[ExI] Our Ageing World

[William Flynn Wallace]

 yet, inexplicably, no one seems to want to create a massive bipartisan
effort to get rid of any and all voting systems dependent in any way on
electronics in any form.  Oy.



Hey cool, a post free of any partisan political content!  By me of all
people.



spike


I agree with all of that, Spike, but to me the major cause of corruption in
the voting process is gerrymandering in the state legislatures by the party
in power.  I saw just a few days ago a North Carolina law was struck down
that essentially inhibited blacks from voting - by a Repub legis., natch.
I have no idea what to do about this problem, but it's a big one, far more
pervasive than the problems you mention.  Win at any cost is the motto.
Cheat and even if you get sued the court might be stacked for you.
Mississippi does this constantly.  You have to go to federal court to get
relatively unbiased judgments.  (yeah, Dems do it too)


bill w

On Tue, Aug 16, 2016 at 5:07 PM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

>
>
> *From:* extropy-chat [mailto:extropy-chat-bounces at lists.extropy.org] *On
> Behalf Of *Anders
> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 16, 2016 2:22 PM
> *To:* extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org
> *Subject:* Re: [ExI] Our Ageing World
>
>
>
> On 2016-08-14 19:33, William Flynn Wallace wrote:
>
> >>… Will hackers win the next war?
>
>
> >…It might be more relevant to ask whether hackers will win the next
> diplomatic negotiation…
>
>
>
> Ja.  The hacking led to this paradoxical comment in the article:
>
>
>
> >…Even so, we have to accept that someone is attacking our nation's
> computer systems in an apparent attempt to influence a presidential
> election…
>
>
>
> Sure, but it resulted in catching the head of the DNC, who unfairly
> attempted to influence the nomination of her party and lost her job.  So
> this is a case where hacking caught the bad guy.  This is a good thing,
> ja?  On the other hand, the result was allowed to stand, even though it was
> derived through cheating.  What does that tell us?  If hacking catches the
> bad guy, is the hacker a bad guy?  Or does the hacker become the good guy?
>
>
>
> >… And it points to the possibility of an even worse problem in November
> -- that our election systems and our voting machines could be vulnerable to
> a similar attack…
>
>
>
> Well ja.  We know those machines can be hacked:
>
>
>
> http://thenextweb.com/insider/2016/08/10/an-easy-to-find-15-
> piece-of-hardware-is-all-it-takes-to-hack-a-voting-machine/#gref
>
>
>
> And yet… still… with that known risk, the obvious solution is not even
> suggested: get rid of those goddam voting machines.  Replace them all with
> a system that leaves a permanent auditable re-countable paper trail.  Now,
> wasn’t that simple?
>
>
>
> We still have paper ballot boxes in many places; voters punch out their
> ballots on paper cards, then physically drop their ballots in the box.
> Then a group of people of all political persuasions follow that box every
> minute from the time it leaves the polling place until the time it arrives
> at the countiong place and all the paper ballots are counted and filed.
> But the voting machines?  No, those are different.  No need to watch
> those.  Those don’t count.  They are just votes, not paper ballots, and
> besides no one is quite sure what is actually going on there anyway, if
> anything at all.
>
>
>
> OK sure, so what happens if a candidate appears to have won with plenty of
> evidence of cheating?  Do we care if Americans lose faith in the democratic
> process?  Do we then just shrug and let the suspicious result stand?  Or
> what?
>
>
>
> Anders this problem has been sticking in my craw at least since November
> 2000, if not before.  We had a suspicious result, there was no way to
> recount some of the ballots, and the questionable outcome was left to
> stand.  There were consequences.  And yet, inexplicably, no one seems to
> want to create a massive bipartisan effort to get rid of any and all voting
> systems dependent in any way on electronics in any form.  Oy.
>
>
>
> Hey cool, a post free of any partisan political content!  By me of all
> people.
>
>
>
> spike
>
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>
>
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