Rig the machine so that it doesn't print what it says it's printing.
That'd be a neat trick seeing as how the voter who uses the ballot marking device still gets to see and hold the ballot before he casts it. It would also be a neat trick when you consider that the vast majority of voters will be filling out their ballots by hand.
P.S. Running machine candidates with major avenues named after their namesake granddaddies is a pretty sure-fire way to rig the democratic process, too, although it has nothing to do with voting machines.
Yeah and drawing your own election district is also a way to rig the process. Are we talking about those issues or voting technology here?
How about electronic vote tabulation device manufacturer?
Yes, that's it. You've found me out. I'm actually a Diebold employee who has established himself on/. by posting thousands of comments in hundreds of unrelated stories over a period of five years just so I could astroturf the stories relating to voting technology.
Policies and procedures aren't going to matter when you have no idea what the electronic signals are doing inside of a device.
What part of the paper ballots are retained is so hard for you to understand?
Counter Point #1 Ballot Marking Devices fail electronically during elections
If the ballot marking device fails then there is nothing stopping the handicapped voter from having a friend or family member assist them with filling out a paper ballot. For that matter, the poll workers themselves can assist the voter if they request help. It does take two of us from different political parties though (to avoid the appearance of trying to influence the vote)
Counter Point #2 Ballot Marking Devices have marked ballots incorrectly
So have human beings, so I guess any system that relies on pen and paper is equally suspect.
Counter Point #3 most users don't check their ballots are marked correctly
That's not my problem. I check that my ballot is filled out correctly before I deposit it. When we used the lever machines I also checked to make sure that the levers I wanted were indeed the ones I pulled down before I cast my ballot. If you can't be bothered to review your ballot before you cast it then I don't have much sympathy for you.
Oh, and btw, go fuck yourself for accusing me of lying. I'll have more respect for you when you put your money where your mouth is and go work a day at the polls. Until then you are just mouthing off about a subject that you know little about other than what you read on/. and Wikipedia.
If someone, for instance, uses child labor or pollutes, and the majority of people don't think that is fair, these societies enforce ostracism of the offender.
Laws against child labor and pollution are not incompatible with Libertarianism. If you believe otherwise than you don't know much about Libertarianism. Pollution directly threatens my peaceful enjoyment of my property and the value thereof. Children lack the capacity to enter into contracts and make informed decisions, thus it is generally regarded as permissible for the state to restrict their right to make such decisions until they reach the age of majority.
We can have a socialist democracy with an open and accountable government
I don't want a socialist democracy or any democracy for that matter. Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner. It's a great deal if you are one of the wolves but doesn't work out so well for the sheep. The United States is a Constitutional Republic, not a Democracy. If you think it should be a Democracy then perhaps you should start by advocating for the disbanding of the United States Senate?
We want open and transparent governance.
Another thing that Obama promised you. Tell me, how happy are you with the results?
This is not impossible, as some would have us believe.
History suggests it is.
What exactly are the 'fruits of your labor?'
The wages that I earn working for my employer. The monies and/or goods that I earn doing jobs on the side.
I believe in democratic control of the means of production as the only fair and equitable way to distribute natural resources.
Then you believe in something which has proven to be a complete disaster every single time that it's been tried. At it's best Governmental control of the means of production results in a system that's inefficient and which doesn't live up to it's full potential. At it's worst it results in a corrupt system that results in the ruling class craving out a different set of rules for themselves and seeking to profit from their position in much the same way as the businessman that you hate so much. Except these guys can back up their decisions with guns and tanks -- something that Bill Gates is obviously unable to do.
"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of misery."
You appear to think that what you earn is objectively determined, fair, and has nothing to do with the use of force or the oppression of others.
I have never pretended that there isn't unfairness in our society. I'm just skeptical that more government is the solution. So far you've said nothing that would change my mind. In fact some of your arguments seem to further validate my skepticism, namely "We can have an open and transparent government", meaning that you acknowledge that government as it exists today is anything but.
Every single time that Government is used to impose "fairness" it invariably results in exactly the opposite for at least a portion of the citizenry. As a case in point, I'm put at a competitive disadvantage because of crimes that were committed by people who were dead long before I was born. How is that fair or just?
But you seem to be advocating a government that employs coercion to enforce your particular view of what you earned.
My "particular view of what I've earned"? You don't think I have the right to assume that I've earned my paycheck? See, this is why you can advocate for a system that steals from the haves in order to supply the have nots -- you've convinced yourself that anybody in the "have" category must have gotten th
See, now this is how I know you aren't a liberal by any stretch of the imagination:
Did I claim at any point in our conversation that I was a liberal?
Socialism is not bad
Yes it is. Socialism by it's very definition relies on the state to impose "fairness". The problem is that "fairness" is an objective term and that the people who are deciding what's fair rarely include themselves in the calculation. Socialism encourages the growth of Government and it's been my experience that the larger the government the more potential there is for corruption. I tend to agree with the quote that says "A Government big enough to give you everything that you want is big enough to take away everything that you have."
take away firearms, or restrict free speech
Where did I associate either of those issues with socialism? I associated them with the United States Democratic Party. I did this to show you that where you see evil in the GOP (the religious right going into your bedroom) others can see it in the Democrats. Do you dispute that the so-called "fairness doctrine" is being pushed by "progressive" Democrats or that the base of the Democratic Party is rabidly in favor of tight gun control?
Those are anti socialist lies created by the ruling class to further their class war against the workers and the poor.
The problem is that the "ruling class" we are offered by the left in the United States is just as bad if not worse. I've attempted to explain this numerous times but you are not interested in hearing it. The workers and the poor aren't going to be the ruling class in your socialist paradise -- the ruling class is still going to be the same old group of corrupt politicians. All you've accomplished under socialism is to grow the government to the point that they have even more power over our day to day lives.
And really, "class war against the workers and the poor"? Is that really how you see our country? You think there's a class war being waged against the poor in a country where almost half of the population isn't asked to pay a dime of income tax and wherein large numbers of people actually get more money back than they paid in? If your view is that clouded it's no wonder you can't have an objective discussion about politics.
The Republican party's policies all boil down to one overriding principle: will this policy help provide cheaper labor for the ruling class.
