administrator Linda Lamone. Lamone asked Parrott to remove a webpage that specifically addressed a brochure issued by the Maryland State Board of Elections, called “Maryland’s Better Way to Vote – Electronic Voting: Myth vs. Fact.” According to Jones’ webpage, the Maryland State Board of Elections brochure “was intended to counter widespread public criticism of the voting system in use in Maryland.” Maryland has purchased and used the allegedly notoriously-inaccurate Diebold DREs, or touch-screen voting machines, and according to Ellen Theisen in Myth Breakers for Election Officials, Maryland appears to be moving toward an election system that consists entirely of fully paperless DREs (Version 4.0, page 35). Maryland’s “Myth vs. Fact” brochure was first brought to Jones’ attention by Van Smith of the Baltimore City Paper on July 9, 2004. Jones describes the problems with the brochure on his U of I webpage: “Maryland's Myth versus Fact defense contains a sufficient number of misleading assertions, straw-man arguments and outright errors that it may well do more to fuel public distrust than it does to assure the trustworthiness of the system it defends. In sum, many of the statements in this brochure would be more nearly accurate if the labels myth and fact were exchanged. A more appropriate defense might have involved squarely admitting the defects in the current system and clearly documenting, for each, the actions taken by the Board of Elections to deal with the problem.” Jones outlines on his webpage, point by point, the flaws and glaring inaccuracies in the Maryland brochure. This is the page that Lamone requested the U of I take down. Jones adds that before he put the webpage up for public consumption, he had actually invited comments and corrections from the Maryland Board of Elections. According to Jones, Parrott, the Director of University Relations, refused to remove the page, holding “that the webpage fell within the bounds of [Professor Jones’] academic freedom.” On a related note, on Monday, eight Maryland voters filed motions asking the Court of Appeals of Maryland to force the State Board of Elections to fix alleged problems with the Diebold system. Linda Thieman Wednesday, August 4
What You Can Do: A Message from Voters Unite!
by
Linda Thieman
on Wed 04 Aug 2004 11:39 AM CDT
What You Can Do: A Message from Voters Unite!
United Voters! As the election draws closer, the likelihood of changes in voting systems decreases (with a few notable exceptions). So, most of us are focusing more and more on how to increase the chances of an accurate election, given the equipment that is already in place. Here are some things you can do. —Volunteer for Poll Watching BlackBoxVoting is organizing an "election watch crew". http://www.blackboxvoting.org/ VerifiedVoting.org is organizing "TechWatch." http://vevo.verifiedvoting.org/techwatch/ Informed poll watching can make a difference. Read about the work Roxanne Jekot's group of 150 volunteers did in the Georgia primary. Then join in the efforts of a national org, or work with other concerned citizens in your area to be a well- informed election observer. —Advocate Accountability Procedures One of the new items on our Info page links to our recommended accountability procedures for counties using optical scan machines. This page was developed as a cooperative effort between VotersUnite! and Concerned Citizens for Democratic Integrity (King County – Seattle), with some input from Bev Harris. http://www.votersunite.org/info/OSprocedures.asp If you live in an optical scan county, consult with your local election officials. See if they are following the minimum accountability procedures. Many of them probably are. In particular, talk with them about testing and about establishing auditing procedures — not recount procedures, but manual counts in a randomly-selected percentage of precincts to check whether the machines read and counted the votes correctly. Go here to find information about which machines your Iowa county uses and to get the name of your county auditor. —Object to New E-Voting Purchases We have a request from New Mexico, and we need all of you to participate. Help stop Bernalillo County (Albuquerque) from buying more Sequoia AVC Edge electronic voting machines. Remember Bernalillo County? 48,000 people voted on the touch screens in November, 2002. Only 36,000 of their votes were counted. The 25% error went unnoticed for 10 days until an attorney noticed it. Sequoia technicians claim they were able to reconstruct the data and determine the actual vote counts. (See our "Mess-up Du Jour" from July 9.) A recent article in the Albuquerque Tribune quotes Mary Herrera, Bernalillo County Clerk as saying: "We have never experienced any election in which all votes have not been counted." New Mexico activists tell us that Bernalillo County is poised to make a very large purchase shortly, and the county's decision is likely to set the standard for the state. CALL AND OBJECT! - Call 505 768-4085, then press 1 when the message starts. - Ask for county clerk Mary Herrera or her assistant. - Tell them you are calling to request that they do not purchase any more of these unreliable voting systems for Bernalillo County. Even if you live outside NM, call and let them know where you are calling from. You are a stake holder in New Mexico elections. You have a right to be heard. - For talking points about other Sequoia AVC Edge disasters, see: http://www.votersunite.org/info/Sequoiainthenews.pdf —Keep Educating Yourself and Others - Hand-deliver "Myth Breakers for Election Officials" to your local official, if you haven't already. [Actually, Alta went on a well-organized delivery spree a couple of weeks ago and it looks like we've got Myth Breakers and the ES&S supplement delivered to all but 12 Iowa counties. Woo-hoo! More details to follow.] - Keep up on the voting news: http://www.votersunite.org/news.asp - Visit our "Mess-up Du Jour" each day for a brief description of an election problem — a different one each day. http://www.votersunite.org/info/mess-updujour.asp - Check our Info page periodically for new activist materials and ideas. http://www.votersunite.org/info.asp - Take your concerns off-line by speaking to friends and neighbors about it. Let them know that paper ballots are essential. Speak at local meetings. - Put anti-e-voting stickers on all the letters you send out: http://www.votersunite.org/info/label-instructions.asp - Write letters to your local newspaper. Over and over and over. The press is beginning to catch on. Tell them the facts. "We should not be silenced." ~ John Gideon —Don't Get Discouraged The movement is growing. More people are becoming aware. More officials are taking a stand for paper ballots. More newspapers are publishing editorials opposing paperless voting. (May the gods smile on the New York Times editorial board.) Because of all us 'ants,' each doing our little part, the November election looks much brighter than it would have if we had all been sleeping for the past year. Keep up the good work! You never know what good thing might happen tomorrow. ~ the VotersUnite! team |
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