Please excuse the interruption in our normal schedule of cute Cordy pics and whining about morning sickness for this public service announcement.
We’re less than a month from Election Day here in the US, and I hope everyone is thinking about voting this year. Lots of important local and national issues and government seats are up for consideration, and your vote could change the entire direction of the country.
When I was younger I was a much less regular voter. Who cares about the local school levy and city council seats, I figured. I didn’t think they impacted me at all – after all, I was a renter, so I didn’t pay property tax, and the city council certainly never seemed to do anything that noticeably impacted me. Sure, I’d always show up to the polls on presidential election years, but otherwise it was too big of a hassle.
As a “responsible adult” now (wow, that was hard to even write), I am more concerned with voting. I have a child, I own a house, and I care about the direction my neighborhood and my city is heading. A school levy is now almost as important as making the choice for president.
If you are not a registered voter, make sure you get registered soon. If you are a registered voter, look up where your polling station is, and make decisions about when you plan to go vote. If you know you’ll be busy, make plans to vote absentee.
Here in Ohio, I’m actually a little nervous of voting on Election Day. You see, Ohio has these wonderful electronic machines designed to make voting so much easier for all of us who can’t operate a punch card. They’re made by Diebold (where the president of the company is a die-hard Republican who promised he’d win the election for Bush in 2004), and they are a touch screen system. Simply touch the names of your choices, hit confirm, and voila – your votes are cast into the electronic ether!
Now, anyone who has had a post eaten by Blogger can tell you that electronics can fail. Did your vote really go through? Was it really recorded? There is no paper trail for these machines, so there is no confirmation that your vote was submitted, or recorded properly.
Then there’s the small issue of hackers. Oh sure, we’d like to think that no one out there would want to do anything to forcibly change the outcome of an election, but let’s be honest: lots of people would give their left arm to force an issue their direction, even if it is not what the majority wants. That’s why after reading this report by Princeton University, I’m even more nervous about using these machines. It seems that an amateur hacker, given access to a machine for less than a minute (which is easy to do behind the little curtain), can easily insert malicious code into the system to change the logs and voting outcome. Even worse, that same hacker can nearly as easily install a virus that can silently affect all the machines at once. A simple computer virus could steal votes without detection.
So if you’re in Ohio, or any other state using these machines, I urge you to consider voting absentee. Absentee voting has a paper trail, and has to be hand counted, so you know your vote will count. We also need to tell our state governments that these machines, in their current vulnerable state, are not acceptable voting devices, and demand that they either make the needed security changes to protect the votes, or fall back on another system.
And I’m not trying to say that because the Diebold CEO is a die-hard Republican that Republicans are trying to steal votes. The truth is, anyone can hack these machines.
So get registered, get educated on the issues affecting you, and go vote, one way or another. Maybe this year we can get the national voter turnout higher than 35% to find out what people really do want for this country.
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This PSA was paid for by the “If you don’t vote, you can’t bitch about the government” committee of A Mommy Story.
Isn’t Ohio wonderful! LOL. I liked it so much better back when everything was done on paper. Except, I didn’t vote then, either. Oops.
I will definitly be voting this year, and will be doing so ON PAPER. Our levy needs to PASS this time!
Thanks for the heads up! I didn’t know all of that about the electronic machines. I need to do some research.
Wow. You guys are advanced. Out here in the sticks we still use paper and fill in the boxes with number 2 pencils. Wait. After reading this post I think that might be a good thing.
That last sentence is totally my moms mantra. She’s all about calling people out when they complain about the gov and dont vote.
Yes! Yes! VOTE!! Things are going to be very interesting here in Ohio come November. We went to a rally for Sherrod Brown last week, and the turnout was 3x what they expected.
Good for you for posting on this, Christina! Voting is REALLY important. We can’t afford not to. I’m with you! (And absentee is the best. I’ll never go back to voting in person now that I’ve tried absentee. It’s just so much easier cuz I can do it on my own time.)
