By Luther Weeks on November 2, 2015
Now from Seattle, this video of a “Ballot Box” with a “tamper resistant contraption“, in the hands of practically anyone: King County acknowledges using cardboard boxes to collect ballots
If you have voted Absentee, for the election tomorrow, we ask “Do you know where your ballot is, and where it has been?
Posted in Mail/Absentee Voting, National
By Luther Weeks on October 28, 2015
New report: California: Ranked-choice voting linked to lower voter turnout <read>
The headline only articulates part of the problem:
The analysis revealed a significant relationship between RCV and decreased turnout among black and white voters, younger voters and voters who lacked a high school education… Studies have also found high rates of disqualified ballots due to voter errors. In addition, some minority groups were particularly disadvantaged by the RCV process
Posted in Instant Runoff Voting, National
By Luther Weeks on October 23, 2015
Bradblog has an instructive post bringing home the limitations and possibilities of optical scan paper ballot elections: Caught on Tape: Election Officials Behaving Badly
Posted in Electronic Vulnerability, HowDoWeKnow
By Luther Weeks on October 18, 2015
It used to be “Do you know where your children are tonight?” Now we must ask “Do you know which laws and regulations were violated yesterday?”
Laws and regulations are insufficient to protect us from individual, organized, and corporate skulduggery. The reality is thoroughly articulated by Truth-Out: Capitalism and Its Regulation Delusion: Lessons From the Volkswagen Debacle
Posted in HowDoWeKnow, National
By Luther Weeks on October 12, 2015
For Connecticut this is a time for our legendary “Land of Stead Habits”. A real crisis would be a knee-jerk reaction to claims of a crisis. It would be the National reaction to 2000 and the Help America Vote Act all over again.
There will be a time to change deliberately, once better systems are available and proven.
Posted in CT, National, Our Editorials
By Luther Weeks on October 7, 2015
Yesterday, Secretary of the State, Denise Merrill, conducted a random drawing of 15 districts for post-election audit of the September 2015 primary. There were 143 districts in the primary, yielding 15 as 10%. Several of the districts were exempt from selection (but not from determining the 10%) based on close vote recanvasses.
Posted in Post-Election Audits
By Luther Weeks on October 3, 2015
“Where their is smoke there is fire”. We say, “Where there is black and blue there is a victim” and “When it quacks like a cover up, suspicion is justified”. In this case we have ballots filled-in in black and blue with cross-outs. We suspect Colorado democracy is the victim.
Once again, a blow to those who claim there is no voting fraud. A further justification of counting votes by scanner in public in polling places, limiting mail-in voting, and limiting central scanning, while arguing for requiring adversarial election officials in every operation.
Posted in Chain of Custody, Mail/Absentee Voting, National, Skulduggery and Errors
By Luther Weeks on September 28, 2015
Myth: Conspiracies don’t exist
Truth: Conspiracies exist. People, corporations, and governments are frequently discovered to have committed conspiracies, often charged, and even convicted of Conspiracy to Commit [some crime]. The recent Libor financial scandal comes to mind, the Tobacco companies covering up studies linking tobacco to cancer, the recent disclosure that Exxon hid studies predicting global warming for decades, the NSA cover ups exposed by Snowden, and the FBI conspiring with Whitey Bolger, to name a few.
Myth: If Conspiracy X were true, too many people would know and it would have come out by now.
Truth: There are may conspiracies that remain unknown or not well-known for years or decades. Some may never be known. Many actually take only a few individuals who are highly motivated by fear of consequences, real intimidation, or perceived intimidation. Many suspected conspiracies are not investigated, even some where participants come forward publicly or surface their concerns through channels.
Posted in Electronic Vulnerability
By Luther Weeks on September 22, 2015
Over the years, we an others have pointed out that voting systems cannot be tested to assure performance before an election. Not the system itself before it is setup/programmed for a particular election. Not a setup and programmed system either. Not even if a system is completely secured and is somehow proven to run approved/certified software.
Here is some proof, not from a voting system – from a crime by an automaker. In this case it only puts the environment and lives in danger, rather than Democracy.
Posted in Electronic Vulnerability, Reports, Skulduggery and Errors
By Luther Weeks on September 18, 2015
The Intercept covers the lack of security and abundance of BS from the TSA: TSA Doesn’t Care That Its Luggage Locks Have Been Hacked
In a spectacular failure of a “back door” designed to give law enforcement exclusive access to private places, hackers have made the “master keys” for Transportation Security Administration-recognized luggage locks available to anyone with a 3D printer…
Now that they’ve been hacked, however, TSA says it doesn’t really care one way or another.
What reminders and lessons can we learn from this?
Posted in Chain of Custody, CT, National