Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org

"Suppose an article had been introduced into the Constitution, empowering the United States to regulate the elections for the particular States, would any man have hesitated to condemn it, both as an unwarrantable transposition of power, and as a premeditated engine for the destruction of the State governments?" --- Federalist No. 59, 1788 In today’s world yes, the authors of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 would hesitate. Rush Holt would hesitate. Diane Feinstein would hesitate....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org

The Colorado Secretary of State seems to be having a bit of problem with the big 4 vendors. The state has been ordered by the court to re-certify all voting systems used in the state. This order is a result of a lawsuit that proved that previous SoS Gigi Dennis had failed in her job to ensure voting systems were actually certified. Now Secretary Coffman is trying to follow the court order but the vendors seem to be standing in the way and making the pre-certification testing and inspection a process that is harder than necessary. Of course the vendors claim that they are doing all they can to assist the state. One has to wonder why Secretary Coffman would lie about the lack of support. Do the vendors want to drag the process out as long as possible so time runs short and the certification process has to be rushed? Are they all trying to hide something?...

Blogged by Brad from somewhere in Colorful Colorado...

After threatening, and trying for the last two months, to get fully "off the grid," by jiminy, I'm gonna do it. At least for a few days. Come hell or highwater. At least until after Labor Day.

Heading up to get lost in the mountains for a few days beginning today, and so the Guest Bloggers will do as they please here (or not). Whatever happens at The BRAD BLOG, will stay at The BRAD BLOG.

Goodbye cruel world! At least until next week at some point (unless the bears get me)...

Blogged by Brad from Boulder, CO...

Must get off the grid today very shortly (and will be gone until after Labor Day), so not much time for comment here. Rather, I'll give you quick pointers to three superb editorials in today's papers as the voices of the good guys return to counter the charlatans and propagandists who've been dominating the media pages for far too long.

Please read on, for some heroic cries for accountability --- finally --- from the hopelessly compromised U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC), Election Officials in general, and Sequoia Voting Systems in particular, all found in the op/ed pages today from Coast-to-Coast!...

Guest Blogged by Alan Breslauer

Last Thursday we had the opportunity to speak briefly with California U.S. House Rep. Brad Sherman about election integrity reform during one of his appearances here. Sherman, who had nothing but praise for the election integrity efforts of CA Secretary of State Debra Bowen, is a cosponsor of Rep. Rush Holt's (D-NJ) controversial “Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2007,” otherwise infamously known as HR 811.

Sherman stated that he believed that Bowen's landmark, independent “Top-to-Bottom Review” of Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting systems --- which resulted in the near-decertification of all but one California voting system after it was found they were all vulnerable to hackers and manipulation and failed to meet even marginal federal disabled voter accessibility standards --- was consistent with the Holt Bill that relies so heavily on the use of the same DRE voting systems.

That Sherman was apparently confused about the difference between what Bowen's study revealed (DREs are not safe to use in elections) and what Holt's bill allows (DREs, as long as they have so-called paper trails of the type Bowen's study found could not guarantee secure, accurate elections), is little surprise. Even in the wake of findings which undermine his own bill, Holt has been using Bowen's study, disingenuously, to tout his own exceedingly flawed bill as The BRAD BLOG reported some weeks ago.

However, to Sherman's credit, he agreed to withdraw his co-sponsorship of HR 811 if he learned that Bowen did not support it.

With this in mind, we direct the Congressman to radio talk show host Peter B. Collins's interview with Bowen on June 27, 2007 (audio below, appx 3 mins). Responding to a direct question from Collins about whether she supports the Holt bill, Bowen responded, "I have not. I have worked with the author to try to strengthen the bill, but have not taken a position of support."

We have sent on this information to the Congressman's office, per his instructions, and await his reply.

The BRAD BLOG has previously reported on several other HR 811 co-sponsors, including Reps. Maxine Waters and Dennis Kucinich, who have indicated their intent to withdraw from the bill in the wake of strong opposition to a number of the bill's provisions by many advocates in the Election Integrity community.

UPDATE: Congressman Sherman responds through staffer Esther Azal:

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org

A Sequoia VP told Riverside Co., California, officials that the company may be willing to discuss a rebate or credit if state or federal regulators decertify their equipment. May be willing? The county, like every county that has purchased these machines, needs to demand its money (our tax money) back from the vendors. Sequoia sold its machines as being accessible. They aren’t accessible as proven by the California “Top-To-Bottom” review. The company sold its machines as meeting the voting systems standards. As proven by the source code review team, Sequoia uses banned software components. May be willing? If Sequoia misrepresented its system at any time to those who were spending our money, then Sequoia needs to give our money back or go to court and prove that it hasn’t misrepresented its product. And the other vendors need to do the same in other counties across the nation. Meanwhile, KY has discovered that machines used in their largest county were not state certified; more on the retirement of Conny McCormack; and the four major vendors are dragging their feet in providing information to Colorado that is necessary to allow the state to do court mandated inspections....

Blogged by Brad Friedman from Boulder, CO...

