Here we go again! Huge numbers of votes are missing from E-voting machine tallies in Florida. Is anyone surprised?
Governor Jeb Bush and the Florida Department of State pledged on Friday to investigate tens of thousands of missing e-votes spread across at least four counties. This will be the second such investigation in only four years. A large percentage of the votes cast in Florida's just completed election came up missing. These are known as “undervotes” where the pick is not recorded on the machine, but all other races have selections. The affected e-voting machines were all manufactured by iVotronic.…
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— go to most recent comments76 - MCH
"In 1973, my dad was still four years away from forgetting to wear a rubber! :-/"
- RJ Elliott
So you were 27 years old when you told bhw you just "shit your pants"...?
77 - Jet in Columbus
I may have to punish one of you... I just haven't figured out which one yet.
78 - RJ Elliott
So you were 27 years old when you told bhw you just "shit your pants"...?
I do not recall that one...though I can't doubt your extensive dossier of RJ quotes... :-/
79 - Clavos
That's his specialty, RJ, and not just you,either.
His bookmarks file must be a mile long...
80 - Jet in Columbus
You know what? I... you know... I think I'll just stay out of this one. The voters of Florida would probably appreciate that...
81 - MCH
Actually it's from memory, Clavos. Just one of those weird comments that sticks in a person's mind.
Elliott was cyber-hitting on bhw a couple years ago, she mentioned that she was old enough to be his baby sitter, and he replied with the "Oops, I better go, I just shit my pants" response.
That's why I was so surprised to learn he was that old (27) at time. It's something a high school kid would say, but I knew he was in college, so I figured he was probably about 20 or so.
I was cursed with a photographic memory, sorry...although two concussions and a decade of alcoholism (1970s) eroded about 50% of it....
82 - RJ Elliott
"Elliott was cyber-hitting on bhw a couple years ago, she mentioned that she was old enough to be his baby sitter, and he replied with the "Oops, I better go, I just shit my pants" response."
Hmm. Vaguely rings a bell.
So, you don't see the (weak) humor in that? Like, babysitters take care of babies, and babies tend to shit their pants? Like, kinda making fun of myself for my relatively young age?
83 - Jet in Columbus
RJ OSU is favored by 6 down from 7 against Michigan.
(:^b~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
84 - Jet in Columbus
Officials today will continue a detailed recounting of votes in the 13th Congressional District race " the second-closest congressional contest in the nation last week " amid allegations of voting machine malfunctions.
Republican Vern Buchanan led Democrat Jennings by just 377 votes after the Nov. 7 election. In Sarasota County, touch screen voting machines recorded that 18,382 voters, or 13 percent of all voters, did not vote for either candidate " a rate much higher than in other counties in the district.
No one is sure why there were so many undervotes. Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent says voters could have intentionally skipped that race because it was particularly nasty, with lots of negative ads and campaigning. But some skeptics blame voting machine malfunctions, poor ballot design or skewed computer coding in the machines.
As part of the recount Monday, Sarasota officials ran about 22,000 optical scan absentee ballots through machines to find ballots where people marked either no candidate or more than one candidate.
For the rest of this article click anywhere in the underlined section
85 - Clavos
RJ,
After the examples of your humor and jokes you've regaled us with over the past couple of days, I have some advice for you:
Don't quit your day job.
86 - Jet in Columbus
I thought that was his day job?
87 - RJ Elliott
LOL...
88 - Jet in Columbus
UPDATE...SARASOTA, Fla. -- A circuit court judge Tuesday temporarily delayed a state audit of touch-screen voting machines used in the contest for the seat Rep. Katherine Harris gave up to make her failed Senate run.
Sarasota Circuit Judge Deno Economou delayed the audit until both candidates can get their own experts involved in the investigation.
The order does not halt an ongoing recount in the congressional race to replace Harris.
Electronic voting machines in Sarasota County reported 18,382 people _ about one in eight voters _ did not vote for either Republican Vern Buchanan or Democrat Christine Jennings, but made choices in other races. That rate was much higher than other counties in the district.
After the recount began Monday, Jennings' lawyers asked a judge to order Sarasota County's voting machines secured in case the recount does not clarify the high number of skipped votes, or undervotes.
