New York, Colorado vote tabulator troubles. Internet Vote hacked - for Palin?

Alaska GOP repudiates all of Joe Miller vote count allegations...Open Records request for Georgia election data denied...Minnesota starts recount of gubernatorial election Monday..Was internet vote for 'Dancing with the Stars' rigged?. In real internet elections Canadian citizens in Township of Huron-Kinloss council worried more about system crashes or not getting to vote rather than tampering...John Sebes of TrustTheVote writes about Colorado & New York tabulator troubles...

All this and more in today's voting news below...

AK: Murkowski argues election delay could cost seniority
http://newsminer.com/pages/full_story/push?blog-entry-Murkowski+argues+election+delay+could+cost+seniority%20
&id=10439318&instance=blogs_editors_desk http://tinyurl.com/2793jwr
Murkowski responded ...by filing as an intervener, saying she could suffer a "gap in service" if she isn't sworn in with her colleagues on Jan. 3, 2011.

AK: Alaska lieutenant governor calls Miller's lawsuit over write-in ballots 'baseless' http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/senate-races/130655-alaska-lt-gov-calls-millers-lawsuit-baseless "...the state courts have erred on the side of enfranchising voters when their intent is clear," Campbell said.

AK: ALASKA REPUBLICAN PARTY OFFERS POINT BY POINT REPUDIATION AGAINST JOE MILLER'S CHARGES OF PROBLEMS IN ALASKA VOTE COUNT http://electionlawblog.org/archives/018088.html

AL: R.I.P. -- ANNIE LEE COOPER
http://www.votelaw.com/blog/archives/006481.html
The Selma Times-Journal reports: Annie Lee Cooper, a civil rights hero, died Wednesday afternoon at Vaughan Regional Medical Center. She was 100 years old.

Cooper became known worldwide in 1965 for a confrontation with Sheriff James G. Clark.

AL: Voting Rights Act still vital, representatives of Shelby County blacks tell judge
http://blog.al.com/sweethome/2010/11/voting_rights_act_still_vital.html The law, in part, requires certain areas of the country with a history of voter discrimination to have their voting-related activities pre-screened by the Justice Department to ensure minority voters are not disenfranchised.

CA: Cooley concedes California attorney general race to Harris
http://www.scpr.org/news/2010/11/24/cooley-concedes-california-attorney-general-race-h/ Facing a more than 50,000 vote deficit, with a little over 100,000 votes to count, Cooley conceded in a morning telephone call
...
In a statement, the Harris campaign said the Democrat would wait until the vote count concludes next week before she declares victory.

CA: Ballots mislaid in Indian Wells (absentee ballots, Riverside County)
http://www.mydesert.com/article/20101122/NEWS0301/11220305/
1006/NEWS01/Ballots+mislaid+in+Indian+Wells http://tinyurl.com/2fx2se6 The Desert Sun learned last week that 137 vote-by-mail ballots from an Indian Wells precinct were mistakenly stored away with unused ballots so their results weren't reported until 10 days after the election.

CA: Final Sonoma County votes in; school bonds win
http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20101124/ARTICLES/101129760/1349?Title=Final-Sonoma-County-votes-in

CA: Federal voting rights cited in Watsonville Council appointment lawsuit: Lawyers says plaintiffs seek to deprive District 2 people of representation
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_16683722

CO: Canvass board members withdraw certification
http://www.centerpostdispatch.com/v2_news_articles.php?heading=0&page=72&story_id=1393 SAGUACHE — After meeting all day Friday Nov. 19 to audit the contentious Nov. 2 election and signing election certification documents then forwarded to the Secretary of State (SOS), four canvass board members withdrew their signatures on Monday.
...
“In every instance,” the letter continues, “we were either informed that those reports were not available, that the data from Nov. 2 was no longer available as it had been corrupted, or that we, as a canvass board, did not have the authority to make those requests — including the request for a hand count as was made numerous times. Reports of election results by precinct were not provided to many of the canvass board members until shortly before we convened on Friday, Nov.19, making it virtually impossible to independently assess the outcomes.

CO: Saguache County voting machine reviewed (The ES&S M650 high speed scanner)
http://www.centerpostdispatch.com/v2_news_articles.php?heading=0&page=72&story_id=1392

CO: Tabulator Troubles in Colorado
http://www.trustthevote.org/tabulator-troubles-in-colorado What this boils down to for me is that current voting system products’ Tabulators are not up to correctly doing some seemingly simple tasks correctly, when operated by ordinary election officials.

CO: Raising ID requirements endangers voter access (2 letters)
http://blogs.denverpost.com/eletters/2010/11/24/raising-id-requirements-endangers-voter-access-2-letters/11233/

CT: Conn. certifies down-to-the-wire election
Allegations dog Bridgeport tally http://www.boston.com/news/local/connecticut/articles/2010/11/
25/conn_certifies_down_to_the_wire_election/ http://tinyurl.com/2vpqmru

GA: Open Records request for Georgia election data denied
http://valdostadailytimes.com/todays-top-stories/x1455938574/Open-Records-request-for-Georgia-election-data-denied The request sought to preserve two voting machines from the general election along with a copy of a county server and its election results database. The requested items would have allowed a public test of the voting machines to help verify the Election Day counting accuracy of the equipment.

