Iowa Voters

Former Congressman Berkley Bedell is tackling the problem of legalized bribery that is our current campaign financing system. He wants to meet with you, if you want to change the system. Ed Fallon is helping publicize the event. Ed wrote:

He will be hosting a meeting next Wednesday, August 2, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Polk County Senior Center, 2008 Forest Avenue, to listen to your ideas on how we can make this happen and to share some of his own thoughts. If you’d like to attend, please call Berkley at (712) 336-5070 or e-mail your RSVP to: berk.survey@gmail.com. We hope to see you there!

This tip is base on a rumor: I have heard that Lou Dobbs may discuss the Pottawattamie county ballot miscount on his Moneyline show Friday.

Dobbs continues to cover voting machines better than anyone else in the vast wasteland.

You read it here first. In my first week of blogging I called Chuck Allison a “placeholder” in his weak bid to be Secretary of State. That was back in January.

Now he has quit the race, after having inexplicably defeated a qualified candidate (Robert Dopf) in the June primary. It”s pretty ironic that a man running to oversee the state’s elections would defraud the voters by pulling out of the race AFTER he has won a contested primary. I’m glad he won’t be overseeing our elections. Soon we’ll see just whose place he has been holding. The Republicans have until August 18 to slip in a new candidate.

Gasp! What would the Register’s gardeners think? Here’s a candidate who lost his election by a landslide but still challenged it. And he “won” a significant victory in doing so.

He won (a) more voting machines for underserved precincts, (b) better pollworker training, (c) better security after the ballots are cast, and even more stuff–basic stuff–that make me think they must have run a pretty sloppy election in that Indiana county.

Roses for him.

Thanks to John Gideon whose Daily Voting News service tipped me to this story, as it has to many other stories where he went unthanked.

Last week Polk county recorder Tim Brien dropped his request for a recount of his race in the the June primary. The vote scanners of Polk County had indicated a defeat for Brien, something which apparently surprised (or maybe embarrassed him). Sunday’s Des Moines Register awarded a “thistle” to Brien for “casting doubt on the legitimacy of the county’s new vote-counting machines.” For that reckless statement the Register writers deserve a whole bouquet of thistles. Canada thistles should do nicely.

It wasn’t Brien who cast doubt on the machinery. It was the actual use (misuse) of the machinery in Pottawattamie county and elsewhere around the US that has warned all unbiased observers that skepticism is in order whenever vote totals are created by machines. Brien’s action may have been his last act of public service. Or it may have been a self-serving smokescreen to hide his embarrassment at the official vote totals.

Whichever it was, the Register missed the story. For the real business of elections is to convince the losers that they lost. As long as doubt exists, the system is broken.

The Register’s attitude is in conflict with its long history of vigilance regarding open meetings and open public records. What are election returns if not public records deserving strict scrutiny? The Register wonders if Brien “finally realized the damage he was causing to the credibility of Polk elections . . .” Does the Register worry about the damage it causes to county sheriffs or county prosecutors when it questions their official acts?

The way to credible elections is not through silent losers. It is through rigorous procedures, checks and balances, and bright sunshine.

This is a long story. It has mostly played out elsewhere on the web. Since I played a small part and since it involves Iowa’s election director Sandy Steinbach (see here ironically), I think it is worth posting for Iowa readers. It is about the programming of voting machines that we use in Iowa; about a lawsuit in California, and about correspondence with the Iowa office of the Secretary of State. Here goes:

It all started on the web when John Washburn posted some emails at his website. The emails came to light because of legal action in California regarding how that state had decided to approve the use of Diebold voting machines. But these emails refer to the other major voting machine company–Omaha’s ES & S–whose wares are used in Pottawattamie, Polk, Johnson, and other counties.

The emails are written by voting machine examiners for the National Association of State Election Directors(NASED). They worked under the direction of Sandy Steinbach, then chair of the NASED Voting Systems Board and long time election director for Iowa. Steinbach has praised their work:

“Brit Williams, Paul Craft and Steve Freeman are my heroes. These three men are the heart and soul of the voting system testing program and they do this work for free. None of them has a salaried position. They work as consultants and their time is valuable.

One of the emails indicates that there is virtually no way for a user of ES & S voting equipment to know whether the proper software is running on the equipment.

Every time pests like me cast doubt on computerized voting devices, the defenders say, “Don’t worry, the software has been certified by an independent laboratory,” thus making it sound like it has earned the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, or something. The point of the email published by Washburn is that the certified software is altered every time it is used. Thus it cannot claim to be certified any longer and it is virtually impossible for the user to know what has been changed.

This alteration occurs during the creation of every ballot that is prepared for use on ES & S devices. It wouldn’t have to work like this, but the oracles of Omaha designed it this way, so it does.

When Washburn posted these once private emails back in May, he concluded that the ES & S system always operates on uncertified software, and thus always in violation of the standards that supposedly protect us from vote manipulation by the machinery. His conclusion was sent to the NASED president and to Steinbach and others, but they did not acknowledge receipt.

