Twenty Things We Now Know Four Years After 9/11

Bernie Weiner puts it all together from 9/11, through the Downing St. Minutes and down to the related crimes of the Bush White House. Just read it all, but here's one really important and I think neglected point that needs to addressed very soon.

15. PROTECTING THE VOTE

We know that America's voting-machine system -- and more importantly, vote-counting system -- is corruptible and likely has been corrupted. Sophisticated statistical analysis along with wide-scale exit-polling, suggests strongly that the 2004 election results were fiddled with by the private companies that tally the votes. These companies are owned by far-right Republican supporters. But the same objection would be lodged if Democrats owned the companies. There are no good reasons to "outsource" vote-counting to private corporations -- who refuse to permit inspection of their proprietary software, and whose technicians have behaved suspiciously on election nights in 2000 in Florida, in 2002 in Georgia, and in Ohio and Florida in 2004. And we haven't even mentioned the GOP dirty-tricks department whose function has been, by hook or by crook, to lower the number of potential Democrat voters, especially minority voters. Note: Unless the vote-counting system can be changed soon -- and the vote-tallying scandal will not be adequately dealt with by voter-verified receipts -- the integrity of our elections will be suspect into the far future. Even if all the other reforms were implemented, they would mean nothing without the guarantee of honest elections.

The midterms are soon upon us. It would be good to start focusing on verified voting. I would bet a strong movement to verified ballots would temper a lot of the GOP arrogance. I'm convinced the most egregious extremists are thinking they can buy the private companies who tally the votes, off.
Don't believe what anybody tells you otherwise. It's possible to hack an electronic vote.