Which explains why it was a Republican that established the EPA, a Republican that expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit, a Republican that established the medicare drug benefit, blah, blah, blah, blah. I don't know why you insist on making these sweeping generalizations when it's obvious that your intellectual capacity is advanced enough to allow for a much more nuanced view of the world. You are every bit as ideologically driven and convinced of your own superiority as the Republican ideologues that I've met in my day. The fact that you can't see this only adds to the irony.
The more you write, the less I believe you were ever, in any way, a liberal.
It took that much of my writing for you to come to that conclusion when I never claimed to be a liberal in the first place? I did say that I supported the Democratic Party and then Senator Obama for a time but I don't recall ever claiming that I was a liberal. I always considered myself a moderate Democrat and my disillusionment with the party started to happen right around the time the left wing of it became emboldened.
Libertarians believe the only real function of government is protecting their private property, and thus acting as the police force to keep their slaves in check
Yes, everybody who supports Libertarianism is doing so out of a desire to keep their slaves in check. Another sweeping generali
Surely that depends on the standards of voting privacy in your district, like whether you get a three-sided screen block or a complete booth with ceiling-to-floor curtains.
The voting booth is separate from the machine. The "voting booth" itself is nothing more than a plastic stand with a privacy screen and a supply of felt-tipped markers. The machine itself is in plain view of the election inspectors and everybody else who happens to be in the polling place. Trust me, you aren't going to be able to tamper with it without being caught during the election. After the election is another matter but that's why they have the backup memory card and myriad of seals on the machine.
And an election can be thwarted by leaving evidence of tampering in a district you want to disenfranchise.
If tampering is evident than the voting machine is going to receive closer scrutiny. The votes aren't automatically going to be discarded. If the "tampering" consists of removing the seals around the memory interface but not the ballot box and the number of ballots therein equals the number of signatures in the pool book then they are simply going to hand count the ballots (or scan them in a different machine). If the tampering consists of removing the seals around the ballot box then they will fall back on the aforementioned memory card that was removed after the election and returned to the Elections Board.
It's really not as easy to rig an election as people around here seem to think it is. I would encourage everybody who cares about this issue to volunteer to be a poll worker. The Election Boards are always looking for help and you'll get a chance to see the system from the inside. All it's going to cost you is a vacation day or two and some time. In some states you even get paid for doing it.
I have no incentive to hide anything as I'm not an employee of the Elections Board nor an office holder with a stake in the system. I became a poll worker because of the controversy surrounding this issue. I wanted to see for myself how the system worked. I came to it as a skeptic and after learning the procedures and seeing them in action have been convinced that the system is as secure as it can be expected to be.
How often has that happened in the history of American elections?
That is exactly the kind of dramatic detail that puts my fraud-detector on alert. "Look, it's so secure that it's even secure against problems you don't have!" Typical distraction.
So now you are complaining that the system is protected against disasters just because they rarely happen? Would you be happier with a system that left less of a paper trail?
As it happens, if you google "ballots lost in fire" you get a bunch of hits on the first page about fraud and failure related to electronic voting machines.
As I said, my experience is limited to the State of New York. In NYS we don't use direct electronic recording machines. You fill out a paper ballot that is then tabulated by an optical scanner. In the event of a disputed election the paper ballot is still around and any idiot can count it with the Mark I human eyeball.
The only part of our voting process that is "electronic" is the so-called "ballot marking device" that handicapped voters use. This is a machine that prints a paper ballot for those voters who are unable to write and have to rely on another interface (audio, sip and puff, foot pedals, etc.) The printed paper ballot is in the same format as the one that you would fill out as a non-handicapped voter and can be read by any human being.
Given the complete lack of transparency at all levels of any electronic voting system I am extremely suspicious of all of them
Evidently that's not all you are suspicious of, since you seem to think that I'm trying to hide something:)
The problem is that while I spend most of my usage near my home, I really, really want service when my car dies on the way to BFE State Park.
Then switch carriers. If you value having service out in the boonies then you ought to be willing to pay for that privilege. T-Mobile is able to offer cheaper plans because they haven't (as yet) invested the capital into building out their network in areas that cost more money to serve.
Personally I never worried about this because I'm capable of taking care of myself when my car dies out in the boonies. When you grow up out here you come to realize that it's foolhardy not to have supplies and tools for basic repairs on hand. At a minimum you should have a good multitool, a good socket wrench set, duct tape, WD-40, hose clamps/hose repair kit, a good flashlight with fresh batteries (a spare set doesn't hurt either) and extra anti-freeze.
You should also be carrying a good first aid kit, fire extinguisher, waterproof matches, enough drinking water to last for a few days and blankets (if you are in a cold climate). It's foolish to rely on the cell phone as your first line of defense against the unexpected. Far better to be prepared and only have to call for help as a last resort.
Remember that if you are forced to call for help you have no control over when it will arrive. It could take five minutes or it could take five days. You'd best be prepared.
The Republican base is truly frightening, on a Taliban level
The Democratic base is truly frightening, on a Lenin level. See how easy it is to put the shoe on the other foot? Can't you just admit that you are rationalizing the failings of the Democratic Party?
They are the American religious zealots who BY THEIR OWN ADMISSION want to turn America into a theocracy
So what? The Democratic liberal base wants to turn America into some sort of socialist paradise where people will be punished for being productive, the government will mandate "fairness" in free speech and nobody will be allowed to own a firearm. I really don't regard that as any improvement over the desires of the far-right.
Republicans and Democrats both want to pilfer my wallet and give it to their contributors, but only one of those two groups wants to invade my bedroom.
Right, and the second group wants to invade your gun safe, radio station and video game. I'm still waiting for you to tell me why this is better.
They seem to believe that God wants them to be rich because they are better than me
And Democrats seem to believe that I'm rich because I'm a selfish SOB who stole from the poor. See how absurd these types of sweeping generalizations are?
because I should know my place and not try to climb above it
Sounds like the Democratic politicians that think there should be a different standard for the elite and whom advocate in favor of "progressive" taxation that punishes people who have the nerve to make more money than the rest of the herd.
Sure, I'd like something else, but voting for anyone else but the Democrats in our current system is simply asking for the American Taliban to turn our country into a theocracy, and I will not have that.
And yet, amazingly enough the Republicans controlled all three branches of the Federal Government for six years and we didn't become a theocracy. So what you are really doing is supporting the political system that you claim to hate because you've been whipped up into a fearful frenzy and think that agents of the state are going to bash down your bedroom door and arrest you for having sex outside the confines of the missionary position between a married heterosexual couple.
