Jim Lampley uses some boxing analogies:
Byron York has treated me fairly and without rancor, and I am grateful for that. Certainly I am more in his wheelhouse than mine, and I’m honored that he saw fit to engage me in this little set-to we’ve conducted since Monday. I fired a lead right, Rep. John Conyers shouted encouragement from my corner, then York delivered a hook to the body. I shot back an uppercut, then he loaded up a right hand and attempted to bring an end to the discussion.
Lampley then counters with a far-left hook and knocks himself squarely on his ass. He has really had too much of the kool-aid, and this response to Byron York is one for the ages
But none of that is necessary, because the entire Edison/Mitofsky report is irrelevant to the argument, given that it is based on the assumption the final official vote tally is accurate. Make no mistake: my argument is that the final official vote tally is anything but accurate, that it is the product of massive vote fraud carried out through the programing of Diebold voting machines and various other machinations aimed at suppressing, destroying or losing Kerry votes. My argument is that what were accurate were the exit polls.
What he means is, what was accurate were the early morning exit polls with a skewed sample (because they predicted Kerry would win), because once the exit polls are correctly analyzed with a better data set later on, they were not flawed and correctly predicted a Bush win (really, if you are not reading the Mystery Pollster, who has just devastated this idiocy from Lampley, you are missing out). Of course, since the later polls with a better sample fall within the margin of error of a Bush win, Lampley rejects them. At any rate, Lampley has gone off the deep end, and goes on to cite a discredited statistician and the Democratic Underground to back his version of this silly story.
A quick side note- we need to stop saying things like “the exit polls were flawed.” The exit polls were fine- the early analyses were flawed. Data is just that- data.
Oh, and by the way, Jim, you might find this interesting:
Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell today halted deployment of Diebold Election Systems’ electronic voting devices in Ohio for the 2004 General Election. The decision is based on preliminary findings from the secretary of state’s second round of security testing conducted by Compuware Corporation showing the existence of previously identified, but yet unresolved security issues. Hardin, Lorain and Trumbull counties had selected to use new Diebold equipment this November. Those counties will use their current voting devices in 2004.
“As I made clear last year, I will not place these voting devices before Ohio’s voters until identified risks are corrected,” Blackwell said. “Diebold Election Systems has successfully addressed many, but not all, of the problems that were identified in our first security review. The lack of comprehensive resolution prevents me from giving county boards of elections a green light for this November.
“I look forward to working with Diebold Election Systems and our other qualified election system vendors as they continue to bolster security and develop voting devices that meet Ohio’s requirement for voter-verifiable paper audit trails.”
Not one Ohio voter used a Diebold machine. Period.
Not that facts will sway the fools.
BTW- there is a difference between being on the fence on the issue and being a committed fool. Being on the fence and wanting to examine all sides of a story before making up your mind is the antithesis of foolish. Knee-jerk responses and an utter inability to understand issues beyond a brief soundbite, like Lampley, is foolish.
Immediately dismissing any concerns and failing to work to better the election system, as many on the right are doing, is foolish.
Immediately screaming fraud and refusing to recognize when you were wrong, as many on the left have, is foolish.
The Disenfrachised Voter
“Not one Ohio voter used a Diebold machine. Period.
Not that facts will sway the fools.”
I guess you might consider me one of those fools. I wasn’t sure if Bush stole the vote, I was still on the fence. However, after reading your post and that article I feel pretty confident that he won legitimately. Thanks for posting that info. It really helped.
ppgaz
As I said to another thread, the Great Election Conspiracy of 2004 has everything except any hard evidence of a great conspiracy. Therefore, I ignore it.
However, I must nitpick with one statement in this article:
“…failing to work to better the election system, as many on the right are doing, is foolish.”
While this may be essentially correct in spirit, the fact is that election bending is a popular sport and one that is as old as the hills. All good citizens should be alert to these malfeasances, and recognize that it is not a partisan issue. No “side” in any political contest is immune to the many ways there are to screw with voting and vote counting. The bad acts are done on small, medium and large scales, and corruption opportunities are always present.
The “right” doesn’t own a spotless record in this area, any more than it is unilaterally guilty. Unfortunately for the “right”, their team hasn’t exactly earned a lot of warm fuzzies and a lot of trust in the last few years. They’ve done a good imitation of a bunch of power-mad, lying and conniving sonsabitches. You know, just like politicians.
pleasewakeupy'all
Also from the link provided(ohiodems.org):
► No Ohio County used Diebold Electronic Voting Machines (See Press Release Below)
Ohio did not use modern electronic voting machines in this election. Six counties use an older form of electronic voting, which has a means of verifying the accuracy of the vote. In 69 Ohio Counties, punch card ballots were used.
Lampley is a little shrill for my (left-leaning) taste, but this really opened my eyes. Thanks for the info–it’s always easier to see when light is shining in the right direction.
