VoteSwap 2004

IT Clouds Over the Sunshine State

IT Clouds Over the Sunshine State

By Cynthia L. Webb
washingtonpost.com Staff Writer
Friday, July 30, 2004; 10:18 AM

The Sunshine State, still smarting from the 2000 presidential election debacle, is once again making headlines for problems with its voting technology, this time with the new high-tech machines that state officials rushed to install to avoid another controversial vote count

Officials from sprawling Miami-Dade County this week acknowledged that technical problems resulted in the loss of most of the electronic records for the 2002 gubernatorial primary, and the glitch is being held up by e-voting critics as yet another example of the pitfalls and lack of security with touch-screen machines.

According to the New York Times, which first reported the news on Tuesday, county elections officials said the "records disappeared after two computer system crashes last year." The Times noted that the "news of the lost data comes two months after Miami-Dade elections officials acknowledged a malfunction in the audit logs of touch-screen machines. The elections office first noticed the problem in spring 2003, but did not publicly discuss it until this past May. The company that makes Miami-Dade's machines, Election Systems and Software of Omaha, Neb., has provided corrective software to all nine Florida counties that use its machines."

Is Vote Swapping Legal?

Marc Randazza recently published a law review article in the Washington University Law Quarterly making a case for why vote swapping is legal. Marc's article The Other Election Controversy of Y2K: Core First Amendment Values and High-Tech Political Coalitions gives a well thought out analysis of core first amendment issues. A definite read if you are intersted in the concept of vote swapping.

Download randazza_article_voting.pdf

Libertarian Badnarik May Cost Bush Support, Poll Finds

Libertarian Badnarik May Cost Bush Support, Poll Finds

WASHINGTON — Democratic strategists have long fretted that Ralph Nader could draw votes from their presidential candidate. But a new survey suggests that President Bush faces a potential threat of his own from a more obscure spoiler: Michael Badnarik.

Nader's "Grassroots" Campaign

TomPaine.com - Nader's "Grassroots" Campaign

For many progressives, even if you didn't vote for Ralph Nader in 2000, you had a lot of respect for what he was doing. It took guts to challenge the two-party duopoly, and Ralph seemed just the guy to do it. Fast forward four years. Nader's struggling for supporters and resorting to some unsavory techniques to get them. Turning to the GOP's phone lists, right-wing big money donors and, yes, Armey's army is no way to run a principled campaign.

Michigan GOP gathers names for Nader

Salon.com News | Michigan GOP gathers names for Nader

Michigan Republicans are helping gather signatures to place independent Ralph Nader on the presidential ballot in the battleground state, irritating Democrats who accuse the GOP of trying to pull votes away from candidate John Kerry.

"It's another example of state Republicans willing to try every unethical trick in the book to hold power,'' Democratic Executive Chairman Mark Brewer said Thursday "This clearly shows that a vote for Ralph Nader is a vote to re-elect George Bush. The Republicans know that, and that's why they are desperate to have Nader on the Michigan ballot.''

Nader debates Dean

Justice Talking is broadcasting a debate between Howard Dean and Ralph Nader. With so much at stake in this election, now is not the time for a third party candidate. Governor Dean will make the case that anyone who cares about the future of our country and undoing the damage George Bush has done will be voting for John Kerry.

Nader: Democrats Are Afraid of Democracy

Ralph Nader said Sunday that Democrats who see his independent presidential campaign as a threat to John Kerry's candidacy are really afraid of the democratic process.

Greens choose pragmatism over protest

Xander Patterson writes that as a Green party member she choose to endorse David Cobb rather than Ralph Nader. She writes, "Greens need to be a pragmatic choice, not merely a symbolic protest vote. We need to show that we care about the real-world consequences of our actions."

Nader postpones Oregon ballot

KATU 2 - Portland, Oregon

SALEM, ORE. - It could take several weeks to determine whether Ralph Nader's June 26 convention in Portland netted enough signatures to place Nader's name on Oregon's presidential ballot.
Under state law, the event must have yielded 1,000 valid signatures from the 1,150 people who attended the event in order for Nader to be listed as an independent presidential candidate on Oregon's Nov. 2 ballot.

