Texas (who else?) GOP holds county election with hand counting of ballots, it doesn't go well.

[Minerva]

Hey Bufford, you used up all 13 of your toes yet?

So the GOP decided to show folks how to run an election in a proper fashion by hand counting the ballots.
This was a GOP primary and only applied to one county. There were approx 8K ballots cast.
Seems that two or three times after they got the final tally done they discovered discrepancies in the totals during simple audits.

All sort of errors were found, some just turned out to be poor penmanship. Others were just transcription errors.

The GOP, in their never ending land of illusion and denial, claim the experiment as a success.

It would have been a better test if they had used their tabulation machines first and kept the results confidential until the hand count was completed.

There were mistakes made at every level, including submitting the results to the state election board in proper format, even though they knew in advance, or should have known, what format the tallies would have to be in.

Doesn't give me any confidence in hand counting of ballots, what do the rest of ya'll think of this?

 

[Phys251]

Hey Bufford, you used up all 13 of your toes yet?

So the GOP decided to show folks how to run an election in a proper fashion by hand counting the ballots.
This was a GOP primary and only applied to one county. There were approx 8K ballots cast.
Seems that two or three times after they got the final tally done they discovered discrepancies in the totals during simple audits.

All sort of errors were found, some just turned out to be poor penmanship. Others were just transcription errors.

The GOP, in their never ending land of illusion and denial, claim the experiment as a success.

It would have been a better test if they had used their tabulation machines first and kept the results confidential until the hand count was completed.

There were mistakes made at every level, including submitting the results to the state election board in proper format, even though they knew in advance, or should have known, what format the tallies would have to be in.

Doesn't give me any confidence in hand counting of ballots, what do the rest of ya'll think of this?

Hand-counting has been done for centuries. Leave it to the Texas GQP to **** it up.

 

[Grand Mal]

Hey Bufford, you used up all 13 of your toes yet?

So the GOP decided to show folks how to run an election in a proper fashion by hand counting the ballots.
This was a GOP primary and only applied to one county. There were approx 8K ballots cast.
Seems that two or three times after they got the final tally done they discovered discrepancies in the totals during simple audits.

All sort of errors were found, some just turned out to be poor penmanship. Others were just transcription errors.

The GOP, in their never ending land of illusion and denial, claim the experiment as a success.

It would have been a better test if they had used their tabulation machines first and kept the results confidential until the hand count was completed.

There were mistakes made at every level, including submitting the results to the state election board in proper format, even though they knew in advance, or should have known, what format the tallies would have to be in.

Doesn't give me any confidence in hand counting of ballots, what do the rest of ya'll think of this?

I'll be 70 this summer and every time I've voted, at any level, it was marking a paper ballot, folding it and dropping it into a cardboard box to be counted later.
It's been working so far.

 

[Minerva]

Hand-counting has been done for centuries. Leave it to the Texas GQP to **** it up.

I have done hand counting of ballots. We always divided the ballots up into three batches.
Then three groups comprised of 3-4 people would count a batch. They would write which group they were and the tally they reached.
Then the groups would swap ballots and count again. At the end of the second count they would write down their tally and only then open the other tally sheet.

If the sheets agreed then that batch of ballots was accepted. If they disagreed the third group would count the batch that had a disagreement.

 

[noonereal]

Hand-counting has been done for centuries. Leave it to the Texas GQP to **** it up.

Point is, it is 2024
We should all be voting on line.
It is ridiculous to do otherwise.

I want to vote from my desk at home. No mail box no pen and paper. Easy as can be.

 

[noonereal]

I have done hand counting of ballots. We always divided the ballots up into three batches.
Then three groups comprised of 3-4 people would count a batch. They would write which group they were and the tally they reached.
Then the groups would swap ballots and count again. At the end of the second count they would write down their tally and only then open the other tally sheet.

If the sheets agreed then that batch of ballots was accepted. If they disagreed the third group would count the batch that had a disagreement.

