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A Tale of Election Intrigue Wins Bruce Schneier's 8th Movie-Plot Contest

Posted by timothy on from the 3d-parties-are-all-terrorists-anyhow dept.

On April 1, Bruce Schneier announced his eighth Movie-Plot Threat Contest; this time around, he asked for a story that showed the evils of encryption, and found a winner in a story that describes an untraceably encrypted U.S. election in the year 2020 -- the first American election to allow on-line voting -- which results in victory for an unexpected third-party candidate.

57 comments

  1. More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It sounds more like a bad design for voting system and not so much as encryption is bad.

    I am not be surprised if half ass stories like this will be used to pull the FUD and anti-encryption propaganda to full speed and used to brainwash clueless people around the world.

    1. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by jargonburn · · Score: 1

      Well, obviously it's a poorly designed encryption or voting system (or maliciously tampered with)...after all, there's no other way a third-party candidate could win!

    2. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Well yeah, that's the evil part, only the two primary parties are good after all!

    3. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by luvirini · · Score: 2

      Well, they have to invent something silly like that as they cannot tell the truth.

      As example:
      The current electronic voting systems are basically really bad in security. A lot of it being the lack of encryption and checks making alterations of the data too easy.

      A good voting system would include elements like encryption with a verifying element that is encrypted with a private key that only the voter has. Basically when you vote you would get a vote number and you would use your private key to encrypt your vote and your identity and likely some encrypted verifying value from the voting system. then your encrypted thing and the public vote would be checksummed and you would get the total checksum too. Thus the vote would not hold any information that allows anyone else to identify what you voted unless they have your private key. After the election you could then check that the vote is correct by retrieving the vote by the number and verifying that the checksum and the hidden info is correct and is the same a the public vote and if there is a problem you could prove that you actually cast the vote by the hidden information, thus just a single wrongly tallied vote would cause an investigation to what happened if that vote was cast by someone who is interested.

      There are many other possible ways to do things too, but that is just an example of a way to have encryption help the voting system too..

    4. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Dr_Barnowl · · Score: 1

      Electronic is a bad design for a voting system, because only a tiny priesthood of nerds can audit it. It's easy to get wrapped up in all the cool cryptographic technology, it's undeniably fun, but something as important as deciding the figurehead of the free world should be open to inspection. And a counting room composed ofa few square millimetres of impure silicon is not. Use a pencil, and hand count ballots.

    5. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Isn't there already a comedy with this story line. Something about a comedian making a joke about running for president, and then actually getting into office, then hi-jinks and then he steps down at the end of the movie? Likely came about after King Ralph.

      Could just be thinking of a fever dream of Colbert.

    6. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by luvirini · · Score: 1

      Hand counting seems have it's own problems including:

        It seem mostly to be a lottery if the vote is close. As in every situation where there are recounts it seems that every recount gives a different result.

      All the fun with what votes to disqualify.

      You still need to verify the chain where the information from the hand counting is done to where the information is centrally collected and the actual central location processes.

      An individual voter will have no way of verifying that their vote was counted correctly and thus is actually not open to inspection.

      And likely others..

      A properly designed system built along the lines I posted above would actually allow for way more verifiability and openness.

      Basically it would require a nerd to actually program verifier, but if all the data and the interfaces for reading them are open, there is nothing preventing a non-nerd from using a program done by others to verify things and I can guarantee that in such a system there would be quite many non-nerds who are both politically interested enough and paranoid enough to run several verifier programs..

    7. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by JDAustin · · Score: 1

      Every vote should be backed up by a paper ballot.

      Every voter who makes that vote should be able to prove they are a legitimate voter for those votes.

    8. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      ... not hold any information that allows anyone else to identify what you voted ...

      You think a private key doesn't identify you? How will they find a public key to extract your vote if your file is truly anonymous? Then there's the problem of giving everyone a key pair, creating an voting-booth key-upload and encryption mechanism, downloading every file and the voter's identity, then accessing a database holding the voter's public key. It requires much infrastructure and little anonymity.

