Ballot publication problem

My son pointed out to me that if there are more than a few races
on a ballot, and all of the ballots in an election are
published, it may be possible to buy votes and coerce voting. It
is only necessary to require a specific, very unlikely pattern
of votes from each person, with all votes in one race of
interest the same, so that individual ballots can be identified.
Telling people to vote for a random selection of candidates of
different parties might raise suspicions, of course, but it
might be possible for the cheaters to avoid this problem using
non-partisan offices and ballot measures.

-- 
Edward Cherlin
Generalist & activist--Linux, languages, literacy and more
"A knot! Oh, do let me help to undo it!"
--Alice in Wonderland
http://cherlin.blogspot.com
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