Posted on this website as of 12-9-2000 is proof that dimples and chads can be identified by simple microscopic examination, as I describe below.
See the article by the webmaster Peter Sheerin entitled:
“My Microscopic Examination of Chads and
Dimples”. There you will see dramatic pictures taken with a
microscope connected to a computer. He also shows how easily
the chads can be dislodged from a stack of blank ballot cards
when they are pressed together by manual manipulation and/or
repeated machine processing. This is why counting and counting
and recounting can distort the truth.
—Bill Wattenburg 12-10-2000
by Dr. Bill Wattenburg
November 29, 2000
There are a number of simple experiments that can be done quickly to show the origin of the “dimples and small holes” in the few thousand Florida ballots counted. These “dimple” ballots should be challenged and examined the same way that the absentee ballots and servicemen ballots are being challenged.
Here are the experiments that can be done quickly. They can demonstrate:
Simple microscopic analysis can be done to determine if “foreign objects” produced the “dimples” and small holes in ballots already counted or to be counted. Even a low-power microscope will show the “footprint” of the device that caused the dimple or small hole. Paper fibers are displaced and/or broken in different patterns depending on the device used to contact the surface. Such examination is routine in crime laboratories which analyze hair and carpet fibers at crime scenes, puncture holes in fabrics, etc. Any dimples or small holes that were produced by some object other than the voter stylus, such as a fingernail or sharp object, can be seen.
A KGO Radio listener, Scott Murray, first brought this possibility to my attention. Loose chads on adjoining ballots could be the cause of “dimples” being impressed into blank ballots that were stacked with the punched ballots—like a piece of sand stuck between the pages of a book. For example, a loose chad on a ballot punched for, say, Bush could cause a dimple to be impressed into a blank ballot stacked next to the punched ballot in a stack of ballot cards when this stack of ballots is pressed together before machine reading This can be determined by simple microscopic examination of the “dimpled” ballots. The chads punched out or the “footprint” of a dimple created by this means will be quite different than a sharply defined dimple produced by the hard voter stylus.
Someone must ask for permission to have the “dimple” ballots examined immediately by a law enforcement or forensic agency that can do a low-power microscopic analysis that will likely show the “footprint” of any device used to produce the dimple area. This easily can be done on a hundred ballots an hour. There are only a few thousand so far.
Go to the election officials in any county that uses the Votomatic machines and ask them to loan you three of the Votomatic machines. Ask them to show you the routine maintenance procedures for cleaning and setting up the machines before an election.
Ask them to show you where punched-out chad is held under any ballot position on the machine.
Suppose that the maximum number of voters that can punch ballots in 12 hours is N. N is the maximum amount of chad that would be in any hole position. Next, fill a voting position on the machine with two or three times this much chad, i.e., 2N or 3N.
You will find that there is no difficulty in punching out a new chad in this position. You can prove this by using two or more machines when only one machine has a position that is full of chad. No one can tell which one is “full” of chad. The Chad is soft and not dense. A new chad can always be pushed into the bulk that is there by the dense stylus. You can have 2N up to 5N amount of punched out chad below a ballot position with no noticeable extra force required to punch out the next chad in this position.
You could use three or four court volunteers to demonstrate this with, say, three voting machines in court. Only one of the machines has 2N or 3N of chad beneath a voting position. You don’t tell them which machine or which voting position has the “plugged chad”. Let them vote several ballots in several positions on each machine. Each person does it several times.
The punched out ballots will show the truth. The voters will not be able to tell you which machine had “plugged chad”. Their properly punched ballots will show you they had no trouble voting properly.
I am a former faculty member and scientist from the University of California. I was an engineer and consultant to IBM during the development of punched card machines.
If you will look at a website www.DrBill.org you will see that I have been asked by the government to solve many problems and technical mysteries. I generally do the actual experiments to solve a problem or find out the truth. I was a member of this nation’s nuclear weapons design team at the U.C Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. I am still a consultant to the laboratory.
On www.DrBill.org you will see, for example (under background report, magnetic credit cards), that I showed the world and the press in 1973 that the first magnetic stripe credit cards that were about to be released to the world by the banks (and the Bay area BART system) could be easily counterfeited by any housewife using only equipment found in the kitchen. (See the story in Business Week, August 11, 1973, page 120). It took the banks and IBM several years to design a better magnetic stripe system that could not be easily counterfeited.
The experiments required to determine the truth about the Florida ballots are no more difficult.
Attached below are some of the recent projects and experiments that I have done to solve major technical problems plus a brief resume:
This page was last modified on .
Related Information |