Mainstream media collude in upcoming election fraud?

Exit polls are one of the best validations of election results there can be. For decades and in many countries they are regarded as very reliable indeed. There have been accusations of election fraud over the last three elections, and there have been discrepancies between election polls and the final results which have supported these allegations. Now all controversy can be safely removed by the simple expedient of doing away altogether with those pesky exit polls!



As you'll see from the links below, exit poll raw data for recent elections have been hard to come by, and when they have been revealed, indicate serious election fraud. There are plenty of threads on this board showing that Diebold, Sequoia and other companies are responsible for serious problems in an electoral process that has just had its last chance of external validation stripped away. I've linked some of them below.

I'm reminded of an Isaac Asimov short story about how, in the far future, voting in an election comes down to one person's responses to a whole range of questions posed and analysed by a supercomputer. It does without the whole messy democratic business of people actually being empowered by the democratic process, nice one, Ike. (I read this story when quite young, and I guess it means I've grown up now that I can see that this future is rather more dystopian than Asimov painted it.) Cut out the supercomputer and substitute Dick Cheney for the representative citizen, and we're there already!

If there are no exit polls, then it might suggest that the media are colluding in the theft of whatever tattered remnants are left of American democracy, and will surely put to rest the tired nonsense that the US media have a left-wing bias. It's the last link to reality that US electoral results retain - and if it is severed, those results are simply not to be trusted, and US citizens in this forum will no longer, with any justification, be able to speak of living in a democracy.

Related News Links:
www.scoop.co.nz
www.scoop.co.nz

Related AboveTopSecret.com Discussion Threads:
2008 - the fix is in...
Diebold Voting Machine Designed for Vote Tampering
Secret Diebold Software Patch Resulted in Republican Victories
politics.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 1-11-2006 by rich23]

That's it?

No-one cares if your elections are honest? No-one thinks it odd that exit polls are now 'obsolete'?

Well first, I am amazed that this story got voted up because of the bias in the intro paragraph. I suppose the rules are relaxing on ATSNN submissions? But other than that, it is a good story, rich.

But in any case, yeah rich23, I care. And I think it sucks. What little cross verification was left is now going to be taken away from an indifferent American public. It's going to take police or military banging down people's doors and shooting, stealing and robbing people before the guns come out and people get serious about saying "no more."

Hell, who's got time to worry if their vote counts or not? They're too busy making money off illegal immigrants.

[edit on 2-11-2006 by TrueAmerican]

Originally posted by rich23
No-one cares if your elections are honest? No-one thinks it odd that exit polls are now 'obsolete'?

Most Americans are so far sucked into the political divide that they care more about Kerrys verbal blunder then the fact Diebold machines appear to be registering Republican votes after somone has voted for the Dems.

Do you want to make certain your vote counts? Use "absentee voting." It leaves a "paper trail" of how you voted, whereas the Diebold machines don't.

Tired of the two-party system being so corrupt? Vote "No Confidence."

Problem solved.

Exit polls have become worthless. Too many people don't answer them honestly to trust them anymore.

Originally posted by jsobecky
Exit polls have become worthless. Too many people don't answer them honestly to trust them anymore.

I hear this a lot. So, did people just start lying in 2000?

Originally posted by TrueAmerican
Well first, I am amazed that this story got voted up because of the bias in the intro paragraph.

If you can point to anything untrue in that paragraph, go for it - although you could have done so in your post rather than crying "bias".

Anyway, it's well-known that reality has a liberal bias

Originally posted by jsobecky
Exit polls have become worthless. Too many people don't answer them honestly to trust them anymore.

And your evidence for this is where, exactly?

Just another apologist for voting fraud. Don't, please, try to tell anyone you live in a democracy, because you don't any more, and it's people like yourself who allow it to happen and even rejoice in it because it's your side winning.

But actually, everybody loses except for a very few right at the top of the food chain.

Originally posted by rich23
Just another apologist for voting fraud. Don't, please, try to tell anyone you live in a democracy, because you don't any more, and it's people like yourself who allow it to happen and even rejoice in it because it's your side winning.

So, you're going to resort to personal snipes, eh, rich23? I thought we were supposed to keep that out of ATSNN?

You can have your discussion - I'm outta here.

I've seen voting fraud on both sides of the coin. It's not just the repubs doing it, it's also the dems. Here in Wisconsin there was a lot of issues with dems slashing tires of republican vans and dems giving homeless people cigarettes to buy their vote. We also had a lot of ballots that voted democrat that were double votes or people that didn't even exist. I think the whole system is just plain screwed up. And I agree with Becky. Who's to keep people from saying they voted for somebody else in an exit poll? You ask why would people just start lying since 2000? Do you have any proof that that's when it started? I've never even had anybody poll me when I exit from voting. Could it just be that the exit polls are more inaccurate? I don't know the answers to these things, but I do know that polls aren't always unbiased.