It sounds to me like you've bought the fear being sold by the DNC hook, line and sinker. Eventually you'll wake up and realize that the shit they are shoveling is virtually the same as the shit that the Republicans are shoveling. The Democrats are just shoveling it from a different pile and using a different salesman to try and sell it to you.
The only problem with this is that you aren't going to get a few "private minutes" with the machine and that any competent election authority is going to seal the machine with tamper-evident seals.
I've worked as an elections inspector (poll worker) in the state of New York for the last five years. Every aspect of the machine (both the old style lever machines and the new optical scanning machines) that could be tampered with is sealed with numbered tamper evident devices. If the numbers on the seals don't match up with the records retained by the Board of Elections then you know the machine has been tampered with. This isn't rocket science people.
Our new machines go even further than that. They both retain the actual ballots themselves in a locked ballot box and retain a scanned image of those ballots on a memory card. The memory card is removed from the machine at the end of the election and hand delivered to the Board of Elections. It is designed to serve as a backup in the event that the machine is destroyed (i.e: building burns down) and the ballots are lost. The ballots themselves are only scanned by the machine and not marked in any way. In the event of an issue with the machine there is nothing stopping you from counting each ballot by hand with the Mark I human eyeball.
If you can find a way to rig an election in the State of New York then I'd be real interested in knowing about it. I've worked behind the scenes here for a long time and I haven't seen any vulnerabilities in the system. The only voting technology that I'd be concerned about is DRE (direct electronic record) -- but thankfully my state wasn't stupid enough to go that route.
Only two games in town: Verizon and AT&T. Everyone else is a bit player that doesn't have a real network.
That's not really a fair statement to make. T-Mobile is primarily an urban orientated carrier but they are a perfectly viable option for someone who spends 95% of his time in the metro area. Hell, I used them here in the sticks of Upstate NY for the better part of two years without issue. The only reason I switched away from them is because my girlfriend values the better coverage more than the cheaper monthly plan.
Sprint also roams on Verizon's network and has coverage anywhere Verizon does so I don't see how you can call them a "bit player". From the end-users perspective the results are the same -- the phone works anywhere that a Verizon phone does. Most people don't know or care that it's using a different network.
The US cellphone providers *WANT* you to think it's apples to oranges. They want you to get lost in the details of calling plans, perks, special cases, unlimited calling, times of day, all that rubbish.
I'm not lost in any details. Here's the detail I care about:
Last month's bill: $131.75 before taxes/governmental fees ($170+ with them but that's a bitch fest for another discussion)
Minutes used by myself and my four family members under the same plan: 5,741
Per minute cost: $0.0229
Per line cost: $26.35 (it must be noted that this is cheaper than most landline plans I've seen)
You'll forgive me if I don't feel that I'm being ripped off. For less than three cents a minute my family and I effectively have unlimited calling from almost anywhere in the United States. We also have unlimited text to go along with that, although that's more for the rest of the family as I don't really regard SMS as being particularly useful.
It's like how physicists count how much energy went into a system and how much energy went out, without having to fuss about details like friction or leaks or whatever.
In other words, it's not a complete comparison and is an overly simplistic talking point designed to say "US sux0r!" without bothering to dive into the nitty gritty of the issue.
Per area, I would guess that Finland has the US beat
In other words, you don't actually know and are just guessing based on your preconceived ideas about Finland and the United States? Thanks for clarifying that for us:)
at least when it comes to destroying cell phone towers.
I wouldn't venture a guess in either direction. I used to climb cell phone towers for a living. The natural disaster that comes along and destroys one of them is a pretty rare event. Disasters that disable service for whatever reason (power outage, loss of the trunk lines feeding the tower, equipment failure, etc) are much more common but even they don't happen often enough for it to be a real big problem. The users don't even notice most of the time unless they live in a rural area with a single point of failure (i.e: just one tower serving the whole town) or the disaster affected an entire region (major event like a hurricane or earthquake)
IOW, you don't mind overpaying for service because you get perks for "free"?
I don't think I'm overpaying for service when it works out to around $0.02 per minute. If you can find me a cellular plan that will let me use around 5,000 minutes per month on five different lines for less than $0.025/min then I'm all ears.
As with anything you have to know how to work the system and evaluate the different options. Postpaid cellular service can be a great deal for a lot of people (who talk on the phone a lot and value mobility) or a horrible waste of money for others (who don't talk much). It's up to the consumer to research the options that are available to him and to select the one that best matches his needs. If you are willing to do this then there is no reason why you can't get a great deal on wireless service here in the states.
If you aren't willing to do it and want the government to do it for you -- well, then you are going to deserve what you get in the end.
I hope we in the EU get to pay for INCOMING calls because I'd love to pickup the bill for every SMS-Spam or Telemarketing call I get... or not...
Actually over here it's illegal to call cell phones with such calls. I've never received any SMS Spam and the only unsolicited phone calls I've ever received on my cell phone were from a company that just got shut down by the FTC a few weeks ago (the auto warranty nonsense).
but after reading about your horrible healthcare ("pay or die")
No, that's not how our health care system works. "Pay or file bankruptcy" would be a better description. While such a system is far from ideal it's no where near as bad as "pay or die" and you ought to at least learn a little bit about how it works before you open your mouth and insert your foot.
bad telecommunications/internet
As opposed to the UK where landline users had the privilege of paying for local calls for the longest time and your ISPs are keeping logs of your activity to turn over to the Government?
lack of vacation time
I have four weeks of vacation time, 3 personal days and 12 sick days. This is for a private non-union company mind you -- I could get even better benefits if I sold my soul and went to work for the Government. How'd I get this? I negotiated for it.
and completely uncompetitive wages/working conditions
More stereotyping. If you have marketable skills then there is no other country on this planet where you'd rather be. Why do you think the best and the brightest continue to come here in spite of our many flaws?
We have a more realistic way to live your life... Clue: It isn't JUST about work/money.
You choose what matters to you and I'll choose what matters to me. Personally I would rather live in a country that isn't sleepwalking into a surveillance society and which trusts me enough to allow me to own firearms. We can play this game all day but for every stereotype you have of us I can probably come up with two for you. Now be a good mate for me and wave to the cameras on your way home, ok?
Oh, God no! You believed Obama? Now I understand, and kinda feel sorry for you. I didn't even believe Clinton, and I was young and naive when I voted for him.
