There are many controversial topics in this politically correct world. There are topics about morals, standards, and personal ethics. One of the newest debatable subjects however, is the one concerning this new centuries way of casting an individual’s vote, through electronic voting. Electronic voting is a way to cast a person’s ballot using an electronic voting machine that is touch screen. There are many advantages to using these machines during an election but there are also many disadvantages to using them as well. Before a person can make their own judgments on this subject it is important to understand and view both sides of the argument.
Hundreds of millions of dollars have been put forth to upgrade
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No ballots can be misplaced and there is no need for poll workers to help a voter out by looking over the voters shoulder, then making changes where necessary (Voting Technology Project). People are looking to protect their privacy and make sure that there vote is one of the votes that really count. The problem is that it is not safe to have a paper or receipt type thing printed out for a voter, this type of thing could lead to a wide spread buying of votes by the separate sides. Buying votes is obviously something neither side wants to see happen.
Many groups opposed to electronic voting want a paper print out like a receipt that could be used for recounts. The request does not seem absurd but returning to this paper system introduces some new complications, among them: What happens on Election Day if the printers fail, as printers often do? How do poll workers and voters prevent tampering with the paper ballots? These questions do not have strong enough answers to make companies add printers to the machines. The main reason there is a demand for the electronic voting system is because of the rumors of fraud with the older paper ballots.
The government has passed the Help America Vote Act, after the 2000 elections voting problem occurred. The act set aside the money to help fund the purchasing of new and improved voting equipment (Voting Technology Project). Some of the major improvements with touch screens or simple
American citizens shall be able to make use of all technology available to digitally track their vote for the president of the United States.
From a newspaper editorial: [The recent use of mail ballots in Oregon’s election of a U.S. senator has led some people to hail this as the wave of the future in our democratic republic].
Many people in America find it difficult to even get to the ballot box on election day. Some say that they can’t get off from work because they live paycheck to paycheck and they would have to work overtime to make up for the pay they didn’t gain that work day. This is a problem that seems to be leading to substandard representation of those at, near or below the poverty line. Suggestions have been made to potentially make election day a holiday so everyone can get off working to go through the long ballot lines and I believe this could potentially be the right step to take to ensure more people are adequate representation. To make election day even more efficient, it would probably be a good idea to have mail-in ballots for every state along with election day being a holiday.
Getting to polling locations can be a hassle, especially for the disabled, the sick, and people without transportation. In addition, voting becomes even more difficult for
J.J Strossmayer who holds a P.H.D in law research found that empty and invalid ballot papers (defined as blank or spoiled votes) are one of the biggest problems of the countries that have a compulsory voting. During Brazil’s 1990 elections voter turnout was 76.57%, but 40% of the votes were deemed invalid. (Mackerras & Mcallister 1999) (Evidence: Statistics) In Ecuador’s 2006 elections 40% votes were
I understand that in an ideal situation voting should be easily accessible for all and the while still is difficult to have people commit fraud. But you just can’t have it both ways realistically and if you can have it both ways it still hasn’t been presented yet, maybe in the near future sure but as it is at the moment that’s the dilemma. Like how Walsh said, “It’s all about political power—who has it, who wants it, who gets it (Kenneth T. Walsh).” It rings true on so many levels it truly all does come down to those three simple things it seems as though that’s what every politician is striving to achieve their end goal of
In this essay, I would like to discuss the major obstacles to voting, recent changes to overcome voting barriers and the political influence of changed rules. Low turnout in the U.S. reflects that there are obstacles for people to voting and changes to overcome these obstacles may also bring new problems to different social groups. I will elaborate on these aspects in the following parts.
Voter Authentication is the process of validating voter identity. The fact that the voter claims to be represented by a specific cards like voter id cards which does not necessarily mean that this is true. Actual voter can be identified by using secured mechanism in the system and then be granted rights and permissions to vote. The voter must provide evidence to prove his identity to the system. It is the process of ascertaining claimed user identity by verifying voter-provided evidence.[a]
In 2000 Riverside County California decided to spend 14 million dollars to make their voting system all electronic. This decision was made on the basis that in 1998 more than one million dollars was spent on paper ballots (in Riverside), but when only half of the county voted the extras had to be trashed. For local elections their new electronic system fetched a 99% approval rating from voters (Wired.com article). The only foreseeable downside to this technology is the start up price and with internet voting not likely due to security issues, this maybe the best solution.
Paper ballots use ALOT of paper. Which is a waste of trees! If you do the math there are about 1 million people a state. Thats 50 million small papers being wasted on polls every time we vote. EVMs are electronic. They use a large amount of materials. Once. even though theres 50 million people thats only hundreds of EVMs. Not millions! The choice for EVMs will make voting better in many ways.
The United States of America should stick with old school paper ballots. On paper is safe, reliable, cheap, and cannot be tampered with. Protecting your votes should be top priority.
EVMs should be available to use for voters. Over the past years, some individuals were not able to vote due to the fact that paper ballots were only offered in few languages; this causes confusion and may lead individuals to vote for the wrong canidates. Paper ballots are only available in few languages, whilst there are hundreds of languages spoken across the country. Although they may ask for assistance from poll workers, there would be invasion of privacy.
But, as of today there is no solid way of knowing if someone is or is not trying to sneak in more than one ballot. “I don’t know if anybody knows how prevalent it is, because the only time you find out is when somebody gets caught.” (Guzman, 1) And the statistics of that happening is .00000013 percent or 26 out of every 197 million cases. Because there are multiple techniques that can and have been used time after time again. Although this is the case there has been some attempt to prevent it. Voter ID law are one example, but it is far from the perfect solution. First, it prevents only one type of voter’s fraud, voter impersonation. And, second, the voter’s ID laws has been ruled as discrimination; so the rule is not enforced everywhere and the public can vote without
The primary advantage of the mail ballot is that it requires little time and effort on the part of the voter. We think that also is a primary shortcoming of this process.
Besides that, there were complaints about the use of indelible ink in the 13th general Election. Oppositions and clean-polls activists reported that the ink could be easily washed off (Election ink under scrutiny in Malaysia, 2013). To avoid the issue of phantom voters and to reduce human error when checking the voter’s information during the election a new modern polling