Turnout won Va. for Bush

[Freddie Stubbs]

More voters in counties cast ballots than in cities, where Kerry ran stronger

BY TYLER WHITLEY
TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER Nov 23, 2004


Voters in Virginia's counties, which generally went for President Bush, turned out for the presidential election in proportionally greater numbers than did voters in the John Kerry-leaning cities.

In the counties, 72.7 percent of registered voters cast ballots. In the cities, 68.1 percent did so, according to the official canvass of the results completed yesterday by the State Board of Elections.

The overall turnout of 71.3 percent was almost 3 percentage points higher than four years ago.

A total of 3,223,156 Virginians cast ballots, 450,000 more than in 2000. The Bush-Cheney ticket increased its vote total by 279,000 votes over four years ago. The Democratic ticket of John Kerry and John Edwards surpassed the total for Al Gore and Joseph I. Lieberman by 217,000.

more: http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD%2FMGArticle%2FRTD_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031779300288&path=%21news&s=1045855934842

[NewYorkerfromMass]

1. They got 29% more new voters than us.

I have looked at Pennsylvania, where they also got more new blood than us, but only 19% more.
This map shows where we increased our margins, and where we lost.
The white shows we pretty much lost ground everywhere in Pa.

[MrUnderhill]

5. That may underrepresent the problem

By comparing merely Kerry's PERCENTAGE of the vote to what Gore got in 2000, we ignore the fact that Nader drew 2% of the PA vote in 2000 and was not on the ballot this time.

In fact, had Nader been on the ballot and received what he got in 2000 (unlikely), Bush may have won PA.

I wonder what the chart looks like comparing relative strength?

[NewYorkerfromMass]

9. I am well aware of that

but Nader only got 100,000 or so votes statewide, and you can't say for sure if they even showed up or absolutely did vote for Kerry.

[gauguin57]

16. Wow ... it's so great to see ultra-conservative Lancaster County in blue!

The Democratic committee chairman here set that as a goal for local Democrats -- not to think the Dems could BEAT Bush in this VERY REPUG county ... just to get Gore's percentage plus a bit more. He hammered that point at every speech he made to the Democratic faithful here throughout the campaign -- if our efforts could bring out Gore plus more, we could help Kerry win PA.

The Democrats were more active, more vocal than I've ever seen them here -- great candidates for local offices, a gazillion volunteers coming out of the woodwork ... and the Dems DID IT!

One bright spot in a miserable day-after-Election-Day.

[underpants]

2. Ugh!

That sucks.

I have 100 things I could say about this but I'll just leave it at that because most of them are very negative.

[righteous1]

Turnout

It's all about turnout. Always has been, always will be

[tngledwebb]

14. And evil-doers rigging elections

can't happen here. Move along.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

6. I bet a map of Va. such as the one I did for Pa. would look similar

We did great around Philadelphia (better informed, more liberal) than away from big cities in the sticks.

[Racenut20]

3. I never thought Kerry would win Florida, especially on Nov 2.

Although I wanted desperately to believe... I did not see the turnout of black voters at my polling place that I saw in 2000 when Jeb had them all p/offed. Then when in mid morning, the local news channel was showing the lines in the RedNeck Riveria, I was pretty sure it was over.

[BeFree]

4. Bad numbers

279,000 +
217,000 =
496,000 new votes, not, as the article states, 450,000. They are missing 46,000 votes, they are off by more than ten percent! Stupid, eh? Can't trust the conservative media.

Question: Has anybody ran the Va. numbers through the black box cruncher such as ignatzmouse did for NC? You'd think the press would have done something like that, instead it was done by an individual.

Damned conservative media, not only are they lazy, they don't even think!

[spooky3]

7. Does anyone know how widespread electronic voting is in VA?

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

8. Chart of State By State E-Voting

http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/041020evotestates/pfindex.html

According to this table re Virginia:

Virginia 46 of 134 counties and independent cities use DRE Sequoia AVC Advantage and AVC Edge, Hart Intercivic eSlate, ES&S, Unilect, Advanced Voting Solutions No voter-verifiable paper with DRE

[KoKo]

10. Sounds like someone needs to do some serious checking in VA..

With the machines....who knows what the real vote is. And, since so many people feel Va is conservative they would accept that it went for Bush because of Falwell. But....what if it really didn't...???

With the Bushies, we should never accept anything just because it appears to be so..like Virginia is Bush country.

Maybe it is...maybe it isn't.

[spooky3]

17. Thanks, Ommsweetomm, and Koko01, there are people

checking. Unfortunately, even good Dems who have been involved with adopting the machines are defensive about it and even smirky when questioned.

One of the studies that reported exit polls for 47 of the 50 states plus DC says VA exit poll data unpolluted by adjustments for "actual" votes are not available. This is very troubling.

Also, VA was pretty close when Clinton ran (IIRC, around 3-4%), and Gore was not very far behind Bush (about 8%) despite spending zero time in VA. Kerry-Edwards also gave it up early. Yet there is a popular (60%) Dem governor leading the state. With this and all the demographic changes going on, it certainly should not be regarded as an immovably red state.

[DancingBear]

11. We live in VA - in a Repub county

My wife was working the polls on Election Day (I was in OH).

She reported that many more folks took the copy of the sample Dem ballot she was handing out than the corresponding Repub sample ballot of the other poll worker. Scientific - of course not. Interesting - most assuredly.

Many polls had * up 3-5 points - he won VA by 9-10.

I'm sorry, but I can't believe ANY analysis of voting patterns if the data used to analyze same has been tampered with.

I believe most of it has.

[Straight Shooter]

12. I don't accept any rationale that assumes bush got 100% Repub vote

I suppose the exit polls theory has fallen flat, it's time for a fresh horse in the race.

Sure, maybe more registered, maybe more turned out, but it's illogical to assume that every Repub registered equals a vote for bush. This seems to be the premise of the extra turnout argument lending credibility to bush "winning."

They don't make that assumption for the Dems registered.

Many young adults register in the same party as their parents; it doesn't necessarily follow that they vote as their parents do. After all, many youth attend their parents' church and have completely different idealologies which they keep to themselves but practice private.

No, I will not accept bush got 100% Repub vote, not with all the influential moderate Repubs turning against him in the last weeks of the campaign and stridently arguing against voting for him.

I can accept that bush won certain states; I cannot accept the margin in some of those states.

edit: typing dissonance

[lthuedk]

13. Stop writing epitaphs until we know the scope of the fraud, damn it!

[goclark]

15. Let's keep questioning every state

I live in California and I have not talked to one person that loved Arnold yet.

I'm not sure that he won by the margin that they claimed.

So, keep checking, leave no stone unturned in any state.