Contributed by Doug Ferguson
Are we now being led by third-world rulers? That was the gist of the headline above award-winning author/lawyer and commentator Joel B. Pollak’s recent article. He listed nine reasons why he believes the new Biden Administration is off to doing exactly that.
Looking at the huge stack of executive orders that our new president signed in his first few days in office and the bunch of initiatives now being immediately pursued by the new Democrat-controlled Congress, including the impeachment of a former president, he lists them as follows:
1) Rule by executive order
2) Putting a predecessor on trial
3) Censorship of opposition
4) Attacking the private sector
5) Exploiting identity politics
6) Challenging judicial independence
7) Purging former officials
8) Encouraging a slavish media
9) Military in the streets
In each one of these, he presents a very plausible case with the evidence being the actual orders signed and initiatives introduced in congress. Many of these are currently being challenged in the courts and in the legislature by states, businesses, the now minority Republicans and even some Democrats. Some of these efforts may succeed in slowing what appears to be the new administration’s efforts to gain total control of all three branches of our federal government. However, for our unique American “check and balance” system of government to be restored in the long run, only our republic’s democratic process of uncorrupted elections by the people can recover this “takeover” of our free society.
This begs the question: Was the recent election really stolen? At the expense of being called a “conspiracy theorist”, a “far-Right militant radical” or worse, a “racist” that anyone who asks this question is labeled, I will say, along with millions of other Americans, it is definitely possible and, unless proven otherwise, it sure looks like it. There are many problem areas to look at, but two key ones need to be recognized.
Long before COVID and the 2020 election, the “progressive” movement initiated many things that made our elections less secure. Among these was pushing to eliminate the need for IDs that we use for almost everything else and also “mail-in” voting without independent certification. Both of these allow non-registered ineligible people to cast ballots as had not been the case previously.
Also, years before this past election, there were many technical experts in the field of election security raising questions about the increasing reliance on electronic technology and software for voting systems. One of the most well-known is Harri Hursti, a Finnish genius and data security expert. Hursti is considered one of the foremost authorities today on election computer security.
Back in 2005, not long after he had sold a security software company he co-founded and had thought he was “retired”, he was called back into the security business. This was in the aftermath of the 2004 U.S Presidential Election when the punched card “hanging chad” controversy emerged in the close election recount in Florida. At that time there was a big push to do away with paper ballots and use more “advanced” electronic voting technology. As part of a team of experts he showed that the Diebold machines being used were easily “hacked” and compromised, also going on to prove auditing hand marked ballots remain the only way to verify election integrity.
The “official” line is that this is “fake” news, but other experts have repeatedly verified Hursti’s “proof of hackability” effort on all systems. Diebold finally renamed and eventually sold the division that made voting machines. After a very complicated process including a 2010 antitrust ruling against the buying company, it was eventually sold to Dominion, the company at the center of controversy this past election cycle. Ownership of voting machine companies has been very murky to say the least!
After the Florida situation, Hursti came out of retirement and for the past fifteen years has focused entirely on election security. Last year he was the featured subject of the HBO documentary, “Kill Chain” that followed him around the United States interviewing people and showing how easy it is to compromise voting systems. He was a key factor in starting an ethical “Hacker’s Village” to demonstrate voting machine vulnerabilities as part of the annual Hacker’s convention (Def Con) held in Las Vegas in 2017.
He allows that most of the people involved in the voting process at the state level are honest, well meaning people who are totally unaware of how easy it is to corrupt the system. The reason for this, Hursti says, is because the vast majority of the states don’t have true and qualified IS personal to support election related systems including keeping them up to date, making them very vulnerable to mistakes and being compromised externally.
What’s the takeaway from all of this?
With information such as Mr. Hursti and others have found, along with all the recent strange, un-investigated and un-audited election night incidents that occurred, no wonder millions of our citizens are questioning the outcomes, especially when we see the draconian actions being made to suppress any questioning and auditing. The giant propaganda spin on the January 6th debacle at the capital has only further obscured election integrity questions. To have a truly democratic process of electing the people that will honestly represent us in local, state and federal government, we must have a secure and openly auditable system of voting that all Americans believe in.
What can you do? For one thing, be sure to watch the HBO Special “Kill Chain”. Then contact your local and national leaders and push them to investigate, make auditing mandatory, fix the system and get our “Check and Balance” democracy back! Your honest vote needs to count!
Doug Ferguson is a retired engineer living in Palmer, Alaska who has had a lifelong interest in science, computer technology, history and, of course, politics.