> why isn't it equally a problem for money?
Because in the US (and in most places where there are no strict banking secrecy laws), there's no shame in admiting that you deposited $100 in your ATM: your actions can be audited because everyone involved has an active interest in identifying exactly who did what.
Elections are much different.
> we can electronically program missiles to bomb
> cities and dollars to bomb economies, but we
> cannot program votes to be cast and counted,
> say, from home, a post office, a train or plane,
> even, withpout keeping the progam as safe as
> the one to bomb?
I think the online election stuff is more akin to the work that was done to perfect the system of Permissive Action Links. It's very tricky, it's very subtle, and it requires a lot more effort than what has been put into it so far by Diebold and the like.
Here's a decent (if slightly geeky) intro to PALs:
http://www.research.att.com/~smb/nsam-160/pal.html
/jordan