Reply #60: Febble, my response...

[TruthIsAll]

YOU:
I referred to TIA on DKos:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/6/22/183230/208

so it is only fair that I comment here.

Here is where I agree with TIA:

I agree that his table showing the "12.22" exit poll responses shows a) Kerry winning and b) proportions of respondents who say they voted for Bush and Gore respectively that match the proportions that actually voted for Bush and Gore in 2000.

One possible interpretation therefore, is that the poll responses accurately reflected both the proportions of votes in 2000 and the proportions of votes in 2004.

I also agree with TIA that his table showing the "1.25" responses shows a) Kerry losing and b) proportions of respondents who say they voted for Bush and Gore that do not match the proportions who actually voted for Bush and Gore in 2000. Moreover, I agree with TIA that not only are the proportions wrong for the 2000 vote in the second table, the proportions are impossible, as it that implies more repeat Bush voters in 2004 than actually voted for Bush in 2000.

One possible interpretation of this, therefore, is that the responses have been reweighted to match the results (we know this was done), but that the fact that this reweighting makes the plausible number of Bush repeat voters implausible (and in fact, impossible) suggests that the vote count used for the reweighting must have been fraudulent.

This is a good argument. It makes mathematical sense. And I agree that it is suggestive that the Gore/Bush proportions in the early table actually match the vote-count Gore/Bush proportions, a point in favour of their veracity. So far so good.

ME:
You agree with the math. That’s an excellent start. Therefore, it logically follows, and I assume you agree, that the Final Exit Poll is no longer viable on its face, since the weightings are impossible. Would you also agree that anyone who reads the poll and does not bother to check the 43%/37% split for feasibility, much less plausibility, would be misled into thinking that the exit poll results are legit?
Do you also agree that the Final 13660 NEP, which has been proven as fiction, should not be presented by the media in its current form, since it misrepresents the reality which you have just stipulated to?

As I see it, your response from this point on rests on two very suspect hypotheticals.
1) Gore voters lied or forgot who they voted for in 2000 when they said they voted for Bush
2) Kerry voters were more apt to respond to the exit pollsters, by a 1.12/1 ratio over Bush voters.

Ok, let’s continue.

You say:
Here is where I diverge from TIA's thinking:

Suppose there is a discrepancy between the count and the poll, as there was. And that this was either due to the fact that Kerry voters had been polled at, say 1.12 times the rate of Bush voters, or that a proportion of Kerry votes had been switched to Bush (I haven't worked out the proportion, but I know TIA has).
I say:
First of all, a correction. The MINIMUM response ratio is 1.155/1. The optimizer has shown, using the WPE and aggregate response data supplied by Mitofsky, that THERE IS NO FEASIBLE SOLUTION FOR alpha <1.155 which will satisfy the constraints.

You say:
When the precinct results start to come in, the E-M computer program will start to discover this, and reweight the projections in line with the precinct results. I do not know how this is done, only that it is done, and I know this from the E-M FAQ:

http://www.exit-poll.net/faq.html

How are projections made?
Projections are based on models that use votes from three (3) different sources -- exit poll interviews with voters, vote returns as reported by election officials from the sample precincts, and tabulations of votes by county. The models make estimates from all these vote reports.


My guess is that the way it is done is by identifying particularly categories of responses (from a particular demographic group, say) that seem to be most divergent, and adjusting those. I imagine it works rather like your optimizer, except that the constraints on the output start being very loose and only become tighter as the results come in.

I say:
Yes, you are guessing. You DO NOT know how the projections are done. And to suggest that the projections work like the Exit Poll Optimizer is 100% incorrect.

The Optimizer does not project anything. It just tells us whether or not a particular result is feasible, given a set of constraints. In the case of the Optimizer, to repeat, the constraints ARE NOT MINE. They were supplied by Mitofsky. And they show that his 1.12 alpha hypothesis is IMPOSSIBLE , because it contradicts his precinct WPE’s and 53% aggregate response rate.

You say:
And we know that when the final adjustment had been made, the projection made a nonsense of the Gore/Bush responses.

I say:
I agree.

You say:
One reason for this nonsense, could, I agree, be fraud. However, I see two alternative explanations that I find plausible, though I respect your right to disagree.

