Illegitimate election-Key RFK Source-Responds to Criticism of 04 Election

[kpete]

Illegitimate election
A key source for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. responds to criticism of his analysis of the 2004 election

By Steven F. Freeman

June 12, 2006 | Because Robert F Kennedy Jr. based much of the discussion in his Rolling Stone article on interviews with me and on a close reading of my new book, coauthored with Joel Bleifuss, "Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? Exit Polls, Election Fraud, and the Official Count," and because Kennedy cites in his thorough footnotes many of the same key sources we worked from, I feel compelled to address directly several statements that Farhad Manjoo makes about the exit polls, both in his original Salon article and in his response to Kennedy's response to that article -- statements that are either incorrect or based on misunderstandings about exit polls and the 2004 results.

We regret that Manjoo did not request an advance copy of our book before writing his article. Had he done so, I'm confident that many of the basic errors he made could have been avoided.

Are exit polls usually accurate?

Yes, they are. On Nov. 2, 2004, Manjoo's source Mark Blumenthal, the Mystery Pollster, had this to say: "I have always been a fan of exit polls. Despite the occasional controversies, exit polls remain among the most sophisticated and reliable political surveys available." Properly done exit polls are highly accurate. Given the large sample size in U.S. exit polls, they ought to be accurate within 1 to 2 percentage points of the official count.

The 2004 Election Day exit poll was a well-funded effort conducted by the most experienced pollsters in the business, and it represented a broad spectrum of media interests, from Fox to CBS. The sample included 114,559 respondents in the 50 state exit polls, conducted at 1,480 precincts throughout the nation. A subsample of these was selected to provide a sample representative of the U.S. electorate for the national exit poll: 11,719 Election Day voters and 500 absentee and early voters. The National Election Pool, NEP, a consortium of six news organizations (ABC, AP, CBS, CNN, Fox and NBC) pooled resources to conduct a thorough survey of each state and the nation. NEP in turn contracted two respected firms, Joe Lenski's Edison Media research and Warren Mitofsky's Mitofsky International, to conduct the polls.

more at:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2006/06/12/freeman/

[bleever]

1. I'm happy to see Salon watching both sides of this through

more than just the first two exchanges.

[rumpel]

2. If exit polls are still not being released by NEP

the media sure is claiming "legal ownership" issues. I do not understand why it can not be compelled, especially from those firms that are licensee's of the public airwaves. Meaning the citizens' of this country own their very life source.

But, rather than fight, In hindsight, all grassroots organizations representing the citizens and not the media, could retain the same pollsters, which data will be owned by the organizations in the "public's interest".

Just a thought

[IndyOp]

5. According to Elizabeth Liddle - all information from the polls has

been released except for 'precinct identifiers' which are being kept private because, when people participate in an exit poll, they are told that their information will remain anonymous. Her example: Imagine that you were one of only a very few black or hispanic voters in a small precinct, and you were gay -- if Mitofsky releases the precinct identifiers -- which make the data useful, then the identities of people who participated are no longer kept anonymous.

My solution: The data does not have to be released with precinct identifiers on the net to anyone and everyone. Instead, a court could order the poll information with precinct identifiers released to an independent team who are required by law to keep to the same standards that Mitofsky and other pollsters are required to keep.

[Febble]

7. Data was released for Ohio

after "blurring", and I understand more states may be commissioned.

If it came to court, I would imagine it would be easy to subpoena the data. I would argue, however, that it is not likely to be of great help. Far more copious, and actually better data is publicly available in the form of the precinct vote returns for 2004 and previous elections.

What you need, essentially, is a baseline - some relatively independent estimate of what the vote count in a given precinct should have been, with which to compare what they actually were. One such estimate is an exit poll, but another estimate is the vote returns for another election. It is true that a previous election could have been corrupt, but if we are alleging that this one was far more corrupt, then this should show up as anomalous "shift" values. If these "shift" values correlate with, say, a jurisdiction you are suspicious of, or a technology you are suspicious of, especially if this has changed since the reference election, then you have much better statistical evidence than anything a poll can provide.

Note that what you are interested in is the correlation, not the absolute values - it's the predictive power of your baseline measure you are interested in. If you correlate Bush 2000 with Bush 2004, you will get a "predicted value" for 2004. By seeing how far the actual 2004 deviates from the predicted value, and whether this deviation correlates with a factor you think, a priori, is suspicious, then you have a case. This of course is the kind of analysis the DNC did for Ohio (using 2002 as the reference year), and did not find anything to suggest vote-shifting, although they found plenty of other stuff. I know that many have criticisms of that study, but it was an important analysis, and an important null finding. And of course it had far more statistical power than the ESI study of the exit poll data, which also "retained the null".

