Let's Get Real!

In my last post I reiterated some of examples of the Medieval thinking and ignorance that persist in modern times, by supposedly intelligent people. Were it only in these regards (Big Bang, Time Travel, and the Zero Dilemma) that brain space and time were wasted, there wouldn't be very much to worry about, but these are only the least examples of the backward thinking that hobbles peoples' minds. Like sheep they are led along the paths laid out by the twin authoritarianisms, politics and religion, which have so come to resemble one another that it becomes harder to tell them apart. Organized religion seeks to keep the spirit bound to its toxic agenda, while politics does the same thing in more secular ways. Both keep mankind living in the past while they strive to imprison us in the present. The subject this time is elections.

Who elects the president? Surely it isn't the people that he (or she, maybe someday) pledges to serve. The presidential elections of 2000 and 2004 were travesties. Bush was appointed to office by the Supreme Court after Katherine Harris ordered the recount of the controversial Florida vote to stop. So the Oval Office was handed over to this criminal misfit by six people, Harris and five justices (a misnomer if ever there was one). There is no need to go into the crimes that this administration is guilty of, they are too well known by those not too frightened or stupid to face facts. It's time to put a stop to this imperialist nonsense and face one glaring fact: that our election system is woefully inadequate, prone to corruption, highly inefficient, and far more expensive than it need be. The answer?

The Internet, of course! All forms of commerce are regularly transacted on the Net; people buy and sell things, bank records are accessed and transactions performed with complete safety, bills are paid remotely, all on secured sites. Why not elections?

Computers are everywhere: anyone can gain access given enough time. And that brings up another question; why an election day, why not an election week? That way anyone who doesn't own a computer could go to their public library, school, or other facility, and vote. Here's how it would work;

Every American citizen has a Social Security number and the Social Security Administration has all the records on computer. It would be simple enough to build a pointer file consisting of a person's name and Social Security Number. Records in this file would be accessed only by the number and the file would return the person's name, solely for confirmation: the name and number match. Once the match has been established the person's full record would be accessed but not displayed. From this hidden record data would be read to ascertain the person's current address, city, state, and zip- and area codes. These data would be used to ensure that the proper input screens are pulled up for each level of candidacy. These screens would show the names of every candidate for every office; national, state, and local, currently being filled. If it's a presidential election year the screen showing the names of the candidates would be displayed first; if it's a mid-term election it wouldn't appear. Only active elections would be operational.

If a Senate seat is involved, the 'state' field in the hidden record would bring up the correct screen showing the candidates for that particular seat. The voter would only need to click on the button next to the name of their choice and to continue. The zip code would identify the Congressional District, bringing up the proper screen displaying the candidates for the House of Representatives. Gubernatorial elections would be handled the same way. Click, Enter, go on to the next screen. The candidates' screens would be arranged in a top-down sequence, and local elections could be covered as well. The 'city' field would access the correct screen for a particular mayoral election and any other city-wide office (dog catcher) and would cover county-wide elections as well. The information in the hidden record would have all the necessary data to correctly identify the candidates in every race.

After every screen has been operated upon, a final screen would appear showing the complete record of votes cast. This could be printed out for further reference. If the voter finds an error on this final screen, he or she can click on the line and bring up the proper screen to be re-entered: this should not happen, but...

Now the process has been completed. The voter sign off. When this happens the pointer file record will be erased, no longer accessible: one person, one vote.

As with anything, problems may arise. If the Social Security number brings up the wrong name, or no record is found, the first screen would show an 800-number that the person could call to report the anomaly and have it corrected. The operators at this number would have access to the hidden record for verification purposes in the event that someone has already accessed that account and placed a fraudulent entry. Upon verification of the caller's identity, the bogus vote would be erased and the pointer file record reactivated.

There is no reason this system could not be implimented: the technology exists. I personally have been programming computers since 1975 - not only do I know it can be done, I'd be happy to write the system myself! While the system would seem labor intensive, this problem could be addressed by assembling a shared file with all the screen templates stored there for access by local officials who would enter the proper locus identifiers and candidates' names.

It is, after all, the 21st Century.