There's a lot of reason to believe Zelaya is corrupt, and shouldn't be Honduras' president. But that means Honduras should impeach him, or convict and imprison him, removing him from office, if that's how their constitution works (which is what appears to to be the case).

Any government process that features the army forcing a president out on a plane in his pajamas is at least as unacceptable as a crooked election keeping one in power.

Nobody's saying electronic records can't be faked through physical access to the machines. You're the only one who seems surprised at that, in order to deny it should be surprising. Which is a straw man argument.

This story is important because it crossed the line from possible, to (evidently) actual. Which has consequences. Not the expected consequences of helping keep a president in power, but (even more notably) in helping to keep one ousted by a coup this past week out of power, boosting arguments of his corruption.

Next you'll be sarcastically moaning "oh, noes, presidents are corrupt". FYI: Yes, and when they are, the people need to be outraged about it, and get rid of them.

and the industry shills who have sold their conscience:

you can screw with paper ballots. but a lot less easily and a lot less slower and with a lot more effort and a lot easier to trace than the effort required to mess with electronic voting

simply for the sake of the integrity of democracy, electronic voting should NEVER happen, in ANY country

do you really need any convincing about what can happen to a country if a vote is put in doubt considering recent events?

not that iran used electronic voting, but imagine how much LESS forensic evidence there would be if iran ever lets anyone independently monitor the results

Its far easier for a 3rd party overwatching election committee to verify that the box is empty before the election, than to verify that the electronic election is actually reset, and the machines aren't tampered, and have no back doors, and so forth.

You may not have noticed this, but paper ballots are ... made of paper. And lots of ballots take up lots of space. They're heavy. They have to be disposed of. This takes time. People notice. There are witnesses. The amount of effort involved in altering or covering up the results of a fully computerized election is so much less than the amount of effort involved in altering or covering up the results of an election that uses paper ballots that the two aren't really comparable.

Of course paper ballots are no guarantee of an honest election. Nor is there any guarantee that locking your door will keep your house from being broken into. But an all-electronic election is like leaving your front door hanging wide open and putting a sign in your yard that says, "Come take stuff."

They avoided more serious bloodshed the way they did it. If this is a true fact, and he had remained "in power", he would have beern still able to order around a lot of the military forces who were loyal to him, plus cause mass demonstrations, etc and be able to coordinate it better. Because there is no way he would have gone along with getting impeached.

Even on the surface it was a blatant power grab by him, the entire issue was designed to turn him into el presidente for life. The congress there and the judges ALREADY had told him this wasn't proper nor legal, but he was going aherad with this "vote" scam regardless. So what makes you think he would have gone along with an impeachment? They were under the gun of making a time critical decision, and didn't off the guy or anything, just got him out before the situation got worse. If they hadn't already warned him about it that would be different, but they did warn him before the fact.

Ya, two sucky choices, but I think they chose the lesser of two suckages there.

But all of this is based on "if" and we just don't know the veracity of this latest revelation, but we do know about the power grab he was attempting, sort of like chavez making himself the president (basically and practically)for life "legally".

Term limits are a dang spiffy idea when it comes to politicians, no matter how popular they are, and changing the rules, like he wanted to do with this plebiscite, at the last second, is a serious mistake and transparently was just an effort to accrue more power under some umbrella of it legally happening. The people there had a right wing dictatorship like forever, and a lot of them could plainly see a left wing version now happening, and they just went "no you don't!".

That's how I have read these ongoing events anyway.

The main benefit of paper ballots are the many eyes and hands that the ballots and ballot boxes go through.

Think of it this way: the trademark images of the Iraqi elections a few years back were the inked thumb and the translucent ballot box. Neither are inherently secure, but the inked thumb made it more difficult for people to vote early and vote often without the risk of someone noticing it. Likewise, the translucent ballot boxes made it more difficult for the bins to be stuffed before hand without the risk of someone noticing it. Computers are so incredibly opaque that it is nearly impossible for someone to notice discreprancies without direct and intensive observations as well as a great deal of technical knowledge.

Now we all know that elections are fixed, even with pen and paper ballots. It is possible to pay off the right people so that they conveniently don't notice anything. Almost everyone else can be intimidated into not noticing anything. But, either way, more people will notice the discreprancies and people tend to have long memories about such things. So there is still a potential for them to remedy it.

So, If we'd only thought to use stealth bombers in Iraq, we wouldn't have needed six years of using pretty much all of our military to occupy a country the size of California with a smaller population?

