To the Editor:

There is an easy solution to Russia’s, or anyone’s, hacking of our voting system. There is no reason for any voting machine, vote tallying or vote totals transmission and storage to be connected to the internet. It is just for our convenience and America’s desperate need for immediate answers.

As a young boy in New York City, I would go around voting precincts with my father, a party official and twice a candidate for office. Voting machines had small mechanical levers next to each candidate’s name, and the voter just pulled levers down to vote. The votes were tallied by simple mechanical counters in the back of the machine that you could see when a police officer unlocked it in the presence of a representative from each party.

The totals were officially recorded on paper and called in by each precinct election captain. Of course it took a few hours, and we now have many more voters and would therefore need hundreds more Election Day volunteers. But isn’t that worth protecting our democracy?

This incessant drive to automate everything and put it all online is condemning our system of government to control by anyone with brains and a computer.