I should perhaps make clear something that I realise may have caused some confusion - on average, only about 30 precincts per state are included in the exit poll. That's not even one per county, and it is at county level that fraud is often suspected to have occurred. Large counties will be more likely to have a precinct or two in the poll than small counties, but many counties will be completely unrepresented. The exit poll data are completely useless for the kind of fine-grain, county level analysis that you actually want.

What the exit poll data can tell us is whether something massive went on at a nationwide scale, and, as I have said elsewhere, the evidence from the data if anything contra-indicates this. It remains possible, but fairly heroic assumptions are required to get widespread massive vote-shifting scenario that fits the data.

But apart from listening to me, your best chance of knowing what is in the exit poll data are either further blurred datasets for individual states (which won't tell you a lot because of the meagre statistical power and the complete inadequacy for county level analysis), or a subpoena if it comes to court. But to get to court need to look at the vote return data first, and if you got a case out of those (as you are far more likely to do if there is a case to be made) then you wouldn't need the exit poll data.

FWIW.

Lizzie

[BeFree]

8. You say "trust me"

Once again you speak from a position of authority. But you hold the cards and tell us what we are supposed to think without us being able to view the same data as you.

All of our experts say "let us look at the data". You say we don't need to. Well, I trust our experts.

But following your explanation, lets take a look at Pasco County Florida, as written about in "Fooled Again".

Pasco county results 2004 ES&S voting machines

Kerry - 84,749
bush - 103,320

=================

2000 Punch card ballots

Gore - 69,564
bush - 68,582



Here we see Gore won on paper ballots. Yet Bush swamped Kerry with touchscreens. So, according to your words, "If you correlate Bush 2000 with Bush 2004, you will get a "predicted value" for 2004. By seeing how far the actual 2004 deviates from the predicted value, and whether this deviation correlates with a factor you think, a priori, is suspicious, then you have a case.

We have a case? Let's have a look at that data, eh?

[Febble]

9. Actually I didn't say

"trust me". I said you could, but of course you needn't.

And I quite agree you should look at that data. I had a look at it myself back in November 2004, and it was one of the things that made me suspicious. I didn't find a statistically significant association between vendor and "swing" but that doesn't mean anything. It could have been something specific to Pasco. And there could have been other things in other counties. The other counties that looked anomalous were Hernando, Brevard, Osceola and Volusia. I'm not saying there was fraud there, but that I thought they were worth another look.

What you are doing is exactly what I suggest needs doing.

Good luck.


ETA: I can't remember now what made me think those four were anomalous. I think it was when I was pursuing the idea that machine type was important, and I'm no longer convinced it is. FWIW the two counties with the biggest swing to Bush, even after allowing for the fact that swing was greater in redder counties, and also in smaller counties, were Union and Dixie. That's according to Kathy Dopp's spreadsheet, downloaded shortly after the election. But that's at county level. You'd need precinct level data to find precinct level anomalies.

[BeFree]

10. Now, if we had the exit-poll data for that area...

... we'd really be able to make a case?

Ohio had some scrubbed data released, maybe Florida is next?

Hey, we know you don't believe in fraud, wait, do you? I mean if the returns from Florida don't make you believe.....

[Febble]

11. Well, I would expect Florida

would be a priority, but I don't know.

And, BeFree, I have never said I don't believe in fraud! I'd be very surprised if there wasn't fraud in 2004. I know there was voter suppression, and I know some of it was deliberate, and I know fraud is possible, so why wouldn't I believe it? Especially in Florida.

I think it is extremely improbable that millions of votes were stolen nationwide, as the only evidence for that is the exit polls themselves, and I don't actually think that argument holds water, for reasons I've given elsewhere. But I do think it is possible that thousands of votes were stolen, and if I was going to start looking somewhere, I'd look in Florida - in fact I did. that was the state that Bush had to win in 2000, so surely that has to be the state most tempting to anyone wanting to rig the election. Especially as Gore won more of the overvotes in Florida, and with the demise of the punchcards, Bush would have been set to lose, all other things being equal.

But I don't have to convince you of this. I have no evidence for fraud in Florida, but I have none against it either. All I'd say is that the exit poll data are unlikely to help. There just aren't enough precincts. There may well not be a single NEP precinct in those small counties.

[BeFree]

12. You know you don't know

Admit it. You say it won't do any good, but you don't know. Once again, you say the exit poll data are unlikely to help, and our experts say it is likely. You don't know. That's all there is too it. You don't know.

