Florida E-Voting Machine Fails

cmason32 writes "An optical voting machine memory card failed earlier today in Daytona Beach, Florida, sending election officials scrambling to secure the 13,000 paper receipts. Without the paper ballots, all 13,000 votes would have been lost. Considering how close some predict this election to be, losing that many ballots would be catastrophic. Let's hope that we won't see any more of this in the next 24 hours, and that these problems are fixed before 2006."

Comments

I'm concerned about lost votes.

[alexatrit]

Regardless of the type of voting machine (optical readers, Diebold, or others), I'm still concerned about lost votes. I half-wanted to use the provisional ballot this morning, but when I asked the voting "official" about a paper ballot, she looked at me like I was crazy and said "we don't have any paper ballots here." Having untrained voting officials is going to bugger up this election as well.

Re:These are the good electronic voting machines

[Otter]

Voters fill in bubbles for the candidates they want, and the machine scans and counts the votes. The ballots are saved for just such a problem. Honestly, I don't know why all the electronic voting isn't like this. It's incredibly simple and efficient.

Personally, I prefer the punch ballots. It's probably just superstition, but removing a single chad seems much less ambiguous than the various bubble-filling exercises, where I'm never quite sure when enough is enough. Some of your neighbors seem to have problems with the chads, but I can't imagine they do so much better with "fill in the arrow".

The most satisfying, though, has got to be the old mechanical lever machines. You'd pick your slate, pull the bar and *CLANG*! Always really felt like striking a blow for democracy.

Re:These are the good electronic voting machines

[JCMay]

[I live in Brevard as well] You missed the best part-- unlike touchscreen panels, I don't have to wait for a voting booth to vote! I filled out my ballot standing in line and skipped the booth altogether! Much faster than doing it the "offical" way. :)

Lesser of two evils solution

[isotope23]

For those considering casting their vote for the lesser of two evils, check out Inverse vote pairing.

Find a family member or friend who would cancel out your lesser evil vote. Make a deal with them to both vote third party. You get to take a vote AWAY from your greater evil, and the third paties get two votes. If enough people did this when the candidates suck perhaps we'd have REAL debates?

If you want to do something about this...read this

[goombah99]

Don't just say "Oh my gosh" and rant here.

Moreover it does no good to have voter verified paper trails in your own precint if florida or california lacks them. That paper trail only secures your one vote. You want everyone elses secure too as errors elsewhere swamp your measly vote.

So rant to the persons who could actually do something about this: the head of NASED the organization that sets voting machine standards is Denise Lamb and the head of the National Association of Secretaries of state is Rebecca Vigil-giron. Tell them you are a professional programmer and give them your candid opinion about the need for voter verified paper trails. Currently they are outspoken in nation wide advocacy agains adding paper trails to touch screen voting.

Diebold Parania

[Ender77]

I just saw on cnn news about a woman who voted for Kerry but when she saw the screen showed her summary report it was for Bush. She called a lawyer and reviewed her selections with the election officials and it did show she selected kerry for her answers. They say it was "computer error" *Cough**bullshit**cough*

that's not right...

[St. Arbirix]

From TFA, emphasis added:
Members of each political party and the canvassing board must witness the recount process Tuesday.

How is this fair? When I voted this morning some positions were competitions between a Republican or Democrat and a third party, so you'd think several different parties would get called for the recount.

Does Florida not allow more than two parties to watch recounts?

Drudge Report Exit Poll Results

[Anonymous Coward]

These were posted to Drudge Report, and quickly yanked.
AZ CO LA MI WI PA OH FL MI NM MN WI IA NH
Kerry 45 48 42 51 52 60 52 51 51 50 58 52 49 57
Bush 55 51 57 48 48 40 48 48 47 48 40 43 49 41

Re:These are the good electronic voting machines

[AuMatar]

I once programmed a scan-tron machine. Its pretty simple- check the pixel data in a rectangular area around the bubble. See how many are abover a threshold for darkness. If the number above the threshold is greater than a constant, its filled. a quick strike with a marker is sufficient to fill one, it does not need to be filled ot the edges. Writing an X or a check in there will also be picked up.