Gatchaman
I like my conspiracies to be a little more entertaining — like Freemasons controling the country or David Icke’s Lizard Men.
Randolph Fritz
My impression is that good old-fashioned “keep-in-the-vote” tactics (not enough voting machines in Democratic districts, removal of voters from the registration lists, and so on) made a big difference in Ohio and Florida. Enough to swing the election? Perhaps; it was very close in those states.
The real issue here is that we do a very poor job of operating our electoral system; most Third World democracies do a better job. Why we aren’t ashamed of this is, ah, left as an exercise to the reader.
Laurence Simon
The man is begging for a second Idiot of the Day medal.
He’ll make Ace by the end of the month. I just know it.
jeff
As a resident of South Philly, I have to laugh my ass off at this newfound concern the left has regarding voter fraud and intimidation.
They think it just started in Florida in 2000.
And spare me the bullshit about how “it’s wrong when either side does it” or “don’t just say the other side does it too”.
The fact of the matter is, you never gave a fuck that Democrats in Philly, Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis have been doing it for fifty years. You only care that it’s your ox that got gored (no pun intended).
Brandon
Democrats really care about election reform. Which is why Wisconsin’s governor just vetoed a bill that would have made it mandatory for voters to show ID cards when they vote at their precincts.
And on a side note, Jim Lampley ought to stick to boxing.
sasqatch
Well said John. Lampley’s making a fool of himself and is clearly unable to do the research necessary to enter the argument. Regardless, this isn’t a partisan matter. Evidence has come out on both sides – the double voting by Dems in Wyoming and the strange glitch on a non-Diebold e-voting system in Ohio giving Bush an extra 4000 votes (http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/11/05/politics1149EST0515.DTL) – and we should all be pissed at it. Just because it has a long standing tradition in this country doesn’t mean we should ignore it now. Any chance to actually get the electorate to wake up and participate in a meaningful way should be taken advantage of.
Kimmitt
Which is why Wisconsin’s governor just vetoed a bill that would have made it mandatory for voters to show ID cards when they vote at their precincts.
And just to make sure people know what they’re voting for, let’s put into place some literacy tests!
Y’all poisoned this well a long time ago.
Randolph Fritz
“The fact of the matter is, you never gave a fuck that Democrats in Philly, Milwaukee, Chicago, St. Louis have been doing it for fifty years.”
Really? Going to drag out 1960 now? The big-city Democratic machines have been dead for decades; Republican meddling (not, I think, mostly through electronic voting machines) is now the issue.
Oh, and I care about honest elections and counting votes. As a registered Democrat (I am in fact an independent, but Republicans haven’t fielded candidates I care to vote for in many years) I take that as an insult to my honor. No, I’m not going to challenge anyone to a duel. But let’s lay off the unsubstantiated charges, hunh?
ppgaz
People who really “care” about election reform don’t go around talking as if ill-conceived silver bullets (ID cards, for example) are a good idea in and of themselves.
All measures and schemes potentially disenfranchise some group of voters, whether intentionally or not. Interestingly, the amount of “concern” about this issue seems to be directly proportional to how many of “your” voters might be in the affected blocs.
Randolph Fritz
[to repeat myself from another venue]
A great deal of US politics depends on keeping people from voting, largely through the inconvenience of the registration system. I want to see any adult citizen who files a tax return, has a driver’s license, or has a state ID card, automatically registered to vote. I’d just as soon allow people with felony convictions who have served their time to vote, but I’ll allow there might be a legitimate argument there. The only reason a huge percentange of US voters aren’t registered is because some politicians sometimes find it advantageous to discourage voting.
If your vote doesn’t count, how come some politicians keep trying to stop you from voting?
Rick
The big-city Democratic machines have been dead for decades; Republican meddling (not, I think, mostly through electronic voting machines) is now the issue.
Errr…no; it’s the way to change the subject from a substantive history of hands-on fraud to hypothetical “intimidation.”
Glad someone mentioned literacy tests: a Dixie Democratic tactic to keep likely GOP voters (Black) from voting.
Cordially…
Randolph Fritz
Rick, don’t you want your vote counted? If the past election–if any election–is won by diddling with the balloting, your vote was not counted, even if you got what thought you wanted.
It is well documented that “keep-in-the-vote” tactics were used in the 2004 elections. The problems of the voter registration system are also well documented.
As for literacy tests, they are 30 years gone and the national Democratic Party has repudiated the Dixiecrats, who have either recanted or left the party.
Fighting the last war is a way to lose the present war.
Rick
Rick, don’t you want your vote counted
Fritz,
Absolutely, as long as I’ve truly cast it. And only once per election.
Ballot-box fraud has a long (“well documented”) heritage, and appears recently in Milwaukee and Seattle.
I’ve said on other threads here most emphatically that I would welcome–be orgasmically happy–to have truly clean erect…uh, elections.
