Update: Brad called, and disagrees with the points I’m trying to make, and was deeply unhappy both at the way I characterized him and at the fact that I hadn’t made an effort to contact him before slamming him publicly as I did. He’s wrong, I think, on the substance, and absolutely right on the style. The tone of this post is far more hostile than it should have been, and while I am ‘torqued’ at the way he’s dealing with the issue, and disagree with him pretty substantially, I want to apologize both for not letting him know I thought he was wrong and for the tone I take below. My bad, and I thought I’d learned that lesson. Maybe this time.
I actually have met and personally like Brad of BradBlog; while I might have been on the voting machine issue early, he was tireless in raising awareness on the issue and deserves tons of credit for that.
Now I kind of think he deserves a boot to the head (from the Frantics sketch, folks, calm down). He’s gone off the deep end, suggesting that the difference between polls and results in NH was the result of a Diebold conspiracy. No, really.
I’m not sure why Obama would have conceded so soon, given the virtually inexplicable turn of events in New Hampshire tonight.
What’s going on here? Before proceeding, I recommend you read the third section of the post I just ran an hour or so ago, concerning the way the ballots are counted in New Hampshire, largely on Diebold optical-scan voting systems, wholly controlled and programmed by a very very bad company named LHS Associates.
And, to boot, one of the principals in LHS may have dealt drugs back in 1990 – 18 years ago.
Now I have no idea if LHS is a good company or a bad one (some of the things Brad points out are certainly bad, and the Diebold machines themselves aren’t good news). But it gets my back up a bit when liberals – who ought to believe in rehabilitation – suddenly drag out irrelevant 20-year old history and wave it as a bloody shirt to make an argument.
There’s a better quick test, which is to look at the paper counts vs. electronic (about 25% of NH was on paper) and see if the results differed wildly. Commenter NB over at Pollster.com did just that:
Regarding the fraud hypothesis:
On BradBlog, they link to this page — http://ronrox.com/paulstats.php?party=DEMOCRATS — which has the vote totals by township, along with the voting method (electronic or paper).
One basic question is whether paper-voting towns produced different results from electronic-voting towns. Of course, town size correlates strongly both with voting method and the Clinton/Obama ratio. So I took the numbers above and did basic matching using the only data I had, total votes, which I presumed correlated with town size, and thus (hopefully) with other important demographic characteristics. That is, I took the 91 towns that voted electronically and matched each one (using matchit in R) with a similarly sized paper-voting town, and then compared the vote percentages for Clinton and Obama in those two populations. The results?
…………….Cl …. Ed .. Ob
Electronic…. 39.2%..17.5%..35.8%
Paper……… 38.5%..18.0%..36.1%Ie, the two voting types seem to have produced nearly identical results. Of course, more demographic data to match on would be nice, but I think this puts a big burden of proof on the doubters.
Posted by: NB | January 9, 2008 10:58 PM
I’ve gotta call bullshit on this one, and suggest that hysteria like this distracts from and devalues the real problems with voting security as badly as Tawana Brawley and Crystal Magnum distracted from and devalued the real problems of violence against women.
_[O]ne of the principals in LHS may have dealt drugs back in 1990 – 18 years ago._
Hey, I wonder if he sold any to Barack?
Why does this surprise you? Brad DeLong testified on a witness stand in one of the Florida 2000 cases in favor of _disqualifying_ valid votes as a means of statistically remedying malfeasance in the process of registering absentee voters in Florida.
“link”:http://www.sptimes.com/News/120700/Election2000/Fix_urged_in_absentee.shtml
It’s hard for me not to conclude that in some sense he thinks the poll is at least as valid as the vote. That strikes me as a profoundly dangerous and antidemocratic position to take. People can (and do) lie to pollsters — it’s what people decide in the privacy of the voting booth that should count.
[Bare link corrected. –NM]
Sigh…where to start?
a) If you can show me where I’ve suggested “that the difference between polls and results in NH was the result of a Diebold conspiracy. No, really.” I’d appreciate it.
b) You might want to take another look at your data concerning the difference — a 7% swing for Clinton — where Diebold op-scans were used instead of hand-counting (LINK:http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5540) and before you go off on an unsupported allegation that that means I’m suggesting that’s evidence of some conspiracy theory, read the article closely to note that I point out it does not do that at all.
c) As to rehabilitation for criminals (whether I’m a “liberal” or not), of course, I certainly do believe in and support it. I just don’t feel it’s a particular smart idea to give complete control over virtually every vote cast in New England (not just New Hampshire) to a guy who pled guilty to narcotics trafficking in the recent past. Do you? And if you don’t understand the “complete control”, then you don’t understand how these systems work.
