Redstate

I agree that this is not just bad polling, but an example of an attempt to subvert the election. It is consistent with the cheating noted by Hugh Hewitt. The worst offenders were the MSM, including Rather's fake memos, the fake missing explosives, the debate "lesbian" tactic, etc. From the party itself, the attempts to refuse overseas votes in PA were matched by rumors of paid voters on Indian reservations in SD and collecting absentee ballots from prisoners and nursing home patients with dementia.

Frankly, I was worried that it was all true, and reading the DU site made me think folks were in fact engaged in this behavior. "Win at any cost" is a dangerous mentality.

But, I was just at a Demo blog site where there is suddenly all this talk about going after what they call (ROB)'ers or (R)epulican (O)wned (B)usinesses. They say they are going to identify and boycott them to drive them out of business. How crazy is that, my God now that is divisive, what are we coming to?

...I'm in agreement that the exit numbers were likely cooked and spun to fit the pro-Kerry narrative. It certainly wouldn't be that difficult to do, by the sounds of things. But the thing is, given the long lines and bad weather on Tuesday, rumour of a Kerry tidal wave may actually have depressed Democratic turnout. If they were going to spin, they ought to have spun the story that the candidates were running neck and neck (especially in Ohio, Iowa, New Mexico, Nevada, etc.). Maybe that would have prompted some last minute Dems to get out and vote.

Anyway, at least we all know not to put much faith in exit poll numbers from here on in. As the president said, "Fool me once..."

I saw those poll numbers and immediately believed they were part of the Democratic establishment effort to elect Kerry.  What a crock, the media was completely untrustworthy.  Stop watching TV, including cable.

We won. Turn down the paranoia. It's very likely that early exit polls presented skewed results: law of small numbers, unreliable answers, etc. This is not productive.

Some folks at media outlets leaked early results to their blog buddies.  Those results favored Kerry.  Therefore, Kerry was behind it, and not only that, his intent was to prevent Bush supporters from voting.

Does the word "shrill" mean anything to you?

Statements that begin like this:

"One bit of very credible speculation from a highly placed source"

and this:

"Based on information was I hearing, it sounded very much like"

are lame.  If you're going to claim a "scam", you need to do better than that.

Cheers -

if that were the case perhaps it was leaked to give Democrats a false sense of security!

Funny, that's the word among the more rabid commenters at dKos also. Paranoia knows no party, I guess.

on Tech Central Station was the idea that many Bush voters are angry at the MSM and refused to talk with exit-poll people.  This would obviously skew the sample and effectively make the polls quite anti-Bush.

Here's the article.

. . .is that in some of the lefty fever swamps out there, there is speculation going on that the exit polls were accurate, and that the reason the vote totals don't reflect that is that massive electoral fraud--presumably connected with some of the new voting machines--took place behind the scenes.

Seeing tinfoil beanie stuff like this makes me hope that a cure will be found for BDS, and that it involves a method as painful as rabies shots, so that the recovered victims will not be inclined to go out and get re-infected.  A couple of Supreme Court appointments by GWB should do the trick.

Could it be that some of the exit poll questions were bad? Misleading? Pro-Kerry?

Exit polls for the last 12-16 years have proven to be more or less inaccurate to those in the marketing field. And, for many reason. Some are somewhat influenced by party partisanship and with others, it's a mistake with the way the questions were structured, many times both are connected as well as other factors.

Polling is no science. It has many possibilities to be fallible and have differing outcomes statistically.

More the later than the former. Also many people now ,,,umm, lets say stretch the truth these days at polling outlets. I know I have been there for 25 years.

The final outcome are the numbers that matter. Endless speculation will never be laid to rest on an issue that doesn't even matter when it comes to things that can never be proven or disproven.

The likelyhood of any conspiracy on any level is extremely, and highly unlikely. Just too many eyes from too many places all over every inch of every place.

I'm sure many things are already being scrutinized, but I feel confident, nothing will ever be found either way to be legit.

Somebody rigged them.  They were consistently wrong...in every state.  

Since the effect in elections has been that people tend to NOT vote if they think it is hopeless (for whatever reason) it is hard to believe that whoever was doing the rigging intended it to benefit Bush.