"I have no evidence for fraud in Florida, but I have none against it either. All I'd say is that the exit poll data are unlikely to help."

[Febble]

13. Well, obviously

to an extent I do know.

But regardless of what I know, my point is that 50 precincts in a state with 67 counties isn't going to help you find anomalous counties.

What the exit poll data might help you find is nationwide anomalies. I don't think they are there, but of course I can't demonstrate that to you except in ways I have already attempted.

But if you want to find out what happened in Pasco, Union or Dixie the exit poll data simply won't help. At most you will find one precinct in each county in the poll. You can't do statistical analyses with those kinds of numbers.

But you can do them with precinct level data from the vote counts for 2000 and 2004.

Look BeFree, I know you like to spit whenever I appear, but I am honestly trying to help here. I can't give you what you want, but I can tell you that for this particular purpose it can't possibly help. There have been extensive studies done on far better and more copious data than the exit poll data on Florida, and they have been inconclusive. But on the ground investigations in the counties with the biggest swing might just turn something up.

But please stop this sniping at me. It really bugs me, and quite honestly, I don't think I've done anything to deserve it. I know you are angry, and I understand that.

But really, I've had enough.

Cheers

Lizzie

[BeFree]

14. I've had enough

Of your professional pontificating, when it is evident: You Don't Know.

Our experts say the exit poll data will help, you say it won't.

There is a disagreement. When one side is presented, it lays it open to argument. You don't have to post here, and you don't have to click on my posts.

The exit poll data for Florida, in all it's glory, would help us understand what went on there. To say otherwise just opens it up for argument, that's all. No reason to take it personally.

Profesionally? Now, you might have a case to get upset. I wish I could get quoted in websites, but hey, I'm just a poster here. Nothing more than that, so that sets us apart, eh?

[Febble]

15. Well, don't read my posts then

if you don't like them. But if you post comments to them, then I shall respond, and it would be nice if you could drop the snark. I'm human too.

And sure, I shall be delighted if exit poll data is made available for Florida. I'd love it if it could be made available for the whole country.

But seeing as that is unlikely, I'm just telling you the kind of things it might tell you, and the kinds of things it can't. And you can't use the NEP data to do county level analysis, because there are simply too few precincts. Way too few. How many precincts does a county have? Thousands?

And there are about 50 in the poll for the whole state.

[BeFree]

17. Just in case....

...someone else reads all this, I want to say how much I treasure your involvement here. I hardly ever miss a word you write, except when you start droning on and on.

To others: _{Febble, rid at your own risk}

Exit polls: If there are any exit polls for Pasco county then the comparison of those polls on the results would be telling. To be able to see that data would lead to a better understanding of the Florida election.

But we can't see that poll's data, even if it did exist, because the people who have that data won't release it. Haven't released it, I should say.

Oh, a few people have seen it, and they talk about it, a lot. They claim it says this or that, but since our experts can't look it over, we have no way of verifying what they say. Rather un-democratic, I'd say.

Anyway, the data is very important... don't be swayed by those who say it isn't. Our experts say it is important to further our knowledge about the election of the government. That is all important, don't you think?

[Febble]

21. Well, it's nice to be appreciated

OK, the Florida voter sample was about 3000, i.e. about .04% of all Florida's voters. There were, according to Kathy Dopp's spreadsheet, about 19,000 voters in Pasco. This means that there is a fair chance that one of the NEP precincts would have been in Pasco. I don't know how big the precincts are in Pasco, but I guess there are a few hundred of them.

What do you think knowing the exit poll result for that one precinct would tell you?

I'm not saying it wouldn't tell you anything, but my point is that statistically, it would tell you nothing. One is not a meaningful sample size.

On the other hand, if you could get hold of precinct counts for all the Pasco precincts in 2000 and 2004, you would be able to correlate Bush's 2000 vote with his 2004, and you might see that some precincts were way out of line.

And there is absolutely nothing to prevent you getting that information.

Sure, if you can get hold of the exit poll data, good luck. All I'm saying is that the actual available vote returns for all precincts in a county will be way more useful for looking for anomalous precincts in a county than an exit poll precinct result for one or two precincts.

[OnTheOtherHand]

22. no, they wouldn't

The two sides in this particular discussion are the facts, and the wishes.

Pasco County contributed 2-3% of Florida's vote, so it maybe had one exit poll precinct, possibly two. Looking at results from one or two exit poll precincts can't tell anyone very much.

The facts are clear. So are the wishes.

[BeFree]

23. Thanks for your....

.....professional pontification. We disagree. In my professional opinion every fact needs to be looked at by as many people as possible. It's called Democracy.

