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Saturday, Nov 7, 2009
vondo
Published Letters: 121 Editor's Choice: 15
Ok, I'm not the biggest soccer fan. But when looking at overtime procedures for various sports, I like college football best: Alternating posessions from the 20.
The current soccer situation is crazy, but if they did alternating corner kicks (or maybe 3 corners/per team), that would improve things. When the ball left the box, the attempt would be over.
The goal of overtime should be to test the *team*, but in an abbreviated fashion to figure out which team is best. Corner kicks would do that in a real game situation without all the time wasted at mid-field.
Can someone point me to a video (didn't find one on YouTube) or transcript (didn't find one with Google) that shows in context what Kerry was saying? What was he saying a minute before and after this remark was made?
I manage a precinct too. We have a different touch screen system (not Diebold), but it has some similarities. Not having seen the Diebold system, I can't say for sure, but it seems like our system is better designed, but these are still complicated computers that can run complicated code and one must trust the election board. Of course the same was true of the old pin and lever machines and is true of most systems.
Let me address some of your points.
0) I don't think letting campaign workers have the machines at their own house for weeks is a good idea. Of course mine spend a few days in a public library sealed up (like yours), but you can never guarantee that a person with enough resources can't fool with them.
1) This is a problem with any election system. You could take paper ballots, fill them out, and deposit them in a paper ballot box. Or any other way a ballot is cast, you could cast extra ballots if you had the support of your co-workers. If you were really motivated, you could figure out who was not likely to vote (public record) or wait until the end of the day, then forge voters signatures, and cast ballots. That's why (presumably) the campaign workers are at least nominally of different parties. So they won't collude to do this.
So in this case I presume they would count ALL the votes. If the outcome was in doubt, the courts might declare a new election. In any case, they would know who to arrest.
3) If yours are like ours, they have a battery backup. They might even beep at you if you pull out the power. In any case, the votes will be stored to non-volatile RAM and won't be lost if the power goes out.
I think one of the biggest oversights with the Diebold machines is that it sounds like they use a readily available smart card, like something you open a hotel door with. But since I haven't seen one, I could be wrong. In our system, it is a proprietary cartridge that has no electrical contact with the machine. And we never give anything to the voter. We stick the cartridge in the machine and then select the ballot for them (Dem. primary, Rep. Primary, if there are two different ballots in the precinct, etc.) This doesn't make it impossible to hack, but more difficult.
Thanks for writing this. I've been a poll worker in Tennessee now for a couple of years and this last cycle was still challenging with a very high turnout and lots of people who've moved since the last time they voted. Please remember that when you vote, the people that are there to help you do it are basically volunteers. 2-3 times a year they sign up to spend several hours in a class (that can't possibly prepare them to deal with all the intricacies of election laws) and then pull a 13-14+ hour day to help you vote. Some may be better at their jobs than others, but they are almost all doing the best they can.
For this service they may earn around $100.
"I proudly entered to VOTE wearing my "IMPEACH BUSH AND CHENEY" shirt."
In most places, no one, including voters, is allowed into the polling place with any campaign material visible nor are they allowed to discuss politics in the polling place. What you were doing could be viewed as campaigning inside the boundary, which is not allowed.
Your judge was likely just doing his or her job, not discriminating against you. As a judge, I've had to do this several times, mostly to people whose views match mine. The integrity of the process is important.
It's great you went out to protect the integrity of the process, but it would be even better if, now that you've done it, you recognize that having capable people doing the job is even better than having capable people watching others do the job (perhaps less capably). I hope in the next election, you will sign up to work rather than observe. Someone who let you work even though you were supposed to observe likely broke the law.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The Maine fight was supposed to be the dress rehearsal for repealing California's Prop. 8 -- but gay marriage lost
Once one obtains Seriousness credentials in the Washington media, they are irrevocable no matter one's conduct.
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