Eventually a response was wrung from Iowa Secretary of State press agent Casey Sinnwell. It is posted here, and it addresses the question, “Does ES&S routinely use uncertified software to run elections?” Sinnwell’s answer is No, but to be sure you must be able to stand on your head and swallow swords while reading heiroglyphics. Or, as he put it–

To verify the software requires using a master copy and a copy of the election definition, then creating a reference copy of the specific election program to compare against the version used in the election. The technique is slightly more difficult because some EEPROM burner/readers create or fill blank areas with different characters and the sections need to be checked to verify that they are true fills. However, the technique has been used in Florida and other locations and the version of the software verified. . .

The problem is that the ES&S system can not be verified with a simple comparison, . . .

I was not reassured by this, so I wrote back to Sinnwell asking about the description of his method as “difficult” and “has been used in Florida” and “cannot be verified with a simple comparison”. I asked if it was fair to assume that county election officials would not be able to routinely make this comparison for their various ballots and thus would not know what the hell was actually going on in their vote counting gadgets. Sinnwell has not responded.

Washburn then went on to create a glorious picture of what this means. His comparison of ballot preparation with paint mixing leads even a technophobe to understand why it would be so difficult to tell whether the vote counting program has been corrupted in the process of creating the ballot. He says that a program (green paint) that is prepared by mixing the ballot information (blue paint) and the certified program (yellow paint) will yield a different shade of green for each ballot. But the bystanding auditor cannot unmix the paint to see if the proper portions of blue and yellow were used. This gem about 47 shades of green is hidden in the lower part of this post.

Slogging thru all this analysis is work. Probably no one but the auditors themselves has the motivation to puzzle it all out. But as Cerro Gordo’s auditor Ken Kline (a user of ES &S, by the way) once told me, “I didn’t get elected to do an ‘easy’ job.” Amen.

The Council Bluffs NonPariel has editorialized that computerized voting machines are no cure for ballot fiascos. Citing lawsuits, the NYU Brennan Center study and their own experience in the June primary, the paper concludes that the latest in voting technology has not been a change for the better.

It’s a pretty timid conclusion given the available information, but it’s good to see more papers taking up the topic.

Ever get into a discussion about voting machines with a well-meaning, educated person who says, with obvious skepticism, “I hear there’s been a lot of talk about that on the Internet?” Here is a nice summary of mainstream, non-print coverage of voting machine issues, for quick name-dropping or for links to embed in told-you-so e-mails.

For print coverage, remember these articles in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Newsweek, and USA Today. That is by no means a comprehensive list of recent print coverage.

There was some pretty good mainstream coverage before the 2004 election; 60 Minutes even did a piece back in 2004. But after the election, major media seemed to go dark. Thank goodness they are coming around in time to help us worriers convince our friends that we aren’t Internet-addled conspiracy nuts. Jerry noted recently that friends of his have begun to get the issue after seeing Lou Dobbs’s coverage. A lot of smart, skeptical people, like it or not, just aren’t going to believe there’s a problem until broadcast media give said problem their stamp of credibility.

Thanks to garybeck at DU for calling attention to the summary of coverage.

-Sean Flaherty

Residents of Iowa’s Fourth Congressional District: Tom Latham says he needs to hear from you about verifiable elections.

The gold standard of election integrity billls, H.R. 550, now has 199 cosponsors, including noteable Republican support.

These are some of the things H.R. 550 will do for federal elections:

* Require a voter-verified paper record of every vote cast.

* Require that at least 2% of the precincts in the county be randomly audited by hand

* Require public disclosure of software used in voting systems.

Iowa’s Rep. Jim Leach, conservative Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma, and very conservative Rep. Curt Weldon of Pennsylania are among the GOP cosponsors.

But Rep. Latham says he is not hearing from constituents about the bill or about verifiable elections. This needs to change.

Here is a map of the Iowa 4th Congressional District.

More detailed information about 550 can be found at sponsor Rush Holt’s website, and by downloading the iccountcoalition’s excellent packet on the bill.

Letters and phone calls from people in Latham’s district have the greatest impact, but any Iowan interested in the issue should contact him.

Here is Rep. Latham’s contact information. Make sure he won’t be able to say again that his constituents are silent on election integrity.

-by Sean Flaherty

Here’s James Bovard’s attack on the “We can’t be bothered with this” attitude expressed by so many Republicans in the Congress when the 2004 election was challenged over Ohio’s returns.

The best lines:

The “debate” in Congress illustrated how elections are now about consecration, rather than representation. Elections have become something for rulers to shroud themselves in, rather than leashes used by the people. Politicians are obsessed with maintaining the imagined dignity of their class, not in resolving doubts about honest vote counting.

CNN’s Lou Dobbs has been covering voting machines. He bemoans the lack of security and the situation in general with each installment. He got started in early June when he told of the foreign ownership of one voting machine company. Today he tackles the high failure rate allowed in voting machine standards, something I have hardly even discussed on this blog. He has a poll question on his website.

