What kind of voting machine did you use? - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

NCB · 11-07-2006, 08:21 AM

My county uses an optical scan machine with a paper reciept. I like it

cj2112 · 11-07-2006, 08:37 AM

Oregon is a vote by mail state, I imagine that they use an optical scanning machine of some sort or other to read the ballots. However in my county there is somebody running a pretty serious write-in campaign for county commissioner, I don't expect him to win, but I did vote for the guy, and I anticipate he'll probably pull better than 30% of the votes. This likely means that alot of the ballots will have to be hand counted.

samcol · 11-07-2006, 08:43 AM

Voted in Indiana on an Infinity electronic voting machine. No paper trail. My understanding is that in order for the vote to count the data has to go from the machine to a memory card and then uploaded to a central database.

Rekna · 11-07-2006, 08:45 AM

In my Utah district we used Diebold touch screen machines. There was really only one snafu with the voting machine that I noticed. On the first screen we have an option of choosing a straight ticket ballot. The screen listed all the parties, well apparently one of the parties is named "Personal Choice", this party is the last one listed making it look like if you want to make your own choice you click on this party.

Other than that the machine was decent. There was 2 chances to review your ballot, once electronically, and then again on a paper receipt that printed. As long as the paper receipts aren't discarded there is a chance for a recount.

pig · 11-07-2006, 08:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by samcol

Voted in Indiana on an Infinity electronic voting machine. No paper trail. My understanding is that in order for the vote to count the data has to go from the machine to a memory card and then uploaded to a central database.

i don't know the brand, but the machine i used in sc works the same way. i really don't get the problem with adding a papertrail to the vote - polling workers get a copy, voter gets a copy. it really is almost like we already have all the technology to do this, but just aren't.

stevo · 11-07-2006, 08:48 AM

scantron..

Kadath · 11-07-2006, 09:34 AM

Electronic, but not the Diebold. There's a big paper ballot over the machine, and you push the buttons through the paper that correspond to who you want to vote for, and then press vote when you've made all your selections. No paper trail.

Willravel · 11-07-2006, 09:42 AM

Electronic touch screen with paper printout.

ShaniFaye · 11-07-2006, 09:43 AM

I have no idea what ours is. I know you place a credit card thing in it and you touch screen all your choices and push cast ballot where it uploads the data to "somewhere" and it pops the card out and you hand it over to a guy that gives you your voted sticker.

host · 11-07-2006, 10:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by pigglet

i really don't get the problem with adding a papertrail to the vote - polling workers get a copy, voter gets a copy. it really is almost like we already have all the technology to do this, but just aren't.

....the first time I used an ATM was to withdraw cash from my cheking account in early 1980, almost 27 years ago. I received a paper receipt at the end of the transaction, and the cash that I requested.

What is happening today...the breakdowns, glitches, lack of paper receipts, is intentional bullshit.

Quote:

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12888600/site/newsweek/
Levy: Will Your Vote Count in 2006?
'When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security,' says Stanford's David Dill.
By Steven Levy
Newsweek

May 29, 2006 issue - Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the voting booth, here comes more disturbing news about the trustworthiness of electronic touchscreen ballot machines. Earlier this month a report by Finnish security expert Harri Hursti analyzed Diebold voting machines for an organization called Black Box Voting. Hursti found unheralded vulnerabilities in the machines that are currently entrusted to faithfully record the votes of millions of Americans.

How bad are the problems? Experts are calling them the most serious voting-machine flaws ever documented. Basically the trouble stems from the ease with which the machine's software can be altered. It requires only a few minutes of pre-election access to a Diebold machine to open the machine and insert a PC card that, if it contained malicious code, could reprogram the machine to give control to the violator. The machine could go dead on Election Day or throw votes to the wrong candidate. Worse, it's even possible for such ballot-tampering software to trick authorized technicians into thinking that everything is working fine, an illusion you couldn't pull off with pre-electronic systems. "If Diebold had set out to build a system as insecure as they possibly could, this would be it," says Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University computer-science professor and elections-security expert.

Diebold Election Systems spokesperson David Bear says Hursti's findings do not represent a fatal vulnerability in Diebold technology, but simply note the presence of a feature that allows access to authorized technicians to periodically update the software. If it so happens that someone not supposed to use the machine—or an election official who wants to put his or her thumb on the scale of democracy—takes advantage of this fast track to fraud, that's not Diebold's problem. "[Our critics are] throwing out a 'what if' that's premised on a basis of an evil, nefarious person breaking the law," says Bear.

