Unofficial Audit of NC Election: Comprehensive Case for Fraud

[ignatzmouse]

Sorry for the numbers. This is a long and comprehensive report, so please stay with me -- it offers what I believe to be a strong case that election tampering took place, and I want to carefully establish the facts. I think it may be the first deep examination inside the numbers of a given state -- not just speculation -- but real data collection and questionable results put to the test.

BeFree asked me a few days ago to look over the North Carolina election returns. Things looked funny. They were way out of sync with the exit polls and no one could believe that Erskine Bowles had lost in the Senate race. The deeper I looked at the figures, the more things began to look disturbing. I downloaded the precinct data and began to pour through it for clues. Then I saw that the absentee vote (which apparently also includes the early voting data) was huge, comprising more than *a million votes* and nearly a full third of the total vote (30%). It offered the chance to compare an unadulterated voting pattern against the strange results of election day. I reasoned with an early vote that large, it is no longer a sample but a benchmark. The nearer one approaches 100%, the more accurate the picture of the whole. At one third, any inconsistencies should even out -- even if more white suburban Republicans voted by absentee (as has been charged in the past with smaller samples) or if the Democratic GOTV pushed our early numbers (as has been assumed for this election). In that respect, I was lucky to have looked at North Carolina -- it's not as crazed as the battleground states and the electorate is nicely split between parties. Any inconsistencies of one side dominating the early vote would have showed up in the data -- they didn't.

With that in mind, I began an informal review of the NC absentee vote. What I found was stunning, and I believe it should have national implications. I have little doubt that we will find the same thing elsewhere by using benchmark absentee data against election day returns. It not only reflects the pattern of exit poll discrepancy we saw throughout the country, but it also makes a compelling case for purposeful tampering with the electronic data. I also think it reveals the three objectives of the Bush re-election campaign: 1) re-election 2) mandate 3) strong Senate majority.

All of the absentee information was buried in the precinct data, hundreds of thousands of lines worth, and had to be pulled out before a comparison could be made. Before we look inside the numbers, note that of the 102 North Carolina counties, 2 have not yet posted absentee data, Catawba and Lee. It may well be in the precinct data but mislabeled or combined in some way. The NC Board of Elections said that both counties have reported, but weren't sure where it was recorded -- I'm awaiting a call back with the information. My estimate based on Catawba's demographic similarity to Davidson would shift the absentee percentages by 0.6% in the Republican's favor, so bear in mind that I've not incorporated it into the data and the consistency is going to be even better than represented. Catawba has a strong Republican base (47,923 to 33,024 registered Republicans to Democrats) and is heavily White (91,141 white to 7619 black registrants). As it is now, the absentee/early vote is almost precisely balanced statistically with the final results. Lee county is much smaller and has 16,391 Democrats to 9149 Republicans (again mostly white) -- it likely would have little impact on the percentages.

Now, here is the absentee data for all the statewide offices, followed by the overall vote, and then the poll-only results (obtained by subtracting the absentee data from the overall figures). The poll-only data is important as it gives us an isolated snapshot of the results that were returned on election day.

GOVERNOR (Absentee)
Mike Easley (DEM): 573,120 (55.6%)
Patrick J. Ballantine (REP): 445,505 (43.2%) -12.4
Other: 12,490 (1.2%)

GOVERNOR (Overall)
Mike Easley (DEM): 1,939,137 (55.6%)
Patrick J. Ballantine (REP): 1,495,032 (42.9%) -12.7
Other: 52,512 (1.5%)

GOVERNOR (Poll only)
Mike Easley (DEM): 1,366,017 (55.6%)
Patrick J. Ballantine (REP): 1,049,527 (42.7%) -12.9
Other: 40,022 (1.6%)

Already we notice that the Democrat, Easley, ran consistently at 55.6% at the polls, in the absentee, and in the poll-only vote. The Republican, Ballantine, actually did very slightly better in the absentee. But this is the overall pattern of consistency in all the statewide races (except for Senate and President which I'll hold till last). There is one other important hidden benchmark we can measure here, percentage of turnout. Perhaps the Democrats had more early/absentee voters and the Republicans had a bigger election day turnout? Well, we can figure that by dividing Easley's absentees by his overall votes (573,120 divided by 1,939,137) to find a ratio of 30% for the Democrat. And then do the same for the Republican Ballantine to also get a ratio of 30%. Both Democrats and Republicans turned out in equal numbers in early voting and at the polls. Thank you, North Carolina.

To establish the point of consistency, here are the comparisons of all the other statewide races. It's a lot of numbers, most all of them in the same percentile range, but it was important to establish that there was a clear, obvious, and unaccounted diversion from the norm in both the Senate and Presidential races, so I spent a couple of twelve hour days and went through all the statewide numbers including the amendment votes.

MAJOR RACES

*******************
LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR (Absentee)
Beverly Eaves Perdue (DEM): 561,584 (55.7%)
Jim Snyder (REP): 433,112 (43.0%)
Other: 13,217 (1.3%)

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR (Overall)
Beverly Eaves Perdue (DEM): 1,888,382 (55.6%)
Jim Snyder (REP): 1,453,711 (42.8%)
Other: 56,367 (1.6%)

LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR (Poll Only)
Beverly Eaves Perdue (DEM): 1,326,798 (55.5%)
Jim Snyder (REP): 1,020,599 (42.7%)
Other: 43,150 (1.8%)

*******************
SECRETARY OF STATE (Absentee)
Elaine F. Marshall (DEM): 575,045 (58.0%)
Jay Rao (REP): 416,145 (42.0%)

SECRETARY OF STATE (Overall)
Elaine F. Marshall (DEM): 1,911,570 (57.3%)
Jay Rao (REP) 1,423,115 (42.7%)

SECRETARY OF STATE (Poll Only)
Elaine F. Marshall (DEM): 1,336,525 (57.0%)
Jay Rao (REP): 1,006,970 (43.0%)

******************
ATTORNEY GENERAL (absentee)
Roy Cooper (DEM): 546,477 (56.7%)
Joe Knott (REP): 417,824 (43.3%)

ATTORNEY GENERAL (overall)
Roy Cooper (DEM): 1,869,699 (55.6%)
Joe Knott (REP): 1,493,061 (44.4%)


ATTORNEY GENERAL (poll-only)
Roy Cooper (DEM): 1,323,222 (55.2%)
Joe Knott (REP): 1,075,237 (44.8%)

******************

OTHER STATEWIDE RACES:


******************
AUDITOR (absentee)
Leslie Merritt (REP): 476,257 (48.6%)
Ralph Campbell (DEM): 503,250 (51.4%)

AUDITOR (overall)
Leslie Merritt (REP): 1,662,361 (50.4%)
Ralph Campbell (DEM): 1,633,622 (49.6%)

AUDITOR (poll-only)
Leslie Merritt (REP): 1,186,104 (51.2%)
Ralph Campbell (DEM): 1,130,372 (48.8%)

*********************
COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE (absentee)
Steve Troxler (REP): 478,794 (48.6%)
Britt Cobb (DEM): 506,613 (51.4%)

COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE (overall)
Steve Troxler (REP): 1,665,678 (50.04%)
Britt Cobb (DEM): 1,663,022 (49.96%)

COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE (poll-only)
Steve Troxler (REP): 1,186,884 (50.7%)
Britt Cobb (DEM): 1,156,409 (49.3%)

**********************
COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE (absentee)
Jim Long (DEM): 582,238 (58.4%)
C. Robert Brawley (REP): 414,204 (41.6%)

COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE (overall)
Jim Long (DEM): 1,934,061 (57.6%)
C. Robert Brawley (REP): 1,421,404 (42.4%)

COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE (poll only)
Jim Long (DEM): 1,351,823 (57.3%)
C. Robert Brawley (REP): 1,007,200 (42.7%)

**************************
COMMISSIONER OF LABOR (absentee)
Cherie Berry (REP): 475,570 (50.2%)
Wayne Goodwin (DEM): 472,632 (49.8%)

COMMISSIONER OF LABOR (overall)
Cherie Berry (REP): 1,721,841 (52.1%)
Wayne Goodwin (DEM): 1,582,253 (47.9%)

COMMISSIONER OF LABOR (poll only)
Cherie Berry (REP): 1,246,271 (52.9%)
Wayne Goodwin (DEM): 1,109,621 (47.1%)

***********************
SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (absentee)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 507,523 (51.7%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 473,991 (48.3%)

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (overall)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 1,656,092 (50.1%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 1,646,838 (49.9%)

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (poll only)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 1,148,569 (49.5%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 1,172,847 (50.5%)

**************************
TREASURER (absentee)
Richard H. Moore (DEM): 546,160 (55.3%)
Edward A. Meyer (REP): 440,871 (44.7%)

TREASURER (overall)
Richard H. Moore (DEM): 1,812,182 (54.5%)
Edward A. Meyer (REP): 1,512,628 (45.5%)

TREASURER (poll only)
Richard H. Moore (DEM): 1,266,022 (54.2%)
Edward A. Meyer (REP): 1,071,757 (45.8%)

*******************************
NC Constitutional Amendment 1 (absentee)
FOR: 432,697 (51.7%)
AGAINST: 403,475 (48.3%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 1 (overall)
FOR: 1,494,789 (51.2%)
AGAINST: 1,423,195 (48.8%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 1 (poll only)
FOR: 1,062,092 (51.0%)
AGAINST: 1,019,720 (49.0%)

****************************
NC Constitutional Amendment 2 (absentee)
FOR: 679,434 (78.6%)
AGAINST: 185,101 (21.4%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 2 (overall)
FOR: 2,334,683 (78.0%)
AGAINST: 659,532 (22.0%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 2 (poll only)
FOR: 1,655,249 (77.7%)
AGAINST: 474,431 (22.3%)

****************************
NC Constitutional Amendment 3 (absentee)
FOR: 591,122 (68.7%)
AGAINST: 269,641 (31.3%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 3 (overall)
FOR: 1,984,151 (68.0%)
AGAINST: 933,021 (32.0%)

NC Constitutional Amendment 3 (poll only)
FOR: 1,393,029 (67.7%)
AGAINST: 663,380 (32.3%)

****************************

Of all the statewide races, the only other votes that may raise red flags are the Labor and Agriculture Commissioners, though likely the Catawba data will pull them into line. But none of the races showed anywhere near the unexplained swing of the Senate race.

*************************
SENATOR (absentee)
Richard Burr (REP): 492,166 49.48%
Erskine Bowles (DEM): 492,536 49.52% .04
Other: 9,917 1%

SENATOR (overall)
Richard Burr (REP): 1,791,460 51.6%
Erskine Bowles (DEM): 1,632,509 47.0% -4.6
Other: 48,103 1.4%

SENATOR (poll only)
Richard Burr (REP): 1,299,294 52.4%
Erskine Bowles (DEM): 1,139,973 46.0% -6.4
Others: 38,186 1.5%


*************************

WOW. With essentially the same vote demographics in the absentee and the poll, there was a sudden shift of 6.4% of the vote toward the Republican. That's more than a little alarming and is in itself enough to call into question the legitimacy of the election day vote. North Carolinians in this forum can speak to this, but Bowles is generally well liked. There is absolutely nothing to account for the bizarre drop of support in the electorate by 6.4% between the early voting (mostly the week prior) and election day. But when we compare it to the Presidential race, it is dwarfed by absurdity.

*************************
PRESIDENT (absentee)
George W. Bush: 529,755 52.9%
John F. Kerry: 469,522 46.9% -6.0
Others: 2749 0.2%

PRESIDENT (overall)
George W. Bush: 1,961,188 56.0%
John F. Kerry: 1,525,821 43.6% -12.4
Others: 13,989 0.4%

PRESIDENT (poll only)
George W. Bush: 1,431,433 57.3%
John F. Kerry: 1,056,299 42.3% -15.0
Others: 11,240 0.4%

**************************

So what the heck is going on here??? Kerry was behind by 6 points in the absentee/early voting. The result is consistent with the pre-election polls and most importantly with the exit polls of November 2nd. THE EXIT POLLS TELL US THAT PEOPLE VOTED IDENTICALLY TO THE OTHER THIRD OF THE ELECTORATE. By all standards of reason, the other two-thirds of the vote should be very close to the same result. But look at what happens -- a sudden and unexplained plummet in the very same electorate of NINE POINTS at the election day polls, more than doubling Kerry's overall margin of defeat. A 15 point edge for Bush in North Carolina on election day??? Come on -- I'm not that gullible. I honestly don't know how to account for that outside of computer programming -- and if it's there, there's a damn good case with the nationwide inconsistencies between exit polls and results on election day to say that it follows everywhere electronic tabulation goes. My gut tells me that this is why there is a reluctance in Florida and Ohio to push the absentee counting and that the ballots and counts had best be watched very damn closely. They present a paper trail challenge that if understood will provide a key benchmark for election day fraud. I also want to point out that the differential was not there prior to election day -- meaning there either had to be a *date specific* alteration in the software, a hack, or a specific activation just prior to the election. And lastly, it is not only the Presidential election day vote that is spurious -- the close Senate races also bear close scrutiny.

(Also posted to the NC Forum.)

[Tace]

1. Wow, Nice Work -- Thanks

[NCvoter]

39. 2000 totals in NC w/ absentee

this also includes early voting, though the early voting numbers were much higher in 2004.

Absentee Totals from 2000

Gore 187140 41.7%
Bush 258714 57.66%
Browne 1482
Buchanan 1061
McReynolds 303

Total 448700


These totals don't include curbside and provisional votes, which were relatively small figures.



Final overall totals:

Gore 1,257,692 43%
Bush 1,631,163 56%


http://www.sboe.state.nc.us/y2000elect/stateresults.htm

[TruthIsAll]

285. HERE IS A GRAPH OF THE GOV, SENATE, PRES RACES

Image

[mdhunter]

2. Bowles was a lock the week before the election. This is very interesting.

Thanks for the write up.

[NCvoter]

22. I'm not sure where you got this info...

Several weeks leading up to the election, polls showed Burr and Bowles tied. Very very tied.

I expected this race to be the one that forced a huge recount. The spread was a bit shocking.

[ignatzmouse]

24. Bowles

You're right. They were also tied in the absentee vote with a very tiny lead to Bowles. Statistically, it should have stayed that way, plus or minus a point. The 6.4 differential resulting entirely from Nov. 2nd moved so hard against the grain that it's cutting a jagged edge.

[NCvoter]

27. find past precedent of absentee ballots

and how they correlate to the overall vote.

in fact, let's see how the absentee/early voting numbers match up with other states in this election. of course, we should pick states that aren't in dispute, but did have a significant number of early voters.

we also need to find absentee/early voting records...to what precinct their vote counted, and % of Dems and Reps.

We can't accurately check the precinct totals compared to past years because the early voting numbers were so huge and they are simply lumped in with the absentee ballots. Comparing precincts this year to precincts from 4 years ago gets you nowhere because the numbers are in large part much lower this year with so many early voters.

[UL_Approved]

292. Vote total questions?

If you add up votes for various races, you see that the voter totals for state races are around 2.5 million. If you add up the amendments, the totals are approximately 2.8 million. If you add up the senate race in question, the total is about 3.3 million. The totals for the presidential election are around 3.5 million. Does somebody want to explain why there would be 40% more people turning out ONLY to vote for the presidential ticket that didn't vote for any state races (excluding senate and amendments)? Is this even possible with Diebold terminals (to vote for only a few of the offices and not all)?

[mdhunter]

58. I should have been more explicit, sorry.

Though it was likely to be close, I felt that Bowles would be a lock. With an the governors race a done deal and Kerry polling better than most thought he would, it seemed, despite the close Senate race numbers, that things would tend in Bowles' favor.

[whalerider55]

3. smokin'

like a gun

whalerider55

[sabra]

4. Wow, great work!

Do you have any links to source your data for both vote results, and polls?

[ignatzmouse]

14. NC data download

It's all downloadable here:

http://www.sboe.state.nc.us/enrs/main_primary.asp?ED=11...

Updates daily, so there's sometimes a slight shift in the numbers but not enough to throw off the percentages.

[Lucypher]

66. Easy to import into Excel as well

Data >> Get External Data >> Import Text File >> name of file >> Delimited >> next >> check off comma >> finish

[On the Road]

5. Goddammit, IgnatzMouse, That is a Great Analysis!

I would never thought to have done that. Maybe it's worth doing with other states.

Believe me, there are dozens of reasons someone can come up to explain this pattern, but boy, does it scream for an investigation.

(I nominated this for the homepage, BTW.)

[RuleofLaw]

11. Kick!

[SmallFatCat]

6. Thankyou, excellent work

Can we get some coders on the job to get some automation for a similar analysis of any other data we can get hold of?

I can help, but I haven't compiled any data. Data obtained directly from the source would be best too, that way we could avoid any "transcription" errors that seem to be coming up on the web based data.

[SmallFatCat]

7. More Benford's Law

Can you run an analysis using Benford's law on the precinct data you have?

[loudsue]

8. Great job, Ignatzmouse!! I live in NC...and I will NEVER believe that

Burr beat Erskine Bowles! Never!

In talking to the BoE, can you determine what would trigger an election AUDIT? Have you provided the BoE and/or the Governors office with this? The Atty. General race is a critical one... we need some Dem Atty General that will PROSECUTE people who tamper with elections!!

And, as for the Auditors race....Campbell has been the Auditor in NC for ....well, forever. They've done a recount on that race, and Campbell lost in the recount. I'd like to see an AUDIT OF THE MACHINES!!

Someone needs to impound those damned machines and go over them with a fine-toothed comb.

Same for Ohio. It looks like people voting absentee and/or provisional ballots, may have been voting in more than one county. We have had NOTHING but gerrymandering from the republicans in this election -- from throwing away Dem registrations in GOTV efforts, to extremely strange race statistics for pres. and congress.

It's enough to make you want to SCREAM!! ...and throw things!

[ignatzmouse]

17. NC Elections Board

The Elections people kept switching me around, putting me on hold, and finally I got a voice mail. I don't think they were intentionally being evasive. I have the impression they are spinning in a thousand directions. I'm not in NC, so it may be best for a native to push with the officials there.

[KoKo]

112. They are spinning all the time...believe me...I'll send this to whomever

I can. Hope other NC'linians will, too. Was at a meeting last night where the vote was being "spun" as "not much of a problem." This was a Dem wind up for those of us who worked on the ground...ACT/GOTV...it was pretty discouraging in that the people conducting it really didn't want to hear much about the "angst."

I'm more Lefty that most folks here, but our lefties are working on other things...so that's the good news.

Thanks for all your work...I'll pass it along to wherever it might do some real good.

I posted election night that "something is wrong in NC." Posted again after the election...funny numbers, but I can't do statistics it was my observation of watching the polls and being there on election day.

Two Precints are still outstanding...they wouldn't even give us the princinct names last night...it's as if no one knew, or they didn't want to talk about it. I'm a precinct co-chair, they should have shared the info.. I assume those twp pricincts are the ones the articles are coming out about today...you'd think we here would know.

[KatieB]

376. I wrote the General Counsel of NOE on 11-10 - ridiculous answer

Here's his email: [e-mail]

and he said this - (6 of these machines were ES&S BTW. Since then I have been passing along the info on the non-human error and also sent him the four-lines (@ten words) of simple computer code that could have fixed the problem in Carteret.)
---------
There was a malfunction of a voting machine in Carteret County because the company technician failed to set the machine to handle a higher number of votes. It was a simple matter of pressing an additional switch. The other counties you refer to were counties that reported total incorrectly and later corrected the reporting, had a ballot error as to the placement of a candidate that was corrected prior to the election, or miscounted the first attempt absentee votes. All those matters were quickly corrected.

The counties you mentioned use a variety of voting systems, punch cards, optical scan paper ballot, and electronic machines that are used by 93 out of 100 NC counties. The seven remaining counties either use paper ballots that are deposited in a ballot box and must be hand counted or lever machines an obsolete technology that has not been manufactured in this country for decades. The point is, that voting systems and the reports of voting totals work as well as the persons who are manning the machines or producing the report. As with every election, human errors do occur, and we have and will continue to address each error as to causation, and whether procedures should change to help prevent future errors. As the high rate of highway accidents show, the human factor in technology is and will be the primary source of accidents and errors.