GA: Two McIntosh County women charged with election violations(absentee ballot fraud)
They're suspected of mishandling ballots. http://jacksonville.com/news/crime/2010-11-23/story/two-mcintosh-county-women-charged-election-violations

HI: Delivery of overseas absentee ballots explained
http://www.mauinews.com/page/content.detail/id/543265/Delivery-of-overseas-absentee-ballots-explained.html?nav=18 We urge overseas voters to apply for absentee ballots as soon as the law allows and to remember to supply election officials with sufficient address information to assure delivery of their ballots in the foreign country where they reside.

IN: St. Joseph County election recount now under way (close election results)
http://www.southbendtribune.com/article/20101123/News01/101129698/1129/News
A five-member recount commission is hand counting ballots cast for county clerk and county assessor in the Nov. 2 election

IN: Election results impounded Wednesday (for manual recount)
http://www.browncountyindiana.com/index.php?id=6206
The bailiff of Brown Circuit Court is impounding election materials this Wednesday afternoon in advance of a recount hearing scheduled for 3 p.m. Monday, Nov. 29.

KY: Lawsuit says dead people, felons voted in Magoffin election (absentee ballots)
http://www.kentucky.com/2010/11/24/1537997/lawsuit-says-dead-people-felons.html
Bribery and votes by felons and dead people contaminated the November general election in Magoffin County, two losing candidates have charged in lawsuits.
Sheriff Randall Bob Jordan and John P. Montgomery, who ran for judge-executive, said in the court actions that a man allied with their opponents paid "numerous voters" at least $100 each to buy their votes.

KY: Lawsuits Claim Vote Buying in Magoffin County
http://www.wsaz.com/home/headlines/Lawsuits_Claim_Vote_Buying_
in_Magoffin_County__110407704.html http://tinyurl.com/39v54gv

MI: Bay County election officials schedule a second recount for Garfield Township road millage http://www.mlive.com/news/bay-city/index.ssf/2010/11/bay_county_election_officials_1.html The Bay County Board of Canvassers met this past Tuesday to conduct the recount, but were unable to do so when it was determined that the number of ballots in hand — 684 — did not match the number of ballots certified on election night— 683.

MN: Minnesota election: Recount ordered
http://www.thestatecolumn.com/blog/2010/11/minnesota-election-recount-ordered/
The state’s Canvassing Board says it will begin hand-counting the 2.1 million ballots cast in this month’s gubernatorial election.

MN: Minnesota recount, the last one, was relatively inexpensive Pew study finds
http://www.minnpost.com/politicalagenda/2010/11/24/23672/minnesota_
recount_the_last_one_was_relatively_inexpensive_pew_study_finds
http://tinyurl.com/34gx2ph

MN: Election board in recount balancing act
http://www.woodburybulletin.com/event/article/id/36722/group/homepage/
The Minnesota State Canvassing Board ordered a statewide recount in the governor's race Monday while trying to balance campaigns' rights to challenge local election decisions with limiting frivolous challenges.

MN: Minn. justices deny GOP effort to change gov tally
http://topnews360.tmcnet.com/topics/associated-press/articles/2010/11/25/120888-minn-justices-deny-gop-effort-change-gov-tally.htm

MN: Ballot counters hope Minnesotans learned their lesson
http://www.grandforksherald.com/event/article/id/184566/ Minnesotans remember all too well the days, weeks, months of squabbling over ballots two years ag

NC: N.C. House candidate concedes contested race (NC House District 45)
http://www.news-record.com/content/2010/11/24/article/nc_house_candidate_concedes_contested_race
GOP hopeful Jackie Warner said in a statement Wednesday that she decided to withdraw her election challenge because the process would be costly to both her campaign and to taxpayers. She still believes that problems with touch-screen voting machines may have cost her the election.

NV: Voting-machine age could be an issue
http://www.rgj.com/article/20101124/NEWS/11240339/1321 Complaints of voting irregularities might be attributed to the age of Nevada's fleet of electronic voting machines, Democratic Secretary of State Ross Miller said Tuesday.

NY: Tabulator Technology Troubles
http://www.trustthevote.org/tabulator-technology-troubles But some canny readers are probably wondering about a simpler question. If the data was on the sticks, why not simply copy the files off the stick using a typical PC, and examine the contents of the files directly?...Answer: the voting system software is set up to prevent direct examination, that’s why!

NY: Defending The New Voting Machines (with youtube video)
http://www.capitaltonight.com/2010/11/defending-the-new-voting-machines/
Bo Lipari thinks the new machines are getting a bad rap and he’s reminding us now that those old lever machines were far from perfect.