We knew it was possible, nay probable, from the day these machines were first used. It's like me pointing to a dark cloud coming and saying "Gee, looks like it's going to rain." Why is it suddenly news when I finally get wet?

...when the populace was armed with muskets, and the government was armed with muskets.

Now the populace is armed with, at best, assault rifles, and the government is armed with tanks.

What really keeps the government in check is the right to join the military.

But.... why?

Paper ballots work better.

Not everyone has access to a computer or internet connection.

Paper ballots are cheaper.

Paper ballots are harder to forge.

Paper ballots /work now/, and work well.

Is it? Why?

If I'm capable of rigging an election electronically, I could be capable of covering my tracks.

> Eventually we would see the people voting on a daily basis on the projects they want.

That is the most stupid way to run anything ever known. Even worse than a dictatorship.
The Sheeple are not to be trusted.

As people are finding out as they look closer at Economics. Economics breaks down because it is based on ideal knowledge conditions. Even half baked knowledge conditions do not exist in most cases. Economics fails because purchase decisions are subject to information gaps and information war.

The same can be said of democracies. A function democracy relies on an active educated and wise voter base. Democracies fail because voters are lazy and stupid. Asking a wide population to become educated on all issues and to put aside prejudices and other characterizations and vote in a wise and informed manner is ridiculous. Democracy fails because voter decisions are subject to information gaps and information war as well as apathy and prejudices.

The tyranny of the majority is a problem. But no worse than the apathy and ignorance.

The congress and the supreme court tossed him from office when he violated the constitution. The Army just fulfilled their constitutional duty.

It would be no different than the US Senate convicting a President at trial, and the President refusing to leave office. At that point what the rest of the government is supposed to do is toss him, forcefully, if need be, although in the US it would probably be the Secret Service that did it.

Actually, the supreme court down there DID rule that he was in violation of the constitution and ordered and arrest warrant. The army then kicked him to the curb, rather than imprison him. Any way you look at it, legally, he should no longer be in power. Exile instead of imprisonment? He SHOULD be happy for that, but somehow the rest of the world is taking this opportunity to say something against military coups. Uh, rather than, maybe taking the chance when it's a coup against a leader that wasn't about to be arrested for violation of the constitution.

The US has a crazy system where they have "embraced" democracy beyond that which is practical. They vote for far to much. They vote for the local sheriff and the local dog catcher. There are pages and pages of things to vote on the US voting system. It is beyond ridiculous to expect any significant percentage of voters to become aware of all the positions that are voted on.

The US has embraced the idea of democracy but failed at the application due to an over application of the idea.
Not quite as bad as the USSR and communism.

But there's also this notion of due process / fair trial / etc.

According to Wikipedia, the Supreme Court issued a secret order for his detention and then he was forced out of the country by the military. That doesn't exactly sound like a fair trial.

You're thinking rationally and spewing facts again. He's the poster child of socialists and as such this is just a plot by conservatives in the US to overthrow the rightful ruler of a south american country.

I think I poked a hole in my cheek with that one.

Then everyone can check their vote

Unfortunately, so can their abusive spouse ("vote like this or I will beat you black and blue"), their abusive boss ("vote like this or I will sack you"), their local mafia boss ("vote like this or you will be wearing concrete shoes") and the local freemasons lodge ("vote like this or we will ruin your business")

apart from that though, I find your ideas intriguing.. do you have a newsletter?

Interesting how you state two things here with no proof. Nor are either of these in any of the articles and the only one who has said it was "unofficially supported by the US" has been Hugo Chavez. Further, US President Obama has condemned the coup. Oh, and it didn't say that they were voting machines, either.

> eVoting CAN and WILL happen.

It may come, but it will come over my cold dead body.

> ..every voter must have its own private key... [lots of useless tech details clipped]

The problem is with the tech. You, me and at least 10% of the nerds here on Slashdot could design an evoting system that would be technically perfect. And still spell the final death of our Republic because of the non-technical flaws that can't be fixed with tech.

Problem one. Take away the secret ballot (i.e. the voting booth) and it is 100% certain that vote buying, voter intimidation and many other evils will follow. No ballot cast over the Internet can be proven to be secret. Note that this defect exists with absentee and general mail in balloting as well. Mailed in absentee ballots generally don't decide elections and can be accepted as a compromise. General mail in elections are inherently corrupt.

