Alice in Wonderfornia
I have been urging the creators of Vote-PAD to come to Iowa and get their invention certified for use in our elections. (Vote-PAD is a low-tech way to assist disabled voters with ballot marking.) There is currently no market here for their product since our counties already have bought more expensive high tech gadgets that purport to assist some disabled voters, so the Vote-PAD people have not attempted to get Iowa certification.
Instead they went to Wonderland California. But the Queen of California laid a trap for them. On Friday California denied them certification, following the most bizarre certification process imaginable. Vote-PAD has responded with this satire of the California decision. Here’s a taste:
The Queen started by describing the testing process, “We asked them to vote independently on the Vote-PAD, and we told them exactly what to do the entire time.”
“Excuse me,” said Alice, “but how is that independent?”
“That’s not the point,” said the Queen. “The point is that they weren’t able to vote independently.”
“But you didn’t let them,” objected Alice.
The state announced its decision on a Friday. Last winter it was also a Friday when they certified Diebold’s touchscreens despite a report saying the Diebold system violated federal standards. Friday is when many government agencies announce things that are embarrassing to them because fewer people see the newspaper on Saturdays.
I still hope Vote-PAD comes to Iowa. I think they would get a fair hearing from the Iowa board of voting machine examiners. Then if some county has trouble with their Diebolds, an alternative would already be certified.