Draw your own conclusions.  But add to the mix that fact that the MSM broadcast these at 2:30, and then followed them with Zogby's firm statement that KERRY WOULD WIN, at 3:00!  EVERY channel ran with these.  

Very sad and scary!

Okay, M Scott, you're on.

In what particular "lefty fever swamp" did you see the claim you cite?  I haven't seen that particular bit of insanity.

And, what the heck is "BDS"?

Your wishes for physically painful recoveries for those afflicted are sincerely appreciated.

Best -

Okay, consider the source, but this article describes the Dem "disinformation campaign".

Tuesday's Dirty Numbers

By

The Prowler

Published 11/4/2004 12:09:14 AM

"According to at least three sources, one inside the Kerry campaign, and two outside of it, but with ties to senior Kerry advisers, some of the "early polling numbers" were in fact direct reports from Kerry campaign or Democratic Party operatives on the ground in such critical states as Pennsylvania, Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, and Wisconsin. According to a Washington lobbyist with knowledge of the numbers, the numbers were packaged together so as to appear to be exit poll results. They were then scrubbed through several sources to land in the lap of sympathetic bloggers who these operatives believed would put the numbers up with little question.

Some of the numbers claimed to be exit polling data that showed Kerry with a 8-1 voter ratio. As soon as the numbers hit the Internet, panic set in."

Rand -

Early exit polls are based on a sampling of early voters.  A notable thing about early voters is this:

Not that many people have voted yet.

So, it's not a statistically accurate sample.  As the day progresses, the exit poll results increasingly resemble the actual outcome.

Is it theoretically possible that agents of the Kerry campaign insinuated themselves into the exit poll process in order to skew the results and discourage Bush voters?  Yes, it is theoretically possible.  And, monkeys might fly out of my butt.

Is it at least equally likely that the early exit poll results favored Kerry for reasons having nothing to do with the dark and nefarious influence of the Kerry campaign?  Yes, that is at least equally likely, and is probably the case.

The election is over.  Early exit polls are inaccurate.  Nobody considers them to be indicative of what the final result will be.  Your guy won in spite of them.  

Give it a rest.

Thanks -

People who know me know I am one of the last to put credence in conspiracy theories, but in this case I am not so sure.

Forget fabulist Dick Morris but nobody is smarter or more solid than than Michael Barone about this stuff and he says this looks mighty suspicous.

In addition to Barone, Larry Sabato (no wing nut) is apopletic -- calling for a full scale investigation into rigged exit polls.

To quote Ken Mars in Young Frankenstein, "A riot is an ugly thing... and I think it is about time we had one!"

This is all a little too conspiratorial for me.  I'm pretty sure this was incompetence compounded by an already liberal slant and ahem Drudge.

I read the following article by Dick Morris.  

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=15821

He makes a few points I'd like you to address:

Exit polls are almost never wrong. They eliminate the two major potential fallacies in survey research by correctly separating actual voters from those who pretend they will cast ballots but never do and by substituting actual observation for guesswork in judging the relative turnout of different parts of the state.

So reliable are the surveys that actually tap voters as they leave the polling places that they are used as guides to the relative honesty of elections in Third World countries. When I worked on Vicente Fox's campaign in Mexico, for example, I was so fearful that the governing PRI would steal the election that I had the campaign commission two U.S. firms to conduct exit polls to be released immediately after the polls closed to foreclose the possibility of finagling with the returns. When the polls announced a seven-point Fox victory, mobs thronged the streets in a joyous celebration within minutes that made fraud in the actual counting impossible

actually, the threads on daily Kos are some of the tamer ones I've seen.

more of the Diebold-type fears.  people, we have got to stop this stuff.  the flag in front of my house is red, white, and blue.

In addition to Barone, Larry Sabato (no wing nut) is apopletic -- calling for a full scale investigation into rigged exit polls.

I'm pretty skeptical myself that the disparities between the exit polling and the vote were entirely the product of honest error or mere sampling problems.

