Saturday, April 30, 2005
Advocacy Journalism In Action
Robert Koehler is a syndicated columnist who attended the national election reform conference ("Nash-ional") in Nashville last month. He came away knowing there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections. Reflecting on the conference, he wrote "The silent scream of numbers: The 2004 election was stolen — will someone please tell the media?"
Apparently a few of his affiliates have picked up the story but most have not. Most notably, the public editor at the Chicago Tribune, Don Wycliff, wrote "When winning isn't everything", a rebuttal of sorts or perhaps an attempted debunking of Koehler's article that the Tribune couldn't even bring itself to publish.
Many people have read Koehler's article at his own personal site. But it has also gained significant attention at Democratic Underground and Brad Blog. Both places list countless letters sent to Wycliff, including mine below.
I don't want to say a lot about the details of any of this because GuvWurld readers should venture to these other sites. Suffice to say that Wycliff has sent a few rather weak replies that have been made public, and Koehler has also been checking in with DU member Wiley50. In this DU thread, a cousin of the one above, discussion is about how to get the story of Wycliff's indefensible position to be covered by other media. By making him the star of the story, election fraud, voter confidence, and the Consent of the Governed all slip into the mainstream consciousness. This is real-time advocacy journalism in progress.
* * *
To: dwycliff@tribune.com
Subject: Voter Confidence
Sent: 4/29/05 1am
Dear Mr. Wycliff,
My position is simple: there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections.
Your position seems to be: there is no basis for questioning the results reported from U.S. federal elections.
Please read the Voter Confidence Resolution below and reconsider. If you still disagree I expect you will be prepared to explain on what basis we should maintain confidence in a system designed to make a conclusive outcome impossible. I truly look forward to your reply.
In Respect and Peace,
Voter Confidence Resolution
(v6.0, LAST UPDATED: 4/23/05 11pm)
Whereas an election is a competition for the privilege of representing the people; and
Whereas each voter is entitled to cast a single ballot to record his or her preferences for representation; and
Whereas the records of individual votes are the basis for counting and potentially re-counting a collective total and declaring a winner; and
Whereas an election's outcome is a matter of public record, based on a finite collection of immutable smaller records; and
Whereas a properly functioning election system should produce unanimous agreement about the results indicated by a fixed set of unchanging records; and
Whereas recent U.S. federal elections have been conducted under conditions that have not produced unanimous agreement about the outcome; and
Whereas future U.S. federal elections cannot possibly produce unanimous agreement as long as any condition permits an inconclusive count or re-count of votes; and
Whereas inconclusive counts and re-counts have occurred during recent U.S. federal elections due in part to electronic voting devices that do not produce a paper record of votes to be re-counted if necessary; and
Whereas inconclusive results have also been caused by election machines losing data, producing negative vote totals, showing more votes than there are registered voters, and persistently and automatically swapping a voter's vote from his or her chosen candidate to an opponent; and
Whereas inconclusive results make it impossible to measure the will of the people in their preferences for representation; and
Whereas the Declaration of Independence refers to the Consent of the Governed as the self-evident truth from which Government derives "just Power";
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED:
Because inconclusive results, by definition, mean that the true outcome of an election cannot be known, there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections; and
Be it also resolved:
Ensuring conclusive results is only one necessary step toward creating a new basis for voter confidence in U.S. federal elections. Additional reforms that would take further steps toward building voter confidence include:
1) voting processes owned and operated entirely in the public domain, and
2) clean money laws to keep all corporate funds out of campaign financing, and
3) a voter verifiable paper ballot for every vote cast and additional uniform standards determined by a non-partisan nationally recognized commission, and
4) declaring election day a national holiday, and
5) counting all votes publicly and locally in the presence of citizen witnesses and
credentialed members of the media, and
6) equal time provisions to be observed by the media along with a measurable increase in local, public control of the airwaves, and
7) presidential debates containing a minimum of three candidates, run by a non-partisan commission comprised of representatives of publicly owned media outlets, and
8) instant runoff voting (see H.R. 5293) and proportional representation to replace the winner-take-all system for federal elections;
Be it further resolved:
When elections are conducted under conditions that prevent conclusive outcomes, the Consent of the Governed is not being sought. Absent this self-evident source of legitimacy, such Consent is not to be assumed or taken for granted.
***
The permalink for the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/04/voter-confidence-resolution.html
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Apparently a few of his affiliates have picked up the story but most have not. Most notably, the public editor at the Chicago Tribune, Don Wycliff, wrote "When winning isn't everything", a rebuttal of sorts or perhaps an attempted debunking of Koehler's article that the Tribune couldn't even bring itself to publish.
Many people have read Koehler's article at his own personal site. But it has also gained significant attention at Democratic Underground and Brad Blog. Both places list countless letters sent to Wycliff, including mine below.
I don't want to say a lot about the details of any of this because GuvWurld readers should venture to these other sites. Suffice to say that Wycliff has sent a few rather weak replies that have been made public, and Koehler has also been checking in with DU member Wiley50. In this DU thread, a cousin of the one above, discussion is about how to get the story of Wycliff's indefensible position to be covered by other media. By making him the star of the story, election fraud, voter confidence, and the Consent of the Governed all slip into the mainstream consciousness. This is real-time advocacy journalism in progress.
To: dwycliff@tribune.com
Subject: Voter Confidence
Sent: 4/29/05 1am
Dear Mr. Wycliff,
My position is simple: there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections.
Your position seems to be: there is no basis for questioning the results reported from U.S. federal elections.
Please read the Voter Confidence Resolution below and reconsider. If you still disagree I expect you will be prepared to explain on what basis we should maintain confidence in a system designed to make a conclusive outcome impossible. I truly look forward to your reply.
In Respect and Peace,
Voter Confidence Resolution
(v6.0, LAST UPDATED: 4/23/05 11pm)
Whereas an election is a competition for the privilege of representing the people; and
Whereas each voter is entitled to cast a single ballot to record his or her preferences for representation; and
Whereas the records of individual votes are the basis for counting and potentially re-counting a collective total and declaring a winner; and
Whereas an election's outcome is a matter of public record, based on a finite collection of immutable smaller records; and
Whereas a properly functioning election system should produce unanimous agreement about the results indicated by a fixed set of unchanging records; and
Whereas recent U.S. federal elections have been conducted under conditions that have not produced unanimous agreement about the outcome; and
Whereas future U.S. federal elections cannot possibly produce unanimous agreement as long as any condition permits an inconclusive count or re-count of votes; and
Whereas inconclusive counts and re-counts have occurred during recent U.S. federal elections due in part to electronic voting devices that do not produce a paper record of votes to be re-counted if necessary; and
Whereas inconclusive results have also been caused by election machines losing data, producing negative vote totals, showing more votes than there are registered voters, and persistently and automatically swapping a voter's vote from his or her chosen candidate to an opponent; and
Whereas inconclusive results make it impossible to measure the will of the people in their preferences for representation; and
Whereas the Declaration of Independence refers to the Consent of the Governed as the self-evident truth from which Government derives "just Power";
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED:
Because inconclusive results, by definition, mean that the true outcome of an election cannot be known, there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections; and
Be it also resolved:
Ensuring conclusive results is only one necessary step toward creating a new basis for voter confidence in U.S. federal elections. Additional reforms that would take further steps toward building voter confidence include:
1) voting processes owned and operated entirely in the public domain, and
2) clean money laws to keep all corporate funds out of campaign financing, and
3) a voter verifiable paper ballot for every vote cast and additional uniform standards determined by a non-partisan nationally recognized commission, and
4) declaring election day a national holiday, and
5) counting all votes publicly and locally in the presence of citizen witnesses and
credentialed members of the media, and
6) equal time provisions to be observed by the media along with a measurable increase in local, public control of the airwaves, and
7) presidential debates containing a minimum of three candidates, run by a non-partisan commission comprised of representatives of publicly owned media outlets, and
8) instant runoff voting (see H.R. 5293) and proportional representation to replace the winner-take-all system for federal elections;
Be it further resolved:
When elections are conducted under conditions that prevent conclusive outcomes, the Consent of the Governed is not being sought. Absent this self-evident source of legitimacy, such Consent is not to be assumed or taken for granted.