Those familiar with the actual election process—by and large run by honest people but historically subject to partisan politicking, dirty tricks and sloppy practices—are less sanguine. "It gives me a bit of alarm that the voting systems are subject to tampering and errors," says Democratic Rep. William Lacy Clay, who worries that machines in his own St. Louis district might be affected by this vulnerability. (In Maryland and Georgia, all the machines are Diebold's.)

The Diebold security gap is only the most vivid example of the reality that no electronic voting system can be 100 percent safe or reliable. That's the reason behind an initiative to augment these systems, adding a paper receipt that voters can check to make sure it conforms with their choices. The receipt is retained at the polling place so a physical count can be conducted. "When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security," says David Dill, a Stanford professor who founded the election-reform organization Verified Voting.

To their credit, 26 states have taken action to implement paper trails. But the U.S. Congress has yet to pass legislation introduced last year by Rep. Rush Holt, Democrat of New Jersey, that would extend this protection nationwide. Holt says his bill is slowly gaining support. "The voters are saying that every vote should count, and the only way to do this is by verified audit trails," he says. But even an optimistic scenario for passage would challenge his goal of mandatory paper receipts for November's elections. In other words, it's unlikely that every voter using an electronic voting device in 2006 will know for sure that his or her vote will be reflected in the actual totals. Six years after the 2000 electoral debacle, how can this be?

<b>As the Nov. 2, HBO showed....Cuyahoga County, OH, election officials were well informed about the flawed and unreliable Diebold vote scanners, but they spent $22 million to buy then, anyway!</b>

Quote:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washing...machines_x.htm
Election cliffhanger: Will it all work?

Updated 10/26/2006 10:01 PM ET
By Richard Wolf, USA TODAY
CLEVELAND — Jackie Baker has worked the polls here for 15 years, but this year is different. The electronic voting machines are new. The state law governing who can vote is new. Identification requirements are new, as are the many rules for handling those who don't meet them. Poll workers must take four-hour training courses and study two manuals totaling 137 pages. Then they take a test.

Baker flunked. So did 26% of her colleagues.

As America prepares to vote Nov. 7, the grueling preparations underway in places such as Cuyahoga County, Ohio, are being replicated in thousands of municipalities. New machines and voter databases intended to fix the problems that beset the 2000 presidential election must be in place this year. Many states and counties have rushed to meet the deadline — with unfortunate results.

POLL RESULTS: A question of confidence

Three in every 10 voting jurisdictions in the USA are using new equipment, up from 9% in 2004. More than 20 states are using paper trails for the first time, which produce printouts of voters' choices. Dozens of states have new voter registration and identification requirements. About 1.2 million poll workers and tens of thousands of technicians are still being trained to open the polls before daybreak, set up and maintain the machines, and work up to 15-hour shifts.

"We're facing a huge problem as a nation," says Candice Hoke, director of the Center for Election Integrity at Cleveland State University. "We've made the entire election system overly complex and technologically vulnerable, and lowered public confidence in the legitimacy of the results."

After presidential elections that brought attention to Florida's hanging chads in 2000 and Ohio's long lines in 2004, thousands of poll monitors, politicians and lawyers will be out in force this year, ready to cry foul — or file lawsuits.

Democrats complained the loudest about the results in 2004, when Ohio tipped the election to President Bush. Their candidates for governor and senator are leading in polls this time, but they remain concerned that the votes must be counted fairly. "This is about trying to protect the integrity of the process," says Christopher Nance, Democratic Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones' expert on elections issues.

Michael Vu knows the pressure is on. In May's primary here, poll workers were overwhelmed by new equipment, memory cards for machines were lost, printouts were mangled, and absentee ballots took six days to count. As a result, the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections director was in the news more than Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James. And the coverage was far less flattering.

In the months since, Vu has presided over a revamping of the way Cuyahoga's 1 million registered voters will be treated Nov. 7. A county review panel that included Hoke issued more than 300 recommendations in July; Vu turned that into more than 800 tasks, including 147 deemed "mission critical" for November. About 7,000 poll workers are being trained to staff the county's 1,434 precincts; among them are 1,200 high school students who will serve as backups. Poll workers' pay has been raised $50, to $172.10. About 1,300 technicians who take eight-hour classes will get $250.

