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Re: Where's the Beef???
I thought we were going to return to civil conversation, but since Bo
started the last flame war (by accusing Al Kolwicz of lying without
providing any evidence, still), I'm not surprised he's ready to start
another. I'll try to do better this time, but I'm known to write angry
e-mails from time to time, sorry.
Perhaps had the Elections Office worked with citizens as opposed to
against them, they would have found more people willing to work with
them.
Hundreds of people signed up on a public petition to volunteer to
assist with hand counting to attempt to validate the accuracy of the
machine counts, or to count the ballots entirely by hand. Did the
County contact any of those folks? Does anyone remember seeing a
posting to this mailing list from the County saying that they were
looking for help? (Individuals have posted, but no one from the County,
i.e., no one whose taxpayer-funded job it is to make sure there is
enough staff on hand).
It's interesting to note that the County chooses to respond with
misinformation and another little jab at citizens, too, as the County
Spokesperson is attributed as saying that "more volunteers" were needed
to make the process go more smoothly, but anyone who would be handling
ballots would presumably have to be a paid, pre-trained, deputized
elections judge, not a volunteer.
CVV, the ad hoc citizens group, hasn't held a meeting in months,
basically since we "lost" preventing the purchase (although many people
seem to perceive that we "won" paper ballots) and subsequently were
denied the ability to verify the machine counts. Since the local
Elections Office and the Secretary of State refuse to allow the
citizens to check the accuracy their work, is it any surprise people
don't show up at (or after) the polls?
I'd also like to point out, however, that citizens as a point of
consensus agreement made it clear that it is the Accuracy of the Count,
not the speed of completion, that is the most important metric of
election performance. It's the elections officials, candidates and
"instant media" that want results immediately.
I tried working with the Boulder County Elections Office intermittently
for months and left repeatedly feeling extremely deceived, I don't
currently intend to go back until it changes over there. Perhaps others
feel the same way, in which case, why don't you ask the Clerk's Office
why they have so few people willing to show up to help? Maybe people
are afraid they might be arrested if they point out any problems they
encounter.
In the meantime, I'm better at trying to make noise to draw attention
to these issues, and I've put in probably a part-time job's worth of
hours (as a volunteer) doing so over the last year.
Many of us have spent months TRYING to constructively participate in
the process and protect Our Democracy, and WE LOST because we were so
few up against the comparatively giant political machine.
Typical, though, people spend months warning that there might be
problems pending, then there actually are problems, but who gets
blamed? The messenger!
Joe
On Aug 11, 2004, at 10:55 AM, Bo wrote:
There were supposedly over 100 CVV people ready to assist the Clerks
office
with election work.....most notably the hand counting that was
demanded.....
So, howcome only 4 (that's all *I* heard about) people from CVV showed
up?????
Where was Joe Pezzillo??
Where was Ralph Shnelvar???
Even Al K. could have been there as a poll watcher or election
judge.....if
he *really* wanted to.
Is all these people do is complain and don't do anything about it?
I don't see how these people can criticize and then refuse to be part
of the
process, where they can actually MAKE A DIFFERENCE!
*Not* interfere and make a shambles of a process that is already in
place,
whether it has flaws or not......but actually be a *part* of the
process and
be able to point out CONSTRUCTIVE criticisms, in a civilized manner.
THAT's how you get taken seriously......
Bo