My idea for elections: 1) Voters fill in a Scantron (or other brand) ballot (like used at colleges for tests). This is PAPER ballot is used for the official count.
2) To satisfy Anmerica's love affair with technology, the voter takes his/her ballot to a Scantron reader, inserts it, and it gets counted to the joy of TV watchers all over the country.
3) The voter then takes the paper ballot and puts it in the cardboard ballot box.
4) Vote counters can be taken from a local pool of public employees, preferable not management level. They may be volunteers or not, but they are to be drawn at random for the job. Of course, representatives of each party in an election must be present during the count.
This is the official count. If there is any discrepancy (% to be determined) between this count and the machine count, then the paper ballots must be recounted.
This is so simple, and foolproof, it will work. Machine breakdowns will not affect the vote count, only the TV projects. Machines will still have to be made available for people with disabilities who are not able to mark a Scantron ballot.
And, it will not be that expensive because counters are already being paid by the taxpayers, and with the redundancy to the count, recounts will be less frequent. And best, I can't see how the vote can be hacked.
Posts: 6 | Location: Lakeside CA | Registered: 20 November 2003
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