Voters Beware

I would like to think that this sort of thing doesn't happen in our State, but then you hear of stuff like this. A hat tip to Paul Valone of the GRNC for bringing it to my attention.

A Craven County voter says he had a near miss at the polls on Thursday when an electronic voting machine completed his straight-party ticket for the opposite of what he intended.

Sam Laughinghouse of New Bern said he pushed the button to vote Republican in all races, but the voting machine screen displayed a ballot with all Democrats checked. He cleared the screen and tried again with the same result, he said. Then he asked for and received help from election staff.

This sounds hauntingly similar to what occurred in Texas earlier this week. There, a voter noticed that as soon as he voted for Governor Rick Perry, the machine would change the vote to the Green party candidate, then fill in all the Green party candidates down ballot.

He has become suspicious of voter fraud because of news reports he has heard. He would prefer voting machines to display an error message when they need to be calibrated, as opposed to completing ballots for the opposite party, he said.

“I’m all for our country and we know there has been voter fraud before and it continues even today,” Laughinghouse said. “So you get suspicious when something like this happens.”

Update:  More on the incident can be found at Investor's Business Daily. The article also refers to a case in Nevada where a voter who was going to vote for Sharon Angle found the ballot already checked for Harry Reid.

One wonders if all these machines are made by the same firm?

Update 2: The Liberty Sphere has good summation of the various reports of voter fraud around the country. As the Welshman points out, all of these vote machine "glitches" seem to redound to the benefit of...wait for it...Democrats. Does that sound "random" to you? Then we find out that the workers servicing the machines are...wait for it again...SEIU members. Well, golly gee. What can go wrong here. If candidates could be prosecuted for this stuff as well as the perpetrators, such fraud would die down in a hurry.

Beware as you go out to vote. Be alert, and don't cast you ballot until you are sure what you are getting.