Nev. 1st Touch-Screen, Paper-Trail Voters
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In what could become a model for other states, Nevada voters on Tuesday became the first in the nation to cast ballots in a statewide election on computers that printed paper records of electronic ballots.
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With the presidential election less than six weeks away, activists and security experts are ratcheting up concern over the use of touch-screen machines to cast votes.
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Forget the lore of Bugsy Siegel and the frolics of Paris Hilton. Nevada &#151; long the wild child of American culture &#151; is being repackaged as utterly ordinary. With its new, early presidential caucus next January, the state is attempting to lure presidential candidates to unfamiliar terrain. And state Democratic Party leaders are banking that the best way to do that is to emphasize strip malls over the Strip.
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As the primary season continues, observers of the electronic-voting scene ask whether it's possible to tally the ballots efficiently while restoring Americans' faith in the process. Random, mandatory audits of cast ballots show promise, but even after demonstrated successes, not everyone's on board.
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The Associated Press asked the presidential candidates to name their favorite electronic gadgets.
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You can do a pretty good job of following the politics leading up to Tuesday's New Hampshire primary from television in rain-soaked California. CNN has an excellent program running all afternoon called The Ballot Bowl. The format is really simple. They have cameras following the candidates and they're broadcasting their town hall stump speeches. They're authentic, based on my experience in the campaign for the 2004 New Hampshire primary. The NY Times has an excellent resource (no RSS feed apparently) that lists the candidates' schedules. It's also possible to import the schedule into Google Calendar as an overlay. ABCNews is hosting two 90-minute debates, one for each party, tonight starting at 4PM Pacific. Tomorrow Fox News is hosting a controversial Republican debate, which the Republican Party has withdrawn from because they won't let Ron Paul participate. He's polling third among the Republican candidates in New Hampshire. For once the Republicans got it right.  In the very limited time betw Iowa and New Hampshire there's a lot of action and drama. Romney all of a sudden is shamlessly the candidate for change. There was an Ahmadinejad moment when I thought for sure he was doing parody, but he was serious. He's changed his attire, but his pitch is still the sleazy VP-Sales who got promoted to CEO. Change change change, I can change too, just watch. Please die now. I don't think anyone stands for Romney.  Giuliani and Thompson are still nowhere to be seen. Edwards is doing a good job of keeping the game on. McCain is earnest and honest, but he's old and small and tired.  Obama has the aura of a front-runner and Hillary seems to believe that if only Iraq were still the big issue she would be where Obama is. Even so, according to recent polls she's likely to win New Hampshire. A lot of my friends on Twitter dismiss Huckabee, and to be clear, I could not vote for a Republican this year, no matter who their candidate is, but he is a fantastic American personality. Elections are all about feelings, not policies or positions or even records as the pundits insist. Who you vote for is a function of how you feel about the country and the world in relation to yourself. The candidate who comes closest to validating your feelings is the person you vote for. I think we'll tire of Obama quickly, and we're already tired of HIllary. I think the rational choice for each party, although many disagree, is Edwards and Huckabee because each of them tap into the well of frustration Americans feel about everything. But my guess, which will probably certainly turn out wrong, is that the Dems will nominate Obama and the Reps will nominate Huckabee, and Huck will win.  PS: After writing this, I wonder if George Lakoff would agree. I think I've just used a very Lakoffish process, unwittingly.  PPS: I went to UW-Madison. Bucky Badger is the school mascot. Our favorite cheer and T-shirt said Fuck em Bucky! It occurred to me the same slogan would work for Huckabee. PPPS: Obama? Yo mama!
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Political parties and campaigns are racing to train voters, holding mock caucuses or 'mockuses.' Glitches are common in these sessions since trainers themselves are newbies to the caucus system.
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By Bill Hirschman, South Florida Sun-Sentinel  Dec. 12--Broward County's $23 million touch-screen voting system may be scrapped unless commissioners find a way to create a paper trail.
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A Sarasota recount is complicated by electronic voting systems. One solution: Bring back paper.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote as early as Thursday on a bill that would require a paper record for electronic voting machines. Representative Rush Holt's Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act, which has 216 cosponsors in the 435-member House, would require that all e-voting machines used in the November 2008 U.S. elections be accompanied by a voter-verified paper ballot. E-voting critics have been calling for paper-trail ballots for several years, arguing there's no way to audit e-voting machines without them. Holt, a New Jersey Democrat, said on his Web site that he's pleased the House is set to move forward with the legislation. His bill would require random audits of voting results in 3 percent of all U.S. precincts, and it would prohibit e-voting machines that include wireless or Internet connections. While groups like Common Cause and VerifiedVoting.org have called for paper trails, groups like the National Federation of the Blind have resisted efforts to slow the adoption of e-voting machines, saying e-voting allows blind people to vote without assistance for the first time. The Holt bill faces several obstacles to becoming law, said Matt Zimmerman, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which supports the bill. "It is not at all clear whether the bill will pass or, even if it does, whether a substantively similar companion bill will then pass the Senate," Zimmerman wrote on the EFF blog. "Like it or not, with election officials arguing that they're running out of time to implement wholesale changes, this likely amounts to Congress's only attempt to make any serious improvements to the nation's election procedures ahead of the 2008 presidential election." Common Cause sent an alert to members Wednesday morning, urging them to contact lawmakers in support of the bill, said Mary Boyle, a Common Cause spokeswoman. "This is the last chance for Congress to ensure that ballots are backed by paper records in the critical 2008 presidential election," she said.
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A New Hampshire paperâs anti-endorsement called the candidate a âphony.â
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Just five weeks before election day, federal legislators are increasingly casting doubt on electronic voting terminals and demanding that touchscreen computers produce paper records.
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By Tamara Chuang, The Orange County Register, Calif.  Jan. 30--The anticipation is over. Windows Vista is finally here.
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OLYMPIA - New votes are turning up in the governor&#39;s race around the state as election workers find ballots that were never counted, punch cards with problem chads and optical scan ballots that weren&#39;t marked properly.
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By Kevin Howe, The Monterey County Herald, Calif.  Feb.
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By Heather Civil, Northwest Florida Daily News, Fort Walton Beach  Feb. 8--Touch-screen voting machines, once touted as a way to cut back on the stacks of paper produced during elections, may end up making paper trails of their own.   Gov.
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By Rita Savard, The Sun, Lowell, Mass.  Feb. 15--CHELMSFORD -- The 2007 Town Election ballot is formed -- and it won't take long to fill out.