Still, rather than waste any time with an investigation, I suggest we all simply take a deep breath, and remember not to pay the exit polling any heed in 2008. In other words, let's just assume in future elections that exit polling is vulnerable to partisan rigging. I frankly think the Republic will survive having to wait eight or ten hours to see who's really winning.

Besides, "investigating" the rigging of exit polling strikes me as just the type of activity that's easily branded as zealous overreach by a biased media that's just itchin' to put us uppity conservatives back in our place. We've all got bigger fish to fry, and deeper majorities with which to fry 'em.

I would love to agree with Dick Morris, but wisdom tells me otherwise, and to look for all other answers before I make such a conclusion. I think I found one almost immediately. Exit polls indeed have historically been very accurate, but not this time and for a legitimate reason, as well as showing signs of increasing inaccuracy for the last 12- 16 years.

Reasons.

Absentee Ballots/Early Voting. In Florida alone I think I heard that several counties had as much as 25% of the electorate voting early or through absentee balloting. How anyone get's the overall results from just exit polling is beyond me, and seems blindingly obvious how it could not reflect accurately the final count numbers.

And, demographically it makes perfect since. Most early voters that I saw were the elderly, at least here in Miami/Dade and Broward.

I hear most of the absentee ballots were elderly and military, two groups that significantly favor Bush.

you can almost make a line between the bi-annual increase in number of absentee ballots to that of the error margins of the exit polling for the last 12-16 years. An even clearer line can be drawn with this years new event, early voting.

I strongly believe you'll see this verified soon enough. If not then we'll all be very, very, very sad and surprised I am sure, but I can't put any faith into that thought at this point.

"what are we coming to?"

That is a very good question.

Anyone who's read my posts here knows I'm not a Bush supporter.  I live just north of Boston MA, in the very heart of Blue State Land.  I drive a semi-fancy German car, get my coffee at Starbucks, live in a swanky seaside town, and work, quite happily and comfortably, in the People's Republic of Cambridge, MA.  I spent the Sunday before election day getting out the vote for Kerry in Portsmouth, NH.  I have gay friends who have been in stable, decades-long relationships, some of whom have quite successfully raised happy, accomplished children, and I would support any law that would grant them the same mutual legal and fiduciary privileges and responsibilities that my wife and I enjoy.  At our last Town Meeting, I was the sponsor of an article in opposition to the USA PATRIOT Act (which passed).  I've been a card-carrying member of the ACLU for at least 10 years.  Unless I'm shopping on Sunday, I buy household supplies at the local hardware store instead of Home Depot because the owners of HD are big Republican donors (I also like giving my money to the local guy, who lives here and spends it here).

On paper, I'm a Red Stater's worst nightmare.

That said, I find the idea of targeting people's businesses for boycotts on an organized basis because of their political beliefs kind of odious.  Everybody has to make a living.  I realize that's inconsistent with what I do personally, but that's the key -- my personal choices are my personal choices.  I'm not asking anyone else to agree with me, or to act as I do.  I'm strongly hawkish on the second amendment, although I neither own or want to own a gun.  It's the second amendment in the Bill of Rights, for crying out loud.  I'm the grandchild of an immigrant, but I believe that our immigration policies are out of control.  And, here I am on Red State.

What's my point?

Bush won the popular vote by just over 50%.  I congratulate him on that achievement.  As I understand it, that's simultaneously the first popular vote majority in many years, and the smallest margin of victory since 1918.  There are a lot of people in this country who love Bush and what he stands for, and a lot who do not.  For better or worse, we're stuck with each other.  

We have important things we need to do.  Bush, or whoever, is going to come and go.  We'll all still be here.  We better learn to get along.

End of sermon.  As always, thanks to Red State for the opportunity to participate here.

Best -

Just checked Kos.  There are, in fact, some folks discussing the unreliability of electronic voting machines.  I didn't see anyone who made the particular claim that M Scott cites, but then I didn't read all of the posts.  In any case, I stand corrected.

On the Diebold issue: as a professional software engineer with over 20 years in the business, I can tell you that the consensus in the engineering community is that electronic voting machines which do not provide a paper trail are an invitation to abuse.  They should not be used.  If you are interested in the technical details, I recommend the most recent issue of the Communications of the Association for Computing Machinery (CACM) as one resource.  There are lots of others.  It's not tinfoil hat weirdness, it's a matter of genuine concern.  

