Report Election Cheating or Shady Actions:

[Q_]

http://www.drudgereport.com/vote1.htm
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/ ... index.html

Report any personal experiences or rumors or whatever. Let's see how we are cheated this year.

[geekster]

I had an interesting experiance last year. Seems the card for the electronic votong machine that you got depended on your party affiliation. I gave the poll worker my name, she turns to the guy with the memory cards, she says "He's a Libertarian" and he reaches into the basket and gets a different card than the one he had in front of him ready to give me.

I thought it very odd that the guy hading out the vote recording memory cards needed to know what people's party affiliation was when handing out the cards.

Haven't voted yet this year. I passed by the polling place, a neighbor's garage, the line was halfway down the block.

[Alpha]

Isn't Drudge an unabashed conservative? Is there a non-partisan site / organization that will take reports of irregularities?

[Rob the Wop]

I had an interesting experiance last year. Seems the card for the electronic votong machine that you got depended on your party affiliation. I gave the poll worker my name, she turns to the guy with the memory cards, she says "He's a Libertarian" and he reaches into the basket and gets a different card than the one he had in front of him ready to give me.

I thought it very odd that the guy hading out the vote recording memory cards needed to know what people's party affiliation was when handing out the cards.

You have no idea how pissed off this makes me. The idea of someone tampering with my personal vote would have had me in a rage.

Voting machines DO NOT have 'special' cards for the different parties, and you do not have to vote for your party anyway. Did they give you a coded reciept?

I think maybe an idea for you would be to tell them "My party? None of your fucking business. Give me a non-partisan card."

[Simply Joel]

i voted today with absolutely no irregularities.

[Q_]

i voted today with absolutely no irregularities.

That's because white male Republicans get to go to the front of the line and have a personal fluffer assigned to them while they are in the voting booth.

[Q_]

I think maybe an idea for you would be to tell them "My party? None of your fucking business. Give me a non-partisan card."

Cheers!

[geekster]

You have no idea how pissed off this makes me. The idea of someone tampering with my personal vote would have had me in a rage.

Voting machines DO NOT have 'special' cards for the different parties, and you do not have to vote for your party anyway. Did they give you a coded reciept?

I think maybe an idea for you would be to tell them "My party? None of your fucking business. Give me a non-partisan card."

Well, I suddenly understood how easy it is to tamper with electronic voting. Since there are only about a dozen memory cards that store all the votes, it would be easy enough to put all the "undesireable" votes on one card and then somehow damage it so the votes were lost/unrecordable. I got no receipt showing my votes, only one that said I had voted. Also, I did not volunteer my party affiliation, it was printed on the sheet of registered voters and the lady scratching people's names off the list said it aloud to the guy handing out the cards.

It was reported that there were severe "irregularities" with electronic voting in California with many thousands of votes "lost" but I have not seen any specifics of how they were lost or what kind of irregularities.

In my particular district the voter registration is extremely one-sided to a particular party. I wish there was a law that says the majority party may NOT run polling places. A better bet would be to have small third/forth parties run them.

[Rob the Wop]

i voted today with absolutely no irregularities.

That's because white male Republicans get to go to the front of the line and have a personal fluffer assigned to them while they are in the voting booth.

Nuff said. You've convinced me. I am changing my party.
Viva la Bush!

[Dork]

I don't rank it as suspicious since I'm not in a swing state, but I never received my absentee ballot even though I'm registered as a permanent absentee. Very short lines at the polling place, and I was the only one there under 70 years old. I files my provisional ballot with no issues. Hopefully it will be counted without incident.

[geekster]

Prty affiliation doesnt matter anymore anyway. It USED to when the primary was about voting for delegates to the convention. These days with open primaries ... it doesn't matter at all.

As a matter of fact, I make it a POINT to tell all telephone polls, exit polls, opinion polls, etc ... exactly how I am NOT going to vote just to mess them up. So when the polls come out, I represent some thousands of registered voters ... and they have the WRONG DATA! Muahahahaha!

[Isotopia]

Report any personal experiences or rumors or whatever. Let's see how we are cheated this year.

You make this sound like it's a foregone conclusion. Regardless of where you stand politically it seems such statements (and speculation) only stokes the fires of contempt and division around the process.

So, thanks but no thanks. I'll continue to remain optimistic enough to believe that my vote 1) counts 2) will be counted 3) makes a difference to me.

[Zulegoona]

Isotpia did you and Badger each vote today?

[Q_]

You make this sound like it's a foregone conclusion. Regardless of where you stand politically it seems such statements (and speculation) only stokes the fires of contempt and division around the process.

oooch, that hurt.... sniff, sniff

[geekster]

I have always suspected that cheating was pretty much built into the system. In Virginia, for example, it is against the law to ask for positive ID to ensure that the person voting is the person they claim to be. In California they never ask for identification. In Ohio the Democrats went to the Supreme court to prevent the Republicans from posting challangers at the polls to verify that the people voting are who they say they are. In Maryland the total tally on the voting machines is greater than the number of registered voters in the precinct, etc.

I am pretty sure it is a matter of course and the norm not the exception in many areas.

