Wednesday, November 01, 2006

can this machine be trusted?

can this machine be trusted?from time: The U.S.'s new voting systems are only as good as the people who program and use them. Which is why next week could be interesting...

More than 80 million Americans will go to the polls, and a record number of them--90%--will either cast their vote on a computer or have it tabulated that way. When that many people collide with that many high-tech devices, there are going to be problems. Some will be machine malfunctions. Some could come from sabotage by poll workers or voters themselves. But in a venture this large, trouble is most likely to come from just plain human error, a fact often overlooked in an environment as charged and conspiratorial as America is in today.

Four years after Congress passed a law requiring every state to vote by a method more reliable than the punch-card system that paralyzed Florida and the nation in 2000, the 2006 election is shaping up into a contest not just between Democrats and Republicans but also between people who believe in technology and those who fear machines cannot be trusted to count votes in a closely divided democracy.


as always, please go to black box voting for the real deal on electronic voting... also, check out vote smart for information on every candidate, issue & initiative under the sun

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