So, will this American election ever end? Or are we about to witness an endless series of vote recounts?
Green Party leader Jill Stein, who some say is partially responsible for Hillary Clinton not winning the presidency, is raising cash for vote recounts in three states: Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. And at least one of those recounts will proceed, in Wisconsin, with the other two more than likely to proceed. And the Democrats are now saying they will be onboard for the recount process.
The reason: Because Stein and others feel that voting machines could have been hacked in states that use electronic voting machines, thus altering the legitimate results and denying Clinton of a victory.
Says David Cobb, Stein’s campaign manager, in a report on The Hill site: “It’s been proven that hacking occurred during this election cycle,” Cobb said, alluding to cyber attacks on the emails of Hillary Clinton’s campaign manager, John Podesta, the Democratic National Committee and several state election computers. “We do not have any knowledge that a hack took place, but if it can be done, we want to investigate it to see if it was done and if the systems in these states were hacked, to what extent did they alter the results in these states.”
More from The Hill article: (Cobb) cited J. Alex Halderman, University of Michigan professor of Computer Science and Engineering, for the possibility hacks in voting machines can occur. In a blog post defending his call for a Michigan recount, Halderman wrote: “We’ve been pointing out for years that voting machines are computers, and they have reprogrammable software, so if attackers can modify that software by infecting the machines with malware, they can cause the machines to give any answer whatsoever. I’ve demonstrated this in the laboratory with real voting machines — in just a few seconds, anyone can install vote-stealing malware on those machines that silently alters the electronic records of every vote.”
So, I’m not expert on computer hacking, but I am very suspicious about the recount process: What’s to say electronic voting machines haven’t been hacked in the last week or so to make it look like there was a hack on Nov. 8? What’s to say they won’t be hacked or altered during the recount process, i.e. once they are booted back up.
How can we trust the recount process? How do we know for sure that Jill Stein, the Democrats and others aren’t conspiring to fraudulently change the results of the presidential race?
And if they don’t find evidence of computer hacking, how can we be sure there wasn’t any? Could it be possible that the hackers were so good that no one will ever be able to tell they altered the course of history?
And, finally, if they do find evidence of fraud and oust Trump from the White House, will his side then order another vote recount in an attempt to prove Stein and company fraudulently altered the results?
Jill Stein and friends are leading America down yet another rabbit hole, and the whole thing is becoming the maddest tea party the world has ever seen — in real time.
— Jillian
Photo credit: Jill Stein, Green Party candidate for U.S. president, at a campaign stop at Metro Community College in Omaha, Neb., on Sept. 7, 2016. (Matt A.J./Wikimedia Commons)
Jillian Page 
ALOHA: “…Green Party leader Jill Stein, who some say is partially responsible for Hillary Clinton not winning the presidency …” …. WHAT an ignorant comment!!….. WHO is saying this?…. there was not a single state where if ALL of the JILL STEIN voters had voted for HRC she would have won!…. This must be coming from the Macedonian fake news sites! HRC lost because HRC lost!… plus the “electoral college” system in electing the POTUS in the U.S. of A.! currently HRC has TWO MILLION more votes total!….. in most western democracies, there are multiple parties. in addition, millions of voters were NOT racist, bigoted, xenophobic, misogynist, which Grump was. They were just fed up with “business as usual” in the federal government and were willing to destroy everything to get rid of the status quo. If the U.S. had ranked choice voting/instant runoff voting and/or preferential voting, then people could vote for their preferred candidate and if they did not gain enough votes, their vote would then go to their second choice. It is about time individuals who do not have a clue about amerikan politics stop accusing people who want to vote FOR a candidate rather than the lesser of two evils, have that option……. ’nuff already!
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I understand what you are saying, but you are not addressing the questions I asked: How can we be sure the recount process will not be fraudulent?