Your comments would be something a suspect would say to a detective:
"Don't look there... it won't tell you anything!"

Not saying you are a suspect, mind you, just what your comments bring to mind. We've all been there and done that, eh?

Which further reminds me of this sage saying: Everyone is the same. The only difference is those that have been caught, and those that haven't.

[OnTheOtherHand]

24. but you DON'T look at facts n/t

[BeFree]

25. I would if they'd release those facts

I figured Pasco had an exit-poll marker, thanks for confirming that. Now, if we could just get look at that data..... I know, I'm only wishing. Just like I wish the election had been fair and square. It wasn't, and I'd like to know why. Looking at all the facts would help, eh? You do agree, right?

[Awsi Dooger]

16. It's well known in Florida that Pasco County is trending Republican

The numbers and change from punch card to machine don't tell the entire story, not even close. Massive changes in Pasco from 2000 to 2004. I'm originally from Florida and there have been many stories in the Tampa papers and Miami Herald, etc. regarding the political swings of that county. That county is north of Tampa, the central part of the state that was the focus of both parties prior to 2004. Republican registration gains were substantial in that county, and others nearby. The GOP gained more than 6000 net registrations in Pasco from 2000 to 2004. Here are the numbers:

2000 Registrations:
Democratic:88,854
Republican: 90,172

2004 Registrations:
Democratic: 99,272
Republican: 106,649

Gore actually should have done better in Pasco in '00. My notes indicate he lost 670 net votes due to over vote.

For the posters on this board who like to deny Republican GOTV advances, or that the GOP was at least equally motivated in 2004, read this New York Times article from 2004. It focuses on Pasco County but the basics can be applied throughout the state, and elsewhere:

http://www.uselectionatlas.org/INFORMATION/ARTICLES/20041107NYT_FL.html

AND O' LAKES, Fla., Nov. 5 - Pasco County might be unheard of outside Florida, but that did not stop President Bush, Rudolph W. Giuliani and other Republican luminaries from visiting as Election Day approached.

This rapidly growing place north of Tampa, where shopping centers, road extensions and subdivisions open by the month, supported Al Gore in 2000 and Bill Clinton in the two previous elections. But since Mr. Gore's bitter defeat, thousands of middle-class families, many of them Republican and independent, have joined the many Democratic retirees who used to dominate here, making it a prime target for Gov. Jeb Bush, his brother and a vast army of Republican volunteers eager to erase the stain of the 36-day stalemate of 2000.

Their efforts paid off. While Democrats placed their emphasis on the state's urban centers and dispatched thousands of lawyers in a defensive effort to avoid mistakes they made four years ago, the Bush campaign concentrated on the new face of Florida, winning a margin of nearly 20,000 votes in Pasco and racking up many thousands more in counties like it."

<snip>

"What happened in Pasco County is what happened in suburban and rural communities throughout Florida. The Bush campaign lavished these communities with attention while Senator John Kerry's campaign and the independent groups working on its behalf invested most of their resources in cities like Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Tampa and Orlando.

The Republican strategy succeeded most along the Interstate 4 corridor in central Florida, where Mr. Bush's pledges to quash terrorism and promote traditional values appealed to the mostly white, middle-class, religious-leaning population.

Mr. Bush held rallies in out-of-the-way places like Gainesville, Niceville, New Port Richey and the Villages, a giant subdivision in Central Florida, while not neglecting conservative cities like Pensacola and even making several stops in Palm Beach County, a Democratic stronghold. But it was aggressive grass-roots efforts in new population centers like Pasco that Republicans say turned out record numbers of Bush supporters on Election Day, expanding a 537-vote margin four years ago to nearly 400,000 votes this year.

In particular, the Republicans focused these efforts on conservatives who had often failed to vote."

<snip>

"You've never seen anything like it," said Mr. Bunting, a former New York City bar owner and the Pasco Republican Party chairman, still pulsing with adrenaline on Friday. "People working 11 or 12 hours a day, making hundreds of phone calls for the president. Retirees, young home-schooling moms, college kids, a guy in a wheelchair, all saying, 'I'll do anything to help.' "

Mr. Bush's campaign executed similar intensive turnout blitzes in other important swing states, including Ohio, where the Republicans also relied on tens of thousands of volunteers who helped make three million voter contacts in the days leading up to the election."

[BeFree]

18. Blah, blah, blah

If the NYT spent as much time researching the stolections as they do kissing b's ass, we'd all have a bit more confidence, eh?

But no, they say: they sent in the clown and that's why he won. Blah, blah, blah.

