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

[Ralph Shnelvar <ralphs@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Evan:

On Wed, 10 Nov 2004 09:27:48 -0700 (MST), you wrote:

>
>So, they can be paid $1, to make it legal. Parties charge each other
>$1 all the time for rent or whatever. I don't know what the legal
>name is for this kind of thing.

I believe it is called "minimal consideration."

Obscure piece of trivia.  By common law, the "least consideration" that one
person can give another is a peppercorn.

The point of all of this is that for a contract to be valid something of
value ("consideration") has to be exchanged.  In the U.S. we exchange a
dollar because peppercorns are hard to find.

Ralph

>
>Evan
>
>On Tue, 9 Nov 2004, Some Guy wrote:
>
>> There is no *free*. The volunteers get paid $10 an hour. The polling judges
>> were getting $150 per day.
>> The clerk has to pay them to make them employees otherwise they can't
>> legally make them dance to the tune.
>>
>> But it sure as hell isn't going to cost $1.3M.
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Evan Daniel Ravitz [mailto:evan@xxxxxxxx]
>> Sent: Monday, November 08, 2004 7:01 PM
>> To: kellen carey
>> Cc: cvv-discuss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>> Subject: RE: How can Neal say Boulder's election was accurate
>>
>>
>> You're forgetting, Kell, that people here in Boulder care enough
>> about elections that we got 130+ people in less than 3 days to
>> volunteer over 1000 hours to count.
>>
>> IF the county asked for vounteers in our utility bills, we'd have
>> thousands to count for free.
>>
>> We employ election officials to do the research and the math.
>>
>> I suggest we don't exhaust ourselves on the details but decide what
>> we want, learn how to say it simply so everyone will agree with us,
>> and then get citizens to join us in asking for it.
>>
>> "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well
>> enough." -Einstein
>>
>> Evan
>>
>>
>>
>> On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, kellen carey wrote:
>>
>> > Evan,
>> >
>> > Do you know how many different races people typically
>> > vote on in one election in other countries?  Most
>> > (nearly all, if my comparative politics isn't too
>> > dated) European countries don't vote on amendments,
>> > initiatives, referendums, recalls, judges, etc. in
>> > elections.
>> >
>> > Just a reminder: it took three election judges about
>> > 5+ hours to count only 597 ballots with only three
>> > races in the Spring 2004 Nederland election.  There
>> > were about 25-30 different contests in this Boulder
>> > County 2004 election, with some 150,000+ voters.  I'll
>> > let others do the math.
>> >
>> > I'm certainly not saying we shouldn't handcount, given
>> > the obvious transparency, verifiability, and accuracy
>> > advantages.
>> >
>> > But it would be nice to hear a definitive answer on
>> > this question from other countries.
>> >
>> > kell
>> >
>> > --- Evan Daniel Ravitz <evan@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> >
>> > >
>> > > On Mon, 8 Nov 2004, Some Guy wrote:
>> > >
>> > > > For the length of time that it took to count the
>> > > vote, it could have been
>> > > > done by hand in each precinct.
>> > >
>> > > I believe countries that do it by hand do it in
>> > > precincts -in hours,
>> > > not days.
>> > >
>> > > What we have is the kluge of kluges: Illegally
>> > > tested (thanks for
>> > > trying, Al) proprietary software running on Windows,
>> > > intersecting
>> > > with the vaguaries of printing, and the greatest
>> > > motive in history:
>> > > the Presidency.
>> > >
>> > > If humans see imperfect boxes we have no problem
>> > > compensating.
>> > >
>> > > But instead of hand-counting which is cheaper
>> > > ($1.82/vote in Canada
>> > > compared to $3-6 here) more accurate (according to
>> > > MIT/Caltech),
>> > > done in public (poll watchers watching) with the $
>> > > going to humans
>> > > not software corps, we will get a very sophistocated
>> > > expensive
>> > > way of making the boxes better, kluged on top of the
>> > > pile of shit
>> > > we're now buying.
>> > >
>> > > Poll watchers THINK they're watching now, but
>> > > they're staring at
>> > > "black boxes."
>> > >
>> > > Evan
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> > >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > __________________________________
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>> >
>> >
>>