Originally posted by closettrekkie
I've seen voting fraud on both sides of the coin. It's not just the repubs doing it, it's also the dems. Here in Wisconsin...

Bev Harris mentions that in the HBO documentry, Hacking Democracy. Some Republican in Louisiana was testing out the voting machines, for the then-upcoming 2004 election, and, although she voted for herself, it showed up as a vote for her opponent. She tried it again. Same result.

I agree with you. There's definitely enough sketchiness to go around.

You ask why would people just start lying since 2000? Do you have any proof that that's when it started?

First off, that was the first election I was legal to vote, so I don't know this from personal experience. However, from everything I've read, exit polls were usually on the money... until 2000. That's why I asked.

Does anyone else know if exit polls were usually right, back when we were allowed to see them?

Originally posted by rich23

Originally posted by jsobecky
Exit polls have become worthless. Too many people don't answer them honestly to trust them anymore.

And your evidence for this is where, exactly?

I think the very simple to understand evidence for this is that the exit polls are not very accurate anymore. I don't think how I voted is any pollsters business and might say someting different myself just to throw them off. The thought process is that if the polls quit being accurate, maybe they'll just leave us alone when we vote. Some people also seem to be blurring the distinction between word of mouth exit polls and the actual vote. Besides, if exit polls are so wonderfully accurate, then why not just use them and do away with all that voting hassle?

But wait, aren't you also forgetting the possibility of fraud in the exit polls? It would be way easier for the pollster to skew the results of their polls (because there are no controls over them at all) than it would to change actual votes.

Everytime I see one of these discussions claiming voter fraud because the polls don't match the vote, I see people grasping at straws because they didn't like the outcome of the last election.

I really want to see answers to these questions:
What will you be saying if this time around the exit polls say the Republicans are winning, but the actual votes say the democrats won? Will you still be jumping up and down screaming voter fraud?

[edit on 11/3/2006 by centurion1211]

Originally posted by HarlemHottie
Does anyone else know if exit polls were usually right, back when we were allowed to see them?

Here is a start:

Also: Have the Exit Polls Been Wrong Before?
And Edison Media Research and Mitofsky International's (pdf.) own report and thier findings (January 2005).

The first article will direct you to a few different sources as well, but to directly answer the question...

As it appears the margin of discrepency in presidential election exit polls have not been as recently large as since 1988 (vs. 2004 data) and similar sizeable discrepencies existed in 1984 and 1992.

So...exit polls are not a sacred cow...nor always correct.



mg

Originally posted by xpert11

Most Americans are so far sucked into the political divide that they care more about Kerrys verbal blunder then the fact Diebold machines appear to be registering Republican votes after somone has voted for the Dems.

And it also seems to not be registering with the media and the public that Bush's chief enemy in the Western Hemisphere - Hugo Chavez - just bought control over the company that makes and provides software for voting machines in something like 17 states plus Washington, D.C.

Any of you CT's not see a potential problem with that? IMO, if you don't, then we're witnessing hypocrisy in action.

Originally posted by rich23
If you can point to anything untrue in that paragraph, go for it - although you could have done so in your post rather than crying "bias".

Anyway, it's well-known that reality has a liberal bias

Reality may have a liberal bias according to you, but ATSNN intro paragraphs are supposed to contain NO bias. As in, no opinion. They are supposed to be a summary of the facts as known for the story, written in the own author's words. The opinion part is supposed to be in the analysis/conclusion section at the bottom.

Exit polls are one of the best validations of election results there can be.

If that right there is not sheer opinion, and hence BIAS, I don't know what is, especially for an ATSNN submission. It is opinion because it is extremely subjective, and it is those kinds of statements that were usually not allowed in ATSNN news article intro paragraphs. Again, things appear to have changed.

Now all controversy can be safely removed by the simple expedient of doing away altogether with those pesky exit polls!

Another heavily opinion-based statement, and clearly showing BIAS. These kinds of statements are best left for the analysis/conclusion section at the bottom.

This piece would have worked as an OP/ED piece, but I just can't understand how it works as an ATSNN news piece now. I suppose all those that used to fight for ATSNN presentation quality have given up, seeing as no one else is saying a word.

Originally posted by jsobecky
So, you're going to resort to personal snipes, eh, rich23? I thought we were supposed to keep that out of ATSNN?

You can have your discussion - I'm outta here.

I just love the way you quoted my entire post except for the part where I asked for you evidence for asserting that exit polls are biased. You offer no evidence, stalk off in a huff... you had an opportunity to deny ignorance, but seem disposed instead to embrace it. Until you demonstrate otherwise, I feel vindicated in deeming you an apologist for vote fraud for reasons of partisanship.

Originally posted by centurion1211

Originally posted by rich23

Originally posted by jsobecky
Exit polls have become worthless. Too many people don't answer them honestly to trust them anymore.

And your evidence for this is where, exactly?

