In June, Seven Stories Press published the book I co-authored with Steven F. Freeman, Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? Exit Polls, Election Fraud, and the Official Count. We had spent the previous year and a half examining the exit polls and learning about the problems posed by electronic voting. I took up this task, devoting evenings and weekends to… return to article
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Reader Comments (12)Page 1 of 1 pagesWas the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? Exit Polls, Election Fraud, and the Official Count?
What more do the skeptics want?
Proof.
The following excerpts from Bleifuss’ article are not examples of “proof”
64 percent of Americans voted on direct recorded electronic voting machines or optical-scan systems, both of which are vulnerable to hacking or programming fraud
it would only take a few people to steal an election
could allow unauthorized personnel to disrupt operations or modify data and programs that are critical to … the integrity of the voting process
Proof of this came on September 13 ... which found that the most commonly used electronic voting machine is vulnerable to programming fraud
We found that the machine is vulnerable to a number of extremely serious attacks that undermine the accuracy and credibility of the vote counts it produces
Malicious software running on a single voting machine can steal votes with little if any risk of detection. The malicious software can modify all of the records, audit logs, and counters kept by the voting machine, so that even careful forensic examination of these records will find nothing amiss. We have constructed demonstration software that carries out this vote-stealing attack
Anyone who has physical access to a voting machine, or to a memory card that will later be inserted into a machine, can install said malicious software using a simple method that takes as little as one minute
AccuVote-TS machines are susceptible to voting-machine viruses that can spread malicious software automatically and invisibly from machine to machine during normal pre- and post-election activity. We have constructed a demonstration virus that spreads in this way, installing our demonstration vote-stealing program on every machine it infects. … Once installed on a single “seed” machine, the virus would spread to other machines, … allowing an attacker with physical access to one machine (or [memory] card) to infect a potentially large population of machines. The virus could be programmed to install malicious software, such as a vote-stealing program or denial-of-service attack, on every machine it infected
It would only take a few Bush operatives in key states, with access to voting machines, who were armed with doctored memory cards and willing to break the law
we have the means by which the election could have been stolen
Are there issues? Yeah, sure. But, was the election stolen? Where’s the beef?
Not once in the article does Bleifuss actually document fraud (please, if you find one, just one, let us know). Just a load of could’ve and would’ve BS. If he thinks that should be enough for me to pony up dough for his book, he is deluding himself.
Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 4, 2006 at 2:09 PM “What more do skeptics want?”
How about some actual evidence that favors your conspiracy theory?
The evidence you present does not distinguish between your theory (stolen election) and Mitofsky’s (selection effect on exit polls). An example of evidence that would so distinguish would be: IF the gap between exit polls and vote counts could be shown to be dependent on WHAT voting method was used—electronic, punch card, or marked ballot, that would be much more significant. If there was dependence on the brand of electronic machine, that would be even more significant.
I agree that proven (or even suspected) vulnerabilities in voting machines is cause for concern and should be a warning against using them—but please show that the machines had some effect on the vote (via data like I suggest above) before concluding the vote was stolen.
I can’t evaluate your claim that Mitofsky’s theory has been disproven, since you offer no specifics (and also seem to have a very loose definition of “proof"), but I did see a selection effect in action at my polling place. The exit pollster looked like the usual person hired off the street so commonly used here in Colorado to gather petition signatures. While I was in line, I saw a number of older couples and women take roundabout routes back to the parking lot apparently to avoid him. Since older people tend to vote more Republican than younger, I have no doubt that the exit poll results at my precinct were skewed.
Posted by BobC on Oct 4, 2006 at 4:25 PM Prof. Sam Wang used his “Electoral College Meta-Analysis” to analyze polls before and during the 2004 election. His results consisteltly showed Kerry winning all thourhg the vote.
The next day, Prof. Wang attempted to determine why his results were inaccurate, andhe blamed poor exit polls as well.
But his pre-vote data was accurate, and his post-vote thoughts were just that, thoughts.
