Of the seven active Republican candidates in the Arizona governor’s race, three are write-ins [3]. Kari Lake, one of the four appearing on the ballot, is a former TV news anchor in Phoenix who is comfortable appearing on television and who is taking a position of reforming Arizona election laws. She is also actively pushing back against policies of the current Washington DC administration. The “establishment” Republican party is backing candidate Karrin Taylor Robson.
Four candidates are in the Republican primary for Secretary of State, with Mark Finchem being the one wanting to do something about voting fraud and to have election reforms.
In the primary elections in Arizona, a person wins with a plurality of the votes, and does not have to have a majority (50 percent plus one) in order to win. However, this allows one of the oldest tricks in the book to occur: some candidates file just to dilute the number in competition, which might take away enough votes from one strong candidate to result in a victory by a less desireable or weaker candidate who can then win by the plurality of votes.
Lurking in the background are electronic voting and counting machines, the biggest potential risk to honest elections existing today, since any voting fraud done by machines is almost undetectable, and without constant monitoring and detailed examination, can be undetectable. The machines are everywhere in Arizona–
The issue of electronic voting machines became more known after the 2020 presidential election. The details of the design, materials, computer software, hardware microcode, circuit boards, semiconductor chips, construction, and operation of the machines have not been voluntarily made public by the companies which make a lot of money selling the “election services” and “election technology” to unthinking governmental bodies and election departments.
Additional risks are presented in the creation and functioning of electronic voter registration lists.
Real election technology consists of two things — paper ballots and a dark pen to mark the voter’s selection. Recently in April, the French presidential election took place without a known glitch, as voting took place on election day using paper ballots and with strict rules about absentee voting. In 2009, the German Constitutional Court declared electronic voting machines illegal for elections in Germany, primarily because every step of the voting process had to be transparent and understandable to the average citizen, and done without the risk of manipulation or error.
In the recent primary elections in Georgia and Colorado, obvious voting anomalies appeared. Even though many eyes are on the Arizona primary, every step of the voting process will not be visible to the voters and the public.
[1] http://ballotpedia.org/Republican_Party_primaries_in_Arizona,_2022
[2] http://ballotpedia.org/United_States_Senate_election_in_Arizona,_2022
[3] http://ballotpedia.org/Arizona_gubernatorial_election,_2022
Hand-marked and hand-counted in public… In 2018, here in my district in CA, I voted for a Republican woman. She won. Then, several days after the election her victory, as well as four other Republican victories, were reversed. I am neither Republican nor Democrat. I am an American, and the bs is over the edge.
Armageddon. Arm Aged Don.
No further comment. But it could be a trick of the naming nincompoops. Weird though. n’est pas? Problems of interpretation though. We have a very aged “Don” now. Don Bideeniewitz.
The second and third oldest tricks in the book are getting your opponent disqualified from being on the ballot, as Gretchen Whitmer did to the black candidate, James Craig; followed by getting your opponents jailed. Which Zelensky the great obviously has done to ‘traitors’, and Whitmer has arranged for ‘insurrectionist’ Ryan Kelley.
As for political intrigue I have seen from French sources an amusing play:
– Kamala resigns
– Newsom is named VP
– Joe resigns/is resigned
– Newsom gets to be POTUS
– Joe and Hunter get prosecuted (better late than never 🙂 )
– Newsom directly pardon them
– Et voila!
Does this make sense and is there any hint of it in the US?
jld
and Augustus Newsom is the first emperor.
I’ve long assumed the plan is to usher in the Thirty Technocrats in Year Zero (2024) but I guess it could go that way.
Would that be the thirty Immortals?
I was thinking more of the fate of the Athenian democracy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirty_Tyrants
That’s a great reference Barbara Ann, brutal and short-lived. I think that is what a technocratic take over would be like. The destruction of their electronic empire would leave them in the hands of those they’ve ruined. My reference was to the Eight Immortals who were made the ruling oligarchs by Deng Xiaoping’s transformation. China being the technocratic model for our future.
Moore v Harper hopefully will provide some clarity on the “time and manner” question. Commentators seem to agree it will also be determinative of appointment of electors. It’s an interesting federalism question if the national constitution can provide a power to a subordinate entity that isn’t subject to requirements of a state constitution.
Meanwhile in Alaska because vacancies in the HoR can only be filled by election, they are having a jungle primary for November election and ranked choice election for the remainder of the current term.
Our current system was largely put in place in the 1890s with adoption of the so-called Australian ballot. Historically political parties were empowered to create their own ballots which were distributed to voters. Timing of elections was often specified in state constitutions, but per the time and manner provisions of the US constitution federal election day became consolidated in all states (1848 for selection of presidential electors and 1872 for Congress except for Senator until ratification of Amndt XVII).
The expressed concern of the late 19th c reformers/progressives was that party-controlled ballots allowed verification of what ballot was voted, and hence a vote could be bought. By having the government control the ballot, and voting in secret, it would be impossible for parties to enforce a purchased vote.
Most vote accountability concepts have difficulty because true accounting would require the ability to match voted ballots to electors. Identification, authentication, and non-repudiation are difficult in a “secret” system.
I also note that it is often argued that the XVIIth took power from state legislatures. But in looking at the history of the amendment, it was state legislatures who were most in favor of it. The reason was that politics had become increasingly nationalized, and in Senator election years a vote for state representative was considered a proxy vote for US senator. State politicians preferred not to be bound to their US senator. Even as far back as 1858, consider the “Lincoln/Douglas debates”. Neither was a candidate on any ballot but they had been “pre-selected” by their parties and all voters knew a D vote was a vote for Douglas and likewise R for Lincoln in the subsequent term of state legislature.