No state or county board anywhere in our country can guarantee you an election without human error, but we are committed to that goal. Please be assured that the human errors in the counties you name are corrected and actions taken as to them.
Don Wright
General Counsel


-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, November 09, 2004 11:30 PM
To: Don Wright
Subject: North Carolina deserves a re-vote

With more than ten counties reporting electronic voting machine "glitches" North Carolina deserves a revote. Reports are this would cost $3.5 million. Seems a small price to pay for hope. What is that - a buck a person?
If our votes have no validity we have no hope. And without hope, we have NO society. Please don't take our hope away.
----------article follows:
>>
In North Carolina, tens of thousands of votes were affected by multiple problems with electronic voting machines in Carteret, Mecklenburg, Craven, Guilford, Yadkin, Onslow, and Forsyth counties.

Election officials in these counties and with the North Carolina State Board of Election were warned repeatedly that these types of problems COULD and WOULD occur and they dismissed the warning<<
http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/10133265.htm?1c

Posted on Tue, Nov. 09, 2004

[YellowDoginthehouse]

34. I had a hard time believing this also

And I'm originally from NC too. I moved a year ago.

[BeFree]

9. Yep

Good work, ignatzmouse.

Folks, the absentee/early vote is the barometer, as ingnatzmouse says. If your state has not yet released their early/absentee find out why. Heck, now you know why, now it's just a question of applying the same logic to your state as ignatzmouse has done for NC.

[DeadManInc]

73. absentee

Here in Ohio they haven't even counted the damn things yet!

[YellowDoginthehouse]

10. Congrats for this

I tried to pm you, but I can't...

[shelley806]

12. I imagine your 'gut' is right on the 'nose!'

My gut tells me that this is why there is a reluctance in Florida and Ohio to push the absentee counting and that the ballots and counts had best be watched very damn closely. They present a paper trail challenge that if understood will provide a key benchmark for election day fraud.

But then again, the early voters weren't subject to the 'missing explosives story' or the 'scary' OBL video. (I jest, just trying to find out ways for possible Rep spin)

This data is fascinating. Good work!

[enough]

13. Chilling reading.

Thank you, ignatzmouse -- another DU star bursts into the dark sky.

[Eloriel]

15. Magnificent

Just magnificent -- precisely (IMO) the type of analysis that should be done everywhere.

Can you do any others? (Hate to be greedy, but....you yourself know how important this is.)


MEGA:

[ignatzmouse]

20. Most Certainly...

I'd be happy to look at any state where there is sufficient data for investigation. My eyes are going a little blurry and my ass is getting a little sore, but these are critical times that call for blurry eyes and sore asses. I think Jefferson said that...

[SomthingsGotaGive]

23. great work.

As a Canadian looking in. It's work like this, by average citizens, that give hope to the world that Americans can and will free themselves from the tyranny that took over your country in 2000.

When are the police, FBI, or any other authorized body going to impound the machines?

[TexasChick]

26. LOL! n/t

[Cadence]

165. Colorado Numbers

I haven't looked at all of Colorado's Numbers yet but

Bush (R)........1,058,040.....Kerry (D).....944,052
Salazar (D).....1,023,803.....Coors (R).....944,520

does this look strange to anyone else?

Oh and good work btw!

[pointsoflight]

172. This isn't strange.

Colorado is still a little to the right overall, and Bush won in 2000 as well. Salazer won the senatorial seat because Coors is a doofus and in local elections there was a backlash against the extremely conservative governor.

There might be things worth looking at in CO, but that difference for the presidential and senatorial races was completely expected.

[Cadence]

175. It doesn't seem to you

that if you switched the names Bush and Kerry that the numbers would appear more consistent?

[pointsoflight]

178. Polls before the election had it exactly this way.

Bush winning the presidential race (albeit by less than the final margin), but Salazer winning the senatorial race. This alone is not suspicious. It's exactly what all polls were predicting before election day.

[MelissaB]

340. That is the funniest thing I've read all day!

Thanks for the laugh!!

[oddtext]

16. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you

when i saw the returns last week almost spit at my tv -- BULLSHIT!

[shelley806]

18. How to find out what states are still not reporting absentee

ballots? Actually one of the clues that the election was fraudulent early on for me, was that for a pres so unpopular without media coverage spin, the huge numbers of absentee ballots was favorable for Kerry, not the incumbent; as was the fact that voters often had to wait hours in abysmal weather conditins. B* doesn't inspire that kind of loyalty.

If other states are as high percentage wise as NC, and the same trends are followed, then it will reinforce the validity of the exit poll data, and a statistical analysis can be done on the differences between absentee and regular vote. Way suspicious.

BTW: I too nominated for front page (not sure if it takes more than 1 vote!)

[Horse with no Name]

19. Awesome analysis

Great work.

[NCvoter]

21. There are 100 counties in NC

I did notice a trend favoring the Democrats in the absentee ballots. With Bush getting more support than anybody else in the state that is in the GOP, it doesn't surprise me to see the absentee ballots shake out that way.

I just don't know if what you have shown is too much of a bounce. I'd like to see some statistical analysis on these numbers.

Nice work.

[bj2110]

160. See county-county analysis below....

[Woody Box]

25. Excellent work

A great argument to counter the increasing exit poll bashing

[Lone_Star_Dem]

28. Outstanding piece of work!!

Thank you for all the time it must have taken you to compile all of that information.

[splat]

29. So are recounts planned in NC? n/t

[KatieB]

377. Heard there might be a revote for 2 state races due to Carteret machines

From Charlotte Observer

Posted on Tue, Nov. 09, 2004

Glitch could force state to vote again

MICHELLE CROUCH

Staff Writer


More than 4,500 votes irretrievably lost in coastal Carteret County could trigger a new statewide election if the official margin of victory in two Council of State races is close enough, state election officials said Monday.

The problem, which one expert called one of the worst election glitches nationwide, occurred on a machine that wasn't set correctly.

"This is one of the few cases in which the votes were totally lost," said David Dill, founder of the Verified Voting foundation.

The votes, all early ballots, could affect the races for superintendent of public instruction and agriculture commissioner, both too close to call Monday.

Counties will add totals from as many as 75,000 provisional ballots to their returns today. If the final margin in any race is within 4,532 -- the number of lost votes in Carteret -- the losing candidate can file a protest with the N.C. State Board of Election.

It's unclear what would happen in that case. Attorneys Attorneys are studying whether the board could call a new election in Carteret County only, or even ask the disenfranchised voters to vote again. (Local elections officials have their names.)

But state law may not allow that: "The new election shall be held in the entire jurisdiction in which the original election was held," it says. That could mean the whole state.

Gary Bartlett, the state board's executive director, did not know Monday if the state has ever had to redo a statewide election; it hasn't happened in recent memory. A second election would cost between $2.5 million and $3.5 million, he said. <snip>

[Critical Thinker]

30. Excellent concept and analysis

Your idea (apply the absentee voter returns as a "contol group" for comparison to election day returns from polling stations) is positively brilliant in its simplicity.

This thread merits elevation to homepage status.

Suggestion: a graphical presentation (as part of your analysis) would be very helpful.

[ignatzmouse]

37. Graphics potential

You're very right. I don't know if I'm the best person to attempt a graphic on it, but the exit poll graphics that were posted earlier really did make the concept come alive. If someone wants to attempt this, I'd love to see it.

[Beetwasher]

31. Stunning, Absolutely Stunning! THANK YOU!

You've done a thorough job here and you have my gratitude. It's clear as day, something's rotten, very, very rotten.

[toodistracted]

32. Where are you getting the absentee ballot info?

I just downloaded the precinct results & don't see where they mark the ballots as absentee or not. Maybe I'm being stoopid, but how are you distinguishing absentee from poll? Do I have the wrong file?

[ignatzmouse]

36. Examples

No. It's there. You have to go line by line and pull it out. It lloks like this:

GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","AUDITOR","Ralph Campbell","DEM",38197,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","AUDITOR","Leslie Merritt","REP",34427,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE","Steve Troxler","REP",39334,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE","Britt Cobb","DEM",34810,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE","Jim Long","DEM",44992,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","COMMISSIONER OF INSURANCE","C. Robert Brawley","REP",29359,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","GOVERNOR","Patrick J. Ballantine","REP",31774,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","GOVERNOR","Mike Easley","DEM",44653,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","GOVERNOR","Barbara Howe","LIB",811,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR","Beverly Eaves Perdue","DEM",41728,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR","Jim Snyder","REP",32891,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","LIEUTENANT GOVERNOR","Christopher Cole","LIB",869,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","NC Constitutional Amendment III","For"," ",44727,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","NC Constitutional Amendment III","Against"," ",20362,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","SECRETARY OF STATE","Elaine F. Marshall","DEM",43541,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","SECRETARY OF STATE","Jay Rao","REP",30109,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION","Bill Fletcher","REP",34406,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION","June S. Atkinson","DEM",38594,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","TREASURER","Edward A. Meyer","REP",32652,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","TREASURER","Richard H. Moore","DEM",40409,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000

These are some of the Absentees I compiled for Guilford County for instance. But that is a lot of cut and pasting to get to that point. Each County lists every single ballot race as a group with separate returns for every single precinct in the county. There might be a hundred precincts in a county to sift through before you find the ones marked "ABSENTEE" for a given race. They are usually at the top or the bottom of a given race, though, so you can pan to the start of "GOVERNOR" and if the absentees aren't there, pan to the bottom of "GOVERNOR."

[toodistracted]

51. I see it now...

thanks!

man, you did a LOT of work. My imac doesn't even want to handle that much info in one file--will hardly let me scroll thru it.

kudos to you...have you sent this to any media? AAR or Olbermann --?

[txindy]

33. Amazing, detailed analysis

Thanks for doing this!

Those numbers are bizarre, to say the least.

[Pithy Cherub]

35. Excellent Analysis

and Welcome! Every voter deserves to have the points raised in this analysis answered with irrefutable proof. Faster than a speeding bullet-it's a 15 point swing - don't think so!

spelling, spelling, spelling

[bear425]

38. Great work! Are you communicating this to Bev Harris?

[e-mail]

[NCvoter]

40. 2000 Totals in NC w/ absentee

this also includes early voting, though the early voting numbers were much higher in 2004.

Absentee Totals from 2000

Gore 187140 41.7%
Bush 258714 57.66%
Browne 1482
Buchanan 1061
McReynolds 303

Total 448700


These totals don't include curbside and provisional votes, which were relatively small figures.



Final overall totals:

Gore 1,257,692 43%
Bush 1,631,163 56%


almost an exact match. this is interesting...

[chomskysright]

359. I ASKED THE BOE IT GUY TO PULL OUT THE ABSENTEE

CONTACT ME HERE: I'm hopeful of an answer. They have answered me so far, at least: [e-mail]

Rauf is the IT guy: [e-mail]

Mr. Rauf: This appears to be an SAS program. This is merely an example of some of the online data.

Can you not easily pull out the details of the absentee ballots on a county basis as associated with each office?

thanks for your help.

marsha hammond,phd


GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","AUDITOR","Ralph Campbell","DEM",38197,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","AUDITOR","Leslie Merritt","REP",34427,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/2004","A ","ABSENTEE ","COMMISSIONER OF AGRICULTURE","Steve Troxler","REP",39334,2004-11-11 03:30:13.560000000
GUILFORD,"11/02/

[Calvinist Basset]

101. Yes! Yes! Yes!

Communicate this information with Bev Harris ASAP!

[milkyway]

41. If your numbers are right, this should be sent to the NC Attorney General.

This certainly looks like criminal fraud. I just checked: the NC AG is Roy Cooper, Democrat.

And it should also be sent to Cam Kerry. Thanks for the great work.

[drm604]

42. Great Work!

I just emailed the address of this thread to Keith Olberman. This needs to be publicized widely!

[newyawker99]

76. Hi drm604!!

Welcome to DU!!

[drm604]

105. Hi newyawker99!

Thanks for the welcome.

[City Lights]

43. Wow. Great work.

Have you contacted anybody with your findings? Keith Olbermann might be interested in your work. [e-mail]

[milkyway]

44. NC uses several kinds of voting machines. Can you break it down by county?

Both Diebold and ES&S are used in NC (ES&S is just as suspicious as Diebold). It would be real interesting to see if all counties have this deviation from the absentee voting, or it varies depending on voting machines.

Here's a link for the voting equipment used in each county.

http://verifiedvoting.org/verifier/map.php?topic_string...

[bj2110]

162. See county-county analysis below...

[Election Mess]

374. Diebold and ES&S relationship

Aren't the owners of both companies brothers?

See site for FLA discrepancies:

[KatieB]

378. Yes, they are BROTHERS!

[chomskysright]

387. where's the info on them being brothers?

don't see it on your web page, passing lane

[e-mail]

[YBR31]

45. Has anyone sent this analysis to BBV or to friends in the media?

Has anyone sent this analysis to BBV or to friends in the media? I think calling it comprehensive case for fraud may be overstating things, but it sure looks odd.
Also is ignatzmouse credentialed? If ignatzmouse has a degree in math or statisitics, it would be more powerful.

[newyawker99]

77. Hi YBR31!!

Welcome to DU!!

[osubucks30]

46. EXCELLENT FIND!!

I wonder what explanation they are going to throw on this? Everything else matches almost perfectly. But when it comes to THE TWO MAJOR RACES it clearly defies logic and tilts toward the Republicans!

[kimchi]

47. Thank you so much.

Maybe when all the irregularities have proven our case of fraud; we can all chip in and buy everyone who has a sore ass a nice vacation!

[Guava Jelly]

48. just in case anyone forgot NC has 15 electoral votes

if nc is a fraud then nevada and new mexico are a fraud..
then bush had his ass handed to him and rove worked his magic

[TruthOutDawg]

49. GREAT WORK!

Thank YOU!

[mdb]

50. The media can try to debunk some Dixiecrat votes but not in whole

This whole issue does not resolve around Florida's panhandle.

NC is on the map. Ohio is another state. Need I go on? Okay... NM, CA, and the list goes on.

Here is something recent on N.C.

N.C. Voting System Has Many Failures.

http://www.nynewsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/wire/s...

[newyawker99]

78. Hi mdb!!

Welcome to DU!!

[Pooka Fey]

52. Holy Sh*t !

[gradstudent]

53. Benford's Law and the 2004 Presidential Election

Wow! Really interesting stuff.

I thought it would be interesting to do a Benford's Law analysis of the election. It's a law regarding the first digits in natural sets of numbers that is used to find accounting & tax fraud. I've done an analysis of all the states. Here is the web page if you are interested:

http://www.physics.ucsb.edu/~pagem/Benford /

M. Page
Dept. of Physics
UCSB

[Pooka Fey]

54. I don't get it.

This is great work! Thank you for doing it. I read your whole article and read the graphs, but I don't understand what the conclusions are. I'm one of those right-brain dominant fine arts people. Also the 2nd big chart on the main paper didn't post properly.

[gradstudent]

300. Thanks for the interest!

That one image should work now.

Benford's law is not used necessarily to prove fraud, but rather to "flag" suspicious looking numbers. So certainly some of the states match the law better than others. I now have a list of the most "suspicious" states, that is, the states that differ from the Law the most, available on the website.

This is the average amount (in standard deviation units) that the percentages from each state differ from theory. (I report in standard deviation units, to remove the effect of number of counties.)

The 12 "worst" states (Iowa being the worst of the worst):

PA 1.0369
MS 1.0552
IL 1.0702
KY 1.0735
MO 1.0853
MI 1.1072
GA 1.1562
IN 1.2083
VT 1.2400
TX 1.2482
ME 1.2600
IA 1.6296 (This state is WAY off - just look at the graphs too!)

I would like to do a similar analysis of NC, for both the absentee and regular ballots. But to do that I would need county-by-county totals of both the absentee and non-absentee votes. Does anyone know where I could get these?

[txindy]

303. Texas looks bad, does it?

I know I'm not surprised. I live here and the results that came out of here do not reflect what I've seen. I'd love to see someone dig into DeLay's results some day.

Nice job, gradstudent! Welcome to DU!

[uhhuh]

56. That's interesting

But I'm not good with reading this data. Could you explain what your results indicate?

[spacedog]

60. The lines should be close

If I understand the plots correctly, you just want the lines to be CLOSE. Close, of course, has some leeway -- the more counties (or data) the closer they should be. Connecticut and Massachusetts look pretty dead on. Others are just a mess!

[newyawker99]

80. Hi spacedog!!

Welcome to DU!1

[Beam Me Up]

57. Big graphic not showing on your page "img src=file:///home..." etc.

Also a .PNG Can you make it a gif or jpg?

THanks

[newyawker99]

79. Hi gradstudent!!

Welcome to DU!!

[Helga Scow Stern]

133. Fascinating...maybe it would lead us to states to suspect, and

you also said that it would not show ways of cheating that reflected randomness, like subtracting the numbers from one candidate and giving them to another, for instance.

I will post it if I can.

[bleever]

337. Very nice work! A great tool to show us where to focus first. Do

these standard deviation numbers

1. Depend on a state's performance related to the whole class of states, or does this measure each state's performance with regard to random probability?

2. Can you demonstrate the magnitude of the variations in a chart or graph, for example within the expected bell curve, or on a like chart?

This is really good stuff, and a great contribution to this part of the activity here.

[chomskysright]

360. I sent it to the U PA guy: here

[e-mail]

here is his analysis: ooops. too tired. its on that 'buzz' URL web site.

[hippiegranny]

55. even a math retard like me

can understand this! Great analysis and presentation.

[JohnnyCougar]

59. Now THIS is what I call evidence!!!

This is some serious shit right here. This will raise the suspicions of even the most skeptical!!

Way to go!!!!

Get this to Conyers, the media, everyone!!!

[liam97]

61. This should be sent to everyone everywhere!

Hi, joining late - I assume this has been forwarded already.. to Greg Palast, Tom Paine, Bob Fitrakis etc.

[City Lights]

62. I wouldn't assume anything.

And it never hurts to send this stuff from numerous people.

[bostonbabs]

65. A Numbers Trail !..thankyou for all your hard work!

[newyawker99]

81. Hi liam97!!

Welcome to DU!!

[On the Road]

63. OK, IgnatzMouse, you Inspired Me

I did the same with Cuyahoga County Ohio. All I have easily available are races for president, senator, and the gay marriage issue:

	        Kerry  Bush   Badnarik Peroutka 
Non-Absentee	65.6%	32.1%	0.3%	0.3%
Absentee	61.8%	34.4%	0.2%	0.2%

	     Fingerhut Voinovich 
Non-Absentee	47.3%	52.7%
Absentee	49.2%	50.8%

                Yes 	 No 	
Gay Marr Ban   52.6%	46.7%	
               52.7%	43.5%	

Don't know what to make of it -- just passing it on. Maybe I can do the local races Monday.

[jhgatiss]

64. I was a little bit surprised that...

when I went to look for that kind of data on the Franklin county BOE website that was just there last week it was gone today. The SOS website doesn't have statewide statistics for Ohio which makes an analysis like this for statewide Ohio somewhat challenging to say the least!

[ignatzmouse]

71. County by County Numbers Are Too Small: Find An Accurate Statewide Count

I saw the same thing with North Carolina. Several of the decidedly Democratic counties produced a higher than expected count for Bush. I don't know what to make of it except perhaps not wanting to vote in line with the opposition. In the smaller samples of the past, the white suburban Republicans were more likely to use absentee and tended to skew the statistical merits of absentees as a predictor. Things average out, though, as the numbers increase as they did dramatically this year. The smaller sample size of county by county results can still vary a good deal, so one really needs the state's overall numbers.

[On the Road]

152. On the Other Hand, County-Level May Give More Information

To me, sample size is not the issue, since we're talking about the entire voting universe, not a sample of a larger group. There will definitely be variation, but the goal is to look for outliers.

If fraud was committed, it is likely to be localized, so that the absentee/poll-only comparison would match for most counties, but in some there would be outliers.