If this was a business, they'd be out of business wasting all this time and energy.
Wake the **** up folks, it's 2024. Don't be scared.

 

[zincwarrior]

Hey Bufford, you used up all 13 of your toes yet?

So the GOP decided to show folks how to run an election in a proper fashion by hand counting the ballots.
This was a GOP primary and only applied to one county. There were approx 8K ballots cast.
Seems that two or three times after they got the final tally done they discovered discrepancies in the totals during simple audits.

All sort of errors were found, some just turned out to be poor penmanship. Others were just transcription errors.

The GOP, in their never ending land of illusion and denial, claim the experiment as a success.

It would have been a better test if they had used their tabulation machines first and kept the results confidential until the hand count was completed.

There were mistakes made at every level, including submitting the results to the state election board in proper format, even though they knew in advance, or should have known, what format the tallies would have to be in.

Doesn't give me any confidence in hand counting of ballots, what do the rest of ya'll think of this?

Someone forgot about Illinois hand counts...

 

[Phys251]

Point is, it is 2024
We should all be voting on line.
It is ridiculous to do otherwise.

I want to vote from my desk at home. No mail box no pen and paper. Easy as can be.

Too easy to hack. Absentee voting is fine, however.

 

[Ug make hammer]

I like that it's slow. Election season lasts the best part of a year, why should it all be over in one night?

 

[Lursa]

Point is, it is 2024
We should all be voting on line.
It is ridiculous to do otherwise.

I want to vote from my desk at home. No mail box no pen and paper. Easy as can be.

Not sure I agree with that.

IMO we still need physical, traceable ballots. The internet is far from secure.

I am all for mail-in/dropbox voting tho.

 

[HIP56948]

Republicans 8,347
Democrats -164 "Sounds 'bout right to me Buford"

 

[Ug make hammer]

Point is, it is 2024
We should all be voting on line.
It is ridiculous to do otherwise.

I want to vote from my desk at home. No mail box no pen and paper. Easy as can be.

The problem with online voting is that user-owned devices are not guaranteed to be secure. If someone makes or buys a zero-day hack for a class of devices (say iPhones) it only has to work on one government-issued ap. Assuming it's even detected, what do you do then? Fix the bug, push system updates onto all the devices, maybe reissue the ap, and hold another election before safe harbor day? Well OK, it's possible, but how many people are going to not vote the second time, because they've lost faith in the process?

Another thing is identifying who's actually voting, and privacy of the vote (tho these are problems with mail-in ballots too). A lot of people aren't going to be comfortable with turning on their camera and letting a government server do facial recognition on them.

I do think it should be trialed, but users should have the option of also voting by a conventional method. If the online vote and the conventional vote don't match, the online vote would be discarded.

 

[WorldWatcher]

But on the bright side.

Texas will know the age and address of everyone who views porn in the state and the type of porn they view.

Amirite?

WW

 

[HIP56948]

Looks the Poll Building needs a little fixin' up.
.

 

[Ug make hammer]

Not sure I agree with that.

IMO we still need physical, traceable ballots. The internet is far from secure.

The internet is secure enough, and the server end could be made secure with enough funding (bit of an issue here, since local government tends to skimp). The real problem is at the user end. As I said above, if a whole class of devices get hacked on election day, you'd have to re-run the election.

I am all for mail-in/dropbox voting tho.

Mail-out and mail-in. I think you should only be able to vote with the ballot that was mailed to you personally. There should still be in-person voting, for homeless or transient people, and anyone whose ballot got stolen or lost.

 

[Lursa]

The internet is secure enough, and the server end could be made secure with enough funding (bit of an issue here, since local government tends to skimp). The real problem is at the user end. As I said above, if a whole class of devices get hacked on election day, you'd have to re-run the election.

Wow. A) no way do I believe 'the internet is secure enough' when there is tons of evidence to the contrary at the highest levels and B) dont you think that 're-running the election' should be something to avoid rather than just (seem to imply) 'ruh oh! Do over!'