If you don't agree, imagine Hillary Clinton as the majority stockholder of a voting machine company and see what your gut reaction is.

Cheers -

Morris is correct that exit polls sample people who have actually voted.  They also have value as a reality check for the final reported results.

Note, however, this phrase in Morris' statement:

"I had the campaign commission two U.S. firms to conduct exit polls to be released immediately after the polls *closed*"

Emphasis mine.

The numbers Erick is citing in his post are numbers that were released sometime between noon and 2:00 PM on election day.  They were early results, inherently based on a tiny sample of the eventual population of actual voters.  

So, they (the results released in the early afternoon) were likely to be statistically less accurate.

They probably shouldn't have been released.  MSNBC should exert some discipline over their staff.  But, I doubt the malign hand of Kerry et al was involved.

Time to give it a rest.

Cheers -

How can that be the smallest margin of victory since 1918? The 1960 election was much closer. Also, there wasn't a Presidential election in 1918, maybe you were referring to 1916?

That is extraneous to this discussion. The absentee ballots are not counted until a later date in most cases. That is certainly true of Florida. So in comparing the exit poll to the reported returns of election day voting, there is no reason that those two sets of data should differ significantly. Dick isn't complaining about the absentee ballots (which haven't been counted) throwing the results off. He is complaining about the difference between the exit poll from the precincts where people voted on that day and the real results from those precincts.

To further make this point, Fox News in their coveraged explained this very issue. They said that they took the exit polls of various precincts and matched them to the real results of those precincts and found big differences. After discovering that, they threw out the exit polls and just waited for the returns. Historically, there hasn't been big differences between the returns and exit polls. 2000 and 2004 however have had problems. It would be nice to find out if it is foul play or just bad survey techniques.

Seth -

Looks like I did not have my facts in order.

The year I meant to refer to was 1946 -- Truman -- when the margin was 2.1M voters.

You are correct, 1960 was closer than that.

My point, which stands, is that there are very, very many people on both sides of the Bush divide.  We're gonna sink, or swim, together, so we better learn to get along.

Thanks for the correction.

Cheers -

1948, not 1946.  I'm going to bed now.

Best -

The completed exit polls were systematically undercounting Bush votes as well. If you will recall, after VA had closed its polls, the exit poll still showed a dead heat. Bush won by about ten points.

The early bad data is easily explained as you have done. But what has to be answered is this:

1. Why was the complete data so wrong as well?
   
   
2. Why was it wrong in the same direction across the board? That is statistically impossible. There had to be a systematic factor.
   
   
3. Why was the data leaked early?

Now, I am not saying it had to be foul play. There may be a plausible explanation to #1 and #2. However, there is no plausible explanation to #3.

There is enough stink here to warrant an investigation. I'm not lighting the torches yet, but someone needs to answer these questions, particularly #3. If this was all a great big misunderstanding, then fine, the investigation will reveal much ado about nothing.

I'd agree to forgo any call for investigation on one condition. Future elections do not conduct exit polling for the networks, and do not release any data until at least every poll across America is closed. I'd further request that the polling be done by a company with a impeccable reputation for keeping their mouths closed, like those that count votes for Oscars, etc.

Amos, you keep overlooking the most important point. Even the exit polls from the end of the day were completely off. Specifically the poll data after the polls had closed showed several states competitive when they were not even close. And they were all skewed in Kerry's favor. Now maybe there is a plausible explanation outside of foul play. I'm open to hearing it and finding out what went wrong. But to exclude the possibility of foul play is to stick your head in the sand.

He certainly didn't manufacture the bad data. He may have published it, but he also wasn't responsible for the leak. Questions need to be answered though.

The number of absentee ballots and early voters is the important part, not the exit polls.

Watch; Early voting in Miami/Dade county I believe I heard was done by as much as 30% of early and absentee voters. Those groups WERE MOSTLY HARD REPUBLICAN, and seperated mostly on age.

