What I want to know now is: Why was it rigged? We know who might benefit. You could say it was the Clinton campaign, or you could argue that it was the Republicans wanting to run in a race they likely perceive to be easier. We need to find out the political connections, if any exist, of the higher-ups at LHS, the firm responsible for the machines, and a firm whose leadership has a criminal past and (in some states) present.
Now we need to figure out which of those parties was responsible. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
You guys would come up with this at 10:15PM!
Let me do a quick hit on Google and see what I can come up with.
I'm too old for this shit
In last week's program LHS President John Silvestro admitted his staff violated Connecticut security protocols during the 2006 election. Memory cards were swapped by LHS staff members who saw protocols from the State indicating they were not to touch machines.
From here
So you can establish a previous whatchamacallit.
These guys are definitely shady. Black Box Voting has been all over them. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
Vote fraud expert Bev Harris has warned that New Hampshire's electronic voting machines are wide open to fraud and that even modestly skilled computer programmers were able to identify key vulnerabilities within ten minutes of assessing them as key Democrat and Republican primaries unfold today. Harris points out that LHS is a private company that will count over four fifths of the New Hampshire vote with no oversight whatsoever. LHS is not subject to public records requirements, as the government is, at least, not in New Hampshire. The control over memory card contents is absolute; when cards malfunction or get lost, LHS brings the replacements. Since LHS maintains the machines, repairs the machines, and replaces the machines -- often on Election Day -- when they malfunction, they have intimate access to the chips, sockets, ports, communications devices and other electronic components. A recent CNN report featured on Lou Dobbs' show highlights just how easy it is to hack a voting machine and change how votes are tallied with just rudimentary programming skills. Experts warn that it takes only a minute for an unsupervised machine to be inserted with a virus and hacked.
Harris points out that LHS is a private company that will count over four fifths of the New Hampshire vote with no oversight whatsoever.
LHS is not subject to public records requirements, as the government is, at least, not in New Hampshire. The control over memory card contents is absolute; when cards malfunction or get lost, LHS brings the replacements.
Since LHS maintains the machines, repairs the machines, and replaces the machines -- often on Election Day -- when they malfunction, they have intimate access to the chips, sockets, ports, communications devices and other electronic components.
A recent CNN report featured on Lou Dobbs' show highlights just how easy it is to hack a voting machine and change how votes are tallied with just rudimentary programming skills. Experts warn that it takes only a minute for an unsupervised machine to be inserted with a virus and hacked.
Should get in touch with Harri Hursti who has been warning about the fraud potential of Diebold machines and LHS. He has a company in Finland (!) so maybe somebody 'round here knows someone who knows him. If he holds a press conference and presents the information you've got instant credibility AND it will get picked-up.
Anyway, this establishes:
Hursti has been warning about the Diebold machines but the LHS part is unconfirmed.
When I went to the UK Lib Dem conference in September I attended a Lunch "fringe" session on electronic voting organised by the Open Rights Group. I must have the guy's business card somewhere! We have met the enemy, and he is us — Pogo
Drew wrote in part:
You could say it was the Clinton campaign, or you could argue that it was the Republicans wanting to run in a race they likely perceive to be easier.
This is actually a nice situation for potential Republican fraudsters: as the more conservative candidate and the candidate less liked by independent voters, Clinton should be both easier to beat and preferable if she actually wins. These two effects tend to oppose one another, giving such a potential fraudster pause; but not this time. Not that I trust Hillary, but given this point and the Republicans' connections to Diebold, I'd expect Republicans as by far the most likely perpetrators.
But the simple truth is that we just don't know the answer yet. We can speculate, and some arguments seems tronger than others, but it needs further investigation. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers. - George Carlin
Clinton should be both easier to beat and preferable if she actually wins
Until now, I didn't believe the first part, but I definitely agreed with the second. But that's no longer the case. One reason I used to think that Clinton would not be easy to defeat was that all of the scandals that could be found, or could be invented, to use against her have already been tried, while we've no idea what they could invent against the others candidates.
But that is no longer the case. There is a new scandal, and that's the New Hampshire election. If people like those at the Election Defense Alliance hadn't done their work, this scandal might well have surfaced after the Democratic convention, and dogged her all the way to the general election, if not beyond (once she had a reputation for election fraud, I can see the Supreme Court inventing yet another law, this time to allow recounts that might work against her).
For that reason, it's essential that she clear this up as soon as possible, and I can see only one way to do this. Clinton should call for a recount herself, and then try to turn it against the Republicans if it turns out to be true. If not, it's critical that she not win the nomination, to then go on and lose the general election. Until today, I was certain that I would vote in February for Edwards, but now I'm seriously thinking of switching to Obama, to help make sure that she does not win the nomination.
Whether or not Clinton had anything to do with election fraud (or would ever do so at all) is inconsequential, once Fox and the rest get the scent of a spectacular story --even one with an indeterminate conclusion. This is just the sort of smart tactic that has emerged from the Rove machine for a long time. Because it relies on an astute instinct for voter psychology and media weaknesses, it's powerful.
Assume for a moment that the statistical case that got Mig's attention and pushed him and Drew into action can be made solid, and explained in a way that the media can sell.
How to get them to do it?
I think this is the great obstacle, and an almost insurmountable one perhaps.
I suggest that, rather than changing your vote, a far better tactic would be to get on the phone, get on the net, get in your car and show up at the door of EVERY SIGNIFICANT PLAYER IN THE GAME.
