September:
http://voicesweb.org/archive/sept07/politicsandeconomics.pdf
Editorial
for July-August Voices 2007
by
Jon Eich
Voting
machines – In order to assure voter confidence
in elections, particularly elections that are close
and/or hotly contested, Centre County needs a voting
system that produces a voter-verified paper ballot (VVPB).
Unfortunately, the incumbent commissioners made a bad
business decision by selecting a system that does not
produce a VVPB.
The paperless system selected by the incumbents is not
accepted by 28 states, is being replaced in Florida,
and has been determined to be unsuitable by the National
Institute of Standards and Technology.
The selected touch screen system also costs more to
purchase, has a shorter life span, requires more equipment,
and costs more to operate than the alternative system.
Jon Eich for County Commissioner
Editorial
for July-August Voices 2007
NOT A TIME TO GLOAT-YET
by Bob Brownlee
Incalculable women/man hours have been expended in the
last few years
in Centre County by a group of dedicated citizens, the
Concerned
Voters of Centre County (CVCC). They tried to prevent
the purchase of
the paper-less touch screen voting machines in favor
of the
re-countable paper ballot optical scan equipment. Their
early efforts
failed when Commissioner Chris Exarchos hood-winked
this group by
publicly declaring his support of paper trail ballots,
and soon
thereafter, with Commissioner Steve Dershem's assistance,
the Board of
Elections voted to purchase junk paperless touch screen
computer based
voting machinery at a cost of one million plus dollars.
Leonard
Holliday, the computer scientist assigned to the Board
to temporarily
replace candidate Commissioner Conklin, cast the lone
vote against
paperless computer based voting equipment. Commissioners
running for
office cannot serve on the Board.
Submitting very solid technical evidence in writing
Holliday warned
Dershem and Exarchos of the obvious severe security
flaws already
demonstrated nationally with computer based voting.
The security of
computer software is extremely complex and difficult
to examine even
when it is accessible. Voting machine software is, suspiciously,
held
secret by the vendors.
Hearing aids must have been turned off and impaired
vision must
have set in during the Boards deliberations or, some
other behind the
scenes machine vender negotiations were in play. No
proof of that
exists but the seemingly only other excuse for their
vote would be
ignorance. I doubt that ignorance played any role. The
inability to
check the outcome of close elections is a very simple
concept to grasp
even by casual comprehension of those of us deemed computer
or
technically illiterate.
Another Exarchos subterfuge was to publicly blame State
law as the
reason he chose equipment that lacks a paper ballot.
Pennsylvania law
allows use of Optical Scan voting machinery that employs
voter
verifiable re-countable paper ballots and should have
been selected by
the Board. It is also less expensive and has numerous
other
advantages.
After a brief period of depression following the Election
Board's
egregious error, Concerned Voters stiffened their spines.
Mary
Vollero became chair, and Brenda Black Vice-Chair. I
became involved
and was determined to help get the message out to the
public about the
dangerous of paperless voting. Our efforts included
a website, paid
advertising, letters to editors and a petition drive
in which we
gathered more than 1,000 signatures requesting State
and County
officials to favor Optical Scan equipment. Representatives
of CVCC met
with Pa Secretary of State Pedro Cortes to present him
with the
results of petition drives and letter pleas for a change
in direction
at the State level. Though cordial during the meeting
Cortes never
responded to any of our concerns. He said he would discuss
the
situation with the Commissioners and get back to us.
Great advice
there, betcha.
During the meeting he did attempt to invoke the official
views of
the famed Dr Michael Shamos of Carnegie Mellon University.
Shamos is a computer scientist and direct advisor to
the State
regarding voting machine security. Trouble here Big
Time (to use a
phrase contaminated by Dick Cheney). What trouble?
Dr Shamos' almost lone and certainly erroneous view
of safe
computer voting are offset by the official position
of the 80,000
member Association of Computer Machinery (ACM) that
touch screen
voting is not secure. Another Shamos offset is the National
Institute
for Science and Technology (NIST).
NIST, formally the august National Bureau of Standards,
and
supposedly the primary adviser to the federal government
on technical
issues voted unanimously against paperless computer
voting in their
recommendations to the Bush selected Election Assistance
Commission
(EAC). The EAC for unknown reasons ignored the advice
of brilliant and
respected government scientists. An increase in the
odor of limburger
seems ubiquitous these last few years.
Some very promising movement has been made nationally
in the last
year to increase the security of voting. The CVCC is
a small very
effective group of dedicated people and parallels the
efforts of
similar large and small concerned citizens' organizations
around the
nation. Their grass roots efforts are finally paying
dividends. Many
states have been convinced to pass legislation requiring
archival
quality paper ballot voting systems and federal legislation,
HB811,
coming soon to the floor of the House promises a re-countable
paper
ballot in spite of opposition by the strong lobbies
of voting machine
manufacturers. It is imperative that we all contact
our
representatives to insure passage of HB811.
Pennsylvania remains a backwater state with Cortes remaining
obstinate. Optimism prevails in spite of our states
backward position.
It appears that Cortes and Shamos will get their comeuppance
in the
near future, as did Exarchos in the primary election.
Gloating is out
of order but I believe CVCC's educational activities
were the major
cause of the ouster of Exarchos. He lost the primary
election by only
a few hundred votes but had no way to call for a recount
or even to
complain. The irony is that he was hoisted on his own
petard. Comical
in a way, but the most important issue far exceeds the
importance of
Exarchos' loss. That is, the electorate seems to be
educated about
these voting issues thanks to all the stiff-spined work
of the
organizations like CVCC, VotePa, VoteTrustUSA. I am
prepared to gloat
when backward, greedy, and corrupt politicians and their
fifth column
are forced by federal law to fix the mess they helped
create.
