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Voting Machine Irregularities

Mycroft said:
If the "appearance of fraud" is purposefully created by a conspiracy woo, what difference does it make?

Sure, it’s “appearance is important” in democratic elections, but it’s not all important so that we have to give credence to conspiracy theorists with unsubstantiated allegations.

Appearance is important in banking too, but we still have loonies going on about what a scam the Federal Reserve system is and how we screwed ourselves by taking us off the gold standard. What do we do? Mostly we ignore them, trusting that it’s educated opinions that make policy.
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It´s not just "appearance of fraud" - it is "open invitation of fraud that could be easily avoided".
 
I think this topic can usefully be subdivided.

Are the current market leaders in election machine provision shady and/or politically connected with the Republican party? Yes, without a doubt. This may or may not bother you.

Are the current crop of election machines vulnerable to election rigging if locals with access to them wanted to rig an election? We don't know about most of them. We know many that are though, and we know that the certification procedures in some places were thoroughly rotten. This may or may not bother you.

Is either issue being taken seriously? Not really. This too may or may not bother you.

Was the 2004 election stolen, and probably a bunch of earlier ones (like Hagel's suprise win)? Nobody knows, but last time I asked around here nobody could find an alternative theory that covered the available analyses of the exits poll in 2004 except that an insider in the company that did the poll took it into their head to frame the Republican party for election theft in such a way that it would take years for professional statisticians to detect it.

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=46363

There are many other reasons to believe individual states or counties were rotten, Ohio being a main offender with it's farcical "recounts", but the most damning evidence of widespread fraud is still the exit poll anomaly.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
Here's a challenge. Let's pick a day. We'll walk into any random bar in the country. Then a doctor's waiting room. Then a public library. Then a shipyard. We'll spend 20 minutes in each place, listen in on conversations. If at any time during those 20 minutes, someone is discussing voting irregularities. I'll pay you $10,000. However, if at the end of the day, no one has been talking about it, you pay me $10,000. Care to take that challenge? I didn't think so. I don't know what part of the country you live in, but it's no place I've ever been.
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I live in Kansas. No shipyards. However, I don't think your challenge is particularly accurate. I could pick any one of thousands of subjects and am unlikely to hit any particular one in a such a small random sample. The point is I hear people discussing it both in rl and on the internet. You can ignore it if you like, but that doesn't mean it's not being discussed.


A number of professional experts also claim there were multiple shooters in Dealy Plaza. Let me ask you - Who killed JFK?

See the JFK thingy above. :rolleyes:
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Dr. Adequate addressed this point succinctly and accurately. I couldn't have said it better.
 
It's a common metaphor to refer to arranging things such that theft is relatively safe and profitable, say by leaving a street-level window open with a direct view to valuable items, as "an invitation to theft". It is not meant to imply an actual rather than metaphorical invitation.

If leaving $10 000 in a poorly secured box is an invitation to theft, then leaving an election in a poorly secured box is an invitation to fraud.
 
Kevin_Lowe said:
but the most damning evidence of widespread fraud is still the exit poll anomaly.
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I wouldn't hinge your conspiracy theories on that "anomaly" since you have yet to substantiate why said "anomaly" is indicative of anything.
 
SlippyToad said:
Ah, of course, since you say so it must be true.
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This isn't debatable. After the 2004 election Bev Harris was putting out loony bush-stole-ohio-and-the-media-isnt-allowed-to-report-it crap along with false claims that BBV would reveal the evidence real soon. Harris never provided evidence of either.

QED
 
Dr Adequate said:
Yes, quite. If experts in one field (statistics) agree on some subject, then we can always discredit them by pointing out that some experts in another field (history) are wrong about something else.

After all, if biologists agree on evolution, then since some physicists research cold fusion, evolution must be rubbish.

And that's logical, so it is!
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False dichotomy. The point being, that you can find "professional" experts to affirm any position, no matter how woo it is.

But of course, you knew that.
 
Kevin_Lowe said:
There are many other reasons to believe individual states or counties were rotten, Ohio being a main offender with it's farcical "recounts", but the most damning evidence of widespread fraud is still the exit poll anomaly.
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One little problem - my exit poll showed Bush winning Ohio. It's funny, you keep forgetting that. Throw out that evidence that doesn't agree with your pre-determined conclusion, and Lowe and behold, you have a gen-you-wine conspiracy!
 
Beth said:
Dr. Adequate addressed this point succinctly and accurately. I couldn't have said it better.
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And I pretty much carved up his response.

ETA: Evasion noted on the "Who killed JFK" question. You're a bleever, aren't you?
 
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The Central Scrutinizer said:
And I pretty much carved up his response.
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Well, you think you did. It's rather sweet.

False dichotomy.
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Unfortunately, you don't know (or don't care) what "false dichotomy" means, so your reply was irrelevant to the point of meaninglessness. You then merely repeat your fallacy:

The point being, that you can find "professional" experts to affirm any position, no matter how woo it is.
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...and then blithely declare that you've "carved up" my post. Well, well. Perhaps next time you wish to "carve up" one of my posts you'd like to address its content.
 
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You know, reading these threads, I am reminded of an old Charlie Brown comic strip.


