January 8, 2019

The other day they came out in the news that New York State is introducing new voting machines thereby replacing the old lever operated machines.

These lever machines were in use since the 1960s according to historians and they had their share of problems.

Since I never voted anywhere else but New York I have no idea how voting is conducted in other states. All I can say I never had any problem with the current machines.

But then I'm not the lead dog!

Anyway, the new machines will be electronic voting machines, almost like real computers they say.

This where the problem lies.

I voted in almost every election since I became eligible. I stood in line, waited patiently and at the same time watched the people.

Even though there were translators to help the good American citizens in the practice of their constitution given rights even if they could not speak a word of English, these people and many others had major problem understanding how to cast their votes.

But not only the voters had trouble comprehending the use of a simple voting machine the doddering idiots who serve as voting inspectors were at time more panicked than than the people they were supposed to inspect.

Whenever something happened these inspectors were running around in circles in total panic about what were the supposed to do.

And that was the situation with a simple mechanism that worked with levers.

Can one imagine what will happen with an electronic voting machine?

First of all the everyday people will not understand the instructions and voting will be a shamble.

Second, the inspectors will not be able to explain the uses of these computers in English much less in any of the "official" languages of this country.

I can just visualize how some high level people sit around in a conference room and decide this move.

Their decision very likely is based on how they can profit from the successful vendor. How grateful he will be for getting the contract.

It is a $70 million contract. The winner would provide 5,000 to 7,000 new voting machines in the city.

That is a very nice chunk of money for any vendor in today's bad economy.

The other thing is that these people understood (maybe!) how these machines work but I bet dollars to donuts that the average voter will not be able to comprehend it.

If it turns out to be too much of a headache people just going to turn around and go home and say screw it and watch the Golf Chanel instead.