So, the North Carolina Diebold saga continues and Diebold again announces its plans to leave NC in disgrace... for the second time. I still can't quite sort this out. Maybe I can start a discussion to sort this out. Here's what I have found so far:
From today's edition of Greensboro NC's News & Record:
Voting machine maker Diebold has told the State Board of Elections that it will not sell its equipment in North Carolina, at least for the time being.
The move leaves one company, ES&S of Omaha, Neb., eligible to sell voting equipment in the state with tight deadlines looming in advance of primary elections scheduled for May.
Election officials said they will have to wait until next week to figure out how severe the impact of Diebold's withdrawal will be on the state's ability to conduct elections. But under the state's current timetable, counties have until Jan. 20 to sign a contract to buy new voting machines.
Last I heard, Diebold was out, then back in, code escrow snafu be damned... But now, after some Dkos national exposure, our good Dem NC guv might have quietly asked wut-the-fuck.
Some background, still from News & Record:
This is the latest twist in a long-running saga that has its roots in voting machine glitches in the 2004 election. Foremost among those was a Carteret County voting machine that lost more than 4,400 votes.
A state law, written and passed in 2005, essentially made illegal all voting equipment now used in North Carolina and required the state to investigate and recertify as sound a new generation of machines.
They include computerized direct record equipment and machines that read marks on paper ballots.
In the past few months, there have been disputes and two legal challenges about how the State Board of Elections decided to implement that new law.
Much of the furor surrounded a requirement that companies escrow and submit their computer code for inspection. Diebold, in particular, had objected that it could not submit code developed by third parties such as Microsoft and Adobe to the scrutiny the state sought.
But North Carolina said it would take care of the escrow situation with Microsoft and Adobe, which brings us to the confusing part: I can't find anything out about the Wednesday Dec. 21 court hearing cited in this article.
The state Board of Elections said they would deal with Microsoft and Adobe:
The state Board of Elections agreed to be responsible for contacting the companies that produced the software not owned by Diebold and the other certified vendors and getting access to the source codes directly from them. That solution has been challenged in court on the grounds that it does not strictly comply with the law. A hearing is set for Wednesday.
And remember, this is, I think, the second time Diebold has announced it was leaving NC...
Some sketchy shit indeed.