You know how The BRAD BLOG is always going on about how Vote-by-Mail is a very bad idea for democracy (other than in cases where a voter really must vote absentee or is otherwise forced to vote on a 100% unverifiable touch-screen voting systems at the precinct on Election Day)?…
Yes, those dangling envelopes are absentee ballots being sent to voters. Maybe they’ll actually reach them. Who knows?
The photos were taken by San Francisco surgeon and Election Integrity advocate Dr. John Maa last week and highlight just one of the many reasons why Vote-by-Mail is such a bad idea unless it’s absolutely necessary. They were sent to us after being taken in the mail room of a San Francisco apartment building in advance of the upcoming November 5 municipal elections there.
“It was 10pm at night when I took those photos, so there were probably a lot more of them out there earlier in the day,” Maa told us…
Where we live in Los Angeles, we often see completed Vote-by-Mail ballot envelopes on their way back to the county, set on top of the building’s mailboxes, waiting for pickup by the postal worker. You’ll be happy to know we haven’t stolen a one of them, even though it would be very simple. Can’t say the same for everybody else in this county of 4.8+ million registered voters, however — especially with more than 1.3 million of them now registered as “Permanent Vote by Mail” voters, according to the general numbers LA County Registrar-Recorder/County Clerk Dean Logan offered The BRAD BLOG via email this week.
According to a 2011 Caltech/MIT study [PDF] by R. Michael Alvarez, Charles Stewart III and Dustin Beckett, across the state of California, “the percentage of ballots cast by mail has risen from 18% in 1990 to 48% in 2010.”
Those numbers are confirmed in statistics posted at the CA Sec. of State website, detailing how, as of 2012, for the first time, Vote-by-Mail ballots accounted for the majority of votes cast in this state’s Presidential election. The trend is similar in many other states.
When Republicans pretend that polling place Photo ID restrictions are needed to prevent “voter fraud”, they are lying. They are doing nothing more than attempting to disenfranchise some of the more than 21 million citizens (11 percent of the population) in this country who happen to be disproportionately Democratic-leaning and who do not have the type of ID that is required to vote under such laws.
Polling place voter impersonation happens about as close to never as one can get in a country with hundreds of millions of voters.
Absentee ballot fraud, on the other hand — which is deterred in no way by polling place Photo ID restrictions dishonestly promoted by its Republican or otherwise information-deficient proponents — is another story entirely. That’s where most of the actual “voter fraud” (fraud by voters, in some fashion, rather than insider election fraud via voting system manipulation, etc.) actually happens in this country. It’s also where ballots are most easily bought, sold or lost in the mail and where the secret ballot is most easily exposed.
If you have the option, and if your precinct allows you to vote on hand-marked paper ballots, do that rather than Vote-by-Mail. In California, if you are sent a VBM ballot, you can mark it at home and deliver it in person to your polling place on Election Day. Or, you can just wait at home and hope your ballot decides to hang out and wait for you before you get it out of the mail — then hope it doesn’t disappear on its way back to the county.
No properly trained USPS mail delivery person would leave the ballots as shown.
I am guessing maybe a Saturday fill-in worker dispirited at their likely loss of even one day of work thanks to the stinking Republiscum out to destroy the Postal Service. Maybe they even paid $250 for a study program to ace the Postal test.
Otherwise I call foul – BS – bogus setup, since the ballots fit in the mailboxes if bother to unlock with a passkey.
Isn’t this site blowing the lid off of easily hacked voting machines? Vote by mail so far is not easily rigged to produce the in-your-face-yes-we-stole-it 54-46 Republiscum victory.
I live in Oregon, which is all vote-by-mail, all the time, for several years now. I like it and trust it and don’t think there is much fraud involved. Where we live you must sign your ballot and the signature is looked at before the ballot is opened. There are also free ballot deposit boxes at government places like libraries or the county courthouse to deposit them if you don’t want to pay the postage. If something happens to your ballot and you can’t find it when it’s time to vote you can get another one, no problem. They find non-matching signatures once in a while, and go after the people who cast those ballots. One was a woman who was in the hospital after surgery. I can’t remember the outcome, but it seemed to be her politically-employed husband (either an office holder or a party chairman) voted for her while she was drugged up. I also know that the election board has called people about questions about their signature, allowing them to come down to the office and show I.D. to verify their ballot. But that only works if you vote early, if you turn things in at 7:45 on election day you’re screwed.
