No Secret Ballot for Military Personnel?

belmolis writes "According to this editorial in today's New York Times, US military personnel for whom regular absentee ballot procedures are inconvenient are being provided with a questionable alternative, the Electronic Transmission Service, run by a private contractor, Omega Technologies. According to the NYT, the secrecy of ballots could be breached when they are faxed or emailed from the field, when they are in the hands of Omega Technologies, or when they are in the hands of local officials. The NYT was unable to obtain any information on security procedures from the company or from the Pentagon. A manual describing the system can be downloaded here [pdf document]. Like Diebold, Omega is far from non-partisan. Omega President and CEO Patricia Williams has donated $6,600 in this election cycle to the National Republican Congressional Committee and is a member of its Business Advisory Council."

Comments

That is only one corruption of thousands.

[Futurepower(R)]

There are many, many situations of this nature. See Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government

Re:why voting anonymous anyway

[Superjhemp]

Am i somehow under threat if i vote for kerry or bush or even the communist party candidate and gasp someone finds out :o

Maybe not you, but lots of other people might feel uncomfortable to vote Democrat if their boss votes Republican. A threat doesn't need to be a threat to your health and lifelyhood; a threat to your career is more than enough.

And then, there's the specter of "vote buying". If ballots are secret, it's much more difficult to buy votes, because you cannot be sure that they guy whose vote you bought really voted the way he promised ;-)

And then, the special case of the armed forces. Even if Joe the Soldier is brave enough to vote Democrat (knowing full well that his hierarchy would prefer Republican), and does not care that his might lead to his removal from the armed forces, we still have a problem: Now suddenly the Republicans have an army at their disposal which they know that they can trust. No risk of the army siding with the people, if ordered to commit unconstitutional acts, because the Republicans will have "weeded out" the untrustworthy elements before.

Ummm...

[The Tyro]

That wouldn't put a huge dent in the military, which tends to vote republican 80+ percent of the time (I saw a statistic at one time that showed military officers voted republican 8 to 1 over democrat... Here's an article about the Duke Study ).

I'd have to say from my own experience (former military officer talking here) that the percentage is probably higher than they think. I can count on one hand the number of real liberal democrats I encountered during all my years in the military.

Bush is respected by almost all the current and former US military personnel I know, in distinct contrast to Bill Clinton. When I was in the service, many officers and enlisted so despised Clinton that they refused to display any certificates, awards, decorations, citations, etc with his signature on them. Despite the prohibition on using "contemptuous words" against the commander-in-chief and elected officials, most guys were (privately) very frank about how they felt... The level of enmity was really remarkable.

Re: Ummm...

[The Tyro]

On the off chance that you really don't know, I'll try to offer some context.

Much of the ill will regarding clinton came from his history. He stated that he "loathed the military", and subsequently dodged the draft. Despite this, he still managed to get himself elected commander in chief... that really rankled the older vietnam-era guys that were still around... some of them couldn't say Clinton's name without spitting. They resented very much having to salute and take orders from him (the younger guys resented Clinton for the same reasons, but it was really palpable among the older guys).

Clinton's sexual indiscretions were also a huge liability. Military members can be prosecuted under the UCMJ for adultery alone; sexual indiscretions with a subordinate (ie. Miss Lewinsky) are even worse. Many active duty members felt that Clinton, as commander in chief, should be held to the same standard. It's a pretty terrible example to set when the commander gets off for something that would earn a lowly Sergeant a court-martial...

Note: we haven't even started talking about his politics.

Anyway, that'll get you started... I'm sure some others in this forum can add some additional thoughts.

What pissed off the military last time...

[MyNameIsFred]

I know several people in the military, who were absolutely enraged with the last election because their absentee ballots were'nt counted. See this for example. They were far more angry that their vote was usurped, then they were concerned about someone seeing their vote.

Re:Gain control over the military first

[Mr. Slippery]

Whether the democrats like it or not the majority of military is behind their Command-In-Chief and will in all likelyhood vote for him again.

Actually I've discussed the question with a few military people, and none planned to vote for Bush. Indeed, one Army officer pointed out to me that, given the "backdoor draft" going on, members of the Guard and Reserves "would be idiots" (his words) to vote for Bush. (Of course, I live in a pretty solid "blue" state.)

I can also tell you first hand, that if your knowledge of the events in Afghanistan and Iraq is from the news media then you are basically ignorant of reality. The vast majority of the Iraqs' and Afghanistans' citizens are very glad the US stepped in and helped...Someday the true events will be revealed and you guy's will be amazed at how totally clueless you were.

Right, I'm going to take the word of an Anonymous Coward on this. As if all the bombing and shooting was actually just an old Iraqi way of greating visitors.