      This protects the vote from departure to counting. It doesn't stop the voting machine changing your vote before check-sum and encryption. (IE a nice little algorithm saying every 3rd voter under 30 is Republican, and every 2nd older voter is Republican.)

      The best hope is a universal private key in the voting machine, a universal public key in the tallying room. The votes are anonymous again, with a single point of failure: The private key can be stolen, enabling ballot-box stuffing.

    9. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't know about you, but my electron is fatigued.

    10. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by garyisabusyguy · · Score: 1

      In 'Brewster's Millions', Richard Pryor runs for office to waste a lot of money and has his election motto be, 'Vote for none of the above', but he throws the election because the major plot point is that he needs to be penniless to inherit his fortune and the salary of office would blow it

      Then there was 'Dave' where an actor is a stand in for a President who dies, then finally fakes his own death to get eh right person into office.

      There still seems to be something out there that is closer to what you are mentioning but it isn't ringing a bell right now. If we are not careful Adam Sandler will use it as a plot for a movie

      --
      Wherever You Go, There You Are
    11. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      An AC down below found the movie.

      Man of the Year

    12. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Lennie · · Score: 1

      Maybe I didn't understand you correctly, or you should read this page on why we have secret ballots:
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      --
      New things are always on the horizon
    13. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You probably didn't understand. You being able to prove that a given ballot is yours is not the same thing as someone else being able to prove that a given ballot is yours. There are elaborate protocols for individual people to speak up and prove that their votes have been miscounted without compromising everyone else's secrecy. See Remotegrity for example: https://eprint.iacr.org/2013/2... (I'm not advocating this as it's ridiculously complex; but some seemingly impossibly problems really can be solved using advanced crypto.)

    14. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Hognoxious · · Score: 1, Insightful

      If I can prove the ballot is mine, then so can someone looking over my shoulder while I do it. Especially if he's pointing a gun at me.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    15. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by luvirini · · Score: 2

      Ok trying to explain again:

      I bring with me: My key and my "computer". The computer can be any device with a voting software, where the client end is open specification so the computer can be a cell phone, table, laptop, SDC based thing or whatever. The idea being that there will be many implementations and anyone who cares enough can code their own.

      The officials verify who I am and direct me to the voting booth

      I connect my computer via some standard cable to the voting machine.

      The voting machine sends me a plain text random number "serial number" and the same number along with some other information encrypted with their key(or actually one of really many keys).

      My program takes that plain text number and stores it.

      My program will then take my vote, encrypt it along with some other data. And then combine my plain text vote, my encrypted vote(+identifying info) and their encrypted serial number(+identifying info) and then calculate check sum on the whole thing, storing the checksum.

      It will then transmit my vote to the voting machine.
      The voting machine will then show what I voted(the public part), the "serial number" and the checksum they calculated(and likely somewhere on the whole thing if I want to see it) and I should then verify that the vote and the checksum are the same as on my own screen.

      After I press of the vote is then sent away.

      All such votes are then collected and you can connect to a web server where all such are displayed and you can either get the whole list or just a single vote based on the serial number.

      The information there that is thus available for everyone is serial number+vote+encrypted gibberish+checksum

      Thus anyone can count the public votes and you can check your own vote by checking the public vote based on the number you have stored and then comparing the gibberish and checksum to your gibberish and checksum and if need be unencrypt your hidden vote and compare.

      If there is then later a question of tampering, then I can verify my own vote and if I there is need to show that it was indeed the vote then as example a court appointed panel/person can then with me do the following:
      I will give them my key and they will give me the key that corresponds to that serial number.

      Thus both can then decrypt first my vote to see that the vote outside was the same as inside and then use the other key to decrypt the other blob inside that should contain the serial number.

      And that idea might well still have some holes, but if you do your flip of 50% probability of me being republican as in your example I then have 50% chance of noticing your algorithm and if while a single case of such might become a "he says she says thing" like "there is a bug at your end" or whatever the skin doctors come up with, a pattern like that will be readily apparent even if only a fairly low number of people check their votes(and because of the fanaticism of some people when it comes to politics and the paranoia bout technology quite many non geek people will check I think, some using several programs..)

