Science Guardian

With Pennsylvania and Ohio in the bag, election decided, short of midnight reversal

Will 2004 be repeated as Obama parties? No chance!

Tues Nov 4 9.10pm: President-to-be Barack Hussein Obama has now won the US presidential election on the face of it, since both Pennsylvania and Ohio, home of Joe the Plumber, have been called for Obama by none other than Fox News. If right that means McCain cannot win.

Obama supporters in Grant Park, Chicago are cheering wildly, with McCain supporters still unaware of this setback since they are being entertained by a loud country singer.

McCain is reportedly no longer so enthusiastic with reporters about his choice of Sarah Palin as he has hitherto pretended.

The issue now becomes, can the prediction be proved false by a little sleight of hand in the internal workings of the new electronic system now counting the votes of 32.6% of the electorate?

A report commissioned by the Ohio secretary of state and written by Penn State and the University of Pennsylvania listed numerous potential vulnerabilities for machines built by Election Systems & Software, Hart InterCivic, and Premier Election Systems.

The report stated, “All of the studied systems possess critical security failures that render their technical controls insufficient to guarantee a trustworthy election.” CNET News reports that the conclusion was reached by the researchers after finding multiple ways a hacker could insert viruses, erase logs, produce incorrect vote totals, or block some or all totals and keep voters from voting.

The makers of the voting machines claim that many of the possible vulnerabilities are overly theoretical or have been fixed with hardware and software updates. Despite the worries of voters and researchers, the makers of voting machines are quick to point out that no breach of an electronic voting machine has ever been recorded. (Many Worry About E-Voting as Election Day Nears - Nov 3 - DailyTech Shane McGlaun blog<

Innumerable citizens are monitoring the polls many of them uploading video to YouTube courtesy of cameras distributed by PBS. But they are not going to be able to catch any hacking of the counts.

E-Voting’s Biggest Test
In Several Key States, Electronic Voting Machines Have Already Flipped Votes From One Candidate to Another
By Kurt Kleiner Nov. 4, 2008—

As the US heads into a historic and contentious presidential election, concerns over electronic voting technology could be about to stir up controversy over the legitimacy of some results.

Ironically, electronic voting machines were meant to make elections more reliable and secure. After the 2000 presidential election, when spoiled ballots and “hanging chads” sent the disputed result all the way to the Supreme Court, Congress began dispensing billions of dollars to help states replace punch-card ballots with more-sophisticated voting technology. Since then, however, concerns over the trustworthiness of electronic voting system have steadily grown.

Already in several key states, early voting has seen touch-screen voting machines “flip” votes from one candidate to another. Some voters casting early ballots in Virginia, Tennessee, and Texas say that machines have flipped their votes. All were able eventually to correct the mistake, but this has added a sense of urgency to long-held unease over the security and reliability of electronic voting systems.

Earlier this month, a report from Election Data Services (EDS), a Washington, DC-based firm that tracks election administration, said that electronic voting machine usage will drop this year for the first time ever. In Tuesday’s election, 32.6 percent of all ballots will be cast using an electronic voting machine, compared to 37.6 percent in 2006, the equivalent of 10 million fewer voters. “Basically, the activists and the political scientists have kind-of won that battle,” says EDS president Kimball Brace. “Most election administrators don’t find it worthwhile trying to fight the battle and are trying to move on.”

Nonetheless, that percentage will still be higher than it was during either of the last two presidential election races: in 2000, 22.0 percent of votes were cast electronically, compared to 29.2 percent in 2004. Also, several key swing states, including Ohio, Indiana, and Nevada, will rely heavily on electronic voting. Ohio and Indiana will use a combination of optically scanned paper ballots and electronic voting machines, while Nevada will rely almost entirely on electronic voting, according to the same EDS study.

Meanwhile, the political situation in Ohio couldn’t be more tense. Republicans and Democrats are already wrangling in court about voter registration issues and so, if the race is particularly tight, the state could well be the scene of fierce legal action centered on electronic voting irregularities.

E-voting machines are receiving an unprecedented amount of attention from experts and activists. Grassroots organizations such as Black Box Voting and Video the Vote are urging voters to monitor the election and have already publicized problems with some voting machines, including touch-screen vote flipping.