Lawyers for both candidates told the judge Tuesday at an emergency hearing that they wanted their own experts on hand to participate with an audit team sent to Sarasota by Florida Secretary of State Sue Cobb. The team had expected to begin testing machines on Wednesday.
For the rest of this WASHINGTON POST/ASSOCIATED PRESS article click anywhere in the underlined section.
89 - Jet in Columbus
vote-counting flaws in several Connecticut towns gave Democrat Joe Courtney a narrow victory over three-term Republican Rep. Rob Simmons on Tuesday.
Courtney won by 91 votes instead of the 167-vote margin counted on election night, according to results tabulated by 65 town clerks and reported to The Associated Press. Nearly 250,000 votes were cast.
"This is doing it the hard way," Courtney told the AP.
Courtney is the second Connecticut Democrat to oust an incumbent from Congress this year. State Sen. Chris Murphy defeated 12-term Rep. Nancy Johnson last week as part of a Democratic surge that shifted the balance of power in Congress.
"It's been an exciting year for Democrats and this is the crowning glory," state Democratic Party chairwoman Nancy DiNardo said.
Both parties monitored the recount carefully and confirmed that Courtney had the final edge, although their figures differed slightly. Republicans said Courtney won by 96 votes, while Democrats had the margin at 93. Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz planned a news conference Wednesday morning to announce the results.
For the rest of this article click anywhere in the underlined section
90 - Clavos
Jet,
There's an interesting article in this morning's Miami Herald, titled "Cluttered Sarasota ballot may be at fault, expert says" which says in part:
SARASOTA - The electronic ballot implicated in 18,382 nonvotes in one of the nation's hottest congressional races was a ''poster child'' for bad ballot design, according to a top voting-systems expert.
The problem: The 13th Congressional District race shared the same page as the higher-profile governor's race, cluttering voters' screens and making it more likely they would miss the race entirely, said the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Ted Selker.
''I've said it to everyone who will listen for the last five years: You're going to get fewer errors if you give each race its own page,'' said Selker, chairman of a joint project launched by MIT and Cal Tech to try to prevent a recurrence of the problems following the 2000 elections.
Sarasota County Elections Supervisor Kathy Dent said the county's ballot followed well-established rules. ''I don't think it was a bad ballot design,'' she said.
It goes on to say:
If it turns out that the nonvotes -- called ''undervotes'' -- were the result of voter oversight and bad ballot design, that probably spells doom for Democrat Christine Jennings, who trailed Republican Vern Buchanan by 377 votes Tuesday morning. Also, a human-error scenario likely would blunt calls by activists who want paper ballots.
And:
Dent has insisted the machines never failed. She has blamed the undervote primarily on voter error and choice, saying the nasty race turned off many voters. On Tuesday, though, she acknowledged that the ballot design ''was a factor, a factor along with other factors.'' But she said, ``I cannot give it a weight as to what was the real cause.''
...Only 1 percent of Sarasota voters failed to cast a vote in the U.S. Senate and governor races. The typical error rate on all ballots is 1 in 30, about 3 percent, Selker said.
''This is much more severe,'' he said. ``Whenever you have a number approaching 10 percent, then clearly something went wrong.''
The most significant problem in elections is the poorly designed ballot, Selker said. ''You can say it's just people not paying attention to what they're doing,'' but there are ways to structure information -- such as putting only one race per page on an electronic ballot -- that drastically reduce errors, Selker said.
`CONFUSED EASILY'
Roughly 15 percent of the population has some sort of reading disability, and such people ''get really confused easily with disorganization of text,'' Selker said.
He also noted Dent's attempt to bring the ballot-design issue to the attention of poll workers and voters after complaints cropped up in the early-voting week before Election Day.
''She tried to communicate that she had a problem, but she didn't have a very good solution. I don't know what she could have done'' at that point, Selker said.
The key for elected officials is to test their ballots thoroughly before the election begins, before it's too late.
Selker is conducting experiments to determine just how much of the undervote can be attributed to the Sarasota ballot's design.
But he said he already may know the answer: ``The ballot looks so suspect. It's a poster child for me.''
Kathy Dent ought to be dusting off her resume at this point.
91 - Nancy
What is it about the people of Florida - and more importantly, the various elections boards - that they just can NOT seem to get their act(s) in order to carry out a simple, recurring, straightforward task every 2 years? They did one thing right, however: they gave Katherine Harris a one way ticket to the unemployment line. Now hopefully the state of Florida will follow up with filing charges in her previous personal voting fraud case, & park her abusive, rude, insolent & arrogant butt in jail where it belongs. She's as bad or worse than Cynthia McKinney!
