The October Surprise has been sprung - on James Webb.
James Webb's last name has been cut off of the ballot in Alexandria, Falls Church and Charlottesville Virginia -
thanks to a voting machine company tainted by partisan ties to the opposing political party.
*This WILL be very damaging to James Webb. *
What else is wrong with the machines that we can't even see?
Neat trick, eh?
Washington Post:
Some Voting Machines Chop Off Candidates' Names
Computer Glitch Affects Voters in 3 Jurisdictions; Error Cannot Be Fixed by Nov. 7
Tuesday, October 24, 2006; Page B04
"U.S. Senate candidate James Webb's last name has been cut off on part of the electronic ballot used by voters in Alexandria, Falls Church and Charlottesville because of a computer glitch that also affects other candidates with long names, city officials said yesterday.
Although the problem creates some voter confusion, it will not cause votes to be cast incorrectly, election officials emphasized. The error shows up only on the summary page, where voters are asked to review their selections before hitting the button to cast their votes. Webb's full name appears on the page where voters choose for whom to vote...
"...
'Thus, Democratic candidate Webb will appear with his first name and nickname only * -- or "James H. 'Jim' " -- on summary pages in Alexandria, Falls Church and Charlottesville, the only jurisdictions in Virginia that use balloting machines manufactured by Hart InterCivic of Austin.'
More here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...
*Who is to blame?
Well, you can
thank Hart Intercivic, the voting machine company whose key investors also have significant ties to a certain political party.
Hart Intercivic fouled up the primary in Summit County Colorado this year
July 20 - No ballots for Democrats.
HART InterCivic printed the ballots for Summit County's upcoming Democratic and Republican Primary elections. Problem is, they did not print any Democratic ballots.
http://www.users.qwest.net/...
Virginia has a real mess in general, and even has voting machines with wireless networking that caused a meltdown in Fairfax Virginia in 2003.
November 18, 2003. Fairfax To Probe Voting Machines
"On election night, Fairfax Republicans filed a lawsuit alleging election irregularities after 10 machines from nine precincts broke down during voting ..."
... "We've just done an electronic Florida. That's what it looks like to me at first blush," said Sen. Ken Cuccinelli (R-Fairfax), referring to the balloting problems in the 2000 presidential election.
Even with these problems, Virginia failed to ban paperless voting).
If you live in Virginia and want to get rid of paperless electronic voting, then please join our efforts here at:
Virginia Votes - a Coalition for Verified Voting for Virginians.
Also, please sign up at
Pollworkers for Democracy and help us document the 2006 electronic voting problems. www.pollworkersfordemocracy.org
Help us to gather the evidence we need to build our case for voter verified paper ballots for Virginia.