:rolleyes:
Even the SDMB’s conservatives, by and large, seem fed up with the Bush administration and the current Congress. And the Democrats here, although they’re not all convinced the Dems will get either or both houses, know the party will pick up seats. Bush has been a lame duck for a while, and no result is going to change that. Nobody seems to think that the future of the country turns on this election.
Mr Clothahump meet Mr Bricker.
I think that’s the problem. We have, and have had, some fairly doughty fighters on the conservative side, but they’ve been saddled with defending the incompetence, the excesses and the ideological extremity of the Bushistas on the one hand, and the economic corruption and hypocrisy of the Congressional Republicans on the other. It’s not an easy task when the people you’re defending are THAT corrupt, THAT incompetent, and THAT fucking evil. I mean, the Bushistas have embraced TORTURE for Og’s sake. How the fuck are you going to be able to say, 'Waterboarding isn’t SO bad …" when it very obviously IS so bad?
I think most of the conservatives on this board and many in the nation at large have decided that Bush and many of the Pubbie leaders are not only people they can’t defend, they’re not people they WANT to defend. So there’s not much defending going on. So the board is quiet.,
That said, the board in general has bene kind quiet generally of late, even in the relatively apolitical realms of CS and MPSIMS. Well, quiet may not be the word. Boring, that would be the word.
I hope those bipartisan officials are watching everyone drop the printouts in the box, too … seems to me it would be very easy to smuggle in extra printouts and drop them into the box.
How would it be any easier than smuggling in extra paper ballots? They watch when you put those in the box (I just did it).
I think most conservatives have come to the conclusion that stating their views in GD is essentially begging for being viciously attacked by twenty people. And why bother wandering into GD to do that when it conveniently spreads itself all over the rest of the forums as well?
I know Bricker still occasionally posts in GD, but he’s a Catholic, so I think he’s into that.
Things will change if we keep seeing reports of voting machine problems and some tactics that are, let’s say ‘ethically questionable.’
Paper ballot state votor here. Each precinct is issued enough ballots to account for registered voters -early voters -absentee ballots + a few spares.
Prior to voting, each voter is ID’d, and checked against the precint registration rolls, and must sign a master list. They are then issued a “voting ticket” with thier precinct registration number.
This ticket is then exchanged for a ballot. Each ballot has a serial number on a numbered tear off stub. There is no serial number on the ballot itself. HOWEVER, the serrations between the stubs and the ballots are not uniform. The stubs are kept bound into the pad of ballots. (we’ll get to the reason for this later) The ballot number is recorded on the voting ticket which is kept for audit purposes.
Marked ballots are fed (by the voter, supervised by poll worker) into a counting machine which records the votes, and counts the ballots, Integral with that machine is a sealed bin that collects the paper ballots.
I see the electronic scanner as the weak link, because it represents a convienient place to alter lots of votes. However the paper ballots are available for manual recounting or audit purposes.
Given this system the following safeguards exist:
-The only way to get a paper ballot into the collection box is via the electronic scanner. The only way to get it out is via a sealed door.
-If the electronic scanner were to fail, or be suspect, all the ballots that went through that scanner are in one box, and can be manually counted. THIS is the main advantage of paper ballots, IMO. Pretty hard to lose the data.
-The number of ballots in the box must equal the number of ballots signed for by the voters. Makes it hard to stuff the ballot boxes unless the precinct workers/observers are all in cahoots.
-All ballots issued to each precinct must be accounted for…the recording machine total plus the leftovers must match the issued number. So if I stuffed in extra ballots, I’d have to get them from the stack issued to the precinct. That would create a discrepancy between the number of signatures/ tickets vs. the number of ballots.
-If a pad of ballots was short or long, the ballot stubs are available to track down the problem.
-If serious monkey buisiness were suspected, there is process where a particular voter can be linked to a particular ballot. This is all paper, and not a computer data base. It could be done by forensic comparison of the tear pattern between serrations, then searching through the ballot tickets, then looking up the precinct voter number, and finally arriving at a name. It is only practical for a small random sample, and pretty well addresses voter secrecy concerns.
I’m a conservative. I don’t post about it. I don’t need the headache. I know if I put my views out there the kind of reception I’m going to get. Again, I don’t need the headache. If I want to be insulted, I’ll call my ex husband.
You know, I’ve never had to show ID to vote in this town. One of the upsides to having high school students volunteering at the polling places. By the time I make it to the front of the line, they already have the page turned for my signature.
It’s been driven home that once you accept the primacy of evidence-based reasoning, you’ve abandoned conservative politics. It is a strict either/or. Hence the on-board silence.
…
They’re all busy robo-calling voters into staying home? 
There comes a time when I can do nothing more, except vote. I may as well relax at that point. The voters will vote, and the numbers will come up, and I cannot affect it at all. I’ll watch a recorded movie, and I won’t trouble myself with watching the results shows until much later.