Electronic voting: seemed to go smoothly
October 31, 2006 
Shirley and I each voted today, and things seemed to go very smoothly. The folks working at the polls directed voters through the check-in, to the voting machines, and on to deposit one's voting card (which activates the machine) in a box on the way out. The verification screens correctly displayed my selections. So at least that part of the process was good. The sad thing is that we have absolutely no way to know whether our votes were counted correctly inside each machine, nor whether the totals from each machine will make it to the final tallies, nor whether or not those final tallies will be accurate. And if there are any questions ...well, that's just too bad, because the current state administration does not see fit to require a paper audit trail.
But it's still important to do what we can. If you are a Florida registered voter, you can vote early through Saturday 04 November; if you miss that deadline, then you will cast your vote on Election Day, Tuesday 07 November. Here in Hillsborough County, many libraries are open 10am until 6pm through Saturday for early voting (if voting on Election Day you must instead go to your designated polling location). The county has a web site about voting, and they do list all early voting locations ...but they post it as a Microsoft Word document, which shows yet again how out of touch Buddy Johnson is (local elections supervisor ...known to take time trading his company's stock while he should be working). For those who need the information in a more accessible format, here's the list of early voting sites converted to a PDF file.
Politics
Reader Comments (2)
I am nervous, but cautiously optimistic about next week. I am buying into the theory that Rove's recent sunny optimism is a propaganda ploy, to keep The Base from connecting with reality (rather than evidence that the fix is already in).
Seven days to go.