BS: Personal Voting Secrecy

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Donuel
Date: 12 May 08 - 11:03 AM

At the end of the day every transaction you make, be it food or government, is a matter of trust.

We complain, suffer and even die when that trust is corrupted.
Hammurabbi tried to get a grip on the issue but we are still trying to get it right.

What is the status of voting on line?

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 12 May 08 - 06:05 AM

Thanks Rowan, that sounds a bit more like it!

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Rowan
Date: 11 May 08 - 11:45 PM

All [UK] ballot papers are numbered and, with a court order it is possible, legally, to find out how anyone voted!

I'm led to believe that the Australian version of secret ballots was known, early on in California, as the Australian Ballot. The version now used in Oz requires you to present yourself to the polling booth, where you are asked your name (and, if necessary to eliminate ambiguities, your address) by an attendant. Your name on the electoral roll is marked and you are issued with the relevant ballot paper(s), each of which is not numbered but is marked by the attendant with their own signed initials. You mark your ballot paper with your votes (we have preferential voting and, for the Senate, preferential voting and proportional representation) and plonk the marked ballot paper(s) in the ballot box under the supervision of an attendant who makes sure it is folded, can't be retrieved, and isn't removed from the booth. Ballot papers damaged after being issued but prior to being put in the box can be replaced (by destroying the first and reissuing another by the same process) but I've never seen it happen.

During counting the number of papers in the booth's ballot boxes is tallied against the number of voters attending that booth but there is no way that any individual's paper can be connected to the person. The number of Informal votes is often commented on by psephologists as an indicator of how dis/satisfied the electorate may be with the general picture.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Mr Red
Date: 11 May 08 - 04:51 PM

Emma - does that make you a "countess"? I would think if the spoilt ballot paers got to be too big a percentage - notice would be taken. Just look at how they view the non-voting percentages.

FWIW I tell no-one how I vote. I had to assure the officials last time that my red glasses and the website flyer with my picture on it were purely a sartorial affectation and not a political statement.

I can quite easily slag any of them off. Though the Green Party candidate in our ward (local elections) is a very nice lady and an excelent Appalacian Dancer. So I wouldn't dare criticise her - until she is elected.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Peace
Date: 10 May 08 - 05:46 PM

"Say all of you who were never disappeared by death squads for not having your voting papers stamped..."

Well, DOH!

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 10 May 08 - 01:01 AM

"merely consigned to the 'spoilt paper' bin"

Well in Aus that bin is counted as part of the 'informal' vote...

I've always voted informal - I've never worn a suit and tie...

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST
Date: 09 May 08 - 10:25 AM

if you have nothing to hide then you don't care about invasion of privacy...(or so the argument goes by the ones doing the invading)

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 09 May 08 - 06:58 AM

refresh

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 07 May 08 - 09:41 AM

How do you know?

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Fantasma
Date: 07 May 08 - 08:40 AM

Say all of you who were never disappeared by death squads for not having your voting papers stamped...

Your views are so quaintly insular and myopic.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 07 May 08 - 08:37 AM

Leaking markers? We use crayons in the UK. Great big thick ones so you can easily see which box the X is in.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Chief Chaos
Date: 06 May 08 - 10:31 PM

A few years back a transvestite in San Francisco tried to get on the ballot under the name of Sister Sarah, Nun of the Above.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Leadfingers
Date: 06 May 08 - 08:47 PM

A box for 'None of The Above' would be a useful addition to Ballot Papers - And have them counted as a Vote , not a spoilt paper - Show how UN popular some of our politicians are !

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Peace
Date: 06 May 08 - 06:33 PM

Progress: we have so MUCH of that.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 May 08 - 06:20 PM

ya can't stop progress eh? "Yes we can", as the saying goes...

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: gnu
Date: 06 May 08 - 05:03 PM

We got a neat new system. Went to vote in the municipal election here yesterday. First, they check you in on the computer(s). Then, someone explains the complicated ballot and tells you not to make any mistakes or smudges... even a "handprint" ???? Then, you take it a desk where you mark the ballot, repleat with markers that leak so that the ballot gets smudged. Then, you take it to a person that feeds it into a reader that tells you that your ballot is fucked up. Then, a scrutineer must hold up every other voter while they verify that your ballot has been fucked up by the leaking marker and then you have to sign a form and swear on the eyes of your mother that it was fucked up so that you can try it again. Hey... ya can't stop progress eh?

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Emma B
Date: 06 May 08 - 04:43 PM

Peace I would dearly love to write 'none of the above - you are having me on aren't you?'

Unfortunately I've been one of the folks who counts the votes at many elections and I know this is a total waste of time as such 'protests' are merely consigned to the 'spoilt paper' bin - sigh.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: Peace
Date: 06 May 08 - 04:31 PM

When I mar a ballot I do so by saying (words to this effect, but I don't use the number symbol), "You have GOT to be kidding. Please fu#k off with this slate and give me someone for whom to vote."

I sign my name.

If they intend to jail me for that, they'd best send more than a few to arrest me.

Subject: RE: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Adrian Banfield
Date: 06 May 08 - 04:25 PM

This is probably desirable traceability for fraud prevention but it also does provide means in a `Hitlerian` society where individuals find their necessary voting secrecy being compromised?

Subject: BS: Personal Voting Secrecy
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 06 May 08 - 04:19 PM

How many 'Catters` realise that complete secrecy of your personal voting in UK is not necessarily completely secret? All ballot papers are numbered and, with a court order it is possible, legally, to find out how anyone voted!