Then I guess I should feel sorry for you, because I realized my mistake before election day:)
I honestly wish that the Republican party was not so dominated by religious wingnuts
I honestly wish the Democratic Party wasn't dominated by big city liberals that think they know what's best for the remainder of the country. I wish you had more people like Webb and Tester and less people like Schumer and Pelosi.
If you truly dug into my posting history as you threatened to do so earlier you would see that I have often condemned our political process for being held hostage to the wingnuts on both ends of the political spectrum. Our Legislators get to draw their own election districts and usually manage to do so in such a way that the real election happens during the primary. As a consequence of this they only need to answer to two constituencies: The hyper-partisan primary electorate and the special interest groups that donate the most money.
Our Legislators are choosing their voters instead of the voters choosing the Legislators -- and neither party is inclined to address this issue. Until they show a willingness to do so I have no intention of voting for any Republican or Democrat for Federal office. The lesser of two evils is still evil.
I want a smaller Federal government and fiscal responsibility
Then I hope you aren't voting for Republicans or Democrats.
In Europe (and most other regions outside of the US and Canada for that matter) the cellular user is not expected to pay the full cost of having wireless service. This is why other users who call your cell phone pay a premium for doing so and why the wireless customers over there often have free incoming calls. This is known as a "caller pays" model.
The US has (for better or worse) adopted a "subscriber pays" model wherein the wireless customer pays a higher price and for incoming minutes but those who call him and do so at the same rate as any other phone call (free in many/most cases). The US also has many perks that aren't part of most calling plans in other countries -- unlimited calling to X numbers, unlimited nights and weekends, unlimited mobile to mobile, etc, etc. Add in all of these perks and break down the monthly rate by the number of minutes used and many Americans wind up paying around $0.02-$0.03 per minute for their cellular phones.
It doesn't really tell us much to see a per month cost break down without looking at all of these other factors. In any case if you want to copy something from the rest of the world regarding wireless business models I would look at copying the concept of unlocked phones that are separate from contracts long before I'd look at copying their rate plans. I rather like to be able to call my friends who have cell phones without paying a penalty for doing so.
If there are few Republicans who believe that Obama was born outside the US, why is the media giving them so much coverage?
Why does the media give so much coverage to Michael Jackson/Paris Hilton/Britney Spears/Octomom when our troops are engaged in combat over in Afghanistan?
You act like you haven't ever posted here before, like you have no history, and you can claim anything you like because we can't look up what you've posted over the years.
If you start aiming your criticism at the Republicans, it will be a first for you on this site.
Go look up my posting history then. I spent the better part of 2008 as an Obama groupie before he reversed himself on FISA and showed that he was just another pandering politician with no principles of his own. I spent the better part of 2004-2008 bitching about the excesses of the GOP. While there have always been a few issues that I've agreed with the GOP on (gun rights) I've never been a member of the GOP and I've never voted for a Republican for any office higher than County Executive.
My problem with the Democrats is that I was actually stupid enough to believe Obama's talk of a "new kind of politics" and had hoped that we'd get away from the excess of the past. Instead all we've done is shift the excess to the other side of the political spectrum. The "new" kind of politics looks and smells an awful lot like the old to me.
We aren't driving the bus over the cliff, we're hauling it back from the edge.
Seems to me like you are only too happy to admit to being a Democrat, thus I don't think I owe you any particular apology for using the phrase "you guys"
Would I be as annoyed if you were trolling in a pro-Democrat fashion? Oh, probably not.
So your a hypocrite? Thanks for confirming that:)
You can bring up anecdotes to 'prove' that there is parity in lunacy and corruption, but matching anecdote 'R' to anecdote 'D' does not mean the two are equal.
Did I claim they were equal? All I said was that both parties have their corruption, their hyper-partisan congressional leaders and loud mouthed assholes on radio and cable "news". From where I sit they have a lot in common.
Folks who live in cities contribute the most in taxes and represent the greatest percentage of the population.
Whoopie-fucking-do for them. That still doesn't give them the right to dictate to the rest of the country how to live. Lest you forget we do not live in a two-wolves-and-a-sheep democracy -- we live in a Constitutional Republic. I see no reason that New York City should get to dictate policy to Upstate NY or that California should get to dictate policy to Vermont or Wyoming. Ever heard of the tyranny of the majority?
Don't worry, the Earth will remain inhabitable even in the most dark of the global warming scenarios.
Just not by humans.
What global warming scenario says the planet won't be habitable for humans? I've seen scenarios where the carrying capacity is drastically reduced (due to serious declines in agricultural output) but I've never seen one where it's eliminated entirely.
Humans have survived serious climate changes before -- without the benefit of modern knowledge and technology. Do you really think we have the ability to do more damage to the climate than the Toba event?
Humans will be extinct long before that, evolved to become some other species.
Why do you say that? Species tend to evolve because the new form offers advantages/adaptions that enable them to better survive in the current environment. In the absence of this pressure there isn't much incentive to evolve. Sharks and crocodiles are two examples that come to mind -- they haven't changed much in the last hundred million years or so. You could go back to the time of the dinosaurs and they would still be recognizable.
What pressure does homo sapiens to evolve, given that our technological abilities largely shield us from the pressures of our environment?
Here in the Boston area, any computer job that pays enough to survive is exempt
So move somewhere with a cheaper cost of living. I have a friend who moved to Boston because she got tired of living in a small town and wanted to experience the big city lifestyle. Too bad she's too busy working 60 hours a week just to afford the crappy little apartment that she has to share with a roommate to enjoy much of anything.
Try living in the sticks sometime. There may not be as much to do but you can actually afford to live out here. Combine that with lower crime, less traffic, better air quality and less stress overall and it's a win-win.
The civilization that was living in that planet is traveling to a little blue planet that was nearby at a modest 100 light years. Invasion is scheduled for next Tuesday.
Thankfully the invasion was called off when the aliens learned of mankind's secret weapons: lawyers, building permits and environmental impact statements. Said Fleetlord Atvar, "We came here looking to save our race, not to spend the next two hundred years filling out paperwork. We'll find a new home somewhere else, thank you very much."
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Rig the machine so that it doesn't print what it says it's printing.
That'd be a neat trick seeing as how the voter who uses the ballot marking device still gets to see and hold the ballot before he casts it. It would also be a neat trick when you consider that the vast majority of voters will be filling out their ballots by hand.
P.S. Running machine candidates with major avenues named after their namesake granddaddies is a pretty sure-fire way to rig the democratic process, too, although it has nothing to do with voting machines.