Irwin Mainway said @ 1:
For what it’s worth, the photo was taken on a Thursday.
Also, FWIW, some of the ballots were inside some voters mailboxes at the same building.
Where fraud happens, it’s usually via Vote-by-Mail. Whether or not it’s easy to defraud an entire election with that message is a separate issue. The point here is that a) Permanent Vote-by-Mail/Absentee voting is an open invitation to fraud and b) Where Republicans pretend polling place Photo ID laws are needed to prevent “voter fraud”, such laws do nothing to prevent absentee fraud, which is FAR more prevalent than polling place impersonation. And c) Republicans know that, don’t care and want polling place Photo ID simply to disenfranchise Democratic-leaning voters.
Mcarson said @ 2:
Been wondering what took you guys so long to show up! 🙂
No worries about stuff like this?: “Oregon Dept. of Justice Confirms Investigation of GOP Ballot Tampering in Clackamas County”
…Or this?: “Oregon Man Convicted of Fraud After Offering $20 for Blank Vote-by-Mail Ballots”
Beyond that, “trust” doesn’t come in to play in American elections. Or shouldn’t. Our system is build on checks and balances, not trust. While Oregon’s VBM system is among the best in the nation, it still has many holes and reasons for concern. While you discuss things like what to do “If something happens to your ballot and you can’t find it when it’s time to vote you can get another one, no problem,” etc., you don’t discuss concerns about vote buying/selling/intimidation, etc. that can’t happen when folks vote at the polls.
Yes, I appreciate that you folks in OR find the system convenient, as do most VBM voters elsewhere. That doesn’t mean it’s secure, unfortunately.
Brad wrote:
The most convenient way to vote is on the keyboard of your computer. It’s also the most insecure.
Perhaps there’s a scientific principle involved, an inverse ratio between the degree of convenience and the degree of security of the vote.
Of course, if voters like Mcarson don’t really care whether or not their votes are accurately counted, then their preference for convenience is understandable.
Sorry I missed the PDA IOT Voter Integrity Call tonight; did not see the ;notice until this evening and it was mailed in the afternoon..
I reviewed the data on VBM from the Oregon Secretary of State review report, this being a few years ago. Their data is very impressive re security, voter participation and accuracy. I saw a vote receptacle this summer; looked like a mailbox except for the tank-like structural design….I doubt that it could ever be broken in to. Although many statements are made denigrating VBM there is a total blank re any data to support these presumed shortcomings. Review the Oregon SOS report; then do the criticism….
Thanks for your thoughts, Raymond. I’m sorry you missed the PDA call tonight, though it was an “Election Integrity” call, not a “Voter Integrity” call. The voter’s are doing fine. Please leave them alone.
As to my specific response to your points, please see my comment above @ 4 to Mcarson and get back to me. While the Oregon SoS from several years ago is no longer there, I hope you’ll read my comments above @ 4, and then get back to me. Thanks!
Brad… Colorado is where this story us playing out. First election after precinct polling terminated.It seems many counties are offering only DRE for in person voting and not paper except in mail -in packets.
7000 incorrect ballots sent to Summit County voters.
Lots of ballot packets in trash.
Marilyn Marks leading effort to litigate to correct for illegal effects of new HB 13-1303 bill of which there are many when you look at details the promoters overlooked when ignoring our attempts to hrlp…(Democratic Party legislative caucus and the 2/3 GOP affiliated members of Colorado County Clerks Association. Zero GOP legislators voted for that 120 page bill.
Major vendors lined up to respond to Uniform Voting System RFP…
Too much to type on my phone.
Harvie
Re Harvie Branscomb @8.
Thanks for directing us to what is taking place in CO.
There can be no question that VBM is preferable to in-person voting on the 100% unverifiable DREs.