Nader spokesman Mark McDougal said more than 1,000 people did sign the petitions. He said the campaign is doing its own check of the signatures before turning them over to election officials for verification.

"It could be a few weeks before people know," McDougal said Thursday.

By law, Aug. 24 is the deadline for the state to certify that 1,000 of the signatures were from registered voters.

Nader Off the Arizona Ballot

Daily Kos reports that Nader's Arizona organization has withdrawn itself from ballot consideration. We will research allegations that many of the signatures turned in were fraudulent.

Close Vote Costs Nader the Green Nomination

Close Vote Costs Nader the Green Nomination

MILWAUKEE — The Green Party chose a little-known California attorney as its presidential nominee Saturday — a serious blow to Ralph Nader and a potential boon to Sen. John F. Kerry.

Nader, the Green candidate in the last two presidential elections, sought the party's endorsement this year for his independent candidacy — a move that could have gained him ballot access in at least 22 states and the District of Columbia. Instead, after days of feverish debate, the Greens opted for David Cobb, 41, by a narrow margin.

It is interesting to note which states have a 3rd party on ballot this fall:

Reform Party (7):
Big swing states Florida, Michigan. Also Colorado, South Carolina, Mississippi, Kansas, Montana.

Green Party (23):
Big swing states Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin. Also small swing states Delaware, New Mexico, Colorado, Oregon. Also Bush states South Carolina, Mississippi, Montana, Utah, Nevada, Alaska. Also Kerry states Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maryland, D.C., California, Hawaii.

Bush or Kerry: The Electoral College Map

The LA Times has a cool tool to track the electoral college on their website. Of course as with all polling results, keep a sound head and a grain of salt in your palm.

Check out the 2004 Electoral Vote Tracker

The U.S. presidential election is decided by the results of 51 electoral vote contests. In all states except Maine and Nebraska the electoral votes go to the winner of the popular vote in a "winner-take-all" system. Thus, trends in the campaign must be considered on a state-by-state basis.

Electoral Vote Changes for 2004:

After the 2000 census, seats in the House of Representatives were reallocated based on new population trends. Electoral votes are based on those numbers. Here are the changes for 2004 from 2000:

Gained Electoral Votes: Arizona (+2); Florida (+2); Georgia (+2); Texas (+2); California (+1); Colorado (+1); Nevada (+1); North Carolina (+1). All gained electoral votes are either in Bush dominated states on swing states

Lost Electoral Votes: New York (-2); Pennsylvania (-2); Connecticut (-1); Indiana (-1); Illinois (-1); Michigan (-1); Mississippi (-1); Ohio (-1); Oklahoma (-1); Wisconsin (-1).

Bush and Kerry split in key state of Florida

Poll: Bush and Kerry split in key state of Florida

Tallahassee, Florida-AP -- A new poll says President Bush and Democratic rival John Kerry are in a virtual dead heat in the state that turned into a fierce tug-of-war in the 2000 presidential election.

The poll from the Quinnipiac (KWIN'-uh-pee-ak) University Polling Institute of Connecticut says Bush and Kerry are split at 43 percent each in Florida, which holds 27 electoral votes. Five percent of the state is leaning toward Independent candidate Ralph Nader.

With Nader removed from the race, Kerry gains a two percentage point advantage. That's within the poll's three percent margin of error.

A pollster says Florida voters are "sharply polarized" -- and also that voters in the state "don't like either of the candidates very much."

Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

Oregon Vote Swapper

Dan Carol is a Democratic political strategist and a founding partner of CTSG (www.ctsg.com),a progressive consulting firm based in Eugene and Washington, D.C. writes his views onvote "swapping" in Oregon in the Eugene Weekly. A satirical way to look at the importance of swing state voters in this year's presidental elections.