The media are going to decide this.
They can and will ignore Harry Hursti. God knows they did before, for the most part.
drive them crazy. Capitalism searches out the darkest corners of human potential, and mainlines them.
On second thoughts, the statistical case may not be that relevant to the point I was making. By the standards of Love Story, Swiftboats, or Saddam's WMDs, the fact that the polls showed Obama winning, while Clinton won in the end is already strong evidence of fraud. That's what we're up against. Like the rest of you, I made the mistake of assuming that facts are what matter here.
On the other hand, I do vaguely remember similar claims being made about her NY Senate victory, so it's just possible that this is yet another made-up scandal that has already been captured by current opinion polls. I would still feel more comfortable, though, if her campaign was doing something to respond to it.
I definitely would like to contact her campaign, but I'm trying to think of the best way to do so without being immediately dismissed as yet another person complaining about fraud. Anybody got suggestions for the best way to go about it?
I meant to introduce myself at the end of my previous, first, post, but hit the "Post" button prematurely. As usual, I've been lurking for quite a while, etc.etc. There was no way for you to know, but I live in Italy now, making showing up at doors and so on rather difficult (I know that "get in your car" is meant metaphorically, but I can't resist the opportunity of bragging that I haven't owned, or even driven, a car for over a decade).
The primary that I'll be voting in will be for delegates for Democrats Abroad. I just learnt that the Italian vote will be on Super Tuesday, so I won't be able to vote in person, and will have to chose between voting by absentee ballot, or over the internet. I'm considering the latter just for the experience, but I am rather dubious about how it will work in practice.
For me, the point is that computers are not the appropriate technology to count votes. There is a reason why right after the election has closed, the ballot box is emptied in front of witnesses from all competing (as well as other interested parties) factions and counted. The system is designed to eliminate the need for trust.
A computer makes the entire process one of trust - after we have so carefully eliminated the need for trust originally. Why bother watching the election if you can't watch the designing of the computer program that counts the ballots?
aspiring to genteel poverty
Walden O'Dell, then-CEO of Ohio-based Diebold, wrote an invitation to a Bush re-election fundraiser in 2003 stating that he intended to help "Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president." Ohio did get counted in the red column the following year, with its result providing the decisive margin of victory for the Republican incumbent. The uproar over O'Dell's comments, compounded by allegations of voting irregularities in some Ohio precincts in 2004, culminated with his resignation two months ago. Company officials privately acknowledged the impropriety of such partisan remarks by O'Dell, who was also a major donor to Bush's re-election bid. But Diebold's new CEO, Thomas Swidarski, is also a Republican stalwart. Swidarski was one of about a dozen Diebold executives who helped fund the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2004, with Swidarski himself making the maximum individual contribution of $2000. Diebold has since barred its top administrators from making political donations. But the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported recently that three Diebold executives not covered by the ban have continued to contribute to GOP candidates in Ohio. Two groups of investors are meanwhile suing Diebold in federal court on the grounds that the company gave misleading assurances about the security of its voting machines. Those allegedly false claims led to artificial inflation of Diebold's share prices, the lawsuits charge. The disgruntled investors complain that Diebold is "unable to assure the quality and working order of its voting machine products." Taking note of these developments, The New York Times criticized Diebold's "flawed approach to its business" in a December editorial. "The counting of votes is a public trust," the Times declared. "Diebold, whose machines count many votes, has never acted as if it understood this."
The uproar over O'Dell's comments, compounded by allegations of voting irregularities in some Ohio precincts in 2004, culminated with his resignation two months ago. Company officials privately acknowledged the impropriety of such partisan remarks by O'Dell, who was also a major donor to Bush's re-election bid.
But Diebold's new CEO, Thomas Swidarski, is also a Republican stalwart. Swidarski was one of about a dozen Diebold executives who helped fund the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2004, with Swidarski himself making the maximum individual contribution of $2000.
Diebold has since barred its top administrators from making political donations. But the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported recently that three Diebold executives not covered by the ban have continued to contribute to GOP candidates in Ohio.
Two groups of investors are meanwhile suing Diebold in federal court on the grounds that the company gave misleading assurances about the security of its voting machines. Those allegedly false claims led to artificial inflation of Diebold's share prices, the lawsuits charge. The disgruntled investors complain that Diebold is "unable to assure the quality and working order of its voting machine products."
Taking note of these developments, The New York Times criticized Diebold's "flawed approach to its business" in a December editorial. "The counting of votes is a public trust," the Times declared. "Diebold, whose machines count many votes, has never acted as if it understood this."
LHS Associates removed their personnel information from their website so I can't do cross-checking.
BTW, we're already on the first page of Google using the search term ["Silvestro" + "Republican"]. That was pretty quick, huh?
(Except it doesn't seem to be working.)
A Lexis/Nexus search - which I can't do - needs to be run, tho' I don't expect much to happen with that, either.
Irregardless of the statistical analysis preliminary evidence indicates LHS Associates and John Silvestro shouldn't be in charge of counting votes to elect the officers of the local Gardening Club.
More often than not, however, even tertiary sources link back to BBV. A common trail is:
BBV <- BradBlog <- 3rd Source
so the search results need to be manually verified and qualified. On a dial-up ISP that takes a while.
The 3rd Source is a serious problem as some of those Information Sources are not of the highest intellectual quality -- shall I say. (The phrase "stark raving bonkers" leaps to mind.)
and yet you hang around here... ;-) Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.