If you’re unclear on my general arugment, 80% of New Hampshire’s votes have been counted by exactly *nobody*. Understand that?
Do you think that’s a good idea? I don’t. But maybe I’m just one of those off-the-deep-end sorts who believes that in American election, we ought to actually count the voters’ ballots.
Particularly in a race that nobody has yet come up with an explanation for the results of.
P.S. Chris Matthews said raw (unadjusted) exit polls they were getting “indicated a signficant win” for Obama, of at least 8 points. That was from voters who just voted. Exit polls. Unadjusted. Is he also doing election integrity a disservice, Marc? LINK:http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5535
P.P.S. To Commenter #2 – I’m Brad Friedman, not Brad DeLong. No need to sully his good name here. Sully mine all you wish instead.
P.P.P.S. I except your apology, Marc.
Brad, you’re up as early as I am – and I’m jet-lagged as an excuse.
No apology happening just now. First, to suggest that your recent series of posts doesn’t assert fraud is disingenuous to the max. You’ve got a great hyperbolic style, and as noted it means that while you may carefully parse words so as to stay on the edge of a statement, the plain reading of what you write is well into the middle of it.
I was rhetorically lazy in using the term ‘Diebold conspiracy’ as a shorthand for ‘political fraud using known weaknesses in Diebold machines by people who are paid to maintain them’; but using the above standard, I think a plain reading would support my choice.
Brad, your 7% swing for Clinton is demographically driven; the numbers don’t stand up to any analysis. The communities in NH that have machines are larger, less rural, and demographically different than the communities that hand counted.
To make your statement, you have to show a like-community to like community variation, and from the data I’ve seen (“here”:http://benmoseley.blogspot.com/2008/01/final-nh-democratic-primary-results.html or “here”:http://drunkardslamppost.wordpress.com/2008/01/09/diebold-and-new-hampshire/ , for example) it doesn’t exist at nearly the level to make your level of hysteria justified.
Yes, Diebold (and ES&S and Sierra) machines suck and should be junked. Until they are we’re going to have elections, and those elections are going to have vulnerabilities, and we should both do what we can to proactively protect against them (as Sec. Bowen did here in California) and retrospectively examine the results to look for real inconsistencies and raise alarms when we find them.
I’m torqued at what you did because you didn’t wait to the numbers and so – like Tawana Brawley – it will make it easier for people to dismiss later, more real cases where real inconsistencies need to be looked at.
Drinks?
A.L.
Brad Friedman, I apologize for conflating you with DeLong.
Last weekend’s cover story in the NY Times magazine was about voting machines and security issues that vary from type from lever machines to punch cards to touch screen to optical scanners. It would appear that optical scanning systems are the most reliable, most difficult to hack and most secure because there is a paper ballot with filled in circles for every voter who participated; other systems seem to be fraught with problems. Even if there isn’t overt fraud, they do not seem to produce reliable audit trails in the event of a suspected problem. (Which can occur if, for example, poll workers are poorly trained.)
The article is “here”:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?_r=1&ref=magazine&oref=slogin/
Certainly some issues to think about.
Anybody else think its pretty twisted that polling done by human beings, face to face is apparently considered more definitive than actual voting in some circles? Isn’t there some particular reason we have a secret ballot instead of just randomly calling up a representative sample of likely voters?
When sporting events dont match up to the pundits prediction, we say ‘thats why they play the game’. When elections dont match up to polling done by god knows who, there must be fraud. Thats silly.
In 2004, the exit pollsters all but called the election for Kerry only to have to the actual results come in for Bush. You’d think that we would have learned…
John Zogby was on TDS last night and his explanation for why they were so wrong on the Democratic side and spot on on the GOP race was “I don’t really know.” Which might tell us everything we need to know.
I think it’s much more likely that all the out of state license plates from NY and MA in the parking lots of NH polling places were from people who drove over to NH from NY and MA, claimed they were residents, did a same-day registration, and voted for HRC. The vote total was 500,000 (100,000 higher than it was four years ago). You don’t have to blame fraud on Diebold to see fraud.
