From: Jei (jei@cc.hut.fi)
Date: Sat Jan 24 2004 - 05:47:17 MST
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/012404F.shtml
Democracy at Risk
By Paul Krugman
The New York Times
Friday 23 January 2004
The disputed election of 2000 left a lasting scar on the
nation's psyche. A recent Zogby poll found that even in red states,
which voted for George W. Bush, 32 percent of the public believes
that the election was stolen. In blue states, the fraction is 44
percent.
Now imagine this: in November the candidate trailing in the
polls wins an upset victory but all of the districts where he does
much better than expected use touch-screen voting machines.
Meanwhile, leaked internal e-mail from the companies that make
these machines suggests widespread error, and possibly fraud. What
would this do to the nation?
Unfortunately, this story is completely plausible. (In fact,
you can tell a similar story about some of the results in the 2002
midterm elections, especially in Georgia.) Fortune magazine rightly
declared paperless voting the worst technology of 2003, but it's
not just a bad technology it's a threat to the republic.
First of all, the technology has simply failed in several
recent elections. In a special election in Broward County, Fla.,
134 voters were disenfranchised because the electronic voting
machines showed no votes, and there was no way to determine those
voters' intent. (The election was decided by only 12 votes.) In
Fairfax County, Va., electronic machines crashed repeatedly and
balked at registering votes. In the 2002 primary, machines in
several Florida districts reported no votes for governor.
And how many failures weren't caught? Internal e-mail from
Diebold, the most prominent maker of electronic voting machines
(though not those in the Florida and Virginia debacles), reveals
that programmers were frantic over the system's unreliability. One
reads, "I have been waiting for someone to give me an explanation
as to why Precinct 216 gave Al Gore a minus 16022 when it was
uploaded." Another reads, "For a demonstration I suggest you fake
it."
Computer experts say that software at Diebold and other
manufacturers is full of security flaws, which would easily allow
an insider to rig an election. But the people at voting machine
companies wouldn't do that, would they? Let's ask Jeffrey Dean, a
programmer who was senior vice president of a voting machine
company, Global Election Systems, before Diebold acquired it in
2002. Bev Harris, author of "Black Box Voting"
(www.blackboxvoting.com), told The A.P. that Mr. Dean, before
taking that job, spent time in a Washington correctional facility
for stealing money and tampering with computer files.
Questionable programmers aside, even a cursory look at the
behavior of the major voting machine companies reveals systematic
flouting of the rules intended to ensure voting security. Software
was modified without government oversight; machine components were
replaced without being rechecked. And here's the crucial point:
even if there are strong reasons to suspect that electronic
machines miscounted votes, nothing can be done about it. There is
no paper trail; there is nothing to recount.
So what should be done? Representative Rush Holt has
introduced a bill calling for each machine to produce a paper
record that the voter verifies. The paper record would then be
secured for any future audit. The bill requires that such verified
voting be ready in time for the 2004 election and that districts
that can't meet the deadline use paper ballots instead. And it also
requires surprise audits in each state.
I can't see any possible objection to this bill. Ignore the
inevitable charges of "conspiracy theory." (Although some
conspiracies are real: as yesterday's Boston Globe reports,
"Republican staff members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee
infiltrated opposition computer files for a year, monitoring secret
strategy memos and periodically passing on copies to the media.")
To support verified voting, you don't personally have to believe
that voting machine manufacturers have tampered or will tamper with
elections. How can anyone object to measures that will place the
vote above suspicion?
What about the expense? Let's put it this way: we're spending
at least $150 billion to promote democracy in Iraq. That's about
$1,500 for each vote cast in the 2000 election. How can we balk at
spending a small fraction of that sum to secure the credibility of
democracy at home?
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