Dan Feidt's log on Minnesota, Information Operations, spinstorms and latent contradictions.
Blue Lemur carries a story from the University of California Berkeley, where researchers have found that Bush was likely awarded an extra 130,000 to 260,000 votes via the electronic voting systems there, including an impressive 72,000 in Broward County alone.
The survey, which is the most comprehensive and detailed analysis of Florida’s 2004 election results to date, found that compared to counties with paper ballots, counties with electronic voting machines were significantly more likely to show gains for Bush between 2000 and 2004.
Unlike other analyses, this survey accounted for and ruled out other demographic factors which have clouded the results of other studies, such as the “dixiecrat” phenomenon, where Democratic counties have supported Republican nominees in the past.
“For the sake of all future elections involving electronic voting - someone must investigate and explain the statistical anomalies in Florida,” Professor Hout remarked in a statement to RAW STORY . “We’re calling on voting officials in Florida to take action.”
Among the factors weighted in the study were the Hispanic/Latino population, median income, change in voter turnout between 2000 and 2004 and support for Senator Bob Dole in the 1996 election.
The three counties where the voting anomalies were most prevalent were also the most heavily Democratic: Broward, Palm Beach and Miami-Dade, respectively. Statistical patterns in counties that did not have e-touch voting machines predicted a 28,000 vote decrease in President Bush’s support in Broward County, yet machines tallied an increase of 51,000 votes – a net gain of 81,000.
President Bush should have lost 8,900 votes in Palm Beach County, but instead gained 41,000 - a difference of 49,900. He should have gained only 18,400 votes in Miami-Dade County but saw a gain of 37,000 – a difference of 19,300 votes.
“No matter how many factors and variables we took into consideration, the significant correlation in the votes for President Bush and electronic voting cannot be explained,” Hout added. “The study shows that a county’s use of electronic voting resulted in a disproportionate increase in votes for President Bush.
The odds of this occurring by chance?
“Less than once in a thousand,” he said.
In the reported results, Bush led Senator John Kerry in Florida by 377,216 votes.
Stunning reports of illegally installed software from April of 2004 add to already-horrific mess!Then there is the weird story of Jeff Fisher, a Democratic candidate who claims straight up vote fraud. BradBlog followed up on this guy, who seems like he might be crazy. Thom Hartmann, who wrote a piece that raised Fisher's credibility perhaps more than he deserved, has sort of retracted what he wrote earlier. There is a lot of other interesting info in this one... A couple older pieces claiming voter suppression from Bob Fitrakis, "None dare call it voter suppression and fraud" and "And so the sorting and discarding of Kerry votes begins." Posted by HongPong at November 21, 2004 10:21 PM
Still waiting for the "Liberal" Media to Show Up!
A series of investigative stories (here, here, and here) by WISHTV.com in Indianapolis from April of this year, have just come to my attention (sent by several different readers).
They concern yet more troubling reports about the Election Systems & Software (ES&S) company, who's software and tabulating machines, along with Diebold's, are responsible for tabulating about 80% of the votes in America. Both companies were founded by the same man, who just happens, along with the rest of their Boards of Directors to be big donor/supporters of the Republican Party.
The series of reports from WISHTV earlier this year tell of ES&S employees surreptitiously installing illegal, uncertified software, into the voting and tabulating machines in Marion County, Indiana. They then ordered their regional ES&S project manager to lie about it to county officials. She refused. As had her husband in a previous ES&S incident, where he was also a project manager, in a different Indiana county. He was fired for his refusal.
In one of the reports, the Marion County Clerk Doris Anne Sadler is quoted as saying that ES&S "has willfully and purposely deceived me and the Marion County election board...[W]ith complete disregard for business ethics and with intent to deceive, [ES&S] deliberately worked to keep their actions from the Marion County election board and its employees."
The county's election board vice chair added, "Throughout the process, there have been missteps and outright fabrications and mistruths given to us by the vendor implementing the election process."
The assiduous BRAD BLOG readers will note that ES&S has popped up time and time again in so many of these stories of "irregularities" related to electronic voting and tabulating machines. Amongst the many troubling incidents so far reported here:
- ES&S Employee found on Auglaize County, OH Computer! Just weeks before election! County had 4th highest Bush vote percentage in the state!
- 10,000 Extra Votes Added in Nebraska County! Another ES&S computer "failure".
- 50,000 Votes LOST in LaPorte County, IN County! Yet another ES&S computer "failure". This one in a heavily Democratic county.
Additionally, DailyKos reported ... on yet another Indiana county where the U.S. Congressional results are now in doubt and a recount may be coming shortly due to revelations from nearby Franklin County where a recount was already held after it was discovered that the optical-scan tabulating machine was counting straight Democratic ticket votes as Libertarian votes!