Problem two. You will never design an electronic system that is 100% proof against fraud. It is doubtful one can be designed as resistant to fraud as paper ballot counted in the open with observers from all camps present.

> Voting could then be extended to government actions that currently skip the peoples' opinion.

You are describing Democracy. And the Founders were aware of this system of government and rightly rejected it as proven by history to be madness. We were instead given a Constitutional Republic. I have seen nothing to indicate the current government educated masses possess such an advanced level of civic virtue as to justify a reevaluation of their verdict on the subject.

Term limits for the country's leader are not rare. He attempted to call a referendum directly, when it is stated that he does not have the power to do that in the local constitution; the courts and the legislature refused to have such a referendum when asked. This is what makes it illegal - he does not legally have the power to call such a referendum.

Is it any surprise that he was ousted? And is it any surprise that the referendum never happened and yet the results are sitting on the servers?

The election was rigged per se.

Merely *holding* the election was illegal and in violation of the law. This was settled by law, and in courts.

This was not a "coup" by the lawful government, but rather the lawful government thwarting a coup by the president . . .

hawk

They don't. See "hondurascrisis.org" for details from a Honduran.

Wikipedia's article on the matter suggests that by even trying to hold the referendum, the constitution required that he was to be removed from office.

Again, according to the link above, the constitution does say that trying to change the length of the President's term (currently 4 years) is treason. Zelaya was trying to change the rules to allow for his re-election. So, technically, he was committing treason.

Now, for all those who call this a "coup", ask yourself what the Honduran authorities were supposed to do? You had a President committing treason, repeatedly ignoring the orders of the Supreme Court, and attempting to use the military to hold an illegal referendum. You don't have an impeachment process. Do you:

1: Put him in jail in Honduras? Possible, but then he's in a place where his supporters know where he is, which could lead to a mass assault in an attempt to free him. If that happens, hundreds of people could die, and incite a civil war.

2: Execute him. Obviously, a non-starter. It creates a martyr, and again the chance of civil war.

3: Exile him. Clearly the wisest choice. Get him out of the country, and away from his supporters, try to let the situation cool down, and get the facts out. The fact that CNN, the BBC, etc. are staunchly suppressing these facts, and dressing this up as a military coup says more about their agenda than it does their believability as objective news organizations.

One should of course take such breaking news reports with a grain of salt till confirmed, one could imagine this being some sort of misinterpretation of the observations (e.g. maybe those were early voting ballots??), Moreover this is hondouras.....as I'm sure other posters will talk about.

IN any case assuming the report is correct, it's critical contextual significance is thus:

One of the big strawmen often raised by folks in favor of electronic voting is that there is this supposed panacea called "parallel testing" that is touted as being an invincible process of detecting rigged machines. The idea is that at random a machine will be chosen before the elections begin and pulled out of service, then the election workers will cast pretend votes on it all day long. then it's output checked for accuracy. This is called "parallel" testing because it's done in a time period parallel to a real election, supposedly to "fool" any date dependent software. It's not an awful idea and would indeed detect some kinds of naive electronic fraud. But the idea that this is remotely a solution is even more naive.

Moreover, said proponents don't actually ever do this--- it's just a thought experiment. The real reason for that strawman argument is not that people would actually would do it, it's that since you could in principle do it, this keeps that bad guys at bay. Ha Ha Ha.

So it's such a terrible irony then that the very first time in history that, effectively a different kind of parallel test did occur, that yep massive machine rigging is found!

the parallel test in this case is: call an election. cancel it unexpectedly at the last possible second and impound the machines, test them for rigging.

Fuck Zelaya, and all the leftist leaders upset by this, including Obama, Chavez, and Castro.

Honduras proved they have a set of balls and aren't going to get pushed around by communists. More power to them.

They did the right thing, just wish they had thrown Zelaya in jail for the rest of his life rather than exile him.

You've got it a little mixed up. When we vote for President (and we do vote for president, just not completely directly) we are voting for the makeup of the electoral college. This in no way depends on the -vote- for the house of representatives. The number of representatives to the electoral college that a state recieves depends only on the number of representatives that state has in congress - which is their house of rep + two senators. The minimum is three, there is no maximum but it is around 130 or so, I forget how many representatives california has.

