Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org
It appears that the Senate will go the way of the House and move any requirement for a voter verified paper audit trail to at least 2010. Reports on testimony given to the Senate Rules Committee today are that there was a lot of “kissing a**” and hand wringing.
Election officials in Montgomery Co., Ohio, had a grand idea. They decided to solve their problem recruiting poll workers by allowing companies and groups to wear their logos on shirts while they work the polls. For example, “Mom and Pop’s” burgers could man a poll site and the poll workers could all wear their uniforms while they helped voters. This was a bad idea made worse when people began to complain that one of the groups who would be manning the polls would be wearing their “Dayton Right To Life” T-shirts and, according to the head of the group, “We will be there to answer life questions.” This came up originally in a story from Utah. This is a bad idea that needs to stop. We can do something about it by getting involved and volunteering to work on elections on election day.
Links to those stories, and the other notable voting news items today, all below…
Election bureau director says $300,000 needed to cover a 3-year extended service contract. LINK
**”Daily Voting News” is meant as a comprehensive listing of reports each day concerning issues related to election and voting news around the country regardless of quality or political slant. Therefore, items listed in “Daily Voting News” may not reflect the opinions of VotersUnite.Org or BradBlog.Com**
John,
I was amused at the confusion and comparison of Feinstein’s Senate bill to Holt’s House bill in the article you linked to. Even Bev Harris was at first confused by all the rancor and multiplicity of bills. No surprise that reporters are too, but unlike Bev who checked it out, they won’t.
Actually the compliment to Holt’s HR 811 is Nelson’s S. 559, which I have repeated ad nauseum here, as you know. But no one checks things out anymore it seems. People like to talk without knowing what they are talking about.
That is one of the consequences of a fragmented, “what she said” approach. When people “do not have time” to research something themselves, they have faith in someone else. They listen to stars of the movement.
And I was interested to find that the positioning goes along party lines. Yes, strangely enough, it is a partisan issue:
(CNET Story About HR 811, emphasis added). Those who opposed Holt (D-NJ) and Nelson (D-FLA), primarily republicans, which spawned the Feinstein (D-CA) legislation, can now bask in the status quo ante and extol the virtues of helping to do nothing about electronic voting machines in the 110th Congress.
To be fair I do realize the opposition thinks that the status quo is better than what would have happened if S. 559 had become law.
And honestly I can not say with moral certitude that one position is the gospel truth and the other is the spawn of satan. Reasonable people can differ peacefully.
Thank you Dredd for at least attempting to bring objective facts into this.
Sometimes egos exceed common sense.
This country has never known comprehensive, National standards for voting methods—including Hand Counted Paper Ballot elections.
HR 811 was just the staring place. But apparently no one, not even the extreme left, seems to want to start this process.