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Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

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Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#591
Why does an otherwise fairly extraordinary country (space missions, amazing inventions, lots of creativity) manage to get basic stuff so completely wrong (bad toilet plumbing, units of measurement, paper currency, health care, dodgy voting). You need a proportional system. On paper. With hand counting by volunteers overseen by party reps. Stop with all the private enterprise technology stuff. Democracy is too precious to contract out to some lowest bidder. The Australian Electoral Commission runs all our ballots here and I have absolute confidence in them. Have a look at how other places run elections.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Precisely what I predicted. Even worst: You don't seem to be willing to (or capable of?) distilling through data on your own and have to resort to being supported by others. If you even took a few minutes to play with the numbers you'd be horrified to realize where we are and, more importantly, where we are going. Creating an economic model with a spreadsheet is a really scary and sobering exercise. I've done a coupl…

Pretty much all your points come down to "ignore the past, where republicans always screw over the public, trust us this time". That approach is unscientific. It completely ignores data. And the numbers you're fuming about are a trick. The republican proposal is to cut 5 trillion in taxes. How does that help the debt problem. And the debt isn't a problem at all. The entire professional economist community is against…

Well, you got your wish. We'll have to compare notes in four years. Or maybe sooner.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#594

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In no world does this equate to D are represented in the majority by those without High School educations. I never said that. If you want to criticize my post like an asshole, at least read it first. Are you by any chance a Democrat without a high school degree? If so, I forgive your lack of reading comprehension skills. In that case, let me give you an example: If I said, "The best racial demographic for Democrats i…

Your statement directly states a comparison between R and D percentages and uses the ambiguous term 'best'. The idea that you can state with any credulity that 2% of the population is 'better' than 15-16% of the population, or that that comment has any value to anyone else is the height of vapid punditry.

That's some cute pedantry, requires some very creative reading to come to that self-righteous interpretation. I find semantic pedantry more vapid than data, though.

So check the 2012 results: http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/race/president?hpt=...

Yet again, the Republican candidate scores his highest vote share among college graduates, and the Democratic candidate scores his highest vote share among people without high school degrees.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#596

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for being the voice of reason. It's a fucking calibration error. I hate sensationalism like this.

How is it a calibration error? He clearly says he tested for calibration error, and it wasn't the case. This is of course, we assume he's not lying.

His testing isn't thorough. He shows us the incorrect voting, and doesn't have enough sense to prove the other buttons are fine with his video camera.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#597

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A random person's video carries more weight than a random person's unsubstantiated claim because video is, to some degree, evidence (it would be possible to fake, but would at least require some work).

But there is no real evidence. He shows a video of a garden variety bug/error with resistive touch screens, then makes some sensationalist claims in his comments that are completely unsubstantiated.

He makes no sensasionalist claims that I've seen, he's only said that it's not a calibration error according to his testing.

In any case the mere presence of this type of bugs are a really strong point against wasting money in these devices.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#598
post #544

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ehh, maybe. Philadelphia's roads are legendarily bad though. One summer when I was living in Philadelphia they removed the surface of the road in front of my apartment. Two months later they put it back. And if it's not that, it's crews filling in holes from road-work with about half as much asphalt as the hole needed, or the random patches of cobblestone street still left in the city, seemingly with little rhyme or…

A great example is Canada. 35 million people, but 80% of them live within 200 miles of the US border. The population density stat would be very misleading in that case.

Hmm. Good counter-example.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#599

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much all your points come down to "ignore the past, where republicans always screw over the public, trust us this time". That approach is unscientific. It completely ignores data. And the numbers you're fuming about are a trick. The republican proposal is to cut 5 trillion in taxes. How does that help the debt problem. And the debt isn't a problem at all. The entire professional economist community is against…

Well, you got your wish. We'll have to compare notes in four years. Or maybe sooner.

Condolences on your loss

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#600

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If voters are given a receipt, buyers of votes can demand to see said receipt to verify they voted the correct way. boss/abusive family member/mafia can demand to see the vote receipt on threat of your job/safety/family returning safely tonight. The potential for a vote receipt means that these 3rd parties can reward/punish you based on the way you voted. Without it, they have no way of knowing if their coercion/blac…

Without it, they have no way of knowing if their coercion/blackmail worked or not. Sure they do: use a lie detector and ask them. Honestly, the situation you describe is the problem, not the presence or absence of verifiable voting. If you've got the mafia threatening your family, voting is the least of your problems.

What is this mythical lie detector you speak of? No trustworthy lie detector exists. If you disagree: does yours work for all mental variations (psychopaths, autism, retardedness, ...) and physical variations (Down syndrome, a score of other genetic abnormalities, ...)? Have you actually verified the research or trust someone who did?
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