      And yes I know the practical problems of making all that actually work are not trivial because of people...

      But my point above is not to suggest that exactly that system has to be used, but a system where both parties keys are used to encrypt the thing and both parties can thus only decrypt one layer and then putting it all in public with the otherwise anonymously but with a reference you have along with the public vote and checksum allows for checking.

      Will something like that be implemented? likely not.. as people like the current machines where cheating on the system side is easy it seems...

    16. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure, but you would have to do that to every individual. That's not the same thing as having all of the ballots public.

    17. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Livius · · Score: 1

      It was an excellent design - it achieved its intended purpose. They could have put a little more effort into the plausible deniability.

    18. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by the_other_chewey · · Score: 1

      There's also "Bulworth":

      Politician is finished due to $I_don't_remember, and decides to put a contract on his
      own head. So now that he doesn't give a damn anymore, he is honest towards everybody
      for the rest of the campaign (and his life), which unexpectedly proves to be hugely popular.

      It doesn't end well.

    19. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Hotawa+Hawk-eye · · Score: 1

      Thus anyone can count the public votes and you can check your own vote by checking the public vote based on the number you have stored and then comparing the gibberish and checksum to your gibberish and checksum and if need be unencrypt your hidden vote and compare.

      And the person who threatened to harm you or your family or fire you from you job unless you voted the way they wanted, or who offered to pay you after the election if you voted the way they wanted, can do the same by requesting that you provide them that secret information or allow them to look over your shoulder as you check your vote.

    20. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by skids · · Score: 1

      This. Part of these systems has to be that you cannot prove to another person how you voted, whle still allowing you to prove to yourself that your vote was correctly counted. There are schemes for that but they mostly require the voter to be intellectually able to trust mathematics.

      --
      Someone had to do it.
    21. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by luvirini · · Score: 1

      Correct. But given that if someone today threatens to harm your family in a believable way unless you bring a photo of the filled in ballot.. given how hard it is to stop something like bringing in a cell phone with you.

      How many people would then have the internal fortitude to fake it?

      So yes, there is a degree of difference but not as much as you indicate.

    22. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Kremmy · · Score: 1

      If hand counted ballots were effective, we wouldn't have the winners announced the day of the polling. It takes more time to count the votes than that. They don't even wait a few days to make a show of it, just announce the winner when only a small amount of votes have actually been counted. Electronic voting has greater ability to be verifiable and accurate, as opposed to this charade we get now.

    23. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Also, it enabled you to sell your vote.

    24. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's hard to scale, at least at present. Some folks can surreptitiously photograph their own ballots, but polling locations can fight back with various anti-photography measures. Also, voters can mar or destroy their ballot after taking the photo, making the proof less reliable.

    25. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      1. Go into booth.
      2. Mark the candidate you are paid to vote for.
      3. Take photo.
      4. Go back to the people handing out the ballots, explain you marked the one person by mistake.
      5. Receive new ballot.
      6. Go back in to the booth
      7. Mark real candidate.
      8. Profit.

    26. Re:More like a bad design for voting system by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      1. You failed to account for how to prove that the count that comes out of the system matches the votes that were put in.

      2. Now explain your system so that any random voter can understand the security of it. Including my mother who decides she cannot understand it, if you get technical at all (e.g. using such technical words as "computer"), and gives up if it takes more than 15 seconds.

    27. Re: More like a bad design for voting system by Cinnamon+Beige · · Score: 1

      If I can prove the ballot is mine, then so can someone looking over my shoulder while I do it. Especially if he's pointing a gun at me.

      The same can be done with secret ballots at the time the ballot is filled out, which is why polling booths are set up so nobody ought to be able to see what you enter. What you want, really, is a way to do a zero-knowledge proof that the ballot is yours--and possibly which will only give access to something that can in turn be used to do a zero-knowledge proof that its contents are correct. Is it really necessary to know more than if your ballot was tampered with, if it ensures that even somebody looking over your shoulder will not know anything about its contents?