County-level data would make it possible to do a scatter graph showing the mismatch between absentee and poll-only data by geography. Areas in which there might be irregularities would stick out visually like a sore thumb.

The Rep counties voting for Bush is probably due to the Dixiecrats -- that's a very real effect. But the absentee/poll-only vote should match unless there's something funny going on.

[bj2110]

163. See county-county analysis below...

[shaggy briard]

67. This highlights the problem

If exit polls generally show 94% of Repubs voted Bush and 90% of Dems voted Kerry, with the Inds 50/50 -- then you can't run up those "dixicrat" pluralities in small counties here and in FL and OH without screwing up the turnout, or the final vote -- the turnout is known, the exit polls are consistent -- therefore, it is the count that must be wrong.

[newyawker99]

82. Hi shaggy briard!!

Welcome to DU!!

[gercohen]

68. response from a North Carolina activist - just DEM early vote GOTV

I analyzed after the early voting deadline but before the election the counts for Wake, Durham, Orange, Buncombe, Guilford, and Mecklenburg. In each county the % of Democrats casting early votes exceeded the percentage they make up of the total electorate, in other words Democrats were more likely to cast an early vote than Republicans. So it is not surprising at all that Kerry did much better among early voters than he did non election day, because Dems had tapped out the most driven part of their electorate. Durham and Orange were the highest % for Kerry overall, 68% and 67% respectively. In Orange and Durham counties, I believe half the total turnout was early voters. This helped skew the early voting turnout MUCH more Democratic than on election day.

So I think it not unexpected at all that there would be a wide divergence between how Kerry did among early voters and how he did on election day. In fact, it was to be expected

In my humble opinion your comment that:

"A 15 point edge for
Bush in North Carolina on election day??? Come on -- I'm not that gullible. I honestly don't know how to account for that outside of computer programming -- and if it's there, there's a damn good case with the nationwide inconsistencies between exit polls and results on election day to say that it follows everywhere electronic tabulation goes."
is not really supportable.

[ignatzmouse]

84. It averages out

Yes, but the reverse happened in smaller counties throughout the state. Of course you will find more Democrats voting early in Democratic urban areas. You will also find more Republicans voting early in their strongholds and also actually in smaller Democratic counties. It averages out. At MOST there was a 1.8% early voting edge for Democrats as a percentage of their early vote. It's probably closer to 1.2% as there are more Democrats in North Carolina.

If we use the best case scenario for the Republicans of a close race, we can pretend that the field is even and check the early voting figures. It assumes that the electorate is 50/50 Republican/Democrat. The superintendent race was the closest, so I'll use that.

Atkinson, the Democrat, received 507,523 votes in early/absentees. Divide that by her total votes in the election 1,656,092 to find a ratio of 30.6%. Her early voting totals accounted for 30.6% of her total votes.

Fletcher, the Republican, received 473,991 votes in early/absentees. Divide that by his his total votes in the election 1,646,838 to find a ratio of 28.8%. His early voting totals accounted for 28.8% of his total votes.

So even assuming a 50/50 split of Republican/Democrat, the difference in early voting was just 1.8%. The best case for the Democrats is almost dead even at 30%. The mean between the extremes is 0.9%, meaning Democratic voters probably had roughly a 1% edge statewide in early voting. -1% to -2% does not translate into -15% in the presidential election day vote.

[mountebank]

85. But what about absentee votes?

Common wisdom also says that absentee ballots favor Republicans, and these are included in the category he compares against votes cast at the polls. I would also make an assumption that there were more absentee ballots than early votes, though it's not supportable by any facts.

My point is that his category absentee/early voting is possibly not skewed like you suggest because it also includes absentee ballots.

[noiretextatique]

307. remember: a lot of democrats voted absentee THIS election

or on provisional ballots...to have a paper trail. when i went to vote (totally democratic stronghold in northern california), several people (myself included) asked for provisional ballots.
absentee ballots may not have favored republicans this time.

[Bozos for Bush]

97. Freeper alert - any sane person can clearly see evidence beyond...

a reasonable doubt here. This is as ironclad as it gets folks, yet we have a 2-post person suddenly showing up trying to cast doubt.

Absurd.

[JudyM]

140. My thoughts exactly.

[gercohen]

146. a 2 post person

Oh, so since I have just discovered DU and have just made two posts, therefore I am a freeper? I guess I'll just go back in my cave.
I've been active in Democratic politics in NC for 36 years. I've run for office 4 times myself, twice successfully. I am NOT a freeper.

[gercohen]

150. freeper? Hardly.

If I was a freeper why would I have picked a screen name that was actually my name (ger cohen IS my name) rather than just making up a fictional screen name like almost everyone else on DU? I'm not trying to hide who I am.

[On the Road]

156. Seriously, This is NOT Evidence of Fraud Beyond a Reasonable Doubt

It's an abnormality in the data that has to be explained. Making claims beyond the data does not help the case.

IgnatzMouse had twenty-something posts when he started this thread, which is a more creative and thorough analysis and any long-timers on this board, including me.

It's very important that naysayers are NOT discouraged. One of the biggest dangers of the post-election period so far is that Democrats all over the map (including Greg Palast) are making unsupportable claims. They leak out to the national media, they are examined and correctly rejected, and all legitimate findings are dismissed. The WaPo article is a prime example.

Every finding should be tested. As Richard Feynman said, our goal should be to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible. The ones that can't be disproven are most likely the genuine ones.

[bj2110]

168. Great Point. We should all be trying hard to prove these theories wrong...

It's the only way we an be sure that they are correct, and the only way that they can lead to any concrete evidence.

[JohnnyCougar]

104. OMG...I posted this on KOS, and this EXACT SAME RESPONSE

showed up after my post on there.

This poster's assertations are way off the mark, anyways. It is probably the same disruptor trying to go on every board and kill this story.

Karl Rove, is that you?

Not gonna kill this one.

[JudyM]

141. Ha! Beware Karl the Freeper n/t

[gercohen]

148. no I am NOT Karl Rove

No, I am not either Karl Rove, or a freeper. I am an active Democrat in North Carolina, have been so for 36 years. I simply do NOT believe that the mountain of statistics at the top of the post proves anything. I WILL say that the two weeks of early voting in North Carolina I worked for the Wake County Board of Elections at an early voting site (I got to hand my old friends John and Elizabeth Edwards their ballots in fact -- I've known Elizabeth Edwards since 1969 and went to law school with both John and Elizabeth.) Repeat, I am NOT a freeper. I am sorry that my analysis of the situation does not fit in with what people would like things to be.

[understandinglife]

301. hi

you may want to check:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/14/13100/777
sure seems so very much to want to leave the present and speculate about the future.

as soon as you think a comprehensive update Diary on Bev Harris work should be posted at dKos just let me know and I'll do it for you if you determine it should be done before you can start posting your own diaries.

"It's about America" -- the one on life support and in need of immediate, heroic treatment: not more wishful thinking.

[understandinglife]

306. Highly relevant....

....suggest that you and Ignatz and others here post to this thread at dKos:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/14/144941/51

and, here is something interesting from a Federal, voter's rights perspective:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/14/153843/98#2

[pointsoflight]

119. Sorry, try again. The author directly addressed this.

"Any inconsistencies of one side dominating the early vote would have showed up in the data -- they didn't."

"Perhaps the Democrats had more early/absentee voters and the Republicans had a bigger election day turnout? Well, we can figure that by dividing Easley's absentees by his overall votes (573,120 divided by 1,939,137) to find a ratio of 30% for the Democrat. And then do the same for the Republican Ballantine to also get a ratio of 30%. Both Democrats and Republicans turned out in equal numbers in early voting and at the polls."

Besides all of that, you completely miss the point. The absentee data perfectly predicted every single race and referendum except the senatorial and presidential races. If dems dominated the absentee data, all of these votes would've been skewed towards the dems. Instead, all of these votes were nearly identical to the final numbers.

[gercohen]

149. sorry too

Just because the author directly addressed this does NOT make his analysis correct

[pointsoflight]

179. He addressed this...

...with a concrete analysis of large samples of data from the entire state. Are you trying to say we should dismiss data that's coming from hundreds of thousands of voters because one person who says he was on the ground in one precinct reports a difference in the number of Kerry stickers he saw?

[rjbny62]

183. anecdotal evidence is irrelevant at this point

numbers are needed, and that is what makes this study so compelling. Someone over at Kos showed that large numbers of Kerry supporters voted early in a few dem leaning counties - see http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/13/164121/27 for more details

>>>>>

My theory is that the early democratic vote turnout - while may have been similar to republican - was from areas that are more friendly to K/E.. e.g. I suspect the turnout in Orange and Durham counties (dem. strongholdes 2:1 Kerry voters) turned out higher than other areas for the early absentee voting...

Actually my theory seems supported ...
In Orange county 2 to 1 kerry voters..

early absentee voting was more than 50% of the total votes cast.. in Orange County (chapel hill)

That could explain the results.... Dems from very friendly areas including Orange and Durham turned out much higher for early voting than dixiecrat or less liberal dems in the rest of the state.

>>>>>

I would like someone to calculate whether the early Kerry voters in these counties could actually account for the large discrepency between the Pres/Senate races and all the other races, which was so clearly illustrated in the study.

[gercohen]

154. trying to be rational

My own personal observation having worked at an early voting site in Wake County NC and on election day at the exact same location -- During the early voting, I counted 125 people wearing Kerry/Edwards buttons, hats, t-shirts, bumper stickers on their chest, whatever, compared with 6 such persons for Bush. Almost everyone with either Bush or Kerry stickers were white voters. The site went 70% for Kerry in the early voting

On election day, I was working outside the polls handing out Democratic stuff. I found a much larger concentration of hostile white voters who told me they were voting for Bush. Election day vote at that polling place, 59% for Kerry. So, a statistician looking at the election results say "same location, 11% swing to Bush, must be evidence of fraud". But my own anectdotal evidence? - there was a significant difference between the early vote type of voter and the election day type of voter, or maybe the OBL tape got to people (it was after Early voting ended)

[ignatzmouse]

171. A Wake Up Call

It's okay. Questions are good. Individual counties can be all over the place because of the smaller sample size. Wake is fairly large, though, so let's look at their numbers -- again, roughly 1/3 was cast in the early vote.

Overall Wake County, NC:

Early/Absentee
Kerry: 51,899 52.9% +6
Bush: 45,974 46.9%

Election Day Polls
Kerry: 118,010 47.3% -5.4
Bush: 131,350 52.7%

Almost a complete juxtaposition, an 11.4 percent swing!

Also, as a guide here are Wake's numbers in the Governor's race. They are nearly the same, only around a 1.5% swing.

Absentee/Early:
Easley DEM: 59,926 60%
Ballantine REP: 38,180 39%
Howe LIB: 1,139 1%

Overall:
Easley DEM: 205,535 59%
Ballantine REP: 138,650 40%
Howe LIB: 5,357 1 %

Election Day Poll:
Easley DEM: 145,609 58%
Ballantine REP: 100,470 40%
Howe LIB: 4,218 2%

How does one account for the other 10% differential between the first 1/3 and the second 2/3 of the vote while the other races are the same?
Voting technology brought to you by: ES&S Optical scan

[pointsoflight]

174. With all due respect, I don't think you understand the argument.

The author presents tons of data showing that statewide, there was no difference between the early voters and late voters. For numerous local races, state-wide races, and referendums, the early-vote results were right in line with the election day results. Despite this, there was a huge swing in the presidential race.

You present anecdotal information from one precinct. If your anecdotal evidence is true for the whole state--that early voting favored the dems--then why didn't all of the races show this? Why do the early and election day votes nearly identical patterns for ALL of the races other the presidential and senatorial races. Wouldn't a dem bias in early voting show up in all of the races?

[gercohen]

158. Bush/Burr/Democrats on election day

Oh, and here is another anecdote -- there was a white woman taxi driver taking people to the poll where I was working on election day, the car was plastered with Bush stuff. She was telling her passengers to vote for Bush/Burr and then straight Democratic the rest of the way.

I asked her why? she said "Vietnam".

[fasttense]

159. WHY WOULD DEMO VOTE EARLY MORE OFTEN THAN

Repubs? Here in TN the early voters are usually senior citizens and they tend to vote for Repubs not against him.

[pointsoflight]

173. More importantly, the data shows the dems didn't dominate early voting

[noiretextatique]

309. excellent point...democrats didn't dominate early voting

the trend shift, if it was a legitimate one, should have been a boost for kerry, not *.

[althecat]

69. Great work... Here's some pre-election poll data to consider

http://www.electoral-vote.com/states/north-carolina.htm...

[Carolab]

87. Yeah must have been that "OBL" tape

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[floridadem30]

70. absentee and early votes in Jefferson county total 6884/7501

Although the results show the democrats winning the county the important thing to look at is that the democratic party lost 23.6% of it's expected vote to republicans. This is a heavy democratic county with 6726 registered democrats vs 1929 republicans and out of 9300 registered voters 7501 voted and of that total 6884 were by absentee ballott and early voting. Here is another odd stat when comparing the senate and presidential race in this county.

Martinez 976/Bush 1192 Early Voting Republican
Castor 1427/Kerry 1269 Early Voting Democrat

Martinez 425/Bush 515 Absentee (R)
Castor 567/Kerry 513 Absentee (D)

This is a op-scan precint and used Diebold Machines

I don't know how you analyze this info but hopefully it will help. I do have websites and info to back it up saved on hard drive.

[Bread and Circus]

72. Damn, looks like brilliant work to me. Needs to be sent to Olbermann and..

other "listening" media sources.

M. Moore perhaps?

[ms liberty]

74. I live in rural NC, and this confirms my suspicions

I expected the race to be much closer at the end with Kerry, and I thought Bowles might win it. I voted early, on Oct 21st, and there were about 5 people in front of me. When I came out of the voting booth there were at least 12 people in line to vote. The Democrats I know here were all very motivated, and I also know several people who voted for Bush the first time were voting for Kerry.
I'd like to see the breakdown by county also, and see this and it on a graph. I got laid off 2 days after the "election", and I like to play with charts and graphs so I'm going to see what I can come up with on these numbers.
Excellent Work and Many Thanks

[bleever]

83. Welcome ms liberty!! And we love charts! n/t

[JudyM]

142. Here in Va, too - lots of former Bush voters said they were voting Kerry

but I never heard ANYone say the converse. The only thing that could explain it to me is if *'s GOTV far exceeded the votes he lost. And that's hard to believe.

Welcome to DU!

[childslibrarian]

143. Welcome to DU

Thanks in advance for your work!

[Spiffarino]

75. One thing that might account for some of the bounce

...that hasn't been mentioned is the "Sunday" effect. Specifically, the number of preachers who pretty much told their flocks how to vote on Tuesday.

I live in the NC mountains. Nearly every Dem I know who went to church on Sunday before the election was shaken up by what they heard.

While no pastor that I know of mentioned Bush and/or Burr by name, they pushed VERY hard that there were "certain values" every Christian should always vote for. Around here, folks understand those code words to mean bible-thumping Muslim-killing abortion-hating stem-cell-research-denying Republicans.

IgnatzMouse, your research is excellent and very compelling. I hope the numbers spur the North Carolina AG to action. However, having lived here for some time I think they could have pulled it off to some extent by leveraging Christian guilt and obedience.

[NJCher]

86. I heard snippets of an argument on the radio today

I'm not sure if it applies here but I think it was the south.

The argument goes like this: there are many registered Democrats who have been long-time republican voters. They just never bothered to change their registration.


Cher

[Spiffarino]

90. Maybe, but

...I did a lot of phone-banking for Kerry in Western NC, and knocked on quite a few doors. By and large, the Dems in this area held. And I think more of them held for Kerry than did for Gore in '00.

That being said, I think the fundies were especially motivated to get * and Burr into office because of their great respect for life...the petty issues of favoring the death penalty and unjustified wars notwithstanding.

[Zan_of_Texas]

96. Yeah, but if they're Rs in D clothing, why did they vote for Ds statewide?

Except Senate and President?

[ArthurRuger]

92. IgnatzMouse

I'm quite new to DU but I'm impressed with what I've found.

Congratulations! This is excellent work.

[JudyM]

145. Do you have info on whether those churches have received federal $

as part of *'s 'faith-based intitiative' or otherwise? This is a serious issue that should also be explored!

[Hephaistos]

185. Another oddity: quite a Sunday Effect

Just looking at the Senate and Prez races, there is something odd in the pattern that Bowles voters went for Bush.

Fact:
- More people voted for prez than for the senate race. Those voters only went to polls to vote for the top of the ticket.

In early and absentee voting, those were 1.32% of voters, while this type of voter comprised 1.81% of the overall vote, so they must have made up over 2% on Nov. 2 - maybe the folks fired up the preachers?

Let's assume the simplest (and most benevolent, to Bush) case:

- ASSUME: ALL of the people voting for Kerry also went for Bowles
- ASSUME: ALL of the people voting for Burr also went for Bush
- ASSUME: ALL of the people voting only for prez went for Bush

What is left to explain is the difference in the vote between Burr and Bush. According to the numbers, there must have been a bunch of voters who voted for Bowles for Senate and Bush for Prez.

To be precise, using the simplified assumptions above:

Early & absentee voting
-----------------------
- 23.000 Bowles voters also voted for Bush (4.67% of Bowles voters)

Overall results
---------------
- 106,700 Bowles voters also voted for Bush (6.54% of Bowles voters)

If early and absentee voting made up 30% of the overall, that means close to 8% of Bowles voters went for Bush on election day, compared to only 4.67% in early/absentee voting.

Those preachers must have been on FIRE...

Also note that if some unknown percentage of top-of-the-ticket-only voters went for Kerry, this effect would have to be even greater, as those comprised a much higher percentage on election day than in early voting.

Another note of caution: without a better breakdown of real data, the simplifying assumptions made above could change this conclusion - however, except if we find that a larger number of Burr voters went for Kerry in early voting than overall, almost any change in the assumptions would tend to increase the effect.

On edit: the effect would almost, but not quite, disappear if we assumed that ALL the early/absentee top-of-the-ticket-only voters went for Kerry, while ALL the voting day top-of-the-ticket-only voters went for Bush (7.63% vs. 8%).

[liam97]

88. Dear Ignatzmouse

I wasn't sure if youwanted this circulated or may be you have done it already?

[ignatzmouse]

91. Yes, please pass it along.

Yes, please send it where ever and to whom ever it may help.

[aprillcm]

89. Catawba County is mine :)

What you do not understand from my county is although we have long been strong for Republicans this year some things played into this that nation wide coverage may have missed.

First we Love Huffman here all of us even Democrats. McHenry beat him in the Primaries and angered alot of people. Some switched to independent some switched to Democrat and this registered many new voters and was long seen as bad news for Republicans including the President.

I went to early voting with my Husband and a few others we knew they voted early I voted election day. I witnessed the same kind of crowds at early voting and on election day and the same sentiment was expressed either for or against Bush in equal numbers.

Why our numbers aren't out yet I have no clue but if you haven't found out by Monday post a message to me, I will call myself.

[joubert]

93. really interesting

Just wanted to say I hope this gets circulated and analyzed further.

[JohnnyCougar]

98. Hi joubert!!! Welcome to DU!!!

Cheers

[ms liberty]

95. I'm in Alexander County

totally rural, it's the same thing. We're all furniture around here and it is not getting better. Between outsourcing to China and corporations merging their way to industry dominance and maximized profits the people are being abandoned. I saw more democratic signs and bumper stickers this year than I ever have before. And some of the really right wingers I know acted kinda worried there toward the end of the campaign.

[JohnnyCougar]

99. Hi, ms liberty!! Wlecome to DU!!!

CHeers to you, too!

[aprillcm]

100. The Republican Rushed in the Last few weeks

and ran some pretty nasty ads against Bowels here did you notice blaming him for everything while Clinton was President including trying to say all the Job loses are Clintons(and Bowels by assos.) Fault I guess they forgot under Clinton we lost a few jobs but we gained a bunch of tech jobs that we are now losing under Bush never to return.

[TangledThorns]

94. John Edward's State

And what is he saying about this??? hmmm, i h8 this

[JohnnyCougar]

102. Hi Tangled Thorns!! Welcome to DU!!!

Lots of newbies on this thread! Cheers!