Still, "there's a question out there as to whether or not this system will work," Vu says. Combining electronic machines and new laws with confused poll workers and voters, he says, creates "the largest social change management process in this country."

Encoders and memory cards

At the center of that process are people like Baker. Unemployed and living on disability benefits, the 45-year-old Cleveland resident has been a poll worker since the early 1990s, when the job paid $75.

After failing the new test once, she returned last week for another four-hour training course, in which she learned about encoders and memory cards, printer modules and paper spindles, what form of ID is OK and which voters must cast "provisional" ballots.

"It's not really hard," Baker insists. "If you work as a team, you'll come out a lot better." She passed the test this time.

Following May's fiasco, the training courses were outsourced to Cuyahoga Community College, which has set up 15 sites throughout this sprawling county. Class sizes are limited to 18 students, who work in pairs at the new machines. A private instructor and a technician from equipment manufacturer Diebold run each session, under the watchful eye of a Board of Elections monitor.

Baker's class runs 41/2 hours with one short break. At the end, students struggle to install the printers on the machines. After learning how to handle blind voters, one student asks what accommodations are made for the hearing-impaired. None, Diebold's Sherry Hendershot replies; they can see the ballot. Another asks if the rules could change before Election Day. The answer: absolutely.

Instructor Van Williams, who teaches at the college, says he didn't work the polls as usual in May, when the new machines were first introduced. The pay, he says, wasn't worth the effort. And "everything that could go wrong did go wrong."

Even with the new pay scale, "The people need to be committed to the cause," says Michael Devlin, a college vice president, "because you can make a hundred and seventy-two bucks easier than this."

Upon learning what supplies and records go in the red bags, blue bags, red envelopes and black envelopes that poll workers must submit at day's end, and how to handle all the seals and labels, Josephine Lockett, 56, is shaken. "It is more than I thought it was going to be," the retired cashier says.....

ShaniFaye · 11-07-2006, 10:02 AM

I dont understand this map

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpo...t.exclude.html

its supposed to show the places that use touch screen, our county has been using these since before the last presidential election, but not one county in GA is shown as using them... hmmmm

Willravel · 11-07-2006, 10:08 AM

Most of the counties in Georgia are shown as using them. It's the one between South Carolina and Florida (I had to think about it for a second), and it's almost completly red. Red means that you use touch-screen electronic voting.

ShaniFaye · 11-07-2006, 10:10 AM

ok, now I look like a complete idiot cause I couldnt recognize GA....Im going to go hid under the covers now

man...WHERE is my brain today

kutulu · 11-07-2006, 10:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShaniFaye

I dont understand this map

http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpo...t.exclude.html

its supposed to show the places that use touch screen, our county has been using these since before the last presidential election, but not one county in GA is shown as using them... hmmmm

Are you sure you are looking at that map right?

Paq · 11-07-2006, 10:22 AM

in SC..voted absentee, used electronic machine with no paper readout that i could tell. you just reviewed and pressed the flashing vote button twice.

not confidence inspiring since another lady in there almost lost her vote bc she only pushed once.

pig · 11-07-2006, 10:51 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paq

not confidence inspiring since another lady in there almost lost her vote bc she only pushed once.

i only had to push the vote button once, but i stuck around to make sure it had registered my vote. at least, electronically as far as the machine itself is concerned.

mixedmedia · 11-07-2006, 11:05 AM

Paper ballot w/ optical scanner.

dogzilla · 11-07-2006, 12:45 PM

Still in the dark ages here (NY), using the same old mechanical voting machines we have used for years.

cyrnel · 11-07-2006, 01:49 PM

I'm in Oregon. Normally I would have mailed my ballot but procrastination meant I voted at city hall, in a little fold-up privacy shield, with a #2 pencil.

When we eventually go electronic I hope Diebold is kind enough to install vibrators and a lube dispenser so we can get the full effect.

Cynthetiq · 11-07-2006, 02:01 PM

I used one of these, in the lobby of my building ...

we have our own voting booths in each of the buildings of our coop, so there's no excuse to not vote.

StanT · 11-07-2006, 02:09 PM

Machine?

