There have already been a few articles and discussions over the past few months about the “Bradley effect”, which attempts to “explain” discrepancies between what white voters tell pollsters and how they actually vote when it comes to “non-white” candidates.
And even though a lot of these discussions end up with evidence that dismisses the theory, as the election season heats up, there will no doubt be more of a racial undertone (whether it is blatant or not), and as long as poll samples are intentionally skewed to help McCain, or likely Obama voters are being excluded from the polling samples – there will be more focus on the so-called “closeness” of this race.
A few months back, I wrote a diary titled “They just have to make it close enough to steal”, and this point bears repeating over and over and over…..and over until the election.
The ways that the elections have been stolen since 2000 have been in a number of ways – whether it be caging, gaming the system from the inside, questionable software security “patches”, illegal voter roll purges, voting machine “issues”, voter ID laws, illegal redistricting, phone jamming or other shenanigans by people like Ken Blackwell or Katherine Harris – there have been different and creative ways for different states, different races and on different levels.
Many Americans have been led to believe that exit polls were suddenly inaccurate and unreliable, even though they have historically been the most accurate methodology in numerous countries for many years. We were convinced by the lying corporate media and the republican party that, while our exit polls were so far off in the 2004 Presidential race – and all in the favor of one candidate while at the same time, exit polls were being cited in the Ukraine as irrefutable evidence of a stolen election which was ultimately overturned there.
In many states, the voting machine problems have not been satisfactorily fixed – hell, in New Jersey, the voting machines are known as some of the least reliable in the country. And with new anti-voter voter ID laws being introduced, a renewed effort at voter suppression with each cycle, more states in play for Obama to potentially capture and the skewed polls that I mention above, this election is another one that is ripe for an attempt to steal.
While we can argue whether there is a “Bradley effect” – on that election, on ones involving Jesse Jackson, David Dinkins or others, the narrative of such a “phenomenon” is out there. And just as there were “theories” (no matter if they were based on fact or evidence, or if they were just explanations and cover ups so that a neat and tidy media narrative could exist) of why the 2000, 2002, 2004 and certain 2006 elections defied all sense of reason, statistics, evidence of suppression or disenfranchisement, it will be all too easy for a “new” (but recycled and largely false) narrative to come into play if there is a race that is close enough to steal comes into play.
And just as we have already seen skewed and biased reporting on Obama vs. McCain, just as we have seen biased polling sample sizes in order to give the impression that the polls are close than they are, and just as we have seen prior elections stolen with impunity, it will be all too easy for another “explanation” with no proof to be advanced if there are swings outside of the margin of error in certain states, or even if Obama loses states that historically voted republican but he is winning (or will be projected to win) this November.
Which makes it all the more imperative for this election to be a blowout, and for this narrative to be killed before it starts to rear its ugly head again – as it has from time to time over the past few months.