***
The permalink for the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/04/voter-confidence-resolution.html
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Sunday, April 24, 2005
The Voter Confidence Movement
For a variety of converging reasons, the GuvWurld raison d'etre is evolving under the banner of the Voter Confidence Movement. An all-new Voter Confidence Resolution is making the rounds and will be the starting point for Arcata City Councilmembers Harmony Groves and Dave Meserve as they do their subcommittee work to prepare the resolution to come before the Council.
I met with Harmony this past Wednesday and she was encouraged by this new direction. She provided limited and minor input which is reflected in the published resolution referenced above. Harmony also gave me a date of June 15 to target for a public hearing. This is not the first delay the resolution has encountered. But as before, other near term events seem likely to benefit the push for support when the resolution is heard.
Most immediate is the fast approaching Town Hall Forum on Ranked Choice Voting in Eureka this Thursday, April 28 at 6pm at the Wharfinger Building on the water front. Publicity for the event picked up big time last week. I appeared with Scott Menzies as a guest on KHSU's Thursday Night Talk hosted by Rob Amerman. Scott's My Word column was also published in the Eureka Times-Standard. We also had Eureka City Councilmember and Forum co-sponsor Chris Kerrigan do an interview with Mike Dronkers on KHUM.
Chris also appeared on the cover of the Humboldt Advocate which does not publish online. In this piece and elsewhere, some prominent community members have been very vocally opposing the forum. Their noise making has only served to help raise awareness. Their attack the messenger, ignore the message style has typically backfired.
The Voter Confidence Committee is getting increasingly organized and efficient. Last Monday, with the help of Democracy Unlimited, we were able to do a dry run of much of the upcoming forum. We've also seen an increase in volunteers, though more are always needed and can contact me here for more info. At the forum we will unveil a new banner and even before that we expect to launch our new website. Voter Confidence has, by all accounts, been a smart frame for us to adopt.
It feels like the neglected front last week was the County Board of Supervisors. It is still my intention to present them with a compact yet comprehensive case both against Diebold and strongly for the Open Voting Consortium's open source electronic voting system with a paper ballot and triple redundant vote counting (see previous GuvWurld blog entry, and this rave editorial by the Mercury News calling OVC the "holy grail"). The revised goal is to have this document created by the forum so it can be presented to the community as well as the Supes.
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I met with Harmony this past Wednesday and she was encouraged by this new direction. She provided limited and minor input which is reflected in the published resolution referenced above. Harmony also gave me a date of June 15 to target for a public hearing. This is not the first delay the resolution has encountered. But as before, other near term events seem likely to benefit the push for support when the resolution is heard.
Most immediate is the fast approaching Town Hall Forum on Ranked Choice Voting in Eureka this Thursday, April 28 at 6pm at the Wharfinger Building on the water front. Publicity for the event picked up big time last week. I appeared with Scott Menzies as a guest on KHSU's Thursday Night Talk hosted by Rob Amerman. Scott's My Word column was also published in the Eureka Times-Standard. We also had Eureka City Councilmember and Forum co-sponsor Chris Kerrigan do an interview with Mike Dronkers on KHUM.
Chris also appeared on the cover of the Humboldt Advocate which does not publish online. In this piece and elsewhere, some prominent community members have been very vocally opposing the forum. Their noise making has only served to help raise awareness. Their attack the messenger, ignore the message style has typically backfired.
The Voter Confidence Committee is getting increasingly organized and efficient. Last Monday, with the help of Democracy Unlimited, we were able to do a dry run of much of the upcoming forum. We've also seen an increase in volunteers, though more are always needed and can contact me here for more info. At the forum we will unveil a new banner and even before that we expect to launch our new website. Voter Confidence has, by all accounts, been a smart frame for us to adopt.
It feels like the neglected front last week was the County Board of Supervisors. It is still my intention to present them with a compact yet comprehensive case both against Diebold and strongly for the Open Voting Consortium's open source electronic voting system with a paper ballot and triple redundant vote counting (see previous GuvWurld blog entry, and this rave editorial by the Mercury News calling OVC the "holy grail"). The revised goal is to have this document created by the forum so it can be presented to the community as well as the Supes.
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Saturday, April 23, 2005
Voter Confidence Resolution
BREAKING NEWS (7/21/05): Arcata, CA City Council becomes nation's first to adopt the Voter Confidence Resolution. Click HERE for the story and HERE for a scanned copy of the official resolution signed by Mayor Machi.
* * *
NOTE: The Voter Confidence Resolution is intended for City Councils across America. As unified communities make this collective declaration, they call to question: Has the Consent of the Governed been withdrawn, YET? The resolution is a template that should be customized locally through bridge-building, consensus-seeking teach-ins. For a more thorough understanding, read A Blueprint For Peaceful Revolution (NEW 9/22/05). For abbreviated talking points, please see the Guide to the Voter Confidence Resolution.
* * *
(v6.1, LAST UPDATED: 5/14/05 5pm)
Whereas an election is a competition for the privilege of representing the people; and
Whereas each voter is entitled to cast a single ballot to record his or her preferences for representation; and
Whereas the records of individual votes are the basis for counting and potentially re-counting a collective total and declaring a winner; and
Whereas an election's outcome is a matter of public record, based on a finite collection of immutable smaller records; and
Whereas a properly functioning election system should produce unanimous agreement about the results indicated by a fixed set of unchanging records; and
Whereas recent U.S. federal elections have been conducted under conditions that have not produced unanimous agreement about the outcome; and
Whereas future U.S. federal elections cannot possibly produce unanimous agreement as long as any condition permits an inconclusive count or re-count of votes; and
Whereas inconclusive counts and re-counts have occurred during recent U.S. federal elections due in part to electronic voting devices that do not produce a paper record of votes to be re -counted if necessary; and
Whereas inconclusive results have also been caused by election machines losing data, producing negative vote totals, showing more votes than there are registered voters, and persistently and automatically swapping a voter's vote from his or her chosen candidate to an opponent; and
Whereas inconclusive results make it impossible to measure the will of the people in their preferences for representation; and
Whereas the Declaration of Independence refers to the Consent of the Governed as the self-evident truth from which Government derives "just Power";
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED:
Because inconclusive results, by definition, mean that the true outcome of an election cannot be known, there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections; and
Be it also resolved:
The following is a comprehensive election reform platform likely to ensure conclusive election results and create a basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections:
When elections are conducted under conditions that prevent conclusive outcomes, the Consent of the Governed is not being sought. Absent this self-evident source of legitimacy, such Consent is not to be assumed or taken for granted.
*** Endorsements
Palo Alto, CA Human Relations Commission
David Cobb, 2004 Green Party Presidential Candidate
Voter Confidence Committee of Humboldt County
Green Party - Eureka, CA, Humboldt County, CA
Progressive Democrats of WA
Veterans For Peace, Humboldt Bay Chapter 56
Black Box Voting, Inc.
Velvet Revolution
Paul R. Lehto, Attorney at Law
Jane Allen, GuvWurld contributing editor
Submit your endorsement or the version of the resolution that your City Council is considering; or post your comments HERE.
***
The permalink for the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/04/voter-confidence-resolution.html
The permalink for the Guide to the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/06/guide-to-voter-confidence-resolution.html
***
An archive of related prior works can be found HERE.
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NOTE: The Voter Confidence Resolution is intended for City Councils across America. As unified communities make this collective declaration, they call to question: Has the Consent of the Governed been withdrawn, YET? The resolution is a template that should be customized locally through bridge-building, consensus-seeking teach-ins. For a more thorough understanding, read A Blueprint For Peaceful Revolution (NEW 9/22/05). For abbreviated talking points, please see the Guide to the Voter Confidence Resolution.