Fewer Democrates voted during early voting than did Republican's. So what happened? FEWER Republican's showed up at the final polls than normal because more of them voted early and never went to the polls causing what appeared to be a disproportionate amount of figures, get it?

But the absolute unreliability of the end of day exit polls across the country is puzzling.

Someone should look into this, simply out of academic interest.  How did this election differ from past ones?  Why were the polls biased in one direction, nationwide?  Inquiring minds would like to know.

Again, absentee ballots are a red herring. It was clearly stated on the election coverage that the absentee ballots were not going to be counted that night. So what is measured? The election day votes to the exit polls. Absentee ballots do not factor into that equation one iota.

Some instances may be easy to explain away for other reasons such as early voting. But not every state has early voting. Systematically, the exit polls undercounted Bush votes in every state. Those looking at the disparity between exit polls and results noted that it was consistently at least a few points off across the board. Do you get it? I don't know if it was foul play, but this combined with the early leaking of even more flawed data, seems to point in a general direction.

Two points....

First, did I not hear from the D-campaign that the

early voting in Florida showed a 6-8% LEAD for

Kerry???  And this was AFTER early voting was over

(Friday was the last day of early voting in Florida),

and BEFORE the polls even opened on

Tuesday?  Wishful thinking?  More skewed exit poll

data during the two weeks of early voting?  Since

I saw no dispute of this from the R-camp, other

than to counter with a nationwide lead of 5% for

Bush during early voting, I think this was likely

based on ACTUAL vote counts and VERY accurate.

Add to this the fact that Florida election law

PROHIBITS the tabulation of absentee ballots

before election day--not to mention that some

50,000 absentee ballots were still being Fed-x'd

out TO Florida voters on MONDAY--your arguments

that, "Fewer Democrates voted during early voting

than did Republican's." and that absentee votes

are even relevant to this discussion, are debunked

and, in fact, exhibit an even GREATER skew of the

election day exit polls(early AND final), at least

in Florida, towards the D's.  Consider...if Kerry

did indeed have a 6-8% lead with 25-30% of the

votes cast(early voting) going into election day,

does this not mean that the remaining 70-75% of

votes cast on Tuesday represents a double-digit

swing(11-13%) towards Bush? --final Florida tally

gives Bush a 5% win-- I would challenge you to

find ONE county...even the heavily D-counties you

site(Miami/Dade and Broward) that could have

produced FINAL exit polls showing a Kerry lead

statewide without "help"?

Secondly, whether these exit polls were intentionally

fraudulent or merely the result of

the blind incompetence of the MSM (led by CBS and

the NYT who continue to deny ANY bias, despite

overwhelming evidence to the contrary), the effect

is the same:...1.)at least some percentage of disheartened

Bush votes were not cast; 2.)some

percentage of "swing/leaner/undecided" votes were

swayed towards the "apparent winner"; and 3.)some

percentage of "re-energized" Kerry votes were

encouraged and cast.  Consider...a 1% swing would

flip New Hampshire and Wisconsin from "blue" to

"red"...2% flips Minnesota, Pennsylvania and

Michigan.(Oregon also flips at 2%, however the

fraudulent exit polls could have no effect here

because ALL ballots are cast via snail-mail.)

Bottom line....a 2% "exit poll effect" may have

prevented an EC count of Bush-348, Kerry-190.

The words "landslide" and "mandate" come to mind.

Seth -

I just read an email from a good friend who forwarded a Greg Palast article claiming that the discrepancy between the exit polls and the final result was actually due to Republican manipulation of the actual vote count -- hanging chads strike again!!

I see your point, Seth, and frankly I can't explain why the exit polls from the end of the day are different from the final result. I have achieved the limits of my understanding of statistics.  I don't know if the discrepancy is or is not within the margins of error.  I'm afraid I have to bow out of this discussion at this point.

To be honest, I am actually perfectly happy to put my head in the sand on this one if it means we can move forward, for crying out loud.  I'm not sure what would be achieved by an "investigation" into the exit polling process, and I suspect it would not be worth the animosity it would generate.  My two cents.