[KellY]

In Ohio the Democrats went to the Supreme court to prevent the Republicans from posting challangers at the polls to verify that the people voting are who they say they are.

I'd just like to point out that judges sided with the Demos because it was obvious that the "challengers" were more about voter suppression than preventing fraud. That's the job of the trained poll workers and election monitors who re non-partisan. A bunch of republicans standing at the polls saying "Hey- let me check your ID. Prove to me that you can vote here." is NOT going to improve the process. Also interesting to note that the suit was originally brought by a black couple who were very annoyed that the GOP was planning on sending the majority of their operatives to black neighborhoods.

[Q_]

/\

The Ohio supreme court ruled this morning in favor of allowing the untrained unauthorized partizen challengers.

[KellY]

I thought it very odd that the guy hading out the vote recording memory cards needed to know what people's party affiliation was when handing out the cards.

Jeez dude, get a clue. That was the primaries, remember? You got a different computer thingie the same way you'd have gotten a different paper ballot. They have to know your party in that circumstance. Nobody was asking party affiliation today.

[lurker]

That Ohio thing...there are Republican AND Democrat challengers...it's not one-sided.

oh, it may be one sided in that Republicans want people to verify that they're entitled to vote....gods know the Democrats don't....they've registered cartoon characters....

and, any state that doesn't ask for photo id is pretty much guaranteeing vote fraud...

[Simply Joel]

Even the uber-doubter Paul Krugman still believes... i wonder what it takes to convince you the system, despite its flaws, works.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
November 2, 2004
Faith in America
By PAUL KRUGMAN

Florida's early polling was designed to make voting easier, but enormous voter turnout swamped the limited number of early polling sites. Over the weekend, people in some polling places had to stand in line for four, five, even six hours, often in the hot sun. Some of them - African-Americans in particular - surely suspected that those lines were so long because officials wanted to make it hard for them to vote. Yet they refused to be discouraged or intimidated.

Here's what a correspondent from Florida wrote to Joshua Marshall, of talkingpointsmemo.com: "To see people coming out - elderly, disabled, blind, poor; people who have to hitch rides, take buses, etc. - and then staying in line for hours and hours and hours ... Well, it's humbling. And it's awesome. And it's kind of beautiful."

Yes, it is. I always get a little choked up when I go to the local school to cast my vote. The humbleness of the surroundings only emphasizes the majesty of the process: this is democracy, America's great gift to the world, in action.

But over the last few days I've been seeing pictures from Florida that are even more majestic. They show long lines of voters, snaking through buildings and on down the sidewalk: citizens patiently waiting to do their civic duty. Those people still believe in American democracy; and because they do, so do I.

In truth, I wasn't sure what would happen in Florida this year. After all that has gone wrong with voting in that state, it seemed all too possible that many people would simply give up and stay home.

But it's already clear that the people of Florida - and, I believe, America as a whole - have refused to give in to cynicism and spin.

Far from being discouraged by what happened in 2000, they seem to realize more than ever - and better than those of us in the chattering classes - what a precious thing the right to vote really is. And they are determined to exercise that right.

And it's not just in Florida. Similar stories are coming in from across the country, wherever early voting is allowed: everywhere, huge numbers of voters are coming to the polls, determined to exercise their democratic rights.

Of course, most Americans won't get their chance to vote until today, but I have no doubt that they will turn out in record numbers. I don't think the rain that will blanket some parts of the country will deter them. Regardless of their politics, most Americans understand that this is a crucial election, and that never before has their vote mattered so much for the nation's destiny.

The talking heads on TV will no doubt frame all of this in partisan terms: light turnout favors one party, heavy turnout favors the other. True enough.

But this isn't a zero-sum game: the more people vote, the more vital is our democracy.

By coming to the polls, citizens are literally giving a vote of confidence in American democracy. And in so doing, they are proving themselves wiser than some of those they elected.

Those who govern us seem to have learned little from the 2000 electoral debacle: voting machines are still unreliable, voting officials are still unforgivably partisan.

But the public seems to have learned a lesson. Instead of becoming cynical, people seem to have become motivated. After an election in which a few hundred votes determined the fate of the nation, after four years of an administration that has demonstrated, for good or ill, that it matters a lot who becomes president, citizens know that their votes matter. And they are determined to cast those votes.

What will happen when they do cast those votes? I don't know; neither does anyone else. That's how democracy works.

Regular readers won't be in any doubt about who I want to win, though New York Times rules prevent me from giving any explicit endorsement. (Hint: it's the side that benefits from large turnout.) Above all, though, I want to see democracy vindicated, and the stain of 2000 eradicated, by a clean election in which as many people as possible get to cast their votes, and have those votes counted.

And all the evidence says that's what the American people want, too. May all of us get our wish.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company

[Q_]

/\

I like how they kept track of who voted in Afghanistan. (assuming they would have used the correct pens) No photo IDs, no registration, no challengers. You go in, you vote, you get your thumb marked with ink. Simple, fair, cheap, hard to cheat. Too bad all us United Statians would bitch up a storm if we ever had to get our thumbs dirty.

