Electronic Voting Systems - Why no checks and balances?

So, I know this has been brought up before, but there are a few things that are really bugging me about voting these days.

Whether it is a primary or general election, most states are using the Electronic voting systems to count vote totals. Fact is this has been proven in the past to be a rigged system, yet all that happened was a hearing about it with the company that created the system, and then silence. The media ignores it completely.

The company's which create these systems use an algorithm and programming they claim is secret for copyright or patent purposes, which is fine, but at the end of the day, how are we to know the votes are being calculated correctly?

A few things stood out to me on Tuesday that I feel should be looked into.

Here are the results for Tuesday's Republican Primary:

Indiana: Romney - 64.7% Paul - 15.6% Santorum - 13.3% Gingrich - 8.4%

North Carolina: Romney - 65.7% Paul - 11.1% Santorum - 10.4% Gingrich - 7.6% nopref - 5.2%

West Virginia: Romney - 69.6% Santorum - 12.1% Paul - 11.0% Gingrich - 6.3% B.Roemer - 1.0%



Notice the Bold. I understand that these candidates were placed on the ballot prior to bowing out of the race, as well as understand that some people will still vote for a person even though they know the person isn't in the race anymore.

But Honestly, look at the high numbers there are for those candidates. Do you honestly believe that Santorum had that many votes when it has been known for weeks that he is no longer in the race?

I may be wrong here, and am not saying that any kind of fraud was done, but what proof do I have?

So here is what I wrote in another post about my Idea for keeping the voting systems fair and that we know that votes are being calculated correctly,

What would convince me?

Checks and Balances
instead of relying on just a computer program or private ballot counting to tally the votes correctly.

How about a voting papertrail that can be viewed by the voter to make sure that the vote was made correctly with these electronic machines, then have it put in a sealed box that is allowed to be watched by both candidate party representatives, to make sure there is no tampering of the ballots.

Then allow for a public count (at the voting location) of each box to make sure the counts match the totals registered with the computer program.


Then post the results for each computer count matched with the papertrail count, then post the results side by side online for all to see.

This will allow the public, candidates, and candidate representatives to assure accuracy with county state and national results to assure they actually do have a voice.

All counting should be public and allowed to be counted by appointed candidate representitive at each voting location as well as county and state wide level. All Public, no more hiding behind a computer program or private county.

There should be rules put in place to keep the crowed quiet however and any rowdy crowed members should be escorted out and given a ticket. This will assure that it is quieted enough to be counted correctly.

I also feel a video record of the counting should be available as a secondary measure to add another check to the process in case an error not originally caught is accounted for.

Does anyone have a better Idea?

here are a couple videos I'm sure many of you have seen before





Thoughts?

Good question. How will anyone ever know if their vote is counted correctly?

Maybe independent foreign voting observers?

or

Perhaps if every voter gets a receipt with a unique code on it, everybody could lookup the code (online?), and verify that their vote is counted correctly?

There are many ways to provide a system of checks and balances. But, why do that and make it tougher to fix elections?

Kinda like the question "Why is the tax code so complicated" They share the same answer. So that those in power can keep screwing us over.

Secret algorithm

1+1+1+1+1+1.....is all it needs.

Personally as I mentioned above in the quote, I think the best method is to have a paper with the vote which is double checked by the person once all votes are in, and then placed in a sealed box which is publically displayed at all times and counted by the public, then matched with the computer results throughout the day.

I do like the idea of having a random number for each vote so that mistakes can be tracked.

reply to post by VoidHawk


I always found that interesting as well, why do they need an complicated system.

I personally work as a programmer and I can create an accurate vote counting program in minutes, and it's protected from fraud.

reply to post by tw0330


I program just for fun an even I could do it. What an efing joke

reply to post by tw0330


Electronic casting of a vote and electronic counting of votes should be two completely separate things.

Electronic counting is always corruptible whereas manual counting in front of witnesess for each candidate while perhaps not perfect is the most reliable and dependable method there is.

How to cheat

If (RonPaulVotecount < anyoneelse)[
RonPaulVotecount = anyoneelse +1
]

I look at it this way, if corruption wasn't going on, then you would think they would welcome the paper trail and public counting process.

I also believe the counting should be recorded and posted for all to see.

and here is a thread that proves that these systems are corrupt in this very election.