Using your logic, the 'republican surge in new voters', one would have to concede that everywhere else simply had to go democratic since Dem registrations were far higher than pubs nearly everywhere else. If only that theory held water. Maybe it does?

Nope. The NYT should get ahold of Florida's exit poll data, before they go spouting off about something they don't know anything about.

Screw the NYT. They have zero credibility when it comes to elections.

[Awsi Dooger]

19. Nice whiff

You presented a specific county as proof, without basic knowledge of partisan changes there. Sorry for having the audacity to point that out.

BTW, new registrations in Florida between 2000 and 2004 favored Republicans by 4000.

But keep trying.

[BeFree]

20. Link?

You use a discredited source for your point, and I'm supposed to ignore it? To roll over and say ok? That expectation is the audacity, if there ever was one.

If you have that link backing up your statement on regs, we'd like to see it. Even if true, what are the numbers of reg'ed voters.... Dems are higher than pubs, eh?

Still, the point is...Febble said that an example such as Pasco is a good basis to make a case. I made the case and you refute it with the NYT.

You, against what Febble said? For once, I side with Febble. The numbers make for a case when you look at the shift from 2000 to 2004. That is what she said, right?

[Awsi Dooger]

26. I didn't realize the NYT had been universally discredited

The answer to both questions was in that NYT article itself, which you obviously didn't read: "Statewide, Republicans had a slight advantage in new voter registration in the last four years - 462,254 to 458,168 - but registered Democrats still outnumbered registered Republicans by 4.3 million to 3.9 million on Election Day."

Those are not disputed numbers. Many other sources. I posted a thread prior to election day in 2004 regarding the GOP registration push in Florida from 2001 thru 2004, that they made it a priority for 4 years and we were struggling to catch up with our late emphasis.

Of course, a chunk of those 4.3 million registered Democrats, particularly in the Florida panhandle, will be DINOs. You can't use pure registration figures to predict elections, otherwise we'd never lose in Oklahoma, a state that tilts more than 25 points GOP in presidential races. The new registers will likely follow party lines closely, but tens of thousands of older registered Democrats, if not more, simply never changed party affiliation.

There were plenty of stupid studies post-election 2004 trying to claim fraud in those DINO counties, asserting the numbers didn't match registration figures. Sections of northern Florida are very much the deep South. All they had to do was check previous elections to understand the registration figures didn't align with vote tallies..

I'm from Florida and I have relatives in Tampa and St. Pete. That gave me a significant advantage in this instance, understanding the changing politics of Pasco County. As I indicated in my previous post, that county was oft-highlighted in Florida papers as an example of the political differences from 2000 to 2004.

Here is the link to Pasco County's voter registration numbers. You will note the trend continues. Now more than 10,000 more Republicans than Democrats, as of 2005. That's a net change of 2800 in a year since the 2004 election. There is a bar chart under "History of Voter Registration By Party 1956 - Present" that demonstrates the partisan shift of the county: http://www.pascovotes.com/passtat.asp

It's simply not a good example, IMO. The other counties Febble specifically mentioned -- Hernando, Brevard, Osceola and Volusia. As a native Floridian I can tell you Hernando County directly borders Pasco County to the north, so the same demographic, and GOP emphasis, changes were likely in play there. Likewise, Brevard and Volusia are bordering counties directly across the state in central Florida, the Space Coast. Osceola is in the same region, just slightly inland. That's the so-called I-4 corridor, where Florida election results are said to hang in the balance. Here's the relevant paragraph from the Times article you didn't like: "The Republican strategy succeeded most along the Interstate 4 corridor in central Florida, where Mr. Bush's pledges to quash terrorism and promote traditional values appealed to the mostly white, middle-class, religious-leaning population."

[BeFree]

27. And....

....I say the machines stole thousands of votes.

What? You expect me to change my mind?

L & L, and MCM too, have both published the idea that a shift of the degree we saw in Pasco, was a case of possible fraudulent activity.

So we disagree. So what? Either you think the voting machines, and the people who own them, are crooked, lying, bastards who would steal elections, or you don't.

I don't expect you to change your mind, but I will, to the best of my ability, challenge those who think the election was fair and square. K?

[Awsi Dooger]

34. My opinion about Florida

The Republicans were lazy for a decade or more, failing to take registration and ballot box advantage of segments of the state that very much mirror the deep South. I'm in Florida for several months each year and once you get north of Palm Beach it's unmistakeable how conservative the state feels.

In 2000 we had the ground advantage and caught them off guard. It should have been a Gore victory by 50,000 or more minus the masochistic ballot designs and all the shenanigans. The loss was even more devastating since Rove realized it was a fluke win and took immediate steps to make sure Florida was reinforced for 2004 and beyond. We won't sneak up on them again.