If everyone didn’t need such instant gratification, the old style of voting would be sufficient.
It sucks to think that our whole idea of democracy could be a sham. I like to think that my vote counts for something.
Guess I better brush up on my issues and candidates. The only thing worse than only 35% of the eligible population showing up to vote is that most of them haven’t done their homework when it comes to the choices and just end up pulling any lever. Sigh.
Great post!
Do you realize the political power of the Mommy vote? If we all went out and voted in November, there is no doubt in my mind that politicians would have to start listening to us and we’d have a HUGE impact on who gets elected to the White House in 2008.
But they’ll only listen and act if we show our strength. There are so many distractions out there, sometimes we don’t even have time for a shower, but it is extremely important that we make our voices heard this November.
I agree that there are many problems in the voting system, but that’s part of the game. If you submit and don’t vote because you think you’re vote won’t be counted then those corrupt politicians and their deep pocket campaign contributors have won.
Our strength lies in our numbers and an agenda that can no longer be ignored. Vote for yourself, vote so your children can see how important it is and vote so that thos moms who can’t speak for themselves will be heard through your participation.
OK. I’ll get off my soapbox now 🙂
We Canucks are still using the ole pencil and mark your x inside the circle…
But I certainly hope you guys get the vote out. I work the election every time (I’m a keener for this sort of thing) and I understand how important it really is.
Afterall, you can’t bitch if you don’t vote.
Man, how I wish we could go back to the pencil and paper days. I also wish that election returns weren’t broadcast as they come in, especially with the “predictions” with only 1% of the vote counted. I think that all networks should show reruns of MASH and Cheers on Election Day.
Another hint: Don’t bring your toddler into the voting booth. She will undoubtedly hit the “cast vote” button before you’ve finished. Ask Kyle.
I loved this post. I always argue with my husband that if he doesn’t vote then he doesn’t get to bitch about politics!
yikes, glad we do things the old-fashioned way up here (although, recently i would have liked to have blamed cheating on the results instead of having to wrap my head around the fact that a conservative won fair and square!).
Well, I am going to leave this comment even though it may not do one little shred of good.
There are SO many things that you discuss in this posting about Diebold and their equipment that is simply not true. No, I am not a Diebold employee, nor am I connected to any board of elections. I am just a correctly informed voter who does the complete research.
First of all, the President of the company that you are referring to (as far as supporting Bush) is not with Diebold anymore.
The next item that I know is incorrect is your statement regarding the paper trail. Actually, there is a paper trail on EVERY voting machine (at least in Ohio). This was a requirement by the Secretary of State. Every vote is printed out and that printout is maintained within the machine itself.
The Princeton University “testing” is completely incorrect as well. The machine and software that they were testing was a very old version and many things have changed in the units in use today. The units are completely safe and are NOT able to be hacked by some Joe Schmoe in a matter of a minute (or many minutes for that matter).
Absentee voting is a good thing, and I think that more people need to get out and vote. Yet when people like you are spreading false information, you discourage people even more in their perspective on the elections and the goverment as a whole.
Please do more research on things before you post such damaging and incorrect information on your blog. Think about who all your words may affect for those who work for these companies when this kind of press is what most people (who are not willing to do their own research) are going to come across and probably trust.
Well, Anonymous, I have done research on this matter, and I stand by what I said.
As for your claim that Princeton was using outdated software, please see this section refuting these claims.
They did test the most recent (as of mid 2006) software, and found the software easy to breach.
As for no paper trail, I was referring to no paper trail that the voter can see. When you submit your vote, it is printed, but you do not have access to confirm that the correct votes were recorded. Were you to be using a machine that had been tampered with, you could think you’re voting one way, while the machine records, even on its paper, the wrong vote.
No, the machines can’t be hacked by the average person, but there is the possibility that they can be hacked by the average amatuer hacker with a computer science background.
