Fw: [CalifElectionProtection] Re: [ei] Re: [Fwd: Holt Bill is backed by Electronic Frontier Foundation]

[Randy Moor]

I am herein forwarding to ElectionIntegrity Sherry Healy's response to MG because MG's email went to more than one email group but Sherry's response did not go back to EI.

----- Original Message -----

From: Sherry Healy

To: Michelle Gabriel

Cc: CEPN

Sent: Wednesday, September 05, 2007 11:22 PM

Subject: Re: [CalifElectionProtection] Re: [ei] Re: [Fwd: Holt Bill is backed by Electronic Frontier Foundation]

Michelle--

The only reason the audit committee went with the spot check method is because they were seeking to bolster the existing 15360. They did not even have the fixed percentage, precinct based, audits on the table since they do require hand tabulation at the precinct, which is not something Californians seem to remember how to do.

However, after studying audit models for over three years now and spending half that time trying to figure how to bolster the existing 15360 spot check, I did finally concede that the fixed percentage at the precinct is far superior. Here's just a few reasons why it is superior to the spot check method:

1) A sample of ballots at each and every PRECINCT will affirm that the ballots cast are the same ballots that are tabulated before the chain of custody is diminished by transportation and time at a central site. This is not addressed by a post-election, centralized, government controlled, audits where citizen observation is a spot check at best, and which is the case with the 15360 spot check method.

2) A fixed 10% sample of ballots at each and every PRECINCT, when examined in its entirety can affirm a 99% accuracy level, and it does it without statistical weighting formulas that can be disputed.

3) It provides citizen control (not government control) of the elections, because it turns out precincts were formed to serve as neutral territory in bite size chunks that can be tabulated in one night. (In California precincts cannot exceed 1,000.)

--Sherry Healy

On Wednesday, September 5, 2007, at 08:12 PM, Michelle Gabriel wrote:

re: audits
In CA, SoS Bowen commissioned a group to look at audits. Their recommendation was to go to riskbased audits, not fixed percentage.  But the math still needs to be done on how to do this and implementation will not be simple.  If you are interested, I suggest you check out SoS Bowens web page.  There were some serious experts on this panel.
mg

Randy Moor wrote:

I would gladly support Kucinich's bill if he were to reintroduce it.  But he has not yet, and if he wants it to be considered at all, it seems to me, he better do it before HR811 is voted on.  I'm afraid he has run out of time.
 
Regarding Ellen Theisen's paper:

* It is out of date - for example one of the seven failures "The dysfunctional Election Assistance Commission is made permanent," is not true of the latest version of HR811.  The paper was written before the latest version was made public.
* Its claim that "many experts who have researched election audit methods agree that the model in HR 811 will not be effective or provide confidence" does not specify who the experts are.  And many experts do support the audits, but in any case some audits are better than none.
* The argument that it "institutes legally...'ballots' that will never be counted, and...secret vote-counting" does not seem to me to demonstrate a degree of harm that outdoes the good in the bill, like the mandatory audits.  Congress would be no less able to make laws in the future requiring ballots that really are counted and vote-counting that is not done in secret.  So is there any real "harm"?  Without HR811 we will have secret, electronic vote-counting anyway in 2008, but the counts will not be cross-checked by audits except in any individual states that require them.  That seems to me more harmful. 

Best,

    Randy

----- Original Message -----
From: Karen Renick
To: Olivia Alperstein
Cc: CEPN ; Voting Rights ; Election...@googlegroups.com ; Randy Moor ; Michelle Gabriel
Sent: Wednesday, September 05, 2007 2:11 PM
Subject: Re: [ei] Re: [Fwd: Holt Bill is backed by Electronic Frontier Foundation]

I highly recommend that you read this paper by Ellen Theisen, "Rush Holt's HR 811 Does More Harm than Good: Seven Serious Failures in the Latest Holt Reform Bill", found at:
 http://www.votersunite.org/info/hr811Report.pdf.

As far as other voting reform bills, there has been much pressure put on Rep. Kucinich to introduce a revised version of HR 6200, a HCPB bill he introduced last session, that would call for paper ballots hand-counted in public view for all federal races (pres,v.p., senator, representative). He has said he will, but it hasn't happened yet.

Karen Renick
Austin, TX
www.VoteRescue.org


Randy Moor <moor...@gmail.com> wrote:

Consensus is that this bill is the only one with a chance of passing this year that will require paper records and audits in all voting jurisdictions in 2008.
 
I recommend asking your Representative to support HR811 as long as, and only as long as, it continues to require paper records and audits in 2008.  At the same time I think it is important to let them know that this bill will not fix all the problems and future legislation for later years will still be necessary.  We need to "manage expectations" in this way so that legislators do not get the impression that this bill will satisfy citizens' demand for election reform in the long run.
 
Thanks,
    Randy

----- Original Message -----
From: Olivia Alperstein
To: Michelle Gabriel
Cc: CEPN ; Voting Rights ; Election...@googlegroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, September 05, 2007 10:53 AM
Subject: [ei] Re: [Fwd: Holt Bill is backed by Electronic Frontier Foundation]

I am of the opinion that the Holt bill is not an adequate solution; on the other hand, could someone who's better informed than I tell me if there are any other measure for election integrity that have been put before Congress?
 