"I don't want to preside over the dismantling of voter services that have been successful and accurate," LA County Registrar of Voters Conny McCormack tells the LA Times this morning. "I suppose I do take that personally."

McCormack's systems were "dismantled" after ES&S, one of her vendors, refused to supply its source code in time for testing of her paper-based InkaVote Plus system, and after her other vendor Diebold's touch-screen machines were disallowed for use because they were found vulnerable to hacking. Only one such machine will now be allowed per polling place in order to marginally meet federal disability voter accessibility standards, and the paper trails from those machines, as per Bowen's orders, will have to be 100% hand-counted.

Though that didn't keep McCormack from signaling, in a Bush-style signing statement, that she didn't think she had to actually count them prior to the final certification of the election. In a a statement [PDF] posted on the LA County Registrar's website in reply to Bowen's order, McCormack wrote, "However, it is important to clarify that the SOS Order does not require the 100% manual count audit to occur prior to completion of the official results certification."

The link to that document from the front page of the site has now been replaced by McCormack's resignation statement.

The LA Times Hector Becerra goes on to report that McCormack "angrily accused Bowen of unfairly attacking the voting machines to gain political points."

While we're not sure what "political points" Bowen gains (she was elected last November on the promise of doing exactly what she's done, won't have to run again for another three years, and has come under considerable criticism in the media for her courageous, principled stand), it's little surprise that McCormack, who has been fighting for the voting machine companies instead of the voters for years --- even appearing on a Diebold sales brochure to sing the company's praises --- would bug out of the nation's largest county just a month before the first Presidential Primary Election in 2008, leaving the voters to whatever may happen.

McCormack's official statement of retirement [PDF] didn't mention her anger at Bowen for taking away her toys and those of the companies she's concerned about. Rather she claimed...

So the question we pose to you is...

Let us know your opinion. The BRAD BLOG will, of course, let you know when we find out. It shouldn't be long. Something tells us, McCormack already knows where she's going from here...

UPDATE: I'm told the print edition version of Becerra's LA Times story on Conny was longer than the one posted on the web as linked above. In the carbon based version, there is a quote from yours truly, as Becerra interviewed by phone for reaction to McCormack's announcement late yesterday:

(Via All Hat No Cattle, hat-tip BRAD BLOG toon sherpa, Pokey Anderson!)

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org

The Kentucky Attorney General, Greg Stumbo, has announced that during his investigation of the state's voting system usage, as reported several weeks ago by The BRAD BLOG, a surprising result has been discovered.

Just prior to the AG's investigation, Diebold Elections Systems, Inc. (now re-named Premier Election Solutions), sent a letter to Jefferson County, KY, election officials to tell them that they had been using an uncertified voting system for the last three elections.

At the beginning of the investigation Stumbo had contacted the Secretary of State, Republican Trey Grayson, who is rumored, like Stumbo, to be a gubernatorial candidate. SoS Grayson assured him that only certified systems were being used in the state.

Grayson was wrong...

...and I love my wife too. (Even though I'm not married.)

Just wanted to mention that.

Guest Blogged by John Gideon of VotersUnite.org

Just after the “Dan Rather Report” ran for the first time Sequoia Voting Systems issued a press release and promised exculpatory evidence in the way of documents. These documents were promised to demonstrate proper paper thickness; to demonstrate the ballot card chad removal pressure was within the appropriate industry specifications; and to demonstrate proper overall specifications, signed by quality control. Over a week after the press release the documents were finally released. The documents did nothing that was promised. What was presented was numbers on paper with no comparison with the industry standards and no signatures. The only dates on the documents were pre-Florida primary, which brings into question whether the documents even represent documents for the general election run of ballot cards. Also of interest today is that Conny McCormack, Diebold’s spokeswoman and LA County Registrar of Voters, has decided to retire....

Guest Blogged by John Gideon, VotersUnite.org

Joining Karl Rove and Alberto "Fredo" Gonzales in announcing their retirements is Conny McCormack, the much embattled and always friendly to voting machine vendors Registrar of Voters for Los Angeles County, the most populous county in the nation.

In a statement on the LA County Registrar's website McCormack begins by saying:

Here's a picture from a Diebold brochure that features McCormack. Could our question that accompanies the picture, which we used in a recent article on McCormack's expressed concerns for Diebold's profits, be an omen of what is to happen in the future?

UPDATE FROM BRAD: Despite McCormack's exit statement to the contrary, as linked above, she has left Los Angeles County a mess. At this time, we have no idea what voting system will be used in next February's Presidential Primary Election, as she's sided with the vendors, rather than the voters, when it came to meeting the requirements for CA SoS Debra Bowen's "Top-to-Bottom Review" of voting systems.

Furthermore, while she joined the throng of California Registrars all too happy to rush to the media, to bitch about having just six months to implement Bowen's new security requirements with just six months before the next big primary, it's telling that she's willing to leave nation's largest county altogether just a month before that primary. What does that tell you about her (and the other Registrars') feigned concern about having enough time to make sure the voters are well served in the next election?

The question is not will she go to work for a voting company, the only question seems to be which one, and how soon.