As noted below, Ron Sims and Interim Elections Director Jim Buck ("Jimron") have been telling outrageous tall tales to cover up the IT problems that are slowing down this week's tabulation.
I should have realized earlier that Tuesday night's story was absurdly self-contradictory (I paraphrase): "We're counting more slowly than before in order to be more accurate but we're also counting faster than in the 2004 primary when we only counted 70,299 ballots in 24 hours vs. 45,521 in 12 hours this year".
It's not only self-contradictory, it's also not truthful. I asked someone who worked on the 2004 primary if they counted ballots for 24 hours straight and the exact response was "that's crap". They said that only a handful of management types worked overnight and they only counted about 3,000 ballots. The real work hours were not significantly different from this year's.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 21, 2006 12:52 PM | Email ThisI think any sort of counting or handling of ballots should be open to public scrutiny. When public viewers aren't there, they should lock the room where the ballots are kept and not allow ANYONE to enter.
But no doubt, Ron will ride this one in to the ground. You can't make this stuff up.
Posted by: Jeff B. on September 21, 2006 01:35 PMTonight only fill in the bubble party at the County building.
Rub elbow with:
Chris
Ron
Greg
and others.
Fill in some little circles and talk policy.
Let's make sure the "right" people win!
I always give credence to a " someone who worked on the election...."
Come on, Stefan, Who is buying this? You have been railing for what seems like years about this issue. It has been to court, reviewed to death and the uproar is coming from one, single voice. YOU! This is indicative of the lack of concern for your concerns that the voting public has.
I know that you believe fervently in your politics. This is a blue state. No matter how much you wish it wasn't. It is not a red state being kept blue by election manipulation.
Give it a rest.
If want to change things, get out and campaign for your candidates, Knock on doors. Talk them up on your blog. It seems like your blog always has a negative bent. People are tired of negative politics, see Bush's rating and the $2Million flushed down the toilet by the BIAW.
Posted by: frogtalk4u on September 21, 2006 01:57 PMMust anyone right of center that lives in a 'blue' state just knuckle under to the system? There are many thousands that have no confidence that their vote will not be cancelled by an elections division psychic 'devining voter intent'. And it's not your vote, frogtalk4u, being cancelled.
Those in power within the blue stain from Thurston to Snohomish on a red canvas of Washington that assures blue statewide control. Why else does most everyone east of the Cascades want to secede?
Just because the Times/PI/KINGKOMOKIRO cabal don't want to investigate and report malfeasance doesn't mean that it doesn't happen. Stefan - please do not give it a rest; you are our only source of this information.
Posted by: GOPolitics on September 21, 2006 02:44 PMFYI- it's not a blue stain, it's a blue skid mark, as in, the lib elite treating the fine hardworking honest folks of this state like soiled underpants.
Posted by: Jeffro on September 21, 2006 03:02 PMIs there any reason to believe that this IT break-down is limited to King County? Personally, I do not see one. Limiting this to a "blue stain of King County" problem may be easy considering how populated KC is, but can anyone honestly say they think that King County is the only county without its act together?
Posted by: Alcon Nighthawk on September 21, 2006 03:30 PMYou know what, I would not argue that Stefan is a bit...well, obsessive about this voting stuff and probably goes a little far in his pronouncements at times. But it is also true that he does a LOT of work that no one else is and while I might not draw the same conclusions he does, he raises a LOT of very important questions about a fundamental freedom. Questions that King County just cannot or will not answer.
You assert that it is down to one voice. And you might be right, but thank goodness for that one voice! How sad to think that it may just be one voice. Stefan reports FACTS and NUMBERS and the terms of the LEGAL CODE you dont get anyplace else.
You assert that "This is indicative of the lack of concern for your concerns that the voting public has." and here again, you are probably right. And the fact that this is true is both a very sad and a very scary commentary on us (including me) the "voting public". That is exactly what Ron Sims seems to count on. Just think of the outcry from the "voting public" if the voting on "American Idol" were so badly mismanaged......
but--later in life (after accumulating things the government can take or tax) i realized these people literally micromanage a huge part of your life and have police power to take anything of yours.
Right wing nut? nope--just read the Federalist Papers for the same observations. When you delegate power to someone, make damn sure you WATCH them. My example--tossing car keys to a teen with no restrictions.
Stefan--(may his name be blessed)--is just doing the old-fashioned (hard & tedious) gum-shoe detective work that newspapers or persistent citizens once did. Now, we all have excuses not to "watch the pot on the stove." Papers are lazy. Politicans know you are busy, too & play on that.
Posted by: jimmie-howya-doin on September 21, 2006 04:28 PMThe new moto for MLKco Records, Elections & Licensing Services Division.
Now's the time to rally! Demand outside elections oversight!! Bring in Kim Jong-iL, Hugo Chavez, and Jimmy Carter to monitor the elctions in MLKco!!! If there's any problem getting in touch with these three Baghdad Jim knows how to contact them!!!!
Posted by: Tyler Durden on September 21, 2006 04:39 PMFor example, Island County has 43,885 registered voters and so far, only 9,937 have been credited with voting, a 22.6% turnout. We don't know how many more ballots are remaining to be counted.
SnoCo today again counted only about 10,000 ballots, which seems slow to me. They said that they have about 40,000 more to go, so that will bring their turnout numbers to around 35%, from the 26% the reports currently shows.
The counties with the larger numbers - 59%, 53%, 49% are actually having very good turnouts.
Posted by: SouthernRoots on September 21, 2006 05:24 PMI know that it's turnout, and that ballot stats aren't available. However, Island and Lewis County turnout has no reason to be unusually low relative to all of the other counties. It may be a guess, but if Island, Lewis and King are done counting, I will happily eat my hat. If I owned one.
Posted by: Alcon on September 21, 2006 05:42 PMHere is the point. We get out of our system exactly what we put in it. If one does not vote, one should not complain.
It is my feeling that there are enough honest MSM reporters, who enjoy muckraking, that if there was a story here, they would find it.
I will concede that it may very well be that Stefan may be ahead of his time, and just maybe there might be something there that everyone else is missing. If it turns out he is right, I will be the first to congratulate him.
As for your statement "blue" state--caused by burdensome WA taxes & micromanaging laws constantly squeezing the taxpayer's private parts". Well, we elected the politicians who passed the laws, we voted on some of them ourselves. The end result is that the blue side is dominnant. And that trend continues today. Hence, we have a blue state, not because of the laws, but because we this is a Democrat majority state.
Posted by: frogtalk4u on September 21, 2006 05:49 PMRon Sims would agree with you: we do get out of the system what we put into it. And sometimes we have to stay overnight to put more into it to get out exactly what we want.
Posted by: Organization Man on September 21, 2006 06:34 PMThat is one very very interesting discovery.
Not surprising, but interesting.
The parties and the media are the ones who want everything fast...the media because it makes for better stories and sells papers, etc; the parties because they are anxious to determine winners so they can get their campaigns moving. If that is the problem, move the primary to an earlier date.
How about the best interest of the voters?
Posted by: Bob B. on September 22, 2006 01:24 PMThis isn't the first time we've voted with this type of primary requirement. I don't recall so many errors and so many voters rebelling in the last primary....
I'm smelling another Dem "tactic" to manipulate vote totals.
Posted by: Deborah on September 22, 2006 10:15 PMSo which way is it, KCE?
Oh, I get it, "Heads I win, tails you lose"
Posted by: alphabet soup on September 23, 2006 09:28 AM