[Q_]

Even the uber-doubter Paul Krugman still believes... i wonder what it takes to convince you the system, despite its flaws, works.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
November 2, 2004
Faith in America
By PAUL KRUGMAN

I don't care about this guy.... I never said that I don't think that the system works. Of course I also never said that I thought that it does work.....

[geekster]

I thought it very odd that the guy hading out the vote recording memory cards needed to know what people's party affiliation was when handing out the cards.

Jeez dude, get a clue. That was the primaries, remember? You got a different computer thingie the same way you'd have gotten a different paper ballot. They have to know your party in that circumstance. Nobody was asking party affiliation today.

Actually, no it wasnt. But I am not certain it was last year, might have been the year before. It was the election when they also had the recall for Grey Davis and Arnold won. I can't vote in the primaries, I am a Libertarian.

[Simply Joel]

Too bad all us United Statians would bitch up a storm if we ever had to get our thumbs dirty.

cites? any data that backs up your claim or simply more flatulence?

flat·u·lence [ fláchələns ]
noun

1. medicine gas in digestive system: excessive gas in the stomach and intestines that causes discomfort

2. sense of self-importance: an excessive sense of self-importance

3. language bombastic style: pretentiousness or pomposity in speech or writing

[geekster]

Joel, you might like this one. It was in the SF Comical over the weekend:

http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/sparks/

[geekster]

In Ohio the Democrats went to the Supreme court to prevent the Republicans from posting challangers at the polls to verify that the people voting are who they say they are.

I'd just like to point out that judges sided with the Demos because it was obvious that the "challengers" were more about voter suppression than preventing fraud. That's the job of the trained poll workers and election monitors who re non-partisan. A bunch of republicans standing at the polls saying "Hey- let me check your ID. Prove to me that you can vote here." is NOT going to improve the process. Also interesting to note that the suit was originally brought by a black couple who were very annoyed that the GOP was planning on sending the majority of their operatives to black neighborhoods.

Hey, Kelly ...

Giving a pre-dawn Election Day boost to the GOP, a federal appeals court early Tuesday cleared the way for political parties to send in people to challenge voters' eligibility at Ohio polling places. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to step in.

Overturning the orders of two federal judges, a three-judge panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals (search) ruled 2-1 early Tuesday that the presence of Election Day challengers was allowed

[geekster]

Oh, and by the way ...

I voted. There were no irregularities to report. Poll workers didn't seem to care about party affiliation, and the way things were being done, there was no way they could steer a certain card to an individual. Once you were crossed off the voting roll you stood in line and got the next card that became available after someone finished voting. There were maybe 20 people in line to be scratched off, 10 in line to vote and 5 voting. Very busy for a garage in a little neighborhood at noon.

But, at no time was I ever required to show ID. THAT is a big problem. Voters should have to show some identification. Otherwise I can register under an assumed name, give a street address of the nearest "Mail Boxes, etc" place, and vote again in a different precinct. As a matter of fact, I am fairly certain that this is done as a matter of course because the parties fight tooth and nail against requiring ID every time the subject comes up.

[KellY]

Yes, I saw the news. Fucking lame. Do you REALLY think it's conducive to democracy to have a member of the opposing party be able to come up to you in the poplls and say"Okay, show me some ID and prove to me you can vote here". Do you really thin kthat someone might not get a bit to enthusiastic and say "Not good enough, beat it." even when they have no justification?

This should have been left to the poll officials and nothing else. Total Jim Crow flashback, dude.

And about your party ID being known at the polls, it sounded like you were talking about the primaries - and yes, Libertarians DO vote then, on competing Libertarian candidates if there are any, and ballot measures regardless. There's no other reason they'd have given you a different computer thingie.

[Badger]

Yes, I saw the news. Fucking lame. Do you REALLY think it's conducive to democracy to have a member of the opposing party be able to come up to you in the poplls and say"Okay, show me some ID and prove to me you can vote here". Do you really thin kthat someone might not get a bit to enthusiastic and say "Not good enough, beat it." even when they have no justification?

The problem seems to me that there just aren't enough people who see it as acceptable level of radical self-expression to kick someone squarely in the cock who who would pull that kind of shit. Personally, given that sort of fundamental affront, I'd have no problem doing it. - just before I started pissing on 'em as they lie rolling on the ground.

There are some thing I won't apologize for.

But that's just me....

[geekster]

I believe that there should be a 100% ID requirement for voting in all states. You show up at the poll, you show an ID before you vote. And a REAL id too ... like your driver's license, passport, whatever. NOT a library card or one you made yourself.

And I have no problem with ANYONE asking to see my ID and verifying my right to vote. At my polling place the list of voters is posted outside for anyone and everyone to see. All someone has to do is look at my D/L, write down the name and addy, and walk over to the list on the board to verify it. Easy.

They dont even do that here. No id required. ILLEGAL to check in some states, like Virginia. If I show up and say I am Joe Blow at 2222 Boogie Woogie Ave. and that name and address are on the list, then I vote. If I come back 10 minutes later saying I am Bill Clinton at 4321 Whatzit St. and that is on the list, I vote again. No checking.