On the eve of the Iranian election, President Bush declared today that Iran's electoral process failed to meet "the basic requirements of democracy" said that the "oppressive record" of the country's rulers would undercut the legitimacy of the vote.

Hi Gus.

Did he have anything to say about the ballot rigging & voter registration fraud perpetrated in the last US Presidential elections?

I wonder how the Iranian elections would stack-up against those held in Uzbekistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq, China, Burma, Thailand & other 'outposts' of democracy run by his authoritarian mates?

Cheers.

Here's the first paragraph from a recent editorial in New York Times.

There are many problems with American elections, but none more serious than the rise of paperless electronic voting, whose results cannot be trusted. Grass-roots reformers are in the middle of a two-day lobbying blitz on Capitol Hill in support of a House bill that would require that electronic voting machines in federal elections produce voter-verifiable paper records. It is an important measure that should be passed without delay.

And the discussion at Slashdot.

But, look, isn't there a perfect application for the Microsoft-Murdoch junta? Voting, on each and every whim, from the handheld console, in the comfort of your living-room couch? Cynics and doomsayers will quibble about the risks of rigging, rorting, rooting, etc, in a paperless system. But I want more relaxation and more comfort. I would love to be able to press the YES-YES-YEEEESSSS! button every time John Howard turns on the sobs to announce one of his private school pals has been rescued from the clutches of satanic infidels.

From the Washington Post

Some Voting Machines Chop Off Candidates' Names
Computer Glitch Affects Voters in 3 Jurisdictions; Error Cannot Be Fixed by Nov. 7
By Leef Smith
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 24, 2006; B04

U.S. Senate candidate James Webb's last name has been cut off on part of the electronic ballot used by voters in Alexandria, Falls Church and Charlottesville because of a computer glitch that also affects other candidates with long names, city officials said yesterday.

Although the problem creates some voter confusion, it will not cause votes to be cast incorrectly, election officials emphasized. The error shows up only on the summary page, where voters are asked to review their selections before hitting the button to cast their votes. Webb's full name appears on the page where voters choose for whom to vote.

Election officials attribute the mistake to an increase in the type size on the ballot. Although the larger type is easier to read, it also unintentionally shortens the longer names on the summary page of the ballot.

Thus, Democratic candidate Webb will appear with his first name and nickname only -- or "James H. 'Jim' " -- on summary pages in Alexandria, Falls Church and Charlottesville, the only jurisdictions in Virginia that use balloting machines manufactured by Hart InterCivic of Austin.

"We're not happy about it," Webb spokeswoman Kristian Denny Todd said last night, adding that the campaign learned about the problem a week ago and has since been in touch with state election officials. "I don't think it can be remedied by Election Day. Obviously, that's a concern."

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Gus: See cartoon at head of this line of blogs, etc...

Gives new meaning to the phrase "robbing them blind" Gus .....

‘Six years after the emergence of the now infamous "hanging chad" in the 2000 presidential elections, monitoring groups warn that technological glitches and hackers could throw next month's mid-term elections into chaos.

With polling day less than two weeks away, a report this week by electionline.org, a non-partisan organisation, anticipates problems at the ballot box in as many as 10 states.

Machine failures, database delays and foul-ups, inconsistent procedures, new rules and new equipment have some predicting chaos at the polls at worst, and widespread polling place snafus at best," the report says.’

US Warned Of Ballot Box Chaos As Elections Near

elsewhere …..

‘The access panel door on a Diebold AccuVote-TS voting machine - the door that protects the memory card that stores the votes, and is the main barrier to the injection of a virus - can be opened with a standard key that is widely available on the Internet.’

Freedom To Tinker

and the prize goes to …..

‘Here's an indictment of the IT profession, and a fine irony: the degree of independent hand-auditing of paper ballot records sufficient to verify the corresponding computerized vote tallies is comparable to the effort required to more accurately count all the ballots by hand in the first place, dispensing with the machines. But until that day arrives, the programs that the voting vendors actually distribute - as opposed to the software they may say they distribute - will continue to determine who takes power after the votes are tallied.’

Pull The Plug On E-Voting: Part 2

Thousands Face Mix-Ups In Voter Registrations
In New Databases, Many Are Wrongly Flagged as Ineligible

By Mary Pat Flaherty
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 18, 2008; Page A01

Thousands of voters across the country must reestablish their eligibility in the next three weeks in order for their votes to count on Nov. 4, a result of new state registration systems that are incorrectly rejecting them.

The challenges have led to a dozen lawsuits, testy arguments among state officials and escalating partisan battles. Because many voters may not know that their names have been flagged, eligibility questions could cause added confusion on Election Day, beyond the delays that may come with a huge turnout.

The scramble to verify voter registrations is happening as states switch from locally managed lists of voters to statewide databases, a change required by federal law and hailed by many as a more efficient and accurate way to keep lists up to date.

But in the transition, the systems are questioning the registrations of many voters when discrepancies surface between their registration information and other official records, often because of errors outside voters' control.

The issue made its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which yesterday blocked a challenge to 200,000 Ohio voters whose registration data conflicted with other state records.

from the independent

 

Campaign for Democracy: What can we learn from the rest of the world?

In the wake of the expenses scandal, Britain is debating how to reform politics to create a more accountable and fair system. We asked our writers around the globe to examine the relevant lessons from abroad...

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I was going to place this item in the Democratic Audit of Australia section but decided to place it here, under the cartoon explaining how voting worked in the USA when Bush Junior was elected president.

Some writers for the Independent have some weird ideas about the greater value of their "system". For example, the writer for the USA mentions the Watergate affair as to show how the system is efficient at stopping corruption, but not a peep about the porkies from the Bush Administration in regard to the war in Iraq and other subjects. To a great extent, the Watergate affair is a piddle compare to the torrent of crap that came from the Bushit...

Strangely too, the writer for Australia devalues the concept of compulsory voting...

See toon at top and read more at the independent...