FC: Internet voting in Florida; state uses Microsoft SQL; more

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

********

> From: Adam Powell <apowell () freedomforum org>
> To: "'declan () well com'" <declan () well com>
> Subject: but will online voting elect Bush?
> Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2000 09:36:02 -0500
> X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21)
>
> Declan,
>
> It's reported that the 5,000 Florida votes that have not been counted at all
> are overseas absentee -- mostly military. That can only be good news for
> Bush, given how heavily the military went for the GOP. But now the Internet
> angle...
>
> There's an interesting Internet voting angle here: There is a little-known
> federal experiment in Internet voting taking place this week involving
> troops overseas who vote in -- yes -- Florida. According to Polli Brunelli
> from FVAP, the agency administering the test [http://www.fvap.ncr.gov/],
> speaking at our eVoting workshop here last month [see
> http://www.netvoting.org/], the number of troops would be very small -- no
> more than a few thousand -- who otherwise might not have been able to get
> their ballots back to Florida by the deadline. But, but, but... Could this
> be the first year the Internet decides a presidential contest????
>
> Cheers
> Adam

***********

> Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2000 05:09:37 -0500
> To: declan () well com
> From: Rich Cowan <rich () organizenow net>
> Subject: Re: FC: Al Gore is only 630 votes away from winning the
>   election
>
> as you may know, this has narrowed to 224 votes according to voter news
> service.  by the way, this is what you get when you try to reach
> the election results site below:
>
> Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error '80004005'
> [Microsoft][ODBC SQL Server Driver][Named Pipes]Specified SQL server not 
> found.
> /SummaryRpt.inc, line 51
>
> so look who is providing the db software used to tally the votes
> in the state that will determine the presidential election!
>
> -r

***********

> Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2000 09:06:45 -0800 (PST)
> From: "Bradley K. Sherman" <bks () emf net>
> To: declan () well com
> Subject: Waitress! Civics Lessons all 'round
>
>
> It's Wed Nov  8 09:01:59 PST 2000.  Do you know where your
> Elector is?
>
> >From <URL:http://www.nara.gov/fedreg/elctcoll/faq.html>
>
>     Are electors required to vote for the candidate who won
>     his or her State's popular vote?
>
>     There is no Constitutional provision or Federal law that
>     requires electors to vote according to the results of the
>     popular vote in their States. Some States (24 plus DC at
>     last count) require electors to cast their votes according
>     to the popular vote. These pledges fall into two categories
>     -- electors bound by State law and those bound by pledges to
>     political parties.
>
>     The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution does not
>     require that electors be completely free to act as they
>     choose and therefore, political parties may extract pledges
>     from electors to vote for the parties' nominees. Some State
>     laws provide that so-called "faithless electors" may be subject
>     to fines or may be disqualified for casting an invalid vote and
>     be replaced by a substitute elector. The Supreme Court has not
>     specifically ruled on the question of whether pledges and
>     penalties for failure to vote as pledged may be enforced under
>     the Constitution. No elector has ever been prosecuted for
>     failing to vote as pledged.
>
>     Today, it is rare for electors to disregard the popular vote
>     by casting their electoral vote for someone other than their
>     party's candidate. Electors generally hold a leadership
>     position in their party or were chosen to recognize years of
>     loyal service to the party. Throughout our history as a nation,
>     more than 99 percent of electors have voted as pledged.
>
>
> How wonderful it was to see the pundits squirm!  Worth every
> second of ambiguity.  Also, how about a little credit to
> Buchanan for demolishing the Reform party?  A Republican
> apparachnik to the end.
>
>     --bks

***********

> From: "Kevin Harper" <kmharper () bastienarchitects com>
> To: <declan () well com>
> Subject: Image of Palm Beach ballot
> Date: Wed, 8 Nov 2000 09:38:30 -0800
>
> Some are saying that the Palm Beach ballot is confusing.
>
> I don't think it is, and being a Republican, I believe W. is our 
> legitimate President Elect.
>
> In the interest of public discourse, however, here is a GIF image of the 
> ballot in question.
>
> I've made it available at www.worldfilm.com/tvr/palmballot.gif .
>
> Thanks, I appreciate your list.
>
> Kevin Harper
> webmaster, worldfilm.com

*********




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