      I just wouldn't overall trust the safety of online voting because I don't expect the security to be sufficient.

  2. That's The Ticket by mentil · · Score: 2

    Why no, Agent... Dontneedtoknow, is it? I have this document titled "Audacious plan to overthrow the evil plutocracy" on my computer because I'm writing it for a contest held by a security researcher, not because I'm a terrorist who has the knowhow to do all the illegal things outlined in this step-by-step document.

    *gets blackbagged and dragged to Gitmo*

    --
    Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
    1. Re:That's The Ticket by KGIII · · Score: 1

      How cute. You think you are going to land in the plane. Your body will be stuffed in an ammo case and dropped out of a C-130 somewhere over the South Pacific. After they use the wrench method of data extraction...

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    2. Re:That's The Ticket by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      For those of you who don't know the wrench method, here it is. Don't forget to hover.

    3. Re:That's The Ticket by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah, it would be cheaper to avoid all the trouble and just make it look like an accident. But don't worry, the rest of us are free.

  3. Shame it could never happen by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It would be handled swiftly by some secret guys in the name of national security.

  4. Robin Williams movie? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    http://m.imdb.com/title/tt0483726/?ref_=m_nmfmd_act_23

    1. Re:Robin Williams movie? by Culture20 · · Score: 1

      Yes, but what's the rule on how long to wait before a reboot?

  5. Wouldn't have been the first time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    a terrorist was elected president, nor even the first time by a voting problem.

    1. Re:Wouldn't have been the first time by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      a terrorist was elected president, nor even the first time by a voting problem.

      The only difference between George W. Bush and Barack H. Obama is their skin colour. In every other way these persons are carbon copies of the same traitor. Bush's ignorance was due to puppet masters Carl Rove and Richard Cheney. Obama, a constitutional scholar, treats the US Constitution with more disdain and contempt than his immediate predecessor. When will the People rise up and take back their Government?

    2. Re:Wouldn't have been the first time by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 2

      When will the People rise up and take back their Government?

      Sorry, the people are too concerned with more important things. Things like whether or not Kim Kardashian's ass was Photoshoped or if the dress is blue or gold.

  6. Impossible by markdavis · · Score: 1

    >"which results in victory for an unexpected third-party candidate.

    What a silly fantasy plot to even think of something so impossible with our unfair voting system. Now, if the plot ALSO says we finally switched to some form of instant runoff voting, then it might be possible to have a third-party win.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
    http://www.fairvote.org/

    1. Re:Impossible by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 1

      And here I'd assumed the result was a side-effect of the "weak encryption" that was specified as an assumption. In other words, the Third Party guy won because the system was hacked....

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
    2. Re:Impossible by toonces33 · · Score: 1

      Maybe not weak encryption, but that's my read as well - the system got hacked by some unspecified means, and the system was "designed" in such a way that there was no to do an audit to filter out bogus ballots.

      There is a fascinating tradeoff between having an anonymous ballot and the ability to do an audit and/or recount.

  7. It's not a good movie plot/subplot by Junta · · Score: 1

    The scenario actually isn't a very good movie plot. If it was about some goofy mixup electing an incompetent to office as part of a comedy rather than a drama, then the absurdity would be believed. As it stands trying to be a dramatic work, it falls into the same trap a lot of geeks have in imagining their day in court: technicalities do not trump the human element. The premise is that an obviously guy subverts the first online election without gaining genuine popular support and overcoming the established power structure and the nation would somehow let that stand.

    It's not believable because such a result would be nullified so fast, even if no one has a precedent for doing so. I know the whole point is to be over the top, but there is also the goal of being plausible enough to work in a drama.

    Actually I think this one and the child pornography one are the two worst of the five. Note none of them I think would be the main plot of a film, but would make decent subplots to drive the story.

