ALSO: For benefit of Venango County's still-in-denial neighbors in Erie County, a brief history of ES&S' epic failures...

Ernest A. Canning Byon 10/3/2011, 10:05am PT

Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

"What is a vote worth?" Venango County, PA's Election Board Chairman Craig Adams, a Republican, asked last week. "If the vote is counted it is priceless. If it is not counted, I don't care what it costs. Let's get a right."

"After months of legal wrangling," Marybeth Kuznik of the non-partisan Election Integrity advocacy group VotePA told The BRAD BLOG last week, Venango County's landmark independent forensic examination of the notoriously unreliable and 100% unverifiable ES&S iVotronic Direct Recording Electronic (DRE, most often touch-screen) e-voting system finally got under way.

Kuznik explained that the study comes in the wake of the heavily Republican-leaning county having experienced "numerous reports of vote-flipping, candidates missing from screens, write-ins missing, and high undervote rates in their May 17 Primary." Some candidates on the ballots even were reported by the voting machines to have received zero votes...

As reflected in a video report from local NBC affiliate WICU-12, posted at the end of this article, the Venango County Election Board --- comprised of two Republicans and one Democrat --- has decided to vote on paper ballots this November, as they've turned their iVotronics over to two Carnegie Mellon University computer science professors for the forensic audit. The experts are examining the systems for free. Adams' "I don't care what it costs" remark flows from the county's decision to spend up to $20,000, primarily for a high-speed optical-scanner, to count the paper ballots in this fall's election.

The Nebraska-based ES&S (Election Systems & Software), describes itself as the world's largest voting machine company. It's certainly the largest e-voting vendor in the USA.

Kuznik calls the independent audit a "a huge development because it is the first time a sitting election board in Pennsylvania has granted unfettered access to a paperless iVotronic voting system for the purpose of forensic testing after problems were reported in a live election."

She adds that the study "will be ongoing for the next several weeks," and lauds "the enthusiastic co-operation" of the Venango County election board for the "rare" instance of such a body "when it comes to investigating electronic voting troubles."

"The Venango County Election Board members are true heroes," Kuznik tells us, "as are the computer scientists who are donating their services to conduct the exam."

The WICU-12 report below also reflects that election officials in the Keystone State's Erie County --- which votes on the same, oft-failed systems --- are either clueless about how their own unverifiable e-voting machines work (or don't) or are simply in denial about them.

"We have not had an election as yet that doesn't match Election Night totals to the internal machine totals, right down to the audit totals from the flash cards," an unidentified Erie official explains to WICU-12 with a straight face. "Everything has matched one-hundred percent," she says, failing to note that there is no actual verifiable record demonstrating that any of those computer-generated numbers actually reflect the intent of any voter.

In the meantime, as Venango waits for results from their analysis, and in hopes of saving the voters of both counties both time and money --- and perhaps their next election --- it's worth offering a very abbreviated history of some of the remarkable recent and systemic failures of ES&S voting systems across the nation, along with a less expensive, and infinitely more reliable and overseeable means for fulfilling Chairman Adams' laudable desire to "get it right".

UPDATE 10/10/11: Venango County's Republican Board of Elections Director Craig Adams calls in to the Mike Malloy Show while Brad Friedman is guest hosting, to offer more details on why they've commissioned their landmark independent forensic analysis of the county's failed ES&S voting systems. Full details now here...



A brief history of systemic ES&S voting system failure

During a detailed series of reports on the virtually-inexplicable numbers produced by the ES&S iVotronics used in the 2010 South Carolina Democratic primary to elect Alvin Greene, a guy that almost nobody had ever heard of, Brad Friedman furnished a brief history of ES&S failures.

Given the continued use of a system that poses a direct threat to the integrity of our democracy, that history bears not only repetition but an updated expansion...

A few loose screws

In "The Trouble with Touch-Screens" (see video below), Dan Rather visited the Manila sweat shop where he witnessed the shoddy assembly of the ES&S iVotronic LED screens by $2.50/day workers. A worker explains in his report that the company's "quality control" process at the Filipino facility, on the rare occasions that it was applied, was to hold up one of these sensitive items of electronic equipment and shake it to determine whether there were any loose parts rattling around inside.

When he covered Rather's documentary at The BRAD BLOG, the late John Gideon observed:

The machines made by ES&S may not have any screws loose, but the folks who think this is any way to run a democracy certainly do!

Democracy's Gold Standard

While Chairman Adams' "damn the costs, let's get it right" attitude is laudable, in truth the expensive means chosen --- a high speed scanner --- like the DREs, is vulnerable as well to both unintended failure and insider manipulation.

The alternative is application of Democracy's Gold Standard --- hand-marked paper ballots, hand-counted in each precinct on Election Night with, and in front of, the public --- a process completed by some 40% of towns in New Hampshire every election, often more rapidly than their machine-counting counterparts.

Not only would payment to part-time employees on Election Night be cheaper, but the monies paid to local employees would be recycled into the local economy whereas the purchase of expensive scanners may enure to the benefit of a corporation that may be based in another state or another country.

* * *

NBC affiliate WICU-12's report on Venango County, PA's decision to vote on paper, and Erie County's denial, follows below (if the video fails to load or play below, you can see it on the WICU-12 website here)…

Part I of Dan Rather's "The Trouble with Touchscreens" (30:09) follows...









* * *

Ernest A. Canning has been an active member of the California state bar since 1977. Mr. Canning has received both undergraduate and graduate degrees in political science as well as a juris doctor. He is also a Vietnam vet (4th Infantry, Central Highlands 1968).

* * *

Please support The BRAD BLOG's fiercely independent, award-winning coverage of your electoral system, as available from no other media outlet in the nation, with a donation to help us keep going (Snail mail, more options here). If you like, we'll send you some great, award-winning election integrity documentary films in return! Details right here...