For the bulk of 2001 thru 2004, I thought we had a better chance at winning Florida than Ohio. That was lousy handicapping. The two state economies were opposite in relation to the national economy. Florida's state economy, rated good to excellent by 60% in the exit polls, provided maybe a 1-2% bump for Bush. So we lost the state by 5%, instead of 3%, mirroring the nation, which would have been the result given a lesser state economy.

I'm sure we have underregistered and underperforming areas of Florida. Now is the time to isolate them and take advantage. You can't expect generic GOP approval ratings any lower than they are right now.

[Febble]

30. Thanks for this n/t.

[Peace Patriot]

3. I love Steven Freeman! He is THE best writer on the stolen election!

He has a unique ability to convey esoteric statistical notions and arguments with superb clarity for the ordinary reader, as well as grasping the fundamental principles of our democracy that are at risk from non-transparent and corrupt elections, and from the non-transparency and corruption of the 2004 election in particular.

Freeman was the first expert to jump into this dangerous battle, about a week after Nov. 3, 2004, and I will never forget reading his first analysis of the election, "The Exit Poll Discrepancy." What a blessing this courageous and brilliant man was to us all! We were swimming in uncharted waters, trying to figure out what the hell happened, with all indicators pointing to a Kerry win--and yet Bush was still president. Nothing added up. There could be no accurate, verifiable vote count, given the deliberate creation of non-transparent conditions--wrought by crooks Tom Delay and Bob Ney in the now infamous "Help America Vote Act" (a $4 boondoggle for Bushite electronic voting system corporations, who had insisted on tabulating all the votes with 'TRADE SECRET,' PROPRIETARY programming code and virtually no audit/recount controls). The disastrous impacts of that rotten to the core piece of legislation were becoming too apparent. And what do you do when the powers-that-be are hiding the vote counting? You turn to whatever verification tool you can grab onto--such as exit polls. The corporate news monopolies had done exit polls, but there were TWO sets of figures--what turned out to be the REAL exit polls (Kerry won) and the exit polls they doctored to FIT the non-transparent results of the Bushite corporations' secret vote tabulation (Bush won). How to sort out the voting data and the real exit poll data and the doctored exit poll data--mountains of numbers--with only one set of them being reliable, the undoctored exit polls. I remember coming to DU for the first time, not long after the election, in the midst of TruthIsAll's awesome battle with the mountain of numbers and with the Freepers and Trolls barking at his heels, and him snarling back at them and outrunning them by a mile. What a time that was! And here comes Dr. Freeman with his brilliant paper, laying it all out for us dummies to understand--I think he said at first a million to one odds, later revised down to 600,000 or so to one, that the real exit polls could that wrong in the battleground states. It was statistically impossible.

Meanwhile, all the reports of utterly disreputable and illegal vote suppression by Republican election officials mainly against black voters in Ohio and other states were coming in. We were looking at Stolen Election II--yet you wouldn't have known it from the war profiteering corporate news monopolies. They had declared Bush the winner, and had confirmed that win by FALSIFYING their exit polls, so that almost nobody knew the truth. Just us midnight bloggers at DU. The Democratic Party had also shut the topic down throughout the Party, and throughout the Left (notably at DailyKos; Michael Moore was also silent; Al Franken was silent--I was amazed at this Dem shutdown phenomenon). (But Randi Rhodes was not silent! Bless you, Randi!) DU was the ONLY place in the blogosphere where it was being pursued. The Greens and the Libertarians and other grass roots groups and volunteers were active in Ohio and a few other places, fervently pursuing a recount in very hostile and non-transparent conditions. These reports were coming in. I'm sure some of thought we were nuts, at times. I sure did. How could this incredible Republican conspiracy be true? How could what we were looking at happen--with all the checks and balances of the news media and the opposition party and election officials around the country? But the numbers and other facts kept relentlessly pointing to widespread fraud on two fronts--both electronic fraud and vote suppression--and a wrong outcome. All of our political institutions had failed us. The failure was catastrophic. And only a small group of people--DU bloggers and a handful of others--were reviewing and analyzing these facts. The silence from the corporate news monopolies was DEAFENING, as was the silence of the Democratic Party leadership. We were all alone.

