Reply #24: It has been brought to my attention

[Febble]

that I should make it (once again) clear that an analysis is one thing; interpretation is another.

The analyses presented by Mitofsky and ESI indicate that there is no linear relationship between the degree to which Bush improved/failed to improve his vote-share in 2004 relative to 2000 and the degree to which the PLD (Precinct Level Discrepancy in the exit polls) departed from zero. These are very important findings, and a simple reading (even quite a complex reading) suggests that the fraud made little or no contribution to the exit poll discrepancy. This is not the same thing as saying that there was no fraud. It is perfectly possible that the exit polls were "wrong" in the "right" direction for quite coincidental reasons.

But the reason the analyses are important is that they do indicate that IF fraud occurred in the 2004 election, it must have been either of a certain type or targetted in a particular way. And this should help us look for the most likely kinds of fraud.

As far as this goes, I have no problems with Kathy's paper, except that she repeatedly mis-states my own interpretation, and I am, I confess, getting a little fed up with the role of bad guy in all this.

So to be absolutely clear: Kathy quotes me, in footnote 4 as saying:

"the failure to find a linear relationship between the magnitude of the exit poll discrepancy and the magnitude of Bush's increase in vote share since 2000 is a major problem for the argument that the discrepancy indicates{sic} fraud."

I presume the origin for her citation is this:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=203&topic_id=398055&mesg_id=398338

and I stand by this statement, with the correction that I used the word "indexes" not "indicates": a small difference but an important one. I will therefore paraphrase my statement thus:

"The failure to find a linear relationship between the magnitude of the exit poll discrepancy and the magnitude of Bush's increase in vote share since 2000 presents a major problem for the argument that the discrepancy is a measure of the magnitude of fraud"

And will add to it: It does not, however, rule out fraud, although it sets important and informative constraints on the type and target of such fraud .

It's these constraints we have been exploring recently on DU, and would certainly be worth writing a paper about.