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Electronic voting or paper ballots?

Electronic voting or paper ballots?

  • Total voters
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JANFU said:
Electronic voting or paper ballots?
Electronic Yes
Paper - Yes
2 choices - no other, no unsure, no pls explain. A simple poll
Any electronic system can be hacked.

https://www.wired.com/2016/08/americas-voting-machines-arent-ready-election/

US election 2016: out of date voting machines spark fears of another hanging chad fiasco - Telegraph

States ditch electronic voting machines | TheHill
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We have both in New Mexico. We mark a paper ballot that is then fed into a voting machine while we watch and that presumably records our vote. If there is no protest, then of course the electronic vote is the official vote. If there is a protest, they have the paper ballots to fall back on for a recount. That's about the best anybody can do I guess so far as getting an accurate count. Doesn't do anything about those who vote fraudulently though.
 
There is no fool-proof system other than just not having one to begin with, especially with so many fingers in this pot. The best possible system has a way to verify the actual votes, which at this time, appears to be scantrons that are paper ballots which are machine read.
 
MickeyW said:
My wife and I never liked vote by mail and have never been turned away from polling stations...that has never happened to me in over 40 years of voting.
Furthermore, I would like to see voter ID to stop fraudulent voters from voting dead or multiple times.

Two years ago one entire precinct in Oregon lost a group of mail in ballots. They were discovered later on accidentally, after the election.
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There has been acouple of cases like that, but they aren't because the ballots were mailed in, it was because they weren't handled correctly. Washington had a gubernatorial election changed as a result of "found" ballots. Fraud can happen anywhere, but least with paper ballots, there's the best chance of having a valid trail. Electronic voting can be altered without any trail left behind.
 
AlbqOwl said:
We have both in New Mexico. We mark a paper ballot that is then fed into a voting machine while we watch and that presumably records our vote. If there is no protest, then of course the electronic vote is the official vote. If there is a protest, they have the paper ballots to fall back on for a recount. That's about the best anybody can do I guess so far as getting an accurate count. Doesn't do anything about those who vote fraudulently though.
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About all that does is move the optical scanner to the voting booth instead of a central location. You do get the additional benefit of having the machine tell you if voted for who you wanted to vote for.
 
JANFU said:
With lawyers and all in attendance at polls for tight races, the paper ballot is the safest. Yes crap can happen, but in today's world no electronic system is safe.
Just ask the NSA.
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I don't have to ask them.....I know full well what goes on there. Well, I use to.

Master PO said:
if people can hack the government and its files, then nothing is secure
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Pretty much.

faithful_servant said:
Paper - Delivered by mail to your home.
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I like it...gonna be hard to separate it from the junk mail.

faithful_servant said:
That would mean that I'd have to come out of retirement and start be-heading people again...
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:thumbs::thumbs:
 
faithful_servant said:
About all that does is move the optical scanner to the voting booth instead of a central location. You do get the additional benefit of having the machine tell you if voted for who you wanted to vote for.
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No, the optical scanner doesn't tell you anything other than your ballot went through and was recorded. So of course fraud is still possible. But. . . we do have the paper ballot backups in case there is malfunction of the machine or there is suspicion of foul play. But we all know that we are at the mercy of those who control the polls as to whether the vote will be honest or not. And we seem to be at the mercy of a government and court system that does not want to do anything to make the vote more honest and/or foolproof. And so it goes.
 
MickeyW said:
Electronic machines can be manipulated, just like gambling machines.
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I am thinking about going to Vegas soon so if you know how gambling machines can be manipulated let me know the secret that will pass casino security. LOL
 
I am not confident in the security of any goddam computer system these days.

Therefore I want a paper ballot, a paper trail (hanging chads and all if need be), and a double-checked manual paper tally, with results posted on blackboards:

Just As They Used To Be

So what if it takes a day longer than it does now to complete the count? One big plus of that might be that the goddam media wouldn't be calling anything until after every poll has closed.
 
we should go back to paper until the electronic voting tech is virtually unhackable. i doubt that we're even close at this point.
 
One can stuff a ballot box, one can hack software.


Either way, the possibility for fraud exists but the impact of any fraud is also limited by some rather important factors, for example the number of registered voters in an area and poll worker records, which should ensure an individual only voted once.
 
faithful_servant said:
Paper - Delivered by mail to your home.
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That is literally begging for voter fraud much more than electronic voting. Because how do you prove who and if anyone in that house the ballot was mailed to was actually the person who voted? The mail man doesn't ask for an ID and makes sure that the person the ballot is addressed to actually voted does he? Does the election board call each person up who was mailed a ballot to see if they actually voted?
 
Everything is going electronic now.
 
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