With the advances in technology on all fronts, notably in imaging and in verification of facts, we can easily verify and scrutinize anything in minute detail if the demand is there.
In the banking space for instance, credit and debit balances are calculated immediately. No one in green eyeshades discovers something amiss days or weeks down the road. If you were to have had your credit card stolen, the bank would immediately be aware of the fraud and your card would be blocked. When you board an airplane, your face is scanned and checked against a database of which you are a digital entry and you are cleared to board.
We use such advanced technology in something as inconsequential as a professional football game wherein an ultra clear, frame by frame slow motion replay of a contentious play needs scrutiny. We can see exactly if the player’s foot was out of bounds or if the ball passed the goal line. Indisputable. Were it not so, we’d have to depend on the judgement of an official who may or may not have had the best view of the event. I guess it’s not inconsequential since there are hundreds of millions of dollars of bets riding on any particular ruling or outcome. So it’s not just an issue of ‘fairness’, it’s a money issue.
How bizarre is it then that in this day and age, with all the technologies and checks and balances available that there continues to be questions about the integrity of the voting process? Why wouldn’t the results of a given election be instantaneously available? If in fact the winning side were so proud of having accomplished their victory, why wouldn’t they be willing to show and crow over the results in an audit? If it were me achieving some kind of hard test, I’d be willing to show everyone just how accomplished I was. If I claimed to have shot a career round in golf, I’d be more than happy to show my scorecard.
And yet, as we’ve seen over and over again, when there is a glaring anomaly in a voting result, one side claims fraud and the other side refuses to allow a real audit. You’ll just have to take their word for it. In the gentleman’s game of poker, when you are called, you have to show your hand. It’s not just rules, it’s common sense.
As it stands now, elections are treated like bowls of candy at Hallowe’en trick or treating. The candies are left for kids to take on the ‘honor’ system. We all know that this protocol only works in a high trust society. We all know that some will simply empty the entire bowl into their bags. The apologists will insist these are ‘isolated’ incidents and besides it’s only candy and no one is willing to stop it. Once or twice maybe. Hundreds of times and it’s a pattern.
The November trick or treat basket has been abused for decades. It’s not as if the technology doesn’t exist to stop it. But people still think that it’s only candy.