Because I think the GOP would win even more, such is the extent of fraud that exists in precincts where Democrats are 90% or greater of the registered voters.
One of the “well documented” problems with voter registration, but probably not one a Democrat, say, would care to consider, is the roll of the dead. Who loyally turn to vote. People think African-Americans are the Democrats’ most loyal constituency, but truly, it’s the dead and non-citizen voters would are the real, straight ticket loyalists.
So indeed, let’s clean up our system. Only living citizens can be registered voters, and they have only one vote per election.
You down with that?
Cordially…
ppgaz
The dead, yes. The brain-dead, too. I mean, if people can be snookered into voting against their interests with bamboozapalooza schemes like “defense of marriage”, I say, let the dead vote. They can’t do any worse than the still-living are doing now.
At least dead people couldn’t be fooled into voting for the “defense of Big Pharma” bunch, or the “Silent Majority of Predatory Lenders”, or the “Buy US Bonds because they are safer than your Social Security benefits, which are only backed by those worthless , er, US Bonds ..” crowd.
I say dead people have earned our respect. Let ’em vote.
adk46er
Oh there’s a winning formula – accuse anyone who doesn’t vote the way you’d like of being brain dead. This will work well in getting independents and moderate republicans to vote for democrats in the future. You may want to contact Howard Dean and let him know… too late he’s already using this strategy.
timekeeper
Why is it that whenever DOCUMENTED evidence of fraud or incompetence is uncovered in a big lefty city (see: Milwaukee, Seattle), it is denied or downplayed by the Democrats and their leftward fellow travellers, but vague insinuations of fraud (see: Florida 2000, Ohio 2004) are incontrovertible proof that the Republicans are committing fraud? In the case of Florida in 2000, it was discovered that over 70% of the several thousand illegally registered felons were registered as Democrats. While registration is not always indicative of voting patterns, it is strongly suggestive. Likewise, amongst double voters that winter in Florida (voted in both Florida and another state, usually New York, the ratio of Democrat-to-Republican is greater than four-to-one. Again, this is ignored because we all “know” that BushRoveHalliburtonSatan stole it from Gore.
Kimmett: What a crock of shit. Requiring a photo ID is not the same as a “literacy test”, and you know it. Don’t even bring up the bullshit of “the poor don’t always have driver’s licenses…”, because I don’t have one either, and never have for that matter. However, anyone can walk their happy ass into a DMV office and get a state ID card; no test needed. Anyone who cannot be bothered to get a photo ID does not deserve to vote.
Yes, I’m pissed off about this; I live in Washington, and I was absolutely disenfranchised by the incompetence of the King County Board of Elections, which allowed hundreds of felons and a least a half-dozen dead people vote, and ended up with almost a thousand more ballots than voters. Regardless of who I voted for, an illegal vote cancelled my vote, and since Dino Rossi lost by 129 votes (after winning the initial count and the first recount), it makes a big fucking difference.
ppgaz
Yeah, uh, I’m posting comments to a blogsite … not running for office, numbskull.
Anyone who would vote for these Republican idiots is brain dead.
What’s the imperative again? Uh, “values”? Yeah, that must be it.
The Disenfrachised Voter
“Immediately dismissing any concerns and failing to work to better the election system, as many on the right are doing, is foolish.
Immediately screaming fraud and refusing to recognize when you were wrong, as many on the left have, is foolish.”
Heh. Good point, John.
As for voting fraud taking place: Face it, it happens, and started way before this year, 2000, and 1960. I am by no means saying it should be done but I’m sure both sides are guilty and they probably use the old “the ends jusitfy the means” type of theory on it. Some people think that the other candidate being elected is such a disaster that they will use any means necessary to make sure their candidate wins.
Randolph Fritz
Rick, no, that’s false.
Compuglobalhypermeganet
Anyone who would vote for these Republican idiots is brain dead.
Yeah, right, pp, and anyone who would vote for Kerry and the Democrats is a traitorous terrorist.
So it appears we have the braindead v. the terrorists.
I guess the only smart people are people like me, who didn’t vote.
I RULE!
Randolph Fritz
You lost.
adk46er
“yeah, uh, I’m posting comments to a blogsite… not running for office, numbskull.”
1) Okay, so you don’t agree with what I wrote, why the need to call me a numbskull?
2) I never assumed you intended to run for office. My comment was meant as a general statement (note the mention of Howard Dean’s name). My point is that after a lost election its politically couter productive to accuse the American public of being stupid. Other elections will follow – so instead of insulting people’s intelligence just run better candidates.
Kimmitt
which allowed hundreds of felons
For the record, Washington State appears to only disenfranchise based on a subset of felonies.
I agree that the vote-counting in Washington State was egregious and I hope you’ll join me in pushing for sane Federal standards for vote casting, counting, and security.