NY: Count leaves Grisanti with 527-vote lead (Erie County)
http://www.buffalonews.com/city/capital-connection/albany/article263824.ece The 3-week-old undecided election now will shift to a Niagara Falls courtroom Monday, when State Supreme Court Justice Frank Caruso could decide the fate of a few hundred ballots that have been challenged.

NY: Affidavits provide details of absentee ballot investigation
http://wnyt.com/article/stories/S1851181.shtml?cat=300
n a statement, Democrat Anthony DeFiglio, long involved in politics, said that he was well aware that absentee ballots would never be received by the people they had gotten signatures from, but that this is a political strategy used by both sides to get control of a third party line.
"The people who are targeted live in low income housing and there is a sense that they are a lot less likely to ask any questions at a later date," he said, according to the statement.

NY: DOCUMENTS: Rensselaer County grand jury to hear voter fraud case beginning Dec. 7 http://www.troyrecord.com/articles/2010/11/21/news/doc4ce8b82bb674a202378140.txt
..nearly 50 voters who claim absentee ballots were illegally cast in their name...

NY: Silver Bullet: The Executive Order That Would Save Lots of Money, and Improve Efficiency and Performance Too http://reformny.blogspot.com/2010/11/silver-bullet-using-executive-order-to.html New York's registration system is a mess. It's costly, inefficient, and year after year, New York leads the country in complaints from people who try to vote, but for some reason don't show up on the voter rolls.

OH: Cincinnati appeals court blocks judge vote probe
http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20101124/NEWS0108/311240043/Appeals-court-blocks-judge-vote-probe
A panel of federal judges will consider whether to do away with her order altogether.
...
Hunter's lawyer argued that many of the 849 provisional ballots tossed out by the board of elections may have been the result of poll worker error and should have been included in the official count.

OH: TEA Party head cites flaws with voting machines (complaints of vote flipping)
http://www.auroraadvocate.com/news/article/4937018 Tom Zawistowski, head of the Portage County TEA Party, is questioning the accuracy of the touch-screen voting machines used in the most recent election.

TN: Putnam Co. State Senate Candidate Contesting Election
http://www.newschannel5.com/Global/story.asp?S=13553680 One reason Steakley is challenging the results is because it was revealed two weeks ago some of Putnam County's voting machines had been tampered with.

TX: County to replace voting equipment
$19 million purchase comes after machines were destroyed by fire
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7308772.html
The new order will include 4,612 eSlate voting machines..

TX: It’s time for Democrats to give in on voter ID bill (opinion)
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/outlook/7311705.html
Of course, the debate over voter ID is completely disingenuous on both sides.
...
I am particularly concerned about the effect on seniors who may have given up their driver's licenses. Perhaps a blanket exemption for seniors would be a good idea.

WA: Pierce County race among 3 set for recounts
http://www.theolympian.com/2010/11/23/1450468/pierce-county-race-among-3-set.html

WA: Machine recount set for December in Issaquah legislative race
http://www.issaquahpress.com/2010/11/24/machine-recount-set-for-december-in-issaquah-legislative-race/

WA: Group seeks to purge alleged illegals from voter rolls; officials say no proof
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2010/11/24/1738278/group-seeks-to-purge-alleged-illegals.html
King County...The group wants information on people who were disqualified from serving on juries, because it says those same disqualifications likely mean they shouldn't legally be able to vote in the state


Internet Voting Watch

Canada: Huron-Kinloss Twp. disappointed with E-voting system
http://www.lucknowsentinel.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2860036 Township of Huron-Kinloss council is disappointed and upset with the E-voting systems it used during the October 2010 election.

Problems ranged from hundreds of missed names on the voters list, voters being "booted" off the telephone or internet voting systems due to the time expiring and the many voters left wondering if their cast vote was acknowledged or not.

'Dancing with the Stars' voting hacked for Palin?
Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20023485-71.html

National

The politics of cell phones
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2010/11/the_politics_of_cell_phones.html There has been much debate in recent years over whether telephone surveys conducted only on landlines have produced distorted findings..

Provisional Voting: Fail-Safe Voting or Trapdoor to Disenfranchisement
http://www.advancementproject.org/sites/default/files/Provisional-Ballot-Report-Final-9-16-08_0.pdf
Report by the Advancement Project

International

Afghanistan: Election flap heats up in Afghanistan
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/top/all/7311486.html
Once the investigation is completed — hopefully within a month — the results will be handed to the Supreme Court, according to Nazari. A Western diplomatic official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the delicate political issue, said the Supreme Court had the authority to issue rulings that could change the outcome of certain races.

India: EVMs lack credibility: Jaya to Election Commission
http://news.in.msn.com/national/article.aspx?cp-documentid=4631007

Taiwan: Jail looms after Facebook `vote sale' gag
http://www.thestandard.com.hk/news_detail.asp?we_cat=3&art_id=105313&sid=30419866&con_type=1&d_str=20101125&fc=4

UK: Open Rights Group Report: ELECTRONIC VOTING AND ELECTRONIC COUNTING
http://www.openrightsgroup.org/ourwork/annual-reports/annual-report-2010/electronic-voting-and-electronic-counting

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