In a related story, the “Indiana voter who has been cited by opponents of voter ID turns out to have been registered to vote, and to have homestead tax exemptions, in both Indiana and Florida.”:http://www.kpcnews.com/articles/2008/01/09/news/today/evening_star/doc478441f2313a5420740819.txt In other words, the voter ID law in Indiana worked to find a tax cheat and stop a voting cheat.
bq. At the Charlotte County, Fla. voter registration office, Sandy Wharton, vote qualifying office manager, said Ewing registered to vote in Charlotte County on Sept. 18, 2002, and signed an oath that she was a Florida resident and understood that falsifying the voter application was a third-degree felony punishable by prison and a fine up to $5,000. Wharton said her office checked Ewing’s Florida residency and qualified her on Oct. 2, 2002. On Oct. 4, 2002, they mailed her Florida voter card to her, to the West Lafayette, Ind. address that Ewing gave as a mailing address.
bq. However, Ewing didn’t vote in Florida that year, nor has she ever voted in Charlotte County, Wharton said. But, just a month after receiving her Florida voter card, she did vote in the November 2002 elections in Tippecanoe County, Ind., according to Heather Maddox, co-director of elections and registration in Tippecanoe.
bq. Ewing confirmed that she is registered in both states to vote, but at first said the Florida registration came automatically with her driver’s license. She repeatedly denied signing the oath on the Florida application. She also said Indiana mailed her an absentee ballot, but she didn’t use it or vote that year.
But actually…
bq. “She signed an oath saying she was a qualified elector and a legal resident of Florida,†Wharton said. “And the space where she was supposed to tell us where she was previously registered, she left blank.â€
And she has repeatedly voted in Indiana, most recently in 2002, 2003, and 2004.
_Chris Matthews said raw (unadjusted) exit polls they were getting “indicated a signficant win” for Obama, of at least 8 points._
And Mark Ambinder has reported that the exit polls were basically correct by the end of the day.
Wolf – saw that, and there’s a post in the queue…
A.L.
The discrepancy looks like the hand of Satan! may have been involved.
The DNC has barred Florida and Michigan from the convention – two states which would have provided a large number of delegates to Obama. The handful of New Hampshire delegates that he has allegedly lost due to tinkering is mere chump change in comparison to that.
Obviously the Clintons have much more effective ways of disposing of Obama, which do not require a screwdriver.
Well civility is nice, but I’m not sure that A.L.’s take on what Brad has written is any different from the take from most of the blogosphere. At some point Brad might want to ask himself why that is. Breathless insinuations and generalized accusations galore.
The drug dealing is an ugly hit. Less than 12 months, released on probation, $2,000 fine, 1/2 of which was suspended. We probably have Presidential candidates that might have engaged in misdemeanor level of drug activity. Can we trust them?
Sorry Marc. But you’re simply way out of line, and either don’t have the evidence for your claims, or your relying on bad evidence.
Your story should simply be retracted. Not because it calls me names (I’ve been called far worse), but because it is simply wrong.
To a few of the comments in your reply above:
bq. You’ve got a great hyperbolic style, and as noted it means that while you may carefully parse words so as to stay on the edge of a statement, the plain reading of what you write is well into the middle of it.
After being called “Tawana Brawley” (who lied about being raped, and accused several people, by name of doing so, though they never did), and deserving of a “boot the head” and “Diebold conspiracy” and engaging in “hysteria” (where’s the “hysteria” you’re referring to, Marc? Was it that time I suggested that the votes, 80% of the ballots cast, should actually be _counted_ by someone that got your goat??)
bq. I was rhetorically lazy in using the term ‘Diebold conspiracy’ as a shorthand for ‘political fraud using known weaknesses in Diebold machines by people who are paid to maintain them’; but using the above standard, I think a plain reading would support my choice.
Well, your more specific explanation would have been far less inflammatory, even as it would have still been wrong. I have explained the possibilities for what _could_ have gone wrong here, and done so by explaining both the vulnerabilities, the processes by which that company has complete control of an election from beginning to middle to end, and the way in which they’ve engaged in law breaking, already, in other states. And even admitted as much.
None the less, educating people on the possibilities (while noting over and over that there is no evidence to suggest anyone had gamed anything), and explaining just how vulnerable these systems are, and what has previously gone on in New Hampshire (James Tobin or Allen Raymond ring a bell, Marc?), and again stating there is no evidence of foul play at this time, is certainly far less speculative than the other theories being spun as fact (without evidence) out there.
I can tell you for a fact that 80% of the votes in New Hampshire have never been counted or examine by anyone. Can any of the conspiracy theorists claiming the “Bradley Effect” or “Woman Turning Out in Droves” present evidence to prove those theories?
(Mind you, I haven’t even *tried* to prove someone stole the election, btw)
bq. Brad, your 7% swing for Clinton is demographically driven; the numbers don’t stand up to any analysis. The communities in NH that have machines are larger, less rural, and demographically different than the communities that hand counted.
