Washblog

I oppose Executive Sims' reckless plan to completely overhaul our elections. I-25 is the last remaining way to oppose. (If anyone else has a plan, I'm all ears.)

Our Democratic leadership (Gregoire, Cantwell, Pelz, Sims, etc.) has been convinced that we need all new tabulators to enable the transition to "vote by mail" (aka forced mail voting). They have been lied to. The expert reviewers, the Citizen Election Oversight Committee, council staff, and we citizens have all taken great pains to point out this simple truth. To no avail.

Put simply, the elections officials currently advising our Democratic leaders need to be replaced. This is broadly recognized. And yet, no corrective action has been taken.

Most recently, the elections officials and Executive Sims' staff are pushing forward with the purchase of VoteHere's Mail-in Ballot Tracker (MiBT). I'm told it'll come up for a vote again before the end of the year.

MiBT doesn't work as advertised, duplicates functionality we already have, and is huge expensive. No matter. The elections officials insist they need MiBT for "vote by mail", so they'll get it.

The whole charade boggles my mind. It's insane.

Just for review, here's the low-lights of the Executive's reckless plan:

• Changing everything, just in time for the 2008 general election


• All new, untested, uncertified Diebold DRS PS900 iM2 ballot tabulators, which have known problems


• Counting ballots before election day


• Illegal "electronic adjudication" of ballots (modifying database of votes vs manual duplication of ballots)


• Computers to automatically verify voter's signatures, which "challenges" +60% of signatures


• First time for regional voting centers (RVCs), closing existing poll sites


• No paper ballots, not even provisionals, at RVCs


• Unreliable electronic poll books at RVCs


• VoteHere's MiBT, which doesn't work

The Curious Statement Against

The statement against I-25 in the Voter's Phamplet cracks me up.

Our Home Rule Charter was approved in 1967 and modernized King County with an executive and council with oversight, transparency, and accountability. With nearly 1 million voters, King County, like Los Angeles and San Diego, has an appointed elections director.

(Emphasis in original.)

Both Los Angeles and San Diego are, inadvertently, excellent examples of WHY we should have elected director/auditor of elections. Among all the troubled jurisdictions of election administration, these two really stand out.

Los Angeles's Registrar of Voters Conny McCormack is notorious with us election integrity activists. She appears in Diebold Election Systems' sales literature, while as Registrar. She was the biggest fan of Diebold's touchscreens. When California's Sec of State Debra Bowen decertified all of the Diebold gear, McCormack resigned, rather than clean up the mess she helped create. (Search "Los Angeles" on VoteTrustUSA.)

San Diego is at least as bad. The contested Bilray/Busby (CA-50) botched/contested US House race. Home of the notorious extended voting equipment sleepovers. Etc. (Search "San Diego" on VoteTrustUSA.)

Conclusion

If you support election integrity, vote Yes on I-25.

If you support our constitutional rights to private voting and public counting, vote Yes on I-25.

If you oppose the corporatization and privatization of our elections, vote Yes on I-25.

If you support citizen-owned elections, vote Yes on I-25.

If you oppose Executive Sims' reckless plan to overhaul our elections, vote Yes on I-25.

Thank you for your time.