Krugman on Diebold...

The one-and-only Paul Krugman (New York Times) gives the Diebold issue a stab in an article entitled "Hack the Vote":

[...]

Why isn't this front-page news? In October, a British newspaper, The Independent, ran a hair-raising investigative report on U.S. touch-screen voting. But while the mainstream press has reported the basics, the Diebold affair has been treated as a technology or business story � not as a potential political scandal.

This diffidence recalls the treatment of other voting issues, like the Florida "felon purge" that inappropriately prevented many citizens from voting in the 2000 presidential election. The attitude seems to be that questions about the integrity of vote counts are divisive at best, paranoid at worst. Even reform advocates like Mr. Holt make a point of dissociating themselves from "conspiracy theories." Instead, they focus on legislation to prevent future abuses.

But there's nothing paranoid about suggesting that political operatives, given the opportunity, might engage in dirty tricks. Indeed, given the intensity of partisanship these days, one suspects that small dirty tricks are common. For example, Orrin Hatch, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, recently announced that one of his aides had improperly accessed sensitive Democratic computer files that were leaked to the press.

[...]

The point is that you don't have to believe in a central conspiracy to worry that partisans will take advantage of an insecure, unverifiable voting system to manipulate election results. Why expose them to temptation?

I'll discuss what to do in a future column. But let's be clear: the credibility of U.S. democracy may be at stake.

Well, Mr. Krugman, unfortunately it will probably take just what the title of your column suggests to get this on to front pages. Specifically, if someone were to hack the vote--modify the tally in some manner (and then prove it) or to unleash a virus specifically targeted at a vendor's election machines--in an important, national election, this would be bigger than the Florida 2000 fiasco. Unfortunately, this is likely only a manner of time... ho hum... poor democracy.

Posted by joebeone at Diciembre 2, 2003 12:00 PM