(v6.1, LAST UPDATED: 5/14/05 5pm)
Whereas an election is a competition for the privilege of representing the people; and
Whereas each voter is entitled to cast a single ballot to record his or her preferences for representation; and
Whereas the records of individual votes are the basis for counting and potentially re-counting a collective total and declaring a winner; and
Whereas an election's outcome is a matter of public record, based on a finite collection of immutable smaller records; and
Whereas a properly functioning election system should produce unanimous agreement about the results indicated by a fixed set of unchanging records; and
Whereas recent U.S. federal elections have been conducted under conditions that have not produced unanimous agreement about the outcome; and
Whereas future U.S. federal elections cannot possibly produce unanimous agreement as long as any condition permits an inconclusive count or re-count of votes; and
Whereas inconclusive counts and re-counts have occurred during recent U.S. federal elections due in part to electronic voting devices that do not produce a paper record of votes to be re -counted if necessary; and
Whereas inconclusive results have also been caused by election machines losing data, producing negative vote totals, showing more votes than there are registered voters, and persistently and automatically swapping a voter's vote from his or her chosen candidate to an opponent; and
Whereas inconclusive results make it impossible to measure the will of the people in their preferences for representation; and
Whereas the Declaration of Independence refers to the Consent of the Governed as the self-evident truth from which Government derives "just Power";
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED:
Because inconclusive results, by definition, mean that the true outcome of an election cannot be known, there is no basis for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections; and
Be it also resolved:
The following is a comprehensive election reform platform likely to ensure conclusive election results and create a basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections:
1) voting processes owned and operated entirely in the public domain, andBe it further resolved:
2) clean money laws to keep all corporate funds out of campaign financing, and
3) a voter verified paper ballot for every vote cast and additional uniform standards determined by a non-partisan nationally recognized commission, and
4) declaring election day a national holiday, and
5) counting all votes publicly and locally in the presence of citizen witnesses and credentialed members of the media, and
6) equal time provisions to be restored by the media along with a measurable increase in local, public control of the airwaves, and
7) presidential debates containing a minimum of three candidates, run by a non-partisan commission comprised of representatives of publicly owned media outlets, and
8) preferential voting and proportional representation to replace the winner-take-all system for federal elections;
When elections are conducted under conditions that prevent conclusive outcomes, the Consent of the Governed is not being sought. Absent this self-evident source of legitimacy, such Consent is not to be assumed or taken for granted.
Palo Alto, CA Human Relations Commission
David Cobb, 2004 Green Party Presidential Candidate
Voter Confidence Committee of Humboldt County
Green Party - Eureka, CA, Humboldt County, CA
Progressive Democrats of WA
Veterans For Peace, Humboldt Bay Chapter 56
Black Box Voting, Inc.
Velvet Revolution
Paul R. Lehto, Attorney at Law
Jane Allen, GuvWurld contributing editor
Submit your endorsement or the version of the resolution that your City Council is considering; or post your comments HERE.
The permalink for the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/04/voter-confidence-resolution.html
The permalink for the Guide to the Voter Confidence Resolution is:
http://guvwurld.blogspot.com/2005/06/guide-to-voter-confidence-resolution.html
An archive of related prior works can be found HERE.
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Sunday, April 17, 2005
Marla Ruzicka, R.I.P.
An American Aid Worker Is Killed in Her Line of Duty
By ROBERT F. WORTH
Published: April 18, 2005
BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 17 - For more than two years, Marla Ruzicka worked to get help for innocent civilians caught in cross-fires here. A 28-year-old Californian with blond hair and an electric smile, she ran a one-woman aid group.
On Saturday afternoon, Ms. Ruzicka became a casualty herself. A suicide bomber attacked a convoy of security contractors that was passing near her car on the airport road in Baghdad, killing her and her Iraqi driver, United States Embassy officials in Baghdad said.
Full story (in GuvWurld News Archive, links to original in NYTimes).
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By ROBERT F. WORTH
Published: April 18, 2005
BAGHDAD, Iraq, April 17 - For more than two years, Marla Ruzicka worked to get help for innocent civilians caught in cross-fires here. A 28-year-old Californian with blond hair and an electric smile, she ran a one-woman aid group.
On Saturday afternoon, Ms. Ruzicka became a casualty herself. A suicide bomber attacked a convoy of security contractors that was passing near her car on the airport road in Baghdad, killing her and her Iraqi driver, United States Embassy officials in Baghdad said.
Full story (in GuvWurld News Archive, links to original in NYTimes).
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Saturday, April 16, 2005
State Dept Nixes Report Showing Huge Increase In Terrorism in 2004
Knight Ridder has published a story picked up by lots of papers (multiple links in GuvWurld News Archive) announcing the discontinuation of an annual report on international terrorism published each of the past 19 years. This by decree of C. Rice who was not directly quoted in the article. However, there were anonymous State Department sources quoted. Interesting excerpts:
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[Since 1986] The State Department published "Patterns of Global Terrorism" under a law that requires it to submit to the House of Representatives and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a country-by-country terrorism assessment by April 30 each year.The report cites 625 "significant" terrorist incidents in 2004, up from 175 in 2003, and these figures don't include Iraq, which Mr. Bush called "a central front in the war on terror" as recently as this past Tuesday.
...
A senior State Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, confirmed that the publication was being eliminated, but said the allegation that it was being done for political reasons was "categorically untrue."
...
The intelligence officials requested anonymity because the information is classified and because, they said, they feared White House retribution.
The senior State Department official said a report on global terrorism would be sent this year to lawmakers and made available to the public in place of "Patterns of Global Terrorism," but that it wouldn't contain statistical data.You'll find this story filed in the Revised Truth section of the GuvWurld News Archive. As is too often the case, I am reminded of George Orwell:
...
But other current and former officials charged that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's office ordered "Patterns of Global Terrorism" eliminated several weeks ago because the 2004 statistics raised disturbing questions about the Bush's administration's frequent claims of progress in the war against terrorism.
...
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., who was among the leading critics of last year's mix-up, reacted angrily to the decision.
"This is the definitive report on the incidence of terrorism around the world. It should be unthinkable that there would be an effort to withhold it - or any of the key data - from the public. The Bush administration should stop playing politics with this critical report."
...
To read past "Patterns of Global Terrorism" reports online, go to www.mipt.org/Patterns-of-Global-Terrorism.asp
"He who controls the past, controls the future; he who controls the present, controls the past"
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Friday, April 15, 2005
Peak Oil Transformation Task Force
At the conclusion of my recent letter to Eureka Times-Standard editor Charles Winkler, I presented the idea of a task force "so that we can begin to study the anticipated local effects and prepare for the massive adjustments that will be required of us all" as the impact of Peak Oil grows more apparent. This idea has since come up in several conversations, never failing to resonate.
Of course, these were exchanges with people who already accept Peak Oil as reality. It would seem that being at that point is a prerequisite to planning ahead. To accept the need to consider Peak Oil's fallout first requires understanding which in turn calls for an education campaign. It has been suggested that I hold a contest for a name superior to Peak Oil Transformation Task Force. Send me your best ideas and we'll see.
As a matter of strategizing the development of an educational campaign, it also must be considered that too many ideas at once can be distracting and counterproductive. With that in mind, I'll mention just one more element that came out of my recent conversations. There will need to be multiple messages for any given concept, specifically created in acknowledgment that for some people it is meant to break them out of denial while for others it must make sense of cognitive dissonance.
With the No Confidence Resolution and the Voter Confidence Committee in high gear I will not be diverting my time to the pursuit of this task force. However, the topic will extend ruthless honesty and apply it to ordinary community interactions. The informal first phase of the education campaign, in other words, must begin by each of us doing the least we can do - talk to one other person about it.
I also just discovered the Peak Oil Blog. It is on hiatus until mid-April but the last entry, dated March 20, contains a transcript of Maryland Congressman Roscoe Bartlett addressing Congress on Peak Oil. Bartlett's website has video.
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Of course, these were exchanges with people who already accept Peak Oil as reality. It would seem that being at that point is a prerequisite to planning ahead. To accept the need to consider Peak Oil's fallout first requires understanding which in turn calls for an education campaign. It has been suggested that I hold a contest for a name superior to Peak Oil Transformation Task Force. Send me your best ideas and we'll see.
