From the LA Times:
Poll workers struggling with a new electronic voting system in last week’s election gave thousands of Orange County voters the wrong ballots, according to a Times analysis of election records. In 21 precincts where the problem was most acute, there were more ballots cast than registered voters.
[…]
David Hart, chairman of Texas-based Hart InterCivic, which manufactured Orange County’s voting system, said it would be impossible to identify which voters cast ballots in the wrong precincts because of steps the company had taken to ensure voter secrecy. For this reason, an exact account of miscast ballots is impossible.
Hart InterCivic, of course, is the manufacturer of eSlate, which is the gadget we use here in Houston. It rather goes without saying that had they produced paper ballots, they would at least know how many people had voted for incorrect candidates. They might even have caught the problem in time to do something about it. Oh, well. Better luck next time. Via Soon To Be Big Media Kevin.
I noticed two of eSlate machines that were “out of order” this morning when I went to vote. As a I passed I look at on of the poll owrkers and said. “Hmmmm, that doesn’t inspire confidence.” She was not amused.
BTW, the polling place was dead. I was the fourth person to vote on the Republican side in my precinct this morning…and it’s a strongly Republican area. Usually by the time I get there, I’m about the 30th person to vote in my L-R alphabetical grouping.
I think the folks at the Democratic primary polling place I went to were catching up on their sleep. They were quite pleased to see me when I showed up.
We were quite surprised when we got to our normal polling place and found out that the Democratic primary wasn’t there. We had to go to another location, right nearby but still a bit of a walk, so I could cast what Tim has been calling my little protest vote.
And there were two referenda on my ballot that weren’t on his — something about privitizing Social Security and Medicare and something I really didn’t understand about an amendment so places that didn’t want to raise their property taxes wouldn’t be required to do so. That one had me scratching my head.