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

[Joseph Lorenzo Hall]

Quick note: I've been talking with the voter who took this video and he
points out that the first video is his and he has no idea who the second
video is from. I was quoted on Gawker -- which I did not know is apparently
such a big deal -- talking about this [1] and the only thing I can say
definitively is that this is the best evidence of "vote-flipping" we've
seen. Nothing makes me think it's malicious -- extraordinary claims require
extraordinary evidence -- but I would note that a clever attacker would
make their attack fail like a commonly-reported type of error (although a
real clever attacker would not allow it to flip more than a few times so
that a poll worker wouldn't see it when called over).

[1]:
https://gawker.com/5958114/an-expert-weighs-in-on-that-viral-reddit-voter-fraud-video


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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