Re: How can Neal say Boulder's election was accurate

[Evan Daniel Ravitz <evan@xxxxxxxx>]

The question Neal is if we're going to be effective in getting
either:

1. open source software with procedural protections to make sure
the source we inspect is what we vote with.

or

2. hand-counted paper ballots

before NEXT YEAR's election.

If you want one of those, you must clearly say so at EVERY
opportunity like you had this morning. Vanishingly few will listen
to your comment, go back to their memory of what you said the day
before, and have any idea what you really think.

One year ago I tried to get consensus on #2 so we could have a
chance of actually forcing the bureaucratic/corporate complex to do
what we want.

They have all the money, time, public relations liars, etc. We are
right, but MUST SAY WHAT WE WANT. If you say what you think will
get you invited to meetings, or what will make voters feel
good, or anything else, you are just making a hobby for yourself
-and maybe you can write a book someday about how democracy was
destroyed with machines in the U.S. -if by then the unelected still
let you.

The confused way you and others are talking will ensure that the
bureaucratic/corporate complex will win again next year.

Evan




On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Neal McBurnett wrote:

> > I just heard Neal say on KGNU that he thought Boulder's election
> > seemed to be accurate.
>
> Sorry if it came across like that, folks.  I didn't have much time to
> prepare and I was concentrating on other aspects of the interview.
> But I didn't say it quite like that.  I made it clear that the system
> is far too vulnerable to fraud or major mistakes.
>
> I just recorded this on the KGNU comment line:
>
>  Listeners may have thought that during an interview with KGNU
>  yesterday, that I said the boulder county vote count was accurate.
>  In listening to the tape, I see that my quick response wasn't well
>  stated - and I'm sorry about that.  I want to emphasize for the
>  record that we don't yet know how accurate the results are.  As
>  discussed in the rest of the interview, it reamains too easy to
>  commit fraud with these systems.  Because of the the lack of
>  transparency in the system and lack of a hand audit, we'll never
>  really know for sure.  The canvass board has not yet reviewed the
>  results, that there are still outstanding questions.  So while I
>  didn't observe anything that indicates hard evidence of a major
>  miscount, I do think we need major changes to have the sort of
>  confidence in our democracy that we deserve.
>
>  On the other hand, we're glad that we got a paper-based system in
>  Boulder, so we have more confidence in the results than those
>  counties that use touch-screen machines.  We can do a recount of the
>  paper if necessary, though unfortunately colorado law makes it hard
>  to do a recount by hand.
>
> But besides that I think the interview again highlighted the concerns
> that so many citizens have been focussing on.
>
> It turns out that somehow by mistake I was unsubscribed from this
> list last Friday, and I now see that there is a lot of other
> stuff to catch up with.  Thanks for speaking out, folks!
>
> Neal McBurnett                 http://bcn.boulder.co.us/~neal/
> Signed and/or sealed mail encouraged.  GPG/PGP Keyid: 2C9EBA60
>
>
> On Mon, Nov 08, 2004 at 08:33:14AM -0700, Evan Daniel Ravitz wrote:
> > I just heard Neal say on KGNU that he thought Boulder's election
> > seemed to be accurate.
> >
> > How can you say that, Neal? You nor I nor anyone else but the
> > shadowy "certifiers" have ever looked at the software which does the
> > counting.
> >
> > As Bev Harris said on KGNU this morning, there is NO way of knowing
> > what goes on in the "black boxes" which count our votes.
> >
> > Again, you techies get so lost in the details of elections, you lose
> > track of the big picture.
> >
> > As David Dill says, there is NO difference between elections counted
> > by secret software and elections counted by had secretly in locked
> > rooms by unaccountable people.
> >
> > Why did you say that, Neal? Is someone pressuring you to be
> > reassuring to the sheep?
> >
> > Evan
>