Re: <nettime> Democracy divided by Corporations = US Elections

[joseph rabie <joe@overmydeadbody.org>]

>
>
>>Anyone interested in expressions of democracy and computers may find this
>>thorough overview very interesting. The facts and figures have
>>been bouncing
>>around for awhile in different features, but The Independent,
>>today, finally
>>put many of them together on the front page online -- as the computerized
>>revolution of US democracy. One of the more astonishing facts is that the
>>voting systems and software solutions are protected by trade secrecy acts,
>>making independent review and checking, well, a felony. And there are, in
>>many cases, no paper trails or verifiable back ups. Anyone who has ever
>>written a single line of logical code to run on an insecure computer would
>>question the checks and balances -- and many computer scientists are doing
>>just that, loudly. One line of audited code, lifted from an open FTP site
>>used to distribute a patch for the deeply flawed Diebold (one of
>>three major
>>players) software, included an inexplicable instruction to divide
>>the number
>>of votes by 1. You do the math for 2004.
>>
>>    
>>
I find this frightening, not neccesarily (or only) for the reasons 
invoked in the article, concerning security, etc.

The fact that trade secrecy acts are given precedence over the 
safeguarding of the democratic process, means that the rights and 
privileges of corporations come before the rights of the people. Big 
business has succeeded its quiet revolution to win control over society. 
The people are reduced to being docile consumers, and there wellbeing - 
or the wellbeing of certain classes vs the illbeing of others - is no 
longer the subject of a social contract, instead it is the subject of a 
business plan determining a client base calibrated for maximum profit.

Joe
http://www.overmydeadbody.org


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