Yeah and drawing your own election district is also a way to rig the process. Are we talking about those issues or voting technology here?
How about electronic vote tabulation device manufacturer?
Yes, that's it. You've found me out. I'm actually a Diebold employee who has established himself on /. by posting thousands of comments in hundreds of unrelated stories over a period of five years just so I could astroturf the stories relating to voting technology.
Policies and procedures aren't going to matter when you have no idea what the electronic signals are doing inside of a device.
What part of the paper ballots are retained is so hard for you to understand?
Counter Point #1 Ballot Marking Devices fail electronically during elections
If the ballot marking device fails then there is nothing stopping the handicapped voter from having a friend or family member assist them with filling out a paper ballot. For that matter, the poll workers themselves can assist the voter if they request help. It does take two of us from different political parties though (to avoid the appearance of trying to influence the vote)
Counter Point #2 Ballot Marking Devices have marked ballots incorrectly
So have human beings, so I guess any system that relies on pen and paper is equally suspect.
Counter Point #3 most users don't check their ballots are marked correctly
That's not my problem. I check that my ballot is filled out correctly before I deposit it. When we used the lever machines I also checked to make sure that the levers I wanted were indeed the ones I pulled down before I cast my ballot. If you can't be bothered to review your ballot before you cast it then I don't have much sympathy for you.
Oh, and btw, go fuck yourself for accusing me of lying. I'll have more respect for you when you put your money where your mouth is and go work a day at the polls. Until then you are just mouthing off about a subject that you know little about other than what you read on /. and Wikipedia.
If someone, for instance, uses child labor or pollutes, and the majority of people don't think that is fair, these societies enforce ostracism of the offender.
Laws against child labor and pollution are not incompatible with Libertarianism. If you believe otherwise than you don't know much about Libertarianism. Pollution directly threatens my peaceful enjoyment of my property and the value thereof. Children lack the capacity to enter into contracts and make informed decisions, thus it is generally regarded as permissible for the state to restrict their right to make such decisions until they reach the age of majority.
We can have a socialist democracy with an open and accountable government
I don't want a socialist democracy or any democracy for that matter. Democracy is two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner. It's a great deal if you are one of the wolves but doesn't work out so well for the sheep. The United States is a Constitutional Republic, not a Democracy. If you think it should be a Democracy then perhaps you should start by advocating for the disbanding of the United States Senate?
We want open and transparent governance.
Another thing that Obama promised you. Tell me, how happy are you with the results?
This is not impossible, as some would have us believe.
History suggests it is.
What exactly are the 'fruits of your labor?'
The wages that I earn working for my employer. The monies and/or goods that I earn doing jobs on the side.
I believe in democratic control of the means of production as the only fair and equitable way to distribute natural resources.
Then you believe in something which has proven to be a complete disaster every single time that it's been tried. At it's best Governmental control of the means of production results in a system that's inefficient and which doesn't live up to it's full potential. At it's worst it results in a corrupt system that results in the ruling class craving out a different set of rules for themselves and seeking to profit from their position in much the same way as the businessman that you hate so much. Except these guys can back up their decisions with guns and tanks -- something that Bill Gates is obviously unable to do.
"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing of blessings. The inherent virtue of socialism is the equal sharing of misery."
You appear to think that what you earn is objectively determined, fair, and has nothing to do with the use of force or the oppression of others.
I have never pretended that there isn't unfairness in our society. I'm just skeptical that more government is the solution. So far you've said nothing that would change my mind. In fact some of your arguments seem to further validate my skepticism, namely "We can have an open and transparent government", meaning that you acknowledge that government as it exists today is anything but.
Every single time that Government is used to impose "fairness" it invariably results in exactly the opposite for at least a portion of the citizenry. As a case in point, I'm put at a competitive disadvantage because of crimes that were committed by people who were dead long before I was born. How is that fair or just?
But you seem to be advocating a government that employs coercion to enforce your particular view of what you earned.
My "particular view of what I've earned"? You don't think I have the right to assume that I've earned my paycheck? See, this is why you can advocate for a system that steals from the haves in order to supply the have nots -- you've convinced yourself that anybody in the "have" category must have gotten th
See, now this is how I know you aren't a liberal by any stretch of the imagination:
Did I claim at any point in our conversation that I was a liberal?
Socialism is not bad
Yes it is. Socialism by it's very definition relies on the state to impose "fairness". The problem is that "fairness" is an objective term and that the people who are deciding what's fair rarely include themselves in the calculation. Socialism encourages the growth of Government and it's been my experience that the larger the government the more potential there is for corruption. I tend to agree with the quote that says "A Government big enough to give you everything that you want is big enough to take away everything that you have."
take away firearms, or restrict free speech
Where did I associate either of those issues with socialism? I associated them with the United States Democratic Party. I did this to show you that where you see evil in the GOP (the religious right going into your bedroom) others can see it in the Democrats. Do you dispute that the so-called "fairness doctrine" is being pushed by "progressive" Democrats or that the base of the Democratic Party is rabidly in favor of tight gun control?
Those are anti socialist lies created by the ruling class to further their class war against the workers and the poor.
The problem is that the "ruling class" we are offered by the left in the United States is just as bad if not worse. I've attempted to explain this numerous times but you are not interested in hearing it. The workers and the poor aren't going to be the ruling class in your socialist paradise -- the ruling class is still going to be the same old group of corrupt politicians. All you've accomplished under socialism is to grow the government to the point that they have even more power over our day to day lives.
And really, "class war against the workers and the poor"? Is that really how you see our country? You think there's a class war being waged against the poor in a country where almost half of the population isn't asked to pay a dime of income tax and wherein large numbers of people actually get more money back than they paid in? If your view is that clouded it's no wonder you can't have an objective discussion about politics.
The Republican party's policies all boil down to one overriding principle: will this policy help provide cheaper labor for the ruling class.
Which explains why it was a Republican that established the EPA, a Republican that expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit, a Republican that established the medicare drug benefit, blah, blah, blah, blah. I don't know why you insist on making these sweeping generalizations when it's obvious that your intellectual capacity is advanced enough to allow for a much more nuanced view of the world. You are every bit as ideologically driven and convinced of your own superiority as the Republican ideologues that I've met in my day. The fact that you can't see this only adds to the irony.
The more you write, the less I believe you were ever, in any way, a liberal.