[patomime]

109. Native North Carolinian

This is more concurrent evidence of what is happening here in NC....

John Kerry was doing very well in the polls until late September, when, I think the "Swift Boaties" helped to take their toll. Even so, I still thought Kerry, Bowles had a chance. I'm in a small rural county -- west of Winston-Salem, - and for the first time in 14 years I'd seen Democratic posters in a Republican county (including mine and my bumper stickers, thank you very much).

There are several troublesome things going on in NC - from voting machines that started subtracting once it got above a certain number, and more erroneous late night totals in several other counties (as reported by Olbermann today).

[Spiffarino]

393. Gotcha

Hi Freep!

[Jane Eyre]

103. A couple of things

Gaston county officials forgot to count 12,000 absentee (early) votes, and I don't know that those are included in your totals. Gaston trends Republican. See article:

http://www.charlotte.com/mld/charlotte/news/politics/10...

Also, Richard Burr really pulled out the big guns in his ad campaigns during the last two weeks specifically. Bowles' ads attacking Burr's stance on breast cancer funding was pretty effectively countered when Burr's sister Debbie, a breast cancer survivor, began appearing in ads to attack Bowles. It was an emotional appeal that may very well have worked to get her brother more votes on election day.

The Democrats did a good job getting the vote out during early voting, especially in urban areas such as Charlotte. Black voters in Charlotte were particularly motivated to vote when Sunday voting was allowed for the first time after right-wing county commissioner Bill James led a last-minute Republican attempt to stop the Sunday voting from going on. His racist comments carried in the Charlotte Observer included calling his detractors "black wackos" and "NAACP groupies".

North Carolina has an odd law requiring that the presidential ticket must be voted seperately from the straight ticket. If you assume that early voters are more motivated and more informed about how to vote, a case could be made that the drop-off in Kerry votes on election day was caused by many voters neglecting to make the seperate vote for president after voting a straight ticket. Also on this subject, the Republicans do a better job IMO on getting information to their voters about how to vote for president as well as their "non-partisan" judges.

[idiosyncratic]

170. Odd laws like that are one more reason all election laws

for Federal Offices should be the same. IMHO

[Jane Eyre]

You can blame the state Dems of the 70's for that

The general consensus is that the law requiring seperation of the national ticket from the rest of the straight party ticket was put there by the Democrats of the early 70's. They wanted to seperate themselves from McGovern, who was sure to lose in NC even as the statewide candidates won. They did not want to be tied to a sinking ship, as it were. Democrats have almost always had a majority on the state level, and that holds true even today.

State and local Dems tend to be a bit more conservative than national candidates. Governor Mike Easley's ads lambasted his Republican opponent as a tax-raising liberal, while promoting himself as the NRA's choice for governor. The radio ads ran during the Rush Limbaugh show, usually right before a Viagara commercial. Go figure.

[Jane Eyre]

184. You can blame the state Dems of the 70's for that

The general consensus is that the law requiring seperation of the national ticket from the rest of the straight party ticket was put there by the Democrats of the early 70's. They wanted to seperate themselves from McGovern, who was sure to lose in NC even as the statewide candidates won. They did not want to be tied to a sinking ship, as it were. Democrats have almost always had a majority on the state level, and that holds true even today.

State and local Dems tend to be a bit more conservative than national candidates. Governor Mike Easley's ads lambasted his Republican opponent as a tax-raising liberal, while promoting himself as the NRA's choice for governor. The radio ads ran during the Rush Limbaugh show, usually right before a Viagara commercial. Go figure.

[Senator]

106. MUST look at all NON-swing states.

ALL states are important. Some people have bought the line that "nothing matters because they won the popular vote." They didn't. They just stole from everywhere they could to "create that reality." The pretense of inevitability that served them well during the 2000 treason.

They learned from 2000. No spoiled ballots to be recounted. Only paperless theft and a return to the "old ways" of:

* poll-tax-lines (time is money folks) - in selected precincts

* dumped registrations - Dems only

* bloated false registrations - to support false numbers and/or absentee ballots (why else would they conceive of this as a "crime" to accuse Dems of registering Mickey Mouse?)

* transposing numbers or "typos"

Don't sell them short. They've perfected these techniques and no one would argue that they're too honorable to use them. They gloat about the 2000 theft in DC -- off the record of course.

Our position simple; show us the voter.

Not black box printout; Show us the voter.

Not low black turnout; Show us the Voter (that left the unlawful 10-hour line).

Not rationalizations for the anomolies; Show Us the Voter.

Not names on a registration list; Show Us the Voter!

Not signatures in a book; SHOW US the VOTER!

Otherwise we will remind you there is no right to have your electors counted and we will show you the door.

We will only count electors who we feel confident were lawfully appointed. From states whose officials recognize who owns the country and the elections. Who answer only to The People, not to any political party.

www.demonizedliberalposse.com

[Senator]

107. Here is the new frame - demand

At UnionCountyforDemocracy.org (NJ) we have decided what needs to be done. Perhaps you agree.

We The People Do Not Concede!

In a true America, leaders serve only with the consent of the governed, and that consent must be obtained by lawful elections that accurately measure the will of the voters. We shall not tolerate any violation of this fundamental principle, the SOLE moral tenet on which our nation was founded and has since relied.

The voting systems and practices used in the conduct of this past election are so clearly flawed that the results in nearly every state are wide open to corruption by systematic vote suppression, data manipulation, human and machine error, and consequently, willful fraud. The only certain result is that we can have NO confidence in how accurately they guage the will of the electorate.

We refuse to further descend into the Stalinist perversion of "democracy;" in which "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything." Such was the clear underpinning of the 4-year-old edict of the 5 black-robed political operatives, who arrogated to themselves the perquisite of sentencing the nation by their fiat to live under appointed rule as opposed to elected leadership.

We the People, through our representatives, have set out our election laws to ensure that election results reflect OUR will. In far too many states, demonstrable errors and anomalous patterns of result have rendered the "official" tally suspect. More tragically, the systems and processes implemented by "experts" now make it impossible for us to rule out corruption without further investigation and audit.

Given the likely consequences of once again tacitly accepting corrupt results, the moral burden must now be on each state to prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that their results are accurate and lawfully obtained. There is no other patriotic option.

But let us be clear, IF WE ARE UNABLE to obtain this proof under current election law, through civil and/or criminal judicial means, then we MUST RESORT to a political solution and demand that our Congress reject the electors from ANY STATE that fails to validate its results through comprehensive, apolitical investigation and audit.

Our law is intended to serve our will, not thwart it. We can never again allow a "technical" or "legal" arguments and rationalizations to trump reality as we did in 2000.

NEVER AGAIN.

[Senator]

108. Put the Burden on Them for a change.

What We Require.

To prove that their election results were lawfully obtained and reflect the will of the voters, we demand that each state:

(1) Provide the data required to prove they did not create discriminatory barriers to voting.

Across the nation, people were forced to wait for hours to even attempt to cast their ballots. This onerous waiting time constitutes a de facto poll tax (time is money). Each state must provide data on wait times at each polling place, demographics of the registered voters served by the polling place, and the number of resources (voting machines, poll workers) assigned and working during operating hours. The burden is on the state to prove, not simply assert, that its practices were not discriminatory.

We will not accept any argument that the discrimination would not have affected the outcome. Such arguments are a sham. Are systematic violations of voting rights OK for those who live in a state in which the margin of victory for one candidate or the other is large? Of course not! Further, if any discrimination is found to be racially based, as was the legal finding of the US Commission on Civil Right in the 2000 Florida election, such a result is unlawful, as well as being intolerably immoral and contrary to American values.

Whatever the margin of victory or number of electoral votes, if any state FAILS TO PROVE that the existence of poll-tax-lines, or any other unnecessary obstruction to voting, was not correlated with RACIAL, SOCIO-ECONOMIC, or PARTISAN STATUS of the voters, that state MUST NOT be afforded the privelege of participation in the electoral vote.

2) Provide to all responsible, professional investigators any necessary records and full access to systems and software, in order to PROVE THAT THE RESULTS WERE NOT CORRUPTED by manipulation, human or machine error, or fraud.

Acceptable investigators will be those sanctioned by any court, professional organization, political party, or other bonding entity willing to warrant their actions. These investigations must be provided the records and access required to examine:

Every tabulation system that consolidates results at any level (e.g., GEMs tabulators).

Every "black box" voting system.

Every undervote, overvote, and spoiled ballot occurance.

Every voter registration record and known voter registration agents and entities.

Every absentee ballot request, delivery record, return envelope, counted and disallowed ballot, any and all records of absentee vote and ballot disposition by any agent or entity.

Every provisional counted and disallowed provisional ballot, unfullfilled provisional ballot request, provisional ballot inventories for each polling station, any and all records of provisional ballot disposition by any agent or entity.

ANY STATE THAT REFUSES to make every effort to successfully confirm that their published vote tallies are free from manipulation and/or error MUST BE considered morally irresponsible and acting contrary to agreed upon American values. There CAN BE NO ACCEPTABLE EXCUSE or rationalization that can compete with the restoration of confidence in our electoral process.

For such a circumstance there can be no other moral, or patriotic response than full criminal investigation and prosecution, civil pursuit of maximum remedies for damage to the body politic, and DENIAL OF THE PRIVILEGE of participation in the Electoral College for any tainted, irregularly appointed, electors who might endeavor to infect the process.

We will accept no verbal assurances, no misleading representations from partial investigations, no shifting of responsibility onto the media or the public at large, and NO DELAY OF ANY KIND.

On this there can be NO COMPROMISE of what is required of us, NO RETREAT from our historic duty, and NO SURRENDER to any agent, foreign or domestic, that would even contemplate any act of obstruction.

[Helga Scow Stern]

128. There's a New Sheriff in Town...

and it is The People!

[illuminaughty]

347. I love this line "Show us the voter"

My sentiments exactly. I wish there was a way to do this because you can't tell me I didn't see young, first time black voters coming out in large numbers. Some came in mini-vans with yellow vote for change T-shirts.

There were 7000 Kerry MoveOn people on the ground canvassing the last week in Missouri. There was no Bush movement and Southern Missouri doesn't have the population to overturn the anit-Bush movement.

[Hobbes199]

114. 2008 -- and we'll have to stay vigilant

or else next time around they'll fix the exit polls early and we'll never know what happened.

[Magic_Cookie]

110. Thanks

just wanted to say thanks to you for this! MANY MANY THANKS
and also a kick

[Critical Thinker]

111. Here's an idea...

You know, it might be real interesting to combine the work of a couple of DU'ers. What if we compared:

(a)ignatzmouse's analysis of the "red surge" of election day votes, and
(b) one of the DU studies regarding trends in the exit polling raw data.

Would the results of such an analysis further "bracket" ignatzmouse's "red surge" into the final hours of NC voting?

[TalkingDog]

113. Please, please write the General Council

of the NC Elections Board with this information. (He's sick of me writing) [e-mail]

Also send it to the Charlotte Observer:
[e-mail]

Winston-Salem Journal:
[e-mail]

For the Raleigh News and Observer, you'd have to send a hard copy. I can't get a non-form email addy.

The more people that write in, the more seriously they'll take it.

(also posted in the NC forum)

Thank you so much ignatzmouse....

[wrate]

115. Mr Smirk, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can .. n/t

[Critical Thinker]

116. As you suggested

I've just fired off some email alerts - good idea.

[cynthia]

117. demand a recount

I understand that a small number of registered voters from a state may demand a recount. You don't have to be one of the candidates on the ballot. Check out NC and see if it is 3 or 5 or whatever and go for it.

Your analysis is awesome. Now follow it up with action. Let's get it out of DU and aboveground where it will HAVE to be noticed.

Great work

[bj2110]

118. Sorting Through Some of the NC Precint Data on my own...

1st post here - Thanks for having me...

Out of all counties up to Lincoln alphabetically, (My excel can only import 65,000 or so rows, if anyone knows how to increae this, let me know), there are 13 counties where Kerry beat Bush in the absentee ballots. Out of these 13 counties, there are only 3 precincts where Bush received over 75% of the total Bush+Kerry votes (ignoring other votes). In other words there are 3 precincts where Bush beat Kerry 3 to 1 in counties where absentees picked Kerry over Bush countywide.

These precincts are:

Windsor #2 - Bertie County
Sharpsburg - Edgecombe County
Roanoke Rapids #6 - Halifax County

Observations on this:

1) There aren't that many precints where this has occurred, certainly not enough to support a hypothesis of hiding huge Bush margins in individual, small precincts.

2) If anyone was to begin investigating the NC vote at a precinct level based on the discrepancies between absentees and election day votes, these 3 precincts are where I would start.

3) Just because there is not a huge number of precincts where this pattern exists, does not mean the absentee vs. election day discrepancy is not a good indicator of some larger issue. With 175,000 precincts nationwide, and a 3.5 million vote margin, that only means that the current "huge" popular vote margin can be achieved with only 20 votes per precinct. Swinging a vote by 20, or even 100, votes might not show up in the above analysis.


WE NEED AS MUCH PRECINT LEVEL DATA AS POSSIBLE! The smallest data sets are the ones that show discrepancies the most clear and are the easiest to investigate for concrete evidence of misconduct.

[rdmccur]

120. Statistics

Recommend you to send your data/results to Steve Freeman PhD: [e-mail]
He did a statistical analysis on the early exit polls that predicted a clear Kerry electoral win.

[JohnnyCougar]

122. Hi, rdmccur!!!! Welcome to DU!!!

Cheers!

[marisa]

125. OpenOffice can handle

as many rows as you need; you can download it for free at http://www.openoffice.org

[ignatzmouse]

131. Bertie County

Yes, it was the strange Bertie County that initially led me into this trail. Here is that info from a previous post:

I chose a predominately black county to give a sharper idea and get free of the crossover voter charge. Here are the demographics for Bertie County, North carolina as of 10-31-2004.

Bertie County has 14,460 registered voters:

Party Affiliation
12052 DEM 83%
1403 REP 10%
1005 UNA/LIB 7%

Ethnicity
8685 BLACK 60%
5633 WHITE 39%
18 AM.INDIAN
12 HISPANIC
34 OTHER

GENDER
8370 FEMALE 58%
6017 MALE 42%

So you can see in every category, this is a Democratic lock.

This is how the vote was recorded:

4801 Kerry/Edwards 61%
3027 Bush/Cheney 38%
35 Badnarik 1%
2 Nader -
7865 Total (a turnout of 54%)

On the face, it's shocking to see a 22% drop in the Democratic vote and a 28% gain in the Republican vote of registered voters. But, we have to be careful in the rural South even in a county that is mostly black. As a reference, let's also look at how the county voted in 2000.

DEM - A. Gore-J. Lieberman 4,660 65%
REP - G. W. Bush-D. Cheney 2,488 35%
LIB - H. Browne-A. Olivier 11 0%
RFM - P. Buchanan-E. Foster 17 0%
7,176

Hmmmm. Well, that shows a 7% swing from 2000 to 2004 for Bush/Cheney. A little hard to believe, but not totally impossible I guess given the possibility that this might be an overwhelmingly democratic black county filled with big Rush Limbaugh fans. Let's look at some further numbers from Bertie and see if they can shed some light.

Senate
Bowles (D) 5089 66%
Burr (R) 2614 34%
Bailey 51 >1%
Total 7754

Governor
Easley (D) 5592 73%
Ballantine (R) 2036 27%
Howe 66 .009%
Total 7694

Secretary of State
Marshall (D) 5,624 77%
Rao (R) 1,650 23%
Total 7274

Notice the Senate race also appears exceptionally supressed for the Democrats. All other races in Bertie County ran roughly in the range of 73-78% Democrat to 22-27% Republican except for President and Senator.

[bj2110]

157. I've got NC absenteee/election day variances by county & machine type...

I'll need some time today to sift through the numbers. I'll post more observations a little later today.

Here's the results for Bertie County as of yesterday:

Total:
Bush 3057 38.1%
Kerry 4938 61.5% (+23.4%)

Absentee:
Bush 792 41.4%
Kerry 1111 58.1% (+16.7%)

Election Day:
Bush 2265 37.0%
Kerry 3827 62.5% (+25.5%) (Election Day - Asbentee = +8.8%)

Bertie County uses a Direct Record Electronic Machine by Fidler, according to NCVoter.Net.

If anything, these Bertie County results are a direct opposite to the hypothesis, however, these numbers vary cosiderably from county-county, and trend to favoring Bush, obviously.

The counties which generated the most Bush votes because of this phenomenon are:

Wake (ED - Abs = -11.4%) (11.4% x ED Votes Cast = 14,132)
Mecklenburg (ED - Abs = -6.2%) (6.2% x ED Votes Cast = 6,852)
Forsyth (ED - Abs = -9.0%) (9.0% x ED Votes Cast = 4,905)
Orange (ED - Abs = -27.4%) (27.4% x ED Votes Cast = 4,253)

Overall, 17 counties had over 1,000 votes gained for Bush this way.

Only 4 counties gave Kerry over 1,000 votes because of this phenomenon:

Johnston (+14.2%) (+3753)
Guilford (+6.0%) (+3640)
Wayne (+19.6%) (+1854)
Lenoir (+23.4%) (+1853)

Statewide, my numbers show a 7.3% total swing for Bush from Absentee Votes to non-Absentee votes, which would account for an approx. 175,000 vote swing on election day.

Of the 17 counties with +1000 gained Bush votes, 7 used Direct Record Electronic machines, 6 used Optical Scan Machines, & 4 used Punchcards.

Of the 4 counties with +1000 gained Kerry votes, 2 used DRE, & 2 used Op Scan.

Overall, the Punchard/Lever/Paper counties showed an 8.8% swing for Bush on Election Day compared to absentees. The Optical Scanner counties showed a 10.8% swing, and the Direct Record Electronic counties showed a 3.8% swing.

Unfortunately, the paper trail counties also showed a large swing for Bush, and makes the likelihood of the phenomonon occuring due to machine tampering, or something similar, pretty small.

Of course, this doesn't someone mean can't tamper with the paper trail votes on Election Day as well. It just means that fraud could be proved more easily if it occurred. And based on your statewide #'s, and analysis of the different race results, I don't see how it couldn't have been altered somehow.

Again, I'm going to keep looking at these #'s today, and post some more observations later.

[understandinglife]

365. Just wondering...

....if you know of any effort in NC to subpoena access records, physical and telecom, for the central tabulating centers. As you know, the "fidler" (ironic name) machines are manufactured by diebold.

And, as you realize all the tallies, irrespective of how the ballots were cast, merge at some point.

So, what will be quite important is that when the recount starts in NC -- I can't imagine it not happening -- that the paper ballots are kept separate from the punch cards and those kept separate from whatever source of data is available from the DRE machines. Then comparisons can be made with the records from the central tabulating centers and with registration records and with exit poll data.

Patterns will emerge; it'll be interesting to see what they are.

Has the recount NC effort gotten underway yet.

[chomskysright]

361. THE PRECINCT DATA IS HERE

AT THE BOE:

It looks like a SAS file: I'm downloading it now:

http://www.sboe.state.nc.us/index.html

[chriscol]

392. Overcoming Excel limitations

I can probably do whatever you want in Access.  If you know
what you want to find out, email me your data and describe. 
I'll put it together and run the queries you need. 
chriscol(at)charter.net 

[Timebound]

121. Wow

Wow ignatzmouse. You've convinced me. I made a bunch of bar graphs using your information:

http://www.geocities.com/aquarianwind/nccomparisonchart...

I will pass this information on to Erskine Bowles personally. I think he'd be quite interested to know this...

[JohnnyCougar]

123. Hi Timebound!! Welcome to DU!!!

Cheers, to you as well!!

[tarheel_voter]

189. Tell Erskine we want to have a meeting on this

If you know Erskine, our message to him is that the NC DU'ers would like to meet with him. We need Erskine to react to these numbers. Please set up a meeting and relay to the board the time and location for the meeting.

Thank you!

