Is Bill Gates on the international inspector team?

Thanks to the blog readers who wanted to hear more about this.

Utah issued an RFP for electronic voting systems -- and only got two bidders. Republican Senator Chuck Hagel owns a good chunk of one of them.

This is a problem on so many levels. First, there won't be a paper record of your vote. Second, there are so few companies doing this work that we may see the corruption that monopolies with close ties to incumbents can breed. Third, with the kinds of dirty tricks we're hearing about in Ohio -- and I mean this is real evil stuff -- you could be removed from a voter list without even knowing it, all without a paper trail. Fourth, these first-generation electronic systems will probably be as reliable as the beta version of Windows 98.

This is downright eerie and more people need to know about it. Where are the journalists?

I don't know about you, but I'm calling the city clerk and making sure I'm still on the list.