2024 Presidential Election Thread

[PaloAltoCougar]

Ted deftly dodged, yet again, the question whether he thinks Trump lost in 2020, declaring that:

Until every state has voter ID laws and requires voter-verified paper audit trails the integrity of all elections will be in question.

That might improve slightly the credibility of the vote, but by a show of hands, does anyone here believe that such a requirement would, as Ted implies, remove all doubt with respect to the integrity of an election? The question, and it's a fair one, is how many safeguards do we need to build into the system, recognizing that the more guardrails and protections we add, the fewer people will vote. We can reduce traffic deaths and injuries with more vehicle safety features, traffic rules, and driver restrictions, but we accept the tradeoffs, believing we''re optimizing transportation.

There hasn't been an election in my lifetime where concerns weren't raised (always by the losing party) about integrity of the vote. But I accept the widely held finding by nonpartisan voting analysts that 2020 was the most secure presidential election in our history. And spare me the anecdotal examples of dead people voting or other errors. Those always occur but we're slowly improving.

In conclusion, Trump lost, fair and square.

[Shaka]

I don't think implementing Ted's recommendations would necessarily remove the possibility of election fraud. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't take measures to remove the possibility of fraud. Ted's recommendations would help.

[YOhio]

The scariest thing is that Ted is the one poster on here with the capability of hacking into a voting machine.

[BlueK]

The scariest thing is that Ted is the one poster on here with the capability of hacking into a voting machine.

I hear Russia's hiring...

[falafel]

Remember how enthusiastic the GOP was last week? News cycles move fast. I get that everyone has euphoria right now but there are still real world problems the administration she was a part of was dealing with.

In terms of the size of the change of momentum, consider how big of a splash she had to make to take the spotlight off an assassination attempt on a former president and current leading candidate for the office.

[falafel]

Yeah, we should just let the elites pick the candidates and only let the people vote in the general election.

Isn't this what already happens?

[Omaha 680]

In terms of the size of the change of momentum, consider how big of a splash she had to make to take the spotlight off an assassination attempt on a former president and current leading candidate for the office.

This is a manufactured splash. We are talking about a media 95% plus of which desperately want DJT to lose. Of course they will play up this "big splash" and push it ahead of the assassination attempt which was aiding Trump. Any bump we are seeing now is relief by the left that there will be an alive challenger to Trump. But Harris needs the middle to win. To USUC's point (who low key is one of the most reasonable posters in the politics forum who does the best at not letting emotion sway his analysis), Biden's policies are not generally popular and Harris not generally liked. She has had a lower net favorability rating than Trump for almost a year at this point:

Harris vs. Trump Favorability (realclearpolling.com)

The projections of her victory count on the middle liking her more and liking her administration's policies more as they see more of her the next two months. I'm just not seeing that happening. Of course she looks super articulate compared to Trump. But a very small percentage of people who have crossed the rubicon in their minds to vote for him are going to turn back. It's Harris who has to convince any remaining undecideds.

I'm not saying she can't win I'm just saying she has a very large hill to climb and nothing I have seen about her Senate/VP career and public persona to date tells me she is up to that, in spite of her big splash.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Sharp as a tack.

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[Jeff Lebowski]

General elections vs how stupid political parties choose their candidates is a completely different thing. General elections are in the Constitution. Political parties are not.You're an idiot if you don't know the difference. Don't belong to the party who doesn't nominate the way you like. Simple. You didn't give a crap about this until Trump's road to victory got harder.

You know what's funny is here in Utah, MAGA republicans do everything they can to try to prevent a normal primary election. It used to be the case that if a candidate gets > 60% of the delegate votes at the state convention, that person was declared the winner and there is no primary. That is literally how Mike Lee got elected. Polls showed that 70-80% of republican voters would have voted for Bob Bennett, had they been given the chance. So people put together a ballot initiative to change the rules so that one could get on the ballot by collecting signatures and they fought it tooth and nail. But the initiative had overwhelming support so the republican leadership agreed to let it happen before the vote to avoid an embarrassing loss. Then later they changed their mind and tried to do away with it, but the courts would not let them go back on their word. But to this day, MAGA folks are furious that they can't just pick a candidate like Phil Lyman at the convention and avoid a primary vote.

[PaloAltoCougar]

Sharp as a tack.

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I will never tire of that video. Trump is such a self-absorbed doofus.

[Uncle Ted]

Ted deftly dodged, yet again, the question whether he thinks Trump lost in 2020, declaring that:

That might improve slightly the credibility of the vote, but by a show of hands, does anyone here believe that such a requirement would, as Ted implies, remove all doubt with respect to the integrity of an election? The question, and it's a fair one, is how many safeguards do we need to build into the system, recognizing that the more guardrails and protections we add, the fewer people will vote. We can reduce traffic deaths and injuries with more vehicle safety features, traffic rules, and driver restrictions, but we accept the tradeoffs, believing we''re optimizing transportation.

The problem is you really can't build a secure voting machine practically. It is possible to build a provably secure computer, with a provably secure operating system, so you then have a foundation for a probably secure voting tabulation application. However, it is really easy to add a simple way to audit a voting machine to determine if it was tampered with: simply add a printing device that prints how the voter voted. This way they can look at the printed ballet after entering it into the voting machine and verify their vote was enter correctly and then deposit the ballet into the locked box. If someone questions the tabulation of the election then there is a paper audit trail to check the mechanized tabulation. This is called a voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT). While many states and counties have adapted and added VVPAT devices there are a lot that have not. Without a way to audit the tabulation of an election how would anyone know if the machine was rigged to tabulate incorrectly? It could have very well has happened and we don't know.