One is that no-one knows whether the weightings were correctly applied - my guess is that they would be optimized to constraints more binding (like gender) than past vote, as past vote is a notoriously unreliable measure. However, there are almost certainly multiple solutions to the possible weights that could be applied to match the poll data to the count data (and I agree - who could not? - that they were matched: they were designed to be matched) and some may give a more veridical match to the Gore/Bush proportions. So the final Gore/Bush proportions may simply be wrong, even though the estimate of the vote count now matches the vote count. Weighting solutions may exist that do a better job of approximating the actual Gore/Bush proportion.

I say:
Your first reason (that it was fraud) is the MOST PLAUSIBLE by a mile and has been proven beyond any REASONABLE doubt. Not just by analysis of the Exit Polls, but the Exit Polls in conjunction with DOCUMENTED VOTER SUPPRESSION, UNVERIFIABLE TOUCH SCREENS, UNVERIFABLE OPTICAL SCANNERS AND UNVERIFIABLE CENTRAL TABULATORS.

But I agree, let’s see those weighting solutions. I have shown that in the three exit poll timelines (8349 to 11027 to 13047 respondents) that Kerry won each and every one of 10 demographic calculations. That’s a total of 30 calculations, done exactly the same we have already shown in the How Voted in 2000 demographic.

The fact is, the How Voted in 2000 demographic statistics are the ONLY ones which can be independently verified. We have shown, and you have agreed, that the 2004 vote (122.3mm) and the 2000 votes for Gore (50.999mm) and Bush (50.456mm) are incontrovertible and have a ZERO MoE.

The fact is that EACH and EVERY ONE one of the other Exit poll demographics was ALSO matched to the vote.

In some cases the weight was not changed (54% Female/46% Male), but Kerry’s percentage was, from 54% of the female vote (at the 13047 timeline) to 51% in the Final 13660.

In the case of Party ID, the weights were changed from 38% Dem/35% Rep/ 27% Independent in the 13047 timeline to 37%/37%/26% in the Final 13660, but in addition the percentages of the votes were ALSO changed in favor of Bush, because just changing the weights was not enough to match the vote by itself.

You say:
But secondly, I do not believe the Gore/Bush raw responses are necessarily accurate. I find it plausible that the initial proportions of Gore/Bush respondents only coincidentally matched reality. I am not saying this is so, just that it could be so. In other words it is possible that the final table tells you something real about what people who voted for Bush in 2004 wanted to think about they way that they had voted in 2004. And that some Bush voters in 2004 wanted to think they had voted for Bush in 2000, whether they had in fact voted for him, or whether in fact they had voted at all. We know, from good research, that people do this.
However, I do not think this is necessarily the case. I think it may simply be an artefact of the way the weighting was done.


I say:
You always couch your arguments with “I am not saying this is so, just that it could be so”.

Well, yes, it could snow in Caracas tomorrow.

What is the rationale for assuming that Gore voters would forget who they voted for?
Isn’t it more PLAUSIBLE to assume that since they knew the 2000 election was stolen from Gore in Florida (with help from SCOTUS) that they would be HIGHLY MOTIVATED to exact justice by coming out in groves for Kerry? And do you really suspect that Gore voters fell in love with Bush, based on his (cough) performance in office?


You say:
But it means that although I follow your mathematical reasoning, I cannot agree that Gore/Bush proportions in the final table are incontrovertible proof of fraud, particularly in the light of evidence that bias was greater where random sampling protocol was most likely to be compromised, for example, where interviewing rate - the rate at which voters are selected for interview - was low.

And I think to assert that it is incontrovertible proof is misleading. It is contingent on a notoriously unreliable measure of past voting behavior from a minority subsample of the participants in the poll, and moreover, the final Bush/Gore proportions diverge from what is possible in exactly the way that one would expect - that people like to report have previously voting for the person they are currently voting for. I think it is known as the "consistency bias".

However, these are behavioural arguments, not mathematical. I do not dispute your math.

I say:
Incontrovertible proof. What is that? How about proof beyond a REASONABLE doubt?
You have not provided a modicum of reasonable doubt.

You say:
Please join the debate with me on DKos if you would like. I won't respond on DU again, for reasons I gave in my last post.

I say:
That is not necessary. First of all, DU is where I spend my time. Secondly, DKos is too complicated to use. Thirdly, I do not wish to be distracted in endless, fruitless argument.

I have stated the case. You have stated yours.

I only ask that you post this thread on DKos and let others form their own opinion.