# A Thread for the Mueller Investigation Results and Outcomes (Part 1) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 28, 2017, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093 "2017-10-28T20:14:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 294
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5862 "2018-07-24T18:11:32Z")
> [@Fiveyearlurker](#): > > Can I ask a dumb question? We keep hearing about how the Russians went through this roundabout way to affect the election. Propaganda campaign to affect people’s opinions is not a “roundabout way,” it’s the standard way to affect the election outcome. Also, it’s the only way to affect the election and still have the election result be considered legitimate. If electronic voting machines were found to be hacked, the election result may be thrown out. But illegal campaign spending rarely results in the election result itself be questioned. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5863 "2018-07-24T18:11:58Z")
> [@Fiveyearlurker](#): > > Can I ask a dumb question? We keep hearing about how the Russians went through this roundabout way to affect the election. It doesn’t appear that the voting system is all that secure, and apparently hacking was their bread and butter. So, why wouldn’t the Russians have just directly affected the vote totals? Are we going to find out at some point that they did? How would you know if they had? There’s no definitive, guaranteed-to-be-correct tally of how people voted in the voting booth; so we have nothing to compare the results to. ---
**Author:** ![dasmoocher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/dbc845/32.png) [@dasmoocher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dasmoocher)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5864 "2018-07-24T18:19:13Z")
> [@Fiveyearlurker](#): > > Can I ask a dumb question? We keep hearing about how the Russians went through this roundabout way to affect the election. It doesn’t appear that the voting system is all that secure, and apparently hacking was their bread and butter. So, why wouldn’t the Russians have just directly affected the vote totals? Are we going to find out at some point that they did? One conspiracy theory I’ve heard from anti-Trumpsters is that ballots in MI, OH, PA, etc were indeed changed. Supposedly, there are 10,000s of ballots where every Democratic down-ballot candidate was voted for on the ballot except the presidential choice, i.e. , Hillary. This is supposedly evidence the the Russians hacked the ballots and deleted votes for Hillary–because why would people vote for all the state and local candidates but not vote for the president? Anyway, that’s one of the theories out there. And, this knowledge is too explosive to be made public. Notice: Tin foil hat not included. ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5865 "2018-07-24T18:27:52Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > How would you know if they had? There’s no definitive, guaranteed-to-be-correct tally of how people voted in the voting booth; so we have nothing to compare the results to. Someone under immunity could testify that it was done, and say how it was done. Then, depending on how it was done, it may he possible for a forensic examination of the machines to confirm the testimony. I’m not saying that I expect that to happen, just that it’s not impossible that tampering could be exposed. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5866 "2018-07-24T18:54:35Z")
> [@davidm](#): > > Someone under immunity could testify that it was done, and say how it was done. Then, depending on how it was done, it may he possible for a forensic examination of the machines to confirm the testimony. > > I’m not saying that I expect that to happen, just that it’s not impossible that tampering could be exposed. A person testifying under immunity could still be lying. If the voting machines could be tampered with before the election to affect the count, they could be tampered with now to look like they were tampered with then. I suppose there’s no way to be 100% sure, but I think we could do a lot better than we do now. The ballots could be done on paper, or issue a paper receipt that the voter could check. Keep those ballots after the election. Store them in boxes with tamper-evident seals. Count some random selection of them by hand (or in a different type of machine) and see if the counts agree. Let either party challenge particular precincts for a verified recount if they suspect something is wrong. Or maybe it’s all fearmongering. Maybe our election systems are as robust as they need to be, but it’s in some people’s interest to cast doubt. Either way, it’s disappointing. Seems that, as good as we are at calculating and tabulating other things, there ought to be agreement that we should have the most accurate and secure election counts possible. ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5867 "2018-07-24T18:54:57Z")
I’ll add that I think it’s unlikely that direct manipulation occurred. First, because the decentralization and multiplicity of voting methods makes it difficult to do on a large enough scale; second, because the obvious and proven propaganda campaign wouldn’t have been necessary if direct manipulation was possible. ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5868 "2018-07-24T19:01:32Z")
> [@Defensive\_Indifference](#): > > I can only assume that they did try to affect vote totals. And, I think there’s a decent chance they succeeded in at least some states or districts. Many of our electronic voting machines have been found to have glaring security vulnerabilities, including poor internal logging in some cases. I think it’s definitely possible that some votes were manipulated, and the poor controls on the systems compounded with the decentralized way we do elections means that we will likely never be able to prove it one way or the other. I haven’t seen anything in the news to make me say there definitely was tampering, but I think the question is a serious one. I agree. > [@davidm](#): > > I’ll add that I think it’s unlikely that direct manipulation occurred. > > First, because the decentralization and multiplicity of voting methods makes it difficult to do on a large enough scale; second, because the obvious and proven propaganda campaign wouldn’t have been necessary if direct manipulation was possible. Given everything else we’ve seen, I think it’s very likely they picked several key districts, and put their thumb on the scale. ---