Randall H. Erben, the assistant secretary of state in Texas, who served as special counsel on ballot integrity to President Ronald Reagan's campaign in 1984 and, in 1986, headed a similar group for Governor Bill Clements, of Texas, told me in Austin, "I have no question that somebody who's smart enough with a computer could probably rig it to mistabulate. Whether that has happened yet I don't know. It's going to be virtually undetectable if it's done correctly, and that's what concerns me about it." Willis Ware, a Rand Corportion computer specialist, warned those attending a 1987 conference on the security of computer-tabulated elections, "There is probably a Chernobyl or a Three Mile Island waiting to happen in some election, just as a Richter 8 earthquake is waiting to happen in California." The chief counsel of the Republican National Committee, Mark Braden, told me that he has yet to see a proved case of computer-based election fraud, but added, "People who work for us who know about computers claim that you could do it.

https://www.csl.sri.com/users/neumann/dugger.html (And this was from the 1980s)

There hasn't been an election in my lifetime where concerns weren't raised (always by the losing party) about integrity of the vote. But I accept the widely held finding by nonpartisan voting analysts that 2020 was the most secure presidential election in our history. And spare me the anecdotal examples of dead people voting or other errors. Those always occur but we're slowly improving.

I would like to see the official report claiming that 2020 was the most secure presidential election in our history given all the issues with Covid-19. Most of the anecdotal examples you speak of are surrounding mail-in voting. There are lots of examples still coming in about the 2020 election of voter fraud. Given the quote above there may be a lot that we will never know about.

In conclusion, Trump lost, fair and square.

Yes, most likely... Without a way to audit the tabulation of the votes can you be absolutely sure? So why not just put the publics mind to ease by doing a few simple things?

- Add VVPAT to all voting machines.
- Require Voter ID
- Only use mail-in ballots for those that actually need it.

For a longer answer, see https://www.csl.sri.com/~neumann/book-voting.html

Edit: This is a good article as well: https://www.thenation.com/article/ar...election-time/

[tooblue]

The problem is you really can't build a secure voting machine practically. It is possible to build a provably secure computer, with a provably secure operating system, so you then have a foundation for a probably secure voting tabulation application. However, it is really easy to add a simple way to audit a voting machine to determine if it was tampered with: simply add a printing device that prints how the voter voted. This way they can look at the printed ballet after entering it into the voting machine and verify their vote was enter correctly and then deposit the ballet into the locked box. If someone questions the tabulation of the election then there is a paper audit trail to check the mechanized tabulation. This is called a voter verifiable paper audit trail (VVPAT). While many states and counties have adapted and added VVPAT devices there are a lot that have not. Without a way to audit the tabulation of an election how would anyone know if the machine was rigged to tabulate incorrectly? It could have very well has happened and we don't know.


https://www.csl.sri.com/users/neumann/dugger.html (And this was from the 1980s)



I would like to see the official report claiming that 2020 was the most secure presidential election in our history given all the issues with Covid-19. Most of the anecdotal examples you speak of are surrounding mail-in voting. There are lots of examples still coming in about the 2020 election of voter fraud. Given the quote above there may be a lot that we will never know about.



Yes, most likely... Without a way to audit the tabulation of the votes can you be absolutely sure? So why not just put the publics mind to ease by doing a few simple things?

- Add VVPAT to all voting machines.
- Require Voter ID
- Only use mail-in ballots for those that actually need it.

For a longer answer, see https://www.csl.sri.com/~neumann/book-voting.html

- VVPAT is used in India. It has proven problematic. I suppose you are aware of its limitations, and vulnerabilities it introduces?
- What actually counts as verifiable voter ID? Must it be a federally mandated standard, and is that constitutional?
- As with voter ID, whom or what body determines who "actually needs it"—what is the standard. Again, must it be a federally mandated standard, and is that constitutional?

Ted is an election denier, unless of course Trump wins this time around then he will absolutely accept the results regardless how they are tabulated.

[Uncle Ted]

- VVPAT is used in India. It has proven problematic. I suppose you are aware of its limitations, and vulnerabilities it introduces?

No. But France still uses paper ballots (and no mail-in ballots) and seem to be able to tabulate their votes faster than we do. https://apnews.com/article/covid-hea...2013e1661caf35

- What actually counts as verifiable voter ID? Must it be a federally mandated standard, and is that constitutional?

https://www.votetexas.gov/mobile/id-faqs.htm

- As with voter ID, whom or what body determines who "actually needs it"—what is the standard. Again, must it be a federally mandated standard, and is that constitutional?

Well, if you go by the French standard... No one needs it.

Mail-in voting [in France] was banned in 1975 amid fears of potential fraud.

Ted is an election denier, unless of course Trump wins this time around then he will absolutely accept the results regardless how they are tabulated.

[tooblue]

No. But France still uses paper ballots (and no mail-in ballots) and seem to be able to tabulate their votes faster than we do. https://apnews.com/article/covid-hea...2013e1661caf35



https://www.votetexas.gov/mobile/id-faqs.htm



Well, if you go by the French standard... No one needs it.

So, the US on the whole should emulate India, Texas and France in that order. Who knew election deniers and Texans were so cosmopolitan!

[Moliere]

I think we should vote by TikTok post. Maybe a Chinese data scraper can tally up the votes using AI to gather the votes people say in their videos.