If only that was the sole problem with this idea resurfacing.
CAREFUL is certainly an appropriate warning before reading the new Steven Rosenfeld and Bob Fitrakis article, now spawning this new round of "conjecture theorists."
FIRST, before going into all the falsehoods promulgated by the Steven Rosenfeld and Bob Fitrakis article, here is where the authors ought to focus--THERE IS direct evidence of vote-switching. Why did these authers distract from that evidence in 2004, with the recount focus, and why do they continue to both ignore the evidence and focus attention elsewhere. They were wrong then, and they are wrong now. Here is the evidence they should focus on, vote-wsitching and probable ballot swapping between precincts:
The 2004 Ohio Presidential Election: Cuyahoga County Analysis
How Kerry Votes Were Switched to Bush Votes
http://jqjacobs.net/politics/ohio.html======================
The GOP's cyber election hit squad by Steven Rosenfeld & Bob Fitrakis
Did the most powerful Republicans in America have the computer capacity, software skills and electronic infrastructure in place on Election Night 2004 to tamper with the Ohio results to ensure George W. Bush's re-election?
http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2007/2553Their article posts a question and does not even answer in the affirmative. Why, because they are WRONG!
"Did the most powerful Republicans in America have the computer capacity, software skills and electronic infrastructure in place on Election Night 2004 to tamper with the Ohio results to ensure George W. Bush's re-election?"
"The answer appears to be yes."
SO WHAT? Appearances mean nothing. These authors are ignoring real evidence in favor of distracting from it.
Let's discus the FACTS instead.
"... on Election Night 2004, Ohio's "official" Secretary of State website -- which gave the world the presidential election results -- was redirected from an Ohio government server to a group of servers that contain scores of Republican web sites,
on Election Night 2004, Ohio's "official" Secretary of State website -- which gave the world the presidential election results -- was redirected from an Ohio government server to a group of servers that contain scores of Republican web sites, ...."
WRONG: The Ohio SoS utilized a hosting service for their election night posting of results. It is not a coincidence that the GOP uses the same "hosting" service, but it is WRONG to infer that the State of Ohio was not directing the election results site w/o evidence beyond a coincidence.
WRONG: "On Election Night 2004, the Republican Party not only controlled the vote-counting process in Ohio, ..."
The vote counting/reporting was controlled by government entities at a county level as usual. The SoS only reports what is reported to that Ohio government office. In no way, shape, or form does the SoS count votes.
WRONG: "... the Republican Party ... also controlled the technology."
The vote counting technology was controlled by the State of Ohio and the counties.
WRONG: "...Privatizing elections and allowing known partisans to run a key presidential vote count ..."
The election was conducted by the county BOEs, not private, and counted by these government organizations. This rhetoric is both false and inflammatory. Why?
WRONG: "there is abundant evidence that Republicans could have used this computing network to delay announcing the winner of Ohio's 2004 election while tinkering with the results."
Now we also have "could have theorists" too!! How does that move anything forward except confusion?
WRONG: "On Election Night 2004, many of the totals reported by the Secretary of State were based on local precinct results that were impossible...."
The election night results gave Bush a substantial margin. Citing several precincts, a la Reagan's anecdotal logic, is now a tired old verse, discredited soon after the election, and proves nothing of substance even when true. A good analogy is Republicans using "voter fraud" to advance a different agenda.
WRONG: "... the facts are not in, but enough is known to warrant a serious congressional inquiry."
Not on this issue. The serious congressional inquiries underway since 2004 do not need to be misdirected by "coincidence theorists." The have real evidence to persue.
WRONG: "... for roughly 90 minutes the Ohio election results reported on the Secretary of State's website were frozen .... vote totals from these last-to-report counties ... were highly improbable and suggested vote count fraud to pad Bush's numbers."
"Improbable." "Suggested." Don't attorneys know how valueless such "proofs" are? Vote counts are always frozen on web sites, then a new result total is posted and they change. Bush was winning Florida in 2000, and the results moved Gore forward to a tie, for all practical purposes. The same fallacious logic would indicate Gore stole the last reporting counties in Florida.
WRONG: "... The most eyebrow-raising example to emerge from parsing precinct results was finding 10,500 people in three Ohio's 'Bible Belt' counties who voted to re-elect Bush and voted in favor of gay marriage, if the official results are true ... in Warren, Butler and Clermont Counties. The most plausible explanation for this anomaly ... was Kerry votes were flipped to Bush while the rest of the ballot was left alone. While we have some theories about how that might have been done by hand in a police-guarded warehouse, could full Republican control of the vote-counting software and servers also have played a role?"
This is easy to explain. These authors know of a plausible explanation and ignore it, as if part of the cover-up themselves. What happens when punch card ballots are switched between precincts with different ballot orders. Kerry votes can be switched to Bush votes while a distinct outcome may or may not result for other, down-ticket races with a different number of options. Warren and Butler Counties used punch cards, and Clermont used optical scanning, so all the ballots are still preserved.
WRONG: "Baiman compared the number of voters who signed in with the total number of votes attributed to precincts. He found hundreds of "phantom" votes, where the number of voter signatures was less than the reported vote total. That discrepancy also suggests vote count fraud."
This is a common problem when voters do not sign in, a well known problem with a well known cause. It does not suggest fraud in and of itself. This is iase argumentation.
WRONG: "... the highest ranks of the Republican Party's political wing, including White House counselor Karl Rove, a handful of the party's most tech-savvy computer gurus and the former Republican Ohio Secretary of State, created, owned and operated the vote-counting system that reported George W. Bush's re-election to the presidency."
This is just beyond ridiculous. Only those with no critical reasoning will not see the lie in this statement.
Laws of the State of Ohio created the system, the People of Ohio own it, and Boards of Election operated it. GET REAL!!
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