Pennsylvania is having their primary elections today and, as expected, the train wreck is underway. As reported by Philadelphia Daily News, hundreds of machines (in this case, those made by Danaher Guardian) have failed…
More than 100 voting machines are reported to be broken across the city, the Daily News has learned.
Apparently, the machines were broken when polls opened this morning — they keep spitting out the paper tape that keeps the tally of the vote. It is the largest breakdown since we started using the new voting machines.
The broken machines were first reported in the weblog for TheNextMayor.com. Expect more on this story in tomorrow’s Daily News.
The local ABC affiliate has more details. Amongst them…
Ward 12, Division 20 in Germantown is one such location. Judge of Elections Bernard Bibbs followed the routine startup procedure, but neither machine would activate. In one case, the write-in paper tape just unrolled and then refused to roll back up. In the other case, the machine will only beep and do nothing else.
Similar problems have popped up across the city. Machines by the score have failed to operate. In most places, at least one machine is functioning. In those places where all the machines are down, voters can request a paper ballot.
The number of failures seems to be evenly distributed across the city. It’s more voting machine failures than the city has ever had before.
“I voted before leaving for DC this morning and was told before voting that the write-in function on my machine was not working because the paper roll inside would not come up. Because I wanted to write in a candidate, I therefore had to fill out a provisional ballot, which may or may not be counted in the end.
I later heard from my judge of elections that this problem was happening AT EVERY VOTING MACHINE IN THE CITY.”
LATE UPDATE: 100’s of machines also failed in Pittsburgh across the state in Allegheny County! Details…
Geez. Bet we won’t even see a glimmer of this in the MSM. After all, it’s just a glitch.
It’s a miracle!
WOW! Got to hand it to those Republicans: with no paper trails allowed and no exit polls allowed, they have succeeded in rigging yet ANOTHER election! In the most crooked wards of Chicago, you never saw such success at vote-rigging! Wonder how long, now, until King George declares martial law and we don’t vote at all!
In my opinion the electronic voting machines were created to allow corrupeted criminal politicians to steal votes and steal the election so as to push their NWO agenda upon the people.
The NEOCON’s and all their cronies are behind this and they must be stopped!!!…
Al F
Will there be a hand cout of votes or will they just give it to the damm repugs again??!! IF all of you out there let this happen any where then we are all screwed. Maybe it is time to rethink our options with the current regime. Damm it America wake up and stop the neo-con-death-cult before it is to late for us to even think for our-selfs.
Resident chuckle-nuts and his cronies will kill us all if he is not stopped.
FIRE THE LIARS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Support our troops by not lying to them.
Plus the only thing that he has done good for America, is by putting our troops on the mexican border. But they should be armed while they are there.
Protect America first!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FIRE the LIARS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
:plain:https://bradblog.com/Images/emoticons/plain.gif
plain jane
Ever think that the installers of these machines know what’s going on and did this on purpose? Or is that too much?
This fiasco will be the excuse the voting machine companies and their GOP facilitators need to deny voters a paper trail. I can hear it now, "we tried to give a paper receipt but you see what happened the machines failed."
We need to go back to paper ballots counted by human beings and available for later review if and when needed.
Isn’t it amazing that machine errors are almost always documented as favoring the Repugnantcans?
I fear for my country. I want to live in a democracy where the values of our Constitution are protected and where the will of the people is truly represented by having every able bodied adult cast a vote and having that vote count as intended. If we do not live in that country, I fear that millions of Americans will one day take to the streets and make sure that the neocons are not in office.
Write-ins were *not* broken throughout the city. It was machine by machine. I was in five wards today– the 8th (west CC) was fine, the 5th (east CC) was mostly fine, the 30th (Graduate Hospital) had some problems, and the 2nd (Bella Vista) had some very bad problems, but localized at one or two polling places. I was told by some committeepeople in the 36th (Gray’s Ferry) that the problems were crippling where they happened, but not universal.
The explanation that we (in the Josephs campaign in the 182nd– basically CC, Bella Vista, and Gray’s Ferry) got was that the mechanisms that were installed for the visually impaired to read ballot lines royally screwed up the machines. (We were also told that some of the problems in Fishtown had to do with machines being stored below street level getting wet during the flooding yesterday) It’s a pretty believable explanation– these machines are so primitive, that there’s not a whole hell of a lot that could go wrong (and anyone who wanted to hack them would need to be capable of manipulating bits on an EPROM)
wHICH cOMPANY
Diebold, Sequoia or S&SE
tHEY WILLWIN hOUSE AGAIN
Please, BigDavefromQueens, edit your elegant sentiment. My late husband, in his wheelchair and with one arm paralyzed and barely able to speak, was the most enthusiastic and thoughtful voter I’ve ever seen.
Lionel Artom-Ginzburg #9
You said "… anyone who wanted to hack them would need to be capable of manipulating bits on an EPROM …"
If a hacker could get access to write to an EPROM, only a novice would mess with the bits. A competent hacker would just overwrite the entire target area with new code. And if the hacker was topnotch, the CRC would match the original, even tho the code would be different and adverse.