It was especially heartening that someone with a Ph.D. after his name, in a relevant field, entered the fray. I like to think of myself as a non-elitist. But--nothing against TruthIsAll, Jonathan Simon and other great heroes of this movement, who were crunching numbers late into the night, and making astonishing discoveries (for instance, the impossible and laughable ways they had tweaked the exit polls to make it come out for Bush)--it was comforting that a credentialed statistician was looking at all this, and essentially confirming it, very early on. I shall never forget Dr. Freeman's courage and clarity. He also has a marvelously readable way of organizing his thoughts. You will see it in this article. He asks simple questions, as subtitles: "Are exit polls usually accurate? Yes"--and he goes on to briefly and clearly explain the basis for that. "Do the exit polls indicate a Kerry electoral victory?" "Yes, as Kennedy reported, they do."--and he goes on to politely explain what appears to have been willful ignorance of the facts by the experts cited in the Manjoo/Salon.com article (that naysays RFK's Rolling Stone case for the stolen election).

Election activists were briefly and profoundly heartened by the challenge of the Black Caucus against acceptance of Ohio's Electoral Votes by Congress, which was joined by Senator Barbara Boxer--the only top Democrat who did not abandon the black community and the voters. But those were very troubled times, on the whole. Nobody in America knew what we knew--and, by that time, Jan. 6, 2005, we knew it with as much certainty as was possible, in non-transparent conditions--that the wrong man was about to be inaugurated.

The election reform movement that is now well underway--and has finally gotten this tip of iceberg above water in the so-called "mainstream" world*--owes a great debt to Dr. Freeman.

I urge you to read the article, and to buy Dr. Freeman's book, "Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? Exit Polls, Election Fraud, and the Official Count." You will be glad that you did.

----------

(*I normally don't use this word, "mainstream" to describe the war profiteering corporate news monopolies, or anything else--because it buys into a delusional rightwing narrative dictated by the White House to the corporate news monopolies. It is an utterly false "mainstream." The majority of Americans--the REAL mainstream--have felt in their gut that this election, and the one in 2000, were stolen, although they have been deliberately and systematically denied the facts. They know Bush is a fraud, but they feel extremely disempowered, demoralized and confused about how this man could still be president. I hear that Jim Hightower has taken to reading audiences stats about the views of Americans, like 75% of Americans are concerned about global warming and want the environment to be protected, while Bush couldn't give a crap. There is a LONG list of such stats. This is, in fact, still a VERY PROGRESSIVE country--most people sticking to their beliefs about human rights and justice and peace and good government and lawfulness, despite 24/7 rightwing/corporate propaganda. THIS is the REAL mainstream, which is nowhere reflected in the corporate news monopolies. Well, now we're seeing some excellent articles about the insecurity and hackablility of these new Republican-controlled electronic voting systems, in the pro-war, protect-Bush NYT; an expose in Rolling Stone (by RFK Jr.); and other such developments. I don't imagine the NYT has a good motives in doing it--they probably hope it will help suppress the antiwar vote in November--people not voting because they've given up in despair over rigged elections. Still, whatever the NYT's motives, people NEED TO BE informed. We have to take that risk and keep telling the truth. America is dying of untruth. And only we, the people, collectively, can save it--by forcing government to restore transparent elections and our right to vote. If the people don't know what's wrong, they can't fix it.)

[mod mom]

28. PP, you truly have a way with words, Your posts convey passion and true

heart felt sentiment.

One of the things I find most appalling is the deafening silence from our own party. I remember hearing Kerry speak about JFK being a hero and a role model to him. I heard over and over again (I worked 8 rallies in and around central Ohio) how this time they would make sure every vote would count. False rhetoric. Betraying anonymous voters is one thing (and obviously not a good thing), but how can he turn his back on Bobby Kennedy, who has already lost a father and an uncle for this country and allow the corporate media to dismiss and ridicule him? Bobby has no hidden agenda. He simply reviewed the evidence (something so many in power are unwilling to do) and with his experience as an attorney, determined the evidence is sufficient to warrant a day in court. He didn't need to do this, but it demonstrates his love of country that he was willing to put his reputation on the line over this issue. Yet silence from our "leaders". It's shameful.

[BeFree]

29. Hey, mom

The failure of the party is shameful. And I think Kerry saw he would never get the party to back him, so he folded. No excuse, just a possibly reasonable explanation of why he didn't carry through. I wish the party would wake up and get 'er done.

We need to back RFK with some of the facts concerning the messed up Ohio recount. Have you any links handy or should I wade through freepress?

[mod mom]

31. RECOUNT info:

Workers accused of fudging ’04 recount
Prosecutor says Cuyahoga skirted rules
Thursday, April 06, 2006
Joan Mazzolini
Plain Dealer Reporter

<snip>


"The preselection process was done outside of any witnesses, without anyone's knowledge except for the Board of Elections."