Many computer security experts have previously raised concerns about the reliability and accountability of these machines, an issue that is complicated, they say, by the fact that they are manufactured by a number of different private companies and make use of proprietary (or undisclosed) computer code. In 2004, Avi Rubin of Johns Hopkins University, Dan Wallach of Rice University, and colleagues published an analysis of an electronic voting machine used in Maryland and concluded that the machine was “far below even the most minimal security standards applicable in other contexts.”

The manufacturer, Diebold Election Systems, now Premier Election Solutions, disputes the conclusion. Nevertheless, in 2007, the Maryland General Assembly voted to move back to paper ballots, although it will still use e-voting machines in Tuesday’s election.

More recently, in a review commissioned by the state of California, researchers at the University of California found that electronic voting machines used in that state had security issues that made them vulnerable to vote tampering. The report prompted California to require that all voting machines also produce a paper trail.

Wallach of Rice University says that touch screens can often be poorly calibrated, causing the on-screen image to be misaligned with the touch-sensitive layer of the screen. Even a properly calibrated machine may not work well for an especially tall or short person because of their angle of view, he adds.

Critics’ greatest concern about electronic voting machines, however, is that they might be vulnerable to fraud. “I think it’s the complexity and the lack of transparency,” says Steven J. Murdoch, a computer security researcher at the University of Cambridge. “It’s certainly not apparent to the ordinary voter how it works, or whether it can be tampered with.”

Murdoch thinks the move towards electronic voting was driven in part by “modernization for modernization’s sake. When I was calling this a bad idea, I was being called a Luddite, but I’ve spent most of my life working with computers.”

However, David Beirne, executive director of the Election Technology Council, which represents voting-machine manufacturers, says that electronic systems are designed to solve real problems. He says that paper ballots are expensive, cumbersome, and often “spoiled” by voters who mark them incorrectly.

“Unfortunately, I think the criticisms have reached such a point that no voting system can satisfy the critics,” Beirne says. He also complains that critics often present unlikely scenarios, or ones that could easily be defended against with good management practices. And they don’t compare the machines against the vulnerabilities of paper ballots.

Charles Stewart, a professor of political science at MIT who has studied voting technology, agrees that paper ballots are also vulnerable to fraud. “Right now, we know a hundred different ways to corrupt paper systems that any idiot could perform. I don’t know of anything that any idiot could perform on voting machines,” he says. But Stewart also argues that the industry has been slow to address real security concerns that have been apparent for years.

A number of technological schemes have been suggested for fixing security problems related to electronic voting. The most common is to require that each machine generate a voter-verified paper ballot and to audit a sample of paper ballots after an election. Some states (including California) have moved towards this method.

Another proposal is to use encryption to ensure voters and observers that votes haven’t been tampered with. In one such scheme, developed by Wallach and colleagues and called VoteBox, when voters completed a ballot, their identity and a record of their vote would immediately be encrypted and posted online. Each machine would also issue an encryption key to voters so that the record could be decrypted to make sure the vote had been recorded correctly.

Copyright © 2008 ABC News

Call 1 866 OUR VOTE at msnbc if you detect irregularity in voting. But it seems that the only indication of true internal hacking is an incredible gap between exit polling and official count.

Critics’ greatest concern about electronic voting machines, however, is that they might be vulnerable to fraud. “I think it’s the complexity and the lack of transparency,” says Steven J. Murdoch, a computer security researcher at the University of Cambridge. “It’s certainly not apparent to the ordinary voter how it works, or whether it can be tampered with.”

Murdoch thinks the move towards electronic voting was driven in part by “modernization for modernization’s sake. When I was calling this a bad idea, I was being called a Luddite, but I’ve spent most of my life working with computers.”

Too big to reverse!

However, now it appears that Obama’s landslide will be too big to reverse. The InTrade betting now (10.46 pm NYC) is 375 Obama to 142 McCain.

