The official blog of the Libertarian Party
January 26, 2007
2004 Libertarian Recount Conclusion
There have been several recent media reports about the somewhat exciting conclusion of recount operations in Ohio. Richard Winger of Ballot Access News wrapped it all up quite well:
After the November 2004 election, the presidential nominees of the Green Party and the Libertarian Party jointly requested a recount of the presidential vote in New Mexico and in Ohio.
Both states had relatively nominal fees for requesting a recount. But elections officials in both states were determined to thwart the requests. In New Mexico, the state retroactively increased the fee ten-fold and a lower court said that was OK. The two candidates couldn’t afford the $1,400,000 new fee for the recount, so they dropped their request, and the voting-counting machines were then reprogrammed so that any recount would be impossible. Later, on May 16, 2006, the New Mexico Supreme Court said the two candidates should have received the recount they had requested after all, but, of course, by then it was too late.
In Ohio, the recount supposedly went ahead. Under the law, a few precincts were supposedly to be randomly chosen. A hand count of these randomly-chosen precincts was then to be compared with the machine total. If they matched, no further recount in that county was needed. On January 24, a jury convicted two Ohio elections officials of rigging the recount. Instead of randomly choosing precincts, they first identified a few precincts in which the hand-count and the machine-count matched. Then they claimed that those precincts had been the randomly-chosen ones; and since totals matched, no further recount of other precincts was needed. As in New Mexico, it is too late to do anything about it.
Posted by Stephen Gordon at January 26, 2007 10:06 AM
Reader Comments:
Unfortuinate this was not widely covered by the media. I wonder why. The media has always loved controversy. I guess they only want bipartisan controversy.
We need to demand that all precincts in the country switch to optical scan voting machines and that all touch screen machines be prohibited. Until all precincts can obtain optical scanners, allow the use of old fashioned paper ballots.
Additionally, one 100% machine recounts should be required for ALL elections, with the recount being performed by outside auditors in the presence of members of all political parties. Any disputed elections are elections within a certain margin of error would automatically be subjected to a 100% hand count of the machine ballots.
The one problem with optical scanners is the situation where a voter wishes to pass on a race or does not care for the candidates. The addition of a NOTA option and a PASS option would solve this problem. NOTA is obvious. PASS essentially means the voter is passing on the race completely. It would allow a voter to pass, without creating an undervote situation. This would solve the problem that occured in the Florida 13th Congressional District, where a large number of undervotes occured and put the race in question.
In my previous post in the middle paragraph should have read:
"Any disputed elections OR elections within a ."
To the contrary, the touch screen machines at least allow the voter to see a REAL printed version of their ballot choices and the opportunity to change their selections prior to casting it. The printed tapes are then available for cross-reference.
Optical scans give the voter no confirmation that the electronically-recorded votes match what they filled on the scanned document.
I recommend watching the documentary called "Hacking Democracy."
I do agree, however, that American's deserve a better election system that guarantees complete voting accuracy. We could start by eliminating the electoral college!
I live in ohio, and have heard the media mention that peple have been tried for selecting districts, but they never mentioned the LP filed the recount requests.
Mike:
However, the optical scan machines have one very important component that makes fixing an election a very dangerous ploy, that being the fact that the ballots are stored right under the optical scanner and lend themselves very well to hand recounting. That is not possible with touch screen. Plus, there is no guarantee that what you punch in on a touch screen is what actually is recorded, even with a receipt. Just because the machine may print a receipt, doesn't mean what got recorded actually matches with the receipt. I have heard hundred of horror stories of people who have actually had to vote on these machines and I don't trust them any farther than I can throw them.
With optical scan, you always have that crucial option of counting the cards by hand. For me, that makes all the difference.
As for the electoral college. The best thing we could do is eliminate the Presidency all together. Short of that, I think a President, elected by Congress and removable at Congress's pleasure would be the way of curtailing the imperial presidency. Although I am leaning towards scrapping the present Constitution all together and establishing a system that has no central executive at all.
Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything.
