Florida Fiasco
The Florida fiasco we are now facing with close counts and recounts has laid bare the underbelly of our election process that most of us probably didn't know existed. In most cases it wouldn't appear to exist when the vote differential between candidates is 2-to-1 or at least wide enough to not require a recount. The fact that a wide margin victory contained vote count errors for both candidates would never come to light.
The fact is most states, counties and precincts continue to use obsolete and archaic vote recording and vote tabulation methods. The punched card system should have gone the way of the hammer and chisel on rock. With the technologies available, local communities are still unlikely to take advantage of any of them because the underbelly is hidden away where they and nobody else sees it.
Florida is now under the spotlight. The punched card system is at the root of the problem and there is nowhere for Florida to hide. There are no standards of what a valid vote for a candidate should consist of when counted manually. Is it a clean 'chad' removal, one corner attached, 2 corners attached, 3 corners attached or 4 corners attached with an indentation on the 'chad'.
What should be clear by now is that all punch card ballots that clearly 'read' a vote for a single candidate, when run through the counting machine, should be accepted and set aside. Only those punch card ballots 'read' as no vote should be under the scrutiny of the canvas board - assuming a clear definition of a vote can be agreed upon by all parties.
After this election, all punch card voting systems should be shipped to a land fill (or recycled) where they should have been prior to the year-2000 election.
11/15/00
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