That’s correct. As noted in my story when I reported that _factual_ swing, along with my note that it is NOT necessarily indicitive of fraud. Problem with that?
bq. To make your statement, you have to show a like-community to like community variation, and from the data I’ve seen (here or here , for example) it doesn’t exist at nearly the level to make your level of hysteria justified.
Wrong. And you are relying on inaccurate information (Moseley’s debunking of his own story, which has, in turn, now also been debunked. By me.
Mosely has issued a retraction of his debunking at one of the links you point to. He concludes “Update: I’m afraid I must revoke my claims of this being debunked. … Based on the incomplete data and the information I have to deem this as inconclusive and another unsolved mystery. I have high doubts that the information needed will be disclosed and that a conclusion could be made from this information. This is a continuing struggle for citizens to discover the truth as the government and corporations have colluded to keep the American people out of the loop. This is a travesty and unacceptable in a free society democracy such as ours claims to be. …
For more information on this take a look at Brad Friedman’s blog.
So he’s retracted his debunking of his own piece. The one you used to demonstrate that I was irresponsible in my reporting.
Will you now be RETRACTING yours, Marc???
bq. Yes, Diebold (and ES&S and Sierra) machines suck and should be junked. Until they are we’re going to have elections, and those elections are going to have vulnerabilities, and we should both do what we can to proactively protect against them (as Sec. Bowen did here in California) and retrospectively examine the results to look for real inconsistencies and raise alarms when we find them.
That’s what I do every damned day, Marc. That’s what I’ve been doing since Tuesday, as I’ve been pointing out the vulnerability of these systems, and the dangers of presuming that dozens of different, independent pollsters, who all came up with virtually the same numbers (for which there are indications that the RAW Exit Poll data actually matched up with), are certainly as likely to be accurate as 80% of a states votes counted by secret software, on easily tamperable, prone-to-error machines, controlled by some very guys.
bq. I’m torqued at what you did because you didn’t wait to the numbers and so – like Tawana Brawley – it will make it easier for people to dismiss later, more real cases where real inconsistencies need to be looked at.
Bullshit, Marc. Wait for WHAT numbers? Got any? I’m still waiting? How did 80% of New Hampshire vote? Can you tell me that in any way that is anything more than mere, speculative, faith-based hopefulness?
No. You can’t. So yeah, I’m calling bullshit, Marc. But unlike your call of same, I believe you’ll find my facts and points hold up to scrutiny. Sorry about that.
And to PD Shaw who charged:
bq. Well civility is nice, but I’m not sure that A.L.’s take on what Brad has written is any different from the take from most of the blogosphere. At some point Brad might want to ask himself why that is. Breathless insinuations and generalized accusations galore.
I’m quite comfortable with my reporting, and the way that it is viewed in the blogosphere. I stand by every word of it. And I’ll go with these guys, over your insinuations any day, sir:
—-
“Brad’s work is more than just good reading–his insight, his diligence, and his staying power make him one of the most informative progressive voices in the alternative media. For all your work, and for your unwavering ability to speak truth to power, Brad, I thank you.”
— Rep. John Conyers, Jr.
Thanks to Brad for speaking out on this issue, and for your passion in fighting for election integrity across America.”
— Senator Barbara Boxer
“You are a true American hero”
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“Brad Friedman is one of the Paul Reveres of [the Election Integrity] movement”
— Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Ring of Fire, Air America Radio
“If you want to learn about the state of our election process, I urge you to visit BradBlog.com. Brad Friedman has worked doggedly on this issue, amassing tons of valuable news and information on this subject.”
— Catherine Crier, CourtTV’s Crier Live
“Perhaps the most dogged critic of electronic voting machine technology in the blogosphere.”
— The New York Times
“The state’s most persistent blogger-watchdog on the dangers of voting technology.”
— The Los Angeles Times
—-
bq. The drug dealing is an ugly hit. Less than 12 months, released on probation, $2,000 fine, 1/2 of which was suspended. We probably have Presidential candidates that might have engaged in misdemeanor level of drug activity. Can we trust them?
To have complete and total control over virtually every vote cast and counted in New England?
Absolutely not.
BTW, you’d be a fool to trust Mother Theresa as well. As any GOOD election official will tell you (see Ion Sancho, Leon County, FL, Freddie Oakley, Yolo County, CA for examples) they are not to be trusted and they will tell you as much.
Our system is not built on trust. It’s built on checks and balances. And as soon as you remove them — like say that it’s just fine to trust in one company with a criminal past to count 80% of votes in the country’s first primary — you have just given away your democracy.
If you guys haven’t figured that out yet. You will. I just wish it happened before the _next_ Presidential election when shit hits the fan.