92 - Jet in Columbus
Of Clavos. All those other races were easy to find. 18,000 people agree with that...
93 - Jet in Columbus
Don't worry Nancy, Bush will find a place for her somewhere, some government appointment. He could put her in charge of the Faith Based initiatives so she could screw that up...
94 - Clavos
Now hopefully the state of Florida will follow up with filing charges in her previous personal voting fraud case
Nancy, you can't file charges without evidence.
There have been numerous independent recounts and investigations of the Florida elections; No evidence of fraud has ever been found.
95 - Jet in Columbus
Justice if fickle Clavos. I mean O.J. was found innocent by a jury and still is considered guilty, right?
96 - Clavos
Invalid analogy, Jet.
O.J. was found innocent by ONE jury. As I said before, the Florida elections have been both recounted AND investigated numerous times; ALL with the same conclusion: there is NO evidence of fraud.
97 - Nancy
No, no, Clavos: Katherine Harris has already been charged w/PERSONAL criminal voting fraud, for claiming to have been resident at an address that was actually her realtor's house, when she registered to vote in an election a couple of years ago. Since then, she's been summoned (or something, details vague in my mind since she's not anyone I really give a damn about) a couple of times to court but has disdained to bother to go or even respond, so last I heard, they were finally going to throw the book at her. Has nothing to do with the 2000 or 2004 national elections. Just that it perfectly illustrates her attitude & personality as a complete, spoiled bitch & asshole. There was an article on BC some months ago about it.
98 - Clavos
Nancy,
The case you're referring to involves Anne Coulter, not Katherine Harris.
No one has ever alleged, much less charged Harris with that kind of an infraction.
99 - RJ Elliott
Yeah, you must have mixed the two up because they are both right-wing females who are absolutely despised by the Left and the MSM...
100 - Jet in Columbus
Oh now come on R.J. how could someone as intelligent as Nancy get those two confused?
101 - Jet in Columbus
Kathy Dent, Sarasota County Elections Supervisor:“We will print the ballot image record of every under vote in the Buchanan-Jennings race.”
Reggie Mitchell, Florida People for the American Way Foundation:
“Something clearly went very wrong in Sarasota County.”
The group People for the American Way claims the machine results will be the same as they were election night, and on the machine recounts performed Monday and Tuesday.
Reggie Mitchell:
“We have called on Supervisor Dent, and state election officials to find a solution that will allow county residents who voted on November 7th, to return to polls for a revote, in the Congressional race.”
Kathy Dent:
“Hey, if the Court orders me to do a revote, that's what we do.”
The call for a revote on the Congressional race would seem an uphill battle. Courts have traditionally shot down the idea. because it essentially takes away the vote from those who cast a ballot on election day, but are unable to return for a revote.
But lawyer Kendall Coffey says this is the first election where the integrity of new electronic voting machines are in question.
Kendall Coffey, Jennings' Campaign lawyer:
“This is a situation where we may have a test case for the entire country... A country that has been wanting to get these questions answered, this may be the occasion, so there's nothing helpful in looking backward.”
For the rest of this article click anywhere in the underlined section
102 - Nancy
Alas, guys, I did indeed get them confused. All them bone-thin, rich, neocon white women look alike, even if one is blonde & the other brunette. I think it's the fangs they both sport that got me mixed up.
Sorry 'bout that, but thanks for the correction.
103 - Jet in Columbus
Nancy, it's the fools who don't admit they're wrong that's the problem.
104 - RJ Elliott
Honestly, mixing up Katherine Harris and Ann Coulter is sort of understandable...kinda like mixing up Alcee Hastings and William Jefferson...
105 - Clavos
Alcee Hastings
We Floridians really do have a lot of crosses to bear, don't we, RJ?
106 - Jet in Columbus
..."kinda like mixing up Alcee Hastings and William Jefferson"
Oh,... well, now I feel foolish
107 - Jet in Columbus
Just as long as they're not burning Clavos... Just as long as they're not burning.
108 - President Bush
LOL
109 - MCH
So Coulter committed voter fraud? What's the penalty for that?