As a matter of strategizing the development of an educational campaign, it also must be considered that too many ideas at once can be distracting and counterproductive. With that in mind, I'll mention just one more element that came out of my recent conversations. There will need to be multiple messages for any given concept, specifically created in acknowledgment that for some people it is meant to break them out of denial while for others it must make sense of cognitive dissonance.
With the No Confidence Resolution and the Voter Confidence Committee in high gear I will not be diverting my time to the pursuit of this task force. However, the topic will extend ruthless honesty and apply it to ordinary community interactions. The informal first phase of the education campaign, in other words, must begin by each of us doing the least we can do - talk to one other person about it.
I also just discovered the Peak Oil Blog. It is on hiatus until mid-April but the last entry, dated March 20, contains a transcript of Maryland Congressman Roscoe Bartlett addressing Congress on Peak Oil. Bartlett's website has video.
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Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Response to Fred Mangels' No Confidence Critique
I regret that it has taken me so long to address comments by Fred Mangels posted to his blog on March 15. I told Fred I would respond as soon as I could and this is it. I appreciate any opportunity to publicly discuss concerns about the No Confidence Resolution.
Fred says: "This campaign reform stuff really irks me, no matter who I hear it from." The No Confidence Resolution calls for: "clean money laws [to] keep all corporate funds out of campaign financing." Fred's resistance to the specific of the resolution seems to be pre-empted by his more general opposition to the notion of reform. He writes:
Regarding regulation, simply presenting it that way is a glass half empty perspective. It is just as easy to view clean money laws as de-regulation - removing the legal obstacles that keep qualified people off the ballot because they can't afford to run a campaign. Either way, it is not the most effective or relevant frame and does not stem from the language of the resolution.
As for making it harder to run for office, this may only be true for people accustomed to the unfair and unethical advantage of corporate sponsorship. For the qualified lower or middle class candidate, not having to raise as much money will certainly make it easier to run for office. More diverse candidates should invariably mean more and better ideas.
In the 1969 Supreme Court case Red Lion v. FCC, the Court spoke of "an uninhibited market-place of ideas" and declared its preservation to be the very purpose of the First Amendment. I've always loved that quote because it sounds to me like the same free market notion that is supposed to drive capitalism (idealistically, in a vacuum) is also supposed to apply to democracy, with ideas as the currency. I see it as Darwinian - let's see how all our best ideas fare in the free market-place and through survival of the fittest ideas we can identify and support our truly most desirable leaders.
Fred's comments also address the current #4 reform in the No Confidence Resolution (there is no significance to the order of the reforms listed) which calls for a national holiday for voting and also limited federally determined criteria for absentee voting. I have no problem with Fred's suggestion that a voting day holiday should be combined with another holiday. I also don't care if this constitutes suggesting that election day be moved from its Constitutionally mandated date - the Constitution was suspended five years ago and we have to stop pretending like it wasn't.
It is "scary" to Fred to contemplate federal criteria for absentee voting. This is an unsurprising position for a Libertarian. I'm none too eager myself to give any control, power, information, etc. to federal entities. To the extent that any of this is realistic, I don't see how it happens while maintaining our current federal structure. It would be worthwhile to discuss in greater detail what the country, or at least the land mass we live upon, would look like. I've said all along that this is part of the No Confidence Movement that would begin to take place across the network of communities that had passed the resolution.
So regardless of what the federal entity might look like or be, it still may be scary to consider a central body for determining absentee criteria. Really, that reform bullet point is written that way as a means of circumventing writing what those specific criteria would be. This would invite debate over too much minutia and impede building broader support. The criteria have to come from somewhere. What is important to me, and has been the point of emphasis in the resolution, is that we limit the security risks related to ballot storage over time, secure the chain of custody over the ballots, and just generally create conditions where most people find it preferable and worthwhile to vote at the poll. Perhaps if Fred and I can agree on these objectives, we could easily see what absentee criteria would serve everyone's needs?
Last, there is a brief reference to public vote counting in which Fred suggests that this should be happening everywhere already. We know this isn't the case, however, in instances of paperless electronic voting. Then there is no public OR private vote counting, just bits and bytes eating away at democracy like electronic parasites. There were also instances in November 2004 where election officials barred the public and the media from observing.
Locally, Voter Confidence Committee member Mark Konkler proposed to the County Board of Supervisors that they form an election reform task force, part of whose mission would be to witness vote counting. It is beyond important that the voting process allow the voter to confirm the record created by their act of voting, that this record then be handled publicly with witnesses, and ultimately be kept available for a recount if necessary.
These are some of the steps that will be necessary for the creation of a new basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections. Ultimately, this has to be the criteria we use to determine what aspects go, stay or get added to our elections process. If this does not become the litmus, if we don't contemplate whether we have a basis for confidence or a reason to believe, we will continue right along with a baseless sense of false confidence, seeing what we want to see, accepting the lies, convincing ourselves they're true. Not me.
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Fred says: "This campaign reform stuff really irks me, no matter who I hear it from." The No Confidence Resolution calls for: "clean money laws [to] keep all corporate funds out of campaign financing." Fred's resistance to the specific of the resolution seems to be pre-empted by his more general opposition to the notion of reform. He writes:
All these proposed campaign reform laws just make it harder for people to run for office. The big money types will always find ways to get around the laws and it amazes me that some people think if they just regulate the way their, or some other candidate, accepts money, all of the sudden the candidate will be squeaky clean.Squeaky clean may be an unattainable goal, but it is also not one I explicitly set forth. "Big money types" most certainly will continue seeking and finding ways around laws but this is no justification for making them our leaders, let alone allowing our "system" to permit their devious and surreptitious assumption of control.
Regarding regulation, simply presenting it that way is a glass half empty perspective. It is just as easy to view clean money laws as de-regulation - removing the legal obstacles that keep qualified people off the ballot because they can't afford to run a campaign. Either way, it is not the most effective or relevant frame and does not stem from the language of the resolution.
As for making it harder to run for office, this may only be true for people accustomed to the unfair and unethical advantage of corporate sponsorship. For the qualified lower or middle class candidate, not having to raise as much money will certainly make it easier to run for office. More diverse candidates should invariably mean more and better ideas.
In the 1969 Supreme Court case Red Lion v. FCC, the Court spoke of "an uninhibited market-place of ideas" and declared its preservation to be the very purpose of the First Amendment. I've always loved that quote because it sounds to me like the same free market notion that is supposed to drive capitalism (idealistically, in a vacuum) is also supposed to apply to democracy, with ideas as the currency. I see it as Darwinian - let's see how all our best ideas fare in the free market-place and through survival of the fittest ideas we can identify and support our truly most desirable leaders.
Fred's comments also address the current #4 reform in the No Confidence Resolution (there is no significance to the order of the reforms listed) which calls for a national holiday for voting and also limited federally determined criteria for absentee voting. I have no problem with Fred's suggestion that a voting day holiday should be combined with another holiday. I also don't care if this constitutes suggesting that election day be moved from its Constitutionally mandated date - the Constitution was suspended five years ago and we have to stop pretending like it wasn't.
It is "scary" to Fred to contemplate federal criteria for absentee voting. This is an unsurprising position for a Libertarian. I'm none too eager myself to give any control, power, information, etc. to federal entities. To the extent that any of this is realistic, I don't see how it happens while maintaining our current federal structure. It would be worthwhile to discuss in greater detail what the country, or at least the land mass we live upon, would look like. I've said all along that this is part of the No Confidence Movement that would begin to take place across the network of communities that had passed the resolution.
So regardless of what the federal entity might look like or be, it still may be scary to consider a central body for determining absentee criteria. Really, that reform bullet point is written that way as a means of circumventing writing what those specific criteria would be. This would invite debate over too much minutia and impede building broader support. The criteria have to come from somewhere. What is important to me, and has been the point of emphasis in the resolution, is that we limit the security risks related to ballot storage over time, secure the chain of custody over the ballots, and just generally create conditions where most people find it preferable and worthwhile to vote at the poll. Perhaps if Fred and I can agree on these objectives, we could easily see what absentee criteria would serve everyone's needs?
