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  • From: Childers.Paula AT epamail.epa.gov
  • To: internetworkers AT franklin.oit.unc.edu
  • Subject: Re: Florida elections?
  • Date: Thu, 09 Nov 2000 12:57:23 -0500




The actual procedures in US elections are still a remarkably hazy venture.
Initial returns at local precincts are usually phoned in to a central
county/area office. I'd bet some of those county returns are still tabulated
manually before going onward. Therefore, you will almost always see a
difference
between initial returns reported on election night and actual returns after
they
are gone over at the central offices in the days following an election. Rarely
are elections so close that this human error plays a major role!

Anyone can make errors, especially after a long day working the polls. My mom
works polls in Virginia, and she is there before they open, there til way
after
they close. I believe most poll workers are volunteers, also- they receive
about 4 hours of training one evening before the election, so you're not
talking
about civics professors here. It does not surprise me that some folks in
Florida
were incorrectly told they could not re-do their ballots after making a
mistake.
I do find it interesting that the recount was called before the "actual" count
was finished.

Being rather paranoid, I'm not really in favor of internet voting yet. I think
we still need the certainty of a marked piece of paper to refer to when
problems
such as these arise. Oh, and if you want to be really freaked out in that
conspiracy-theory sort of way, check out this site on the supposed voter fraud
being perpetrated through closed-source computerized voting machines:
www.votescam.com . I don't really believe all these folks have to say, but
they
do raise some interesting points with implications outside of their specific
"crackpotism." Who watches the watchers?

Nice graphs, Steve.

Paula
-who thinks all those 96,844 people who voted for Nader in Florida should be
royally bitch-slapped.






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