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Edited on Wed Apr-27-05 07:20 PM by FogerRox
Many other states, counties may be able to have petition drives that would put the coice of voting systems up for grabs. In a referendum. If its done by county--thats not as large as a task as the whole darn state. Making it easier to deal with in the local sense.
In NJ IIRC its title 19. If all 50 states have referendum law that works by county--this is the project that can put us over top sort of speaking---in Georgia they may be able to choose paper in the Atlanta area--lot of dems there.
Think of it like this: Every COunty that Kerry won should be able to do this -----this summer---NOW.
1)Legal action 2)educational forums 3)town Resolutions Banning DRE's 4)county referendums banning DRE's
See? it fits into the larger scheme real nice. And What can TOm Delay do to stop it?
Oh yeah my new email-- newjerseyvip@yahoo.com
NJ Voting Issues Project, sounds nice ehh?
Generally speaking my goal is to rid Essex County of DRE's. My intent is to create a series of educational public forums whose objective is to explore the pros & cons of computerized voting systems, and to engage the voting public and their elected representatives in the larger effort to rid Essex County of DRE's. One set of tactics en route to this goal are educational forums. Here are 3 specific tracks that forum panelists should be able to address.
1) Hardware, software & Technical aspects. Since most of the voting public in Essex County is fairly ignorant when it comes to a basic understanding of the hardware & software used in today’s computerized voting systems, one prime task is to provide them with information on these systems, how they function and what these systems can and cannot do.
2) Certification of voting systems and legal issues. Again most of the voting public doesn't have an understanding of what’s going on concerning the lack of national or state standards of performance or certification programs for these computerized systems. Items of concern might be proprietary software that no public official can audit, MS windows used as an operating system and modems installed in DRE's and tabulators. In legal terms these systems may not even be legal where open government/sunshine laws exist.
3) General concepts. Transparency of the voting process. Voting into the corporate owned ballot box instead of a ballot box that is part of the Jeffersonian "Commons". Ownership of Diebold and ES&S: the solid links to the Christian Reconstructionalist movement. DRE's are the most expensive voting system available today. In these times of Federal, State and County deficits, the purchase of DRE's by Essex County is not a fiscally prudent choice.
I think strategically speaking we need a multi-pronged approach. Reaching out to the communities will be a vital tactic as well as reaching out to public officials. An effective method of reaching out and engaging members of our communities would be educational forums. Offering information on computerized voting systems to the voting public can go a long way towards building a consensus. And as part of an overall strategic doctrine, the tactic of using educational forums will play an integral role in accomplishing the goal of ridding Essex County of DRE's. We can also apply GOTV methods to the outreach effort. The message "BBV costs too much money" will resonate with the largest group of voters, with an underlying message of, "you can't trust BBV". The more people are talking about BBV, the closer we are to our goal. And of course if we set the standard in Essex County, the other Counties in N.J. will know that it can be done.
Email and letter writing to public officials will ensure they know where their constituency's feelings are. Letters to the editor, can be effective too. Contacting community, civic, religious, labor organizations asking them to come on board, will swell our ranks giving us larger numbers for public events. Every town should hold BBV public forums. Every town should be pressured to pass a resolution banning DRE's.
In the court house we have an existing law suit to work with. Open Government/sunshine laws in NJ tell us that the DRE's with their "Top Secret" source code are illegal. Asking for an Injunction to stop delivery of the DRE's to Essex County will buy us time and put adjoining counties on notice.
Calling for a series of county wide leadership summits, to bring all the grassroots groups into one room to hash out a common theme, tactical & strategic doctrines as well as legal aspects. It may make sense to invite the leadership of community religious, labor and civic organizations as well.
Here are 8 paths to victory:
1) Media outreach 2) Community outreach 3) Public Officials outreach 4) Educational forums 5) Rallies/Protests 6) Referendum 7) Court action 8) County grassroots leadership council 9) Town Resolutions banning DRE's
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