    --
    XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
    1. Re:It's not a good movie plot/subplot by Cinnamon+Beige · · Score: 1

      The scenario actually isn't a very good movie plot. If it was about some goofy mixup electing an incompetent to office as part of a comedy rather than a drama, then the absurdity would be believed. As it stands trying to be a dramatic work, it falls into the same trap a lot of geeks have in imagining their day in court: technicalities do not trump the human element. The premise is that an obviously guy subverts the first online election without gaining genuine popular support and overcoming the established power structure and the nation would somehow let that stand.

      It's not believable because such a result would be nullified so fast, even if no one has a precedent for doing so. I know the whole point is to be over the top, but there is also the goal of being plausible enough to work in a drama.

      Actually I think this one and the child pornography one are the two worst of the five. Note none of them I think would be the main plot of a film, but would make decent subplots to drive the story.

      Actually, it could also make the good basis for the story. For example, the lack of a precedent probably would still result in the sociopolitical and legal angles of being stuck with what is a (hopefully verifiable) corrupt election, as odds are good that some countries would protest the nullification anyway and then you hit the question of "Why would anybody be this obvious?" Is it somebody wanting to make a point about how encryption isn't magic, or just really incompetent rigging of the election? And that's before you get into the normal consequences of an election being nullified: you have to run another election. Which is expensive.

      It might actually be most interesting to have it be an outside party who simply wanted to cause chaos--and thus doesn't care that it'd almost certainly get nullified--or who doesn't understand the system well enough to realize that it'd be noticed. Perhaps part of the proof of rigging and lack of popular support is that the third party wasn't actually on the ballot in enough states to win? Their candidate knowingly ran simply to keep his (her?) party in the game: at least in some states, getting onto the ballot in the first place is enough harder than staying on that the payoff of running somebody who can't win is actually better than not spending the money at all.

      Though, really, you're right about this not being only the this would make the concept not a subplot but the basis of the actual plot: The things which happen early in the first act of the movie so we can get to the interesting parts.

  8. I think elections already got hacked by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    There has been many proof of concept in election rigging. And the last presidential primary, that republican guy running against Obama, whatever his name was, he got the infamous 51% vote in a certain critical place. Before I even heard of the 51% vote, the election box was "lost" at an old lady's house for several hours. There was all kinds of shadiness going on there.

  9. M. Night Shyamalan by The+Grim+Reefer · · Score: 1

    I think they should get M. Night Shyamalan to direct it. Granted, he hasn't done a good movie in some time, but he can have a truly interesting twist at the end.

    In the end, the encryption will be so good that no one will be able to tamper with the ballots and that's why the independent wins. It'll be discovered that people have been voting for non-major party candidates for decades. They've just been too scared to admit it, and it ends up the two major parties have been rigging the elections against the will of the people since Lincoln.

    Now that would be a movie worth seeing.

  10. my plot by Kishin · · Score: 2

    So, how did you all like mine [1]? The goal was to show the danger of their double standard: they get ironclad security; we get backdoors. They argue that anonymity, encryption, and security can be the end of the country. I argue that, if true, then it's also a confession on their part. ;)

    [1] https://www.schneier.com/blog/...

    1. Re:my plot by KGIII · · Score: 1

      I figured you took the time to write it and had the courage to post it here so somebody has an obligation to read it. I also figured I was the one bored person here who would be interested in supporting you. So, I read it. I can honestly say that it was fairly well written (some punctuation issues and some sketchy dialogue but your point remained the same and it was easy enough to understand) and that the plot was actually better than some of the others on that page. I was no longer bored and I appreciate you sharing.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    2. Re: my plot by Kishin · · Score: 1

      Lol. It seems we entertained each other.

    3. Re: my plot by KGIII · · Score: 1

      Someone had to read it because of your willingness to write it, post it here, and be open to criticism. You did, after all, ask what we thought - not something I would always recommend here on /. but it has been okay for you so far. Anyhow, I figured I would read your mindless drivel. I was pleasantly surprised to find out it was neither mindless or drivel. I would have said it was "okay" or something and concentrated on mentioning the good parts, if there were any. Fortunately I did not have to leave a vague reply as it was legitimately interesting. I recommend other people read your submission and that you consider fleshing it out. You never know when a television show will be along those lines and accept a submitted script and pay you for it. Alternatively you could post it somewhere and allow others to edit it and add to it. It could be an open source book and then you could even call it something like Musings of Nerds.

