You Can’t Touch This

Touch screen voting without true recount capability should be outlawed.

As sour grapes, whiner [remember I am paying the Republicans back for their unfair characterization of Al Gore] Dino Rossi’ s challenge to the election of Washington Governor Gregoire works its way through the Courts to what should be an ultimate rejection, more interesting information about the vote tallying continues to emerge.

Per an article in the Seattle Weekly about a report done on the election, Snohomish County, just north of Seattle traditionally votes Democratic. Kerry won the most Presidential votes there, but Republican Rossi beat Democrat Gregoire in Snohomish. On the Snohomish paper ballots, which could be verified on recounting, Gregoire won 97,044 to 95,228. But on the touch screen machines, which had no method for verifying on a recount, Gregoire lost 50,400 to 42,135.

Random testing of the Snohomish touch screen machines before the election found several machines that switched votes and had other glitches. The Democrats in Snohomish could have replaced these touch screens, and they definitely should do so now. In rejecting all challenges to the election, the courts should mention this 8,000 possible "glitch" vote for Rossi as another example of how the election may not have been perfect but, to paraphrase Don Rumsfeld, "We have to conduct elections with the election materials we have".