--Josef Stalin (attributed) [Rush Limbaugh used this alleged Stalin quote on his radio program in November, 2000.]
Remember the Tamara Clark State Senate election fraud mess in Las Vegas? It was blatant and no one to take it to. The people in power are the benefactors of the fraud. I was involved with our preliminary investigation and we found MASSIVE fraud. Read VoteScam and you will see the blue print of how it happened here in Clark County Nevada.
They did it the hard old fashioned way… They stuffed ballot boxes with fraudulent voter registered ballots.
WE KNOW THAT WE Libertarians won that one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Diebold: One Vulnerability After Another
Will these guys ever get a clue about security? The cheap locks that protect Diebold voting machines — easily picked, by the way — all open to the same key. Diebold put a photo of the key on their web page. So naturally an enterprising tinkerer took that photo, bought some key blanks from the hardware store, and proceeded to home-make keys that would open Diebold voting machines.
http://www.wendymcelroy.com/news.php?extend.676
To all of you suggesting that we eliminate the electoral college, have you thought about the ultimate result. That would be that our high population areas would run the country. Our agricultural fly over country would be dicounted. Where does liberalism breed, look at the red and blue precint map. Just look at Michigan if you want to see what happens when a large city runs the government. One of our founding fathers (sorry I forget who) thought that only land owners could vote. I lean a little bit toward that. If you live in a high rise you can't vote. Well maybe that's a little extreme.
Since voting is pretty important to a democratic/republic, I am not sure that the paper ballot is still not the best way. It's only our desire for immediate gratification that brings about machine voting. Voting is too important to allow the desire for immediate gratification to overhaul the system.
I wish there was some way where we could keep the elecetoral college while also giving third parties a chance to win.
If equality in voting is the goal, the electoral college must be eliminated. It is an inherently unequal process giving more weight to states with small populations. A 500,000 population state like Wyoming gets 3 (of 538) electoral votes (and representatives) or roughly 1/179th of the total instead of their 1/600th population. They have way more pull than they should have. Why should their state be worth more than any other? They get 2 senators and that should be more than fair. If you want to keep the electoral college the representation should be equal.
Why does it matter where liberalism breeds? Social conservatism breeds in agricultural fly over states and that doesn't make it any better. You might say our civil liberties are being violated by the folks in socially conservative areas because they voted for Bush. That worked out well. The unfortunate thing is that regardless of the system libertarianism is not spreading fast enough.
Wait a minute!
There was a time where a third party won the Presidential election in the U.S. even though there was the electoral college. Unfortunately, the pr*ck that won it was Abraham Lincoln of the Republican Party in 1860.
A small note to mention is that there were candidates from four different parties in the election, and each received electoral votes. Unfortunately, Lincoln won the majority of electoral votes.
Besides, if someone doesn't win the majority of electoral votes, then it will be dead-locked and turned over to the House where each state would give one vote to the candidate of their choice. If it's still dead-locked, then it will go to the Senate (I think). If it's still dead-locked, then unfortunately it would go to the Vice President (President of the Senate).
golferhal:
I support optical scan voting, because in effect you have the paper ballots to count, if necessary. For smaller counties/precincts, regular paper ballots would be fine, but with large areas, the counting of paper ballots by hand woud get very tedious, especially if you have a large number of races on the ballot.
Bottom line, I consider only two types of voting acceptable. Optical scan and paper ballots. The rest of the methods, including touch screen, punch card and mechanical voting machines I consider as totally unacceptable.
To reply to the various comments concerning the electoral college:
I would just as soon abolish the Presidency altogether do without any sort of central executive.
Optical scan voting, IRV, eliminate the electoral college, etc.?
Even under these systems we wouldn't win because the voters are sheep. When we talk about changing the way voting is done we sound like whiners who want to change the rules of the game because we're not winning.
This turns people off who might listen to our other, more substantive ideas.
The electoral college is one of the few remnants of a republic left in our system. We are moving closer and closer to an absolute democracy. Democracy is only the right of 51% of the population to oppress the other 49%.
