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FLORIDA POLITICS
Since 2002, daily Florida political news and commentary

 

UPDATE: Every morning we review and individually digest Florida political news articles, editorials and punditry. Our sister site, FLA Politics was selected by Campaigns & Elections as one of only ten state blogs in the nation
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Welcome To Florida Politics

Thanks for visiting. On a semi-daily basis we scan Florida's major daily newspapers for significant Florida political news and punditry. We also review the editorial pages and political columnists/pundits for Florida political commentary. The papers we review include: the Miami Herald, Sun-Sentinel, Palm Beach Post, Naples News, Sarasota Herald Tribune, St Pete Times, Tampa Tribune, Orlando Sentinel, the Daytona Beach News-Journal, Tallahassee Democrat, and, occasionally, the Florida Times Union; we also review the political news blogs associated with these newspapers.

For each story, column, article or editorial we deem significant, we post at least the headline and link to the piece; the linked headline always appears in quotes. We quote the headline for two reasons: first, to allow researchers looking for the cited piece to find it (if the link has expired) by searching for the original title/headline via a commercial research service. Second, quotation of the original headline permits readers to appreciate the spin from the original piece, as opposed to our spin.

Not that we don't provide spin; we do, and plenty of it. Our perspective appears in post headlines, the subtitles within the post (in bold), and the excerpts from the linked stories we select to quote; we also occasionally provide other links and commentary about certain stories. While our bias should be immediately apparent to any reader, we nevertheless attempt to link to every article, column or editorial about Florida politics in every major online Florida newspaper.

 

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The Blog for Friday, June 10, 2005

Civil Rights Warrior?

    That's our Chain Gang Charlie, a grizzled civil rights warrior. How often does a GOoPer candidate get the opportunity to suck up to a GOoPer company like Diebold and get to pretend to be a civil rights activist to boot:
    The state Attorney General's Office confirmed Thursday that it is looking into Volusia County's rejection of controversial touch-screen voting machines -- devices aimed at allowing disabled voters to cast ballots independently.

    The interest from the office of Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist, a Republican gubernatorial candidate who has touted his commitment to protecting civil rights, marks the latest fallout from the County Council's vote this week against a contract with Diebold Elections Systems for 210 touch-screens.
    "Touch-screen 'no' on state's radar". The Daytona Beach News-Journal editorial board puts it in perspective:
    After full and fair hearings, the Volusia County Council voted 4-3 on Monday to reject a contract for nearly $800,000 to buy the voting machines from Diebold Election Systems. That put the council at odds with Supervisor of Elections Ann McFall, who recommended the purchase. At first, she threatened to sue the council but now says that's unlikely. But she contends that the council is trying to run her department.

    The council majority, however, was within its rights not to authorize what it considered a questionable contract. McFall as elections supervisor should be as conscientious.

    On several levels, the Diebold deal raised questions. The most critical is that the Diebold machines offered no foolproof mechanism for "voters to verify their votes on the ballot before the ballot is cast" -- as required by the 2002 federal voting rights act. Diebold does not offer paper verification, which is the only way now possible to ensure ballots are accurately cast. There have been too many instances nationwide over the past year in which touch-screen machines, including those manufactured by Diebold, have malfunctioned or misrecorded votes. Voters deserve a paper assurance of accuracy.

    Further, Florida's elections division, under Secretary of State Glenda Hood, maintains that counties can only purchase state-certified voting machines. It also contends that counties must buy voting machines designed for the disabled by July 1 -- six months earlier than the federal voting act requires. Yet Hood's office has certified only the Diebold touch-screen voting machine for disabled use -- despite the machine's critical missing element. Why the rush? Hood would have better served the public by asking the Legislature to require any voting machine to have a paper-verified record. She should also have asked for clarification of the July 1 deadline, which is a footnote to the election law.
    "Council wise to reject Diebold bid, look for options".

7:03 AM

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