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  11. What kind of a fantasy do you live in? by denzacar · · Score: 1

    If I can prove the ballot is mine, then so can someone looking over my shoulder while I do it. Especially if he's pointing a gun at me.

    ...where people with guns force people to democratically vote-in the candidate supported by the people with guns?

    People with guns don't need threatening or votes.
    They have the guns and are willing to use them as a tool of political influence. The simplest way is not threatening but shooting the dissenters.
    After all... you only have to do it once.

    And that's if people are stupid enough to try to argue the legitimacy of results with a bullet.

    --
    Mit der Dummheit kämpfen Götter selbst vergebens
    1. Re:What kind of a fantasy do you live in? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I can prove the ballot is mine, then so can someone looking over my shoulder while I do it. Especially if he's pointing a gun at me.

      [What kind of a fantasy do you live in?] ...where people with guns force people to democratically vote-in the candidate supported by the people with guns?

      People with guns don't need threatening or votes.
      They have the guns and are willing to use them as a tool of political influence. The simplest way is not threatening but shooting the dissenters.
      After all... you only have to do it once.

      And that's if people are stupid enough to try to argue the legitimacy of results with a bullet.

      You clearly haven't been to Zimbabwe, then.

    2. Re:What kind of a fantasy do you live in? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      That might be down to the snappily-named 'if you actually do shoot lots of people the international community tend to slightly notice a bit and tut-tut a little. But if you just beat them up and kill a select few (like the opposition leader's family in a "road accident" they barely notice at all' effect.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  12. Bogus plot -- didn't the 2000 election teach us? by intnsred · · Score: 2

    I don't like the winning plot at all; it ignores reality and the Constitution.

    Forget about encryption or electronic voting -- didn't the 2000 election teach us anything when Al Gore got more of the votes from the American people across the country but George W. Bush took the White House? Does this plot presume we had a constitutional amendment to do away with the undemocratic Electoral College?

    The US Constitution clearly says that the president is elected by the Electoral College. There are only 535 members of the electoral college. We could call them via phone calls in a couple of hours to see how they voted.

    But don't let me get in the way of a good fairy tale... :-)

  13. Re:Bogus plot -- didn't the 2000 election teach us by Keybounce · · Score: 1

    The question is not, who did the electoral college vote for.

    The question is, who did the states send to the electoral college.

  14. Re:Bogus plot -- didn't the 2000 election teach us by blackanvil · · Score: 1

    Well, yes, this is a "Hollywood Terrorist Plot" after all. If something like this happened IRL, said terrorist's organization would be unable to provide the electoral college members (I'm assuming "no campaign effort" includes no affiliated political party that would have such electors pre-selected.) The state governments would select and instruct the electors, local laws to the contrary be damned, to vote for one of the main candidates, and in the end the gathered electors would decide amongst themselves who should be president instead. There is no federal law requiring the elector to vote as "pledged," so there is no Constitutional or even Federal barrier to this, and given the scenario, most likely even the local laws would be suspended to allow the electors to vote accordingly. Of course, the scenario is ridiculous, even if we did get a thoroughly-hacked election somehow, I suspect all that would happen is the results thrown out, and a new election held using traditional tools held a few weeks later.

  15. Re:Bogus plot -- didn't the 2000 election teach us by ericfitz · · Score: 1

    We might not have the electoral college by 2020:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

  16. Re:Bogus plot -- didn't the 2000 election teach us by intnsred · · Score: 1

    That's an interesting concept.

    But it does not do away with the undemocratic Electoral College, it just massages the system to force the Electoral College electors to vote for the winner of the popular vote.

    As such, it's likely an improvement, but to me the fact that this strategy is being used highlights the broken nature of our political system and the fact that it is simply too difficult to amend the Constitution so such end-around moves have to be done to reform/change things.