Hmmm.. I said this was gonna happen last time it was an issue. Exit polling in the 2004 election was the primary indicator of fraud. We still do not have complete raw polling data to complete some elements of the complete analysis.

Now, we will be denied these polls on election day it seems. Combined with the stories below, I smell trouble.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/TheNote/story?id=2576958&page=1

This has been reported elsewhere, but I like this story. Essentially, the errors have leaned heavy republican in florida. What's particularly worrysome is the tendancy for people to vote full tickets this time around. If an error is made, then it's in favor of one party across the board.

These kinds of errors could easily be isolated with a sample test vote and exit poll.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/10/31/florida_terminals_dont_cooperate/

Nasty huh?

There are four elements to a trustworthy election and they are:

Tranparency -- The record of the vote can be directly observed from vote cast through final tally.

Oversight -- Depends on transparency and the record of the vote in particular. One cannot oversee what cannot be observed. Indirect oversight in the form of exit polls are the benchmarks for fair and trustworthy elections almost everywhere but here.

Freedom -- To vote or not.

Anonymity -- Vote cannot be personally identified to voter, for obvious reasons.

Folks, we are making some big decisions on the future direction of this nation with a majority of votes being cast using means and methods that cannot be proven trustworthy.

Without the check inherent in exit polls and human readable vote records, we've no way to know if the election results are sane or not...

Have fun folks!

Electronic voting machines with no paper trail concern me greatly.

Exit polls are useless, because a lot of people, like me, lie to them, its none of their business how i vote, and i know a lot of other people that do the same thing.

nwokie, it is odd though, with the exception of the 2000 presidential race, exit polls are almost unversally correct on the outcome. This makes your argument "a lot of people" wrong.

my concern, of course, is the number of clueless people like wayne, voting to empty their pocketbooks at the expense of lining the pocketbooks of the wealthy and chickenhawks.

lets hope for a vast turnout of black, hispanic, asian, native american, women, disabled, GLBT, "libs" and other minority and marginalized voters to enable a wide margin of victory, preventing old fat white men from manipulating the election.

The articles by Robert Kennedy Jr. (back off neo-cons!)in Rolling Stone are very eye-opening on the recent incidents and the prospects for upcoming election fraud. This is serious stuff, yet, again, the "mainstream" media seems to be ignoring it for the most part.

I really feel like "1984" came after all, it just came later than that year.

Should the military be allowed to vote? Or will your precincts in Florida deny their votes again like they did in 2000 because they might vote Republican? That shows what libs think of the military!

The military should be allowed to vote, as long as their ballots are turned in on time, just like we all have to do. And I'll bet a smaller percentage of the military will vote GOP as compared to 2004.

Who cares when they are turned in? Plus the Kerry fiasco won't help the Democrats get any votes from the military. We need to find some way they can vote by computer so their votes get counted.

"We need to find some way they can vote by computer..."

Are you serious?

Get started already!

ww sez: "That shows what libs think of the military!"

Not based on fact.

Very little and the turning away of the votes by the military by the Democratic controlled Flordia district proves that.

Wayne do you really want to get into the vote in Florida, and who exactly was denied? I don't think so. Read a bit. And not Hannity, O'Reily, and Limbaugh. If the liberals were rigging the vote in Florida, how did Bush win?

C'mon, even you can do better than that.

The military vote was denied because it wasn't "delivered on time!" Thats a farce and the reason it wasn't counted was because the district was controled by the Democrats. They knew if they had counted the votes it would have favored Bush. there are two things you need to know. First the votes were counted several times and Bush won each time. Plus the votes were already certified by Jeb Bush before Al Gore made his lawsuit. I get the feeling you are afraid of the military because you know they would support Republicans. Thats probably you don't want our servicemen to be able to vote. Thats really shameful. They were the only people who were "disenfranchised."

Wayne, stop talking. Everything you say is fake. All of it.

Shhh. Baby goes to sleep now. You take important things and just fuck them all up.

Now please, go away. Please.

See, even Chickenjuggler doesn't believe that one.

Oh and, a certification by Jeb Bush really doesn't qualify, now does it? (notice his last name).

You can't disprove my point can you? I must have won the argument because you can only answer me with a foul word.

Fuck you. How's that grab ya?

I do not beleive that our men and women in America's armed services support republicans or democrats but that they support the United States of America! They protect you and me, our friends, and our families and I feel it wrong to label them any other way than "Dedicated Defenders of the United States of America". To tie them to any one political party is just wrong. You go and ask any career person in the service how they feel and you will find that there are three things in common, "The love of their families, their country, and the LORD our GOD", not their political position. So please quit tagging a label on these truly great people.

Sorry bout that....just had to vent...continue....

