International Election Observers Arrive in Georgia

International election observers have been in Georgia since last Saturday investigating the state of Georgia's elections. They held an open forum on Monday evening which was wonderful. No one spoke in favor of electronic voting and everyone spoke wonderfully of their fears about these machines. Heather Grey (WRFG radio) and Tom Baxter (AJC) moderated and speakers included Laughlin McDonald of the Georgia ACLU, Senator Harp, Hugh Esco of the Georgia Green Party and many activists and citizens. We filled the room and the entire 2 hours.

The observers went to KSU today to visit the Election Center there, and at our request, asked them about voting machines (14-19) which were stolen in a burglary in June 2002. Our worst fears were confirmed that these machines have been in the wild since then, GEMS servers, Touchscreens and Optical Scanners. They were stolen from a Ramada Inn in Macon, Georgia after the system was set up for poll manager training.

KSU's response was that "they were probably kids who threw the machines in the river when they found out what they were."

Sadly, our officials never made an attempt to LOCATE the machines and make no effort to determine if they are being used in a basement somewhere to subvert our elections. I didn't get the impression they dragged the river, either

The dangers of a GEMS tabulating unit sitting in a basement somewhere, undetected and undetectable to the "legitimate" election system, cannot be stressed enough. However, our elections officials have never even reported them missing to the state agency responsible for recovering them.

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