I was thrilled last spring to move to a Blue state. Still am, except for one major deficiency here. Our voting machine systems. Most of the rest of the free world, at least here in the good old U.S. of A., has discovered the flaws and huge risks present with DRE voting machines.
Risk one here is the complete absence of a voter verifiable paper trail with our ancient Danaher 1242 DRE system. Further risk, the inability to have a verifiable recount. Should we have a squeaker election like the recent AG race in Virginia, we and the candidates would be screwed. What you get out of a DRE system is a REPRINT, not a recount. Thus, a recount would only be able to rely on provisional and maybe mail ballots for recounting. That’s only a partial recount. Pretty scary for a process involving casting your vote into a black box.
This deficiency was pointed out long ago across the land by voting rights groups, and as a result, now 34 states have instituted some kind of voter verifiable paper ballot/trail voting system. Many have dumped their DRE’s for optical scanning systems which have a scannable paper ballot.
It is generally acknowledged by voting system techies that virtually all electronic systems are hackable, even optical scanners. Definitive studies on this have been done in such large voting jurisdictions as California and Ohio. Hacking tests have been run all over the country to demonstrate just how quick and easy it is to jack with the vote via voting software. Check out the work of such experts as Professor Dan Wallach of Rice University. Thus, arduous testing regimes are put it place with many voting jurisdictions, both pre-voting and during the voting cycle.
Yes, I know, you can manipulate votes also with regular old paper ballot and their counting processes. No, nothing is perfect, but why does Delaware have among the most imperfect voting protections in the country according to Common Cause and Rutgers U.?
I can’t find a single local Democrat to show the slightest interest in this issue so central to a functional democracy. Maybe it is because we’re in a pretty amazing majority here and I’m just carrying over my own paranoia from 45 years of voting in Republican dominated Texas.
But, at the very least, isn’t it time to upgrade a 17 year old voting technology here? And while doing so, enhance our protection of the sacred vote? Neighboring Maryland is doing so by dumping the infamous Diebold DRE system and temporarily, until a replacement can be agreed on, reverting to paper ballots for an upcoming election.
Didn’t someone suggest “trust but verify”?