110 - MCH
Wow, it's a felony.
Here's what Jose Lambiet of The Palm Beach Post reported:
"Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections records show Coulter voted last week in Palm Beach's council election. Problem is: She cast her ballot in a precinct 4 miles north of the precinct where she owns a home -- and that could be a big no-no....
She wrote down an Indian Road address instead of [her correct address] on her voter's registration application. And she signed to certify the information as true.... Florida statutes make it a third-degree felony to vote knowingly in the wrong precinct. Lying on a voter's registration can cost up to $5,000 and five years behind bars."
111 - Jet in Columbus
#109... Clavos, Did the rabbit die?
112 - Jet in Columbus
MCH, I hope she gets both
113 - Jet in Columbus
Nov. 20 -- Florida officials certified Republican Vern Buchanan on Monday as the winner of the House seat being vacated by Rep. Katherine Harris (R). The loser immediately sued for a new election, arguing that touch-screen voting machines had malfunctioned.
Christine Jennings contested her 369-vote loss in the 13th District, asking a judge to order a new election because of problems in Sarasota County, where more than 17,000 voters who cast ballots in other races Nov. 7 did not do so in the congressional contest.
For the rest of this WASHINGTON POST article click anywhere in the underlined section
114 - RJ Elliott
I fully understand why doing that is illegal, and it certainly should be punished...but five years in prison?
I mean, it's not like she voted twice, or registered in a completely different state or even a different county...the people on the ballot at her incorrect address were almost certainly the same people that appeared on the ballot at her correct address...she deserves a fine and some negative publicity, that's about all.
115 - Jet in Columbus
Screw it, throw the book at her, no one's above the law. Dear God, I'm starting to sound republican!
116 - RJ Elliott
Heh.
I don't think Ann would hold up very well in a women's prison in Florida...especially for five years...she'd probably come out a Democrat...and a lesbian! :-/
117 - Jet in Columbus
R.J. We're going to have to have a talk about those fantasies of yours.
This has been a recorded announcement
118 - Clavos
RJ writes:
I mean, it's not like she voted twice, or registered in a completely different state or even a different county
And it's not as if it isn't done in every election in every jurisdiction in the nation by thousands of voters who have recently moved.
Jet,
The rabbit didn't die, but it failed the FCAT.
119 - MCH
"And it's not as if it isn't done in every election in every jurisdiction in the nation by thousands of voters who have recently moved."
- Clavos
I guess the main difference being those "thousands of voters" haven't made a FORTUNE by publicly promoting themselves as sanctimonious standard-bearers of morality and virtue.
120 - Clavos
I guess the main difference being those "thousands of voters" haven't made a FORTUNE by publicly promoting themselves as sanctimonious standard-bearers of morality and virtue.
Actually, emmy, she's made her fortune as the standard bearer of conservatism. The morality and virtue bit is your interpretation.
And what is immoral and unvirtuous about voting in the wrong precinct? Illegal by Florida statute, yes. But immoral or unvirtuous?
Only because she's a conservative and you're not.
I call bullshit...
121 - Jet in Columbus
Clavos 118: Well I hope you at least gave it some lettuce and a carrot before you patted its rump and sent it on its way at least.
Lovingly
Jet
122 - Jet in Columbus
Clavos in Ohio there was a move afoot to allow voters to cast ballots at the station closest to where they work on their lunch breaks, but that would've meant too many working-class democrats voting so Blackwell struck it down.
I guess we returned the favor by striking him down at teh polls
heh heh
123 - Jet in Columbus
MCH 119... Yes, but haven't we all at one time or another?
124 - Jet in Columbus
Clavos Bushit, not Bullshit
125 - MCH
"And what is immoral and unvirtuous about voting in the wrong precinct? Illegal by Florida statute, yes. But immoral or unvirtuous?"
- Clavos
Well, it's a felony, punishable by up to a $5,000 fine and 5 years in prison. But you're right, it's not nearly as serious as Destertion from Dannelly AFB.
Sorta reminds me of when Rush Limbaugh got popped for purchasing black market narcotics (to the tune of 100 oxycontins per day), one of his methods being illegally "doctor shopping" to do so...AFTER, he said that "all drug abusers should be sent down the river."
Maybe Coulter could use the same liberal lawyer Limbaugh did to get off due to a loophole in the law...(?)