Sorry, used the blockquote chars incorrectly a few times there. If you could correct that, Marc, I’d be mighty grateful.
Thanks.
[ Done, & typo at end corrected. — M.F. ]
An August 2007 post by A.L on electronic voting is “here:”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/009730.php
Contra Brad Friedman’s suspicions, he doesn’t seem to be a fan of Diebold.
I’m with Marc on this one, there is not any real evidence of any discrepancies on the ground in the vote. The polling data is simply not robust enough to base an accusation of fraud upon and in some cases the differences are within the margins of error. Look at the huge spread of polling results, how can anyone use that kind of wildly variable data by itself to make the kind of claim of criminal conduct made by Brad – it is just completely irresponsible.
This kind of nonsense is exactly the most harmful kind. Demanding accountability and transparency in vote counting equipment is important and I support that. But frothy claims of fraud without any concrete basis is going to further erode our political process. I find it very damaging and very troubling.
What governmental functions should we not trust to someone who has committed a misdemeanor drug offense?
And so on and so forth.
The basic flaw with this argument is that if all the pollsters used the same techniques with the same sample biases (which I think is a pretty good assumption) then of course they’re going to come up with the same numbers. As an example, lets suppose that some percentage of New Hampshire voters wanted to say they’d voted for the black man, but in the booth couldn’t quite make themselves do so, would that population look any different to any polling organization?
I’m in total agreement that current voting machines and procedures should be junked, but claiming Hillary! won because of them seems more like opportunistic propaganda for your cause than anything else, which, as Marc pointed out, is likely to wind doing more harm than good.
Further clarification to an earlier point: Chris Matthews is complaining about exit polls he received at 5:30 on election day:
bq. _Like everyone else, I was stunned at 5:30ish last night. I was passed a piece of paper just for guidance that told me that Barack Obama was going to win a significant victory. This was based upon the polling of people going—sorry, coming out of the booth, having voted._
Stunned that college-educated women had the temerity to vote after work and puncture Matthew’s bloviated aura of precognition.
Brad Friedman focuses in on the Zogby poll, which was the largest extreme among the RCP average. But Zogby points out that they saw in polling that Clinton was closing the gap quickly but because of the methodology of the polling ( a running average of three days ) it wasn’t reflected in the published data.
So there just isn’t any reason for Friedman to believe that the polls he relies are robust enough for the purpose. They plainly are not. Without any factual foundation, his claims are simply defamatory and inflammatory.
bq. But frothy claims of fraud without any concrete basis is going to further erode our political process. I find it very damaging and very troubling.
Riiiight, more than faulty, hackable voting equipment that leaves absolutely no way to verify voting results whether there is reasonable suspicion or not!
These are the comments of a Rightwing hack making sure their ducks are in line for November.
Alan, the only “duck” I see here is that you seem to be implying that if a “right wing” candidate wins it must mean cheating was involved. Kind of obviates the need to actually persuade anyone to actually vote for a “left wing” (or do you consider yourself a moderate?) candidate or proposition.
Perhaps people simply changed their mind. There was enough polling data to suggest that people did change after hearing both candidates and finding Obama not specific enough and Hillary more specific.
That’s enough to discount allegations of fraud.
You DID let him know. You wrote a blog post. That’s all he’s entitled to, and if he disagrees, we have a comments section and you’re a reasonable guy.
There isn’t a thing wrong with your tone. If you believe Brad is off the deep end, spreading conspiracy theories, that’s the right tone. If you think he isn’t, then change your position on that, retractr your post entire, and tone is at best very secondary.
But there’s a lot wrong with Brad’s expectation of some kind of call on the red hotline phone before you criticize him.
As for an endorsement by JOHN CONYERS and the LA TIMES… uh, perhaps that doesn’t say what you think it says, Brad.
Alan writes: “Riiiight, more than faulty, hackable voting equipment that leaves absolutely no way to verify voting results whether there is reasonable suspicion or not!
These are the comments of a Rightwing hack making sure their ducks are in line for November.”
You are completely out of line, Alan. That’s not an adult response to this issue.
Brad Friedman –
I don’t know if you read WoC a lot, but citing the Los Angeles Times as a credibility reference around here is like telling elk hunting stories at a PETA convention.
I’m sure the other references will impress some. In fact, I think that at least one of the pseudonymous commenters here is Barbara Boxer.
Brad,
bq. To the man who only has a hammer, everything he encounters begins to look like a nail. “cite”:http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/a/abraham_maslow.html
Armed Liberal was right, your posts do intimate that the programmers of the Diebold machines defrauded Obama of his rightful victory in New Hampshire. More exactly, this means that a Conspiracy was created to electronically shift Edwards votes into the Clinton column.