Cheers -

I am sure any number of qualified people and some un-qualified people could make a myriad of different theories as to this (admittedly) very unusual red herring. However, proof is going to be very, very difficult for those of the likes of us here online.

If you're really concerned, then go to your local government page, find out who your Senator's and Representatives are if you don't already know and send a Demand letter stating you want the incident investigated. Contact your local University's political science teachers and ask them to make a mandate to aquire funding to independently look into the unusual glitch. Make sure your protected by making the steps to ensure these things if it really is a true concern in your heart.

I would suggest, as council, of course take it or leave it, whatever your will, that you not see things that are truly not there until you actually see it. That does not mean blind yourself or not use intuition, just be certain as possible.

In and is far as "Putting Your Head In The Sand " on this issue to avoid moral disappointment should you find something that displeases you, I would say that is exactly what the forefathers, and founders said NOT TO DO. I personally favor, and fairly strongly, the idea that manipulating this thing would have been exceedingly and overwhelmingly difficult. That again, is not to say it is impossible, anything is possible.

I can tell you this. I need to have hope that there was no manipulation, because to me if anything like that ever came to light as true, our Democracy has already received it's fatal blow to the heart. I pray this is not the case, but will be dilligent until a viable answer surfaces. And if not, to stay deligent until an answer can be verified.

I can tell you this. Of all the states that adopted electronic voting, only Nevada has a paper trail. Any first year businessman understands the value of a paper trail. Why this wasn't the case or a factor in the design of the electronic voting machines escapes my ability to reason to that end. Not all states have electronic voting, and not all counties within states have them while others do. I would start there, and by process of elimination find what is left. Look at trends where the polls where different than the eletorate results where electonic voting is available. You'll have to do it county by county, state by state make and place a map over the top that represents where electonic voting occured.

If this pattern matches, you definitely have found something.

These are the measures you will need to follow. Funding I am sure would be as easy as just asking for it from the party. I have my fingers crossed that this is in fact not the case.

Popular votes, or electoral votes?  If by % of the PV, or difference in vote totals, 1968 and 1976 were also much closer than 2004.

I frankly don't see how vote totals would impact it one way or another. If your exit poll shows 55%, it doesn't matter whether the total votes are 1,000,000 or 1,100,000. 55% is 55%. But I'd like to see what evidence he has anyway.

As for leaving it be, as I said in an post down below, I'm fine with not finding out what happened in 2004 as long as we completely eliminate exit poll data from being used by the networks until after the last polls have closed. I can wait for returns to trickle in just like everybody else. IOW, if there is no way of it happening again, then we can let sleeping dogs lie. BTW, this problem happened in 2000 as well. So something is broken, and it is getting worse.

Actually, I am changing my mind to some degree. I don't need to know what happened, but I still think an investigation needs to take place. Why? Because messing with an election in such a way that the results might be impacted (leaking data, even if the data is correct, etc) is a federal crime. I would like to see election fraud begin to be taken seriously and people charged for illegal activity. That is the quickest way to start reducing some of these problems and the build up of lawyer armageddon.

Closer in terms of the absolute difference in the number of votes.

Palast's claim, which I wish to stress I am not endorsing -- thank you -- is that the exit polls were an accurate indication of the votes people actually cast, while the final total reflect the actual votes cast minus those which were spoiled or rejected for other reasons.  Palast claims that the process of culling out spoiled or invalid ballots was manipulated by the Republicans to disproportionately reject those which were cast by folks likely to vote for Kerry -- blacks, etc.

Please do not flame me on this point, I am not putting it forward as something I agree with.  I'm simple clarifying a statement made in an earlier post for Seth.

I find this suggestion:

"completely eliminate exit poll data from being used by the networks until after the last polls have closed"

to be 100% right on.

Cheers -

Seth is right. The early vote/absentee vote is a red herring. There are never enough of them, under ordinary non-Florida 2000 circumstances, to make a difference.

You sample certain precincts in certain counties focusing on the precincts and counties that are not heavily Blue or heavily Red.

The rest you can adjust for statistically.

If a couple of guys like Barone and Morris believe the exit polling numbers were cooked we ought to take it seriously.