Last, there is a brief reference to public vote counting in which Fred suggests that this should be happening everywhere already. We know this isn't the case, however, in instances of paperless electronic voting. Then there is no public OR private vote counting, just bits and bytes eating away at democracy like electronic parasites. There were also instances in November 2004 where election officials barred the public and the media from observing.
Locally, Voter Confidence Committee member Mark Konkler proposed to the County Board of Supervisors that they form an election reform task force, part of whose mission would be to witness vote counting. It is beyond important that the voting process allow the voter to confirm the record created by their act of voting, that this record then be handled publicly with witnesses, and ultimately be kept available for a recount if necessary.
These are some of the steps that will be necessary for the creation of a new basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections. Ultimately, this has to be the criteria we use to determine what aspects go, stay or get added to our elections process. If this does not become the litmus, if we don't contemplate whether we have a basis for confidence or a reason to believe, we will continue right along with a baseless sense of false confidence, seeing what we want to see, accepting the lies, convincing ourselves they're true. Not me.
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Recently Added to the GuvWurld News Archive
Periodically I like to call attention to stories recently added to the GuvWurld News Archive, a document repository containing over 3,000 articles from the past few years.
John Conyers, Jr. (BuzzFlash) - GOP Heading Over Political Cliff - 4-8-05
SFChron - Conservative Stalwarts Re-Thinking Death Penalty Support - 4-10-05
The Nation - Judith Miller Continues Skewing The Truth At NYTimes - 3-31-05
* * *
LETTER TO CHARLES WINKLER AT EUREKA TIMES STANDARD
Response to editorial "Outrageous Gas Prices," 4/9/05
Submitted 4/9/05, marked not for publication
Charles,
Surely Jill Geist is not the only one finding current gas prices "absolutely outrageous" ("Outrageous Gas Prices," 4/9/05) However, with all due respect, the nagging question is not "When will it stop?" The answer to that question is that it most certainly will not stop. The world is running out of oil and not only will prices continue to rise, the supply will eventually stop flowing and this will affect every aspect of how we live, including how we eat, travel and do business.
I sincerely hope that by now you have at least heard of the Peak Oil phenomenon that explains what I'm talking about. One excellent reference is a movie called "THE END OF SUBURBIA: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of The American Dream" and you can get more info here: http://www.endofsuburbia.com/.
Rolling Stone also just published an excellent article you can read here:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/7203633. This is adapted from a book by James Howard Kunstler called The Long Emergency.
The mass media has certainly not gone into overdrive on this topic but here are a few more references from sources I expect you would accept as credible:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3777413.stm
http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/europe/10/02/global.warming/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1097622,00.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/weekinreview/04yerg.html
And even a Bush administration insider is on the record acknowledging both the scientific and economic realities:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/061203_simmons.html
While my next remark does not apply entirely or exclusively to the Times-Standard, I hope you will recognize the general truth about the performance of the media in general. The failure to fully investigate and report on the shenanigans from the 2000 election; followed by not just the unanswered but more importantly the UNASKED questions about 9/11; the enabling of the lies that led to war in Iraq; and most recently the meek efforts to expose the fraud of election 2004 all have allowed the U.S. to sleepwalk into a very dark era seen more clearly by citizens around the world who are watching us wondering how we haven't seen things coming. In this way, if in no other, comparisons to 1930's Germany are apt - it can happen here because we are allowing it. To paraphrase a famous quote: all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
It is a disservice to your readers and to our community to oversimplify the gas price increases to a shrill quote from a Supervisor followed by a red-herring rhetorical question. Of greater value would be a call by the Times-Standard upon the Board of Supervisors to create a Peak Oil transformation task force so that we can begin to study the anticipated local effects and prepare for the massive adjustments that will be required of us all.
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- GuvWurld correspondent and depleted uranium expert Dennis Kyne made the Tuesday edition of the New York Times. The GuvWurld blog carried news of Dennis's arrest and subsequent legal setbacks, and then trumpeted Dennis's calls for help before ultimately rejoicing when the charges were dropped. Dennis was one of 1,806 people arrested at the Republican Convention last September. The Times says: "Of the 1,670 cases that have run their full course, 91 percent ended with the charges dismissed or with a verdict of not guilty after trial."
- Rolling Stone has an excellent Peak Oil article from a few weeks ago that I finally read. It is adapted from James Howard Kunstler's book The Long Emergency. After reading this I saw an editorial in the Eureka Times-Standard that quoted Humboldt County Supervisor Jill Geist saying the gas prices have gotten outrageous. The paper comments: "And the nagging question is, "When will it stop?"" This inspired me to immediately write the letter below which concludes with a serious new idea we ought to pursue: "a Peak Oil transformation task force so that we can begin to study the anticipated local effects and prepare for the massive adjustments that will be required of us all."
- There are two related stories about Connecticut and Utah taking a stand against the No Child Left Behind act. This is good news. We need local government to engage in civil disobedience toward the federal government. Start by saying we have no basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections. Then start doing what's right by the community in which you live rather than allowing Uncle Sam to compel decisions working against the community. This definitely includes the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) which I challenged last week with a compelling analogy.
John Conyers, Jr. (BuzzFlash) - GOP Heading Over Political Cliff - 4-8-05
SFChron - Conservative Stalwarts Re-Thinking Death Penalty Support - 4-10-05
The Nation - Judith Miller Continues Skewing The Truth At NYTimes - 3-31-05
LETTER TO CHARLES WINKLER AT EUREKA TIMES STANDARD
Response to editorial "Outrageous Gas Prices," 4/9/05
Submitted 4/9/05, marked not for publication
Charles,
Surely Jill Geist is not the only one finding current gas prices "absolutely outrageous" ("Outrageous Gas Prices," 4/9/05) However, with all due respect, the nagging question is not "When will it stop?" The answer to that question is that it most certainly will not stop. The world is running out of oil and not only will prices continue to rise, the supply will eventually stop flowing and this will affect every aspect of how we live, including how we eat, travel and do business.
I sincerely hope that by now you have at least heard of the Peak Oil phenomenon that explains what I'm talking about. One excellent reference is a movie called "THE END OF SUBURBIA: Oil Depletion and the Collapse of The American Dream" and you can get more info here: http://www.endofsuburbia.com/.
Rolling Stone also just published an excellent article you can read here:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/_/id/7203633. This is adapted from a book by James Howard Kunstler called The Long Emergency.
The mass media has certainly not gone into overdrive on this topic but here are a few more references from sources I expect you would accept as credible:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3777413.stm
http://edition.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/europe/10/02/global.warming/
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1097622,00.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/weekinreview/04yerg.html
And even a Bush administration insider is on the record acknowledging both the scientific and economic realities:
http://www.fromthewilderness.com/free/ww3/061203_simmons.html
While my next remark does not apply entirely or exclusively to the Times-Standard, I hope you will recognize the general truth about the performance of the media in general. The failure to fully investigate and report on the shenanigans from the 2000 election; followed by not just the unanswered but more importantly the UNASKED questions about 9/11; the enabling of the lies that led to war in Iraq; and most recently the meek efforts to expose the fraud of election 2004 all have allowed the U.S. to sleepwalk into a very dark era seen more clearly by citizens around the world who are watching us wondering how we haven't seen things coming. In this way, if in no other, comparisons to 1930's Germany are apt - it can happen here because we are allowing it. To paraphrase a famous quote: all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.
It is a disservice to your readers and to our community to oversimplify the gas price increases to a shrill quote from a Supervisor followed by a red-herring rhetorical question. Of greater value would be a call by the Times-Standard upon the Board of Supervisors to create a Peak Oil transformation task force so that we can begin to study the anticipated local effects and prepare for the massive adjustments that will be required of us all.
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Monday, April 11, 2005
Logan Dake Discrimination Hearing Set for April 26
Former City of Eureka maintenance worker Logan Dake will have his discrimination complaint heard by the Labor Commission on April 26. In a story first reported exclusively by GuvWurld on December 13, 2004, Logan discussed the terms under which he was dismissed by the City, ostensibly for his private and protected use of medical marijuana. GuvWurld has always openly stated its mission as advocacy journalism and from the start of this saga has called for Logan's job to be restored with back pay. The Eureka Times-Standard eventually ran a news piece on Logan's plight on February 13, 2005.