**Author:** ![Defensive\_Indifference](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/defensive_indifference/32/6502_2.png) [@Defensive\_Indifference](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Defensive_Indifference)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5869 "2018-07-24T19:34:30Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > Given everything else we’ve seen, I think it’s very likely they picked several key districts, and put their thumb on the scale. Yeah, agreed. You wouldn’t need to move many votes to do that. And I recall reading a couple years ago about the sorry state of some of the voting machines. Some of them used Microsoft Access to record votes. Access is a fine tool for some things. I made my living as an Access developer for a number of years. But what it’s not is very secure or auditable. There’s no native transaction logging, for one thing. So the bad guys could theoretically get into the machine and tweak a bunch of votes. Examination might be able to determine that the bad guys got in, but they’d pretty much be up shit creek in trying to sort out what the impact to the votes was. Then, too, the machines are scattered around a zillion districts, in custody of a collection of disparate voting authorities with their own political goals, and have been used for local and statewide races since then, so good luck finding and collecting the ones that were compromised almost two years ago. Why tamper when they’re already having such success with the propaganda campaign? The Russians have lots of people and resources to throw at the problem. Why not do both the propaganda campaign _and_ vote tampering? While we’re all focused on the noisy problem (propaganda), no one is digging in to the real problem (tampering). I mean, hypothetically. Again, I haven’t seen anything that convinces me that the Russians _did_ tamper with votes. I just wouldn’t be surprised if they did. I’d only be surprised and impressed if US investigators found conclusive evidence of it. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5870 "2018-07-24T19:35:37Z")
> [@davidm](#): > > second, because the obvious and proven propaganda campaign wouldn’t have been necessary if direct manipulation was possible. Even if direct manipulation were possible, the propaganda campaign is necessary, to serve as a plausible excuse for Trump’s win. It’s not enough to manipulate the results, you also have to convince enough people that the result are legitimate. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5871 "2018-07-24T19:37:32Z")
In [this excerpt from the Helsinki Fiasco](https://youtu.be/SNmnPbzVKPY?t=5m28s) Trump says > [@](#): > > [the House hearing of Peter Strzok] … It was a disgrace to the FBI; it was a disgrace to our country; and you would say ‘that was a total witch hunt.’ For once I agree with the incontinent sociopath’s words! Of course he didn’t actually _intend_ to say anything intelligent — it just never occurred to his feeble brain that ‘it’ must have an antecedent and, in context and stipulating that we treat his utterance as English-language, the “witch-hunt” can ONLY refer to the Congressional hearing itself. (Back the video up to 5:04 to watch how Trump deftly passes Putin’s gift ball to Melania so she can give it to Barron.) ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5872 "2018-07-24T19:54:42Z")
Well, we do know that until 2006 one of the top manufacturers of voting machines used PCAnywhere to remote login to their machines, which (PCAnywhere) was subsequently found to have a serious security flaw which allowed machines with the software to be taken over. The company claimed to remove PCAnywhere from their machines, but never revealed what replaced it. I would assume the need to remote in the machines was still needed. > **[Past Voting Systems Had Remote-Access Software](https://www.newsweek.com/election-hacking-voting-machines-software-1028948)** > > Senator Ron Wyden said the decision to sell voting systems with remote-access software, leaving equipment possibly vulnerable to hacking, was "the worst decision for security short of leaving ballot boxes on a Moscow street corner."  ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5873 "2018-07-24T20:08:33Z")
Go back to paper ballots until voting machines can be secured. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5874 "2018-07-24T22:31:44Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > Go back to paper ballots until voting machines can be secured. I think at least one country in Europe did exactly that. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5875 "2018-07-24T23:11:14Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > Go back to paper ballots until voting machines can be secured. Nah. Let’s do it by show of hands. Satellites can pick it up. ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5876 "2018-07-24T23:22:34Z")
No need for hands. The satellites can read/control your mind already. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5877 "2018-07-24T23:22:56Z")
Hands are too hard. Can I just raise one finger? ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5878 "2018-07-24T23:23:38Z")
> [@snfaulkner](#): > > No need for hands. The satellites can read/control your mind already. You mean this tinfoil hat is no good?? ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2018, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5879 "2018-07-24T23:24:57Z")
> [@ThelmaLou](#): > > You mean this tinfoil hat is no good?? It hides that mess you made of your hair. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2018, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5880 "2018-07-25T15:41:53Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > Go back to paper ballots until voting machines can be secured. That’s easy advice for us to give from Canada, where we usually only vote in one election at a time. Lot harder to implement in the US, where on one trip to the polls you might be voting for a president, a US senator, a US representative, a governor, a state senator, a state representative, a mayor, a city councilor, a judge… Automation becomes a lot more necessary. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [July 25, 2018, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093/5881 "2018-07-25T15:50:09Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > That’s easy advice for us to give from Canada, where we usually only vote in one election at a time. > > Lot harder to implement in the US, where on one trip to the polls you might be voting for a president, a US senator, a US representative, a governor, a state senator, a state representative, a mayor, a city councilor, a judge… Automation becomes a lot more necessary. Paper ballots can be scanned very easily. In Washington State we have complicated ballots, but they’re all paper (and all via mail—no trips to the polling place) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093.md?page=293) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-thread-for-the-mueller-investigation-results-and-outcomes-part-1/800093.md?page=295)