Quietly in the background of the news, recently, the state government in Rhode Island has been moving forward with plans to update voting machines:

Raimondo says the new machines will make voting easier and will make sure every vote gets counted.

“Fifty years ago today, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act, allowing everyone to exercise their right to vote in the United States without racial discrimination,” said Raimondo. “This anniversary reminds us that voting is a fundamental right that should be protected. The content of this bill continues to move Rhode Island into the 21st century by allowing the Secretary of State to purchase new voting equipment that has not been replaced in decades.”

Frankly, I’m suspicious of the whole enterprise.  When I was a carpenter, I used tools that were centuries or millennia old.  The hammer, for example, has certainly improved, but its basic design hasn’t changed all that much in about five hundred years.  If a tool works well, there’s no need to change it.

Any new voting equipment that the state approves must produce a paper copy that the voter can verify for him or herself.  The counting of ballots is subject to much doubt about cheating, and there’s no way the electoral system can have integrity if it is entirely digital.

(Via RI Taxpayer Times email)