I think the very simple to understand evidence for this is that the exit polls are not very accurate anymore.

I'm sorry, but this is exceptionally poor and circular logic. The exit polls are worthless because they're not accurate: they're not accurate because they disagree with the final result. If the final result was hacked, then the exit polls may have been a more accurate assessment than the final result.

Therefore the evidence for the exit polls being inaccurate is evidence of nothing of the sort. It is evidence of a discrepancy between two results. A correlation between these results inspires confidence in both processes: a discrepancy suggests that something, somewhere, is awry. We have a situation in which Republicans are accused ot massive voting fraud, and the exit polls support this allegation.

In fact we have a situation in which polls both before and during elections indicate precisely the opposite of the eventual election result, and all the Republicans seem to feel quite calm about it, presumably because they're the winning side. Voting fraud is actually quite an expected occurrence in US elections, rather more so than I think in the UK and the rest of Europe. Both sides have indulged in it hitherto: but right now, the Republicans have got very, very good at it and no-one in the mainstream media seems to be adequately reporting it.

The fact that polls both before and during the election all agree that the result is the opposite of those intended indicates one of perhaps three things:

1. there is real and widespread fraud
   
2. pollsters are actually getting worse at their job across the board
   
3. Republicans consistently lie, big time, to pollsters.
   

There is evidence, independently of the polls, that suggests that the Republicans are getting really, really good at stealing elections. Now one of the last things that can be used as a check on the validity of the elections is being abandoned and many people don't see anything wrong with this. It's scary, to be honest.

Besides, if exit polls are so wonderfully accurate, then why not just use them and do away with all that voting hassle?

Election coverage uses exit polls to try and forecast the result. This is pretty obvious. It's also obvious that in most places, given a decent sample, it's pretty accurate. For example, in the UK 2005 election, the BBC forecast a Labour majority of 66, and Murdoch's Sky predicted 80. The end result was almost smack in the middle of those two on 71. source

However, if you look at the mystery pollster link that someone else in this thread posted, you get a rather different result that is all one way:

In Alabama, a discrepancy of 16.1%
In Arizona, a discrepancy of 9.9%
In Colorado, a discrepancy of 11.5%
In Georgia, a discrepancy of 16.4%
In North Carolina, a discrepancy of 15.8%

...all favouring Bush.

Now this is spun as evidence to show that the exit polls were getting less accurate. The problem with that is that the inaccuracy only goes ONE WAY. The BBC result and the Sky result cited above differ - and they go either side of the direct result. If there is a consistent error favouring one candidate, this clearly points to election fraud being the result rather than an inaccuracy on the part of the pollsters.

But wait, aren't you also forgetting the possibility of fraud in the exit polls?

I'm saying it's extremely unlikely. All fraud in the exit polls will do is make the news companies and polling firms look stupid, which is not in their interest. It won't affect the actual results of the elections, will it? To suggest that news companies will deliberately falsify the exit poll results - when all that will happen is that they will look foolish as a result - is clutching at straws. Particularly when you realise that they're under-reporting the whole issue of vote fraud in the first place.

It would be way easier for the pollster to skew the results of their polls (because there are no controls over them at all) than it would to change actual votes.

Not only do they not have any interest, as explained above, in skewing their polling results, it wouldn't be much easier than arranging vote fraud on some of the voting and vote-tabulating machines in the chain, according to reports I've read. It's really easy to arrange, thanks to poor, proprietary software. Every so often, someone leaks the code for the software, and programmers pick through it. I remember reading one report that said at one point there's an instruction to divide one of the totals by 1. This makes no difference to the total. Why do that unless you're going to substitute another number for 1 at some point in the future?

Everytime I see one of these discussions claiming voter fraud because the polls don't match the vote, I see people grasping at straws because they didn't like the outcome of the last election.

Grasping at straws? When the polls forecast a defeat? When there is huge evidence that thousands of people (particularly black voters) have been deliberately disenfranchised? When Republican staffers turn up in Florida and create a white-collar riot to disrupt a recount? Why disrupt a recount unless you're worried you're going to lose it?

I really want to see answers to these questions:
What will you be saying if this time around the exit polls say the Republicans are winning, but the actual votes say the democrats won? Will you still be jumping up and down screaming voter fraud?

That'll be the day. I think the whole system is monstrously corrupt, so I have no brief for the Democrats either. However, removing people from the voting process altogether is a step towards totalitarianism, which is pretty clearly where the US is headed. The smarter US citizens appear to be realising this.

Originally posted by missed_gear
Have the Exit Polls Been Wrong Before?

This link manages to suggest that a huge discrepancy between the exit polls and the final results is the result of inaccuracies in the exit poll process, despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of these discrepancies favoured Bush.

Inaccuracies would have been more evenly distributed. What these results indicate is not inaccuracy but fraud.

I live in King County Washington.

Do I REALLY need to say anything more about fraud in government?