Brad Friedman Byon 7/12/2008, 2:28pm PT

Blogged by Brad from the road...

A study conducted by a researcher in France has uncovered that polling locations which use electronic voting machines exhibit a higher number of discrepancies than those using conventional paper ballots. Unsurprising to those who have followed the problems plaguing e-voting since its introduction, the revelation has fueled renewed calls for greater scrutiny of electronic voting technology in France. The study was conducted at over 21,000 polling stations by comparing electoral registers, which voters sign after voting, with the total vote counts from machines and paper ballots in several elections. Discrepancies were found at almost 30 percent of polling stations that use electronic machines and only at about 5 percent of those using paper ballots.

More at ars technica...

The findings of the French study are hardly surprising to those of us who haven't been ignoring the exact same problems for years here in the U.S.. The difference, of course, will likely come in the way that France --- like other European countries, and decidedly unlike the U.S. --- responds to the findings...

In Ireland, several years back, the country was set to go entirely electronic, until problems were discovered in the new e-voting systems and they were immediately and permanently warehoused and taken out of use even though thousands of them had already been purchased by the state. Earlier this year, in the Netherlands, e-voting was met with the same swift response once the failures were discovered.

In the U.S., on the other hand, similar findings --- and far more of them --- of the same e-voting failures have meant little, other than they should be lied about by most election officials, all e-voting companies, and then proliferated virtually everywhere in the nation.

Elections in the Autumn of 2008 will be determined via electronic voting machines which don't work. By and large Republicans don't care, and/or prefer machines that don't work. Democrats remain in a state of near-complete denial about them.

I'm delighted to continue taking a few more days off from the nightmare. I should be back on top of things at some point next week. Though, frankly, I'm in no rush. This fall is likely going to be a nightmare, so I continue to get a few days' breather wherever/whenever I can right now. Hope you all understand, and I continue to thank the good Jon Ponder of Pensito Review, and the other Guest Bloggers here for jumping in so smartly in my "absense."

(Hat-tip to VR's Steve Heller.)