Polls have been accurate for the last 100 years. Why are they out-of-whack now? particularly now that we are using elelctronic voting machines, proven to be hackable and innacurate. Look at the problems Maryland had during its Primary, and the governor’s decision to not use them in November.
Something is going on here. Maybe we only have circumstantial evidence, but some people have been put to death with less.
Posted by Ellie on Oct 4, 2006 at 7:43 PM (we should get President Dewey’s opinion on this)
Certainly, allegations should be investigated. Bleifuss, however, in his typical conspiratorial tone, has determined that the allegations are fact, yet provides no evidentiary substance beyond could’ves and would’ves.
When I was at the state fair last month, I could have easily pocketed a couple items off a vendors table when he wasn’t looking. Does that mean I am guilty?
The criticisms are against Bleifuss, not the need.
Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 5, 2006 at 5:28 AM Polls are based on what average people want others to think of their views, reality is alone in the booth pulling the lever.
Posted by texasindependent on Oct 5, 2006 at 5:11 PM Is this hard evidence of a stolen election?
Absolutely not.
Is this enough to warrant serious investigation?
Without a doubt.
Considering that the government that was elected under these circumstances has called into question the validity of other countries elections based on the same level of suspicious activity (or less), I think we deserve nothing less than a full, no-holds-barred, every i dotted, every t crossed, impartial investigation, by people with the authority to actually do something about what they might find.
Finally, all electronic voting machines should be decertified and banned, nationwide. Period, no questions asked and no exceptions. I support a Constitutional amendment that would make such a ban permanent. The machines serve no useful purpose other than to endanger the validity of our elections. Paper-only elections can certainly be stolen - but not with the same level of stealth and ease. It will take longer to count the votes in an all-analog election, to be sure. But if you can have no confidence in the validity of the results of a digital election, who cares how quickly those votes are counted? Digital voting machines are indefensible. No advantage that they might offer outweighs the terribly grave risks they present. Any computer can be hacked, most likely untraceably. A locked metal box full of sheets of paper? That can be hacked too, but it’s a hell of a lot harder, and you’re bound to leave evidence of what has been done. America needs to put an end to this madness, immediately.
Posted by big_bozack on Oct 5, 2006 at 8:03 PM Oh, there is plenty of evidence of stolen and manipulated elections.
Joe Kennedy bought Illinois and Texas for Jack in 1960. LBJ’s first Senate victory went quite radically opposite the polling, and LBJ won by 87 votes out of one-half million votes cast, after some of the remote South Texas ballot boxes were mysteriously delayed, and came in stuffed to the gills. LBJ got the nickname “Landslide Johnson” from this election; his previous nickname was “Bullshit Johnson” from his college days. And of course there are the perennial corrupt Democratic machine political victories in the big cities: New Orleans, Detroit, Los Angeles, etc. There were a number of instances of 2004 election harassment, intimidation, assault, and property destruction, and there have already been some similar incidents in 2006.
The noteworthy point here is that Democrats are always the perpetrators of these crimes and outrages. You rarely find an instance of Republicans engaged in similar illegal behavior during elections.
But elite leftists (liberal, they are not!) simply cannot conceive that most people do not want to be lied to, do not want to be manipulated, and do not care to be stuck in a high tax, low performance, socialist economy.
The big impetus for electronic voting was the punch card voting in Florida 2000. Democrats designed those particular punch card ballots, and then they demanded electronic voting. Never happy.
So Bleifuss is anguished. So sad.
Posted by scorp on Oct 6, 2006 at 11:30 PM I find it puzzling that republicans who have posted here defend the use of machinery that can, quite easily it seems, produce stolen elections. I would think that Republicans would be only too happy to have proof that they won fair and square. If, they’re so sure that they have the hearts and minds of the majority, that is.
Republicans have blocked commonsensical fixes for these machines, e.g. open source code and paper receipts, which only adds to my puzzlement.
But what makes me downright suspicious is when Republicans pass laws outlawing exit-polling.
The only way to hide a stolen election when all other methods to secure the machines have been frustrated (by Republicans), and when the electorate has been surgically shaped to where elections are decided by about a single digit percentage of voters (those who decide how to vote by who last got to them before they entered the voting booth), is to get your base out in full.
