March 16, 2007
Happy Sunshine Week
The day after I appeared on a Sunshine Week open records panel, the Senate passed SB 5566, which prohibits copying of signatures from mail ballot envelopes. (I testified against the companion House bill last month).
Should this bill become law, it would be impossible to effectively publicize election office errors (frauds?) that could conceivably change the outcome of a close race, e.g.:
Two absentee ballots counted from a doubly registered voter
Two absentee ballots counted from a single registration
Bogus "signature verification"
Bogus federal write-in ballots
Wrongful disenfranchisement
Sen. Dan Swecker (R-Rochester) told me yesterday the Rs had voted for the bill out of concern for identity theft from bulk signature scanning. They hadn't contemplated limited copying for elections transparency. He said he'll try to work with his House colleagues on suitable amendments.
Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at March 16, 2007
09:26 AM | Email This
1. Is it really any wonder that the Dems would halt any legislation that would help to identify the obvious fraud and deceit that has become so commonplace in Washington State politics? This is so typical of the type of "politiking" that comes from single party entrenchement in Olympia.The sad thing about it is that I beleive this is what we would get from iether party when they have total control. it only proves that we get the best government money can buy.
2.
Welcome to Sunshine Week. Welcome to obfuscation. How about Democrat Governor Patrick of Massachusetts? What was one of his first acts? To quash the adoption of the Open Document format there and cut funding for the project. Open Document provides a vendor neutral access to all important government documents, policies, purchases and so on in an international standard XML format.
Hey are you listening "Chris" Gregoire? Oh, you've got your pockets lined as well...mmm....
Nice going hypocrites...
3. The KC/Pierce/Snohomish Democrat machine deliberately and systematically set in motion measures designed to make the casting/counting/acceptance of extralegal votes. The statistical evidence alone is such that to deny that there is any evidence of this is ludicrous. The fact that in each and every case of extralegal votes being cast they were disproportionably cast to the benefit of one Party or the agenda supported by that same Party's base reduces the chance that 'errors were made, but they were honest errors" to insignificance. If this chimpanzee McKay could not even see reason to investigate the possibilities that election "irregularities" were actually the consequence of willful corrupting of the system, he is an incompetent at best, however in my opinion he impresses me as more likely that he was a willing accomplice in election tampering and therefore should have been removed from office years ago.
4. If they are really concerned about ID theft, pass a law that prohibits anyone from requiring your SSN unless it is directly related to your SSN account. Lazy programmers can just go figure out another unique identifier and stop using the SSN for everything.
5. What is happening here, larger picture, is that as they make more and more bizarre laws to try and govern behaviors and protect us from crimes, these things cut hugely into other more important liberties. We have plenty laws on the books governing identity theft. Add to that (sorry Sen. Swecker) that these people in Olympia really don't have the sophistication (or the want?) to see all the angles that these things could be applied.
You would think that special attention would be paid to these types of issues by all of our elected representatives simply because we have such a demonstrated problem in this state with fair and honest elections. It's like the problem isn't even on their radar.
Instead, why not make existing identity theft punishment increased to a significant lock-up (multiple years minimum) for each occurrence and identity theft bad guys mercilessly pursued?
6. Have to agree with you Jiggy. We are going to get inundated with lots of "feel good" legislation that really does nothing more than put another layer of bueracracy on a problem that has ample laws.
In the last 2 days since the cutoff for new bills, I have seen several news stories on people in crashes that involve cell phones. This is the new "cause celebre" that will be pushed through "for the children."
It won't matter that there are already laws against distracting driving, we must take away the rights of those who abide by the laws and force them to stay under state control.
7. Adding to my #5:
Why not pass laws that take (more) liberties away from perpetrators of these crimes instead of hindering or preventing things that we (the honest people) do? Particularly things we do that monitor how government performs it's basic functions.