Thanks-
 
Peace and prosperity,
Olivia Alperstein

 
On 9/5/07, Michelle Gabriel <m...@jmbaai.com> wrote:



-------- Original Message --------

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.I know that I am sending emails that make it look like I'm waffling. If you go by who is saying Yes and who is saying No , it is even more confusing because there are excellent people and groups on both sides.  Yesterday I posted an email about Holt saying it was no longer his bill. There was a lot of reaction to that article as misquoting Holt.  EFF is a group I have a lot of respect for and here is their take on it, which I took from the MMOB list.
mg

EFF: Crunch Time for E-voting ReformEFF: Crunch Time for E-voting Reform

Posted by: "Joyce McCloy" jmc2...@earthlink.net   ncverifiablevoting

Tue Sep 4, 2007 8:58 pm (PST)

Matt Zimmerman, the attorney at EFF.org who represented us in court
several times in North Carolina - weighs in with wise advice on HR 811
Crunch Time for E-voting Reform
< http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/005421.php> September 04, 2007
If all goes as planned, HR 811 -- the Voter Confidence and Increased
Accessibility Act of 2007
<http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:h.r.00811: > , introduced
by New Jersey Representative Rush Holt <http://holt.house.gov/> -- will
finally come to a floor vote in the House of Representatives this week,
likely on Thursday or Friday. Despite speculation to the contrary, it is
not at all clear whether the bill will pass or, even if it does, whether
a substantively similar companion bill will then pass the Senate. Like
it or not, with election officials arguing that they're running out of
time to implement wholesale changes, this likely amounts to Congress's
only attempt to make any serious improvements to the nation's election
procedures ahead of the 2008 presidential election.

EFF supports HR 811 and hopes that you will tell your Representative
< http://action.eff.org/site/Advocacy?id=109> to support it as well. As
we have done over the years through the bill's
< http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_06.php#003643> various
<http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/004539.php > incarnations
<http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/005308.php> , EFF has supported
HR 811 based on what the bill would actually do, not what it lacks. At
the end of the day, a post-HR 811 electoral system would indisputably
(despite arguments to the contrary) be better than the one that exists
today. EFF has discussed this in detail before
<http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/005308.php > : from where we sit,
banning the use of paperless direct recording electronic (DRE) voting
machines if they are not retrofitted with voter-verified paper ballots
(VVPATs) and mandating for the first time across-the-board audits of
federal elections would unquestionably be good things which continue to
deserve support, regardless of whether or not we'd like to see
additional improvements.

Are DREs, even those utilizing VVPATs, fraught with problems? Of course
<http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/elections_vsr.htm> . Should more
rigorous audits be mandated? Absolutely
<http://www.brennancenter.org/dynamic/subpages/download_file_50135.pdf >
. But a heartfelt desire to ban DREs or improve audits is no reason to
oppose this bill, especially since states are not prohibited from making
either of these reforms -- or nearly any other voting system-related
reform -- on their own.

Our support for HR 811 is tempered by profound disappointment that one
of the bill's pillars has been watered down to the point of
ineffectiveness due to pressure from the proprietary software industry.
The source code disclosure provisions, requiring that voting system
source code be disclosed at the very least to litigants and other
"qualified persons" who can test the integrity of the voting system
under a non-disclosure agreement, have since the bill's introduction
been replaced by a requirement that "voting system software" -- a
definition that does not explicitly include source code -- be disclosed.
While "correcting" language was included in the Committee Report
< http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname=110_cong_repo\
rts&docid=f:hr154.110.pdf> as a result of prompt feedback from computer
security experts after the bill's current language was released, that
Report will likely not be sufficient to ensure source code access.
Having litigated < http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/004285.php>
cases <http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_11.php#005020 > in which
prompt access to voting system source code is critical, EFF's strong
advocacy for this bill has been based in large part on the source code
disclosure requirement. We call on Rep. Zoe Lofgren and the other
members of the Elections Subcommittee to promptly fix this provision --
using the explicit language included in the Committee Report -- before
the bill makes it to the floor of the House.

Whatever its shortcomings, whatever its incremental pace, HR 811 offers
an important step forward. EFF continues to call for more ambitious
reform than that offered by the current version of the bill, but we also
properly recognize that HR 811 offers the best immediate opportunity for
meaningful change. It needs your support
<http://action.eff.org/site/Advocacy?id=109 > today. Without it, be
prepared to live with no additional federal protections for the 2008
election as we all return to square one with a new bill targeted at the
2010 or 2012 general election.

Posted by Matt Zimmerman #
PS. You can use this easy 60 second action alert
<http://action.eff.org/site/Advocacy?id=109 > from Electronic Frontier
Foundation to send an email if you want, and you can also call your
congressman toll free at: 866-622-2184




Renick
Director, VoteRescue
www.VoteRescue.org
ka...@voterescue.org
 
"Let the ballot boxes speak, so that the souls can be quiet."  
       ~sign on a fence near the Federal Electoral Tribunal in Mexico City

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