You’ve addressed the hyperbole in A.L.’s presentation well, but you’ve avoided tackling the best arguments against your implied charges.
1. In the body of the post, A.L. shows that NB at “pollster.com”:http://www.pollster.com/blogs/new_hampshire_so_what_happened.php found that tallies from paper towns were comparable to tallies from demographically similar Diebold towns.
2. That pollster “post”:http://www.pollster.com/blogs/new_hampshire_so_what_happened.php lists seven possible contributors to the Clinton “upset” before mentioning your evidence as #8, Fraud. Jumping to the “extraordinary explanation”:http://www.quotedb.com/quotes/2789 before eliminating the pedestrian ones has Occam’s Razor exactly backwards.
While Brad was far from nailing this one, there’s an important point he didn’t make (at least not this time, not with clarity):
bq. How can we–The Public–know that the vote totals that are reported match the votes that were cast?
When voting results are somewhat surprising (they were in NH) and somewhat discordant with some polling data (they were in NH), how is the integrity of the voting process to be examined?
Well, a good answer has been around for centuries: re-count the ballots.
Diebold and most other computer-voting companies feeding at the post-Florida trough sacrificed integrity for convenience, speed, handicap access, and cost. This should disqualify their systems , as the CA Sect’y of State ruled back in August ( “somebody”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/009730.php blogged about this at Winds).
Optical scanning of ballots has been around for years, and it naturally leaves the paper trail needed for recounts. Not sexy enough, and not easy for the visually-impaired to use. (Around 2004, my jurisdiction scrapped its optical scanners, replacing them with fraud-prone touch-screens to comply with the post-2000 “reforms.”)
Two points Brad has made on his blog, and a third that he might have meant to make here:
* Computer voting systems are inherently corruptible.
* Diebold’s machines are very vulnerable to a “variety”:http://www.google.com/search?q=diebold+voting+fraud+hacking&sourceid=navclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enUS236US237 of hacks.
* If sinister forces had rigged Diebold’s machines to shovel a percentage of Edwards’ votes to Clinton, there would be no way for us to know, at the time or later.
A.L.,
NB’s figures seem to be wrong.
Also, the only substantive argument you make here – relying on data, rather than ad hominem – is by pointed to NB’s comment.
But, “here is the link to Check The Votes”:http://checkthevotes.com/index.php?party=DEMOCRATS
The numbers that NB cites aren’t accurate.
Hilary’s average by hand is: 34.703%
Hilary’s average by machine is: 40.121%
This shows the difference to be: 5.419% (15,584 votes*)
NB’s numbers are wrong, unless I’ve made a big error.
In fact, that link seems to INCREASE the doubts about this issue.
Needless to say, if there was some issue (and again, like Brad, I am not saying there was) and H.C.’s share of the total was more like 34%, Obama would have won the NH primary.
Amac is right however –
Easy enough to recount the optical votes. And given the wildly off numbers for both:
a. The polling average
b. The exit polls (of people actually coming from voting)
why not get it done, and thus remove all doubt?
Trust but verify, as RR used to say.
HR:
The problem, which I think AL pointed to, is that the type of machine is not random:
bq. _An analysis by The Associated Press’ Election Research and Quality Control service found that Clinton led Obama by about 6 percentage points in machine-counted towns, where she earned 53 percent of the vote and Obama earned 47 percent. Obama led Clinton by about 8 percentage points in hand-counted towns, where he earned 54 percent of the vote and Clinton earned 46 percent._
bq. _Joe Lenski, executive vice president of Edison Media Research, one of two firms that conduct election exit polling for The AP and television networks, said those numbers fit the pattern._
. . .
bq. _”If you do a little more statistical digging, you find out that this isn’t proving what they think it’s proving. It’s a pattern that’s been around for years,” he said._
bq. _In 2008, 2004 and 2000, towns and cities using ballot-counting machines skewed toward Democratic primary winners Clinton, John Kerry and Al Gore, while those where ballots are hand-counted went to second-place finishers Obama, Howard Dean and Bill Bradley._
bq. _Lenski said it’s all of a piece: Education, income and age — factors that influence voters’ candidate choices, also play into where they choose to live._
bq. _”We see those patterns in the vote, we see those patterns in the exit poll. It’s not surprising we’d see those patterns when we looked at the types of equipment used because it’s not randomly assigned, there are reasons why certain towns use paper ballots and certain cities use machines,” Lenski said._
bq. _Manchester, for example, New Hampshire’s most populous city, is largely working class and uses machines at its 12 polling stations. Clinton won there Tuesday, just as previous winners Kerry and Gore did. The small White Mountains towns of Franconia, Sugar Hill and Bethlehem, which hand-count ballots, all went to Obama as they did for Dean in 2004 and Bradley in 2000._
“Experts skeptical of N.H. ballot-count conspiracy theory”:http://www.boston.com/news/local/new_hampshire/articles/2008/01/11/experts_skeptical_of_nh_ballot_count_conspiracy_theory/
hypo – well, in principle, we could do video replays on all calls in MLB games as well; after all, what’s the harm in checking?
