[EM] STV and weighted positional methods

[Jonathan Lundell]

On Feb 1, 2009, at 11:56 AM, Kathy Dopp wrote:

> Again you misconstrue my position. Like virtually all computer
> scientists who do not profit from selling or certifying computerized
> voting systems (and even some who do), I believe that there should be
> methods that average non-programming citizens can use to independently
> check the accuracy of vote counts.
>
> You on the other hand seem to desire to push for voting methods that
> would not allow ordinary citizens to check the accuracy of election
> results unless they hired a trusted computer programmer or unless a
> 100% hand count was done of every IRV/STV election and the ordinary
> citizens are allowed to and have time to observe.

Suppose, for the sake of the argument, that as an ordinary citizen I  
don't trust the presidential count last November in California. If my  
only recourse is to observe a hand recount of every ballot, then  
there's not a lot of point in talking about verification by ordinary  
citizens.