It was November 08, 2005 and I was preparing to go to my town hall to post my vote. That morning I read in the newspaper how NY got 100 million to update its voting machines. I then thought of the machines we have used in this town for years, a machine with manual switches. It really is outdated and yet it always works. I never had any complaints about it but the machine was probably older then me.

     I walked into my town hall to post my vote and started a chat with the electoral inspectors (I think that is what there title is). I said to them, “This might be the last time we will be able to vote on these old machines”.

     They all replied, with a hint of we will believe it when we see it tone, “Yea, that is what they said”.

     I asked if they knew what type of machines were going to be the replacements.

     They replied, “One type of a scanner machine that will scan your vote from a piece of paper”.

     I confirmed with them, “Is it similar to a lotto machine?”

     They replied, “Yes”.. They then said, “There is another machine that might show up, that will be some kind of touch screen voting machine”.

     I laughed silently imagining a power outage messing up votes. Well I went and posted my votes, by manually closing the curtain and clicking the voting switches down, then by opening the curtain the vote got tallied.

     As I walked out the person told me, “The corduroy curtains on the machines were replaced by someone local”.

     I wouldn’t have known, because they looked very professional. I thought maybe I should take a photo of these machines while we still had them. So I decided what the heck?

     I asked, “Do you mind if I take a photo of the voting machine? Seeing that it might be the last time we may ever see them again”.

     They replied, “Sure, we don’t mind”.

     So I went to the car and grabbed my camera. When I got back from my car I then realized it was a dark room (compared to outside) but I was still able to get a decent photo.

     I then asked, “Are the machines made in and by the United States?”

     They replied, “No not really. The one machine is made in Oswego but was a Venezuelan company and the other was made somewhere like Sweden.”

     I jokingly replied, “Like products from Walmart?”

     They chuckled,

     I said. “It’s sad we can’t trust a US company to make a US voting machine.”

     They nodded.

     I thanked them and I left the town hall, while in my car I started thinking about the voting machines in Florida. They have in many areas the voting machine that works just like our lotto machines (but you won’t win anything), and I remembered how they cancelled out 18,000 votes. Apparently the votes were cancelled out for technical reasons. I remember the major networks like NBC and ABC stating that Al Gore won the state of Florida, which meant he won the Presidential election. I guess not, and with all the recounting etc... the numbers were so close. I sure hope these new voting machines have made improvements.