Socialism breeds in urban areas because what your neighbor does affects you more the closer he/she is to you. I don't mind people voting for more gov't interference at the local level. I just don't want to pay for NYC's and LA's socialism.
If we eliminate the electoral college Presidential candidates will completely ignore anyplace other than the urban centers.
As far as comments like Mark B's - I am not in favor of huge overhauls of the constitution. I would like to see our government follow it for the first time in my lifetime.
"I don't mind people voting for more gov't interference at the local level."
Why not?
I do, I mind government interference at every level.
Why would it matter to me as an individual whether the fascist goons taking away my rights get their orders from King George Dubai-ya Bush or from Bob Reilly and Roy Moore of the Alabama Taliban?
Whether they are stealing money for the military-industrial complex at the federal level, to line the pockets of their buddies like Halliburton, or just enforcing their narrow-minded Jim Crow mentality and regime ecclesiocracy at the the local level, the results are the same:
Taking away my freedom.
A gun is getting stuck in my face, literally or metaphorically, it makes zero difference if it's getting stuck by a street thug, a local pig, a state statist gang, the federal mafia or globalists, the results are exactly the same.
John Brandimore:
Optical scan voting and IRV are two different subjects. I didn't comment on IRV nor did I recommend abolishing the electoral college.
I did comment on optical scan voting.
As for constitutional overhauls. We have to rein in the imperial presidency for sure, recent presidents, of either party, have gotten far to powerful. At the very least we need to repeal the 12th, 14th, 16th, 17th, and 23rd Amendments plus the second clause of the 13th Amendment and section 2 of the 21st Amendment.
There are lesser changes that could be made to the Presidential election system. End popular voting for Presidential electors, possibly have the state legislatures choose the electors or do it in convention. I fervently support ending the current system of Presidential Primaries and going to a single caucus day. There are quite a few options we can bandy about.
What a waste of time and money. As they say in sports don't cry about the officials, score more points. In politics it is get more votes. Why do libertarians have to deal with the constant whinning about the rules from the LP? The playing field is level the problem is the LP in unable to gain the support of the large number, if not a majority of people that consider themselves libertarians.
Paulie- I too mind it at every level. I was just saying that reforms we want to make at local levels are impossible until we return the Feds to their constitutional roles.
Then we have to reform at the individual states. However if a certain state chooses to be socialist, then we can move away from there.
Mark B. - I wasn't talking to just you. Others in this thread mentioned abolishing the electoral college. In other threads I have seen Libertarians asking for IRV.
I see asking for any change in the system of largest number of votes wins as bad. The problem isn't the system, it's the voters. Either they are too complacent or emotional or something causing them to make bad choices.
Part of this is our fault. People, when exposed to most of our ideas, agree with us. However, they don't know we exist or we lead with our weakest points.
I basically believe that the long slide away from a republic toward a democratic form of socialism, then dictatorship is inevitable. It happened to Rome (minus the socialism).
The only reason I even vote is so that I don't forfeit my right to complain. Since I'm going to vote I might as well vote for the party that's closest to my beliefs.
However it's all moot.
To everybody:
My bitching got results :)
Governor Crist just announced that all touch screen voting machines will be immediately banned in Florida and all precints must use optical scan voting machines from now on. Sometimes the squeaky Libertarian wheel does get the grease. :)
OHIO 2004: 6.15% Kerry-Bush vote-switch found in
probability study
How Kerry Votes Were Switched to Bush Votes
http://jqjacobs.net/politics/ohio.html
"In a sample of 166,953 votes (1/34th of the Ohio vote),
the Kerry-Bush margin changes 6.15% when the population
is sorted by outcomes of wrong-precinct voting.
"The 6.15% vote-switch differential is seen when the large
sample is sorted by probability a Kerry wrong-precinct
vote counts for Bush. When the same large voter sample is
sorted by the probability Kerry cross-votes count for
third-party candidates, Kerry votes are instead equal in
both subsets."
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Unfortuinate this was not widely covered by the media. I wonder why. The media has always loved controversy. I guess they only want bipartisan controversy.
Posted by: Nick at January 26, 2007 12:36 PM