I spent a good part of the day looking at last November's absentee ballot envelopes trying to figure out what might have caused King County to count roughly 1,000 more absentee ballots than absentee voters. (i.e. a good part of what Dean Logan should have directed his own staff to do even before certification, but didn't) Thanks to Doug T. for his efforts as well! We're still crunching through the data, but here's one small piece of the puzzle solved -- This voter sent in two ballots, one signed on 10/30, the other on 11/1 and they both came back in the same batch and both appear to have been counted!
And, I suppose he got tired of reading before he got to the part where he swore he hadn't voted any other ballot in that election.
Good point, "cur." Their computer system supposedly would prevent counting more than one ballot from the same voter -- unless the people doing the verification just don't bother doing their jobs correctly. The computer can't reach out and grab a ballot envelope from the hands of a dishonest person. (Hmmm. Is there a way to get it to send a shock through the keyboard or mouse?)
Posted by: Micajah on September 6, 2005 06:27 PMWas Key one of the 600 or so voters whose names appeared twice on the first list of voters credited with voting in King County in the general election?
I think the computer system should have created something with a name like "WANDA errors report" for each batch--noting things like more than one ballot from a voter. Have you checked the report for this batch?
Posted by: Micajah on September 6, 2005 06:47 PMOnly the grannies trying to honor their spouse's dying wishes have be prosecuted. All others get a pass on this one.
Posted by: batu songvigone on September 6, 2005 08:07 PMNot only do we have an impossible standard to meet in an election contest, we now have holes in the system that are all most impossible to find.
Not a one of the clowns in Olympia will do anything to clean up this problem either. And why should they, the system is good enough to get them elected, right?
Posted by: T.J. on September 6, 2005 08:18 PMThis is so unacceptable, it is beyond ridiculous that this mess can't be fixed.
Posted by: sgmmac on September 6, 2005 10:15 PMAmazing the typeface observation. Do you think ballots are printed using different printing devices that would make the scan bar below the address and the other coded symbols above the address so different?
I wonder if we're looking at a forged ballot envelope that contained a forged ballot? It's just speculation, but if someone was trying to copy a ballot envelope and didn't have the same fonts, the result might be something that looks close, but quite different like these two envelopes.
They are just so different when you look at the non-text objects on the envelopes. Seems to warrant a closer look by an expert for an explanation to me. These ballots definitely came from different places and were addressed by different machines. Is that to be expected in King County?
Posted by: Mike on September 6, 2005 10:19 PMThe subcontractor used for printing the absentee ballot return envelope addesses and barcodes has multiple ink-jet printer/feeder set ups depending upon the volume of the run. The huge initial run of absentees is printed on one type of very high-speed high-volume ink jet printer, and the subsequent smaller runs of additional requests, re-issues, etc., are printed on smaller printer equipment appropriate for the size of run.
The different typefaces simply indicate that the envelopes were not printed in the same data run.
The second ballot could have been an election office screw-up (a lot of ballots were mistakenly issued twice in 2004) or a legitimately re-issued ballot based upon a voter request. If you look carefully at the barcodes, you will note they are identical, as they should be for the same voter.
The problem is that the software did not catch the second voted ballot coming through, and it is supposed to. Apparently the initial sort, which is supposed to catch duplicates in the same batches failed, and then validation operator did not see the voter was already credited in that batch or at any other time.
Yet another problem with the "new and improved computer system" that our tax dollars were wasted upon last year.
Posted by: Susan B. Anthony on September 6, 2005 10:51 PMThis is exactly the stuff that needs to be smoked out. I'll bet Eddie Key's handlers will dream up some exotic affliction Eddie has that caused this (like Early Alzheimer's----which is known to be caused by combining Prozac with Pot-smoking)!
The LEFTIST PINHEADS will all start a sobbing campaign for poor Eddie,,,will tag Stefan as a neo-con for pointing this out (as well as a racist) and of course blame it all on BUSH!!
Posted by: Mr. Cynical on September 6, 2005 11:11 PM
He and the hundreds of felons and other illegal voters. Posted by: Tim B. on September 7, 2005 12:32 AM
If Mr. Key voted twice, it was probably an accident. To prosecute him for violating the law would be mean...and mean people suck.
Posted by: dl on September 7, 2005 08:53 AM916 49th st (same phone number)so did he vote more than twice? Posted by: Wayne on September 7, 2005 09:05 AM
Jordan, Karen M
Jordan, Karen Marie
Maybe it's a mother / daughter living at the same house.
Accross the street from Mr. Key, there are two voters at the same residence listed as:
Bolos, Lisa P
Mudd, Lisa P
The house is owned by Ms. Mudd. Coincidence that both the first name and middle initial are the same?
Also, the duplicates above show up in the Sound Politics Voter Database.
A little neighborhood activisism maybe?
Posted by: Mike on September 22, 2005 04:40 PMShields, T Bragdon
Lange, Janet E also voted at this residence. Both Lange and Shields are listed as the homeowners.
In all three cases I've listed the second registration happened in 2004.
If a two entries means two votes, then there are quite a few same name folks living on this block.
Am I reading the database wrong?
Posted by: Mike on September 22, 2005 04:50 PM