Like most TV news coverage, each report is very short, but Dobbs has been at it for much of the last month. What the show lacks in depth it makes up in persistance, taking a new angle every time. If your friends are watching, they will realize you are not crazy for thinking about voting machines so much. It’s happened to me already.

Georgia’s second attempt to restrict voting to persons carrying an ID card has been ruled unconstititional by a Georgia district court judge. He called it an “undue burden” and added

“where the right of suffrage is fixed in the Constitution it cannot be restricted by the legislature, but only by the people through an amendment to the Constitution.”

The Iowa constitution seems to likewise prevent imposing an ID test on voters. It says:

Every citizen of the United States of the age of twenty-one years, who shall have been a resident of this state for such period of time as shall be provided by law and of the county in which he claims his vote for such period of time as shall be provided by law, shall be entitled to vote at all elections which are now or hereafter may be authorized by law.

It goes on to state that the legislature may adjust the residency requirements, but says nothing about allowing other requirements. And, of course, the federal 18 year old vote amendment has overridden the Iowa age of 21.

It is amazingly similar to the Georgia Constitution, which states:

Every person who is a citizen of the United States and a resident of Georgia as defined by law, who is at least 18 years of age and not disenfranchised by this article, and who meets minimum residency requirements as provided by law shall be entitled to vote at any election by the people.

If this ruling holds up on appeal, maybe it will melt the determination of Des Moines state representative Libby Jacobs who wants to follow Georgia’s legislature in imposing an ID card requirement. When Iowan’s for Voting Integrity discussed paper trails with her in March, Jacobs mostly talked about the need for ID rules. She was holding paper trails hostage to get an ID law passed. The ransom value of the paper trail bill has only increased since March, but it looks insufficient to buy a new ID law.

Which isn’t needed anyway. No one goes to the polls impersonating another. No fearful guest workers or illegal immigrants would risk posing as a citizen to vote for Tweedledum or Tweedledee.

The Register reports that Polk County recorder Brien has put his money where his mouth is. He’s posted $10,000 to get a recount of his apparently decisive defeat. He’s hoping lightning struck twice on June 6, since he knows the Pottawattamie county recorder and other candidates also were “defeated” in initial returns that were actually erroneous.

The Pottawattamie returns were so egregious that they were noticed right away. So far Brien seems to be the only one who suspects error in Polk’s results, and he admits he has no evidence for his suspicion. But his recount will provide us with the sort of audit that should routinely happen when machines do the counting. Too bad he has to pay for it himself.

Calling it a July 4 firecracker, Blackboxvoting.org has released information that it kept secret in May. The secrets reveal what Diebold may have known all along: how to capture and corrupt their voting machines.

In May BBV released a self-censored report of its examination of Diebold equipment. The exam had been made possible by Bruce Funk at the Emery county election department in Utah. The report made national news because computer scientists proclaimed their shock at that the vulnerabilities of Diebold’s wares that were partially revealed in the report. BBV said that if the whole report were made public, it would constitute a road map for how to steal votes on Diebold touchscreens and avoid detection.

Why did Diebold deserve any deference from BBV in the first place? many people asked. Other computer scientists explained that it was industry practice for critics to privately warn software authors about weaknesses in their software. The weaknesses would not be reported publicly for a brief period, thus allowing the creator to make amends.

But Diebold did not make amends. It denied the problem. Election officials did not make amends, either. They kept using the equipment, merely adding a little security tape here and there.

Now the brief period has elapsed. The whole story is told, complete with pictures, at blackboxvoting.org.

Iowa counties collectively have millions of dollars invested in these devices, which were used in over a thousand precincts in the June primary.

Bev Harris and blackboxvoting.org sure know how to celebrate the Fourth of July: by practicing America’s politics of checks and balances. Happy Fireworks ~~*

Pottawattamie County has received an open records (Iowa Code Chapter 22) request regarding its erroneous early election returns for the June 6 primary. You may recall that county auditor Marilyn Jo Drake didn’t believe the numbers reported by her voting machines, so she counted all the ballots by hand the next day. She thus proved the machine counts were incorrect.

This week John Washburn, a Wisconsin software tester and author of a paper on how to create test ballots, made his request for 188 items. He believes the machines were not adequately tested prior to the election. He has requested the election definition software file for each precinct’s scanner, the deck of test ballots used for each scanner, the sample ballots that hung on the wall in each precinct, and the results tape printed out in each of the various polling places as the staff tried to wrap up their work after 9 pm June 6.

He failed to ask for documents that would show those poll workers saying, “@h,M?G@D”, “~onofab!t(h”, or even “WTF?” when they saw the tape alleging that Sal Mohammed had won so many votes in their very own precincts. Open records requests are such dry business.

Drake’s office told Washburn they would gather the requested materials as quickly as they can.