Vote Flipping in Davidson County, Tennessee

This political season, more than any other in recent memory, is irony-filled. So why this incident involving my friend and the wife of UNCOUNTED filmmaker, David Earnhardt, (as reported by David) surprises me, I can’t tell you.

My wife, Patricia Earnhardt, had an early voting experience here in Nashville, Tennessee, where she saw her vote momentarily flip from Barack Obama to Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney. She voted on a touch-screen paperless machine. Here is her story:

“A poll worker directed me to a touch screen voting machine & instructed me how to use it. I touched “Obama” for president & nothing lit up. I touched 2 or 3 more times & still nothing lit up. I called the poll worker back over to tell him I was having a problem. He said I just needed to touch it more lightly. I tried it 2 or 3 more times more lightly with the poll worker watching & still nothing lit up. The poll worker then touched it for me twice — nothing lit up. The third time he touched the Obama button, the Cynthia McKinney space lit up! The McKinney button was located five rows below the Obama button. The poll worker just kind of laughed and cancelled the vote. He hit the Obama button again & it finally lit up. I continued on to cast the rest of my votes. After completing the process & reviewing my votes, I went to the VOTE page, hit the VOTE button & nothing happened. Again after several tries, I called the poll worker over & he finally got the machine to register my votes. Hurray — I voted! — or did I? I left the polling place feeling uncertain.” Patricia Earnhardt - Friday, Oct. 17 - Howard School Building - Nashville, Tennessee

I also had similar problems with the machine I was voting on that same day, although no vote flipping. I would touch the screen numerous times before I could get my various candidate choices to light up. It was strange and very frustrating. When I finally got through my slate of candidate choices, I could not get the VOTE button to light up when I touched it. I finally called over a poll worker and he told me that I needed to touch lightly. I touched the VOTE button more lightly, but was only able to get it to work after several more failed attempts.

David Earnhardt
Producer/director/writer, “Uncounted”
www.UncountedTheMovie.com

Need more sad irony? The machines David and Patricia voted on in Davidson County, TN - ES&S iVotronic - are the same machines used in the West Virginia counties ( Putnam & Jackson) where vote flipping is also being reported. (Go to the election info page on the state of Tennessee and click on Davidson County. Or download this PDF.)

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Please, if you experience anything unusual, stay at your polling place, ask to speak with the supervisor, call the election commission (they will have the number), and insist that the machine be quarantined until it can be examined.

UNCOUNTED Clip of the Week: It Ain't Heavy, It's My Election

In response to the 2004 electronic voting machine debacle, hundreds of locally-based Election Integrity groups were formed in cities across the country by brave patriots who knew they could no longer trust our electoral system. The formation of these groups – and accompanying journalists, bloggers, activists, filmmakers, and writers - was grass roots citizen vigilance at its finest.
Read the Full Story and Watch the Clip "Voter Fraud": Zero to 60 in 3.5 Seconds
Election Reform Needs Media Reform. Thank you, Mark Crispin Miller, for succinctly writing what I have been fuming about all day. In an introduction to an incredible piece in OpEdNews called, " The False Narrative of 'Voter Fraud,'" by Kenneth Anderson, Mark writes: “Amen, amen. And what it makes entirely clear is that we need not just election reform (and campaign finance reform), but also sweeping media reform.”.

This whole thing about McCain grabbing the moral high-ground on the Election Integrity issue by hopping on the “voter fraud” bandwagon is really getting my goat.…Election Integrity activists and independent journalists have been trying to get the media and the punditocracy to talk about this issue for FOUR YEARS and yet it only takes 3.5 seconds for "ACORN" and "voter fraud" to be on everyone’s lips? Really?!? At this point you have to ask yourself, "Why IS that?" and "HOW is that?"

WHAT YOU CAN DO: Spread the truth about ACORN far and wide. Refute "voter fraud" with real stories of "voter suppression" to everyone you know. And watch Mark Crispin Miller's appearance on PBS's Bill Moyers Journal.

Read the Rest of the Story and Excerpts from "The False Narrative of 'Voter Fraud.'" Send Lawyers, Phones, and Money The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and its Election Protection coalition partners are recruiting legal volunteers to staff Election Protection Hotlines across the country and work on the ground as mobile legal volunteers. Read the Full Story ACORN: Responsible for Stolen Elections, the Mortgage Crisis, the Firing of David Iglesias, and That Insidious Growth on Your Big Toe One of the four statements in the title of this post is not like the others in that it is, you know, true.

ACORN. You thought they were a community-based organization of 400,000 families in neighborhoods across the country fighting for the rights of the oppressed and powerless. You thought they were empowering citizens by registering over 1.3 million low-income, minority, and young voters in a total of 21 states. You thought they have been fighting for years against predatory lending practices.

Read the Full Story Mary Mancini
Co-producer, UNCOUNTED
www.uncountedthemovie.com

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