[EL] Video of PA touchscreen vote flipping in presidential race, apparently not miscalibration

[Mark Schmitt]

"when voting for the Libertarian candidate below Obama (since Obama is
below Romney) the machine correctly lights up and check marks Jill Stein's
name, the Libertarian candidate, unlike what appears on the screen for the
attempted Obama vote."

Jill Stein is not the Libertarian candidate. She's the Green candidate.

Mark Schmitt
Senior Fellow, The Roosevelt Institute <http://www.rooseveltinstitute.org/>
202/246-2350
gchat or Skype: schmitt.mark
twitter: mschmitt9



On Tue, Nov 6, 2012 at 2:46 PM, Paul Lehto <lehto.paul at gmail.com> wrote:

> Here's an 18 second video snippet of a Pennsylvania voter attempting to
> vote for Obama but Romney lights up on the screen instead.  It's hard-to-get
> evidence in light of the fact that most states make it illegal to possess
> cameras or video equipment at polling places, (perhaps PA does as well) so
> evidence like this is hard to come by relative to how frequently it is
> heard.18 second highlight of Obama attempt: http://www.youtube.com/
> watch?v=QdpGd74DrBM
> Longer version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOj2IPulNPA
> In the longer version from which this snippet is taken, it's stated that
> the voter tested to see if it was "miscalibration".  However, when voting
> for the Libertarian candidate below Obama (since Obama is below Romney) the
> machine correctly lights up and check marks Jill Stein's name, the
> Libertarian candidate, unlike what appears on the screen for the attempted
> Obama vote.  So, apparently the problem is not miscalibration of a half
> inch or so.
>
> The miscalibration "test" does not appear on screen, but it's stated that
> the voter will submit their video for some sort of authentication.   But
> given the *prima facie* evidence here of changed votes without
> miscalibration being a facile explanation, it can not simply be assumed
> that when a machine lights up and check marks a certain candidate that
> this necessarily translates into an actual, recorded, electronic vote for
> that candidate, because the naked presumption that the voting machine
> obeys only the voter's command and not anything else is shattered - at
> least for this voter and thousands of others. This kind of touch screen
> behavior has been a top complaint in the past couple presidential
> elections.
>
> Paul Lehto, J.D.
>
> PS  I don't assert a fraud case per se, though this is the seed of a
> potential case. Instead, the problem is bigger than fraud, and basically
> nonpartisan:  because literally no human being has personal knowledge of
> whether vote totals are correct, and because results of elections are not
> reproducible and computerized counts are both invisible and secret, there
> is no scientific basis for confidence in the reported results, no matter
> what they are and no matter who wins, whether it's my favored candidates or
> not (and I do vote).
> This is all because of the HAVA-based approach to addressing the perceived
> problems of ambiguous voter intent evidence symbolized by the hanging chad
> from Florida 2000:  On account of the problems of ambiguous voter intent
> evidence in the agonizing over hanging chads, let's ELIMINATE ALL evidence
> of voter intent by using touch screens. Brilliant.
>
> Rather than claiming the views of critics "cause harm" (apparently to the
> necessary "confidence" or "faith" in secret vote counting), we ought to
> recognize how terribly fragile the system is and fix it, restoring
> transparent public vote counts.  When a person or group comes along with
> enough power and media access, they will be able, with not all that much
> evidence, to invalidate election results because as little evidence as
> there may be for fraud, there's MORE evidence of fraud (even if a
> scintilla) than there is in the utterly conclusory and magical election
> results that pop out of black box computers.
>
>
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