Lame Duck - Quack Quack

Wow, that was quite an election. The Bush Administration is on the rails, and the Democrats are dancing in the streets.

Me, I'm quietly hopeful. Hopeful that Nancy Pelosi, the most powerful women ever elected in this country, will open up some serious investigations into the Bush administration's corruption and cruelties. If the Democrats are smart, they'll bide their time exposing the Bush Administration's myriad crimes, and instead of impeaching the bastard, they'll leave him there, a lame duck, for all to see. But to pull it off, they'll have to start governing again. Figure out a plan on Iraq, and get working undoing the damage done by this drunken frat boy at the helm for the past 6 years.

And that's where I am quietly hopeful. Maybe, just maybe, the Democrats can walk the tightrope they must. And instead of wasting their time trying to impeach W with a razor thin majority in the Senate, they will instead expose this President for what he is, a corporate good old boy and the most corrupt President this country has ever seen.

The Democrats, firmly in control of the House, should work now until 2008, simply and methodically exposing the facts. The facts about Katrina, the facts about Iraq, the facts about Enron, the facts about Global Warming. They could figure out a plan for the country and lead us out of this nightmare that has been the Bush Presidency, by simply exposing the truth. Billions for war, trillions in Debt. The largest federal government ever seen. Billions and billions lost in Iraq, billions lost by his buddies at Enron, and billions lost on all the other corruption tied to these crooks.

Congratulations to to the Democrats. Thanks for winning and not screwing up too badly. Don't let John Kerry tell any more jokes. Now if you can get us out of Iraq, and win the 2008 election you'll have the hat trick. Nothing will erase the memory of your votes as a party for the war, for the Patriot Act, for Nafta and Cafta and all the rest, but still, this was a victory over the Bush Administration. The enemy of my enemy is sometimes my friend.

The Democrats either engineered their best election in decades yesterday, or rode the wave of anger towards Bush to victory. Either way, Bush is lame duck. And I'll drink to that!

Now hopefully the new Democratically controlled House and possibly Senate will get busy and prove my skepticism about the Democratic Party wrong.

King County's Optical Scan Machines Part of New HBO Documentary

For all those Ron Sims synchophants out there, and specfically to Goldie, over at Horsesass.org, I would like to point out the key element in the new "Hacking Democracy" film that just debuted on HBO, is very well summarized by Brad Blog:

Finnish computer security expert Harri Hursti discovered that Diebold stored an executable program on the same removable memory card used to store the tabulated votes on each Diebold voting machine. "If someone had told me there was a modifiable, executable program in the same place where the most secured data was stored, I'd say you'd have to be misunderstanding something, crazy or lying," Hursti declares.

The attempted Hursti hack, as allowed by Sancho, moves forward throughout the film. By the time it was completed (in pitifully short order), the e-voting world would be turned on its head. Hursti succeeding in exposing that both optical-scan systems and touch-screen voting systems manufactured by Diebold -- and apparently tested by no one -- could be hacked, an election result completely flipped, and no trace would be left behind. All that was needed was a $100 memory card reader bought off the Internet and about 60 seconds of access to the machine's memory card. RadioShack or Best Buy has all the necessary tools, in fact.

To repeat: It's not just Diebold's DREs that can be hacked. The Hursti hack targeted the memory card. Not only DREs but optical-scan units can record their information to memory cards. In either case, they're vulnerable. The ability to have an election flipped, and to do so with a small number of people involved, was no longer a "theory."

Yep, as I've said all along. King County's Opt Scan's with central tabulators are no better than Touch Screens.... Ron Sims bought into both.

About That Spoiler Myth

From the PI:

Veteran Seattle Democratic political consultant Blair Butterworth said most votes for third-party candidates "aren't being taken from anybody (else). They're being taken from the I-don't-vote-for-anybody file. They're non-participants." But he said especially in Eastern Washington, Libertarians probably take more votes from Republicans than Democrats.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/

Greg Palast Reports on Absentee

From Greg Palasts new article:

"-Absentee Ballots Uncounted. The number of absentee ballots has quintupled in many states, with the number rejected on picayune technical grounds rising to over half a million (526,420) in 2004. In swing states, absentee ballot shredding was pandemic. "

Now I don't know yet where he got his numbers from, but it certainly is an interesting read. And published right here in the Northwest.

http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?id=1511

Forcing Your Way In The Door

Yesterday I received a phone call from a reporter at Western Washington University. He was working on a story about third party campaigns, and asked me a particularly poignant question, “What's the biggest hurdle standing in the way of third party candidates?”