It took that much of my writing for you to come to that conclusion when I never claimed to be a liberal in the first place? I did say that I supported the Democratic Party and then Senator Obama for a time but I don't recall ever claiming that I was a liberal. I always considered myself a moderate Democrat and my disillusionment with the party started to happen right around the time the left wing of it became emboldened.
Libertarians believe the only real function of government is protecting their private property, and thus acting as the police force to keep their slaves in check
Yes, everybody who supports Libertarianism is doing so out of a desire to keep their slaves in check. Another sweeping generali
Surely that depends on the standards of voting privacy in your district, like whether you get a three-sided screen block or a complete booth with ceiling-to-floor curtains.
The voting booth is separate from the machine. The "voting booth" itself is nothing more than a plastic stand with a privacy screen and a supply of felt-tipped markers. The machine itself is in plain view of the election inspectors and everybody else who happens to be in the polling place. Trust me, you aren't going to be able to tamper with it without being caught during the election. After the election is another matter but that's why they have the backup memory card and myriad of seals on the machine.
And an election can be thwarted by leaving evidence of tampering in a district you want to disenfranchise.
If tampering is evident than the voting machine is going to receive closer scrutiny. The votes aren't automatically going to be discarded. If the "tampering" consists of removing the seals around the memory interface but not the ballot box and the number of ballots therein equals the number of signatures in the pool book then they are simply going to hand count the ballots (or scan them in a different machine). If the tampering consists of removing the seals around the ballot box then they will fall back on the aforementioned memory card that was removed after the election and returned to the Elections Board.
It's really not as easy to rig an election as people around here seem to think it is. I would encourage everybody who cares about this issue to volunteer to be a poll worker. The Election Boards are always looking for help and you'll get a chance to see the system from the inside. All it's going to cost you is a vacation day or two and some time. In some states you even get paid for doing it.
It makes me wonder what you're hiding.
I have no incentive to hide anything as I'm not an employee of the Elections Board nor an office holder with a stake in the system. I became a poll worker because of the controversy surrounding this issue. I wanted to see for myself how the system worked. I came to it as a skeptic and after learning the procedures and seeing them in action have been convinced that the system is as secure as it can be expected to be.
How often has that happened in the history of American elections?
That is exactly the kind of dramatic detail that puts my fraud-detector on alert. "Look, it's so secure that it's even secure against problems you don't have!" Typical distraction.
So now you are complaining that the system is protected against disasters just because they rarely happen? Would you be happier with a system that left less of a paper trail?
As it happens, if you google "ballots lost in fire" you get a bunch of hits on the first page about fraud and failure related to electronic voting machines.
As I said, my experience is limited to the State of New York. In NYS we don't use direct electronic recording machines. You fill out a paper ballot that is then tabulated by an optical scanner. In the event of a disputed election the paper ballot is still around and any idiot can count it with the Mark I human eyeball.
The only part of our voting process that is "electronic" is the so-called "ballot marking device" that handicapped voters use. This is a machine that prints a paper ballot for those voters who are unable to write and have to rely on another interface (audio, sip and puff, foot pedals, etc.) The printed paper ballot is in the same format as the one that you would fill out as a non-handicapped voter and can be read by any human being.
Given the complete lack of transparency at all levels of any electronic voting system I am extremely suspicious of all of them
Evidently that's not all you are suspicious of, since you seem to think that I'm trying to hide something :)
The problem is that while I spend most of my usage near my home, I really, really want service when my car dies on the way to BFE State Park.
Then switch carriers. If you value having service out in the boonies then you ought to be willing to pay for that privilege. T-Mobile is able to offer cheaper plans because they haven't (as yet) invested the capital into building out their network in areas that cost more money to serve.
Personally I never worried about this because I'm capable of taking care of myself when my car dies out in the boonies. When you grow up out here you come to realize that it's foolhardy not to have supplies and tools for basic repairs on hand. At a minimum you should have a good multitool, a good socket wrench set, duct tape, WD-40, hose clamps/hose repair kit, a good flashlight with fresh batteries (a spare set doesn't hurt either) and extra anti-freeze.
You should also be carrying a good first aid kit, fire extinguisher, waterproof matches, enough drinking water to last for a few days and blankets (if you are in a cold climate). It's foolish to rely on the cell phone as your first line of defense against the unexpected. Far better to be prepared and only have to call for help as a last resort.
Remember that if you are forced to call for help you have no control over when it will arrive. It could take five minutes or it could take five days. You'd best be prepared.
The Republican base is truly frightening, on a Taliban level
The Democratic base is truly frightening, on a Lenin level. See how easy it is to put the shoe on the other foot? Can't you just admit that you are rationalizing the failings of the Democratic Party?
They are the American religious zealots who BY THEIR OWN ADMISSION want to turn America into a theocracy
So what? The Democratic liberal base wants to turn America into some sort of socialist paradise where people will be punished for being productive, the government will mandate "fairness" in free speech and nobody will be allowed to own a firearm. I really don't regard that as any improvement over the desires of the far-right.
Republicans and Democrats both want to pilfer my wallet and give it to their contributors, but only one of those two groups wants to invade my bedroom.
Right, and the second group wants to invade your gun safe, radio station and video game. I'm still waiting for you to tell me why this is better.
They seem to believe that God wants them to be rich because they are better than me
And Democrats seem to believe that I'm rich because I'm a selfish SOB who stole from the poor. See how absurd these types of sweeping generalizations are?
because I should know my place and not try to climb above it
Sounds like the Democratic politicians that think there should be a different standard for the elite and whom advocate in favor of "progressive" taxation that punishes people who have the nerve to make more money than the rest of the herd.
Sure, I'd like something else, but voting for anyone else but the Democrats in our current system is simply asking for the American Taliban to turn our country into a theocracy, and I will not have that.
And yet, amazingly enough the Republicans controlled all three branches of the Federal Government for six years and we didn't become a theocracy. So what you are really doing is supporting the political system that you claim to hate because you've been whipped up into a fearful frenzy and think that agents of the state are going to bash down your bedroom door and arrest you for having sex outside the confines of the missionary position between a married heterosexual couple.
It sounds to me like you've bought the fear being sold by the DNC hook, line and sinker. Eventually you'll wake up and realize that the shit they are shoveling is virtually the same as the shit that the Republicans are shoveling. The Democrats are just shoveling it from a different pile and using a different salesman to try and sell it to you.
