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Posted by Connor on November 6th, 2006

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If you haven’t seen the Utah Lt. Governor’s latest propaganda piece for the electronic voting machines, watch the commercial here.

Tomorrow is a great day. It is a day that we, as America citizens, can make our voice heard. But what happens when technology, manipulation, and corruption quells that voice?

Enter the Diebold (and other) voting machines. Already it was reported last week that 12 smart cards in Tennessee went missing. Who’s next?

HBO aired a documentary last week called “Hacking Democracy”, exposing the egregious inefficiencies of these machines. The 1 hour 20 minute video can (and should!) be watched here.

Of course Diebold threw a temper tantrum when they discovered HBO would be showing this film. The Good Morning Silicon Valley blog reports:

With November elections nearly upon us, Diebold Election Systems has finally decided to develop a paper trail — of press releases. Earlier this week, the much maligned voting machine manufacturer (see “AccuVote — that’s an oxymoron, right?“) released a letter to HBO Chief Executive Chris Albrecht that claimed “Hacking Democracy,” a documentary about electronic voting that the cable channel aired last night, is riddled with inaccuracies. “Truth and accurate reporting are the biggest casualties of the film,” Diebold Election System President David Byrd wrote. The errors and misrepresentations are “so egregious that HBO should pull the documentary.”

Well, it seems that truth and accuracy were also the biggest casualties of Diebold’s press release, because according to HBO, not only had Diebold officials not seen “Hacking Democracy” before they penned it, they mistook it for another film about electronic voting called “VoterGate.” “You assert in your letter that the documentary contains ’significant factual errors’; however, based on several of the purported examples you have cited, you do not appear to have viewed the film which will premiere on HBO on Nov. 2,” HBO attorney Peter Rienecker wrote in a letter to Deibold. “HBO stands by the accuracy and fairness of the documentary. Of course, if after viewing the film on the HBO service (Thursday night) you continue to have concerns, we would be happy to discuss them with you at that time.” Nice going, Diebold.

It is our duty, responsibility, and wonderful opportunity to vote and make our voice heard in the affairs of our government. But I’m highly, highly skeptical of these machines, the companies that manufacture them, the secrecy involved in their affairs, the potentially destructive source code, and just about every other aspect these electronic machines introduce. Yes, I voted with an absentee ballot this election so as not to have to use such a machine. But even my absentee ballot will be counted with another machine! Who is counting our votes?

Josef Stalin once said “It’s not the people who vote that count. It’s the people who count the votes.” Truer words were never spoken. Please vote tomorrow, but do so with your eyes open, questioning if your vote will be counted, and how we can assure in the future that corruption and fraud stay out of our election process.

Possibly related posts:

2 comments so far. Care to chime in?

Also be sure to read the story of Bruce Funk here in Utah, being threatened, locked out of his office, and asked to resign by the Lt. Commissioner’s office. Makes you wonder how our Utah elections are going to play out.

#1 Connor on November 6th, 2006

Fortunately we here in Utah won’t have any reason to doubt the black boxes, as long as they all come up with Republicans as winners. It doesn’t really matter who you vote for, Utah is the reddest state in the Union. Your vote here is totally worthless. Other states though, where there is a higher percentage of Democrats will be susceptable to having their vote hacked. Bush won by deceit in 2000, and by fraud in 2004, this being proof that tomorrow’s vote will also be highly riddled with fraud. Even though I voted absentee more than two weeks ago, it is no gaurantee that my vote will not be hacked too! They are even trying to cover-up the methods used to count the votes by suppressing any exit polling! What in the crud are they afraid of? Our democracy is on life support, if not dead already. What a sad commentary on US democracy. And I used to laugh at those dictators of other countries garnering 99% of the vote in their countries when I was a child. We just think that because we live in the “land of the free” that if someone only gets 51% of the votes that he is not an evil dictator! Hah - - what a scam we are witnessing right before our very eyes! What is even sadder, is the fact that most Utahns will go blind to the polls, and vote for the “lesser of two evils,” not even realizing their vote was still for the evil one, no matter if they have a D after their name or an R.

#2 Kelly Winterton on November 6th, 2006