How a state votes in its electoral college members is up to the state, but it is always determined in a way that is linked to a vote of the people at some level. A state could, for example, have the electoral college members be chosen by the state legislature if they wanted. In reality the way it is set up for most states is parties register to the election officials who they will be supporting, and that presidential candidate is put on the ballot. The party who's candidate who gets the most votes then gets to choose who the delegates will be for the electoral college, and the electoral college votes for president. Some states actually split the vote, and each party sends the number of delegates equal to the percentage of the vote they recieved. As far as I know no state deviates from the format any further than this.

Either way, elections are held for president every four years, no matter what system is used. That have made it convenient and use a system that technically is not a direct vote for president does not change the fact that, for all except borderline cases we do, in a practical sense, vote directly for president.

When claims of "treason" interfere with liberty, treason should be redefined more narrowly.

Far better, I agree, that Honduras amend their constitution to include an impeachment process. But seriously, isn't "high crimes and misdemeanours" pretty wide in itself?

Or, as Churchill put it quite succinctly: "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried."

In the real world we have to deal with imperfections. We can't have perfect efficiency in anything, including government. You have to find the balance that works the best. You can't demand perfection because you won't get it and refusing any solution less than perfect means you get NO solution.

(1) When the populace was armed with muskets, the government was armed with artillery cannons, war ships, and every advantage of an experienced and well-trained army. Things are never equitable for revolutionaries, but then their terms for victory do not usually require annihilation of their oppressors, just to make continued oppression an increasingly expensive proposition.

(2) Assault rifles may be ineffective against tanks, but tanks are also ineffective against people with assault rifles. Tanks are very good against infrastructure but in a civil war there is some rather significant overlap between what you consider their infrastructure and what you consider your own infrastructure. Not to mention that if you are transitioning from a democracy or otherwise generally free state your grab at power is going to be quite tenuous if you are not highly discriminate in your retaliation.

(3) Given a little time civilians have many options for responding to tanks. IEDs are quite simple to make, and they may be able to hijack military supplies or find external allies. Look how effective the Afghanis were against the Soviet tanks. Guns, on the other hand, are much more difficult to fabricate, and if already supplied that leaves the civilians with that much more resource to focus elsewhere.

Assuming we're talking about America, the military already has a heavy ideological slant, which is the big reason the counting of military ballots is often a contentious election issue (with the party that is not favored keen on any technicalities which could disqualify those ballots). Of course, I do not see the present ideological slant as representing the slightest danger of empowering a dictator, but the point is that even with the "right to join the military," you do not ensure that the military will have an equitable political makeup. Also, there is no formal "right" to join the military, so even if it's fairly open at present, that could change with time.

That's an odd way of describing the Sho'ah.

Rather than ask you to substantiate your claims that the US government is actually supporting all those dictators you mentioned (which I don't think you can reasonably do), I'm going to ask you this: how is this different from the dictators the US government has always supported (or installed)? Really, your government has a long long history of getting into bed with dictators and fascists. Pot, meet kettle.

By that definition everything short of Anarchy is evil.

Parents as a form of governance over their children is evil and children should have free reign to do completely as they please.

What is "yours" is only what is "yours" by government protection and social contract. There is nothing which says my TV is mine. It has no intrinsic ownership beyond what I can defend. As a member of society I get society's protection of what I can reasonably defend as mine. Without government what is mine is only what I can defend personally, pay someone to defend or threaten into defending.

It's a strong government when can enforce contracts. It's a strong government which can keep the people from deciding that you've received an unfair portion of resources. It's a strong government which enables wealth.

If you want complete freedom from government intervention then you also have to learn to live with the fact that there are is no definition of ownership.

Evil is allowing those around you to suffer and die while others live in excess. Evil is manipulating a system in order to economically subjugate those without as much money through your influence.

Communism is Evil. Capitalism is Evil. Socialism is Evil. Anarchy is Evil. Everything is evil. Some things are just more obviously evil. Nobody gets to take the high road.

The United States supported Stalin. He killed more Jews than Hitler. Is the US evil? Nobody is blameless. To admit that isn't weakness it's reality.

And it was a good rationale...when the populace was armed with muskets, and the government was armed with muskets.

Actually, at the time the population was armed with accurate-at-a-distance RIFLES (compared to the Brits' smoothbores), cannon, warships (merchant ships often carried cannon to fend off pirates and military ships of other countries).

Which doesn't really matter. Because you can't stop a bullet with a bigger bullet.

