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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLast week, my vote flipped on a TN DRE. Three media spins later, I respond.
Last week, I told all y'all about my Tug-of -war with my black box over Amendment 1, which would ban abortions here. Since the outstanding TV news spot on WSMV ran, there have been three print media articles, all of which misrepresented or minimized the story and none of which included interviews with the voters whose votes flipped. After a particularly inept piece ran in the Nashville Tennessean, this was my response.
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To the editor:
In a recent article on early voting, several paragraphs were devoted to the report of two Maury county voters and one Davidson county voter having their votes flipped on Amendment 1 by the ES&S Ivotronic voting machines. You included comments from four election officials, all of whom misrepresented and minimized these reports. You did not, however, interview the voters.
I am one of those voters. What happened to me was simple enough. When I voted in Maury county, I initially checked "no" on both Amendments 1 and 2, which were on the same page of my ballot. Before leaving that page, I double-checked my votes. They were both bright red "no"s.
When I completed my other selections, I clicked the "Review" button to look (ostensibly) at my choices. All choices were correctly indicated EXCEPT my vote on Amendment 1. The machine had changed my vote to "yes".
I immediately followed the instructions to change my Amendment 1 vote back to "no". The second time through the review process, my choice was correct and so I cast my ballot, though with even more uncertainty than usual as to whether my votes were counted, and counted correctly.
It is true, as the election officials stated, that, in the end, my vote appeared as I wanted it to. They say that's all that matters. I say that the "no to yes to no" tug-of-war on Amendment 1 between me and my voting machine also matters, and it matters a lot. After all, if I had simply chosen to cast my vote without reviewing it, my ballot would not have reflected my intended vote. Simple as that.
To know why this voting machine "glitch" has occurred in at least two counties on the same machines, it is imperative that the software be examined to explain how these vote switches occurred. The voting machines themselves should have been set aside until they could be examined (by someone other than the person who programmed them) to explain the vote flip. Unfortunately, no one (including election officials) is allowed to examine the voting machine software in Tennessee and no one bothered to do a thorough forensic check of the machines.
We are left instead with more defense of the indefensible (unverifiable voting machines) by our election officials. The voters? They are ignored or blamed.
As long as we vote on unverifiable voting equipment owned and programmed by corporations without meaningful oversight, our fears are warranted. And as for me and two other voters (at least), our fears have been realized. Right in front of us in the voting booth.
As one friend (with 30+ years in the NSA level cyberworld) said about my experience: "No way that was an accident, Bernie. A zero is not a one."
I can't prove he's right, and Tennessee election officials can't prove he's wrong. That bothers me mightily. Them, apparently, not so much.
I want our elections to be run accident-free. (Paper ballots counted by high school honor society members would work for me). Our current Tennessee state and local election officials want to keep us trusting voting machines that are so error-prone and fraud-friendly that they are now banned in 34 other states.
What possible reason could there be, other than the obvious one, for that?
How did your voting machine vote on Amendment 1? Can you be sure?
Fly by night
Old Natchez Trace Road
Fly , TN
MADem
(135,425 posts)There are jerks out there who are not above doxxing people for their political views or affiliations.
Terrible that we have to think like that, but that's how the world is, these days.
Fly by night
(5,265 posts)brooklynite
(94,331 posts)...because anyone clever enough to be able to reprogram enough voting machines to shift a Statewide election result would be smart enough to program the machines so you didn't see the change happen, right?
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)In 2004 one Ohio county showed 1500 more votes for Bush than were registered voters in the county-not even counting how many people voted for Kerry.
The OH SoS Ken Blackwell certified those results.
brooklynite
(94,331 posts)...I know this is a matter of faith among some people here, but I've directly asked a lot of political people in Ohio and none believe fraud happened.
hobbit709
(41,694 posts)Marion, OH brags about the fact that Warren G. Harding came from there, they don't mention that they haven't come up with anything else since 1920.
bulloney
(4,113 posts)If I was the people of Marion, I'd lay low on their native son. If they have any hope, "W" will replace Harding as the worst president whenever the historians have the chance to evaluate his presidency.