[JohnnyCougar]

124. ignatzmouse, I got this analysis posted at Daily Kos

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/12/233831/06

Perhaps you want to comment there on the details of this study. You or any other DUers!

[rhosgobel]

126. Graphs of the data

Apparently Timebound and I were working on graphs at the same time, as I've also made some based on the data. I don't know how mine compare to Timebound's, however, because I can't load their page right now.

I've got three charts here: http://home.comcast.net/~rhosgobel/DU/NC-DU-data.html

[ignatzmouse]

127. Cumulative Numbers Prove The Point

Here are a few definitive numbers to shore up my conclusions.

If one totals all the Democratic votes cast in all the statewide races against all the Republican votes cast in all the statewide races (except for President and Senator) one comes up with:

Democratic votes: 17,890,020
Republican votes: 15,495,669
(cumulative totals for all races)

Thus, purely as an index to the make-up of the state, it's:
Democrats: 53.6%
Republicans: 46.4%

Looking at cumulative votes cast for each party's candidates in the absentee votes, we find:

Democrats: 5,374,642 54.6%
Republicans: 4,472,273 45.4%

As I stated earlier, that coincides with a 1% Democratic advantage in the early/absentee voting (excluding of course the majority Republican County of Catawba). But, even that is negated when one considers that there were still far more Democratic votes cast on election day than Republican votes cast.

Election Day Polls:

Democrats: 12,515,378 53.2%
Republicans: 11,023,396 46.8%

Taking that into account, the disparity of both the Presidential and Senatorial votes is glaring.

PRESIDENT (early/absentee)
George W. Bush: 529,755 52.9%
John F. Kerry: 469,522 46.9% -6.0

PRESIDENT (election day)
George W. Bush: 1,431,433 57.3%
John F. Kerry: 1,056,299 42.3% -15.0

**********************************
SENATOR (absentee)
Richard Burr (REP): 492,166 49.48%
Erskine Bowles (DEM): 492,536 49.52% +0.04

SENATOR (poll only)
Richard Burr (REP): 1,299,294 52.4%
Erskine Bowles (DEM): 1,139,973 46.0% -6.4

Remember, the *Dixie-crat factor was already figured into the absentee voting* for Bush over Kerry. Kerry was behind, was polled behind, and ran in the exit polls behind by 6%. Nowhere in that figure can anyone account for the other two-thirds of the vote suddenly dropping him to minus 15% on election day. Likewise, there is no way to explain away a small lead for Bowles in the early/absentee votes suddenly changing into a minus 6.4% gap on election day. Even granted the 1% fudge factor, the Democratic numbers were still higher on election day and would have swamped it short of perhaps a good technological fudge recipe.

[no1hedberg]

129. Isn't it equally as odd

This information is unbelievable. I wish somebody in the media would take this and run with it. I guess nobody wants another 60 minutes fiasco. Anyway....Doesn't it seem unlikely that the election day "swing" percentage is nearly identical for the Senatorial and Presidential races??

[JohnnyCougar]

132. Nobody in the media wants anthrax in their mailbox.

They traced that anthrax back to some right wing military site. It's very clear to people what will happen to them if they step out of line.

And let me be the first to say "Welcome to DU, no1hedberg!!!"

Cheers!

[Milo_Bloom]

130. WOW!

Just, WOW! That is one of the best pieces of analysis I have seen in a long time!!




Simply amazing! Thank you for doing this!

[DSperoRN]

134. We need to jump on this!

This is incredible work, Mouse. IMO, we have to get as many people doing similar research on other states, especially the highly black box states . I'm sending this to my son and all his college friends who have time on their hands. Going to beg them to do some work on this. I'm afraid the data will start disappearing from web sites when they realize I.M. has found a way to open the Black Box.
Love to all on DU,
David

[Helga Scow Stern]

135. I will e-mail this to DNC voting irregularities address

[e-mail], and to my Senators in California. I want the word to really get out that this is serious business across the board and we won't stand for them pretending it doesn't exist (I don't mean my Senators in particular, especially. I just have this sense that till now, few elected officials cared even though they've been hearing about BBV for a long time.)

[lamp_shade]

136. kick...

[Duncan]

137. Caroline County VA has gone dem since 72 and just went Repub.

We also had new touch screen machines for the first time. Used to have the old kind with levers. I also noticed that as votes were being "tabulated" after the polls closed, CNN's county map of VA had lots of counties flipping from blue to red. Is any one looking into Virginia discrepancies? I haven't been due to combination of work and small kids.

[DeStewart]

138. Excellent work, ignatzmouse!

The discrepancy b/w the exit polls and "actual" results -- particularly in Ohio, NH, NC, and Florida -- raised a red flag in my mind. Still, I remained skeptical about the accusations of fraud. The numbers ignatzmouse has crunched offer the most compelling evidence that fraud occurred on Election Day. I'm becoming a believer.

[melsmad]

139. Fantastic Job!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[neohippie]

144. My evangelical grandfather and his wife voted Kerry

I live in Greensboro, and I know that my grandfather in Charlotte and his wife, who are Christian evangelicals, told me that they were voting for Kerry because Bush had record deficits and had destabilized the world and lied about doing it, by going into Iraq.

I was surprised but glad to hear it. I am sure that they were not alone in their crossover voting.

No matter what happens we need election reform now. If the people can't trust our election process here how do we justify promoting democracy across the planet.

We need to make sure our voices continue to be heard, not as fringe INTERNET conspiracy theorists, but as concerned citizens. We cannot let the media continue to discredit our valid concerns, This story must be told.

[Firenze777]

147. What was the Kerry mandate?

Does anyone remember if exit polls showed what Kerry's total popular vote should have been? Would he have gotten the 51% of the vote, or would it have been higher?

[Esse Quam Videri]

151. Awesome job!!!!

First time poster - Thanks for your tremendous effort on this subject. I live in Charlotte so I have a vested interest in your results.

[Critical Thinker]

155. Your screen name surely applies !!

Esse Quam Videri...it's the state motto of North Carolina; it translates "to be, rather than to seem"

Clever choice!

[Greylyn58]

153. As A Fellow North Carolinian

I too was stunned that Bowles didn't win. Even with the negative ads that really began to pop out just before the election.

Something just doesn't feel right about this.

I live in Mecklenburg Co and we went blue for Kerry, but something tells me that some of the surrounding counties should have too. There have been so many mill jobs lost and I would have thought they would have voted in higher numbers for him as well.

Maybe not Union Co, home of Jesse Helms, but some of the others maybe.

[NH_Here_We_Come]

161. Bowles won, but without pressure to recount he loses twice.

Where is the media? The New York Times calls us conspiracy theorists.

[mom cat]

164. Here's to your bleary eyes and sore ass! This is magnificent work!

[gercohen]

166. absentee is absentee plus early voters

One of the problems with the absentee analysis is that the absentee/early vote are two different demographics. Absentee mail-ins are lumped in together with early voters on most of the state, but mail-ins are heavily Republican.
For instance, in Wake County NC the mail-ins went
Absentee Mail Kerry 4533 Bush 5676
while the early votes went Kerry 47,878 Bush 40,635
(Bush carried the county by 7500 votes)

was the analysis just early voters or all absentees? if they are lumped in together it makes it not as clean as it looks, because you are lumping in absent military and business travelers with an early voting base that was more Democratic

[bj2110]

167. Doesn't this just support the point even more?

If the theory is that absentee voters are more heavily Republican (Military, "Business Travelers"?), then if they were lumped into the early voting demographics, it would skew the pre-election day votes more to Bush. We're saying here that the pre-election day votes were more pro-Kerry than the election day results. Mixed demographics with a high Republican absentee representation only support the point.

[ignatzmouse]

169. Yes, it's the cumulative make-up that's important

Yes, that's right. It's a cumulative demographic average of 1/3 of the total vote that closely matches the other 2/3 of the vote in all but the Senate and Presidential races. If one begins breaking the 1/3 down into smaller parts, of course higher discrepancy will occur. It's working the opposite way toward smaller numbers rather than the large 1/3 non-election day vote. As it is, the election day figures match within 1% of Republican/Democrat make-up of the early/absentee election.

[harborcoat]

176. election protection

I've been lurking here for a while and thought it was about time I get involved. I am an NC resident and I know that the Institute for Southern Studies (based out of Durham, NC) had a big campaign about "election protection." I think your analyses would be *very* interesting to these people and they might have some connections to help push matters along.
see: http://www.southernstudies.org /


I took this directly from the website (about 1/2 way down the main page):

Protect the Right to Vote in the Battleground State of North Carolina!
ELECTION PROTECTION N.C.
Making Every Vote Count

In the 2000 elections, millions of Americans were wrongfully denied their right to vote due to faulty voting machines, being turned away at the polls, and other problems on Election Day. Focusing on the critical state of North Carolina, the Voting Rights Project of the Institute for Southern Studies is:

(1) Educating 500,000 voters in low-income communities about their rights
(2) Launching a Voting Rights Hotline (1-866-OURVOTE) to prevent Election Day problems
(3) Coordinating Election Monitoring Teams to ensure every vote is counted.

RECENT NEWS COVERAGE:
Volunteers Train to Monitor Voting (Raleigh News & Observer, 10/27)
Officials Want to Ensure Every Vote Counts (WRAL, 10/12)
Activists to Help Watch Poll Sites (Charlotte Observer, 10/10)
N.C. Group Announces Election Day Hotline (Associated Press, 10/4)
Clock Runs Out Friday for Voter Registration (Durham Herald-Sun, 10/4)

[rjbny62]

177. excellent work

would be interesting to see whether there were similar trends in other states.

THANKS!

[rzemanfl]

180. Great work, here's how they'll try to spin it.

The Republicans will say the Bin Laden tape caused the changes. It is important that someone with mathematical ability (I have none)quickly do a similar study in paper ballot states that had early voting (Wisconsin? Illinois?)

You are a patriot and you didn't have to kill anyone to get me to say that.

[myschkin]

181. As the bible says

According to the study of Steven Freeman (yes, I've read it now) the likelihood that the votes switching from the Exit polls in the manner they did in all three big battleground states is one to 250 millions. I'm sure that was GOD...

[valis]

182. Good analysis. It should not be difficult to estimate

the margin of error of the prediction using such a huge sample as the absentee ballots. It is not a random sample, obviously, but 1/3 of the population as a sample should be a pretty reliable estimator for the entire population, even if there is some bias. This does look suspicious. And it does look like it could be systematic error in the counting of the votes by the software. Not saying it is intentional, but it doesn't matter. There has to be a recount.

[Digit]

186. I am not a math wizard, but anyone can see these anomalies!

I would be willing to bet a 10 year old would be able to pick out what is wrong with this picture (and tell the truth about it)!

[ellent]

187. Here's a way to further confirm

Normally, absentee ballots are counted by central count optical scanners on election day, so it seems the central count scanners weren't impacted. If there are small counties with ONLY central count optical scanners, their absentee ballots and early voting ballots should match their election day ballots.

Same for lever counties and paper ballot counties. Is it easy to check this with the data you have?

[earth2chuck]

188. Great ##s analysis. Wanna see how easy it would be to hack the tabulation

Machines and make these numbers happen?

Step by step, with screenshots at http://www.chuckherrin.com/hackthevote.htm

Enjoy!

Chuck

[tarheel_voter]

190. We need a targeted hand recount and help from the Greens and Libertarians

I agree with everyone here there has to be a problem in the election day machine count in NC. Think about it... if the numbers for President/Senate race were accurately reflecting public opinion, then the state Dems wouldn't have stood a chance. Its funny how Gov. Mike Easley, Bev Purdue and all the other Dems running for statewide office won so handily... easily surviving the Bush onslaught!

Just wondering what are our next steps here.

Which counties should we target and can we get the Greens/Libertarians to request a hand recount?

[rdmccur]

192. Another contact to send your analysis

Ignatzmouse consider forwarding your analysis to a European, a
computer scientist who owned a website doing a pre-election
poll analysis. He is 
(or was) a democrat (not sure of his US citizen status --he
lives in the Netherlands I believe).  Perhaps this may
stimulate some other European interest in this 2004 election
investigation.  His e-mail is [e-mail].  

[Merrickgds]

191. Where can i find data for NV %dem %rep voters?

I'm analysing voting data from http://nvresults.nv.gov / for the NV counties & need the % democrat % republican counties, but don't know where to get them from. There's no precinct data in the site i referred to.

Is there a central site that has data from all over the US?

[Gracchi]

193. Completely Debunked

This has pretty much been completely debunked at Kos. The entire argument is based on ignatzmouse's assertation that early turnout was even amongst the parties. He presents a simple formula to support that. Quite simply, he's horribly wrong.

ignatzmouse uses the Governor's race to prove 30% for each party. However, that's the only race which gives an equal number. Senate shows Dems +3 and President shows Dems +4.

That means way more Republicans voted on election day which explains the rapid shift. I've shown with my own simplistic formula over at Kos how this translates into a big Bush win.

The difference between Bush and Burr results early and election are easily explained by individuals crossing party lines.

[Gracchi]

194. link

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/13/9743/8602#321

And yes, please call me a troll because I haven't posted much. Ignore the serious problems with his calculations. Just call me a troll, that's the answer.

[Critical Thinker]

195. It's pretty odd to introduce yourself as a troll

and besides, your assertion that ignatzmouse's results are predicated on equal turnout is simply wrong.

[Gracchi]

197. Are you kidding me?

If more Democrats voted early then of course Bowles and Kerry were doing better early. If you don't think early voter turnout is important then you're an idiot.

I introduced myself as a troll because I was called that about 100 times over at Kos today. I know that would be the immediate response over here, so I just tossed it out there first. Have fun with it.

Clearly I'm not a troll. I just don't wear tinfoil hats.

[pointsoflight]

196. Actually, your debunking has been debunked.

Funny that you feel the need to run from one board to another to try to discredit this analysis.

[Gracchi]

198. Check Again

I've been completely back by Safenukes who has brough information from the NC Democratic party. Democrat's did vote early.

Thanks for your brilliant input though. It was greatly valued.

[tarheel_voter]

199. I disagree. The analysis is dead on.

The above analysis is excellent. We all agree there is a need for more investigation.

Explain how Bush and Burr win 56% and 53% of the vote on election day, when overwhelming political sentiment in state supports the Democratic Party.

The evidence is demonstrated by Dems winning a clean sweep of NC statewide races, the State House, and State Senate. If the Bush and Burr numbers were valid, which they most certainly are not, we would have at the very least seen the Republicans win back the NC House, and win at least a few of the state races.

[Gracchi]

200. Synopsis Here, More at Kos

The simple reason is that Democrats showed up early.

On 10/30 The Democrats provided the following info:

Total Voted = 970,894

· Democrat = 477,298 (49.2%) +2.2% over registration

· Republicans = 358,930 (37%) +1.9% over registration

· Undeclared = 134,666 (13.9%)


Now, I don't know what the +2.2% means (it's some kind of internal number) but it's very clear that Democrats voted early by a lot. That's why the Republicans did better on election day.

And where the hell did you hear that there are more Democrats in NC? Republicans outnumber Dems 40-39-21.

Seriously, this issue is dead people.

Maybe I'll post a new diary at Kos explaining it with small words and pictures.

[Critical Thinker]

201. there's a reason they called you a troll on Kos

...you're condescending, your argument is completely beside the point and does nothing to refute the evidence presented, and when challenged - you respond by repeating the same nonsense.

In fact, you remind me of our president. Welcome to DU, George!

[pointsoflight]

203. Yeah, just keep saying the same thing...

...and in doing so, keep proving that you don't even understand the the analysis. It DOES NOT MATTER what the composition of the early sample was. The main point is that the early sample was completely consistent with the final results for almost all races AND was completely consistent with the exit poll data, yet inexplicably, was way off for the presidential election.

[pointsoflight]

204. But hey, join with us in calling for an audit of the votes...

...and we'll see who's right.

[Gracchi]

205. Wasn't consistant in ANY vote

The only races in which the early sample was consistant was Governor, Lt. Governor and Attorney-General. Did you guys even read his post or just crack some champagne and scream "more fraud, weeeeeeeeeeee".

Seeral other people have now pointed out that there are serious flaws in the analysis. The simple fact is that if the initial sample is wrong then the entire idea is called in to question.

How is the initial sample not important? Which races specifically stay as they are? None besides those three.

You guys are grabbing at straws and it's getting pathetic. We are going to become the joke of American politics if this doesn't stop.

Maybe instead of whinning about '04 we should deal with '06. How about the fact that Cantwell is $2 million in debt. Maybe that's more important than talking about fraud in a state where non exists. Or how about the fact that Johanns has more money than Nelson? Are you guys that left wing? Can you not face reality at all?

[Name removed]

208. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

213. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

207. Deleted message

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[Spazito]

209. ROFL, proven by whom????

You really are reaching, aren't you! Desperation does bring out the worst in some, as shown by your post.

[Name removed]

211. Deleted message

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[Name removed]

242. Deleted message

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[txindy]

254. ROFL! Very nice. There's one more thing, too

He's not just here to come after your analysis, he is after all discussions of fraud. You just lucked out in being first.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[Gracchi]

255. Not Quite

First off, please stop calling me a troll. I've clearly demonstrated I support the Democrats, we just disagree here. That is possible you know?

What you point to at first is the registrations. There is no doubt that more Democrats are registered voters in NC. However, historical precident from 2000 clearly indicates that the Democrats don't GOTV. This is also supported by the fact that the Republicans had a huge GOTV effort in the last three days.

Can you please address the fact that you insist all the races trended Democrat when they clearly did not? http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph... Only three races trended Democrat, Easley and his associates. Can you explain why you said otherwise?

At this point, I'm willing to admit I can't disprove what remains of your argument. You began by claiming that trends suggested fraud and early voting was split 30%/30%. Both have been disproven. I have shown conclusively that your method for determining that was wrong and that you picked the only race where that was accurate.

However, you appear to have shifted the basis of your claim to exit polls. Safenukes sites the last exit polls as being accurate and corresponding with the final results. He's gone to bed and I can't find those exit polls anywhere. So, based on that I can't disprove your assertations about exit polls, but otherwise I have shown you fudged data on your initial claims.

[ignatzmouse]

276. Trends of the Day

You use the word "lying" to describe me, and then ask that I refrain from using the word troll? Okay...

I NEVER stated any race trended Democrat. The totals I just gave, in fact, show there was a 1% Republican shift on election day. Quite clearly as I have stated, the Catawba County absentee data that I was missing will reduce the differential further. There is also a difference between the big general statewide races that include Governor, Lt. Governor, Secretary of State, and Attorney General, and the more specific offices. Commissioner of Agriculture, for instance, gained 2.1% for the Republican Troxler between the absentee/early voting and the election day polls. Correct for Catawba as I asked and this would be 1.5%. (As soon as I can get figures for Catawba and Lee, I will add them in.) The secondary races are slightly more volatile because of unknowns. What does Commissioner of Agriculture mean to rural and urban voters, for instance? That's why the big general races are at top of the data. Still, none of the secondary races reflect anywhere close to the differential of the general races of Senate and President. I included all the data to be as forthright as possible.

The other general benchmarks here are the ammendment votes. If you review the data, they are all within 1% in early/absentee voting and the election day polls. It gives us a good idea that the electorate did not shift that dramatically from the first third of the vote. NC Amendment 1 gives us a really good idea because it was a vote right at the 50/50 margin. The amendment was asking for approval of a revenue bill that would provide funds for community development projects by increasing property values and therefore property taxes. Republican bases appear to have been more opposed to the measure. Heavily Democratic bases tended to favor it. The vote, like the Senate race, was very close with a slim majority in favor of it.

NC Amendment 1:
General Election Totals
For 1,494,789 51.2%
Against 1,423,195 48.8%
Total 2,917,984

Absentee Votes
For 432,697 51.7%
Against 403,475 48.3%
Total 836,172

Poll Results
For 1,062,092 51.0%
Against 1,019,720 49.0%
Total 2,081,812

The results are in lock-step.

To address the 30/30 question, we can look at the closest race where we have a 50/50 split of the electorate.

