Kathy Dent's Feels Blue

Sarasota County Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent had numerous problems with undervotes during the 2006 election. The Christine Jenning/Vern Buchanan recount became a national news story. Election Systems & Software warned Dent about machine problems. Both Dent and ES & S swore there were no machine irregularities. That was until the letter the ES & S letter to Dent became public.

Dent is once again having voting machine problems. Brad Friedman reports Diebold/Premier optical-scan system will not read ballots with blue ink. Dent could move to replace the Diebold/Premier machines. Instead she requires every precinct have black pens. Friedman points out the error of Denr's ways.

Since the state now requires paper ballots, Dent chose to install the newest Diebold/Premier optical-scan systems, the ones that don't read blue ink properly, despite the fact that they had not been federally tested or certified for use at the time. Florida does not require federal certification tests for voting systems before using them.

As I said before, Republicans heart Diebold.