The only problem with this is that you aren't going to get a few "private minutes" with the machine and that any competent election authority is going to seal the machine with tamper-evident seals.
I've worked as an elections inspector (poll worker) in the state of New York for the last five years. Every aspect of the machine (both the old style lever machines and the new optical scanning machines) that could be tampered with is sealed with numbered tamper evident devices. If the numbers on the seals don't match up with the records retained by the Board of Elections then you know the machine has been tampered with. This isn't rocket science people.
Our new machines go even further than that. They both retain the actual ballots themselves in a locked ballot box and retain a scanned image of those ballots on a memory card. The memory card is removed from the machine at the end of the election and hand delivered to the Board of Elections. It is designed to serve as a backup in the event that the machine is destroyed (i.e: building burns down) and the ballots are lost. The ballots themselves are only scanned by the machine and not marked in any way. In the event of an issue with the machine there is nothing stopping you from counting each ballot by hand with the Mark I human eyeball.
If you can find a way to rig an election in the State of New York then I'd be real interested in knowing about it. I've worked behind the scenes here for a long time and I haven't seen any vulnerabilities in the system. The only voting technology that I'd be concerned about is DRE (direct electronic record) -- but thankfully my state wasn't stupid enough to go that route.
Only two games in town: Verizon and AT&T. Everyone else is a bit player that doesn't have a real network.
That's not really a fair statement to make. T-Mobile is primarily an urban orientated carrier but they are a perfectly viable option for someone who spends 95% of his time in the metro area. Hell, I used them here in the sticks of Upstate NY for the better part of two years without issue. The only reason I switched away from them is because my girlfriend values the better coverage more than the cheaper monthly plan.
Sprint also roams on Verizon's network and has coverage anywhere Verizon does so I don't see how you can call them a "bit player". From the end-users perspective the results are the same -- the phone works anywhere that a Verizon phone does. Most people don't know or care that it's using a different network.
The US cellphone providers *WANT* you to think it's apples to oranges. They want you to get lost in the details of calling plans, perks, special cases, unlimited calling, times of day, all that rubbish.
I'm not lost in any details. Here's the detail I care about:
Last month's bill: $131.75 before taxes/governmental fees ($170+ with them but that's a bitch fest for another discussion)
Minutes used by myself and my four family members under the same plan: 5,741
Per minute cost: $0.0229
Per line cost: $26.35 (it must be noted that this is cheaper than most landline plans I've seen)
You'll forgive me if I don't feel that I'm being ripped off. For less than three cents a minute my family and I effectively have unlimited calling from almost anywhere in the United States. We also have unlimited text to go along with that, although that's more for the rest of the family as I don't really regard SMS as being particularly useful.
It's like how physicists count how much energy went into a system and how much energy went out, without having to fuss about details like friction or leaks or whatever.
In other words, it's not a complete comparison and is an overly simplistic talking point designed to say "US sux0r!" without bothering to dive into the nitty gritty of the issue.
Per area, I would guess that Finland has the US beat
In other words, you don't actually know and are just guessing based on your preconceived ideas about Finland and the United States? Thanks for clarifying that for us :)
at least when it comes to destroying cell phone towers.
I wouldn't venture a guess in either direction. I used to climb cell phone towers for a living. The natural disaster that comes along and destroys one of them is a pretty rare event. Disasters that disable service for whatever reason (power outage, loss of the trunk lines feeding the tower, equipment failure, etc) are much more common but even they don't happen often enough for it to be a real big problem. The users don't even notice most of the time unless they live in a rural area with a single point of failure (i.e: just one tower serving the whole town) or the disaster affected an entire region (major event like a hurricane or earthquake)
IOW, you don't mind overpaying for service because you get perks for "free"?
I don't think I'm overpaying for service when it works out to around $0.02 per minute. If you can find me a cellular plan that will let me use around 5,000 minutes per month on five different lines for less than $0.025/min then I'm all ears.
As with anything you have to know how to work the system and evaluate the different options. Postpaid cellular service can be a great deal for a lot of people (who talk on the phone a lot and value mobility) or a horrible waste of money for others (who don't talk much). It's up to the consumer to research the options that are available to him and to select the one that best matches his needs. If you are willing to do this then there is no reason why you can't get a great deal on wireless service here in the states.
If you aren't willing to do it and want the government to do it for you -- well, then you are going to deserve what you get in the end.
I hope we in the EU get to pay for INCOMING calls because I'd love to pickup the bill for every SMS-Spam or Telemarketing call I get... or not...
Actually over here it's illegal to call cell phones with such calls. I've never received any SMS Spam and the only unsolicited phone calls I've ever received on my cell phone were from a company that just got shut down by the FTC a few weeks ago (the auto warranty nonsense).
but after reading about your horrible healthcare ("pay or die")
No, that's not how our health care system works. "Pay or file bankruptcy" would be a better description. While such a system is far from ideal it's no where near as bad as "pay or die" and you ought to at least learn a little bit about how it works before you open your mouth and insert your foot.
bad telecommunications/internet
As opposed to the UK where landline users had the privilege of paying for local calls for the longest time and your ISPs are keeping logs of your activity to turn over to the Government?
lack of vacation time
I have four weeks of vacation time, 3 personal days and 12 sick days. This is for a private non-union company mind you -- I could get even better benefits if I sold my soul and went to work for the Government. How'd I get this? I negotiated for it.
and completely uncompetitive wages/working conditions
More stereotyping. If you have marketable skills then there is no other country on this planet where you'd rather be. Why do you think the best and the brightest continue to come here in spite of our many flaws?
We have a more realistic way to live your life... Clue: It isn't JUST about work/money.
You choose what matters to you and I'll choose what matters to me. Personally I would rather live in a country that isn't sleepwalking into a surveillance society and which trusts me enough to allow me to own firearms. We can play this game all day but for every stereotype you have of us I can probably come up with two for you. Now be a good mate for me and wave to the cameras on your way home, ok?
Oh, God no! You believed Obama? Now I understand, and kinda feel sorry for you. I didn't even believe Clinton, and I was young and naive when I voted for him.
Then I guess I should feel sorry for you, because I realized my mistake before election day :)
We don't have a left wing in this country
Could have fooled me......
I honestly wish that the Republican party was not so dominated by religious wingnuts
I honestly wish the Democratic Party wasn't dominated by big city liberals that think they know what's best for the remainder of the country. I wish you had more people like Webb and Tester and less people like Schumer and Pelosi.