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (absentee)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 507,523 (51.7%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 473,991 (48.3%)

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (overall)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 1,656,092 (50.1%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 1,646,838 (49.9%)

SUPERINTENDENT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION (poll only)
June S. Atkinson (DEM): 1,148,569 (49.5%)
Bill Fletcher (REP): 1,172,847 (50.5%)

The Democrat drew 30.6% of her vote from the absentee. The Republican drew 28.8% of his vote from the absentee. A 1.8% difference in voter turnout for the Republican on election day (remember again that this is a secondary race). That's not an overwhelming majority, but even here one must consider that the missing absentee counties will pull that much further into line. If it's not 30/30, at most it is between 1% to 2%.

[Gracchi]

284. Even Your Supporters Disagree

It is a FACT that more Democrats voted early. The Board of Elections and the State Democrats admit this. You continue to base the entirety of your argument on the fallacy that there was equal representation amongst the two parties.

49% Democrats, 37% Republicans.

That is a fact and it is undeniable. Even your friend Milo agrees with that now. If you continue to dispute it how can I take anything you say seriously? Your analysis fails to take into account people crossing party lines.

You also, undeniably, suggested that the results for President and Senate on election day were out of sync with the early voting far more so than other races. That is stretching the truth, to say the least. Eleven races shows a Republican trend, 2 Democratic and one was flat. The two Democratic were Easley and his associate -- who had huge crossover appeal, the same appeal Bush enjoyed.

[Gracchi]

265. More About Early Voting

You are pointing to the +2.2%, that completely contradicts your argument in the initial post. There, you suggest that roughly equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans voted early. This completely disproves that. The +2.2% refers to a comparison with regitered Democrats. The Dems have way more registered voters in NC than the Repubs (47-35). Those numbers suggest the early vote was at 49-37, not even close to even.

The problem here is that you make up all your numbers with these calculations. They prove nothing and completely ignore independents and voters who cross party lines. Why you insist on sticking with them when Safenukes has provided the concrete data from the board of elections is beyond me.

[pointsoflight]

210. Whatever

I'm not going to keep rehashing the same arguments. What is said here doesn't matter at this point anyway. The information has been passed on and will be examined by those in a position to look into it. That is, after all, all these exercises are for--to point out anomalies, no matter what the cause, that others can investigate more closely.

[Name removed]

212. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[pointsoflight]

214. From YOUR own post

Democrats were NOT overrepresented in the early sample. Or did you forget that you included this in your diary on Kos?

Democrat = 477,298 (49.2%) +2.2% over registration
Republicans = 358,930 (37%) +1.9% over registration
Undeclared = 134,666 (13.9%)

BOTH parties were overrepresented in the early sample relative to the number of registered voters, but democrats only very slightly more so than republicans.

But hey, if you don't think there's anything here and if you think this fraud stuff is all a non-issue, then move on. You imply that it's a waste of time to look at this sort of stuff, yet you're posting non-stop for hours at a time in these fraud threads. Isn't that a waste of YOUR time as someone who thinks this is all a non issue?

[txindy]

216. He's spending an awful lot of time on something he claims is worthless?

It's a puzzlement, I tell you. An absolute puzzlement.

The fear is palpable these last few days, pointsoflight. You sensing it, too?

[Name removed]

221. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

218. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[pointsoflight]

222. Personal attacks?

You've now called me names on two occasions right here, yet I've still not done that even once. Look in the mirror bud, your the one who apparently can't have a debate without getting personal.

[Gracchi]

231. I've been called a troll at least 100 times today here and at kos

Simply for telling the truth and posting what others have found. I post a press release from the Board of Elections and I'm a freeper. I post a link to the initial poster's own data presented as a chart and I'm a troll.

Have you guys even looked at the data?

I am not lying, please just look at the data.

[txindy]

233. Look here. We are all supposed to "Move on to 2006."

What. A. Shock. Not.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[Gracchi]

237. Yes, we are, look at link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

That's a detailed analysis of the 12 most competitive races in '06. We're in deep trouble here.

[Spazito]

217. You have proven squat, ...

regurgitating does not equate to proof. If you really had something of value to offer you would present it in a very different manner from the "you guys" format. I see nothing in what you have posted that negated what the original poster has disseminated but keep trying, I give 'you guys' points for stick-to it-ness if nothing else.

[Name removed]

219. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[pointsoflight]

226. Yet you keep "wasting your time"

[Gracchi]

228. Because I am desperate to save this party

From conspiracy theorist morons who are driving it into the ground. We need to be thinking about '06.

Do you know how much money Bill Nelson has right now? How about Katherine Harris? Or Maria Cantwell? What about Ben Nelson? How is he doing in polls again Johanns? How much does Santorum have in the bank? What states do you think we should be going after?

The simple fact is that you guys are so despondent about the election that you are ignoring the future. The Republicans have a good chance of getting a super-majority if we don't get our heads out of the sand.

That's why it's important those of us who know what is going on get the rest of the party back in line.

Maria Cantwell won the last election by 2,200 votes and her campaign is $2 Million in debt right now.

Focus on reality for christ's sake.

[pointsoflight]

238. Fine, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt. BUT...

I completely disagree with your view that we should drop these issues of voting irregularities. Here's what I posted earlier on Kos, in case you missed it...

"Even if you think fraud didn't occur in 2004, it's just a matter of time with our current electoral process. The machines that are gaining in their use are extremely insecure and fraught with problems. Any average Joe can be shown in just a couple of minutes how to change election results. These machines do not have a paper trail, so we have no way to verify election results, whether there is tampering, computer problems, or whatever. And without a way to verify election results, those who might wish to tamper have much less to fear. On top of that, the companies that currently dominate the industry have a very shady past, have direct ties to one political party, and have a vested interest in the results of the election. Throughout history, there have always been some politicians, party representatives, and businessmen willing to take bribes, commit stock fraud, etc. It would be completely naive to think that there aren't people out their with the willingness, opportunity and motivation to tamper with an election.

So even if you don't think it's happened yet, it's just a matter of time given our current electoral process. Fraud or not, raising the level of awareness on this issue is extremely important for potentially driving change in the way we conduct elections. Uncovering problems that occurred this year is, in my opinion, the best way to raise that level of awareness."

Expanding on that, reform of the electoral process is fundamental to our democracy. Right now, there is extensive voter disenfranchisement. There is also very low confidence in our electoral process. Democrats also happen to feel more disenfranchised and less confident than do republicans right now. If it hasn't already, this may well impact on voter turnout in future elections, because disenfranchised voters don't show up. Reforming our current process is therefore critical for our democracy in general, but is also critical for the democratic party. And I maintain that the best avenue for change is to educate people about how poor our current system is and expose the problems that have already occurred, whether those problems have to do with tampering, glitches, or whatever.

In my opinion, one important thread here--the problems inherent in our electoral process and the need for reform--is very much a forward-looking issue. If you want to work on other issues, fine, there's a great need for that, too. But by 2006, we absolutely must push through dramatic reform in the way we run elections, too.

[Gracchi]

241. I agree about voter reform, but we have to pick our battles

We all hae a fixed amount of time and energy, and right now I guess it's just a question of how best to use that time. Far too many of these posts seem to be about still winning in '04. In fact, almost none of them seem to have anything to do with looking ahead, they seem to be really disappointed posts by what should be our frontline for '06.

I fully support voter reform, but the way to get it is not to contact NC's A-G (as suggested on this thread) but rather to email Feingold and McCain with a link to this. Then say "I don't agree with them, but look at what concerns about accountability have reduced the electorate to." You have to acknowledge that almost all claims of fraud have been debunked and the masses are beginning to look at those who still site it as kind of "out there".

So yes, focus on voter reform and party reform (which I say in my thread on '06) but we need to start looking ahead.

Seriously, take a look at my thread on '06. It looks really, really, really bad.

[pointsoflight]

243. You pick your battles, I'll pick mine.

There's nothing wrong with people putting their efforts into those things that happen to motivate them. It's much better than apathy.

[Gracchi]

250. True, Would be Nice if we could get along though

Why do those who don't support pursuing '04 have to be called trolls? Wy do people like Milo have to insist I'm lying when I just post exact copies of what the initial poster made?

[txindy]

245. No one has debunked any claims of fraud. Period.

Mostly because it has only been the odd irregularity here and there that was pointed out, not fraud. No one has said fraud on television or in the papers. Not yet. But they will. Particularly after the NH recount. Followed by the Ohio recount. And, given the sudden interest in this thread plus the nonsense about fraud debunking, I'm going to really have to look much more closely at NC, too. Thanks for the heads-up!

[pointsoflight]

260. One last thing.

Just to clarify my take on all of this, I don't look at these various statistical trends and immediately think fraud. I simply see them as a good way to potentially find irregularities that are worth taking a closer look at. One reason is to, yes, look for evidence of tampering. But another is to find additional computer problems. I would argue that there are many, many more computer problems out there than have been found so far. Looking at overall numbers, we're only likely to see glitches that produce results that stand out. What about problems that cause 3 or 5 or 10% of votes to be lost or changed? There could be a huge number of those that wouldn't stand out, and a close investigation/audit is the only way to uncover them. This is important because is could at least change local races. and like I said before, exposing the problems also compels reform.

As for the specific issue of fraud, I disagree that "almost all claims have been debunked". The statistical anomalies that have been discovered may have alternative explanations to them, but that doesn't mean anything has been disproven. Further examination is needed to find out whether the anomalies reflect vote-counting problems or not, and only then can we know which explanation holds. But aside from that, I would also argue that there is stuff other than the statistical analyses that raise general concerns about fraud. What about these things, just to give a few examples:

--What was going on with the lockdown in Ohio? The FBI is denying that there was any sort of terrorist threat.

--Why was a former employee of an election-software company given unauthorized access to a central tabulator in Ohio shortly before election day?

--What's happened in that local election in NY in which a hand recount is giving many more votes to the democrat than were counted by the machines, potentially reversing the results there? And what about the evidence that the machines were tampered with?

--What about the number of voting machines per capita, showing many fewer in democratic strongholds in some states?

--What about Blackwell changing the procedure for counting provisional ballots several days after the election, so that more provisionals will be thrown out, preserving Bush's lead?

--What about the pending lawsuits in Oregon and Nevada in which republican-affiliated organizations are being sued for destroying the voting registration forms of democrats?

--What about the caging lists in Florida and Ohio?

I could go on and on. This is dirty, dirty business, and in this context, we have every reason to be skeptical about what's going on with the electronic devices. It would actually be out of the norm for electronic voting to be completely clean when nothing else about the electoral process is clean.

[Name removed]

227. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

229. look at the Kos diary

there are more reasonable people there and they see the truth. I'm not a freeper, look at my blog.

I haven't lied about anything, I didn't even produce the chart showing that the initial poster lied.

You guys are just spreading lies.

[Milo_Bloom]

232. Been there, done that.

It is filled with the same type of nonsense you are trying to sell here. You make completely unsubstantiated claims and then assign them to the original poster.

However, you choose to ignore the actual data presented.


Where is the "lie" in the data? Did the original poster cook the numbers? Is that what you are trying to claim? That he made up numbers for all the races and then only used the REAL numbers from the presidential and the senate race?

Either you are a freeper, or completely dense. Whether Dems got out the vote early or not is IMMATERIAL to the analysis. The analysis lies in comparing the results of EVERY OTHER RACE to the results of these 2 races. It's very simple math and a brilliant analysis of it.

X = Absentee results.

Y = Election Poll Results

In just about ever race X = Y w/in a reasonable standard deviation.

Interestingly enough, X = Z (the exit poll results), but that isn't as conclusive as the fact that in 2 races, X doesn't = Y. In fact, X and Y are so far apart, it sticks out like a soar thumb.

So tell me, oh great studier of mathematics. If the DEMS got out the vote early and the GOP had such a banner day at the polls, how could X EVER = Y????? WOuldn't X and Y have wild swings depending upon the race? They didn't. X=Y over and over and over again.

[txindy]

235. Milo, go look at this for the real motivation here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[Gracchi]

236. X never = Y, look at chart, you are buying into a lie

http://www.charlieboard.com/NcStatewideEVvsElectionDay....

Those are the initial posters own numbers. X only = Y with Mike Easley and close associates of his. These candidates got a lot of support from Republicans (19% for Easley).

You would know that if you had read the diary at Kos.

[Name removed]

240. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

244. I give up on Milo

Some posters here are starting to see I'm not lying. The chart does not show reasonable deviation. 5% is not reasonable deviation. Maybe one or two minor races show reasonable deviation. The simple fact is that the initial post is wrong.

Lets look at the margins: 2, 3, 5.2, 4.2, 2.2, 5.4, 4.4, 2.2, 0.0

That's a consistant pattern of trending towards the Dems?

What are you so adament that I'm lying when it's clear I'm not.

I am patiently awaiting the initial poster so he can explain himself.

[Milo_Bloom]

252. Still Lying I see...

"Some posters here are starting to see I'm not lying. The chart does not show reasonable deviation. 5% is not reasonable deviation. Maybe one or two minor races show reasonable deviation. The simple fact is that the initial post is wrong.

Lets look at the margins: 2, 3, 5.2, 4.2, 2.2, 5.4, 4.4, 2.2, 0.0

That's a consistant pattern of trending towards the Dems?"


Where do you pull this stuff out of? Seriously? Where in the post is the basis of the claim that there was a pattern trending TOWARDS THE DEMS?

The basis of the claim is the consistency with which the numbers match.


You also wanted to ignore this important piece of information from the original post. "Of all the statewide races, the only other votes that may raise red flags are the Labor and Agriculture Commissioners, though likely the Catawba data will pull them into line. But none of the races showed anywhere near the unexplained swing of the Senate race."

The initial poster doesn't have to explain ANYTHING to you, or anyone else, since all the data is there and quite clear to anyone who bothers to read it. Obviously, you chose not to do so.

[Gracchi]

256. How Can numbers be consistant if Republicans are getting jumps?

By Trending Dem I mean maintaing the lead Democrats had. Moreover, how in god's name can the races be consistant when Republicans are getting jumps of 6% on election day? That's ridiculous, have you even looked at that chart?

[Milo_Bloom]

258. LMAO... Oh stop it.

Now you are trying to redefine the language?

"By Trending Dem I mean maintaing the lead Democrats had."

Since when did Trending mean maintaining? And where in the numbers does the poster show that the Dems had and maintained a consistent lead?

Maybe you are looking at different numbers in a different post on some different planet. I see a clear, small trending toward GOP on election day. However, nothing near or that would explain the ridiculous statistical anomaly that makes up that 9 point variance in the presidential election.

Your chart shows EXACTLY the same statistical anomaly, but somehow you are the only one who can't see it.

Amazing!

[Gracchi]

262. Good lord

I didn't change the language at all, I'm explaining because you seem to be confused.

The initial poster clearly indicates that the Senate and Presidential races are anomalies, when they are simply the most obvious examples of a trend. Further, he expressly states that the Democrats did not win the early votes. In fact he bases his entire argument on it. Now he's frantically back-tracking with the help of a few individuals who continue to flame me and try to hi-jack other my other thread.

"Any inconsistencies of one side dominating the early vote would have showed up in the data -- they didn't.

With that in mind, I began an informal review of the NC absentee vote. What I found was stunning, and I believe it should have national implications. I have little doubt that we will find the same thing elsewhere by using benchmark absentee data against election day returns. It not only reflects the pattern of exit poll discrepancy we saw throughout the country, but it also makes a compelling case for purposeful tampering with the electronic data. I also think it reveals the three objectives of the Bush re-election campaign: 1) re-election 2) mandate 3) strong Senate majority."

It has clearly been proven that way more Democrats voted early and absentee.

If you accept that, then this whole debate becomes about the validity of exit polling. Well, that's something which is impossible to refute, and it certainly isn't where this debate began.

[Milo_Bloom]

264. The hole gets deeper and deeper....

"I didn't change the language at all, I'm explaining because you seem to be confused.

The initial poster clearly indicates that the Senate and Presidential races are anomalies, when they are simply the most obvious examples of a trend."

So now trend means to move in one direction, as opposed to maintaining. Hmmm. But, let's put that aside.

Let's look at the rest of what you just wrote. You say that the Senate and Presidential races are just simply the most obvious examples of a "trend". An obvious example of a statistical trend is not a 40% SUDDEN JUMP! That is a gaping wound. It's like playing that old game, which one of these things is not like the other.


"It has clearly been proven that way more Democrats voted early and absentee."

Again, WRONG. Although you are just using wiggle terms here. There was a variance in the number of democrats over the number of GOP in absentee ballots, but it was not NEARLY what you are trying to claim it was, which is supported over and over again by the election day results.

"If you accept that, then this whole debate becomes about the validity of exit polling. Well, that's something which is impossible to refute, and it certainly isn't where this debate began."

No, this is you making stuff up again. This has NOTHING to do with the validity of exit polling, but everything to do with a statistical anomaly, naming a glaring 40% LEAP OF FAITH in a very consistent statistical sample.

[Gracchi]

269. Where is 40% coming from? Are you just making this up?

Where did you get that number all the sudden?

"So now trend means to move in one direction, as opposed to maintaining. Hmmm. But, let's put that aside."

A trend means any kind of pattern. The initial poster suggested the trend was to maintain what was in the early voting. That is not true, the trend is actually a jump for the Republicans. I've shown that repeatedly and I will not discuss that any more. I showed you that every single race went towards the Republicans except the Governor, Lt. Governor and A-G. You ignore that for no apparent reason.

"Again, WRONG. Although you are just using wiggle terms here. There was a variance in the number of democrats over the number of GOP in absentee ballots, but it was not NEARLY what you are trying to claim it was, which is supported over and over again by the election day results."

The state Democratic party completely disagrees with you. They say that 49% of early voters were Dems and 37% were Republicans. I've posted that information a half dozen times.

If you continue to ignore the very facts presented by the initial poster you defend and the state Democratic party I don't know how to even debate this.

Here's one more try:
http://www.charlieboard.com/NcStatewideEVvsElectionDay....
That shows Republican gains of 9.0, 6.4, 2, 3, 5.2, 4.2, 2.2, 5.4, 4.4, and 2.2 in the elections. Three others swing Democratic: 0.5, 0.1 and 0.0. That is clearly a trend towards the Republicans, which is not at all what you or the initial poster describe.

As for early voting:
Total Voted = 970,894

· Democrat = 477,298 (49.2%) +2.2% over registration

· Republicans = 358,930 (37%) +1.9% over registration

· Undeclared = 134,666 (13.9%)

o African American Total Vote = 159,837 (16.5%)

The +2.2% refers to the total registrations in state. 47% of NC voters are Democrats. The initial poster claimed that there was an even split amongst early voters. The state's Democratic party clearly says no, Democrats had a 12% lead in early voting. Even amongst that sample, Bush was up six and Bowles was even.

I really don't understand what it is that you are pointing to as to where I lie. I site the numbers provided by the original poster and the numbers proided by the board of elections.

[Milo_Bloom]

286. LMAO....

"Where is 40% coming from? Are you just making this up?"
Posted by Gracchi
Where did you get that number all the sudden? "

It's called using mathematics. You should try it sometime. It's fun.

"A trend means any kind of pattern. The initial poster suggested the trend was to maintain what was in the early voting. That is not true, the trend is actually a jump for the Republicans. I've shown that repeatedly and I will not discuss that any more. I showed you that every single race went towards the Republicans except the Governor, Lt. Governor and A-G. You ignore that for no apparent reason."

Now you are changing what you have said. Your original claim was that the poster said the election day results were trending democratic. YOu have now changed that you say that he claimed it was maintaining, which also isn't true. Just another one of your little "fibs" that you got caught in.

Now, where did I "ignore" the other results? (HINT: This is where the 40% comes in)

"The state Democratic party completely disagrees with you. They say that 49% of early voters were Dems and 37% were Republicans. I've posted that information a half dozen times."

Okay, so let me get your position correct. The fact that the democrats MATCHED the state registration data almost EXACTLY in the absentee ballots somehow suggests a "LARGE DOMINATION" by the democrats in the early balloting?


"The state's Democratic party clearly says no, Democrats had a 12% lead in early voting. Even among that sample, Bush was up six and Bowles was even."

