Guest blogged by Michael Collins
Part Two of a Two-Part Series (Part One published here, blogged here)
Based on an article published by “SCOOP” Independent News
Washington, DC
At their lowest points of popularity, do you recall anyone who claimed that Presidents Carter and Nixon stole their elections or that they didn’t win fair and square? Did any analysts or activist groups claim massive election fraud in the elections that brought these ultimately very unpopular presidents to office?
How confident are you that George Bush really won the 2004 presidential election? If you are a typical American voter and you have doubts, how did those doubts arise? A mid-August Zogby Poll of 1018 likely voters answered the first of these two very important questions. (The author was a contributing sponsor for the survey.)
| How confident are you that George W. Bush really won the 2004 presidential election? | |
|---|---|
| Very confident that Bush won fair and square | 45.2% |
| Somewhat confident that Bush won fair and square | 20.0 |
| Not at all confident that he won fair and square | 32.4 |
| Other/not sure | 2.4 |
This is a remarkable result. Nearly two years into the second term of his presidency, less than half of those polled think that the 2004 election victory was fair and square. 20% say they are somewhat confident, which is hardly an endorsement of legitimacy. Webster’s defines somewhat as follows: “in some degree or measure: SLIGHTLY”. This does not exactly qualify as an endorsement of a critical democratic process. The 32% who are not at all confident represent a major portion of the population holding the belief that Bush failed to win without cheating. Combining not at all confident with somewhat slightly, according to Webster’s, produces a category of 52% who doubt the legitimacy of the election. Altogether, these results are a clear vote of no confidence.
Combining not confident at all and somewhat (in some degree or measure: SLIGHTLY) produces a category of Doubts. This gives a clear picture on legitimacy versus illegitimacy issue.
Survey Excel file available here
What does this mean? Some preliminary thoughts.
This survey elaborates another Zogby Poll conducted in Pennsylvania and sponsored by OpEdNews.com. In that survey, 39% of Pennsylvania residents indicated that they thought that 2004 Presidential election was stolen. In the current survey, a middle category was created to capture those with doubts, only somewhat confident that Bush won fair and square. By creating that category in this national poll of likely voters, those who doubt legitimacy increased 13 percentage points to 52% while those likely to share the sentiment that 2004 was stolen, dropped from the Pennsylvania 39% to the national sample of 32%.
At this point, the Bush Presidency is an illegitimate one, lacking in the necessary consensus to rule with any degree of confidence by the people. We have entered the Potemkin Village of democracy where the faà§ade of legitimacy is nothing more than a Hollywood back lot. This is the inescapable conclusion from this poll of likely voters.
The location of likely voters with confidence or doubts regarding the 2004 Presidential election.
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So goes a portion of the argument. I have a few questions:
1) Why am I adding this question to Paul Lehto’s survey? Don’t get me wrong, I was glad to do so and Paul is a pleasure to work with, but why him? Why me? Why us? Do we have a total absence of reporters willing to ask these questions and write about them? Apparently so.
2) Why are the Democrats hopping on the election fraud band wagon so quickly? Dodd co-sponsoring a rescue bill is remarkable. He was the co-sponsor of the 2002 Help America Vote Act (along with Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-KY and the Democrat form the House, Stenny Hoyer, D-MD)? It must be really awful when there are heroics like this. I have no inside track, do you?
3) Back to the focus of this article and blog, how much more can the United States of America take of the Whte House and the trouble causers that they employ? We are reeling internationally, there is no consensus for real government here, and the complicity of the ruling party with the perpetrators offers a non-stop display of lock-step loyalty.
We’ve had enough. It’s time for those who lack legitimacy to recognize that and leave. We cannot afford any more deception and suffering. The legacy we will bear is already heavy enough.
Given the social pressure to have “confidence” in elections, A defection from the “very confident” position is significant while the presence of someone, especially a hardcore supporter of the so-called “winning” side, in the “very confident” column is assumed fromthe beginning and/or manufactured and not at all the subject of an independent analysis or thought process in any significant number cases.
In other words, the 45% who are “very confident” bush won fair and square BLEEDS (or is based on a flimsy foundation) while the rest of the voters are getting information and forming judgments without the (inadequate) work of the mainstream media, and they LEAD. And continue to grow.
So, tossing out the hardcore Republicans from the 45% “very confident” figure, and also tossing out those who have zero information yet nevertheless find themselves ‘very confident’, we end up adjusted figures that (regardless of what those actual adjusted numbers would be) show vast majorities of Democrats, Independents, Americans generally, and even thinking Republicans having a doubt about 2004, or having no confidence at all that Bush won fair and square in 2004.
MEANING ALSO: Citizens are now making fundamental political judgments about our country by obtaining information and coming to conclusions DESPITE MEDIA SUPPRESSION of “stolen election” stories in favor of the present “fear of the future” style stories where the media rarely follows up, even if the “fear of the future” story later comes true!
I said this a while back. I said that liberals/Dems did not question Reagan’s victory. In fact, I haven’t seen any presidential elections questioned to ANY extent, except for 2000 & 2004, both Bush. No one questioned Bush I’s win, Reagan, Carter, any of them in my lifetime. So, again, false propoganda when it was “floated” that it was “sour grapes” when half the country questioned the 2000 & 2004 elections. Just more propoganda. Actually, to this day, I don’t question any electons except 2000 & 2004.
It should be noted that the polling figures cited in Michael Collins article about this question in our poll are unadjusted, and that my arguments in comment #1 above propose that those numbers could be adjusted in order to give perspective to voters as a whole in ways I think are justifiable to show that not only are the 45% who are “very confident” of Bush’s victory being fair and square a minority of the American public to begin with, the 45% contains huge chunks of people who never have or never will look at the facts of the 2004 election, while those harboring anything from a doubt to total doubt about the election ARE CHECKING OUT FACTS about the 2004 election. From that standpoint, the views of those who have informed themselves are harbingers of the future much more than the other way around.
