Ars Technica has an article on electronic voting. This prompted me to respond to the author with the following email:

I completely disagree with the premise of your recent article. Paper ballots have horrible "security". When you stated electronic ballots will help us "find out who hackers want to be president." Well, given the 2000 election, is it better to find out who Democratic poll judges in Florida want for president? Having paper as a backup for electric ballot is as brain damaged as having a buggy whip as a backup for an automobile.

The criticism for Diebold stems from paranoid liberal fantasies. No system is perfect or unhackable. If we trust poll judges today with paper ballots, then I believe we can trust an electronic system with the same people.

Today is 06/06/06. That makes it “6-6-6″, or 666, which is the Mark of the Beast. Folks are doing fun things today like releasing a movie about a demon child. Oh, the delicious Ann Coulter is releasing “Godless”, her latest tome on the stupidness that is today’s liberalism.

I am gonna have a little fun, too. Check out the devilishly funny System Administrator Song from Three Dead Trolls in a Baggie

I discovered on usflag.org that you can buy a flag that has been flown over the United States Capitol building. It turns out anyone can write their senator or representative and request a flag. For a fee of approximately $28 you will receive an American flag and a keepsake Certificate of Authenticity from the Architect of the Capitol certifying that your flag was flown. Flag ordering information is typically found under “Services” on the Senate or House members’ web pages.

American Flag

I first saw this video on the North American Patriot blog. In my current position I have the privilege of working with many military officers. I find them to be intelligent, dedicated men and women. The war in Iraq is necessary to confront the terrorist threat facing the world. This video is for all our troops. My heroes!

Click on the image for a link to the video

Thank You

The past year, 2005, brought its share of hype and hero worship. As I did last year I decided to give a select list of underrated items some exposure.

I read an excellent article on podcasting. Would anybody listen to a gazpacho dot net podcast?

In a recent New York Times article two politicasters called for a "paper audit" of electronic voting. I think this is misguided. Paper voting has never been a flawless process. The fact that it has come to be trusted has less to do with its security strength than the human ability to accept risk. But demanding a paper trail for electronic voting is equivalent to forcing car drivers to keep a horse and a buggy whip as a backup.

I think the following summary from a keynote address given by a computer scientist outlines the absurdity of the "pieces of paper" argument.

Touch-screen voting machines store records of cast votes in internal memory, where the voter cannot check them. Because of our system of secret ballots, once the voter leaves the polls there is no way anyone can determine whether the vote captured was what the voter intended. Why should voters trust these machines?

Last December, I drafted a “Resolution on Electronic Voting” stating that every voting system should have a “voter verifiable audit trail,” which is a permanent record of the vote that can be checked for accuracy by the voter, and which is saved for a recount if it is required.

Why should voters trust the current paper system? After all there is no way to verify that any individual’s ballot was captured and tallied. How can the voter check his vote today? He can’t. We do not get a permanent record of our vote today. Why is it good idea for a new system and not for the current one?

Paper documents are inadequate for recounts. Has everybody forgotten the miserable job done during the recounts of the 2000 elections? I remember poll workers holding paper ballots up to examine the intent of the voter. We were introduced to the wonderful terms "dimpled chad" and "pregnant chad". Friends, the paper system for recounts is broken.

Every change made to an electronic system can be automatically documented and audited. I wonder if the fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD) surrounding electronic voting is because the old paper system is well understood and can be subverted by people who cannot win elections any other way. How else do Democrats get elected?

A well-designed electronic voting system can be safer and more secure than today’s current system of paper ballots. We will not achieve a better voting system if we do not allow it to prove its strength without the fetters of the old paper system.

I’ve read the same criticism as everyone else about President George W. Bush’s supposed lax response to the Hurricane Katrina. That reaction is so fundamentally wrong on so many levels. It is rooted in an unjustified hatred of our President.

But people forget a hurricane hit the Carribean about the same time last year. Didn’t John Kerry’s wife tell people to go naked? *genius* That’s the compassion of the Democratic Party.

“Clothing is wonderful, but let them go naked for a while, at least the kids,” said Heinz Kerry, the wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. – USA Today 9/15/2004