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Wednesday, June 07, 2006
Was Ohio in 2004 Stolen Worse Than Florida in 2000?
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has written a provocative article for this month's Rolling Stone, arguing that there is a strong likelihood that widespread fraud and vote suppression tactics by Republicans in Ohio resulted in Bush beating Kerry there on November 2, 2004. (For those of you who are looking for a printer-friendly version, here's a good link.)
Kennedy makes some interesting points, most of which have been discussed in other circles previously. It's certainly worth a read. Anyone who remembers how pain replaced join after seeing those late afternoon exit polls only to watch the results turn out very different will be interested in the piece, as Kennedy addresses the exit polls in one of his sections. It turns out that the networks were told at 7:54 pm on election night that Kerry was headed to at least 309 electoral votes:
On the evening of the vote, reporters at each of the major networks were
briefed by pollsters at 7:54 p.m. Kerry, they were informed, had an
insurmountable lead and would win by a rout: at least 309 electoral votes to
Bush's 174, with fifty-five too close to call. [28] In London, Prime Minister Tony Blair went to bed contemplating his relationship with President-elect Kerry. [29]
As the last polling stations closed on the West Coast, exit polls showed
Kerry ahead in ten of eleven battleground states - including commanding leads in
Ohio and Florida - and winning by a million and a half votes nationally. The
exit polls even showed Kerry breathing down Bush's neck in supposed GOP
strongholds Virginia and North Carolina. [30] Against these numbers, the statistical likelihood of Bush winning was less than one in 450,000. [31] "Either the exit polls, by and large, are completely wrong," a Fox News analyst declared, "or George Bush loses." [32]
But as the evening progressed, official tallies began to show implausible
disparities - as much as 9.5 percent - with the exit polls. In ten of the eleven
battleground states, the tallied margins departed from what the polls had
predicted. In every case, the shift favored Bush. Based on exit polls, CNN had
predicted Kerry defeating Bush in Ohio by a margin of 4.2 percentage points.
Instead, election results showed Bush winning the state by 2.5 percent. Bush
also tallied 6.5 percent more than the polls had predicted in Pennsylvania, and
4.9 percent more in Florida. [33]
And there's not even a butterfly ballot or third-party candidate to blame this time. If a majority of voters who went to the polls in Ohio on November 2, 2004 intending to vote for Kerry, then we're looking at fraud and malfeasance of the highest degree.
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