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ALOHA JILLIAN:…… no, i did NOT “address your question”…… because we CAN’T!….. who is to say anything about anything?…. how do you know what you eat?…. how do you know anything?….. we live in a world of beliefs and trust…. you trust your friends and lovers and then someone lets you down…… all of these right-wing christian extremists believe in a fantasy and they believe it!…. as the good ‘ole grateful dead say:…. “…. believe it if you need it; if you don’t just pass it on…… “….. there is an article which says 300,000 voters were turned away in wisconsin because they did not have the correct voter ID’s…. a new law was recently imposed!….. in florida, thousands of elderly, people of color and minorities were unable to obtain the necessary documents… WHO do you think a majority would have voted for?….in north carolina the early voting locations and amount of time was cut in a third from previous years…. who won all three states?…. no, we do not know anything; we live in a world of “trust” ……. and millions of american voters “trust” that grump will deliver his rhetorical claims…. we shall see…..
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Apparently, the White House and other authorities are saying there is no evidence that anyone hacked the electronic voting machines in the states involved. So, it seems suspicious that they would go ahead and do a recount, anyway.
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ALOHA JILLIAN:…. of COURSE they [the authorities & the WH] would say that!…. the history of the U.S. of A. is that we find out “truth” years after the fact!…. there was NO “attack” in the gulf of tokin in 1965; yet LBJ used that as an excuse to expand the vietnam war…. the u.s. of a. was NOT bombing laos nor cambodia… then we find out years later that nixon was indeed illegally bombing them…. GWbush said iraq had weapons of mass destruction…. so “we” attacked iraq in 2002 and the u.s. of a. is STILL there! …. FDR would not allow jews from europe entry into the u.s. of a….. so they got sent back to germany to get gassed and annihilated….. here is a more RECENT example exactly about voter recounting: …. “In 2004, Greens led investigations and recounts in Ohio and New Mexico in the wake of widespread complaints about disqualification and obstruction of legitimate voters, mostly in majority-black precincts, and tampering with computer voting machines on Election Day.
Democrats, led by nominee John Kerry, were silent in response to complaints and indications that the GOP might have stolen the presidential election. An exception was Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.), who held hearings on the Ohio election theft and published “What Went Wrong in Ohio.” A few local Dems in Ohio spoke up too.
The investigation uncovered evidence that led to the conviction of two Republican operatives in Cuyahoga County, greater caution in many states regarding computer voting, and the decision in some states not to use Diebold machines in future elections.”
aloha from the north shore of maui……
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Any citizen who wants to pay for it can ask for a recount. The application has to come before deadlines that vary by state.
Different states use different voting machines. Most use a paper ballot that is scanned into a machine at the polling place. Others have a paper tape that records the vote when it occurs. A few still have no paper to recount, which should be illegal.
I don’t know what kind of ballot machines the contested states have, but the fairness of a recount is protected by inviting representatives from all parties to observe the count process. (This is how Hillary Clinton’s campaign team is involved- as observers). Each paper ballot is visually looked at by a human and an observer from a different political party- not the machine. The vote in the challenged race is tallied by both. This eliminates machine errors that can occur if the mark on the ballot is unclear, and why two sets of eyeballs look at each one. The parties can also provide volunteers to assist the count.
One county, at least, already reported more ballots than registered voters. This can happen when a poll worker feeds the machine with bogus ballots. (And in almost every case of this, it’s been a Republican).
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So then, how could these machines be hacked, as Jill Stein and others feel is a possibility. I’ve heard the word “Russia” suggested in connection with all this. Could a foreign country somehow hack into electronic voting machines and change the software in favour of Trump?
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The machines are never connected to the internet, or each other. Every precinct is counted separately. That is the best guarantee against widespread hacking of the vote. Hackers *may* be able to infiltrate individual machines during their set-up or maintenance, but other than the precinct the machines are in, swinging a vote would be an extraordinary event. To alter enough machines in a state to swing an election would be a conspiracy so massive and involving so many local officials that proof of fraud would be pretty obvious.
There have been a few instances of voter fraud this year, and every one of them was by a Republican. The biggest joke is one Trump supporter who wanted to prove that voter fraud was possible. His trial begins in a few weeks.
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Interesting. I wonder why Stein thinks there is a possibility of hacking, then.
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