My response, “Exclusion.”

It was an apropos question because at the time I was downtown with the Green Party Candidate for Senate, Aaron Dixon, and his supporters, protesting King 5 TV's exclusion of Mr. Dixon from the one and only televised Senatorial debate. Aaron Dixon was excluded from the debates because as King TV's President summarized:

“We invited all the Senate candidates to participate in the debate under the condition that they met any one of a number of criteria to establish their viability. These criteria were based on the guidelines established by the Debate Advisory Standards Project. It is unfortunate that Mr. Dixon did not meet any of those criteria. It is also unfortunate that he refused to leave the premises when asked to do so."

These are the same standards King 5 pointed to when they excluded my campaign for King County Executive from last year's televised debates. These standards basically consist of an eight point list of criteria that a candidate must meet in order to be included in debates. I'm not going to belabor the entire list of rules, as you can read them for yourself online, here:

The Debate Project Report

But I will highlight this particular section of Debate Project's report:

---

"It is fair and reasonable that inclusion criteria during the pre-election period may be more difficult to meet than during the out-period. If a nonmajor or third-party candidate who is given an opportunity to participate in public debates during the out-period does not earn significant public support going into the final 30 days of an election campaign, debate sponsoring organizations that wish to limit participation have an acceptable rationale to tighten the inclusion criteria.

1.Out-period test. The test for including a candidate during the out-period should be seriousness of purpose. All candidates who have a serious purpose should be included in debates. Candidates who do not have a serious purpose include "joke" candidates; candidates who do not campaign in a meaningful way; and candidates who admit that their candidacies have only symbolic or trivial intentions. It is important that nonmajor and third-party candidates who begin their candidacies with little public support or name recognition are nonetheless equitably provided reasonable opportunities to present their credentials and their positions on the issues during the early stages of an election campaign.

2. Pre-election period test. The test for including a candidate during this period should be twofold: seriousness of purpose plus demonstration of significant public support. All candidates who demonstrate seriousness of purpose and significant support going into the final 30 days of an election should be included in debates."

---

These rules then state that in the “out-period,” 30 days or more before the election, polls should be conducted to see if candidates are viable. If a candidate polls at 5% or more during the “out-period,” he or she is to be included in any debates among candidates for that office.

But most pollsters freely admit they don't typically poll on 3rd party candidates. So this rule is simply ignored and these news organizations conduct biased polls from the outset. A fact recently pointed out by a local Washington newspaper, The Herald:

“Polling shows Cantwell leading McGavick by 8 to 10 points. These polls usually exclude the three other candidates: Bruce Guthrie, a Libertarian, Aaron Dixon, a Green, and Robin Adair, an Independent. None are invited to today's event.”

The Herald Story

The typical poll in the out-period that is actually conducted asks if you are going to vote for the front-runner Republican or the front-runner Democrat. At best they include Democrat and Republican primary candidates. They rarely, if ever, poll on 3rd party candidates.

Most of the polls in the 2005 race for King County Executive, a race in which there were only three candidates, asked only about the Democratic or Republican candidate, and if 5% actually responded with “Gentry Lange” it must have been recorded as “other” or even less honestly as “undecided.” I only know this because at least five of my own supporters were polled and told me about their experiences. Two reported being presented the “Democrat, Republican, or other” options, and two others reported being given only the “Republican” or “Democrat” choice. Only one person who reported back to me said that my name was specifically offered as an option during the poll, 1 poll out of 5, and even that amount of direct inclusion in a poll is highly unusual for a 3rd party candidate.

So in a race in which there were only 3 candidates, the third candidate was excluded the vast majority of the time. Ralph Nader calls this the “No chance to have a chance” phenomenon.

The standards cited by King 5, say the same thing as Ralph Nader. All candidates for office must be included in events during the “out-period.” This includes community forums, radio interviews, and any and all debates. Otherwise the excluded candidate will not have been provided a fair playing field from which to compete with the other candidates in the race. So due to the media's continued use of polling that excludes third party candidates during the out-period, according to their own rules these debate sponsoring organizations do not have an any, “acceptable rationale to tighten the inclusion criteria” during the in-period.

