Although I am not working the election this time around, I have been at the precincts almost every election since moving to Vegas. Voting irregularities are common, a combination of shoddy education, volunteerism, and electronic gadgets. It takes attentiveness from both poll workers as well as workers to make sure that these irregularities are minimized. Even if they are not intentional, they are too common.
Already, instances in four states indicate abundance of irregularities. I find it interesting that in almost every reported case, including the ones about which I have read so far today, the beneficiary is always the Democrat party. Having worked the polls previously, I have had to recalibrate machines when the screen is not aligned with the selections. Although it is not systemic, it happens more often than it should, and the voters who told me details were all GOPers whose votes were recorded for the DEM opponent instead. In Nevada, we have a paper copy as well which reflects what the digital copy records. However, I have long been leery of digital records, because I remember a time when digital photos were inadmissible in court because they were easily altered. Well, I think the same of voting records, and I advise people to double check and make sure the paper copy reflects their selections accurately.
Part of the problem is also the people. Some voters don't notice. Some don't care. Some don't tell us. I can't fix a problem unless I know about it. Then there are the poll workers. These are people who are otherwise usually not occupied who trade their day for $120. They get about four hours of training (which I think can be accomplished in 20 minutes), but the money and the training and the people themselves are just not all that motivated to make sure that the election is accurate. They are not paid enough to care. They are also usually not educated enough to care. The people I saw this morning were nice, but they were NOT my peers in any way, least of all intellectually, and they parroted the trite phrases I remember they taught us to say in election worker training, but I doubt they know the first thing about fixing machine errors. Fortunately I had none.
If someone wanted to take advantage of fraud as appears to be the case, this is the perfect recipe. Hire uneducated people who are randomly selected from the voter rolls. Pay them a wage low enough that most people of means and intellect will abstain. Give them electronic gadgets that they couldn't even begin to comprehend let alone build. Then, throw a glitch into the machine, and viola- disaster for your opponents. It would be easy to steal the election when the people available to vouchsafe it are not people you would normally trust to pour piss out of a boot even with instructions written on the heel. Four years ago, I recalibrated eight of the 16 machines at our polling place, swapped out four printers that jammed, and took one machine completely out of service. It was a disaster. I don't think most of the other people at the polls would be able to handle that.
Ultimately, voting irregularities must be solved by voters. We do this by paying attention at the polls. We do this by peppering elected officials with our communiques until they view us as pests. We do this by paying attention to them and throwing bums like John McCain (R-AZ) out of office when they redact all their campaign promises. We do this by running for office ourselves. After all, you are the only person with whom you agree 100% politically. They need to be noted; they need to be punished. Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.
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