GOP votes to kill Free Election Recounts confirming Election Integrity; don't care about Election Hacking at all.

AP: The state Assembly is set to vote on a bill that would make it far more difficult to request election recounts in Wisconsin … amid anger from some Republicans that Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein was able to request a recount in Wisconsin last year even though she finished a distant fourth … only candidates who trail the winner by 1 percentage point or less in statewide elections could petition for a recount. Gov. Scott Walker has signaled his support for the measure.

2. If Republicans care so much about voter confidence in the integrity of our elections, then why aren’t they worried about having a hacked voting machine system? Seriously, they’ve never mentioned it, not once. Could there be another reason for their voter ID laws?

Even if most voting machines aren’t connected to the Internet, says cybersecurity expert Jeremy Epstein, “they are connected to something that’s connected to something that’s connected to the Internet.”

A recently leaked National Security Agency report on Russian hacking attempts has heightened concerns. According to the report, Russian intelligence services broke into an election software vendor’s computer system and used the information it gained to send 122 election officials fake emails infected with malicious software. Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that Russia might have attempted to hack into election systems in up to 39 states.

University of Michigan computer scientist Alex Halderman says it’s just the kind of phishing campaign someone would launch if they wanted to manipulate votes. “That’s because before every election, the voting machines have to be programmed with the design of the ballots — what are the races, who are the candidates. So as a remote attacker, I can target an election management system, one of these ballot programming computers. If I can infect it with malicious software, I can have that malicious software spread to the individual machines on the memory cards, and then change votes on Election Day.”

A former liberal radio talk host who likes to ask the “follow-up question” at Democurmudgeon.blogspot.com