Interestingly, in the 2005 race for King County Executive, there was an initial poll conducted during the out period that found I was polling at 5%. But this was an internal poll in one of the other campaigns, that was shown to me, but never provided to the media. I think it's safe to say that since I got almost 5% of the vote during the general election, that it was a fairly accurate poll, and therefore never saw the light of day. So even though most of the polls excluded me, by the rules King 5 purports to play by, they should have included me in any debate or discussion with my Democratic and Republican opponents during the initial out-period.

So King 5 was actually breaking two of their own rules:

1. They never conducted a poll during the out-period that included “Gentry Lange” as an option.
2. King 5 television never allowed me to participate in a single media event, debate or discussion during the out-period.

Nor did any other major news organization bother to include my campaign, that is until I learned how to force my way in the door. A tactic effectively employed by Aaron Dixon yesterday at the front door of King 5 studios. And until media outlets, and all the other debate sponsoring organizations start playing by their own rules, it is one of the few tactics that forces the issue of exclusion onto the front page and into the lead story on television.

It wasn't until the in-period that I was even interviewed by Robert Mak, the political news reporter for King 5 News, for a 3 minute segment in which the edited segment badly summarized my political views for half of the interview. And the best explanation I have for this minor coverage they gave the campaign is that I was polling at 7 % in the final weeks of October and threatening to upset the race. In short, I became newsworthy. But from June to October, a period in which numerous polls were conducted featuring my opponents, the only other poll to include me that I ever saw would come out on October 17th, when the race was nearly over.

Survey USA Poll

By excluding me in the out-period against the rules they feign to play by, King 5 as well as several other news outlets, affectively colluded to limit my chances to gain traction in the out-period by excluding me from television coverage. After all, in politics nothing is as important as free time on television.

In the end, after battling tooth and nail for every column inch in the media, the same media coverage that is handed on a silver platter to the “chosen two” major party candidates, I still ended up getting over 24,000 votes in the general election. A number greater than most statewide 3rd party candidates ever receive, and almost the same percentage of votes that Ralph Nader got in 2000, the year he received the most votes he ever received in King County. So by their own rules it was obvious that my campaign was “serious.”

It should be equally obvious that Aaron Dixon is a candidate with serious intent, and does not fall into the Mike “The Mover” category. But with the exclusion of Aaron Dixon from the debates, the question that is remaining is this, “Why is any legally qualified candidate allowed to be excluded from the debate?” And why is it that this Debate Advisory Standards Project gets to choose the criteria of inclusion or exclusion in these debates?

The Debate Advisory Standards Project is funded by the PEW Charitable Trusts. I don't know much about the PEW Charitable Trusts, but I do know this, they were never elected to decide who is or is not a viable candidate. And most polls show an overwhelming number of Americans would prefer more candidates included in political debates, not less.

Furthermore, if King 5 is going to act as if they are following the rules outlined by the PEW Charitable Trusts, then they should at least follow these rules. Any polls conducted during the out-period should include all candidates in the race, and serious effort should be extended to make the system as fair as possible. In fact, as I read and re-read the PEW's rules on debate exclusion, it occurs to me that if King 5 and the other major media organizations actually followed the rules they purport to play by, the debates would be far more inclusive then they are today. Instead, King 5 simply hides behind the rules they like when challenged, while ignoring the rules and recommendations they dislike.

In the end, the fact that Bruce Guthrie was smart enough and wealthy enough to play by these rules, though heavily weighted against him, and force his way into the debates, was little more than a fluke. Guthrie, in a stroke of pure political genius, bought his way into the televised debate, and in the end doesn't even have to spend the money.

It will be interesting to see the final numbers from this race come November, because prior to the TV debates Guthrie was polling at just barely 1%. Televised debates have launched third party candidates to victory before, most notably Jesse Ventura who was polling under 10% until his televised debate appearance. Mr. Ventura then went on to win the Governor's race in Minnesota.

But I'm not predicting Guthrie will win. No, his inclusion in the debates was a fluke, because up until air time, it wasn't even certain that Bruce Guthrie would be allowed to debate, regardless of the rules he had figured out to play by. And he obviously didn't hit a home run... but he did get his point across, and it's likely he'll pick up a few percentage points along the way. Thanks to a spot at the podium. In fact, if he gains 5% the Libertarians will win big on this gamble, because they will become an official “major” party in Washington State once again, and many of the barriers to inclusion will be eliminated with the achievement of major party status.