'68, '76, and '00, we're also closer than this year. Maybe some others too, but I stopped after finding several examples. Not sure how that affects the point you were making about close elections, but 2004 isn't that close compared to at least a number of other modern elections.

I assure you there are many conservatives who feel the same as you regarding the potential for abuse.

In this election, for example, both parties were attempting to head off abuses that they perceived would damage their own efforts.  Republicans wanted voters to vote in accordance with all state voting laws.  Obviously, the fear was that the boxes would be stuffed with illegal votes in close states, potentially stealing the EV's.  This was percieved by Democrats as disenfranchisement.

I think the profound lack of trust on both sides is creating deep and lasting damage to our democracy.  Both sides of the debates have got to find a way to agree to disagree in a civil manner.

Check out the real time numbers given the blogger Wonkette and note the date/time stamps if you visit the site. They all occur around 5:30pm.

Birdies Talk In Code and I Receive Their Orders Through My Fillings

Bush only up by one in Virginia? In gun-toting, gay-bashing VIRGINIA? I feel like I'm taking crazy pills! Kerry = + numbers FL +4 OH +5 MI +4 PA +16 IA +2 WI +5 MN +15 NV Bush up 1... [more]

The Birdies Sing a Sweet, Sweet Tune

FL: 52/48 - KERRY OH: 52/47 - KERRY MI: 51/48 - KERRY PA: 58/42 - KERRY IA: 50/48 - KERRY WI: 53/47 - KERRY MN: 57/42 - KERRY NH: 58/41 - KERRY ME: 55/44 - KERRY NM: 49/49 - TIE... [more]

The Birdies Are Restless

OK, here's the thing about the birdies: They sing different tunes. And I always half-suspect that one of them will rip off his birdie mask and reveal himself to be Karl Rove.... K/B USA: 50-49 FL: 50-49 OH: 50-49 Colorado:... [more]

A Little Birdie Told Us

K/B AZ 45-55 CO 48-51 LA 42-57 MI 51-48 (or MICH 51-47) WI 52-48 (or WISC 52-43) PA 60-40 OH 52-48 FL 51-48 NM 50-48 MINN 58-40 IOWA 49-49 NH 57-41 I have been asked to clarify: The little birdie... [more]

I understand that the exit poll survey form was two sided... I have not heard how many questions it contained.  BUT, I am most interested to hear from actual surveyers how many accosted voters refused to fill them out.  If you send me a survey with more than 6 questions I tend to pitch it.  Voters with jobs may well have been in a hurry to get somewhere.  If you know of any knowledgable assessment of this issue I'd be interested in a reference....  

http://www.nypost.com/postopinion/opedcolumnists/31590.htm

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23580-2004Nov3.html

http://www.reviewjournal.com/lvrj_home/2004/Oct-20-Wed-2004/news/25041510.h
tml

These may get you somewhere.

I readily grant that all people surveyed have actually voted, but I am not prepared to grant that a random sample of voters agree to be surveyed.

OK, kindly ignore this statement from my original post:

"As I understand it, that's simultaneously the first

popular vote majority in many years, and the smallest margin of victory since 1918"

The part about the "smallest margin of victory" was apparently incorrect.  I'd be delighted to discuss any other part of the post.

Thanks!

and you are right on many things (but of course you should realize that in a forum like this, all facts are going to be closely scrutinized!).

What turns me off, and many others, is the unconcealed "sour grapes" attitude that seems pervasive in dem forums. There are very real, important policy reasons why Kerry lost. Hopefully, dems realize that the outer fringe of your party, i.e. the Moore-Franken-Chomsky lunatics, just do not appeal to the nation at large, and actually serve to drive voters away. However, that is not to say that a Clintonesque figure seals the deal for dems.

But you're ultimately right. We are stuck together, therefore we should attempt to cooperate.

The Review Journal was an article from before the election noting that pollers needed to stay away. So it has little to do with the results of Nov 2. The NY Post article is Dick Morris, and his comments were previously paraphrased in this thread. The WaPo article is a little confusing. The guy defending the polls works for the company. And the only thing that he explained was that Ohio turned out to be correct once all their data was tabulated (but that a server crash kept the data from going out on time). That still leaves VA, SC, and a few other states that their polling got very wrong. He did talk about the leak in negative terms as well.

