We're about to finish the 2008 election cycle with the conclusion of two elections for the United States Senate, a recount in Minnesota and a runoff in Georgia. It's hard to imagine a better illustration of America's oddball and potentially disastrous election process.
The Senate election in Minnesota is being recounted in what most consider, ballot challenges aside, an admirably scrupulous process. In Minnesota, every voter votes on a paper ballot read by optical scanners, and ballot-marking devices are available in every polling place to serve voters who cannot use a pen to mark a ballot due to vision, dexterity or other disabilities. Recounts are done by hand. If there is doubt about the intent of the voter, the ballots can be examined, and standards for evaluating intent applied. Part of the reason there are so many unresolved ballot challenges in Minnesota is simply because there is independent evidence of voter intent to evaluate.
The Times Magazine has published an extensive article on problems with electronic voting. It's a net gain for the effort to restore verifiable public elections, and it's about time the issue got extensive treatment in big media.
Good as most of the Times piece is, it pushes a meme that needs to be smacked down immediately
The South Carolina primary could well be a do-or-die contest for at least one of the three top candidates in both major parties. Depending on how the first three states shake up, Huckabee, Romney, or Giuliani will be faced with on-the-ropes status in news coverage by the January 19 primary. Failure to win there could subject one of them to a full-blown candidacy death watch. The same goes for Clinton, Edwards, and Obama and the January 26 Democratic primary in South Carolina. Not to mention the rest of the field.
But the South Carolina primaries will not verifiable. Both will be conducted on a statewide paperless electronic voting system which has become notorious among activists and computer scientists for its reliability and security issues.
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