Earlier tonight, Logan suggested his situation had grown stronger. "The Labor Commission doesn't bring cases forward unless they have evidence," said Logan, "and in this case there is no defense against the evidence. Californians can't be fired for doctor-approved cannabis used off the clock."
Logan expects that the result of the hearing will be one or more rounds of settlement talks. "I don't want to hurt my city," Logan has declared repeatedly in requests to City Councilmembers who he hoped would intervene to spare the City the expense of a defense, let alone a settlement.
The Labor Commission's hearing will be at 619 2nd Street, Room 109, in Eureka, starting at 8:30am on April 26. The meeting is closed to the public.
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Earlier tonight, Logan suggested his situation had grown stronger. "The Labor Commission doesn't bring cases forward unless they have evidence," said Logan, "and in this case there is no defense against the evidence. Californians can't be fired for doctor-approved cannabis used off the clock."
Logan expects that the result of the hearing will be one or more rounds of settlement talks. "I don't want to hurt my city," Logan has declared repeatedly in requests to City Councilmembers who he hoped would intervene to spare the City the expense of a defense, let alone a settlement.
The Labor Commission's hearing will be at 619 2nd Street, Room 109, in Eureka, starting at 8:30am on April 26. The meeting is closed to the public.
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Open Voting Consortium
At the recent No Confidence workshop in San Francisco, I was given a flier for the Open Voting Consortium. They have an open source electronic voting system that I think could actually contribute to creating a basis for confidence in our elections. This is something we all need to pay attention to.
I was encouraged by the flier and the little pitch I heard and brought up OVC at the next Voter Confidence Committee meeting. We agreed it was interesting and had potential but without a lot more detail and assistance in preparing talking points, there was no way we could bring it to the recent Board of Supervisors meeting where we unsuccessfully plead for clemency against the Diebold onslaught.
So I contacted the phone number on the flier and wound up talking to Alan Dechert, shown on the OVC website as President and CEO. It is still a voting machine company, after all, though run by academics with thoroughly smart redundant counting methods. This .pdf does a really good job of walking through the process.
Big thanks also to Jim Soper and Steven Day in SF for trying to help us get up to speed here in Humboldt. Knowing that I was looking for talking points or a better summary, Jim provided this PERSONAL AND UNOFFICIAL primer on OVC:
In addition to trying to get supporters like you and me to talk about and create demand for the OVC system, there is also the bureaucratic mess of getting certification. There is a long way to go before actual votes will be cast on OVC systems. GuvWurld will be continuing the construction of a bridge here.
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I was encouraged by the flier and the little pitch I heard and brought up OVC at the next Voter Confidence Committee meeting. We agreed it was interesting and had potential but without a lot more detail and assistance in preparing talking points, there was no way we could bring it to the recent Board of Supervisors meeting where we unsuccessfully plead for clemency against the Diebold onslaught.
So I contacted the phone number on the flier and wound up talking to Alan Dechert, shown on the OVC website as President and CEO. It is still a voting machine company, after all, though run by academics with thoroughly smart redundant counting methods. This .pdf does a really good job of walking through the process.
Big thanks also to Jim Soper and Steven Day in SF for trying to help us get up to speed here in Humboldt. Knowing that I was looking for talking points or a better summary, Jim provided this PERSONAL AND UNOFFICIAL primer on OVC:
Voting is moving to electronic machines
The public likes it
Computers can make voting goof proof, for example, no overvotes like in Florida
Computers can handle multiple languages, reducing printing problems
Computers can make it easier for people with reading/vision problems to vote. This includes the elderly and new Americans who may have trouble reading English. Specifically, the OVC system will print a ballot that includes a bar code, which voters can insert into another machine and listen through headphones to a description of their votes.
The problem is that the corporate machines are open for cheating
Show the slide show: http://electionfraud2004.org/
Some of the companies are filled with genuine crooks. A VP of engineering for the Diebold/GEMS system has 23 convictions of fraud in King County, Washington.
Even with paper ballots, there are too many opportunities for cheating if Diebold etc control the code. It has to be open source (public programming)
As R. Reagan used to say about nuke arms control, "Trust, but verify."
The German word for "thief" is Dieb, as in Diebold. :)
Why not paper ballots?
Note: Oregon votes entirely by mail. Very successful. I don't know how they handle issues about the disabled.
Nobody is suggesting taking away absentee ballots, which are always paper.
Paper ballots are themselves vulnerable to massive cheating and other problems. Election history is filled with examples, but I will list 3:
- 2000, Florida, just thinking about it gives me butterflies & chads. :)
- 2004, Florida, 50,000 absentee ballots lost in the mail
- A couple of years ago, several ballot boxes were "lost" during a very tight election in San Francisco. They were "cast" into the bay, and fished out later, after the election had been decided...
Double/triple audit system
When the voters are done making their choices, the OVC system will print out the actual ballot, not a receipt, that will be cast. At the same time, it will write the same choices to a non-changeable CD-ROM, which will collect all the votes made on that machine. At the end of the day, you have 2 copies of the vote. If one gets screwed up/lost/stolen, the backup will be there. If the ballots are scanned, you have 3 copies. This is, for me, decisive.
OVC
Before I joined, I wanted to make sure this was a serious effort. I have seen that Alan & co have already thought through a lot of the problems, and that they listen, which is important. I have confidence in their ability to build a good system.
Part of the advantage of the open source process is to invite examination and discussion. It takes a lot of work, but gets you better software, such as Linux.
Things for meetups to do
Recruiting and public awareness
- Go to meetup.com and find the political groups in your area. Ask to give a presentation. This includes republican and civic groups (Rotary, etc).
- Call in to talk radio. Write letters to the editor, etc
Chain of Custody
Open voting means that the entire chain of custody of the ballots and ballot results needs to be verifiable.
- So go to the county registrar of voters, and get the voting procedures for the county, and identify places where crooks can cheat. Publish it on the web.
- Each county will need to build teams of verifiers who will be ready on election day.
- These activities can be coordinated with other voting groups, especially those working for a paper trail.
Identify who your county supervisors are, and their opinions voting etc.
- You will have to lobby them about adopting open-source machines and publicly verifiable procedures.
- In one county, the registrar will be retiring. Activists are looking for somebody to replace him that will be pro open voting.
There will also be lobbying activities at the state level to push for open voting.
There will be lobbying activities in Washington, to push for positive voting laws. We will need to contact our senators and representatives.
Coordinate the above activities with groups favoring open elections:
www.VerifiedVoting.Org
www.BallotIntegrity.Org
www.VelvetRevolution.Us
www.Coalition4VisibleBallots.homestead.Com
www.ElectionScience.Org
www.VotersUnite.Org
www.BlackBoxVoting.Com
www.BlackBoxVoting.Org
Some of these sites have message boards/forums. We need to make OVC more visible in them.
Support the CAClean.org campaign (state financed election campaigns)
In addition to trying to get supporters like you and me to talk about and create demand for the OVC system, there is also the bureaucratic mess of getting certification. There is a long way to go before actual votes will be cast on OVC systems. GuvWurld will be continuing the construction of a bridge here.
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Friday, April 08, 2005
RCV Presentation Scheduled for Next Eureka City Council Meeting
Eureka's town hall forum on Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) is coming up on April 28 and the Voter Confidence Committee is now into advanced stages of planning. At a meeting Thursday with City Councilmember and forum co-sponsor Chris Kerrigan, it was determined that VCC co-founder Scott Menzies will do an RCV PowerPoint presentation at the April 19 City Council meeting. This is a great opportunity for a very visible dry run through at least a part of the presentation planned for the forum. Other, more guerilla-oriented event marketing tactics were also discussed. Volunteers are needed.