Yes, I saw the link you cite (I’m watching the issue unfold) and I still don’t see enough variation between the machine counts and hand counts to suggest that the machine counts are ‘highly suspect’.
Yes, I do think that all the machines should be scrapped and we should use machine-counted (but hand countable) paper ballots. I also even agree with Brad that until we’re there, some form of cross-checking or sampling ought to be in place that guarantees that some valid percent (5%, say) of ballots are on countable paper in all elections.
But until we’re there, we can make unsupported charges that – at the end – will have no resolution until we have ‘do-overs’ on elections. Or we can reserve the charges for those cases where there are enough facts to be suspicious over.
My core disagreement with Brad is his willingness – eagerness, I’d say – to jump to conclusions “Obama shouldn’t have conceded” before the facts supported them – which they still don’t. Yes, the barn door is unlocked, and it needs to be fixed. But can we wait until the horses are out of the stalls before we get hysterical?
And I hate – absolutely hate – the “just sayin'” charges. “I’m not saying you’re a pig-fucker, you know. Just that you’re single and live with a lot of pigs.” That’s bullshit.
Make the claim of fact or don’t. The only fact we know is that our electoral systems are insecure and need to be better. Let’s agree on that and do something about it. I have, and am happy about that.
A.L.
A.L.,
You are making this too easy for me:
“well, in principle, we could do video replays on all calls in MLB games as well; after all, what’s the harm in checking?”
I absolutely agree – they only do replays on questionable calls. In this case, the wild variance from pre-polling and exit polling, makes this “questionable”.
In questionable cases, trust but verify.
“But until we’re there, we can make unsupported charges that – at the end – will have no resolution until we have ‘do-overs’ on elections. Or we can reserve the charges for those cases where there are enough facts to be suspicious over.”
But that’s the thing, the circumstance cited above, warrant the investigation.
“And I hate – absolutely hate – the “just sayin'” charges. “I’m not saying you’re a pig-fucker, you know. Just that you’re single and live with a lot of pigs.” That’s bullshit.”
Well, two separate issues conflated here. The initial “did you know” narcotic charge, and whether the circumstances around this NH election, requires a recount.
I am speaking to the 2nd concern.
Now, given AMac’s link, it is most likely the case, that there isn’t an issue. But there is a duty to recount, given the three inconsistencies:
a. Wildly off pre-polling
b. Divergence of exit polling and the final result.
c. Divergence of hand counting and machine counting.
It may quite likely be the case that for the above:
a. You can’t poll primaries well, especially on the weekend.
b. Well, I don’t know the comeback for this. Exit polling rests on some pretty good statistical “science”, and was one of the biggest issues that I had with Ohio. But in this case, there is a much smaller sample, so that could account for the discrepancy.
c. The article that AMac links to, describing demographic differences.
Again, most likely the case, there wasn’t an issue. But like Nader asking a recount, there is a duty to “trust but verify”, to insure the integrity of the ballot boxes.
It is an issue, that when you make the choice to “go down the rabbit hole”, there’s no telling how far you’ll go. “At his new post”:http://www.bradblog.com/?p=5544, Brade includes some possible questions for the column linked to by AMac.
_We would also caution Kucinich and his team to closely inspect the chain of custody for the ballots in question, and what has happened to them, and the vulnerable op-scan memory cards, since the election two days ago, during the period that concern has been widely expressed about the seemingly anomalous results of Tuesday’s election. It’s important that the chain of custody be both secure, fully logged, and transparent._
_Nancy Tobi of New Hampshire for Democracy, a Granite State election integrity watchdog group, previously noted her concerns in earlier discussions about the possibility of hand counting the state’s op-scan primary ballots._
_We have no control over the ballot chain of custody and we have learned the pain from the 2004 Nader recount, in which only 11 districts were counted, chosen by a highly questionable person, and then nothing showed up,” she wrote recently. “Now all we hear is how the Nader recount validated the machines. A candidate asking for a recount may well be a tool used to ‘prove” everything was okay and then that candidate will be further discredited,” she warned._
So, now the PROCESS OF RECOUNT is thrown into question. [When will it end? How deep will the rabbit hole go?]
