In the immediate aftermath of the 2006 election results, there was sigh of relief as the returns alleviated fears of another stolen election. In any normal year, the tsunami that developed, as voters expressed their disgust with the Republican party, would have swept a large number of Republican candidates — and, indeed, it had.
But lost in the celebration was an ugly fact, one that had emerged in aftermath of 2004 — the exit polls had told a different story than the ‘official’ results. It was a tsunami, indeed, but one of even greater proportions than we had been led to believe.
Analysis of the exit data shows a wave that should have swamped even more Republican candidates, and would have if official returns had reflected the will of the people. And, again, much like in 2004, canards are being proferred as part of a disinformation technique to distract the public from the pertinent methodological questions — such as; exit polls are unreliable, the Rove turnout machine neutralized voter fallout, and so on.
Although “safe districts” insulated Republican candidates in some cases, even those safe districts came into play, as even the most heavily Republican districts, ones that no one would have dreamed could flip, were swamped by a combination of forces; Democrats had turned out in greater numbers, a large contingent of independents had voted two to one for Democratic candidates, the youth (heavily Democratic) had turned out in record numbers, and so on. The damage had been limited, somewhat, by twenty five years of gerrymandering, but the tidal wave of discontent had been too high. Much like Katrina, even well-constructed electoral levees stood no chance in the onslaught.
In spite of this perfect storm, some of the Republican candidates remained standing, as if protected by a some kind of miracle. In places such as in Florida’s 13th Congressional District, where touchscreens rule and paper trails are nonexistent, 20% of the early voters, who voted on touchscreens, didn’t register a vote for the Congressional race. Meanwhile, the absentee voters, who differ from the early voters in that they voted on a paper ballot, failed to register a vote at a more typical rate of 2%. Furthermore, the electoral miracle confined itself to a single county; Sarasota, as the neighboring counties in the five county district experienced non-vote rates close to the historical average.
Perhaps these events explain why Karl Rove was so confident in the run-up to the election — is there something he knew that we didn’t?
Again, lost in the celebrations was the ugly fact that the tsunami had been much bigger than indicated by official results — which, of course, are officially registered on electronic machines that were failing at astronomical rates in polling done before the election. In this age of ‘faith-based’ elections, we have only faith to reassure us, since the evidence — which is far closer to my religion — shows something quite odd was happening.
The following article examines a problem that first reared its ugly head in 2004, that is; a huge difference between the exit polls and the official results.
http://electiondefensealliance.org/landslide_denied_exit_polls_vs_vote_count_2006