The "liberator" pistol was a one-shot (and unscrew parts to reload) "zip gun". Made mostly of cheap stamped parts at a cost of under $10 it was air dropped by the thousands into German occupied areas in WW II. It came with a handgrip full of extra rounds and an instruction manual in comic book form:
  - Here's how to load and fire it.
  - Sneak up on the German soldier.
  - Shoot him point-blank.
  - Take HIS rifle and ammo.
  - Give the Liberator and the remaining rounds to another resistance fighter who doesn't have a gun yet.

Now the populace is armed with, at best, assault rifles, and the government is armed with tanks.

Tanks without infantry support are cans of soldiers waiting to be cooked. Tanks WITH infantry support are crowds of soldiers waiting to be shot, blown up, burned, gassed, ...

A good varmint gun qualifies as an exceptional sniper rifle. A shotgun at appropriate ranges is more firepower against advancing troops - though for a shorter time - than a machine gun.

But if the US government came against its own people you can bet that a bunch of 'em will honor their oaths to the constitution over orders. Think large-scale desertion and coat-turning WITH equipment. Opening of the armories for the population. Lots of ex-military, reserve, and state militia types (with THEIR armories full of stuff - including the tanks you're so concerned about) will be out on a constitutional side, too.

A determined population armed with a few guns can eventually prevail. (Even with a VERY few VERY low power guns they can do quite well. The starving denizens of the Warsaw Ghetto held off the bulk of the German Army for better than a week starting with a dozen handguns and sporting rifles.)

As to capabilities: The typical private gun owner who practices occasionally can shoot rings around the typical non-SWAT policeman.

The Second Amendment isn't just about making it possible for the people to resist the tyranny that the founders thought any government would gravitate toward. It's to make the population's advantage SO OVERWHELMING that no government official could delude himself that he might be able to win.

actually, while it is true that the US has condemned the coup, the US' State Dept. personnel in Latin America often seem to operate with a mind of its own. It is possible that there was a difference of opinion with the people on the ground and Washington. Many of the people in Latin America came to their jobs in the waning days of the Cold War and considered their mission to contain and prevent another Nicaragua/Cuba or the victory of the Guatemala and Salvadorean guerilla (of course, Chavez is the new Devil and he has been used effectively to mobilize opposition against many of the "new left" governments in the region. For many of the US State Dept. personnel, and for much of the Honduran elite, they are still fighting against communism (now reincarnated in Chavez) and believe that having a strong tie with the military and the "trustworthy" business elite is the best way to prevent this from happening. I would not be surprised if in the corridors of the different embassies and at Foggy Bottom the comments are along the lines of "Obama is new to this, soon he will realize who are the real friends of the US..."

... peculiarly, the Honduran Constitution does not include an impeachment procedure

But it does specify that anyone who advocates or takes steps to modify the portion of the constitution immediately loses any government office he holds and is banned from holding a government office for ten years.

This is what Zelaya did. The head of his party called for his ouster and the Supreme Court ruled that he was in violation of this section and no longer the President.

Even if the steps weren't explicitly laid out in advance this sounds like a constitutional impeachment procedure to me.

What if a US president is impeached, but refuses to leave office?

"The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other High crimes and misdemeanors."

Clearly he or she "Shall be removed from Office".

Of course, it doesn't really say:

a) Removed from office by whom EXACTLY?
b) What if they refuse to leave?
c) What if they have support from the group named in part a) above?

Its scary how rapidly you end up with a revolution or coup as the only alternative. Bottom line, if the president decides he's not going to step down, it gets ugly fast. (Because if he thinks he can get away with it, he's probably got someone backing the play... like a big chunk of the armed forces.

"On his own" except for a large backing from the populace.

I don't know if their constitution has an impeachment mechanism either, but I do know that any body of law that puts itself beyond even a supermajority vote is an anti-democratic tyranny.

Chavez never declared himself "president for life" and neither was Zelaya trying to. Chavez, like Zelaya, used the democratic process to change the constitution to remove a term limit, just like many other countries also lack term limits for presidencies. You do not for instance call Nicolas Sarkozy a "president for life", not Gordon Brown nor Angela Merkel, etc..

Why is this clear to 90% of the latin american population, but not to "western" audiences? Could it perhaps be that western mainstream news media provide you with a picture slanted towards "western corporate interests" that are not too happy with the sudden end of the plundering opportunities in latin america?

Note that the previous time left wing governments democratically came to power in Latin America, the US response was swift and clear. And their "solution" I wouldn't exactly call democratic. Latin American people have a vivid recollection of this, it would help if you had too.