[facing_worlds]

I like the ram only aspect but I wonder if the risk of losing all that data in a power disruption is worth it? Seems like it would make a temptimg target for "accidents" in areas where many people vote a certain way and some group wants to disrupt this process. Voting in the US is already a huge ordeal of waiting in line for hours, a lot of those people probably can't / won't come back to revote if the volatile memory erases the machine data.

[specialist]

Just rescan the ballots.

The only truthworthy system is built on mutual distrust (checks & balances). For instance, while I was a poll inspector, everything required two participants, representing both sides. And all actions be done in public.

[speedplane]

Every secure system is going to rely on some source of trust. Wheather that’s certificate issuers for SSL, a non-biased Judge, or the trust of the developers working on the bitcoin protocol, trust doesn’t just emerge purely from systems, there is always some root source based on societal norms.