While we may not be able to bring back the Fairness Doctrine, killed by President Reagan, the next coarse of action should certainly be to sue King 5 for unregulated campaign contributions. Because free air time is the equivalent of giving away millions in paid advertising to these campaigns. The final vote totals that Bruce Guthrie receives will offer a glimpse of the increase in votes a television appearance can give to 3rd party candidates. But until networks like King 5 are confronted, harassed and sued repeatedly for what should be prosecuted as illegal campaign contributions, they will continue to silence dissent and exclude the voices that they alone decide should not be heard on the public airwaves. Regardless of the rules they choose for themselves, this is not Democracy, hell it's not even a fair way to run debates in a Republic.

What it is, is unacceptable. So regardless of your political persuasion I urge you to contact King 5 news, the Seattle Times, Mike McGavick's Campaign, and Maria Cantwell's office, to register your disgust with this type of blatant electioneering. And if you are a lawyer, feel free to give me a call.

Regards,
Gentry Lange
Former Green Party Candidate for King County Executive

Sam Reed Promotes Vote By Mail as the Solution to Problematic Voting Machines

Doing a little research over the weekend on Vote By Mail, I came across the pro-VBM website, called "The Vote By Mail Project".

Now, this website is interesting, it makes itself look like a homegrown Oregon based grassroots type organization. A bunch of voters in Oregon just got together and decided to support Vote-By Mail. Why just look at what their website copy says:

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"The Vote By Mail Project was launched in 2005 by a group of people in Oregon who looked around the country in 2000 and 2004 and realized just how well our Vote By Mail system works. No lines, no touch screen voting machines, no intimidation or voter suppression at the polls, a guaranteed paper trail, the nation’s highest turnout (87% in ’04) plenty of time for individual voters to make informed voting decisions, more convenient for working people and families with children, and voters love it."

"Across the country, an increasing number of cities, counties and states are making it easier for citizens to vote without standing in long lines or using potentially flawed electronic voting equipment. Whether by allowing no-excuse absentee balloting, enabling voters to permanently choose absentee balloting, or adopting vote by mail, election officials, particularly those in the West, are embracing this trend."


http://www.votebymailproject.org/

---

Long lines, polling place intimidation and potentially flawed electronic voting equipment got you down, well we've got the answer.... Vote By Mail. Gosh we won't even need to train poll workers anymore.

So obviously, I want to know more about this organization, so I click around and find the advisers page....

The Advisers Page

Oddly the second name on the list Sam Reed is Washington's very own Secretary of State, Sam Reed.

I'm shocked. Isn't this the same Sam Reed that went around the state touting Electronic Voting Machines to kids in highschools?

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"We hope hands-on experience with touch screen machines will motivate students to get involved and actually prepare them to vote," said Reed. "Traditionally, young voters have not been represented well at the polls. They deserve a say in their future and they ought to exercise their rights to get it."

Yep it's still on the Washington State's SOS website

---

So now which is it, are the voting machines faulty? Or are they the best thing since sliced bread? I hope someone besides me decides to ask Sam Reed this question.

And to everyone who thinks Touch Screen Voting Machines are the problem, why is it that the same people who bought the Touch Screens are now trying to sell you the cure?

This is pretty amazing to me considering Sam Reed is the President of NASS, the National Association of the Secretaries of State. Sam Reed is supporting a group that's attacking voting machines as faulty while simultaneously promoting the adoption of touch screen voting machine statewide and nationally.

Hawaii Reports of Union Review of Absentee

This comes from the, "I told you so" file:
______________________________________________

"There were complaints in 1998 and 2000 by union employees reported to the Hawaii Republican and Democratic Parties, Lagareta says, that union employees were being forced to vote by absentee ballot at work, submitting the ballot to a supervisor for review before being returned to the county clerk for tally."


http://tinyurl.com/y6ngg2

Let Aaron Dixon Debate!!!!!!

Here's part of an email from Mike Gillis, of the Aaron Dixon for Senate Campaign:

_____________________________________________________



Everyone,

I don't know if you've heard, but Libertarian candidate, Bruce Guthrie has
given his campaign for U.S. Senate $1.2 million of his own money. And
because of that donation, he will be allowed in the U.S. Senate debates on
KING-5, because large sums of money is a crtieria of the debate.

Even though Guthrie isn't polling as well as Green Party nominee Aaron Dixon
(3% in the last poll to Guthrie's 1%) and that Aaron has RAISED more money
than Guthrie (Aaron raised over $50,000 to Guthrie's $33,000), it is
disgusting and hypocritical that he be allowed to debate and Aaron is
barred.

