"He said he didn't know whose ticket to run on."
Kimmensen absorbed it as one more fact and let it go.
"The first votes ought to be coming in." Bendix was looking at his watch. "It's time."
Kimmensen nodded.
"It's ironic," Bendix said. "We have a society that trusts itself enough to leave this machine unguarded, and now the machine's recording an election that's a meaningless farce. Give the electorate one more day and it'd have time to think about Messerschmidt's hate-mongering. As it is, half the people'll be voting for him with their emotions instead of their intelligence."
"It'll be a close election," Kimmensen said. He was past pretending.
"It won't be an election!" Bendix burst out, slamming his hand on his knee. "One vote for Bendix. Two votes for Mob Stupidity." He looked down at the floor. "It couldn't be worse if Messerschmidt were down here himself, tampering with the tabulator circuits."
Kimmensen asked in a dry voice: "Is it that easy?"
"Throwing the machine off? Yes, once you have access to it. Each candidate has an assigned storage circuit where his votes accumulate. A counter electrode switches back and forth from circuit to circuit as the votes come in. With a piece of insulation to keep it from making contact, and a jumper wire to throw the charge over into the opposing memory cells, a vote for one candidate can be registered for the other. A screwdriver'll give you access to the assembly involved. I ... studied up on it—to make sure Messerschmidt didn't try it."
"I see," Kimmensen said.