I recently posted about the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors approving the Elections Department's request to begin negotiations with Diebold for the purchase of new touch screen voting machines. It was difficult to hear the Supes make this decision as it appeared they hadn't even heard the concerns or considered the evidence presented by those of us opposed to partnering with a company employing felons convicted of computer fraud, run by executives with extensive partisan ties and notorious for machines that don't work properly.
Well, in just the little time that's past I'd say a bit of perspective has emerged. This is still not a good thing, but perhaps it is not as final a blow as it first seemed. Starting negotiations is not even close to closing a deal. There is still time for the Supes to become convinced that we will all inevitably regret this decision. Here's a new slogan that I can already hear repeated in street rallies: NO DEAL WITH DIEBOLD!
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I recently posted about the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors approving the Elections Department's request to begin negotiations with Diebold for the purchase of new touch screen voting machines. It was difficult to hear the Supes make this decision as it appeared they hadn't even heard the concerns or considered the evidence presented by those of us opposed to partnering with a company employing felons convicted of computer fraud, run by executives with extensive partisan ties and notorious for machines that don't work properly.
Well, in just the little time that's past I'd say a bit of perspective has emerged. This is still not a good thing, but perhaps it is not as final a blow as it first seemed. Starting negotiations is not even close to closing a deal. There is still time for the Supes to become convinced that we will all inevitably regret this decision. Here's a new slogan that I can already hear repeated in street rallies: NO DEAL WITH DIEBOLD!
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Tuesday, April 05, 2005
Humboldt County Supervisors Approve Diebold Touch Screen Machines
I feel rather disgusted at this moment. The Elections Department made a presentation today to the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors in which they asserted that no current system will fully satisfy or create conditions for full voter confidence. It was nice that they recognized this as a criteria, but acknowledging it can't be met made their request to purchase between 76 and 110 Diebold touch screen machines utterly asinine. For the Supes to go along with this proposal was even worse.
As I addressed the Supes, one of the new points I tried out today was an analogy between the voting machines and a hypothetical communications system for the police department. I pointed out that if messages sent by dispatch to patrol units were likely to be garbled by static, or sent to the wrong patrol unit, or be received with different content than was originally sent, then the County would surely not follow a law mandating that they imperil the safety of our community through use of such a system. We must likewise reject the requirements of HAVA (Help America Vote Act), or at the least join efforts to repeal or delay its implementation.
In general, those of us opposed to today's decision were seeking a delay from the Supes, hoping that as long as they did not take action today we would be containing a fire for at least a little while longer. Supervisor Woolley asked whether a delay would meaningfully impact the work needed to be done by the Elections Department. Elections Clerk Carolyn Crnich said the process of negotiating contracts, obtaining machines, setting them up, and testing them would take many months and that she was concerned that any delay could conceivably contribute to missing the 1/1/06 deadline for compliance with HAVA.
Now that the Supes have approved the introduction of more electronics for Humboldt County elections, I don't see how they could possibly embrace the No Confidence Resolution. It is as if they were not convinced that U.S. federal elections have substantial problems, or that we will be moving towards more closely mirroring conditions that create most of these. I don't want to think of this front as being closed off for the No Confidence Movement, especially since the Supes were receptive to the idea of a citizen task force for vote counting and machine verification. Still, this would not seem to bode well.
Both County Elections Manager Lindsey McWilliams and I were interviewed for the (ch. 3?) evening news in the lobby of the courthouse after the decision. He and I then spoke frankly, in the presence of other Voter Confidence Committee members as well as Ellen Komp from the Civil Liberties Monitoring Project. I was astounded at the hypocrisy of McWilliams, a man I'm continually told is reasonable and should be considered an ally. McWilliams acknowledged on the one hand that we have a "monumentally fucked up system" in this country, but in the next breath he cast doubt on the breadth of the tens of thousands of "irregularities" reported from the 2004 general "election." He seems to honestly believe that election machines are not part of the problem. I'm not into personal attacks or even being judgmental, but you decide for yourself if that makes any sense.
When I asked Lindsey what he considers a basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections, he referred to certification standards and qualifications set on both the national and state level. This does not speak to whether the specs are good enough, an especially troubling aspect given that Lindsey has admitted Humboldt County election machines are not stored securely and that employees of the Public Works Department have "unfettered access." So we've got guidelines that are arbitrarily presented as adequate or appropriate, made irrelevant by a lack of security, and this is supposed to constitute a basis for confidence. In rejecting this, am I setting my standards too high?
We are so far past "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me." We are now drowning in Kool-Aid.
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As I addressed the Supes, one of the new points I tried out today was an analogy between the voting machines and a hypothetical communications system for the police department. I pointed out that if messages sent by dispatch to patrol units were likely to be garbled by static, or sent to the wrong patrol unit, or be received with different content than was originally sent, then the County would surely not follow a law mandating that they imperil the safety of our community through use of such a system. We must likewise reject the requirements of HAVA (Help America Vote Act), or at the least join efforts to repeal or delay its implementation.
In general, those of us opposed to today's decision were seeking a delay from the Supes, hoping that as long as they did not take action today we would be containing a fire for at least a little while longer. Supervisor Woolley asked whether a delay would meaningfully impact the work needed to be done by the Elections Department. Elections Clerk Carolyn Crnich said the process of negotiating contracts, obtaining machines, setting them up, and testing them would take many months and that she was concerned that any delay could conceivably contribute to missing the 1/1/06 deadline for compliance with HAVA.
Now that the Supes have approved the introduction of more electronics for Humboldt County elections, I don't see how they could possibly embrace the No Confidence Resolution. It is as if they were not convinced that U.S. federal elections have substantial problems, or that we will be moving towards more closely mirroring conditions that create most of these. I don't want to think of this front as being closed off for the No Confidence Movement, especially since the Supes were receptive to the idea of a citizen task force for vote counting and machine verification. Still, this would not seem to bode well.
Both County Elections Manager Lindsey McWilliams and I were interviewed for the (ch. 3?) evening news in the lobby of the courthouse after the decision. He and I then spoke frankly, in the presence of other Voter Confidence Committee members as well as Ellen Komp from the Civil Liberties Monitoring Project. I was astounded at the hypocrisy of McWilliams, a man I'm continually told is reasonable and should be considered an ally. McWilliams acknowledged on the one hand that we have a "monumentally fucked up system" in this country, but in the next breath he cast doubt on the breadth of the tens of thousands of "irregularities" reported from the 2004 general "election." He seems to honestly believe that election machines are not part of the problem. I'm not into personal attacks or even being judgmental, but you decide for yourself if that makes any sense.
When I asked Lindsey what he considers a basis for confidence in U.S. federal elections, he referred to certification standards and qualifications set on both the national and state level. This does not speak to whether the specs are good enough, an especially troubling aspect given that Lindsey has admitted Humboldt County election machines are not stored securely and that employees of the Public Works Department have "unfettered access." So we've got guidelines that are arbitrarily presented as adequate or appropriate, made irrelevant by a lack of security, and this is supposed to constitute a basis for confidence. In rejecting this, am I setting my standards too high?
We are so far past "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me." We are now drowning in Kool-Aid.
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Monday, April 04, 2005
Action Alert: Speakers Needed At Humboldt Supervisors Meeting Tuesday 9am
The Elections Department personnel is planning to be at the Board of Supervisors meeting when it begins tomorrow at 9am. It is still unclear what they will present or whether the Supes will be deciding how to spend our money. This topic will not be the first item of business, but nor will it be late in the day as I had imagined just yesterday. Please join the Voter Confidence Committee and our new friends at the Civil Liberties Monitoring Project in addressing the Supes. We may have to be somewhat flexible and prepared to shift our arguments on the fly, depending on what the Elections Department presents. No matter what, though, there are some baseline points that should apply:
Tuesday April 5 @ 9am
Humboldt County Board of Supervisors
Humboldt County Courthouse
825 Fifth Street, Room 111
Eureka, CA 95501
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- The County has no business doing business with Diebold or any company whose track record includes partisan executives, criminal employees, and "irregularities" produced by their equipment.
- Election machines in general have proven untrustworthy, as in making it impossible to know what to believe, by counting backwards, producing negative vote totals, ceasing to count at a predetermined limit, reporting more votes than voters, switching from the voter's chosen candidate to an opponent, etc.