The one and only electronic machine at my polling place was broken at 8:05 when I arrived. #2 pencil and fill in the blanks for me.

loquitur · 11-07-2006, 03:23 PM

ancient, creaky and freakin' HUGE lever-pull machine. I think NY is the only state that still uses them. Each one is the size of an old-style phone booth.

Not that it makes much difference, of course. NY is a one-party state, just like the old Soviet Union.

mixedmedia · 11-07-2006, 03:50 PM

I'm surprised to hear that they're having people use pencils. Can't they be tampered with? They had us use black felt tip pens.

In SW Louisiana they used consoles that had the ballots laid out on them with buttons to press alongside the names of the candidates. I was never comfortable with that system. You're trusting that the buttons are programmed to cast the votes correctly. I want my vote to be on paper. In the case of a recount, I want to know that a person will be holding my vote in their hand to be counted. I hope my own district doesn't switch.

ASU2003 · 11-07-2006, 04:58 PM

I used the Diebold AccuVote-TSX machine, with the paper readout. It worked just find for me. But that isn't to say that a hacker at the central tabulator location couldn't adjust some votes, but it would be tough, and the paper trail would hopefully catch it.

goddfather40 · 11-07-2006, 10:44 PM

Used an Electronic touch screen which spit out a receipt type thing on a reel that you looked at and then verified. I have voted on an electronic machine every time since 2000. I lived in Riverside County (CA) in 2000 and they were one of the first to use the electronic systems, with really no issues since. Orange County, where I live now, has been pretty good too, though I did hear about some sporadic problems today.

11-07-2006, 08:48 AM	#6 (permalink)
stevo Rail Baron Location: Tallyfla	scantron.. __________________ "If I am such a genius why am I drunk, lost in the desert, with a bullet in my ass?" -Otto Mannkusser

11-07-2006, 09:34 AM	#7 (permalink)
Kadath Muffled Location: Camazotz	Electronic, but not the Diebold. There's a big paper ballot over the machine, and you push the buttons through the paper that correspond to who you want to vote for, and then press vote when you've made all your selections. No paper trail. __________________ it's quiet in here

11-07-2006, 09:43 AM	#9 (permalink)
ShaniFaye Submit to me, you know you want to Location: Lilburn, Ga	I have no idea what ours is. I know you place a credit card thing in it and you touch screen all your choices and push cast ballot where it uploads the data to "somewhere" and it pops the card out and you hand it over to a guy that gives you your voted sticker. __________________ *I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!*

11-07-2006, 10:02 AM	#11 (permalink)
ShaniFaye Submit to me, you know you want to Location: Lilburn, Ga	I dont understand this map http://www.cnn.com/interactive/allpo...t.exclude.html its supposed to show the places that use touch screen, our county has been using these since before the last presidential election, but not one county in GA is shown as using them... hmmmm __________________ *I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!*

11-07-2006, 10:10 AM	#13 (permalink)
ShaniFaye Submit to me, you know you want to Location: Lilburn, Ga	ok, now I look like a complete idiot cause I couldnt recognize GA....Im going to go hid under the covers now man...WHERE is my brain today __________________ *I want the diabetic plan that comes with rollover carbs. I dont like the unused one expiring at midnite!!*

11-07-2006, 08:37 AM	#2 (permalink)
cj2112 Unbelievable Location: Grants Pass OR	Oregon is a vote by mail state, I imagine that they use an optical scanning machine of some sort or other to read the ballots. However in my county there is somebody running a pretty serious write-in campaign for county commissioner, I don't expect him to win, but I did vote for the guy, and I anticipate he'll probably pull better than 30% of the votes. This likely means that alot of the ballots will have to be hand counted.

11-07-2006, 08:43 AM	#3 (permalink)
samcol Junkie Location: Indiana	Voted in Indiana on an Infinity electronic voting machine. No paper trail. My understanding is that in order for the vote to count the data has to go from the machine to a memory card and then uploaded to a central database.

11-07-2006, 08:45 AM	#4 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	In my Utah district we used Diebold touch screen machines. There was really only one snafu with the voting machine that I noticed. On the first screen we have an option of choosing a straight ticket ballot. The screen listed all the parties, well apparently one of the parties is named "Personal Choice", this party is the last one listed making it look like if you want to make your own choice you click on this party. Other than that the machine was decent. There was 2 chances to review your ballot, once electronically, and then again on a paper receipt that printed. As long as the paper receipts aren't discarded there is a chance for a recount.