Dustlawyer
(10,494 posts)was connected to it. He liked to fly small planes (know where this is going yet), a couple of days before he was to give his deposition, and after several people told him to stop flying he died in a "mysterious" plane crash.
If you want to learn more about electronic vote flipping Google Spoonamore and electronic voting fraud. He is the guru who protects your credit card purchases. He was approached by the two Diebald brothers when they built their first voting machine to see if he could hack it. Took 30 minutes and was relatively easy. They use the same thing now.
Fly by night
(5,265 posts)I agree that most DRE assisted election fraud is performed without voters knowing better. Down here in our swamps, I dib't think this bunch would defer doing anything they can do.
Won't debate DRE election fraud today 'cause I can't. I'm pecking this in an IPhone and I'm 30 miles from a desktop with Internet. But I have no doubt that my machine changed my vote and I am well aware of the number of ways that could have happened.
Thanks for the kick. Kick away but I won't be back online for several hours.
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)hobbit709
(41,694 posts)you can program a computer to make 1+1=3 every other time it does an addition and then remove the subroutine that does that, leaving no evidence behind. With no paper trail I just don't trust the vote counts and I live in a solid blue area and I STILL don't trust them.
rickford66
(5,521 posts)I program also. The code needed to count votes shouldn't be very complicated, but to hide mischief you can make it a can of worms. You can easily make it pass a verification test. The source code should be copyrighted and then published along with a list of compilers and utilities used etc. The whole process could be handled like casinos are monitored.
Buenaventura
(364 posts)by criminals (probably hired by Sheldon Adelson).
riversedge
(70,073 posts)I have enough of these vote flips to convince me to be cautious. We have two refs in my state.
Thanks for your comment
Vinca
(50,236 posts)Great letter, by the way.
Sancho
(9,067 posts)in 2004 my wife and I voted on a DRE that flipped a vote. We called the election supervisor, eventually got escorted out, and the machine was "reset" and put back in business.
It still happens in Florida - if you look at undervotes, patterns, etc. it's pretty clear that some DRE's or tabulators are hacked.
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)Here in AZ, we still use paper ballots ... so any trickier must occur the old fasion way ... at the central tabulation point!
ctsnowman
(1,903 posts)davidpdx
(22,000 posts)It's too bad they won't give you an answer. It seems like they have simply dismissed any error that may have happened (but not admitted of course). I hope you stay on their tail.
JustAnotherGen
(31,780 posts)If anyone has a twitter account - it is @maddow.
Maybe tweet to Revered Al too?
blackspade
(10,056 posts)I'm glad your better connected these days!
Fly by night
(5,265 posts)... the Fly General Store.
Serving the public since the 1700s.
My home since 1969.
blackspade
(10,056 posts)Botany
(70,447 posts)I worked in OH in 2004 and saw machine manipulation first hand
the Ohio and the National Democratic Party didn't do shit despite
100s of cases.
whereisjustice
(2,941 posts)ecstatic
(32,648 posts)In GA. Always review the ballot before submitting. On my first review, it showed that I had not selected a candidate for one of the polls, so I went back to fix that.
On the second review, it showed another candidate had been left off. Even though I was sure I had answered every single question, I went back again and fixed that question.
Amazingly, the third review also showed a missed question.
On the fourth review, it showed that all the questions had been answered and I submitted my ballot.
The good news is that these problems didn't occur with the major votes for governor and senator. Had that happened, it would have been extremely obvious and I'd be crying foul right now. It could be that I was extremely distracted and not selecting candidates when I thought I was, although nothing like that has ever happened to me before.
Fly by night
(5,265 posts)Believe your lying eyes.
Don't move along.
There is something to see here.
City Lights
(25,171 posts)Thanks for taking the time to write and send it!