Here is where you are getting screwed up. The poster is talking about the ratio of HOW PEOPLE VOTED, not HOW THEY SHOWED UP. As I am sure you are well aware, if you are as politically astute as you claim to be and not as your posts suggest that many of the registered "democrats" in North Carolina are no such thing, much like the registered "democrats" in the pan handle of Florida.

You can only look at how they voted as evidence of their party loyalty. The consistency of the votes from Absentee to ED Polls contains the control sample, and the wild variance in the Presidential election is the anomaly you refuse to acknowledge.

[rjbny62]

297. average margin is 3.2%, why are pres and senate numbers so much higher?

AVERAGE(2, 3, 5.2, 4.2, 2.2, 5.4, 4.4, 2.2, 0) = 3.178%

What were the numbers for President and Senator? Why the big difference?

If I remember right, someone stated that the overriding republican goals were to win the popular vote by enough of a margin to be able to claim a mandate and avoid any challenge of the vote, and to gain a solid majority in the senate. You can't forget that.

[Gracchi]

304. I answered this many times

Bush and Burr had crossover appeal (16% for Bush) whereas one can assume the Commisioner of Agriculture did not.

All the races showed a jump to the Republicans because more Republicans were voting on election day. Only two did not and that is because Mike Easley himself had crossover appeal.

The reason Burr and Bush got a bigger jump was that they had crossover appeal and stronger support from independents -- in addition to more Republicans voting.

[rjbny62]

338. you still haven't answered

Why this alleged crossover appeal didn't show up in the early voting? For crying out loud, 30% of the electorate voted early, and although there was a slight lean toward democratic votes, it simply doesn't explain the enormous discrepency among the remaining 2/3 of the voters on election day. 30% is a significant sample, so what is the statistical probability that this could happen? Pollsters can come up with fairly reliable predictions with much a much smaller sample, and in this case, not only does the change seem unlikely because there was such a the large sample, it is way out of line when compared to all the other races.

[pointsoflight]

239. Dude, please.

Because someone has a different view, they're lying? Are YOU a conspiracy theorist as to the intent of the original poster?

[txindy]

215. You really need to watch those accusations

[chomskysright]

202. I've been racking my brain on NC too: great job!

Hiya: great job. I've been looking at NC data too.

You're way ahead of me. I was looking at the percentage of NC registered Dems (46%, 2004) and registered Repub (34%) and the rest independent and trying to get a grip on the cross-voting mechanism in order to see that the exit poll info from the major stations was too good of a match with the data put out by the BOE.

I've just sent your e mail over to several newspaper people: these folks: Cecil Bothwell, in particular, had a court order pending in order to get absentee ballots in Buncombe:

here is what I have been trying to get a wrap on:

The CNN/ ABC/ NBC/ FOX national poll was on a quantitatively/ qualitatively different sample that the population as measured by the BOE NC:

here is what I've been working with:

COMPARISON OF POPULATION OF VOTE PER NC BOE AS OF 11.12.04 ( n = 3500998 )

AND EXIT POLL OF 2167 PARTICIPANTS ON CNN WEB PAGE ( n = 2167)

Assumptions: two comparable populations
Problem: the CNN sample was significantly (have not measured this statistically but eye-balling the matter it appears to be statistically significant) more Republican than the BOE data re: party affiliation.

(perhaps not useful): across the state there was about a 9% increase in registered voters pertaining to party affiliations: Item 3: percentage increase of registered voters by partyfrom October 23, 2003 to November 6

Democrats: .907 increase or approx 9 %

Republicans: .914 increase or approx 9%

Libertarian: .746 increase or approx 7.5%

Unaffiliated: .836 increase or approx 8 and one-third percent


Hypothesis: the actual vote data is not significantly different from the exit poll data which appears to be significantly different from the BOE voter registration affiliation which is current as of 11.6.04.

The contest data below was updated on 11/12/2004 3:31:15 PM. This is actual vote

Repub: 1,961,188 percentage of total vote taken: .560 or 56% Does this reflect a cross over (Democratic to Republican AND UA to Republican) of approx 12% as would be assumed to happen as associated with the poll exit data?

Dem 1,525,821 percentage of total vote taken: .435 or 43.5 %


There are termed here to be UA or unaffiliatedLIBERTARIAN: 11,731 and NADER: 1802 and BROWN : 348 and COBB: 108

TOTAL: 3,500,998

NOW, in state, per NC BOE, party affiliation (11.6.04 NC BOE web page): This is voter registration data

Repub: 1,903,333 34% state Republicans registered

Dem: 2,582,712 46% state Dems per voter registration affiliation

Libertarian12762 Unaffiliated 1,021,701
18.5 % state Unaffiliated & Libertarians 1.5%

Total for Dems plus Libertarians / UA = 3,617,175; 12% cross-over, as postulated by template of exit-poll which is
skewed toward Republicans-- 434,061- What it seems we don’t know is what is the percentage of the registered voters----of Dems / Repub/ Other -----voted?

Now, exit poll data, Vote by Party ID per CNN: (with gathered data apparently skews toward Republicans given BOE registration; however we do not know how the CNN affiliated pollsters asked about their party affiliation e.g., :”Are you a Republican” will get a different answer than “Did you vote Republican”; We will assume that this is a population skewed in terms of being more Republican given the BOE data: what would be the impact on the exit poll? Assumably: less cross-over to Kerry from Republicans and more cross over to Bush from Democrats. One might also assume that there were two questions asked: “How are you registered” and then “How did you vote” or they would not have been able to present this. So, if we assume that the sample was representative of the state of NC (which it does not appear to be given the BOE voter registration data)

Repub (40%) 96% BUSH 4 % KERR per exit poll, then cross voting of Republicans for Dems = 4%

Democrat (39%) 16% BUSH 84% KERRy per exit poll, then cross voting of Democrats for Bush = 16%

So, assuming that the population is ‘intact’ the overall cross—voting in the direction of the Republicans could be estimated to be 12%


Independent (21%) 56% -3 41% Problems? No 1: (This only equals 97%; what gives?: assume these votes went to UA person) So, 9% counted toward Bush if assuming that UA picked up the other 3% which is not verified)



Repub:
Item 6: comparison of registered voters, by party, as associated with 11.12.04 data:

a. percentage of registered Democrats that voted:

59%

b. percentage of registered Republicans that voted:

97%

[Gracchi]

206. These Democrats Don't Vote

In 2000 these Democrats didn't turn out, they didn't in 2004 either, or 2002 or 1996. They simply don't vote. Check the diary at Kos for info.

[Name removed]

220. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[txindy]

223. Quite possible

Welcome to DU, truehawk!

[truehawk]

224. Thanks Glad to Be Here

[Gracchi]

225. Look at my blog

http://www.gracchi.blogspot.com

I'm a Canadian who supports the Democrats. I was in Youngstown for three days before the election.

However, I am a troll just because I disagree with you. Clearly. Read what I said you blithering morons.

A) Proven that the Democrats voted early

B) Proven that only three races trended Democrats and those were races where the candidate received ample support from Republicans.



I site historical evidence that the Democrats don't GOTV in NC. For christ's sake, they have a 10% advantage in registrations and never win the state. It's common sense.

[truehawk]

230. Gracchi, not a presusave analysis

I am on the ground in this area.



NC dems turned out early AND on election day.

Come look at some poll books!

[Gracchi]

234. Please Just Look at What I've Posted

Finally someone who is willing to actually discuss what I am posting. First, please look at the chart. http://www.charlieboard.com/NcStatewideEVvsElectionDay.... That is an exact copy of what the initial poster came up with. He claims it shows all the races trend Democrat except for Senate and President, but it clearly doesn't. It shows the exact opposite, it shows they all trend Republican except Easley and his associates. Easley got the support of 19% of Republicans.

Then look at the release from the Board of Elections. The initial poster uses a faulty formula to try to claim that as many Republicans voted early as Democrats did. The Board of Elections' own data proves that to be a complete lie.

Finally, Democrats have Republicans out-registered by a ton in this state. However, for some reason these Democrats never vote. Some local at the Kos thread had an explanation -- he said it was because they voted in Democratic primaries but nowhere else. I don't know if that's true, I live in Canada for christ's sake. What I do know, however, is that the Democrats just don't show up to vote.

Look at what I've presented objectively. What the initial poster claimed is simply not true at all. More Democrats voted early and the races trended Republican.

That doesn't prove there was no fraud, but it does prove that the reasons he gave to suggest fraud are completely untrue.

[ignatzmouse]

246. And Please Look At What I Just Posted

response above:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[truehawk]

251. ROTFL Exactly Ignatz

[Gracchi]

257. Responded

Don't think that proves anything, you're now attacking the exit polls.

[Milo_Bloom]

247. This is Gracchi's fatal flaw...

"He claims it shows all the races trend Democrat except for Senate and President, but it clearly doesn't. It shows the exact opposite, it shows they all trend Republican except Easley and his associates. Easley got the support of 19% of Republicans."

Here is your problem. You think that this analysis revolves around something you made up, that the basis of his analysis is that the voting trended democratic during the day. That isn't the basis at all.

The basis is that the 1/3 of NC who voted acted as a very reliable control group based on the outcomes of the other races. The chart you love to post shows it just as well.

The fact that the exit polls matched the absentee data adds fuel to that fire.

[Gracchi]

249. What Exit Polls are you Talking About

Safenukes sites the last exit poll before they were corrected over at Kos. It showed Bush up 8 and Bowles up 6.

I really am deeply confused by your incredible hostility. Why are you so desperate to see fraud in places where it does not exist?

[Name removed]

253. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

259. Smaller sample is weighted

As I showed, the smaller sample is clearly weighted strongly towards the Democrats. Do you believe 10% more Democrats voted but Bush won? And Bowles won? The early sample was very skewed towards the Democrats, according the the NC Democratic party. You can't point to the early voters as a proper sample.

As for the exit polls, I don't have a clue. But if we're going to talk about exit polls wouldn't it be more effective to discuss Ohio and Florida?

Please stop saying I'm lying. I'm not, and it' making me upset (along with being called a troll and a freeper when I clearly support the Democrats). Then I get mad, call people morons and my credibility gets hurt.

Can this discussion just return to civility?

[Name removed]

261. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

263. Just not true

"Yes you can when the results are consistent w/in a reasonable variance with nearly ALL THE OTHER RACES!"

That is just not true. Since when is 5%+ (seen four times) reasonable varience? That is just not true.

"No, actually you didn't show that at all. You showed exactly the opposite, that it was only SLIGHTLY weighted toward Dems."

You're talking registration, I'm talking turnout. Final turnout was 40/39/21. In 2000 the Dems only got 41% turnout despite having way higher registration. The numbers were similar in 2002 as well. The Dem GOTV campaign does not work well in NC.

You continue to claim that the exit polls matched the absentee data, but they weren't even close in the Senate race. The last exit polls had Burr by six, absentee has it within 1 point. That firmly indicates more Democrats voting than Republicans early. Stop saying exit polls matched absentee, they flat out didn't in regards to Senate.

As for the President, who knows. Exit polls were off by way more than 7% elsewhere. Why's it such a big issue here? Why would the Republicans cheat in a state where the Senate seat was a lock (given exit polls) and the President was a lock?

[truehawk]

266. Your confabulated "debunking seems "Just not true"

I think you want to look a the exit poll data from 4PM.

[Gracchi]

274. And you want the 6pm data

Good lord.

Hey, the 2pm was better for the Democrats, maybe we should only look at it. That would help us prove fraud right?

[Milo_Bloom]

268. Keep on digging....

"That is just not true. Since when is 5%+ (seen four times) reasonable varience? That is just not true."

Since time and memorium. 5% is MOE +-2.5, which is a VERY reasonable variance. MOE +-4.5 is NOT REASONABLE, especially when the sample has already proven realiable through other data.

"You're talking registration, I'm talking turnout. Final turnout was 40/39/21. In 2000 the Dems only got 41% turnout despite having way higher registration. The numbers were similar in 2002 as well. The Dem GOTV campaign does not work well in NC. "

*SIGH*. No, I am talking turnout.

"You continue to claim that the exit polls matched the absentee data, but they weren't even close in the Senate race. The last exit polls had Burr by six, absentee has it within 1 point. That firmly indicates more Democrats voting than Republicans early. Stop saying exit polls matched absentee, they flat out didn't in regards to Senate."

For the 50 BILLIONTH time, I am not using the exit polling data as a reliable method, but instead as additional evidence. And the exit polling DID MATCH THE ABSENTEES IN THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE WHICH IS WHAT THIS DISUCSSION IS ABOUT! They are also w/in a reasonable MOE of the Senate race as well, but that is a different subject.

"As for the President, who knows. Exit polls were off by way more than 7% elsewhere. Why's it such a big issue here? Why would the Republicans cheat in a state where the Senate seat was a lock (given exit polls) and the President was a lock?"

The first part of that ignores what I have said over and over, so I will let you figure it out on your own. As for the second part, you ask about motivation. The motivation would be to pad the vote count to get a "mandate". The best place to cheat is someplace the opposition most likely won't look, in a state that was a lock.

However, none of what I am saying has to do with ANY of that.

I am simply pointing out your lies about the original message, your bafflingly inability to comprehend the statistical significance of a 40% JUMP in a realiable sample and your complete unwillingness to admit when you have lied.

[Gracchi]

273. Wow, let's recount everywhere

Apparently anything with a MOE of 2.5% is in question, so we need about 35 recounts. Someone let the boards of election know, they have a lot of work ahead of them.

One instance of a 2.5 MOE would maybe warrant concern, but that many races trending Republican is a pattern and need not be embarassed. Furter, the same thing which made Easley do so well on Election day is what made Bush do well -- voters crossing party lines. And the simple fact is more voters crossed to support Bush than did for Easley.

"*SIGH*. No, I am talking turnout."

I know you have significantly less education and electoral experience than me, but try to keep up. In flat out turnout the Democrats won early voting by 12%. The audacity of you to suggest you are exasperated here clearly indicates a questionable level of maturity.

More registered Democrats voted early than Republicans. That is not open to debate or discussion at all. Trying to argue otherwise marks you as someone unworthy of consideration. Board of Elections figures do not lie.

[Milo_Bloom]

277. There he goes again....

You tell the truth, just like Bush.

"Apparently anything with a MOE of 2.5% is in question, so we need about 35 recounts. Someone let the boards of election know, they have a lot of work ahead of them. "

And add another lie to the pile. As I stated, MOE 2.5 is a reasonable variance, while MOE 4.5 from a sample already shown to be reliable w/in a 2.5 MOE is not.

"I know you have significantly less education and electoral experience than me, but try to keep up. In flat out turnout the Democrats won early voting by 12%. The audacity of you to suggest you are exasperated here clearly indicates a questionable level of maturity."

The exasperation comes from your consistent lies about what other people, including myself several times now, have said.

"More registered Democrats voted early than Republicans. That is not open to debate or discussion at all. Trying to argue otherwise marks you as someone unworthy of consideration. Board of Elections figures do not lie."

No one has challenged that statement. In fact, everyone has agreed with you that the Dems had better numbers in early voting than the GOP.

HOWEVER THAT STILL DOESN'T EXPLAIN THE 40% JUMP IN VARIANCE!!!!!

[Gracchi]

279. You contradict Yourself...for the last time

"No one has challenged that statement. In fact, everyone has agreed with you that the Dems had better numbers in early voting than the GOP."

"The basis is that the 1/3 of NC who voted acted as a very reliable control group based on the outcomes of the other races."

"MOE 4.5 from a sample already shown to be reliable w/in a 2.5 MOE is not."

How do those statements gel?

First you admit that more Democrats voted early, then you claim the early voters form an accurate sample for comparison to later results. That makes no sense. The early voting sample is meaningless for later comparison.

Care to try again?

[Milo_Bloom]

287. Pathetic....

""No one has challenged that statement. In fact, everyone has agreed with you that the Dems had better numbers in early voting than the GOP."

"The basis is that the 1/3 of NC who voted acted as a very reliable control group based on the outcomes of the other races."

"MOE 4.5 from a sample already shown to be reliable w/in a 2.5 MOE is not."

How do those statements gel?"

Because they do. Actually the better question would be how do they NOT gel? Why is this so hard for you to understand?

I don't even know how to explain this to you because it is so clear on its face. So, maybe you just try explaining why you can't understand it.

[Gracchi]

288. My God, A New Low

How can it be a 'reliable control group' if we acknowledge that there were 12% more Democrats than Republicans?

Just Give it up.

[Milo_Bloom]

290. Are you kidding????

"How can it be a 'reliable control group' if we acknowledge that there were 12% more Democrats than Republicans?

Just Give it up."

Because the numbers match almost EXACTLY the registration make up of the state.

Further, as I have said before, over and over and over and over again, you need ONLY look at the results to see the consistency between the absentee and the ED Poll data.

How is this not getting through?

[no1hedberg]

362. I have a better idea

You give it up! Look every reasonable person here sees the validity of these numbers but you. Did it ever occur to you that YOU are wrong. I don't want to hear any more crap about saving the party for '06 either. This is the Democratic base, we will be there in '06. The problem is Bush enablers like you, don't want to believe these scumbags would do such things as lie about Iraq, or fix an election. You want us to turn our backs and pretend that his criminal activities are ok. Well they are not. Besides if we don't catch these criminals now, they will cover their tracks better in '06, and we will have lost anyway. Did it ever occur to you that the reason there are so many questionable voting incidents is because the republicans were loosing big, and it took much more manipulation to get the desired effect?

If you are looking for a smoking gun here to convince you that foul play took place, forget it. It's just not that simple, as most people with common sense already know. But those same people also know that where there is smoke there is fire. It's not like we are talking about reputable, honest people here, we are talking about the Bush crime syndicate.

If you don't like the thread then leave! Simple as that. You know if you really believed that this thread was a misuse of resources, then you would be quiet and let the issue go away. By fanning the flames you draw attention to it.

[truehawk]

248. I read what you posted, AND your Kos Blog

I believe that you are putting words in the mouth of the original poster.

The points made are
1. The early/absentee vote corrosponds well with the exit polls.

2. The exit polls corrospond with how people actually voted in almost every case except in our last two presidential elections, and those which have been proven fraudlent.

3. It is possible for Democrats to vote Republican, or vise versa, regardless of party affiliation, those who voted early and absentee just happened to vote very simularly to the way people who were polled SAID that they voted on election day.

[DSperoRN]

267. Stop flaming -- this is serious and unclear

I don't know why people are attacking Gracchi, who appears to be making a serious point. The data aren't totally clear in either direction. We need a statistical analysis. Bush and Burr did get a substantial bounce in the Election Day vote counting -- a 9% swing for Bush and 6.4% for Burr vis a vis the early/absentee voters.

In two other races, Commissioner of Labor and Auditor, there were swings of 5.2 and 5.4% for the Repubs. In five other (similarly low level) races, the Repubs gained 2 - 4% on election day over their EA/UA totals. And in the Governor/ Lt Governor races, the Democrats gained.

So the question is, are Bush and Burr's numbers statistically consistent with the other results? I'm not a professional statistician, but work with them a lot, and I believe that Burr's results maybe, could be, just barely possible. Bush's results seem extremely improbable. Unless there is some other explanation? I don't know what that could be, though. Even if more Dems were crossing from Kerry to Bush, that would have shown up in the EA/UA data as well. So this result looks extremely fishy.

Gracchi, you want people to stop obsessing about voter machine fraud and focus on 2006. But if the machines are rigged, the top priority has got to be to get the voting system changed. Hopefully retroactively to 11/2/2004. It's not just this race. It's what happened to Senators Castor and Cleland and how people like Hagel and Martinez won. If the Black Boxes are fraudulently electing GOP senators, we are doomed if can't show the fraud. GOTV isn't the answer if votes don't count. That's why this is worth investigating.

Yours for democracy,
David

[Name removed]

270. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

272. What?

Where is this other thread? And what do you mean by strawman tactics and lying language? I haven't lied once, yet have been accused of it over a dozen times.

[Gracchi]

271. Thank You

I would love to discuss this rationally. Unfortunately, some people just flame. Milo has called me a liar over a dozen times and I haven't lied once. I don't understand why there is such animosity here. I agree that there are serious concerns about the elections -- but North Carolina is not one of them.