On the official recount day, employees pretended to pick precincts randomly, Baxter says. Dozens of Cuyahoga County election workers sat at 20 folding tables in front of dozens of witnesses and reporters.

<snip>

Kathleen Dreamer was manager of the board's ballot department. Rosie Grier was assistant manager. Jacqueline Maiden was Elections Division director and its third-highest-ranking employee. All have been charged with misdemeanor and felony counts of failing to follow the state elections law.

http://www.cleveland.com/election/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/cuyahoga/1144312870224340.xml&coll=2&thispage=4

**************

On December 13, for instance, Sherole Eaton, deputy director of elections for Hocking County, filed an affidavit stating that the computer that operates the tabulating machine had been “modified” by one Michael Barbian Jr., an employee of Triad GSI, the corporate manufacturer of the county’s voting machinery.

Ms. Eaton witnessed Mr. Barbian modify the Hocking County computer vote tabulator before the announcement of the Ohio recount. She further witnessed Barbian, upon the announcement that the Hocking County precinct was planned to be the subject of the initial Ohio test recount, make further alterations based on his knowledge of the situation. She also has firsthand knowledge that Barbian advised election officials how to manipulate voting machinery to ensure that preliminary hand recount matched the machine count.<7>
The committee also learned that Triad similarly intervened in at least two other counties. In a filmed interview, Barbian said that he had examined machines not only in Hocking County but also in Lorain, Muskingum, Clark, Harrison, and Guernsey counties; his purpose was to provide the Board of Elections with as much information as possible—“The more information you give someone,” he said, “the better job they can do.” The report concludes that such information as Barbian and his colleagues could provide was helpful indeed:

Based on the above, including actual admissions and statements by Triad employees, it strongly appears that Triad and its employees engaged in a course of behavior to provide “cheat sheets” to those counting the ballots. The cheat sheets told them how many votes they should find for each candidate, and how many over and under votes they should calculate to match the machine count. In that way, they could avoid doing a full county-wide hand recount mandated by state law. If true, this would frustrate the entire purpose of the recount law—to randomly ascertain if the vote counting apparatus is operating fairly and effectively, and if not to conduct a full hand recount.

The report notes Triad’s role in several other cases. In Union County the hard drive on one tabulator was replaced after the election. (The old one had to be subpoenaed.) In Monroe County, after the 3 percent hand count had twice failed to match the machine count, a Triad employee brought in a new machine and took away the old one. (That machine’s count matched the hand count.) Such operations are especially worrying in light of the fact that Triad’s founder, Brett A. Rapp, “has been a consistent contributor to Republican causes.” (Neither Barbian nor Rapp would respond to Harper’s queries, and the operator at Triad refused even to provide the name of a press liaison.)

http://www.harpers.org/ExcerptNoneDare.html

[mod mom]

32. Lucas Co Recount:

December 22, 2004

Report from Recount Observer, Lucas County, Ohio

Emailed report from Lucas County, Ohio, Recount Observer:


i was a witness for the testing of the optiscan machines on
tuesday the 14th.

what is puzzling to me, after the tests of the scanners
were finished, the witnesses were not allowed to compare
the hand count results to the printed results from the
scanners. the ballots, the hand count sheets and the
printed tapes were all taken away, to another room, out of
sight of any witnesses and about 40 minutes later, the
director comes out and tells us everything checks out.

we go to lunch and when we come back, we find ourselves
waiting in the lobby. why? we were waiting for diebold to
reprogram the scanners. what? didn't they just verify that
everything was on the up and up? what is the need to
reprogram the scanners?

also, during the testing process, one precinct, sylvania 3,
continuously had the test ballots spit back out at least 3
times for approximatley 50% of them. during the election,
how many times did this occur and what poll worker is going
to stand there and continuosly feed the scanner to get it
to scan 1 ballot? therefore, how many of the ballots were
put in the spoiled pile that were really not spoiled?

another thing that was very interesting was the two people
that i was witnessing actually did not know how to run the
scanner. are they the type of people that were the normal
who were overseeing the election? am i crazy? what is wrong
with this picture?

after witnessing the fiasco of a test recount being
conducted at the lucas county government center, i am
definitely for scrapping this election and having a re-
vote. there isn't any other way we are going to get a
legitimate election.

http://fairnessbybeckerman.blogspot.com/2004/12/report-from-recount-observer-lucas.html

[mod mom]

33. Greens have a great link to recount by county:

http://www.iwantmyvote.com/recount/ohio_reports/

[mod mom]

4. Send this to your local papers!. Thank you Dr Freeman!

[Kurovski]

6. I hope Salon continues on with the discussion as we move forward.

Good news.