Paper ballots can be faster and cheaper than machines except for the counting part and it can
be argued that the genuine paper trail is an advantage there.

Scanning technology is mature, and with sufficient hand count auditing can work well for complex ballots. Touch screens are fine as an interface, IMO, but should never be used for tabulation.

races, county council contests, state legislative district races on the same ballot, no? Not to mention no such thing as party slates here--you have to consider each individual candidate. It's just ridiculous to even consider handcounting King County ballots--3 congressional districes, 17 state legislative districts, some of which overlap into neighboring counties, 39 cities, hundreds of special assessment districts, etc.

Here's an article about it. There were only a few mentions of it in the M$M in the US. The main reason given by the court was that unless the average voter can understand how the vote is verified so he/she trust the process, there can't be a true democracy. The decision came in 2009, not too long ago.

This is from the article: "The twin requirements, of constitutional magnitude, of no "specialized technical knowledge" being required for citizens, combined with the constitutional requirement of a publicly observed count as a practical matter make secret vote counting on computers impossible as the primary means of counting. Nor will a paper trail suffice, said the Court, according to reports about the ruling from European media linked below."



Here's the link to the article:

http://www.opednews.com/articles/Germany-bans-computerized-by-Paul-Lehto-090303-583.html

We must demand this. Andy Stephenson made me repeat this until it was permanently engraved on my brain. Love you Andy. I know you're watching.

And we know turnout is what? Half maybe? WTF do we need vapor ballots for, then? Efficiency my a$$.

--adequate.