FOREIGN COMPANY BUYS U.S. ELECTION RESULTS REPORTING FIRM
January 17th, 2012
(USA) 1/12 – GLOBAL INTERNET VOTING FIRM BUYS U.S. ELECTION RESULTS REPORTING FIRM - By Bev Harris
Permission to reprint granted, with link to
http://www.blackboxvoting.org
In a major step towards global centralization of election processes, the world’s dominant Internet voting company has purchased the USA’s dominant election results reporting company.
When you view your local or state election results on the Internet, on portals which often appear to be owned by the county elections division, in over 525 US jurisdictions you are actually redirected to a private corporate site controlled by SOE software, which operates under the name ClarityElections.com.
The good news is that this firm promptly reports precinct-level detail in downloadable spreadsheet format. As reported by BlackBoxVoting.org in 2008, the bad news is that this centralizes one middleman access point for over 525 jurisdictions in AL, AZ, CA, CO, DC, FL, KY, MI, KS, IL, IN, NC, NM, MN, NY, SC, TX, UT, WA. And growing.
As local election results funnel through SOE’s servers (typically before they reach the public elsewhere), those who run the computer servers for SOE essentially get “first look” at results and the ability to immediately and privately examine vote details throughout the USA.
In 2004, many Americans were justifiably concerned when, days before the presidential election, Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell redirected Ohio election night results through the Tennessee-based server for several national Republican Party operations.
This is worse: This redirects results reporting to a centralized privately held server which is not just for Ohio, but national; not just USA-based, but global.
A mitigation against fraud by SOE insiders has been the separation of voting machine systems from the SOE results reports. Because most US jurisdictions require posting evidence of results from each voting machine at the precinct, public citizens can organize to examine these results to compare with SOE results. Black Box Voting spearheaded a national citizen action to videotape / photograph these poll tapes in 2008.
With the merger of SOE and SCYTL, that won’t work (if SCYTL’s voting system is used). When there are two truly independent sources of information, the public can perform its own “audit” by matching one number against the other.
These two independent sources, however, will now be merged into one single source: an Internet voting system controlled by SCYTL, with a results reporting system also controlled by SCYTL.
With SCYTL internet voting, there will be no ballots. No physical evidence. No chain of custody. No way for the public to authenticate who actually cast the votes, chain of custody, or the count.
SCYTL is moving into or already running elections in: the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Norway, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, South Africa, India and Australia.
SCYTL is based in Barcelona; its funding comes from international venture capital funds including Nauta Capital, Balderton Capital and Spinnaker.
Here is the link to the press release regarding SYCTL’s acquisition of SOE:
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/scy...ing-the-leadin g-election-software-provider-2012-01-11
quote:”In 2007…the top 250 companies in the world had sales in excess of $14.7 trillion…an amount exceeding the GDP [Gross Domestic Product] of the United States or the European Union, $13.2 trillion and $13.7 trillion, respectively…combined sales of the top five (Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell, BP and General Motors) was nearly $1.5 trillion — larger than the GDP of all but seven countries.” — Superclass: The Global Power Elite and the World They Are Making, by David Rothkopf
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(USA) – 1/12 – WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON IN IA, NH, AND SC - by Bev Harris
Despite what you see about who “won” Iowa and who “won” New Hampshire and who “won” South Carolina, that’s not the main function of these very early contests. What they are really about is culling down the field, promptly, and this is not really based on who wins.
New Hampshire, and to a lesser extent Iowa and South Carolina, play a disproportionate role in removing your choice of candidates in the primary. While you watch the horse race in these three states, understand that if you live in any other state, you are going to have fewer candidate choices, or no chance to vote on the candidate of your choice at all.
IT’S ABOUT EXPECTATIONS, NOT WINNING
If a candidate “exceeds expectations” built by TV punditry and whichever poll is being quoted at the time, three things happen:
1. TV pundits start the drumbeat, building public expectations about “inevitability” of the candidate who did “better than expected”;
2. Donor money reroutes itself, pouring dollars into the newly inevitable candidate;
3. Media then reports on the candidate’s prowess in fund raising, citing this newly found skill as reason to believe the candidate is even more inevitable.
The reverse (fewer votes than “expected”) creates an even more definitive result:
1. Media speculates repetitively on when the candidate will drop out;
2. Donor funds for the candidate dry up;
3. Media cites weaker donations as evidence that the candidate cannot win;
4. The party begins pushing the candidate to get out of the way;
5. Articles begin focusing on the cost of primaries in states where people have not yet had an opportunity to vote (underlying message: why do these primaries?);
6. Pundits begin the new drumbeat: “The longer it takes for candidates to get out of the way, the more damage to the party’s prospects of winning the general election in November.”
This is why Iowa and New Hampshire are not really about winning. They are about pushing candidates out of the way citing failure to meet expectations, or surprise in exceeding them.
South Carolina, usually the third state to hold a primary contest, serves as the clean-up round, so that by Super Tuesday (when lots of big states have primaries) only a few candidate choices remain. Non-frontrunners still in the game get so strapped financially that they can’t muster a fight.
Read more
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