[EL] #270DAILYQUIZ PRESIDENTIAL POLITICS DAILY QUIZ ----- "FINAL EXAM EDITION" - November 2, 2012

[Paul Lehto]

On Fri, Nov 2, 2012 at 10:58 AM, Goldfeder, Jerry H. <jgoldfeder at stroock.com
> wrote:

>  *In the meantime, I, like some of our colleagues, have been bombarded
> with questions about how Hurricane Sandy affects the election.    [snip]**
> ***
>
> * *
>
> *Perhaps now Congress and the states will take planning more seriously.  *
>
> *I hope the only question we will have on Tuesday night is “Who won?”
> without having to worry about any constitutional **issues o**r historical
> oddities. *
>

The desire not to think and plan concerning disasters, and avoid thinking
about or dealing with constitutional issues and historical oddities are the
very things that cause significant problems from time to time.

Little or no thought or consideration was given in passing HAVA's funding
for computerized voting to the high cost and limited availability of
electrical generators sufficient to run slews of computers versus (at most)
finding flashlights or battery lanterns and a few volunteers per precinct
to hand count five hundred or so paper ballots per precinct. Nor did HAVA
seem to wrestle with the problems of secret vote counting that inevitably
occurs on computers versus the transparent vote counting with paper
ballots.

In order to survive or thrive under more extreme conditions those voices
who may seem somewhat apocalyptic in warning about constitutional issues,
historical oddities and problems with computerized voting have to be taken
more seriously. Thus, it seems to me that there is some internal tension
above in the hope that Congress will now take planning more seriously and
the simultaneous desire to avoid dealing with constitutional issues and
such.

For Mr. Goldfeder, the two may well be completely consistent if the
congressional planning process he advocates will also take the
constitutional issues and historical oddities seriously, but most often the
reception of those who warn about any or all of these things is essentially
to discount them as unlikely, too much trouble, crying wolf, or even as
conspiracy theory unlikely to ever occur even though US history teaches
that elections can and have been conducted under conditions of civil war.
Today, there is "continuity" planning for government that appears to ignore
that elections themselves, properly planned, are themselves a major
provision for governmental continuity even under extreme conditions.

Paul Lehto, J.D.

-- 
Paul R Lehto, J.D.
P.O. Box 1
Ishpeming, MI  49849
lehto.paul at gmail.com
906-204-4965 (cell)
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