Vote!
Vote!
- Subject: Vote!
- From: Roy Whelden <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 12 Aug 2005 16:56:19 -0700
I have an "open source" Applescript project for this list.
I'm a volunteer working with Bill Rouverol, former professor of
mechanical engineering at UC Berkeley (home of Berkeley Unix!) and
the designer of the first Votamatic Voting Machine, which is now in
the Smithsonian. Mr. Rouverol has studied the 2004 United State
Presidential Election. He has come to the conclusion that there was
massive rigging by the private companies that made the electronic
voting machines (primarily Diebold, E.S.&S and Sequoia).
How was this rigging possible? One scenario Mr. Rouverol imagines is
that the voting programs written by these companies could have had a
subroutine (or handler) which was activated at a certain time on
Election Day. If it sensed that, say, political party A was behind,
the subroutine would then switch votes from party B to party A in a
subtle manner. After it finished switching votes, the subroutine
would erase itself at exactly the moment the voting stations closed.
I've simplified somewhat, but this is the essence of one scenario
imagined by Mr. Rouverol. (I've tried to make it apolitical.)
I wish to propose an "open source" AppleScript project. I propose
that interested scripters work together to build a very simple "proof
of concept." In other words, we build the simplest possible voting
machine V using just AppleScript. To keep things simple, the voters
should be given, in a given segment of time, just two choices: party
A or party B. The voting machine V should have the capability of
erasing, at a predetermined time t, a subroutine S contained within
V. The subroutine S should be capable of switching votes from party B
to party A if it senses that party A is falling behind party B.
I confess that my AppleScripting skills are not up to this task. On
the other hand, as a longtime reader of this list, I sense that there
are many here who would have the ability, if not the interest, to do
this fairly rapidly.
Thanks for your attention. Any comments at all are appreciated.
Roy Whelden
P.S. Mr. Rouverol is writing a paper on "The New Science of Election
Rigging." Anyone contributing to this proof-of-concept open source
project will surely get a mention in the published paper.
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