- Paper ballots and hand counting will get the job done. Why do we even consider making it more complicated and less reliable?
- What standard are we applying to determine if any given machine or system is worthwhile? There should be only one: does it provide a basis for confidence or does something about it create the possibility of a permanently unresolvable uncertainty?
- If we are resigned to machines, they must be capable of accommodating every type of ballot legal in California. That means we insist on buying something capable of conducting Ranked Choice Voting elections.
Tuesday April 5 @ 9am
Humboldt County Board of Supervisors
Humboldt County Courthouse
825 Fifth Street, Room 111
Eureka, CA 95501
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Humboldt County No Confidence Movement Update
Humboldt County Board of Supervisors
The Supes are meeting again this Tuesday, beginning at 9am. The published agenda shows the Election Department report as item E, preceded by what looks like several hours worth of business. Since I can't imagine they'd be held up in the Supervisors' Chambers all day, I intend to call the Election Department on Monday to see when they plan to leave their office. I will post and circulate another announcement when I can make a more specific request for your presence.
The current agenda makes reference to a non-existent document to download, though it is labeled identically to the doc that can be successfully accessed through the 3/15/05 agenda. This is where the Elections Department decries their situation and bemoans not knowing what to recommend. That is, they feel pressured under the 1/1/06 deadline imposed by the federal HAVA (Help America Vote Act) calling for standards meeting the needs of disabled voters, but they can't make a comprehensive proposal of how the County should spend about $1.9 million because there are no good clear options. It would seem to be a point of agreement with GuvWurld.
Front page, below the fold headline from the 3/22 SoHum Independent:
County in 'Near Crisis' Over Election System Changes
The "near crisis" phrase was pulled from a quote by Elections Clerk Carolyn Crnich. The label applies not only to Humboldt County, according to Crnich, but to the state of California. Again, absent the context, we might appear to concur.
Also of note, County Elections Manager Lindsey McWilliams claims that tested touch screen machines performed at 100% accuracy. The basic laws of statistics, and the general concept of margin for error, make this hard to accept; it is almost laughable considering the performance of touch screen machines everywhere else. What is more, McWilliams writes off the need for a security audit of how election equipment is stored...because he acknowledges the failing grade required due to the "unfettered access" of the Public Works department.
We'll be doing some preparation for Tuesday's Supes meeting at the Voter Confidence Committee's gathering tonight (Monday 4/4), 7pm, Liquid Cafe on Myrtle (Burre Center/Eureka). Also check out the VCC pages Scott has built into the Realizing Community site.
In Eureka:
City Councilmembers Chris Kerrigan and Mike Jones have agreed to co-sponsor a town hall forum on Ranked Choice Voting (RCV). It will be at the Wharfinger Building on Eureka's waterfront, April 28, 6pm. I am working with the Voter Confidence Committee to plan and promote the event and this is also an agenda item for tonight's meeting. We need volunteers and the meeting is THE place to find out what you can do.
In Arcata:
To recap, versions 5.1 and 5.2 of the No Confidence Resolution have both been submitted to the City Council. On Feb. 2, Councilmember Paul Pitino moved that the Council consider the resolution at the next meeting. Councilmembers Dave Meserve and Harmony Groves announced they would form a subcommittee to revise the resolution and that it would come forward at an undeclared future date. Because the City of Arcata then sponsored a town hall forum on another topic, which Meserve lobbied for heavily, No Confidence was placed on the back burner. I spoke with Meserve at the end of last week and he said the other matter was likely to be temporarily resolved either when Council meets on 4/6 or 4/20. So it looks like it will be May before the Council deals with No Confidence. It seems Meserve may have been looking to Groves to take the first steps in editing the resolution. He encouraged me to contact her and I hope to do so this week.
HELP NEEDED:
Letters to the editor of all Humboldt publications (see Kathryn Hedge's great piece from the Arcata Eye which also gets into the Arcata topic I vaguely reference above).
Calls to all Supes, and Councilmembers in both Eureka and Arcata. Click HERE for contact info.
Click HERE for more ways to help.
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The Supes are meeting again this Tuesday, beginning at 9am. The published agenda shows the Election Department report as item E, preceded by what looks like several hours worth of business. Since I can't imagine they'd be held up in the Supervisors' Chambers all day, I intend to call the Election Department on Monday to see when they plan to leave their office. I will post and circulate another announcement when I can make a more specific request for your presence.
The current agenda makes reference to a non-existent document to download, though it is labeled identically to the doc that can be successfully accessed through the 3/15/05 agenda. This is where the Elections Department decries their situation and bemoans not knowing what to recommend. That is, they feel pressured under the 1/1/06 deadline imposed by the federal HAVA (Help America Vote Act) calling for standards meeting the needs of disabled voters, but they can't make a comprehensive proposal of how the County should spend about $1.9 million because there are no good clear options. It would seem to be a point of agreement with GuvWurld.
Front page, below the fold headline from the 3/22 SoHum Independent:
County in 'Near Crisis' Over Election System Changes
The "near crisis" phrase was pulled from a quote by Elections Clerk Carolyn Crnich. The label applies not only to Humboldt County, according to Crnich, but to the state of California. Again, absent the context, we might appear to concur.
Also of note, County Elections Manager Lindsey McWilliams claims that tested touch screen machines performed at 100% accuracy. The basic laws of statistics, and the general concept of margin for error, make this hard to accept; it is almost laughable considering the performance of touch screen machines everywhere else. What is more, McWilliams writes off the need for a security audit of how election equipment is stored...because he acknowledges the failing grade required due to the "unfettered access" of the Public Works department.
We'll be doing some preparation for Tuesday's Supes meeting at the Voter Confidence Committee's gathering tonight (Monday 4/4), 7pm, Liquid Cafe on Myrtle (Burre Center/Eureka). Also check out the VCC pages Scott has built into the Realizing Community site.
In Eureka:
City Councilmembers Chris Kerrigan and Mike Jones have agreed to co-sponsor a town hall forum on Ranked Choice Voting (RCV). It will be at the Wharfinger Building on Eureka's waterfront, April 28, 6pm. I am working with the Voter Confidence Committee to plan and promote the event and this is also an agenda item for tonight's meeting. We need volunteers and the meeting is THE place to find out what you can do.
In Arcata:
To recap, versions 5.1 and 5.2 of the No Confidence Resolution have both been submitted to the City Council. On Feb. 2, Councilmember Paul Pitino moved that the Council consider the resolution at the next meeting. Councilmembers Dave Meserve and Harmony Groves announced they would form a subcommittee to revise the resolution and that it would come forward at an undeclared future date. Because the City of Arcata then sponsored a town hall forum on another topic, which Meserve lobbied for heavily, No Confidence was placed on the back burner. I spoke with Meserve at the end of last week and he said the other matter was likely to be temporarily resolved either when Council meets on 4/6 or 4/20. So it looks like it will be May before the Council deals with No Confidence. It seems Meserve may have been looking to Groves to take the first steps in editing the resolution. He encouraged me to contact her and I hope to do so this week.
HELP NEEDED:
Letters to the editor of all Humboldt publications (see Kathryn Hedge's great piece from the Arcata Eye which also gets into the Arcata topic I vaguely reference above).
Calls to all Supes, and Councilmembers in both Eureka and Arcata. Click HERE for contact info.
Click HERE for more ways to help.
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Sunday, April 03, 2005
GuvWurld 1st Anniversary Post
I'll be short on fan fare. Click HERE to read how it began. That first entry has set the course we still maintain. One year later, there is still no one who has responded to GuvWurld to demonstrate a BASIS for confidence in the results reported from U.S. federal elections. If it wasn't clear on April 3, 2004 then the tens of thousands of "irregularities" reported from our subsequent so-called "election" should prove that the only thing we can know for sure is that we can't know for sure who really got more votes. There is simply no reason to believe anything, let alone "election" results reported by corporate networks that have routinely lied, stifled honest coverage or debate, and presented government-made propaganda as straight news.
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