Sandy Drowned Any Significant Chance of Election Theft

[Tom Rinaldo]

For those who worry about such things as potentially vote flipping electronic voting machines, I suspect that threat has receded now from whatever level it was at just one week ago. Hurricane Sandy saw to that.

There is no longer a plausible narrative that can be spun invoking an under appreciated late breaking surge for Romney that could be used to explain Romney at the last minute winning states that most observers and pollers expected him to lose. In truth whatever momentum Romney got from the first debate stalled weeks ago, but that wasn't enough to drive a stake through the heart of Romney's Momentum Myth. Sandy was though.

Sandy stopped the campaigns and shut down whatever election expectation programs had been running. Now America are turning to a fresh rebooted screen. On it we see government aiding its citizens and President Obama clearly in command, and just about everyone expects Obama to benefit from a positive "bounce" in voter support as a result. Romney can't change the new narrative between now and Tuesday. He is going to have to lose this election all on his own.

[still_one]

1. Not at all, especially with electronic voting there is no change

[Tom Rinaldo]

5. It's not the evidence or lack of it that has changed

It is the plausibility of the explanation that could be used to cover a theft that has changed. Election theft is a very risky enterprise. If the public intuitively accepts a small manipulated tweak to the results as plausible, it becomes very hard to overcome inertia to challenge it Any "story" that supports a contention of "momentum" can be used to defend the candidate who supposedly has it doing better than expected. Lacking that however, a jarring election result could set off a hunt for the truth that those who might contemplate election theft do not want conducted in earnest with the public engaged and paying attention.

[madaboutharry]

2. It put a stop to the stupid talk from the TV pundits.

The conversation is now about responsible government.

[mzmolly]

3. Hope so.

[BlueJazz]

4. You haven't seen the trash that runs Florida, have you ??

They don't care 'cause their crimes are as permanent as a smoke-ring.

[KaryninMiami]

6. Not exactly. Those machines can still be rigged and will be rigged.

And people will be disenfranchised and lied to and made to feel confused- it's already going on all over the country in swing states. The fix is in for the machines unless there are verifiable checkpoints in place which is usually not the case. Certainly not here in Florida. They can and will do what they can to cheat their way in to a win and if we are not up above a 5-6 point margin in a swing stage, we will loose because they will skim off 1-3% of the totals. That's the deal.

Want more? Have a look at what's going on in Ohio (again): http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2012/4766

Will "experimental" software patches affect the Ohio vote?
by Bob Fitrakis and Gerry Bello
October 31, 2012

Why did the Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted's office, in an end run around Ohio election law, have "experimental" software patches installed on vote counting tabulators in up to 39 Ohio counties? Voting rights activists are concerned that these uncertified and untested software patches may alter the election results.

During the 2004 presidential election, the Free Press reported that election officials observed technicians from the ES&S voting machine company and Triad computer maintenance company installing uncertified and untested software patches on voting machines in 44 Ohio counties prior to the election. Software patches are usually installed to "update" or change existing software. These software patch updates were considered suspect by election protection activists, in light of all the voting machine anomalies found during the 2004 election in Ohio.

The Free Press has learned that Election Systems and Solutions (ES&S) installed the software patches that will affect 4,041,056 registered voters, including those in metropolitan Columbus and Cleveland (click here for spread sheet from verifiedvoting.org).

snip

[Tom Rinaldo]

7. I know all that. But...

There is a reason why Barack Obama got elected in 2008 anyway. In my opinion major scale voter theft happens when the stolen outcome is thought of as being plausibly genuine. The conditions weren't right for that in 2008 and, given the most recent developments, I no longer think they are ripe for that in 2012 either, post Sandy.

[marions ghost]

8. These events may help Obama

but IMO as much theft as can be plausibly done, WILL be done....

[KaryninMiami]

9. He won because he had a landslide big enough to compensate

for the rigging. When they compared the exit polls to the actual results, without the rigging he would have had an even bigger percentage of votes. We don't have a landslide situation this time- the polls are way too close for comfort. That's how we can loose- not because we didn't have more votes- from a skimming of a small percentage- enough so that it does not constitute a recount but not enough to make it look like it was stolen. You think Kerry lost? Think again. He conceded way too early.

[Tom Rinaldo]

10. We may well disagree but...

I think when the gut sense of the mation is that momentum has swung toward Obama AND the polls already have him ahead in more than enough states to wijn THAT is a circumstance that deters flipping enough votes to change the national outcome.

UNLESS there is some major, and at this late point I mean REALLY majpr news story that pushes Sandy out of news coverage AND makes Obama look really bad. People might swallow a surprising last minute alleged surge toward Romney if in their experience something is going on that can explain why that could be happening (without cheating). But when almost everyone senses that the Romney tide is going out, not in, that becomes impossible (as in too dangerous to attempt).

In other words,I am making a case that there are two scenarios where election theft becomes nonviable. You mentioned one, when everyone believes that one candidate has a large lead. The second scenario is when everyone feels that one candidate is ahead and pulling away from the other candidate and there is nothing left to happen (like a final high stakes debate) that gives anyone any reason to believe that the votes will suddenly break contrary to the trend everyone is noticing. It's not just "Mass" (the amount of the lead) it is also "direction" (the drum beat of news that establishes momentum) that establishes inertia to carry the winning candidate over the line in the face of potential tampering.