I have perhaps a dumb question...with all the analysis today...and the exit polls being used...

[SaveElmer]

To try and explain it...

Why don't exit pollster simply ask voters "Why did you vote for the candidate you voted for?"

[oldtime dfl_er]

1. My question is even simpler

I thought exit polls were unreliable????

[rodeodance]

2. that would be a qualitative question--they want simple forced choices-easier to use

stats.

[AlGore-08.com]

3. Because everybody would have a slightly different answer and you couldn't analyze it

Let's say you ask ten people: "Who did you vote for and why?"

Here are your answers:

1. Hillary Clinton. I like her best.
2. Barack Obama. His speeches speak to me.
3. John Edwards. He's the best one.
4. Hillary Clinton. I dunno, I didn't like any of them, really.
5. Hillary Clinton. She's the most experienced.
6. Barack Obama. He's totally hot.
7. Barack Obama. Because Hillary sucks.
8. Hillary Clinton. I thought the line about hurting her feelings was awesome.
9. Martin Van Buren. The alien overlords told me to.
10. Barack Obama. He's the only one who can win the general election.

With a sample as small as 10 people, you can give those kind of individual answers, but the sample isn't large enough to see a trend and make decisions based on those trends. You can't tell from this sample things like - - Are other folks voting for Obama just because they dislike Hillary Clinton? How many of them? Is it so many that Edwards' campaign might benefit by pointing out his differences with Hillary Clinton? Why do they dislike Hillary Clinton? What can the Clinton campaign do to win over the voters who are voting against her? Are ten percent of the voters really going to back the late President Van Buren?

If you asked everybody who voted in NH last night "Who did you vote for and why", you'd have about 400,000 different answers somebody'd have to read and interpret. It's harder to correctly interpret what "He's the best one" means than it is to tally the answers to set questions like "Which candidate is strongest on defense? Which candidate is strongest on education?" etc., etc.

[SaveElmer]

4. Yes that is true..but

You could certainly glean general trends...and would perhaps give a better general sense of it than the static questions they ask...

[AlGore-08.com]

6. If you think that's true, then open a polling company that works that way

Let us all know how it works out.

[Peace Patriot]

5. The exit poll questions are designed to be able to DOCTOR the exit poll results

to force them to MATCH the results of Diebold/ES&S's secret vote counting formulae.

On 11/2/04, some alert bloggers and statistical experts took screen shots of the real exit poll results, which showed a Kerry win. Later in the day, the corporate news monopoly pollster pulled those results, and proceeded to CHANGE the exit polls, in impossible ways, to force them to fit the results coming in from Diebold/ES&S's "TRADE SECRET"-run central tabulators. The questions are designed to permit this squishiness of the results. Because we caught them at this game, after the 2004 election, they vowed never to let the public get its hands on the real exit polls again. See www.TruthIsAll.net for more info.

Both the exit polls--in their current use in the United States--and the Diebold "trade secret" results--are bullshit. It is all highly non-transparent and manipulable. And when war and corporate rule win, as in NH today, we can be pretty certain that manipulation occurred.

The ONLY solution--the only way of having certainty about the results--is a full hand-count of the ballots. And, as far as I can determine, that did not occur in New Hampshire. They have one of the better of very rotten systems--Diebold optiscans--which means they have a ballot. But even the best states do only a miserable 1% handcount--totally inadequate in a 'TRADE SECRET' vote counting system, run by a RIGHTWING BUSHITE CORPORATION.

And when you have exit polls that are tweaked to MATCH those results--and where the public never gets to see HOW the match was made (more private corporate activity)--there is simply no basis for confidence.

With non-transparent vote counting--vote counting that the public cannot see--you MUST presume fraud. It is an inherently fraudulent system. And since the war profiteering corporate news monopolies likes the results of this system so far, they will not challenge it. They don't want anything new to happen. They want to go on looting us and lying to us, and sending our children off to die in their corporate resource wars. And they want somebody in the White House who will take the cost out of the hides of the poor, not the rich. It's also convenient for them to have all this with a "D" in front her name--and a woman--wow!--she can fool all the women into believing that she will protect their rights, while her corporate pals loot them blind, and send millions more women into poverty.

But would the Democrats let that happen--let RIGHTWING BUSHITE corporations gain control of our election system, with 'TRADE SECRET,' PROPRIETARY programming code, and virtually no audit/recount controls?

Surely not.

Think again. The question is not "would they?". The question is, "DID they?". And the answer--tragically, infuriatingly--is: Yes they did. Figure that one out, and you have the key to everything that has happened since then that has boggled your mind, like the so-called 'Democratic' Congress voting to escalate and fund Bush/Cheney's heinous war.

The betrayal of the American people, and of our democracy, is very profound. And it's difficult to face it without becoming so sickened that you give up. I think this is why a lot of people haven't faced it--they can't face it. It's too ugly. And it makes you feel powerless--which it very much is designed to do. And all I can say is the truth is better than lies and delusions. If you know the truth, then you have a chance to change things--to fix what's wrong. If you live in corporate media delusions, you can never devise good strategies for change. With eyes open, it's clear that our first priority should be restoring transparent vote counting--which can still be done at the state/local level. Then we can worry about candidates and policies--when every vote is counted in public view. It's all just a shadow game otherwise. Did Hillary's tears win her the New Hampshire primary? Stay tuned!

But don't. Don't stay tuned. Go picket your local registrar, and demand vote counting that everyone can see and understand. The bastards and toadies on the "news" will never tell you to do that, but that's what you and all of us should be doing.

[joe_sixpack]

7. Many are assuming that because the exit polls

didn't match the election results, that the results were rigged, but wouldn't the easier and more logical answer be that if anything, the polls were rigged?