Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org
According to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, “A state-mandated test of voting machines before the March municipal election went off without a flaw Friday at the Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections, officials said. Elections Supervisor Arthur Anderson tested 2 percent of the 830 machines that will be in use during the March 13 city elections, running mock ballots to make sure the computerized voting systems and touch-screen machines are working.” 2 percent? That’s not a test, it’s a spot check.
In a press release today PFAW said, “An audit report released by the Florida Secretary of State’s office regarding Sarasota County’s November election debacle came under fire shortly after its release today. “This audit’s a whitewash. It is the result of a flawed process overseen by people with a stake in the outcome, and it will not be the last word on this matter,” said People For the American Way Foundation President Ralph G. Neas. “Something went terribly wrong in Sarasota County last November—and voters have provided credible evidence that widespread voting machine malfunctions were part of the problem. Unfortunately, this report papers over that evidence.”…
U.S. Election Assistance Commission approves SysTest and iBeta Quality Assurance to check machines. LINK
New state law causing officials election headaches LINK
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I was at an official test of the Diebold TSx machines that were to be used in the Utah 2006 election. In a small room were four machines hooked up to a central tabulator.
If you’ve ever seen one of these things set up, you’d know it is no simple task. I would compare it to setting up a tent with a printer.
It takes 15 to 20 minutes just for the machines to process a make believe election. I’m not sure why it takes that long because the machines only have to pick a random number to include after each of the candidates names that matches the total. A program to preform such a procedure would finish in the blink of an eye on a commodore 64 from the mid eighties.
If that same test had been done on all of the other 100 or so machines just outside the testing room it would have proved absolutely nothing about how they would preform on election day, but I guarantee you that was not even done. There wouldn’t have been time, and the machines that completed the test were left with a running total of about 4000 votes, which were not seen on any of the machines used in the election I poll-watched in that same county.