Seeing as my small university alone graduates over 100 computer science majors each term, and who knows how many more from the larger universities, that’s a lot of people in Ohio who could have the ability to craft a simple computer virus. And we all know it only takes one person with malicious intent to use that knowledge for an illegal purpose.
My point is that these machines are not foolproof. Most technology at this point is not foolproof, and with something as important as voting, I, a person who normally embraces technology, believe that old-fashioned voting is the way to go. We’ve placed far too much emphasis on needing the results RIGHT NOW, and not enough on getting an accurate result.
And I’m sure my words do little to discourage people in their perspectives on the elections and our sorry government. The actions of the government and the sensational, mud-slinging election practices in place today carry far more power to do that on their own, without my help.
Personally, my lack of faith in the government is precisely why I AM voting, and why I encourage others to vote as well.
No offense, but using the same study to try and support your rebuttal (when I have already said that I KNOW this information is incorrect) hardly leads me to believe that you have truly researched this matter. Trust me, I have much more credible information than this outdated “study” holds.
Anyway, I actually just wanted to let you know that you are still incorrect about the paper trail. I am not sure if you have actually used the Diebold voting machines or not, but I have. You ALWAYS have access to the printed version of your votes. No, you cannot hold it in your hand, but it is available for you to view. You can hear where the printing is taking place within the machine (in the lower right corner of the machine), you will see that there is a small door on the unit. Many times that door may have been closed by a voter before you, but it can be opened and the printed version of your votes is very easily viewed. Once you select the option to print the ballot, the choices that you have made will print and will remain available for you to view until you opt to cast your votes officially. Once you do this, the paper (which is on a roll) will scroll forward enough that the next voter will not be able to see your votes. Check it out next time.
The units used in an election cannot be hacked during the course of that election. Out of the context of the election, where you are disregarding all of the extra security measures and security coding, most likely anything is possible (as was shown in the Princeton “study”). Nothing that is introduced from an outside source during an election would do anything. You have to remember that they (Princeton) had complete, unrestricted access to the unit and were able to try whatever they wanted until they found a window.
I hate to burst your bubble about something else, too. You state that, “They (Princeton) did test the most recent (as of mid 2006) software, and found the software easy to breach.” This is not accurate, even according to their own website. They state that they used the most recent software MADE AVAILABLE to them. This does not mean that it was the recent software, just what they could steal from somewhere. No, they did not get the software (or hardware) legally from Diebold, they acquired it through some not-so-honest means.
I agree that technology is not always the best answer for every situation. I know that most technology is fallible and able to be manipulated. I just want to make sure that you are not being fooled by the name and reputation of Princeton and blindly believing this information that they have posted out there for all to see. I know that your motives are good, just not your information.
Sigh…anonymous, at least I have provided one study. You say that you have other credible information, yet you haven’t shown it to me. (And I hope it is something other than Diebold assuring you the machines are safe.) I would like to read independent studies of the machines showing they are foolproof.
You can quickly do a simple Google search for “Diebold voting machine safety” and find several more studies of these machines finding security flaws and stories of the machines not performing as they were supposed to all across the country. I went through several pages of links, looking for anything positive, giving me proof the machines were safe, and found nothing. The closest thing to it was saying the machines would just have to be trusted since some areas have no other options on voting day. Hardly an endorsement.
The electronic machines were used in the most recent round of elections in Columbus, and I was never told of nor shown a door to check my printout. I heard nothing that would be described as a printing sound, but it was somewhat noisy in there.
And I can’t believe Princeton would risk its reputation to publish and promote a fradulent study. I’ve worked in higher education in various positions (student services, research, faculty, libraries). Academia is there for research, not to write misleading studies.
Listen, all I’m saying is that these machines have yet to be foolproof. Risks of tampering, software glitches, etc. have proven that they are not an ideal situation yet. They may be soon, but for now I cannot put my trust in these machines.