I don't think there's any doubt that people in the US Military tend to vote Republican, in general. Republicans in our modern era are almost always for more and more military spending, and the officers and troops have the impression that Republicans are stronger on defense than the Democrats are. (Never mind that the Republicans don't seem to give a damn about the troops AFTER they get out of service - but that's another story.)

But after 3+ years of this nightmare in Iraq, undoubtedly our men and women in uniform have woken up at least about the incompetence of the Bush administration. They, after all, have had to assume the brunt of the abuse due to Bush's disastrous decisions and policies. I have no doubt that Bush would NOT win re-election today even among the Military personnel if he were running against a good Democratic candidate. A lot of the troops would hold their noses and vote Democrat.

I first saw this happen in 2004 with a relative of mine who worked high up in the government for years and was always one of these pro-Republican types, constantly ridiculing Clinton and Carter. Yet by 2004 he was so disgusted with the Bush people (having worked close-up with some of the people we still read about in the news every day) that he voted for Kerry. Shocked the hell out of me.

Andrew

Wayne maybe Bush will go for biological research and you might be able to get a brain transplant.

I think even if either of us did that there would still be absolutely no respect for either of us. Some people just will never change. Like my mom used to say: Don't change me with facts my mind is made up.

Dirty pillows.

Pig blood.

Prom.

John Travolta.

Rainy Night

Motel

Shower

Mother Issues

nurse ratched.

lobotomy.

(that evokes a quiet chuckle)

Identity

(hey, just realized how this word was put together: entity-referring to some construct in the abstract and Id-freud internalized = internal entity that defines us... sorry just musing)

Denial

Bifurcation maybe?

Skin as lamp shades
Bones for furniture
Human flesh in the chili
Grandpa 105 yrs old
Stupid teenagers

And one big MFin chainsaw!!!!!!

Oops.... Got off subject

Wayner wouldn't know a fact if it was given to him by TAX-PAYERS in the form of a pension...

It wouldn't make any difference if what you said was even true. You wouldn't change what you think of me in the least! You want everyone in the world to be liberal.

I don't want anyone to be what they don't want to be! I want PEOPLE to STOP shoving what they believe down everyone's throats!
NOT everyone wants to believe in God or a higher power. Is it wrong? To you Wayner it is.... WHY? Because you want EVERYONE to believe as you!!! Is it wrong to want to take care of your fellow American?? NO! But neo-CONers don't want to Liberals want to take care of America as a WHOLE! EVERYONE!!!!! Not just the rich or the well-to-do but EVERY SINGLE American!!!!!!
I'm NOT a Liberal by any means and you keep shoving that down my throat! I don't believe in the same things you do as a REPUBLICAN and you still try and shove you way of thinking down my throat. And if I don't give in I'm a Liberal??? Seems like you want to RID the Earth of all Liberals???? Just kick them out of the House, the Senate and just get rid of them???? SEIG HILE! SEIG HILE! I once heard of this man back in the 30's and 40's that wanted to rid the Earth of a certain segment of the population.....

...back onto voting.

Anyone watch the HBO documentary? Caught part of it this morning. It's on the PVR for later...

This documentary is the result of work done by Bev Harris and company over the course of about 3 years.

I assume you're talking about "Hacking Democracy"

http://www.hbo.com/docs/programs/hackingdemocracy/

Diebold demands that HBO cancel documentary on voting machines

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/290653_diebold01.html

And this from the Washigton Post:

Harris's bete noire is Diebold Election Systems, the Ohio-based company that makes many of the suspect electronic voting systems. (Last week, for instance, Maryland election officials acknowledged that Diebold replaced a flawed electronic component in several thousand touch-screen voting machines in 2005.)

Diebold has its own problems with Harris and HBO. The company wrote to the network this week asking it to pull the documentary, which it says is filled with "egregious" errors and "inaccurate reporting."

And this from Salon.com

"Hacking Democracy"

On Tuesday, 40 percent of voters will cast ballots on electronic touch-screens. If you're not worried already about the dangers of paperless voting, this HBO documentary will blow your mind.

"When people see what is really going on, there is no way we will allow this to continue," the crusading election-reform activist Bev Harris declares at the beginning of "Hacking Democracy," a documentary film about the flawed American election system that premieres on HBO on Nov. 2. It's a nice thought, one you want to believe: If only Americans could be made to understand the true, gut-sinking atrociousness of just about everything involved in U.S. elections -- from the gerrymandered districts to the undemocratic distribution of electoral power to the enormous influence wielded by partisan officials to the underfunded, overwhelmed local offices to, finally, the insanely dangerous technology we use to run the whole thing -- well, then, maybe folks would actually do something about the problem.

But it's been four years since Harris launched her campaign to expose the dangers of new voting technology -- and it's been six years since we witnessed a presidential election in which the winner actually lost, and two years since we saw one in which errors were so widespread that rational people are still arguing over whether what actually happened was historic theft or historic incompetence. Reports of voting irregularities are now a mainstay of the mainstream media, and politicians and political parties regularly vow to fix the problem. Still, in all this time, little has changed. Surveys suggest that many Americans will go to the polls on Nov. 7 feeling (justifiably) uncertain about the integrity of the vote. If you're not already among that number, watch this film.