AARON DIXON CLEARLY HAS MORE SUPPORT THAN BRUCE GUTHRIE, HE SHOULD BE
ALLOWED TO DEBATE!

-- The criteria for this debate is unfair to third parties and
non-millionaires. The money criteria is stated to be a judge of popular
support, but all of Guthrie's money is self-donated. Aaron Dixon has RAISED
more money than Guthrie has ($50,000 all from individual donors, while
Guthrie has raised $33,000 and written himself a big check)

-- Aaron Dixon currently polls THREE TIMES AS WELL as Bruce Guthrie does.
From a September 27th SurveyUSA poll, Aaron Dixon is at 3%, Bruce Guthrie is
at 1%

-- Aaron has consistently gotten more media coverage than Guthrie, who never
got an article in a mainstream media source until he gave himself a million
dollars.

Mike Gillis
Press Secretary,
Aaron Dixon for U.S. Senate
www.dixon4senate.com

___________________________________________________________________________



WHAT I NEED YOU TO DO:

IMMEDIATELY CALL THE TWO FOLLOWING PEOPLE AND LET THEM KNOW THAT AARON
DESERVES TO DEBATE!

Pat Costello, Executive News Director, KING 5 News: (206) 448-4516
David Boardman, Executive Editor, the Seattle Times: (206) 464-2205

Broken Computer, New Computer

So I accidentally destroyed my laptop. And after a couple months in between, shuffling files from portable drive to external, then onto a new laptop, I think it's time I started blogging again.

More to come...

What's that Smell?

While I live in Shoreline, I keep an apartment in the Eastlake district, and last night, after the fireworks display, apparently the Pier at 1801 Fairview Ave East caught on fire. Now I'm no big fan of what I like to call drunks with explosives day, and yesterday's fire was a pretty good indication of why celebrating freedom by getting drunk and illegally setting off fireworks is a very bad idea. How is getting drunk and blowing things up an appropriate celebration for Independence Day?

Now my neighborhood smells toxic, and I woke up with a pretty bad headache, a probably result of the fumes aggravating the sinus infection I am fighting. And while the fire department won't say it yet, I am pretty darn sure that drunks with explosives day was the cause.

Happy Fourth of July everyone! Hopefully you survived and kept all your fingers! National health statistics report almost 9,000 emergency room visits for injuries due to fireworks in 2002... mostly kids!

Health Care IS Emergency Preperation

Recently I came down with a sinus infection. Actually, it wasn't that recently, it has actually been months. But I until recently I didn't have health insurance or a regular doctor, so I have developed a bad habit of ignoring my health problems to see if they'll just go away on their own. This one didn't, and by this morning, it was pretty bad (and kinda gross). So I went down to the Country Doctor Health Clinic on Capitol Hill, and luckily they got me in quick and prescribed a bottle of antibiotics.

On the campaign trail for County Executive last year, I was asked quite frequently about things like pandemic flu, SARS, and other infectious diseases that could be considered security risks to the region. Now I have to admit that Eric Holdeman, director of the King County Office of Emergency Management, is by all accounts doing a bang-up job on preparing the King County Region for possible disasters, but there's a deeper problem here. With so many uninsured Americans, if a flu pandemic were to arise, how many of the uninsured would do like me and wait days, weeks, perhaps months to see a doctor, or go to the emergency room? How many more people will be infected with some deadly disease because of this?

Countries with universal health care are far more prepared for pandemics than the US will ever be until we can figure out how to cover the uninsured. All the money pouring into disaster preparation in the post 911 word will do nothing to counter this problem. Universal Health care is about more than helping the poor, it's about security for the Nation.

The Brennan Center Report

Another report confirms what voting activists have been saying all along. Check it out here (pdf summary).

It's called the Kathy Dopp Analyses The Brennan Center Report on Electronic Voting in the U.S. And it's a fairly detailed report. With the previous GAO report, and numberous books, and thousands of activists nationwide, we might just reach the tipping point yet. Here's a quick breakdown for those who don't want to read the full summary as a PDF.

The report recommends random audits, and several other procedures championed by voting activists for years. It also questions systems like Washington State's in which paper ballots exist, but are not routinely used for hand auditing. Machine recounts are not enough, apparently... something that should have been made clear by the hand recount in Washington of 2004.

