Comments on: Watch Dan Rather Tonight on HDNet 8pm EST

By: Brian

Brian — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 22:19:23 +0000

Mark, I took your advice and started watching the piece.

A bit of history about me, I am a libertarian with fiscally conservative views and liberal social positions. And to me, Dan\'s piece tonight seemed nothing more than a bit of sour grapes.

We have had touch screen voting machines here in rural Indiana for almost the past decade and have never had any problems that Florida seems to attract. Of course there are problems with voting technologies, but each election board makes the decision to purchase their own machines.

I was looking at the voting setup from the former employee, and frankly it is incredibly stupid to put three votes so close to each other with all of that open screen. If the local election board decided to do this, it\'s their fault.

I will watch the rest of it Mark, but I honestly am not impressed with this piece. Dan really doesn\'t do himself any favors by taking up the cause of a Democratic candidate, especially when there are many other more notable elections where Republican candidates loss by a similar margin.

By: Theresa M.

Theresa M. — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 12:42:50 +0000

Get in a warm pool, Mark, and swim, float, and splash about. This will help loosen up any stiffness remaining from your surgery. You don\’t have much free time, I know, but this will make a big difference.

I\’m rooting and voting for you.

By: ugg

ugg — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 02:50:48 +0000

Well, this is just typical US. Here in Sweden we havn\’t got these kind of election fraud problems.

By: Dansko

Dansko — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 00:24:27 +0000

Election fraud isn\’t about left and right, it\’s about wrong and right. And the same can be said for election incompetance and even that bain of Republicans, voter fraud. Totally agree with you.

By: Lugosi

Lugosi — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 20:43:20 +0000

Speaking of HDNet, what\’s the situation with Comcast? Any progress in getting them to add your channels?

By: laptop battery

laptop battery — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 22:48:32 +0000

Chris Monahan comments this is nothing new — I agree

By: Hines Linden

Hines Linden — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 23:58:56 +0000

Thanks Mark for getting behind this information. Election fraud isn\’t about left and right, it\’s about wrong and right. And the same can be said for election incompetance and even that bain of Republicans, voter fraud.
Dan Rather does America a favor by showing the outragious production of this equipment. Should such poorly made, poorly regulated gear be used to safeguard our most basic American right, the right to choose our leadership??? Any reasonable person would have to say, \”NO!\”
And don\’t y\’all be telling me that because you trust bank machines you trust these voting machines. A bank machine can be verified in any number of ways. Computer voting machines cannot unless there is a voter-verified paper ballot which can then be audited. And in such a case, why spend all the money on such computers at all?
One cannot trust a computer voting machine and know what\’s going on inside it anymore than one can know what\’s going on inside your own computer. You don\’t know when a virus or a worm is doing it\’s dirty work. You can\’t know unless it shows you, and many times it\’s too late then. Haven\’t any of y\’all ever owned a computer?
I work the polls, too. I do all the required checks to see if the machines are working, but I don\’t know what\’s going on inside anymore than I know if my desktop has a virus right now. And, I have access (along with thousands of others…) to the machines, and, if I wanted to do so, could hack them myself and throw any election I wanted to change for the whole county…
Some times the old ways are the best. How \’bout pen, paper, locked clear plastic box with the cast ballots inside? Brillient, huh? Then we open it up and count it in full view of everyone as soon as the polls close. We could still know the results by morning…

By: Pete

Pete — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 01:54:25 +0000

Dear Mark,

I thank you for the great piece by Mr. Rather tonight on voting. You have raised good points for all Americans who believe in Democracy, on the Left Right or Center. Bottom line, a vote in this country is sacred and something our soldiers have died for in the past and continue to do so even now. I would like to share a link to a Wired article from 4 years ago about Australia and how they handled the situation.

http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2003/11/61045

In the end I appreciate you bringing up this topic but people in power and with the means need to then start a company that will make American Made voting units that are transparent and not hiding behind \"proprietary information\" B.S.

That means you Mark. I don\'t expect you to spend all your money on it but you can find the capital from sources and help build a better and more transparent mousetrap.

Just a thought.

By: Morgan Warstler

Morgan Warstler — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 00:15:03 +0000

I\’m glad this isn\’t about diebold.

By: Matador

Matador — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 22:58:02 +0000

As Chris Monahan comments this is nothing new.

And I guess you have never seen Hacking Democracy, from HBO.

http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=hacking+democracy