11-07-2006, 09:42 AM	#8 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Electronic touch screen with paper printout.

11-07-2006, 10:08 AM	#12 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Most of the counties in Georgia are shown as using them. It's the one between South Carolina and Florida (I had to think about it for a second), and it's almost completly red. Red means that you use touch-screen electronic voting.

11-07-2006, 10:22 AM	#15 (permalink)
Paq Junkie Location: South Carolina	in SC..voted absentee, used electronic machine with no paper readout that i could tell. you just reviewed and pressed the flashing vote button twice. not confidence inspiring since another lady in there almost lost her vote bc she only pushed once. __________________ Live. Chris

11-07-2006, 11:05 AM	#17 (permalink)
mixedmedia has all her shots. Location: Florida	Paper ballot w/ optical scanner. __________________ Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

11-07-2006, 12:45 PM	#18 (permalink)
dogzilla Junkie Location: New York	Still in the dark ages here (NY), using the same old mechanical voting machines we have used for years.

11-07-2006, 01:49 PM	#19 (permalink)
cyrnel Adequate Location: In my angry-dome.	I'm in Oregon. Normally I would have mailed my ballot but procrastination meant I voted at city hall, in a little fold-up privacy shield, with a #2 pencil. When we eventually go electronic I hope Diebold is kind enough to install vibrators and a lube dispenser so we can get the full effect. __________________ There are a vast number of people who are uninformed and heavily propagandized, but fundamentally decent. The propaganda that inundates them is effective when unchallenged, but much of it goes only skin deep. If they can be brought to raise questions and apply their decent instincts and basic intelligence, many people quickly escape the confines of the doctrinal system and are willing to do something to help others who are really suffering and oppressed." -Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, p. 195

11-07-2006, 02:01 PM	#20 (permalink)
Cynthetiq Tilted Cat Head Administrator Location: Manhattan, NY	I used one of these, in the lobby of my building ... we have our own voting booths in each of the buildings of our coop, so there's no excuse to not vote. __________________ I don't care if you are black, white, purple, green, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, hippie, cop, bum, admin, user, English, Irish, French, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim, indian, cowboy, tall, short, fat, skinny, emo, punk, mod, rocker, straight, gay, lesbian, jock, nerd, geek, Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Independent, driver, pedestrian, or bicyclist, either you're an asshole or you're not. What's the best nation in the world? DO-NATION!

11-07-2006, 02:09 PM	#21 (permalink)
StanT © Location: Colorado	Machine? The one and only electronic machine at my polling place was broken at 8:05 when I arrived. #2 pencil and fill in the blanks for me.

11-07-2006, 03:23 PM	#22 (permalink)
loquitur Junkie Location: NYC	ancient, creaky and freakin' HUGE lever-pull machine. I think NY is the only state that still uses them. Each one is the size of an old-style phone booth. Not that it makes much difference, of course. NY is a one-party state, just like the old Soviet Union.

11-07-2006, 03:50 PM	#23 (permalink)
mixedmedia has all her shots. Location: Florida	I'm surprised to hear that they're having people use pencils. Can't they be tampered with? They had us use black felt tip pens. In SW Louisiana they used consoles that had the ballots laid out on them with buttons to press alongside the names of the candidates. I was never comfortable with that system. You're trusting that the buttons are programmed to cast the votes correctly. I want my vote to be on paper. In the case of a recount, I want to know that a person will be holding my vote in their hand to be counted. I hope my own district doesn't switch. __________________ Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

11-07-2006, 04:58 PM	#24 (permalink)
ASU2003 immoral minority Location: Back in Ohio	I used the Diebold AccuVote-TSX machine, with the paper readout. It worked just find for me. But that isn't to say that a hacker at the central tabulator location couldn't adjust some votes, but it would be tough, and the paper trail would hopefully catch it.

11-07-2006, 10:44 PM	#25 (permalink)
goddfather40 Llama Location: Cali-for-nye-a	Used an Electronic touch screen which spit out a receipt type thing on a reel that you looked at and then verified. I have voted on an electronic machine every time since 2000. I lived in Riverside County (CA) in 2000 and they were one of the first to use the electronic systems, with really no issues since. Orange County, where I live now, has been pretty good too, though I did hear about some sporadic problems today. __________________ My name is goddfather40 and I approved this message. I got ho's and I got bitches, In C++ I branch with switches -MC Plus+