posted 12-20-2000 01:57 AM               

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I’m in the process of trying to get Pattie’s and my PCs up to working order, and all that’s riding on my success is how long it takes to get this update up and how long it takes me to write a term paper that’s due in about 24 hours. Given how harried I feel right now, I can not imagine what it must be like to try and get a machine up and running when election results hang in the balance. In all the fighting over Florida, election workers have taken a lot of heat from all sides. “You didn’t use the right standard.” “There’s too much human error.” “The canvassing boards are biased.” It’s nice to see that they do get a lot of things right, and that they do care about fulfilling their responsibilities.

My initial impulse was to use this as another opportunity to talk about improving voting technology, but let’s be realistic. No system is perfect. It’s not going to be perfect. We have to do whatever it takes to get as close to perfect as we reasonably can (and I know how much of a challenge it is to get the definition of “reasonably” down), but we also have to be prepared to respond to difficult circumstances with good humor and a positive spirit, just like the folks in Huntingdon. See, sometimes, we do get it right.

posted 12-20-2000 01:58 AM               

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In the month following the election, I received no fewer than 20 “dumb Florida voter” emails. Some of them were funny, some mean, and some plain silly. I’m going to give the authors of these emails the benefit of the doubt in saying that they were just trying to break the tension, to add a little levity to a situation they were helpless to alleviate otherwise. I can certainly understand that. Truth be told, I got so sick of the situation, I stopped watching the morning news programs before work each day. Seeing Matt Lauer prattle on about the lack of progress just put me in the foulest of moods for the rest of the day.

I think these feelings stemmed from the fact that I couldn’t shake the feeling that nearly everything and everyone had failed us. The networks failed us on election night. The system failed us by having so many cracks and so many lapses that had never been apparent before. Officials failed us by falling into party lines and putting on legal battle armor rather than just agreeing to a set of uniform standards. They also failed us by just being plain stupid and petty. You can agree or disagree with the outcome of the election but few can argue that the process stunk.

That said, I don’t know if I’m encouraged or depressed when reading Kevin’s account election night in Huntingdon, (thought not due to any deficiency in the quality of said article). On one level, it does comfort me to know that, faced with a challenge, many people do rise to the occasion. I like to think that I do, (even if it takes me a little while to get my bearings and stop screaming) and I especially like to think that people in vital positions do, as well. On the other hand, I’m irked that a few people in a tiny courthouse in rural Pennsylvania showed more collective sense in one night than we saw in the subsequent month and a half from legions of highly paid pundits, politicians and attorneys.
OK, I’m rereading this and I sound bitter as hell and maybe I am, but I think about it this way: Kevin’s story wasn’t the front page of the Huntington County newspaper in November 8th. For the people who stayed up all night to make sure it wasn’t, the residents should be grateful. On the other hand, thanks to the ineptness of a great many people in very responsible positions, Floridians will have the dubious honor of being front-page news for some time to come.

posted 12-21-2000 04:31 PM               

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I probably would have been in a considerable amount of trouble had my story appeared on the cover of the Huntingdon County newspaper on Nov. 8, considering I no longer work there.

To find out more about Huntingdon, go to its great website.

posted 12-27-2000 07:35 PM               

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Oh, come on, every mall should have a gigantic cartoon head of a Founding Father.

After reading Kev's latest post on the Public Policy recount thread, though, I have a question -- what, if anything, did the Huntingdon folks so to make sure that the machine wasn't double counting or not counting the ballots that jammed it up? Or was that not an issue?

posted 12-28-2000 02:14 PM               

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Good question, Dave.
I know they were taking extreme care to make sure the machine wasn't pulling multiple ballots through at the same time. There was also a digital counter telling how many votes were being pulled through at a time, and they were keeping track of that pretty well.
I don't think they had any way of making sure the machine was reading the right votes -- like, reading Buchanan votes instead of Gore votes -- but given their demeanor, I'm sure that they would have made every effort to remedy the situation if they found that's what was happening.

As I said, the ballots were similar to SATs in that you filled in an oval with a number-two pencil, and there were no chads involved. Whether this made the counts more accurate, I don't know for sure, but it would seem that the process was a bit simpler. Each voter marked the ovals with the whole ballot in front of him, with nothing hidden or separated at any time.

I'd be willing to bet there was some degree of error in the count based on the fact that the machine malfunctioned. But there were checks in place: Each precinct recorded the number of ballots given, and the precincts were stacked separately, so they could at least match the final readout number for each precinct to the numbers given by the precinct officials. This is part of the reason they were up so late.

posted 12-29-2000 06:57 PM               

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quote:

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Originally posted by Kevin Ott:
As I said, the ballots were similar to SATs in that you filled in an oval with a number-two pencil, and there were no chads involved. Whether this made the counts more accurate, I don't know for sure, but it would seem that the process was a bit simpler.

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Statistical evidence from the Florida fiasco indicated that optically scanned ballots like these had a significantly lower error rate than punch card ballots. So even if everybody can't get super-modern computerized voting machines, phasing out punch cards in favor of this type of ballot seems like a smart move.

And I'm glad to hear how cautious the Huntingdon officials were. I figured they would be, given the tone of your article, but was curious as to what the exact steps they took were.