Mail-out and mail-in. I think you should only be able to vote with the ballot that was mailed to you personally. There should still be in-person voting, for homeless or transient people, and anyone whose ballot got stolen or lost.

 

[noonereal]

Too easy to hack. Absentee voting is fine, however.

Bullshit.
What service is not on line today?
Your bank. Your SS, your DMV, EVERYTHING. But somehow voting is differant?
As I said, I call bullshit.

 

[Phys251]

Bullshit.
What service is not on line today?
Your bank. Your SS, your DMV, EVERYTHING. But somehow voting is differant?
As I said, I call bullshit.

I can't agree with this. Online voting would be too great a hacking target.

 

[noonereal]

The problem with online voting is that user-owned devices are not guaranteed to be secure. If someone makes or buys a zero-day hack for a class of devices (say iPhones) it only has to work on one government-issued ap. Assuming it's even detected, what do you do then? Fix the bug, push system updates onto all the devices, maybe reissue the ap, and hold another election before safe harbor day? Well OK, it's possible, but how many people are going to not vote the second time, because they've lost faith in the process?

Another thing is identifying who's actually voting, and privacy of the vote (tho these are problems with mail-in ballots too). A lot of people aren't going to be comfortable with turning on their camera and letting a government server do facial recognition on them.

I do think it should be trialed, but users should have the option of also voting by a conventional method. If the online vote and the conventional vote don't match, the online vote would be discarded.

Why would this be an insrmountable problem when all banking and other government functions are done nearly exclusively on line?

It would not be.

 

[noonereal]

I can't agree with this. Online voting would be too great a hacking target.

Then why does it work just fine in all avenues of life?

 

[Phys251]

Then why does it work just fine in all avenues of life?

Like I said, it's less of a target (per capita).

I'm willing to admit that you may be right on this one. I'm just queasy about the prospect of online voting, especially in this day and age.

 

[Jason Warfield]

I'll be 70 this summer and every time I've voted, at any level, it was marking a paper ballot, folding it and dropping it into a cardboard box to be counted later.
It's been working so far.

How do you know?

In case you say because the outcome of what you care about was in your favor…how do you know it wasn’t rigged that way?

Conversely, in the instance that it didn’t go your way, how do you know it want rigged that way?

 

[Grand Mal]

How do you know?

In case you say because the outcome of what you care about was in your favor…how do you know it wasn’t rigged that way?

Conversely, in the instance that it didn’t go your way, how do you know it want rigged that way?

Because I trust the people who do the counting. If I were counting votes I would do it honestly and I believe those that do are as honest as I am.
Is that an odd concept for Americans these days?
One thing you maybe should know about how a Parliamentary system works is we don't vote for our Prime Minister. The parties select their leaders and whichever party's leader can muster a majority of votes in the House of Commons becomes Prime Minister. I vote for an MP from my riding.

 

[bongsaway]

Hey Bufford, you used up all 13 of your toes yet?

So the GOP decided to show folks how to run an election in a proper fashion by hand counting the ballots.
This was a GOP primary and only applied to one county. There were approx 8K ballots cast.
Seems that two or three times after they got the final tally done they discovered discrepancies in the totals during simple audits.

All sort of errors were found, some just turned out to be poor penmanship. Others were just transcription errors.

The GOP, in their never ending land of illusion and denial, claim the experiment as a success.

It would have been a better test if they had used their tabulation machines first and kept the results confidential until the hand count was completed.

There were mistakes made at every level, including submitting the results to the state election board in proper format, even though they knew in advance, or should have known, what format the tallies would have to be in.

Doesn't give me any confidence in hand counting of ballots, what do the rest of ya'll think of this?

I can only imagine the amount of 'mistakes' in counting the votes out of dallas if they ****ed up 8k votes royally.

 

[Lursa]

Then why does it work just fine in all avenues of life?

It doesnt. There are breeches and hacks all the time. Even at very high and secure levels.