Charlie Brown and Linus are standing outside looking at stars. They look at one bright one, and remark that it might be a planet. Or maybe a plane or even a Sputnik.

"Well," says Linus, "we sure can't tell anything from here."

He begins walking away.

"Where are you going?"

"To the top of the hill for a better look."
 
I think the analogy would be slightly more accurate if in the last panel Linus had gone to check the relevant facts and Charlie Brown had put a paper bag over his head and sucked his thumb.
 
Grammatron said:
In fact, if we take the statement "It does not matter if there is no fraud, the system is inherrently compromised." with no further requirements then you it would appear you'd rather have a system that simply appears impartial than the one that actually is.
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A better interpretation is that a system which is impartial through design is better than one which is impartial through circumstance.
 
Kevin_Lowe said:
I think the analogy would be slightly more accurate if in the last panel Linus had gone to check the relevant facts and Charlie Brown had put a paper bag over his head and sucked his thumb.
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Let me know how it is from the top of the hill.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
And I pretty much carved up his response.

ETA: Evasion noted on the "Who killed JFK" question. You're a bleever, aren't you?
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Sigh. I am reminded of why I rarely bother to read or post in the politics forum. But Voting Machine Irregularities caught my eye because it's something I've been trying to get solid information about and the long list that Tricky posted contained some interesting items I either wasn't previously aware of or had forgotten about.

I am a professional statistician. I am on a private email list of professional statisticians who are analyzing the election data to the best of their ability. I got on this list because last summer I was trying to get access to the election data in order to perform my own analysis rather than relying on any one else's. I found this group while seeking access to the election data.

Then I started a new job in August. As a result, I haven't had time to actually do much analysis myself or contribute to the group effort, but I have read over their paper which should be released to the general public in the near future if it hasn't been yet If you are interested, you might try checking out http://uscountvotes.org/ to get a description of the project and who is involved.

On my first and second reads through the paper they are working on, I didn't spot any obvious problems or unmentioned flaws. I hope to go through their analysis with a fairly fine-toothed comb over the holidays, but assuming their data is good and their analysis holds, the probability of the Ohio election results being an accurate reflection of the way people thought they were voting is lower than the probability that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone.

Now, I'm not telling you this to convince you there was a problem. I don't know that there was a problem. I'm still looking into it. I'm telling you this because it bothers me that this issue isn't being taken seriously enough. It isn't a "tempest in a teapot" and it's not just a bunch of conspiracy nuts either. It's a problem I take seriously and so do a lot of other intelligent folks who care about the integrity of our democratic process.
 
The Central Scrutinizer said:
Unfortunately for you, the facts back me up.
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Well, more on that later.
And in response to my assertion that election fraud can and probably does occur you said:
Of course you have evidence for this? May we see it? Election Fraud is a federal crime. Have you called the FBI?
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To which I reply: http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/05/06/con05218.html.

Of course your first act will be to declare this invalid due to the mere physical presence of "certified loon" Bev Harris. Regardless, it appears that Diebold's credibility as a voting machine vendor is rapidly evaporating, as many people suspected it would. Being rather well-versed in computer system design and methodology myself I could tell from a million miles off how inherently insecure the Diebold systems were, which was why I paid attention to Bev Harris even when people like you were hastily splattering her with "lunatic" labels.

The problem is, guys, that if you have what appears to be a crime, you sometimes don't have solid evidence like a smoking gun. Instead you have the evidence of circumstances, and in order to make that stick you have to prove motive, method, and opportunity.

In vote fraud, the motive is clear -- to win an election. Power is corruptive and attractive, and politicians want it as a matter of course.

The method is also quite readily demonstrated -- voting machines with Play-Skool security controls and no standardized auditing mechanism. Of course, the basic problem is that the votes are stored in an Access database. A really sophisticated progammer could get right around any security mechanism just by opening the (apparently unencrypted) table as a raw file and manipulating the data direct without even bothering with the Access program. But you don't have to be sophisticated to hack these machines, it appears.

The opportunity is also quite easily demonstrated -- many of the suspicious counties' election machinery is run by appointees of the same political party that won the elections, which is coincidentally the same political party preferred by the voting machine vendor.

In this context, it doesn't really matter if we can prove that fraud occurred -- Democracies function on the legitimacy of their leadership. Without credible audit and security controls on our election machinery this legitimacy is in question.

When the very same people who so very clearly could benefit from flaky election controls are stonewalling efforts to impose accountability it also stops mattering if actual malfeasance can be proven. Eventually people simply assume that if the election could have been stolen, then it likely was.

Intentionally not understanding this doesn't make you look like the voice of reason -- it makes you look pigheaded.
 
Mycroft said:
How is it an invitation?
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Well, companies whose managers are VERY close to one party, and who have spent LOTS of money supporting that party, provide election machines whichare NOT checked for possible manipulation by independent experts, which do NOT leave a paper trail to insure against election fraud. Then these machines produce a result which strongly diverges from the exit polls, and NO attempt is made to investigate the possibility of fraud.

The ****ing doors are standing wide open, and someone has hung a "rig me" sign on the elections. And you ask where the invitation is?
 
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