Wow! it sure is HARD to look stuff up (like facts and sources) on the internet, that took me almost a whole 2 minutes to get all this! I'm just exhausted!

Nice work.

I've been researching this since before 2004. The more I learn, the uglier this topic gets.

In 2004, 30 percent of the national vote was cast on non-verifiable voting machines. We've no way to know if those vote counts actually reflect the voter intent.

Exit polls from that time can close some open lines of analysis, but have been denied the researchers to date. Reason cited: proprietary information. Yeah right.

I believe the 40 percent figure this election is low. The HAVA act paid for a ton of voting machines. I think the real number is more like 60 percent... Don't have a source handy right now.

Either way, one aspect of this often overlooked, is the reality that all but a small percentage of our votes are counted on electronic tabulators. Many of these have the same potential for flaws as the voting machines do.

In Ohio, many counties use optical scan ballots. The tabulator is supposed to be secure, but technicians often visit these and install patches to the software the manufacturer deems necessary.

I've a lot of concern about this because it's really a bit under the radar compared to the machines that people use directly. One county, documented in the documentary, played recount tricks and had a tech alter the machine prior to the recount... We don't know the final result there because legal means, combined with potentially technical means, was used to distrurb the state of the election.

For me the bottom line remans we should have people counting votes, using technology only to assist in communication. It's not hard, verifiable down to the single vote if necessary and practical as we always have a supply of willing and able people to do this.

For those places where paper ballots are the norm, such as Oregon, we can use audits and legal means to preserve the integrety of the elections. It's a nice hybrid blend, making VBM the best overall system right now.

I'm hoping the county in Washington that picked up VBM this year has good results.

No matter how we settle the tech and legal issues, I really think we need to get rid of the polls nationwide. When the vote is concentrated in one place and at one time, too many things can be done to affect it.

By Trixter on Sunday, November 05, 2006 - 12:08 pm:
I don't want anyone to be what they don't want to be! I want PEOPLE to STOP shoving what they believe down everyone's throats!
NOT everyone wants to believe in God or a higher power. Is it wrong? To you Wayner it is.... WHY? Because you want EVERYONE to believe as you!!! Is it wrong to want to take care of your fellow American?? NO! But neo-CONers don't want to Liberals want to take care of America as a WHOLE! EVERYONE!!!!! Not just the rich or the well-to-do but EVERY SINGLE American!!!!!!
I'm NOT a Liberal by any means and you keep shoving that down my throat! I don't believe in the same things you do as a REPUBLICAN and you still try and shove you way of thinking down my throat. And if I don't give in I'm a Liberal??? Seems like you want to RID the Earth of all Liberals???? Just kick them out of the House, the Senate and just get rid of them???? SEIG HILE! SEIG HILE! I once heard of this man back in the 30's and 40's that wanted to rid the Earth of a certain segment of the population.....


But Trix you are the one who is trying to force your views on everyone. I try to give people a choice. You definately do not believe in choice. Everyone had better be a liberal if he wants to be at peace with you. You should realize that not everyone can be a liberal like you.

Yay! WW is Pro-Choice!


Oh wait....

At least I am not pro death which pro abortion is.

You can watch the documentary online in full here:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7236791207107726851&sourceid=docidfeed& hl=en-CA

WW said>>>
But Trix you are the one who is trying to force your views on everyone. I try to give people a choice. You definately do not believe in choice. Everyone had better be a liberal if he wants to be at peace with you. You should realize that not everyone can be a liberal like you.


100% HORSESHIT!

Thats true and you can't disprove my point any other way than profanity. You just now showed me that you are the one forcefeeding your views. The swearing proves it.

Don't take the bait.

Problems reported in the media to date:

http://www.votersunite.org/electionproblems.asp

Getting ugly.

Tomorrow is going to be very interesting!

I am up waaaaaay past my bedtime watching that HBO special on my computer.

All I can do is shake my head in disgust. It's now Nov 7 and I hope to God our votes count like never before.

..or we have a landslide.

I think that's just too difficult to suppress without most people catching on.

This all seems terribly inexcusable in this day and age. Electronic voting should never have been put in place until it was demonstrated to be reliable.

The second thing that should happen is the penalties for vote cheating should be severe. Reliable elections are the most sacred thing we have in this country. Anyone deliberately cheating should pay a heavy price. It should be a deterent.

Another thing that scares me is a statement made by Nancy Polosi. She said "we will win this election or someone will have cheated". That's several days ahead of the election. What a sick mind set.

I would make one of the penalties not being able to hold office again.