So we aren't much farther along in understanding, IMO.

Not to use the word too often to cause epeleptic alliterative overload but the only thing I agreed to give the people trying to get me to agree to be surveyed was an agreeably large middle finger.

Thanks.  That's what I figured.  

With telephone surveys, hang-ups are handled by calling other numbers and weighting responses to correspond to demographics from previous polls.  But how do graphic (middle finger) hang-ups get treated?

It worries me a bit that Rasmussen will be weighting future samples to correspond to these 2004 exit polling results.  

Hey 51 -

"but of course you should realize that in a forum like this, all facts are going to be closely scrutinized"

That's why I like it here.

"What turns me off, and many others, is the unconcealed 'sour grapes' attitude that seems pervasive in dem forums"

I hear you.  Those of us who didn't like the outcome on Tuesday need to suck it up, quit whining, and deal.

"There are very real, important policy reasons why Kerry lost"

I agree.  Bush won because more people in this country agree with him and his policies than do the same for Kerry.  The popular vote tells the tale.  End of story.

"But you're ultimately right. We are stuck together, therefore we should attempt to cooperate."

Right on.

Best -

"I think the profound lack of trust on both sides is creating deep and lasting damage to our democracy"

Sadly, agreed.

"Both sides of the debates have got to find a way to agree to disagree in a civil manner."

100% agreed.

Best -

I don't have a good answer for the Wonkette stuff.  Frankly, I've never been to Wonkette's site, and didn't actually read any of the exit polling information on election day.  Sorry I weighed in on this at all, I have neither the detailed information or the statistical chops to stand behind my statement.

If you guys think the exit polls were being used to manipulate the results, and feel like there is value in following up with an investigation, go for it.  Live it up.

If you're really just interested in making sure it doesn't happen again, it might be simpler, and less antagonistic, to simply call for a rule that exit polls not be made public until the final results are in.

No more statistical threads for me.

Cheers -

As the bulk of your post concerned the margin of Bush's victory, and as you concede that part of the post was clearly wrong, I will not comment on it. ;)  

However, I liked this part:

"We have important things we need to do.  Bush, or whoever, is going to come and go.  We'll all still be here.  We better learn to get along."

One caveat, however: I think it is important for you and me and everyone else America to understand exactly what is meant by "get along."  If the recent Ted Rall column (or anything written by Ms. Dowd) is any indication, the Left certainly does NOT need to get along in the sense of cooperating on policy and the conduct of the war in Iraq. Does get along mean that both of us agree the tax code needs to be reformed (scrapped, really, if you ask me). What about Gay Marriage, PBA, drilling in ANWR?  I certainly understand, and even sympathize with democrats who believe that they have legitimate policy differences with the GOP and Bush, and that their constituencies have entrusted them with the power/responsibility to frustrate the majority wherever possible.

I think that what you meant (or at least what I hope you meant) is that if there is many part of the Democratic agenda that was motivated by personal disdain for Bush, that part of it needs to be dropped now. I think the Dems should take as their model the actions of the congressional republicans from about 1996 to 2000.  Although they really, fervently, unabashedly hated Bill Clinton, they were still were able to cooperate with him on important policy goals - welfare reform, deficit reduction, missile defense, etc. - when their own position was not intractably opposed to his.  Contrary to popular opinion, I believe it is the opposition party, not the presidential party, which is entrusted with the burden of finding common ground.  By its very nature, the opposition role can be that of an obstacle or an open door.  The question is: where can this Democratic Party cut a deal with Bush?  

My suggestion: tax reform.  There is no reason why a left or center left party should regard defending the multi-bracketed income tax as a cardinal tenant of their political faith.  If support for comprehensive tax reform ever reaches critical mass, Democrats would be well advised to get behind the movement rather than stand in front of it like a squirrel in front of a truck.  Moreover, if the tax code is to be scrapped anyway, why shouldn't a party that represents 48% of tax payers have a say in crafting the new one.  Right now, they don't.