The last point, of course, is that these ARE Diebold machines. By default at this point, this is suspect. So add that to the three points above.
hr has changed my point of view on the Dem primary vote in NH.
I am essentially convinced that there is no evidence of hanky-panky. Unlike Brand and perhaps unlike hr, I don’t view polls (incl. exit polls) as “scientific” and see nothing sinister about an actual vote that diverges from what outside-the-ballot-box estimates suggest. Some people change their minds, dissemble, scheme to throw off pollsters, are secret racists or misogynists, are confused–so what.
However. This primary outcome is a useful test case. Rather than putting it aside and being “surprised” when the real questions of fraud arise later on–as they certainly will–we should insist that New Hampshire run through their “recount drill.”
C’mon Diebold and N.H. Board of Elections, show us the money! Demonstrate that the 1/2/3 Clinton/Obama/Edwards outcome is really the expressed will of the voters. Let’s see how your procedures for safeguarding ballots, verifying their validity, and recounting them work in practice.
And if, for touch-screen votes, that means re-tabulating stacks of .xls-formatted numbers that the machines have disgorged onto thumb drives — I hope the officials with oversight responsibilities have resigned en masse by week’s end.
#37 supra posted without seeing hr’s #36, with link to further BradBlog post advocating NH recount. Good!
AMac,
Since you seem good at numbers, you get volunteered, for counting duties. Congratulations! If you don’t go, you get water-boarded, or , last choice, “you get to watch this”:http://youtube.com/watch?v=6qgWH89qWks” for 8 hours straight, two days in a row.
Sorry, those three are your only choices.
I’m assuming you’ll prefer the counting!
🙂
In the vein of “pre-polling HAS been this wrong before in NH”, there is this story from “Daily Howler”:http://dailyhowler.com/dh010908.shtml
Point against any chicanery in NH.
> you get to watch “this”:http://youtube.com/watch?v=6qgWH89qWks for 8 hours straight, two days in a row.
Why, that’s almost as “terrifying”:http://people.csail.mit.edu/paulfitz/spanish/t10.html as…
bq. Ximinez [angrily hurling away the cushions]: Hm! She is made of harder stuff! Cardinal Fang! Fetch…THE COMFY CHAIR!
bq. [Zoom into Fang’s horrified face]
bq. Fang [terrified]: The…Comfy Chair?
#19 from PD Shaw at 2:46 am on Jan 11, 2008
What governmental functions should we not trust to someone who has committed a misdemeanor drug offense?
I noticed you asking this question on several threads.
First off, the last I checked “Narcotics Trafficking” wasn’t a misdemeanor.
But if you are talking “just a misdemeanor” I’d have to honestly say, you shouldn’t be working for the US government at all. You shouldn’t be contracting for the US government, for it’s states, districts, or territories.
But let’s see um, flying aircraft, operating weapons, concealed carry permit, judicial branch, judge, writing software for nukes, writing software for elections, writing software for finances, DMV, IRS, FDA, really the list should just go on and on..Border Patrol…Dam Engineer..
Someone up there said:
bq. I’m in total agreement that current voting machines and procedures should be junked, but claiming Hillary! won because of them seems more like opportunistic propaganda for your cause than anything else, which, as Marc pointed out, is likely to wind doing more harm than good.
Cool. And as soon as Marc can demonstrate that I have EVER “claim[ed] Hillary won because” of the voting machines, I’ll be happy to agree, apologize and retract.
Marc was extraordinarily irresponsible in this post. He made claims that I never did, he completely mis characterized the issues and, just for good measure, he tossed in a bunch of ad hominem attacks based on all of the above.
But that seems to be his story, and he seems to be sticking to it. And you guys seem to be buying into it.
As to Marc’s still-incorrect assertion:
bq. My core disagreement with Brad is his willingness – eagerness, I’d say – to jump to conclusions “Obama shouldn’t have conceded” before the facts supported them – which they still don’t
My “conclusion” that NO candidate should concede before 80% of the votes have actually be counted is supported by facts. 100%.
Your “core disagreement” with me is without basis or merit. And if you haven’t, by now, learned the problem with candidates conceding before voters votes are actually counted, then I’ll have to continue to assume you haven’t been paying attention to your democracy for the past few years.
Marc’s position remains disgraceful and destructive. And a great pity.
The discussion has moved to the comments section of A.L.’s more recent post, “Start Sauteeing the Crow.”:http://www.windsofchange.net/archives/009985.php#c108162