If you truly dug into my posting history as you threatened to do so earlier you would see that I have often condemned our political process for being held hostage to the wingnuts on both ends of the political spectrum. Our Legislators get to draw their own election districts and usually manage to do so in such a way that the real election happens during the primary. As a consequence of this they only need to answer to two constituencies: The hyper-partisan primary electorate and the special interest groups that donate the most money.
Our Legislators are choosing their voters instead of the voters choosing the Legislators -- and neither party is inclined to address this issue. Until they show a willingness to do so I have no intention of voting for any Republican or Democrat for Federal office. The lesser of two evils is still evil.
I want a smaller Federal government and fiscal responsibility
Then I hope you aren't voting for Republicans or Democrats.
that infrastructure has pretty much been in place for the past decade and hasn't changed much
Which is why we are all still using AMPS analog cell phones that can be easily cloned and eavesdropped on by anyone with a scanner.....
It also seems quite unlikely that the US has "more harsh weather conditions than Finland".
Finland has over a thousand tornadoes every year?
In Europe (and most other regions outside of the US and Canada for that matter) the cellular user is not expected to pay the full cost of having wireless service. This is why other users who call your cell phone pay a premium for doing so and why the wireless customers over there often have free incoming calls. This is known as a "caller pays" model.
The US has (for better or worse) adopted a "subscriber pays" model wherein the wireless customer pays a higher price and for incoming minutes but those who call him and do so at the same rate as any other phone call (free in many/most cases). The US also has many perks that aren't part of most calling plans in other countries -- unlimited calling to X numbers, unlimited nights and weekends, unlimited mobile to mobile, etc, etc. Add in all of these perks and break down the monthly rate by the number of minutes used and many Americans wind up paying around $0.02-$0.03 per minute for their cellular phones.
It doesn't really tell us much to see a per month cost break down without looking at all of these other factors. In any case if you want to copy something from the rest of the world regarding wireless business models I would look at copying the concept of unlocked phones that are separate from contracts long before I'd look at copying their rate plans. I rather like to be able to call my friends who have cell phones without paying a penalty for doing so.
If there are few Republicans who believe that Obama was born outside the US, why is the media giving them so much coverage?
Why does the media give so much coverage to Michael Jackson/Paris Hilton/Britney Spears/Octomom when our troops are engaged in combat over in Afghanistan?
You act like you haven't ever posted here before, like you have no history, and you can claim anything you like because we can't look up what you've posted over the years.
If you start aiming your criticism at the Republicans, it will be a first for you on this site.
Go look up my posting history then. I spent the better part of 2008 as an Obama groupie before he reversed himself on FISA and showed that he was just another pandering politician with no principles of his own. I spent the better part of 2004-2008 bitching about the excesses of the GOP. While there have always been a few issues that I've agreed with the GOP on (gun rights) I've never been a member of the GOP and I've never voted for a Republican for any office higher than County Executive.
My problem with the Democrats is that I was actually stupid enough to believe Obama's talk of a "new kind of politics" and had hoped that we'd get away from the excess of the past. Instead all we've done is shift the excess to the other side of the political spectrum. The "new" kind of politics looks and smells an awful lot like the old to me.
Turned oppositely hyper-partisan awfully fast, didn't you?
We aren't driving the bus over the cliff, we're hauling it back from the edge.
Seems to me like you are only too happy to admit to being a Democrat, thus I don't think I owe you any particular apology for using the phrase "you guys"
Would I be as annoyed if you were trolling in a pro-Democrat fashion? Oh, probably not.
So your a hypocrite? Thanks for confirming that :)
You can bring up anecdotes to 'prove' that there is parity in lunacy and corruption, but matching anecdote 'R' to anecdote 'D' does not mean the two are equal.
Did I claim they were equal? All I said was that both parties have their corruption, their hyper-partisan congressional leaders and loud mouthed assholes on radio and cable "news". From where I sit they have a lot in common.
Folks who live in cities contribute the most in taxes and represent the greatest percentage of the population.
Whoopie-fucking-do for them. That still doesn't give them the right to dictate to the rest of the country how to live. Lest you forget we do not live in a two-wolves-and-a-sheep democracy -- we live in a Constitutional Republic. I see no reason that New York City should get to dictate policy to Upstate NY or that California should get to dictate policy to Vermont or Wyoming. Ever heard of the tyranny of the majority?
Remember the comet cult that thought the world was going to end in 2000 and castrated themselves before committing suicide?
How are they going to handle the 72 virgins if they cut off their equipme.... wait n/m, that's a different cult ;)
Amazing how that works, isn't it?
Don't worry, the Earth will remain inhabitable even in the most dark of the global warming scenarios.
Just not by humans.
What global warming scenario says the planet won't be habitable for humans? I've seen scenarios where the carrying capacity is drastically reduced (due to serious declines in agricultural output) but I've never seen one where it's eliminated entirely.
Humans have survived serious climate changes before -- without the benefit of modern knowledge and technology. Do you really think we have the ability to do more damage to the climate than the Toba event?
Humans will be extinct long before that, evolved to become some other species.
Why do you say that? Species tend to evolve because the new form offers advantages/adaptions that enable them to better survive in the current environment. In the absence of this pressure there isn't much incentive to evolve. Sharks and crocodiles are two examples that come to mind -- they haven't changed much in the last hundred million years or so. You could go back to the time of the dinosaurs and they would still be recognizable.
What pressure does homo sapiens to evolve, given that our technological abilities largely shield us from the pressures of our environment?
Here in the Boston area, any computer job that pays enough to survive is exempt
So move somewhere with a cheaper cost of living. I have a friend who moved to Boston because she got tired of living in a small town and wanted to experience the big city lifestyle. Too bad she's too busy working 60 hours a week just to afford the crappy little apartment that she has to share with a roommate to enjoy much of anything.
Try living in the sticks sometime. There may not be as much to do but you can actually afford to live out here. Combine that with lower crime, less traffic, better air quality and less stress overall and it's a win-win.
The civilization that was living in that planet is traveling to a little blue planet that was nearby at a modest 100 light years. Invasion is scheduled for next Tuesday.
Thankfully the invasion was called off when the aliens learned of mankind's secret weapons: lawyers, building permits and environmental impact statements. Said Fleetlord Atvar, "We came here looking to save our race, not to spend the next two hundred years filling out paperwork. We'll find a new home somewhere else, thank you very much."