Most vote accountability concepts have difficulty because true accounting would require the ability to match voted ballots to electors. Identification, authentication, and non-repudiation are difficult in a “secret” system.
Perfect. 😉
I wish my knowledge of American history was better. Especially concerning the history of D vs R et al.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seventeenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
jld – Replace a black woman with a white man is pure racism.
Jld,
If you replace Newsom with Hillary, it would make more sense.
In Florida we know the results before the 11 news, sometimes we have recounts or elections problems (i.e. the bluest county, Broward, accidentally finding 50k ballots).
Arizona might takes months, what a joke.
6 Republican US House Reps who voted to impeach Trump ran for reelection in primaries. 4 survived Trump endorsed challangers, 2 lost.
Dems posted ads for Mi Rep Meijer’s Trump endorsed opponent which might have aided into Meijer losing.
In WA the 2 Trump endorsed candidates both finished 3rd in “top 2” voting.
Al,
The results of AZ’s Maricopa county are already in? Oh, never mind.
Fred, what do these 6 Repub Reps have to do with Az?
A month ago, in Colorado primaries, the Dems also ran ads for the Repub primaries. They treaded a fine line, staging the ads as “attack ads” on a particular candidate. The formula was to state a few simple positions espoused by the candidate, while showing appealing outdoors footage, concluding with and “Too radical for Colorado.”
The trick was twofold: 1) items supported by the candidate were all pretty standard Repub talking points, esp among the growing populist wing of Repubs; 2) Dems hoped that the ads would actually attract voters to the candidate that the “attack ads” targeted.
That is, according to a local media report, the Dems ran ads “against” the Repub candidates that they thought would be easiest to defeat in the general election, hoping to weaken stronger primary candidates.
It seems to have failed. With the exception of Lauren Boebert in the west, pretty much all the candidates supported by the Repub establishment won.
One cannot resist that old axiom rising in the mind too often these days: It’s not who votes that counts. It’s who counts the vote.
Colorado has statewide mail-in voting since 2012. A voter can opt to vote in person on election day, but local precinct voting centers are gone. And somewhere along the way, in the past few years, the number of manned election centers for dropping off ballots diminished and unmanned, neighborhood drop boxes were added to the system.
The careful, bi-partisan organization, when this Colorado system was introduced, reassured me that it should work alright. However, the public discussion preceding and after the 2020 election made it clear how simple it could be to interfere and alter election outcomes with mail-in and absentee voting.
I was reminded of the Carter-Baker Commission report of 2005. It had resulted from uproar over the very messy 200 election, and no one paid any attention to it, when if finally emerged a whole election cycle later, in 2005. (Well, one did wonder whether interested parties might have used it as a guide for improving outcomes in 2020 elections.) The report warned specifically of the dangers of mail-in voting, and recommended that absentee voting be strictly limited. Voter I.D. check was also recommended.
So in Colorado most ballots are paper and filled in by hand at home. But Colorado is still counting by electronic scanning. And Colorado law only allows electronic recounts.
Several Republican candidates, led by Tina Peters who lost her bid for Sec State in the recent primary, requested hand recounts, and raised over $200K to pay for them. So far, they have only been granted scanned recounts. Reports conflict about how well the counting machines did on the accuracy tests preceding the recount. A hand recount might minimize counting irregularities. But it does not address the problem particularly enabled by mail-in voting: ballot box stuffing.
As Robt Willman alluded to, a canvass following the 2020 election in Colorado, by the Election Integrity Plan, turned up significant irregularities in the conduct of that election. It could happen anywhere, more in some states than others perhaps.
Summary of EIP findings Colorado 2020
Forgot to proofread. For multiple typos in preceding comment, I apologize. Obvious enough to reader, I hope.
You seem by far the cherry blossom king’s (CiC) most faithful lover, Fred, bravely coping with the most adverse fake reality as presented by the media. Are you neighbors down there in Florida?
https://tinyurl.com/Maricopa-Trump-lost
How are the Kraken, personal lawyer Guiliani, and Georgia’s 16 fake electors doing?
Elections Hanky Panky?
Surely not. Say it ain’t so Joe! et cetera et cetera …
“At the plea hearing held September 5, 2012, the defendants admitted that certain absentee ballot voters received things of value in exchange for their votes being cast for Hudson Hallum. For example, in or about May 2011, Carter and Malone provided a chicken dinner to an individual in exchange for the absentee ballot votes of that individual and one other individual. Further, on or about May 4, 2011, Carter contacted Hudson Hallum about a family of eight who had requested a “family meal” in exchange for their absentee ballot votes being cast in favor of Hudson Hallum. Carter requested $20 from Hudson Hallum to pay for the food, to which request Hudson Hallum agreed.”
“In addition, on or about May 5, 2011, Carter notified Hudson Hallum that some absentee ballot voters were “holding on” to their absentee ballots because they needed money for food. Hudson Hallum instructed Carter to obtain money for the absentee voters from Kent Hallum. Hudson Hallum further told Carter that $20 to $40 was too much to pay for one vote, but that this amount was acceptable to pay for the votes of multiple members of a household. On that same date, Hudson Hallum also told Carter, “We need to use that black limo and buy a couple of cases of some cheap vodka and whiskey to get people to vote.” Two days later, Carter and Kent Hallum spoke with an individual in Memphis, Tennessee about getting a discounted price for the purchase of 100 half pints of vodka for the campaign.”
https://www.justice.gov/usao-edar/pr/former-state-representative-hudson-hallum-and-father-sentenced-conspiracy-commit
And there’s more from where that comes from. Unfortunately none dating after the election[s] of 2016.
If any find themselves wondering ‘Hmmm, I wonder why that is’?
Don’t ask me, I’ve been wondering about the same doggone thing.