Dear Sir,

I have followed the discussions about voting machines and their use as they occurred before, during and after the 2004 election. As your recent article suggests they make a considerable contribution to the uncertainties raised in the last two presidential elections. It seems that there is no incentive with the current manufacturers to provide proof of performance.

I have no technical knowledge about the subject and as I am not an American I have no real idea about the voting procedures in your country.

I have the impression that several makes of voting machines are involved.

Ever since the 2004 election I have been wondering if there are people with technical knowledge to design and test a prototype of a satisfactory voting machine among those who believe that the present situation is fraught with problems.

SAN DIEGO -- As that great American, Deep Throat, never said, "Follow the money." (The line is by William Goldman, who wrote the movie, "All the President's Men"). Keeping your eye on the shell with the pea under it is not easy when the right-wing echo chamber continually takes up new chapters in the culture wars -- the dread case of the senator who didn't, in fact, say the United States is as bad as the late Soviet Union and the equally grave perennial constitutional amendment to prevent the menace of flag desecration.

Meanwhile, largely unnoticed and unreported, the drumbeat of giveaways to big corporations continues: unnecessary tax breaks for the undeserving, more green lights for the rampant exploitation of the environment, and all manner of theft and skullduggery.

Seriously, this administration is starting to look like that old television show in which contestants lined up their shopping carts in a grocery store and, on the signal, began running around throwing every valuable item they could find in their carts. Whoever grabbed the most high-priced items won. The contestants here and now are corporations and lobbyists.

The Ohio Senate Rules Committee is currently holding hearings to consider H.B. 3 - the election reform omnibus bill. This will not solve the problems witnessed in Ohio's elections last November. Legislation that requires all voters to show photo identification is misguided and will do more to disenfranchise legitimate voters than it ever will to curb "fraud". S.B. 36 needs to be defeated.

H.B. 3 contains language that would put barriers in the way of voters. There are glaring omissions in the bill and it fails to address several key OH election problems - such as a lack of notification of former felons when their voting rights have been restored, simply put, H.B. 3 does not go far enough to protect the voting rights of Ohioans and should not be passed in its current form. The Rules Committee is currently making decisions that affect all Ohio voters. You can help stop these bills by making two calls today! Please call Rules Committee Chairman Bill Harris as well as your own senator and tell them:
A) Vote NO to S.B. 36! Photo identification requirements harm Ohio voters.

It’s bad enough that the Bush administration had so little international support for the Iraqi war that their “coalition of the willing” meant the U.S., Britain, and the equivalent of a child’s imaginary friends. It’s even worse that, as the British Downing Street memo confirms, they had so little evidence of real threats that they knew from the start that they were going to have manufacture excuses to go to war. What’s more damning still is that they effectively began this war even before the congressional vote.