The big problem with things as they are right now is the motivation to actually reform is pretty small. Slack in this area benefits those currently in the game, so they will play rather than fix things.

A lot of the dishonesty does not come from the candidates themselves, but rather over zeleous campaign workers who get so caught up in "winning" that anything goes.

If the penalties were severe, they'd think a bit more about it.

Oh, and no exit polls this year.

Hmmm....

The military is allowed to vote by fax.

I'm ok with this. There are enough records and enough structure to make this viable. There is a paper trail and accountability in the system.

I'm not sure it's as good as it could be, but it's better than nothing for them. Of all the people that could vote, we should work as hard as we can to make sure that happens for them.

Its a good idea to let the military fax their votes in. That way we don't have to worry about late votes or dimpled chads. our military certainly deserves to vote. For once Missing is right!

I dont get to vote this year cause i just moved and didnt remember to change my address with the elections office.....

I figured that a standard change of address with the post office would be good enough...

ohwell

Awesome!



(jk)

;o)

mc74, so, how is Idaho then?

Mostly Mormon.

Mc74, if you had already been registered in Oregon, you could have simply changed your address as late as election day and still received a ballot and been able to vote.

Andrew

Oh, and no exit polls this year.

That may be incorrect. I did hear a couple of mentions of exit polling during early coverage.

Also I was told by an acquaintance who is a political science instructor that this is a good news/bad news situation. He said AP *will* do exit polling but will not reveal any results until after 8 p.m. Eastern. Yep, that's 3 hours before our polls closed, so it's the same old thing to piss-off voters in the west and give exit polling a bad rap.

Looks like the good folks at Diebold had a "change of heart."

Heck, probably all the GOP secy's of state across the nation are fed up with Bush as well.


ps: remember, I was the one who said it first: Landslide Ted. Next chance for a gop gov taking the oath is in 2011. -- 80's, 90's, 00's and now the '10's -- 4 decades of Democrat rule!

Seems the rest of the country is finally feeling the same way, too. For the first time in 12 years, the majority of state governors in the country are democrat...28 states now have democrats as their governor. First this, then the House of Reps, and very possibly the senate...finally...despite all the recent rain...the skies above are blue again.

Bye Bye Rummy, pray the new guy isn't worse...

(I'm walking on sunshine, whooooaaaaaooo)



This just in: Bush stirs after 6-year coma.

I guess the real reason he's stepping down is because with the whole Iraq war going on he doesn't think he has enough time to woo Britney Spears now that she's filed for divorce.

You're too kind!

Stepping down = fired

I wonder if Rummy will post his profile on Sugardaddy.com

(May/December romances, today on Dr. Phil!)

Oldy Moldy wants Hanky Panky, but won't just go Willy Nilly with any old Ninny.

Golly Gee, take a look at Little Old Me.

Donnie.

Well, we've still a fair number of problems. I'm hoping we can get the Conyers report addressed.

Most of the races were by wide enough margins to not worry about. The close ones are in question on both sides.

Would be just great to see the next national election run without a single court battle.

Damn happy to be largely wrong about how bad the voting was going to be. Was it the attorneys, greater public awareness, numbers of voters, or just better run elections overall?

Hoping it's the latter. Still don't trust the touch screen machines much at all.

AP reporting Virginia win for senate dems. That gives them control. Iraq seems to be the issue, and despite Rumsfeld's departure, the only question is what this will mean for future involvement in this troubled region. My guess is progress will be slow as republicans & democrats really have little power when Bush still has control of the military. Bush has nothing to lose and will likely stay the course.

Little progress will be made bringing peace to Iraq until Bush changes his hardened view that Iraq is part of the "war on terrorism." It isn't. While there are some foreign jihadists in Iraq for sure, a good many of them are home grown Iraqis who simply want the US out. And they realize we are never going to leave with the current program of building these huge military bases.

Once you drop the false "war on terrorism" rhetoric and look at Iraq realistically, you see that these people do not want to get along and form a strong government together. They identify themselves first and foremost as Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis - not "Iraqis." Let's remember that Iraq itself was artificially created after World War I and has been a country for less than 100 years, held together in recent years only by the iron fist of a brutal dictator. The country probably should be broken up at least into a collection of three weakly-joined states that can share oil revenue.

But Bush seems to be unwaivering in his simplistic view of what "victory" in Iraq means. Sadly, I think this will become THE hot issue of the 2008 campaign, like ending the Vietnam war was in 1968.

Meanwhile, the Democrats can't do much to change Bush's policy, but they can exercise long overdue oversight over the conduct of the war. That and Rumsfeld's departure can only be positive but not conclusive steps forward.

Andrew

Waynes_World writes:
Thats true and you can't disprove my point any other way than profanity. You just now showed me that you are the one forcefeeding your views. The swearing proves it.


Oh now Wayne, don't be a:

L O R E S O U S E R.