OH student records Vote flipping on iPhone. Paper vs. Plastic Voting in Houston

California STILL counting absentee ballots..CT,NM, NY having post election audits...Young, Russo file complaint to end electronic voting in Rhode Island...Dan Wallach describes voting experience & struggle to get paper ballot in Houston TX..Parties scramble as recounts loom in several House races..Congrats to Princeton Prof Ed Felton,e-voting expert for appointment as Chief Technologist of the FTC..

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

US: Parties dispatch staff, money in battle for last 10 House seats
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/house-races/128257-parties-scramble-as-recounts-loom-in-several-house-races

AR: ‘Success’ Looks Rough
http://www.nwaonline.com/news/2010/nov/06/success-looks-rough-20101106/
“Election Commission Chairman Bill Williams said final, unofficial results were compiled at 1:54 a.m. Wednesday and posted on the Benton County web site by 2:30 a.m. Despite the technical difficulties and complaints about paper ballots being unavailable at some polling places, Williams regarded the election a success.”
...
Next election, go out and hire some six-toed sloths to help with the counting.
Sloths would give the election commission extra toes to count on and probably move faster.
Thursday’s report detailed, “ ... Internal clock errors, sticky rolls of printer paper and a cutback on paper ballots added up to long lines for some Benton County voters Tuesday ...”

AR: HOW WE SEE IT: Vote Count No Disaster, But ...*
http://www.nwaonline.com/news/2010/nov/07/how-we-see-it-vote-count-no-disaster-20101107/ Benton County.. Williams told us people are not entitled to paper ballots.

However, there are those who prefer paper because they don’t trust the machines. Those people deserve the peace of mind the paper ballot provides them. There’s no excuse for failing to provide paper ballots. The commission also had problems with the machines because their internal clocks were on standard time, not Daylight Saving Time, which forced officials to bring numerous machines back to the commission offices to be closed and processed. If the clocks caused problems for any other county, we’re not aware; how did it happen here? Lastly, the commission did not have final totals for the night until 2 a.m.

AR: Pettus paying $2,500 for recount
http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2010/nov/07/pettus-paying-2500-recount/?latest
Martin received 10,326 votes to Pettus' 5,120 votes, but talk of voting problems in Russellville spurred Pettus supporters to donate the money for a Monday recount, he said.

AZ: Hispanic civil rights group seeks to force provisional ballot count
http://www.eastvalleytribune.com/arizona/politics/article_e712b39a-e960-11df-afa8-001cc4c03286.html ...And the reason they didn't show up on the rolls is that they didn't get registered because they didn't provide proof of U.S. citizenship as required by a 2004 voter-approved Arizona law.
On Oct. 26, though, the appellate court declared that requirement invalid. Based on that, MALDEF attorney Nina Perales said those who were wrongfully denied registration should have their votes counted.

CA: 2 California congressional races remain close
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/11/08/politics/p145541S01.DTL&type=politics

CA: Registrar On Hot Seat Over Smudged Ballot Delay
http://losaltos.patch.com/articles/registrar-on-hot-seat-over-smudged-ballot-delay
As vote counting drags on, Supervisor Liz Kniss calls for an investigation into the response to defective absentee ballots

CA: California Attorney General
http://www.ksro.com/LocalNews/Story.aspx?ID=1308297
It could be weeks before we know who won the race for California Attorney General.
...
Around the state, local elections officials are still counting vote by mail, provisional and other ballots. They have until November 30th to report their final results.

CT: Foley concedes defeat, but GOP wants probe of Bridgeport vote
http://www.westport-news.com/news/article/Foley-concedes-defeat-but-GOP-wants-probe-of-803589.php Republican State Central Committee Chairman Chris Healy earlier Monday said he would file a request with the U.S. Justice Department and with state authorities to investigate the way Bridgeport officials handled the Election Day flow.
...
Foley noted at his news conference that photo-copied ballots had been used in six other towns, in addition to Bridgeport, after registrars had run out of ballots and that those ballots combined exceeded the margin of Malloy's victory.

But after reviewing what he described as a chaotic day of voting and a protracted ballot-counting process in Bridgeport, Foley said, "I'm not willing to pursue a legal challenge to exclude the photo-copied ballots in Bridgeport, because I do believe they represent legitimate votes."

CT: EDITORIAL: Scrimping on ballots proved foolish
http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2010/11/08/opinion/doc4cd768b331db8348435098.txt

CT: State Election System Needs Improving, From Ballot Shortage To Counting Third-Party Votes http://www.ctnow.com/news/connecticut/hc-campbell-vote-gone-1109-20101109,0,6149952.column

MD: Currie challenger seeks probe of voting procedures
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/annapolis/2010/11/currie_challenger_seeks_probe.html
Jennifer Lowery-Bell has asked Maryland Attorney General Douglas Gansler to investigate Prince George's County's handling of write-in votes in the Nov. 2 contest for state senator for the 25th District.

In a letter to Gansler on Monday, Lowery-Bell said local election officials failed to inform voters at two polling places about the procedures for casting a write-in ballot.

MN: Students may face felonies over illegal voter vouching
http://www.mndaily.com/2010/11/08/students-may-face-felonies-over-illegal-voter-vouching
An election judge said students were vouching for people they did not know on Election Day.
...
Saelens said the woman was "in tears … when this election judge was just drilling her, standing over her, yelling at her."

MN: Security and emotion high on the road to recount
http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=880659

MT: Local voter turnout tops 63% - Mills explains error in returns*
http://www.belgrade-news.com/news/article_7801d13c-e8a9-11df-89d5-001cc4c03286.html
Gallatin County election administrator Charlotte Mills said she made an error when creating reports at around 11 p.m. Tuesday. The error caused some votes to be counted twice...
...
“We have to take the cards out of the machines and then put them into the software, and it’s a little confusing because you have to uncheck two boxes and if you don’t get one of them unchecked properly then the numbers fill in wrong,” she said. “The 11 o’clock run got uploaded incorrectly. It was a human error, not a machine error. It was my mistake.”