In the 2004 election (and in 2000), voter turnout increased and mirrored what the exit polls were saying. What’s fascinating is that the ballot count anomalies (between the ballot totals and the exit poll totals) almost without any exception (few enough, 3 preceincts out of hundreds, to be statistically irrelevant) favored Bush. Now, I expect Republicans to respond “That’s because democratic voters are stupid, and don’t know how to fill out a ballot.” Here’s the problem with that response: They’re all on the electronic voting machines.
As all pundits are recognizing, after the Mark Foley scandal, the danger is not that evangelicals will vote for Democrats, but that they’ll stay home. The Republicans’ fears about what exit-polling indicates appears to be why it’s so vital for Republicans to get their evangelical base out to the polls. Come next month, if the evangelicals don’t show up at the polls, there is no way for Republicans to explain how they were able to win.
I expect Karl Rove will launch a `surprise’ if the media isn’t off of the Foley-Hastert-Reynolds-Boehner-etc. scandal in time to drive up their numbers among their base. Because the only way that Republicans can steal these elections is by whipping the base into a fevered frenzy, scaring them out of what little is left of their minds, so that they’ll get to the polls in big numbers. Whatever Rove has up his sleeve, it doesn’t bode well for a safe and secure America. Americans are dying for the power and political ambitions of Republicans.
Posted by Maeven on Oct 9, 2006 at 5:21 PM You want proof? Don’t be naive. If it can be done, it will be done, by either side. If the Democrats win in a landslide, will you keep your mouth shut?
Posted by Mitcherino on Oct 10, 2006 at 12:09 PM Not if there is actual proof of illicit activity, as opposed to theoretical.
So, by your own logic - pony up some proof, or
keep your mouth shut.
Posted by Jay Cline on Oct 10, 2006 at 12:25 PM The party that wins doesn’t matter, when it comes to voting machines. All electoral victories that are associated with voting machines can (and ought to) be called into question. My prediction is, they will be, either in revenge for past accusations by rival parties or by sincere reluctance to entrust the granting of political power to the functioning of fallible, manipulable vote recorders. Whether we’ll wise up and decouple elections from the cult of IT remains to be seen.
All computerized devices have the weakness of being hackable, all software is vulnerable to viruses. It’s not hypothetical, it’s inherent to computerized information processing and always will be. And no manufacturer has a neutral view of elections’ outcomes, therefore no manufacturer’s products ought to be trusted to deliver a bias-free count of electoral results. That would be like allowing only Democrats or only Republicans to count paper ballots, with no oversight or confirmatory counts by opposition partisans. That’s a level of trust that is simply not appropriate, considering the stakes in any election.
Whether the Reps and Diebold defrauded an election can only be ascertained by hard evidence, which is more difficult to gather, once again, to the degree that computerized voting machines were used.
If it was me who won an election, I’d want to be able to say with assurance that I won legitimately. But I guess for some, winning is the only thing that matters, and honor is too old-fashioned a concept.
No, that’s not a shot at the Dumbos, particularly. The Asses are no better. Hell, maybe it’s the cult of convenience that’s also at work; it is America we’re talking about, after all.
“Delete” “Save changes?” “Yes/Enter”. I’ve oversimplified, but not by too much.
Big Bozack is right, ban the damn things. Ever since they entered the picture their accuracy has been called into question, and worse, so have the validity of American elections. Who needs that kind of doubt? Who benefits from it?
Posted by Kuya on Oct 11, 2006 at 2:03 AM Shouldn’t there be tangible proof that you won the election so that there can be an actual RECOUNT?
Why would anyone oppose paper ballots unless they were cheating?
Exit polls in the Ukraine are accurate enough to require a re-vote but exit polls in America are way off in 2000, 2002, and 2004? Gee, what do those elections have in common?
If the rightards lose this election, then you’ll suddenly want a paper trail.
Posted by AmericanInsurgent on Nov 2, 2006 at 8:49 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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