A Slate blogger is already publishing under the banner “President Obama - He won Ohio. He’s going to win the White House”:

Obama Wins the Presidency
Even as visions of a mega-landslide victory for Democrats faded with McCain victories in dubious tossups like Georgia and North Dakota, Obama’s core strategy paid off: Win all of John Kerry’s states from 2004 and pick up a handful of moderate states that elected George W. Bush.
An Obama win in Ohio preserves the state’s role as an electoral kingmaker. McCain had virtually no chance of winning the election without it, and Ohio has almost always voted for the winning candidate in recent memory.
Just how dramatic this year’s political reorganization turns out to be depends on more final results. Virginia and Indiana are both still too close to call, and many Western states are still wrapping up their voting. While it’s still entirely possible that McCain can pull out a respectable loss in this election, a win would require a miracle.- Chris Wilson. (9.27pm)

Won! Obama has at least 284 electoral votes - 11.03pm, NBC.

McCain concedes in call to Obama 11.13pm.

Jim Lehrer announces that McCain will speak at the Biltmore any minute and is interrupted by a producer on his earpiece and wrongly informed that he had said Obama instead of McCain, and handsomely apologizes, saying “I misspoke badly” even though, he says, “I thought I said McCain.” Which he did.

Lehrer says he finds Obama’s victory “inspiring”. David Brooks says he faces a “grueling scarcity” over the next two years which will test his character and resolve to make the most difficult decisions.

McCain speaks to the crowd on the lawn at his campaign headquarters, Hotel Biltmore, Phoenix, Arizona, reverting to his former self and gracefully endorsing the step forward America has taken in electing an African American to the Presidency. He says he extends his sympathy to Obama for losing his grandmother but his faith assures him that “she is at rest in the presence of our Creator and so very proud of the good man she helped raise.”

He pledges to do all in his power to help Obama to meet the challenges he will face, and to find ways to come together and bridge our differences as fellow Americans.

Thanks Governor Palin as an impressive new voice in American politics. We can all look forward to her service to the Republican party and to her country.

“A lost election will never mean more to me than the privilege of your faith and friendship, ” he tells the crestfallen faces. “I don’t know what more we could have done to win this election. Every candidate makes mistakes. But I won’t spend a moment regretting what might have been. This campaign will remain the great honor of my life. I thank the American people for giving me a fair hearing before deciding that Senator Obama and my old friend Senator Joe Biden should have the honor of leading us for the next four years. (Boos. Male voice: He’s a bum!). Please. Today I was a candidate for the highest office in the country that I love so much, and tonight I remain her servant. That is blessing enough for anyone and I thank the people of Arizona for it.” (Chants of USA USA). I wish Godspeed to the man who was my foremr opponet. and who will be my President. Americans never surrender. We never hide from history. We make history! Thank you and God Bless you and God Bless America! 11.21/9 pm.

“Vintage John McCain!” says Mark Shields. (Hit this Show Tab for Text of speech)

Text of McCain’s concession speech
By The Associated Press – 3 days ago
Text of Republican John McCain’s concession speech Tuesday in Phoenix, as transcribed by CQ Transcriptions.
___
MCCAIN: Thank you. Thank you, my friends. Thank you for coming here on this beautiful Arizona evening.
My friends, we have — we have come to the end of a long journey. The American people have spoken, and they have spoken clearly.
A little while ago, I had the honor of calling Senator Barack Obama to congratulate him.
(BOOING)
Please.
To congratulate him on being elected the next president of the country that we both love.
In a contest as long and difficult as this campaign has been, his success alone commands my respect for his ability and perseverance. But that he managed to do so by inspiring the hopes of so many millions of Americans who had once wrongly believed that they had little at stake or little influence in the election of an American president is something I deeply admire and commend him for achieving.
This is an historic election, and I recognize the special significance it has for African-Americans and for the special pride that must be theirs tonight.
I’ve always believed that America offers opportunities to all who have the industry and will to seize it. Senator Obama believes that, too.
But we both recognize that, though we have come a long way from the old injustices that once stained our nation’s reputation and denied some Americans the full blessings of American citizenship, the memory of them still had the power to wound.
A century ago, President Theodore Roosevelt’s invitation of Booker T. Washington to dine at the White House was taken as an outrage in many quarters.
America today is a world away from the cruel and frightful bigotry of that time. There is no better evidence of this than the election of an African-American to the presidency of the United States.
Let there be no reason now … Let there be no reason now for any American to fail to cherish their citizenship in this, the greatest nation on Earth.
Senator Obama has achieved a great thing for himself and for his country. I applaud him for it, and offer him my sincere sympathy that his beloved grandmother did not live to see this d