Holy Illegal Prisons for Illegal Combatants Batman

Apparently the Supreme Court just slapped the Bush Administration around on Guantanamo, and the Military Tribunal System installed to try prisoners there. The ruling is only suprising in that the Supreme Court has been quite the rubber stamp for abuses by the Bush Administration. From the start by installing Bush as President the Supreme Court has been slowly and steadily stripping away Civil Rights in favor of Big Government control. In fact, just recently the Court ruled that Police don't have to knock to enter your house anymore.

Call me a skeptic, but one decent ruling does nothing to quell my fears of a court that has been packed by Conservatives. However, with this ruling Congress is finally poised to have hearings regarding the issues raised by Guantanamo.

Caleb Schaber in Baghdad

My friend, Caleb Schaber, who wrote for the UW Daily, and who ran against Greg Nickels, is back in Iraq. His most recent article appears here.

Caleb has pursued a more interesting life than most. Just google his name and you will find a soul that is further outside the mainstream than most gonzo journalists. As I was listening to a story by Mike Pesca on NPR's "All Thing's Considered" today about how some journalists are too chicken to cover Baghdad and news listeners are tiring of Iraq War News, I thought to myself what Caleb is doing in Afghanistan and Baghdad would make normal reporters pee themselves with fear, and his news and blog reports are far more interesting than mainstream media.

But without the AP behind his name, Caleb must fight his way into every assignment, and most the time he just creates his own. In fact he created his own newswire service, just to get the job done.

The Northern Nevada Newswire

Randomly Drafing Poll Workers

Here's an interesting story from Mexico. Interesting, mostly, because it points out that in Mexico they simply draft 1 million people randomly to work the polls. Pretty much solves the problem of a lack of vote counters. And seems like a Patriotic thing to do. Kinda like the Jury System maybe.

"He said a comprehensive voting list, ballot papers that could not be falsified, an efficient counting system and the presence of 1 million people chosen at random to work at ballot booths would prevent vote fraud."

King County Needs a Team Bike Challenge

June is the Second Anual Team Bike Challenge in Santa Barbara. In order to replace and expand the region's "Bike to Work"" day, this Santa Barbara group challenges infrequent bicycle riders to change their habits by competing for a month with other teams.

In these days of high oil prices, air pollution, and global warming concerns, wouldn't it be nice to see someone like Global Warming cheerleader, Greg Nickels, get on a bike and publicize a good way to lower weight, improve traffic, and decrease air pollution. Why not a King County Team Bike challenge, and we can start by challenging all the fat polticians to change their lifestyles first?

Just a thought...

Read more here.

New Roads or New Ideas to Improve Congestion?

Germany works to solve their traffic problems through vision.

"The Ruhrpilot system constantly picks up electronic data on the traffic situation on motorways, federal highways, state highways and primary municipal roads and from 200 sensing points in urban centres such as Bochum, Dortmund, Essen and Gelsenkirchen. This traffic situation data is then analysed and integrated with data on other modes of transport, such as the railways and urban mass transit systems, reported from 11 towns, 4 boroughs and 13 transport operators, and thus provides the region with access to up-to-date traffic information and traffic forecasts.

Transport users can select a route which is optimal for their needs and decide how they wish to reach their destination - faster and safer than previously. This up-to-date information is already available on the internet and in future will also be disseminated by radio, newspapers, teletext, mobile telephones and motorway information displays."

Is Canada Moving Away From Hand Counts?

This article suggests that Canada might be working to follow the United State's in foolishly changing their election systems. The all too familiar sounding approach combines Absentees and Private Computer companies making the "counting machines".

Vote By Mail Problem in NC, Poll Voting Fraud Doesn't Exist

From North Carolina
Vote By Mail Problems

The Commission found that actual fraud on election day at the polls is almost non-existent. Where the system breaks down is absentee ballots. The Commission discovered that blank ballots mailed to wrong addresses or to large residential buildings were easily intercepted. Further, citizens who vote at home, at nursing homes, at the workplace, or in church are more susceptible to pressure and intimidation. Vote-buying schemes are far more difficult to detect when citizens vote by mail. The Commission therefore recommended that “state and local jurisdictions should prohibit a person from handling absentee ballots other than the voter, an acknowledged family member, the U.S. Postal Service or election officials. The practice in some states of allowing candidates or party workers to pick-up and deliver absentee ballots should be eliminated.”

How Sig Verification Works, and What's Coming

A great Column in the Herald June 21st, 2006. It covers some of the key problems with signature verification, and the problems that are soon to encumber King County's election system.