between no. of voters and vote totals. There were nearly a hundred reports of touchscreens flipping Kerry votes to Bush votes, and almost never the other way around (impossible odds against it). But I think the main fraud would occur (and did occur) at the central tabulator level, with no interference on election day itself, but way before it, in the pre-programming of the tabulators (one hacker, a couple of minutes, untraceable). I think, mainly, Kerry votes were flipped to Bush votes (in both Democratic and Republican districts), and some were "distributed" to third party candidates, and some were 'disappeared'--by means of lines of code/formulas inserted into the secret software prior to the election, and given "self-destruct" orders, so that this code could never be found.
One of the reasons I think it happened this way is the very visible, overt suppression of Democratic voters in Ohio (especially against black voters)--ten hour long lines and all that. Why would they DO that--risk public exposure for egregious violations of the Voting Rights Act--when they had control of the electronic machines? I think the reason was the need to pre-program the fraud, limiting them to a certain percentage tweak, and unable on election day, on the massive scale needed, to overcome a Kerry surge. Kerry won the exit polls by 3%. They flipped that over in the east coast time zone and in some battleground states (according to exit poll analysis; see www.TruthIsAll.net), and it wasn't enough. So they had to short the number of Dem precincts and voting machines, unfairly challenge Dem voters, and all the other voter suppression they did, to retain their pre-programmed advantage. When all is said and done--all the Dem vote suppression, all the discarded provisional ballots, all the purges of black and brown voters nationwide (which Greg Palast estimated at 1 million, for black voters), all the shredded Dem voter registration cards--Kerry probably actually won by a 4% to 5% margin or higher.
The remaining voter pool--the non-purged and non-suppressed--produced the 3% exit poll margin for Kerry. This means that 6% of the vote (of voters who made it to the polling booth) was messed with--flipped, scattered or 'disappeared.' 6% of the total vote (120 million) is 7,200,000. Divide it by 52 states, that's only about 140,000 votes per state--easily flipped, just in Republican precincts alone (where there are always some Dem voters, and, I suspect, in this election, quite a few cranky Repub voters who had had it with Bush.)
The Berkeley statistical group did a study of Florida's main Dem counties, Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach and found 130,000 to 330,000 phantom votes for Bush, in 2004--electronic vs. paper voting.
Here at DU, ignatzmouse did a 2004 analysis that showed a 15% advantage to Bush in electronic vs. paper. Bush may have won NC anyway, but the stolen votes would be to pad his popular national majority (and I think they DID entirely flip the Senate election there.)
In addition to these kinds of studies, there are several studies of the exit polls, and other evidence, that point to massive fraud, inexplicable anomalies in the numbers, and a loss for Bush.
When you put all this evidence together with the HACKABILITY of the electronic systems, the non-transparency and the Bush partisan control over vote tabulation, you have to leave your brain at the door NOT to conclude that we have the wrong man in the White House.
Recently, in Ohio, four ELECTION REFORM initiatives, that were predicted to win by 60/40 votes were flipped over on election day to 60/40 LOSSES--the most audacious flipover yet. (The machines and their masters are now dictating election policy and preventing reform--a chilling Orwellian twist.)
See Bob Koehler's article about the Ohio initiatives:
http://www.tmsfeatures.com/tmsfeatures/subcategory.jsp?custid=67&catid=1824----------
People come at this issue, often, with a lot of questions based on speculation, like, how could they do that, wouldn't too many people have to be involved? or, surely the war profiteering corporate news monopolies wouldn't put FAKE exit poll numbers on TV (har, har), or surely the Dem leaders wouldn't let that happen (ahem).
The answer to all of these questions is that it looks very much like it DID happen, so we have to think back, not to how we would EXPECT people to behave (except, perhaps, for the Bushites, whom we know have an inclination to crime--to say the least), and not what we think is LIKELY or FEASIBLE, but, rather, how could it have been accomplished, given the evidence that it WAS accomplished?
And the answer to that lay in the design of the election system, which could not have been better designed for easy, massive, untraceable changes of the votes--performed by a couple of computer techs at Diebold and ES&S headquarters (or some basement somewhere), put in place before the election in the innards of the machines, and unseeable by the human eye during the election, with virtually no audit/recount capability for verification.
Calif Sec of State Kevin Shelley tried to get hold of Diebold's source code, in a lawsuit prior to the election. He sued Diebold for lying about the security and certification status of their machines. But before that source code could be disclosed, a vicious campaign was mounted against Shelley in Calif., based on unproven charges of fraud, and he was driven from office, and replaced with a pro-Diebold Schwarzenegger appointee.
One of the false charges against Shelley was "abuse of HAVA funds." What really happened is that he withheld HAVA funds from the counties for purchase of Diebold's crappy, insecure touchscreens (the worst of their election theft machines). Some of the county election officials (most but not all Republicans), who were Diebold shills, joined the campaign against Shelley. And they were led by a Dem, Los Angeles election head Connie McCormack, another Diebold shill, who said she wanted to "drive a bulldozer" into the Sec of State's office to spring all that money loose for her good buds at Diebold. (--literally good buds--her best friend is the former chief Diebold salesperson for Calif., Deborah Seiler.)
And this, I'm afraid--and other such scenarios of corruption--is why I said "ahem" to the idea that the Democrats wouldn't let this happen (would they?). They DID let it happen. And corruption is a good part of the reason.
I found this out AFTER the 2004 election, after I had reviewed the evidence of election fraud (which is compelling**), and, with others, began seriously looking into the design of our election system (more and more appalled, the more I looked*). The question is not, how COULD it happen? The question is, how DID it happen? And, what the hell do we do NOW--with a fraudulent election SYSTEM in place for '06?
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Besides all the work on educating and mobilizing the public, filing lawsuits, and trying to change laws, I think we need VERIFICATION tools in '06, to catch the fraud, and try to challenge results as they occur, and ALSO to build the case--and build momentum--for fundamental reform prior to '08.
Independent exit polls
We need the Dem Party (or someone!) to fund INDEPENDENT exit polls. We got doctored exit polls in 2004--which the news monopolies CHANGED (from a Kerry win) to MATCH Diebold's and ES&S's secretly arrived at "result"(Bush won). They've promised to PREVENT us from getting hold of their REAL exit poll results next time.
Other verification tools
We need "parallel elections" and other verification tools, and close monitoring of the election systems and their results. (See www.UScountvotes.org, www.verifiedvoting.org, and votersunite.org for more information.)
And, ultimately we need...
1. Paper ballots hand-counted at the precinct level (--Canada does it in one day, although speed should not even be a consideration, just accuracy and verifiability)
or, at the least...
2. Paper ballot (not "paper trail") backup of all electronic voting, a 10% automatic recount (at least), very strict security, and NO SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code! (...jeez!).
Russ Holt's bill HR 550 will stop the corporate privatization of our elections in its tracks, and reverse it (by banning undisclosed software, among other things). It has 169 co-sponsors (mostly Dems). Sign the petition.
http://www.rushholt.com/petition.html-----
** For the recent GAO report on the horrendous insecurity of our election system in 2004:
access to pdf:
http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-05-956text only:
http://www.gao.gov/htext/d05956.html* For analysis of the 2004 election results and exit polls:
www.TruthIsAll.net