ND: Familiarity with voting machines plays a part in smooth election
http://www.wahpetondailynews.com/articles/2010/11/05/news/doc4cd4
6a8da4981440444598.txt http://tinyurl.com/26o9wjp

NM: NM implements postelection voting system audit
http://www.newswest9.com/Global/story.asp?S=13464948
The new system replaces a postelection random audit of 2% of voting machines.

Starting with this year's general election, the number of precincts to be audited will vary depending on the closeness of a race. More precincts will be checked in a very tight race

NY: New York should have piloted their new voting system
http://ballotusability.blogspot.com/2010/11/new-york-should-have-piloted-their-new.html
The Ballot Usability project evaluates New York's election problems

NY: State-mandated audit of 3% of Suffolk's voting machines begins
http://www.newsday.com/long-island/suffolk/state-mandated-audit-of-3-of-suffolk-s-voting-machines-begins-1.2439224 As Suffolk election workers used a random number generator to decide which voting machines to audit, Rep. Tim Bishop's campaign repeated a call for a full hand recount of Tuesday's results.

NY: Monroe County voting machine are audited
http://www.gateschilipost.com/latestnews/x782438816/Monroe-County-voting-machine-are-audited

NY: New voting machines will complicate legal challenges in tight elections
http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/article/20101108/NEWS/101108021/New-voting-machines-could-complicate-legal-challenges

OH: Akron student captures voting booth problem on his iPhone (Diebold TSX)
http://www.newsnet5.com/dpp/money/consumer/troubleshooter/akron-student-captures-voting-booth-problem-on-his-iphone Stark County Board of Elections takes action

"Everytime I hit the Boccieri button on the touch screen, it activated the button for Boccieri's opponent listed above his name on the ballot," Sanderson said. "I couldn't believe this was happening, so I decided to record the incident on my iPhone."
...
Mullane confirmed the problem was caused by incorrect calibration on the voting machine touch screen, an issue that has now been repaired.

OH: The uncut YouTube video posted by Sanderson on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZON7RjSxTJg&feature=player_embedded

OH: Cuyahoga County's first experience with bilingual ballots is a smooth one
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/11/cuyahoga_countys_first_experie.html

OK: State's next voting system should be like present one
http://newsok.com/states-next-voting-system-should-be-like-present-one/article/3511581
Every time I hear about voting machine difficulties in other states (hanging chads, pregnant chads, touch-screen machines that show votes different from the voter has just selected), I appreciate our system all the more.

RI: Young, Russo file complaint to end electronic voting (ES&S Optech Eagle)
http://politicsblog.projo.com/2010/11/young-russo-fil.html
Christopher Young, unsuccessful Democratic candidate for Providence mayor, and his fiancée Kara Russo, who lost the Republican primaries for lieutenant governor and the 1st Congressional district seat, want to end to electronic voting in Rhode Island.

TN: Computer error changes outcome in Calhoun City Election*(Hart eSlate DRE)
http://www.wbir.com/news/article/141732/2/Computer-error-changes-outcome-in-Calhoun-City-Election
On election night, it appeared Kelly Burns won the race for City Commissioner, but when the Election Commission looked closer at the numbers, it turned out Larry Lunsford got the most votes, 106 to 98.

According to Kris Williams, Administrator of Elections for McMinn County, his office had to use two separate databases to tally the results because of a problem with the original ballot. A program that was supposed to merge the two databases didn't work as planned-- it doubled the vote counts for absentee ballots and those cast on election day. Early votes were not affected
...
Election workers were not comfortable with the results, so on Wednesday they came in and checked the numbers again with the company that provided the computer program and databases, and realized there was an error.

TX: Dan Wallach, Rice University - Paper vs. Electronic Voting in Houston
http://blog.verifiedvoting.org/2010/11/08/1264

TX: An E-Voting Expert, Computer Scientist Votes on Paper in Houston and Lives to Tell the Tale http://www.bradblog.com/?p=8183 Dan Wallach of Rice University was one of the computer scientists who worked on California's landmark 2007 "Top to Bottom Review" of the state's electronic voting systems. He's also a voter in Harris County (Houston), TX where a fire destroyed all 10,000 of the county's 100% unverifiable voting systems just a few weeks before the start of early voting.

WA: Justice Sanders questions rejected ballots
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2013378254_
apwasupremecourt1stldwritethru.html http://tinyurl.com/273q492
Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders said Monday that his campaign is checking on thousands of ballots that have been rejected for signature errors as ballot counting continues in his too-close-to-call re-election bid.

Internet Voting Watch

NCPOR: Online voting becomes more acceptable
http://www.focus-fen.net/index.php?id=n234781
Bulgaria. Sofia. Voting online becomes more and more acceptable for the Bulgarians. 35% of the responders would vote via Internet, if it would be regulated by law. 29% of the responders are not against online voting but would not take advantage of such voting due to the fact they do not use Internet.

National

The Machinery of Democracy: Voting Machines Through Time
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2010/11/the-machinery-of-democracy-voting-machines-through-time/65612/ examples include "the stuffer's ballot box" & ACME voting machine

5 outrageous hacks perpetrated by the FTC's new Chief Technologist
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/government/5-outrageous-hacks-perpetrated-by-the-ftcs-new-chief-technologist/9641 (Congrats to Prof Ed Felton)

International

10,000 flee post-election violence in Myanmar
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_myanmar_election

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