These problems with Diebold have been going on for years.. just like most of us (online in blogs) know that a diebold exec told bush’s people he’d hand Ohio to Bush in 2004.. well he did.. who even knows about this?
have we ever seen it on cnn or msnbc? i haven’t.. and i watch them all the time..
the exec if i recall resigned a yr or 2 later over other business scandals..
welcome to the world of republican run corrupt government 🙁
oh by the way as i posted on my blog for today, home forclosures are at record highs…
Golly. Cash registers and ATMs across the land have spit out paper receipts without a hitch for many years. Somehow, we are supposed to believe that the same functionality represents an insurmountable challenge when it comes to voting machines. This, in the 21st Century. I feel like I’m living inside an episode of "The Flintstones."
If a hacker could get access to write to an EPROM, only a novice would mess with the bits. A competent hacker would just overwrite the entire target area with new code. And if the hacker was topnotch, the CRC would match the original, even tho the code would be different and adverse.
Agreed. I wasn’t being precise. But what I meant is that these machines are 1980 technology– it’s not as simple as hacking in from an unprotected port or altering things from Windows, like Diebold. (The Philadelphia machines were not made by Diebold or ESS, incidentally) The actual data is stored in a cartridge about the size of an old Atari 2600 cartridge.
(I should also point out that the candidate I was working for yesterday, Rep. Josephs, is on record as being in favor of abolishing the machines and going back to paper ballots. )
Chris Bowers discusses this in some detail over at mydd.com
Please, take some time to do your homework before spouting off about the Rupugs and any problems in Pennsylvania.
The story in Pennsylvania is that dozens of powerful Republicans lost huge in elections all across PA. Senate President Pro Tempore and Majority Leader were both turned out in relative landslides. A special election in Chester County elected the first Democrat since dirt was invented.
If powerful incumbents and status quo protectors were pulling strings in electronic voting, these events would not have happened.
Take off your ideological blinders and read the news, instead of each others’ rants. In Pennsylvania at least electronic voting statewide has pretty badly crippled the Republican power brokers.
Lionel Artom-Ginzburg #15
How are the cartridge units inserted and removed?
What type memory chips are they?
Are EPROMS also on the cartridges?
While I was voting yesterday (South Philly), one machine jammed on me and they switched me to the other, which also didn’t work properly. I am all but sure it didn’t record my write in votes properly.
Who knows about the rest.
A hell of a mess.
V. Kurt Bellman # 17
That’s good news! Looks like the Republicans may be getting concerned that stealing elections might be dangerous to THEIR freedom!
Haven’t we been expectng this?? Now’s the time to change it and make the entire country aware, not just those who have been paying attention. Demand a receipt for your vote, immediately!! Or do a write-in. PA should re-do the entire election. When I heard PA got votng machines, I could not believe my eyes.
The bottom line is…. Have the breakdowns happened more in Democratic or Republican voting districts?
I am sure it will be fixed for the next election… but newer machines will be used. Ones that are not tested prior to the election. I bet the other machines used in Florida will be better than those used in Philly.. except maybe for the location of the voting machines themselves…
Doubleb,
It is not known where the majority of machines broke down and it doesn’t matter. It was a closed primary, where Democrats can only vote for Democrats and Republicans can only vote for Republicans, and everyone else can’t vote at all.
My county, Berks county, also had Danaher machine issues, and I can tell you they were almost all in heavily Republcan areas, as are the longest lines in November elections.
My experience has been the exact OPPOSITE of Ohio 2004. The system breakdowns always seem to happen in Republican areas.
Just thinking back to the good ole days when all we had were a few dimpled chads!
Not even Deibold can stop pissed off masses.The whole country should take lessons.Vote every incumbent out,its the only way to take back our country.We ousted 16 the last count i heard legislators in just primaries.More to follow including Santorum hes dead meat i predict.
http://www.allheadlinenews.com/...les/7003609766
It does require cautiously speculative thinking to believe that any recent or future voting can ever be certified – and by whom? Only pen & paper can save us. I can believe that when it looks like republicans are being affected, especially in primaries, I trust there is a underlying motive of distraction.
Each and every partisan politician is expendible. Unlike ‘drug users’ who are immediately incarcerated, it takes ‘our’ justice system years to prosecute these special citizens only to hand down light punishment. They suffer no real jail time or even loss of respect for their negligent mis-management or actual crimes committed extending illegal wars or limiting our rights.
If they speak against the status quo they are quickly silenced or worse, like Conyers or Wellstone. But continuing the illusion of terror, stealing, lying and abandoning our Founders’ democratic principles makes for a great schedule of lucrative speaking engagements and book deals after a short rest in minimum security detention!
Speaking as a former programmer, and someone who’s given it a bit of thought over the past five years or so, I’m wondering if a really competent hacker has decided to teach people a lesson about electronic voting machines in a way they can’t fail to understand.
I’ve myself thought that hacking a few million votes on election day 2008 to swing the vote ridiculously one way — say having Utah vote 75% democratic — would finally make the TV networks and their telegenic clone anchors awaken in dull surprise to the fact that EVS’s are designed to alter elections undetectably — unless someone pranks the system after the serious cheaters are done with their original undetectable alterations.
Might be worth life in prison. Just one shot.