[Name removed]

275. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Name removed]

278. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ignatzmouse]

283. Response posted further upstream...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[Name removed]

289. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ignatzmouse]

280. Amen

Fill a topic with as much noise as possible to frustrate the focus of discussion in order to stifle it...

[Gracchi]

282. You're Hiding and Not Responding

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

After hours of saying I was lying about the early voting he now concedes the issue but says it's not important despite using it as the basis for his entire argument.

How about you try to deal with the issue instead of talking about how you were justified in flaming me?

[Name removed]

294. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Gracchi]

281. Follow link...who's the liar here?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

You can now stop accusing me of lying. You have contradicted yourself about a dozen times on this thread. You entire argument is predicated on the idea that the early voters form a fair sample for analysis but the fact they are democrat stacked removes that possibility.

[Name removed]

291. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[truehawk]

320. Analysis in absence of data

Gracchi whole analysis based on a Democratic party memo

We don't know where they got their numbers, or what they really mean with their +registeration notation.

The original posters analysis is based on NC Board of Election Data.

[Gracchi]

323. That's simply not true and indicates you have not read the thread.

Everyone admits my numbers came from the Board of Elections. The +2.2% refers to how close they came to actual voter registration. NC has far more democrats than republicans, but historically these Democrats don't turn out to vote.

Please read what is left of the thread before posting again.

[gandalf]

293. The NC results are not necessarily representative of the whole nation

It would be therefore very interesting to replicate your analysis in some other states as well.

It is certainly a clever idea to do this kind of analysis. When someone replicates the analysis with more data, it would perhaps be possible to establish some kind of statistical significance (don't know, perhaps some t-tests or variance analyses...)

[gandalf]

295. To correct myself:

It would probably be possible to establish statistical signifiance with the NC data set.

A replication with similar results in other states would only add to this striking phenomenon.

[joubert]

296. Please, let's get back on topic

Hi - I am new here, and sorry to post at such length, but this discussion has me really frustrated.

The error in Gracchi's argument is assuming that the CNN exit poll actually reflects the number of registered Democrats and registered Republicans who turned out on Election Day. It doesn't, for two reasons.

First, an exit poll can only measure party IDENTIFICATION, not actual REGISTRATION. The specific question asked by pollsters is "No matter how you voted today, do you usually see yourself as a Democrat, Republican, or Independent?" See http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/pdf/Questionnaire%201.... . If someone is a registered Democrat who usually votes Republican but has never gotten around to changing their registration, that person may very well tell an exit pollster that he or she is a Republican. This is a well-known phenomenon among pollsters; it's why the majority of pollsters don't weight their data for party identification, because party identification SHIFTS.

Second, the CNN exit poll data was recalibrated to fit the actual results. If the results themselves are inaccurate, then the exit poll will contain the same inaccuracy. This doesn't make the exit poll data totally unreliable, but it means that its margin of error will be greater.

For these two reasons, we can't assume that 40% of the electorate were registered Republicans just because of the CNN exit poll. The only way to know is to get data from the state showing how many registered Democrats and Republicans actually showed up on Election Day. As far as I can tell, the state election board doesn't make this information available on their website. The only relevant piece of information we have is the e-mail from the NC Democratic Party posted early, which indicates that Democrats and Republicans voted early and absentee combined in numbers roughly proportional to their state registration. This isn't conclusive, but it certainly suggests that the population of early voters was not substantially different from the population who showed up on Election Day. The fact that greater absolute numbers of Democrats than Republicans showed up means NOTHING, because we know from past elections that some Democrats in North Carolina typically vote Republican.

The fact that some downticket races tended slightly Republican does not "prove" that the huge difference between the early voting presidential results and the Election Day results is insignificant or that it can be explained solely by Democrats voting early. There's only a substantial swing toward Republicans in a couple of downticket races, and the swing in the presidential results is almost TWICE as great.

Personally, I think ignatzmouse's analysis is fascinating, and it has in no way been comprehensively "debunked" or explained. I signed up on DU for the sole purpose of following this story, and I'm really sorry that huge portions of this thread have now been taken up by a stupid non-debate that disguises how interesting and well-done ignatzmouse's analysis really is. I am not a North Carolina resident or a statistician, but I would like people who are more knowledgeable to take a look at this. I hope someone can post a summary of this data in more readable form and get it out to those in the media who have shown an interest in covering this issue (Keith Olbermann, the guy at the rottendenmark.blogspot.com, etc.).

I would also like to point out that there are non-fraud explanations for this data. There could have been a late surge toward Bush and away from Kerry. However, the CNN exit poll suggests that late-deciding voters broke overwhelmingly TOWARD Kerry, 62% to 37%. (This statistic is at http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/results/states/N... ). It could also be the case that partisan Democrats and Republicans voted early, and ticket-splitters voted late. This isn't impossible, though it would make the general correspondence in the downticket races an odd statistical coincidence. One way to have more of a clue as to whether this happened would be to break down the results by county, to see if a greater proportion of Election Day voters came from counties containing more overall ticket-splitters. Finally, the reported results could be wrong due to human or machine error rather than fraud. We already know that the North Carolina results were corrupted by a number of problems, so this is entirely possible.

In short, ignatzmouse's analysis doesn't prove fraud. However, contrary to what Gracchi says, if the numbers are accurate it shows an odd anomaly that HAS NOT been satisfactorily explained. I really hope this information can be cleaned up and presented to people who might actually have a reasonable opinion about whether an explanation exits. In the meantime, I hope people can discuss the analysis, both its strengths and its possible flaws, without screaming that the analysis has been "debunked."

Thank you for listening.

[txindy]

298. Thank you, joubert, for that well-done -- and calm -- analysis

I agree. It is definitely time to return this thread to the original analysis of NC data. Excellent analysis by ignatzmouse, I might add.

Welcome to DU, joubert! Looking forward to reading more of your posts in the future.

[gandalf]

299. My suggestion: This analysis should be done for another state

by someone whith SPSS on his computer and some time to do a statistical analysis.

If the results are shown to be significant on a 5% confidence level, nobody can say "this analysis is debunked".

Does anyone know if this kind of data is available for every state? After a brief look at the Florida site, I did not find such a detailed bread down.

[ignatzmouse]

312. Other States

I'm very interested in seeing it applied to other states. As Georgia is all e-voting, I asked the Secretary of State for a precinct file with early/absentees but have not received it. For a state so gung-ho on black box voting, they sure are stingy with the raw data.

The only caveat I have on Florida and Ohio is that by general agreement the good folks running their elections are corrupt. Among a million other items, the day of the election, someone posted at the Kerry Forum that her mom called Ken Blackwell's office and could hear the staff making fake calls in the guise of Planned Parenthood to voters (likely Catholics) to be sure to vote for Kerry to protect abortion. (I don't know if that got posted here.) The possibility, therefore, exists that key absentee ballots might go missing in states with sleazeballs overseeing the **** mandate.

[Gracchi]

305. Rephrased for Clarity. Fraud Seems Unlikely.

My response does not conclusively prove the fraud theory to have been debunked. What it does do is provide an entirely plausible and quite likely alternative to fraud.

If the voter sample from early voters was not maintained throughout the election then the early voters are not a good control sample. More importantly, the other races did not stay anywhere close to the early voting samples. As anther post said, ignoring the President and Senate races, the others (not including Easley) averaged Republicans +3 on election day.

I think we can all agree that Bush and Burr had more crossover appeal than the Commisioner of Agriculture. The Republicans +3 indicates (to me at least) that I am right and the voting sample changed a great deal towards the Republicans. We know that Burr and Bush suffered almost no Republicans voting against them. We also know they did very well with Independents and crossover votes from Democrats.

Nobody seems to be questioning the two minor races where Republicans were +5 on election day. However, Burr at +6 is questioned (56% support from Independents and 11% from Democrats -- hope numbers are right haven't looked at them in a while). Bush has even stronger numbers.

If you believe that the early voters were largely Democrats and the Democrats did not maintain this lead in voting then these results are not a stretch at all. In fact, they are exactly what one would expect.

[joubert]

310. There's a big difference between +3 and +9

Even if a marginally greater percentage of Republicans voted on Election Day rather than voting early, it doesn't explain the magnitude of the change in the presidential race. Your theory also doesn't explain why the governor's race results didn't change. Whatever you may say about Easley's crossover appeal, his success in any given N.C. county was strongly correlated to Kerry's. The counties that went for Kerry by a small margin went for Easley by a much GREATER margin. Therefore, Easley should be up in early voting returns above his final percentage if your theory is correct.

There are explanations for why the Easley results are similar. The early voting and Election Day samples might be similar, but there might have been a shift away from Kerry in the final days. However, the exit polls of late-deciding voters suggest that the OPPOSITE of that happened - instead, late-deciding voters shifted toward Kerry. Or there could be some systematic difference in behavior between early and late voters that isn't linked to party registration. That's possible, but no one has offered any affirmative evidence to prove it.

I have no idea why you are so obsessed with this issue. No one is freaking out here - people are patiently examining some pretty interesting data that is far more solid than the vast majority of the "fraud" claims I've seen. I've seen some of your posts on other topics that are perfectly reasonable. If this issue doesn't interest you, why not just ignore it?

[Gracchi]

314. All possible, but not suggested by results

What we have is independents were strongly under-represented early, these people voted predominantly for Easley and Bush. Yes, late decided voters did swing for Kerry, but teh ywere a tiny fraction of Ohio voters (4%).

Your claims about Kerry and Easley simply aren't entirely factual. Yes, Easley does well in counties where Kerry won. He also won counties Kerry lost and counties that were very close. There is no reason to suggest that Easley should have been up more late. By my suggestions there were more Republicans voting late (an assumption that is supported by everything we know), while they did show a strong tendancy to cross-over for Easley, it is ridiculous to suggest that he should have done better on election day than he did early.

As for why I post here, it mostly has to do with the fact that the people who support his belief (here and at Kos, they're the same people) are fanatics who have simply called me a liar while presenting nothing new. All day yesterday they said i was lying about early returns until the offifical numbers were found. They also spent the entire day claiming I was lying about how the races actually swung, then claimed they meant within the margin of error all along. Today the vast majorities of these posts were deleted here. I don't like being called a troll, especially not when I probably did more for this campaign than 90% of the posters here. That offends me and I am determined to prove that these individuals were inventing evidence to support fraud.

As for your suggestion that there is more here than there was in other areas, that's crazy. There was way more in Cuyahoga (which I believed at first), there was conclusive proof in Franklin (which I believed) and there was even more in Florida (because there was no evidence that the Democrats had already voted). To suggest this is a strong case is simply untrue, the argument has completely fallen apart and shifted FAR from what the initial poster began with.

Remember, he claimed that all the races except Senate and President maintained the same trend on election day. His own data shows that's an outright fallacy. He claims that an equal percentage of Dems and Repubs voted early using a flawed formula, but his own formula proves 4% more of Kerry's supporters voted early and 3% of Bowles'. That shows that there was bound to be a huge swing to Bush and Burr on election day.

Essentially, I don't see any single indication that there was fraud which is not easily debunked by three facts:

1.) No matter how you look at it, way more of Bowles and Kerry's supporters voted early.

2.) Burr and Bush had broad cross-over appeal and sway with independents. Kerry and Bowles lost supporters from within their own party.

3.) Every race swung Republican on election day except Easley, who barely maintained his advantage despite having huge support from indepndents and Republicans -- another indication more Repubs voted on e-day.

There is just no indication of fraud which is not countered by those FACTS.

[pointsoflight]

311. So we have viable, testable, alternative hypotheses.

Can we all agree, then, that an audit of the votes is warranted?

[understandinglife]

315. Yes (n/t)

[Gracchi]

317. I suppose, but a very low priority

There is more proof of fraud in a dozen other states. Given that every time we open our mouths about fraud the general population thinks less of us, we must be careful about how we use what little moral authority we have on this issue.

To push for an audit when there is an easily explainable and extremely likely alternative explanation seems foolish given our limited resources and authority.

[understandinglife]

321. Yes: High Priority: Now: Not in 2006 (n/t)

[truehawk]

313. Broken Record Technique.

Standard disinformation technique.

Anyone check out if this guy and the blog are genuine??

[Gracchi]

319. Same thing over and over

You people called me a liar and a troll about a thousand times last night only to see the vast majority of the posts deleted. Now you just suggest it.

This is pathetic, I've currently got a diary in the recommended list at Kos, I've got my own blog and I have tons of other posts here that nobody disputes. The only people who have the audacity to suggest I'm a troll are those who insist there was fraud and believe that every single real Democrat must believe in fraud.

This is getting very tiresome.

[truehawk]

322. Does this guy sound like a Canadian??

Sorry but Republicans are over repersented in Absentee ballots in every count that I have seen.

If your point is valid, it will be eventually found valid.

The fact that you are posting franticly here and on KOS sounds more like an attempt to preempt serious investigation rather than a benign search for the truth.

If you are right, you will be found right.

Stop putting words in other people's mouth.

[Gracchi]

324. Good god

You are desperate to find any way to discredit me. Claim I'm not a Canadian, whatever you need, it's just sad. I posted proof that more Democrats voted than Republicans, now you're saying the Board of Elections is lying.

I could similarily accuse you guys of being trolls by saying that you are trying to put forth a ridiculous request for a recount within any proof in order to discrdit the entire recount movement and the attempt underway in Ohio.

Just please stop posting.

[BlueDog2u]

371. Hey Gracchi

I'm about as nuetral as you will get here. I've been reading this thread for two days now, trying to wrap my non-mathematical brain around what y'all are debating. When I first started reading, I wasn't really sure how I felt about your participation on this thread. I like real debates, and I like to hear all sides of an issue.

But having now had some further time to reflect on it, I have to say that you are the one who is coming across with an attitude the size of barn door. I don't see all the accusations you allude to in which you've been set upon by the DU wolves calling you a "liar."

What I do see is you calling ignatzmouse a liar, and frankly, I think your insinuations are rude and totally uncalled for. Moreover, I agree entirely with those respondents who have said, with considerable clarity, that your "debunking" of the ignatzmouse is anything but conclusive. As has been said to you several times, the magnitude of the shift towards Bush is entirely disproportianate to anything visible for any of the other Republican candidates you refer to.

Your alternative explanations for the phenomenon, while worthy of consideration, simply do not constitute the definitive rebutall you presume for them. This being the case, your rudeness damages your credibility. Please either calm down or go away. Every time you screech the "l" word, you look more and more like someone who can't win this argument on its merits.

[myschkin]

316. do you believe in santa claus?

yes, crossover votes by clever software algorithms... are you naive? how about including the blackbox-argument (just by thinking)?

do you believe in cnn and changed (adjusted) polls? (what a curious habit by americans by the way)

i can't believe that all republicans stands behind a president who reign of the far right, rushed in a wrong war and make a record deficit... i would suppose indifference - but not on the side of the democrats who are "hot" to get rid of this president...

so my feelings say there is something wrong. the triumph of 'conservative america' just a fake?

everybody forgot what the bush team did to mc cain, kerry a.s.l. a.s.l. there was never a team who had so FEW moral values and was so near to some dictatorships in white russia a.s.l.

i don't trust in this guys...

there was a clear tendency in the last polls to kerry (even at fox news polls) - all this should be wrong?

[Gracchi]

318. Did you not see the 6pm exit polls?

The 6pm exit polls were entirely accurate with the Senate Race and were strongly moving towards the eventual Presidential finish.

For you and othes to continue to insist that this is incorrect is worrisome. The scenario by which fraud is explained grows increasingly unlikely.

Why is Ockam's Razor completely discounted here?

[truehawk]

325. Link please

And please repost the part about how you are a Canadian trying to save the Democratic Party.

AND your blog link, I seem to have lost track of it.

[Gracchi]

326. Good lord, you think this is the inquisition?

The 6pm exit polls are in the original Kos diary. You drudge them up.

http://www.gracchi.blogspot.com

Note, if you post anything I'm just going to delete it, I'm not interested in you posting there at all. You have shown a disturbing propensity to viciously flame anyone who disagrees with you. That's not something I'm interested in.

As for my involvement, I participated in the election with ACT and Election Protection in Youngstown. I also made hundreds of phone calls for the campaign and wrote hundred ot LTEs.

I'm just tired of dealing with your fanaticism. I'm done justifying myself to you. I am far more involved in the online political community than you and see no reason to further justify myself to you.

[truehawk]

327. About what I would expect from you

[truehawk]

328. Still no "exit poll" link for 6 PM from NC

[Gracchi]

329. It's in the Kos diary

I can't provide a link to a specific response to the diary and there are over 400 responses for crying out loud. The post was made by Safenukes I think. I'm also pretty sure that somewhere on this thread Milo admits that the 6pm exit poll had Burr up six. Look for that if you want. I'm not wasting time proving facts to someone who has no basis for argument whatsoever.

More Democrats voted early. FACT

All races except Easley and friends tended Republican on e-day. FACT

The last exit polls did not support the early voting at all. FACT


There is absolutely no disputing those three. If you still want to claim there was fraud do so while accepting those facts or you have no credibility whatsoever.

[truehawk]

331. Post it here then

[understandinglife]

333. dKos diary link provided, here...

Hi,

Here is the diary link:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/13/9743/8602

You, and your colleagues at DU in this thread, will find a rather interesting pattern -- just follow each 'gracchi' comment and see how the very reasonable and patient, diarist markusd, and others tried to deal with 'gracchi'.

Now, we have the pattern attempting to repeat itself in this dKos diary:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/11/14/144941/51

So, in the interest of those of us trying to save our Democracy, now, rather than wishfully hoping all will be well by 2006, I posted a couple of reference points for other Kossacks to study.

Thank you.

"It's about America"

[truehawk]

330. I wrote this here before but I don't see it now

You base your accertion that Democratics voted early and did not turn out on election day on a memo from the Democratic Party.

We don't know exactly what that memo means or where they got their data. Also if Democrats were fired up enough to vote early in record numbers, what makes you think that they would not turn up on Election Day as well? Interest in this election was/is at an all time high.

As I undserstand it, the original poster bases his analysis on unaltered exit polls and BOE results.



Your data is just too preliminary for the words you choose to use to be at all approperate.

[Gracchi]

332. I dealt with that complaint two posts ago

My info is from the BOE, simple fact. His info is based on a strange formula which doesn't hold at all. It lumps everyone into two categories: Those who voted for Easley and those who voted against him. His formula doesn't yield the same results with any other race on election day.

Democrats never turn out in North Carolina. There was an explanation at the diary on Kos that I don't remember.

You are just grasping at straws, ignoring historical precident, ignoring BOE results, ignoring the inconsistancies in the initial posters comments.

[truehawk]

334. Here is a link to the exit poll date

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[no1hedberg]

363. I am a North Carolina Democrat

And I stood in line for 4 hours with hundreds of others. So again you don't know what your talking about. Please go away. Besides your much too "prominent in the online community" to waste your time on those of us who just demand that our vote count.

[myschkin]

346. do you k n o w anything?

The last exit polls were adjusted to the voting result - what about the study of Steven Freeman?

Gracchi - take your heart and go on fighting. I really would resign too if I would feel everything was going right.

Ockam's Razor is welcome - but sceptisism and critical thinking also. Or are you hired by Bush?

We should fight with our reason - and I think that's what we do... I don't see any fanatism on this board, although I am new here. People thinking clear and rational here - and they don't break into a board with words of "liar" a.s.l. - so your style of argumenting discredits you a bit...

[truehawk]

352. Kick

[gradstudent]

302. Are county-by-county results available?

Do you have a source where I could find county-by-county vote totals for both the absentee and the regular voting? It would be interesting to do a Benford's Law analysis of the two voting groups separately. I just can't seem to find the data I need by-county.

[ignatzmouse]

308. NC State Board of Elections

You'll find it all here:

http://www.sboe.state.nc.us/enrs/main_primary.asp?ED=11...

The absentee information is contained within the precinct data, so you'll probably need to download it into an Excel file to work with it. I am working on a county by county analysis, but it is a lot of work, so please bear with me.