FYI, C-SPAN just announced that their poll question of the day is “Do you trust electronic voting machines?”
To participate in their survey and view the survey results, go to C-SPAN’s capitalnews.org website:
To vote in C-SPAN’s poll
Current C-span poll results:
Yes (trust voting machines): 24%No (don’t trust them): 76%
Total Votes: 694
Paul, Big Dan, and We Countthanks for such a high level beginning to this blog. And thanks Brad for the invitation and Winter Patriot for the skilled editing (and with me that’s a task;).
Paul’s comments on adjusting the the results is an alalytic task that we are working on with some expert assistance soon (mathematical expertise). The numbers are there on http://www.electionfraudnews.com in Excel format for anyone who wants to download them.
The disconnection between the public perceptions and judgements and the corporate media snow job is striking. The American people are right, dead on. This election, 2004, stunk to high heaven. In addition, the more harmful disconnection is between the people and those who rule. The failed, unsupported, and gruesome policies continue with torture, of all things, presented as an imperative.
This is the very worst type of tyranny, the most incompetent example of governance, and the saddest period of our history.
Elections count, clean elections matter greatly, and public advocacy and action on all levels is imperative.
What? No Satanic, lying, rightwing scum-trolls posting yet?
Where are the scum-trolls??
Who will be 1st?
======================================================
In any case, thank God for this site, and thanks to all with the guts and brains to push this issue, hard.
America has never been in this state before—Let’s just all hope we can correct the problems before our beloved America is totally destroyed from within by the rightwing forces arrayed against truth, integrity and freedom.
C-span poll now 945 – 77% no we don’t trust.
Michael Collins
Thanks for posting these results – I was honored to be among the 1018 polled for this. I received an email invitation and responded immediately. I let Bush have it with both barrels!
I also checked the box requesting to be included in future polls.
Bluebear2: You were probably part of a similar poll by Zogby who does have a sophisticated online polling operation of something like 200,000 regularly polled, but this particular poll of 1,018 was a TELEPHONE poll not an online poll, based on a random nationwide sample taken during a few days in August 2006.
Nikto the professional doubters can do their thing but their only course is histrionics to divert attention from the simple truth: without any national media coverage – television or print – the American people have it nailed. 2004 was a bad election. I’m heartened by RFK Jr’s work on Ohio and more recently (featured above). He’s bright and right. The real issue, imho, with reagard to election fraud is the biggest theft, the author of our current miseries, 2004; not just Ohio, the national election. There’s more to come on that, I’m sure.
Bluebear2 whatever poll that was I’m glad you made the key points. Just think of how many you represented in a national sample of likely voters!
56.9% are NOT very confident that Bush won it fair and square.
That means: 69mm of the 122mm who voted in 2004 are NOT very confident.
Party Pct No Unsure Very
Dem 38% 59% 24% 15%
Rep 35% 5% 24% 80%
Ind 27% 34% 22% 39%
Total 100% 33.4% 23.5% 44.2%
Total 122 40.7 28.6 54.0
__________________________________________
Of Dems and Independents, 72% are NOT very confident that Bush won fairly.
Party Pct No Unsure Very
Dem 59% 59% 24% 15%
Ind 41% 34% 22% 39%
Total 100% 48.8% 23.2% 24.8%
When are we going to do something about it?
As Mark Crispin Miller put it so elequently, when the American people are given the facts, they usually make the right decisions. THAT is why it’s such a crime that our corporate mainstream media is now suppressing numerous (purposely, they’re not stupid) important stories the American people MUST KNOW ABOUT! They are just starting to report on e-vote fraud…something WE’VE been talking about for YEARS!!! Something WE’VE been smeared with as “conspiracy theorists” by the SAME PEOPLE WHO ARE SUPPRESSING THE STORIES! And then their sheeple non-independent thinking followers “fall in line” behind them…MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!!! That is what they want, either total suppression of an important story, or a huge delay in informing the American citizens, which is the case with e-vote fraud.
For example, the way the corporate MSM was acting in recent years, it came as a surprise to me that THE NEXT DAY after Condoleeza (Condosleeza?) Rice LIED about Bill Clinton handing off a terrorist plan for them, the MSM was actually doing their job and pointing out that SHE LIED!!! Of course, FOX News/Hannity/Limbaugh/O’Reilly are still pimping the lie, but I don’t consider them “corporate MSM”…they are paid partisan GOP shills who provide 24×7/365 days a year free campaigning for the GOP.
But, was that amazing that, when they WANT TO DO IT, they pointed out Rice’s LIES the very next day! They can do this whenever they want. It was a conscious effort to suppress e-vote reporting…the Rice thing is an example. Don’t expect that the cavalry has arrived…IE, the corporate MSM is finally doing their job. That boat has sailed, and when they do something like the Rice Lies reporting, don’t be fooled again and again and again when they throw the American public a bone…it’s not happening…don’t fool yourself. Don’t EVER AGAIN think that when they do ONE GOOD JOB reporting, that “they are back”…I’ve fallen for that several times…never again.
Thanks Paul Lehto and Michael Collins! Whatever anybody says, results showing this great of a doubt that the election was legitimate are startling! Paul is right. All we have to do is separate the willfully ignorant from the simply ignorant and we have a movement that can’t be stopped!
Boy, were you ever right about Keith Olberman, Michael! I just keep watching his “special comment” over and over again. I’m quite sure it’s the strongest statement ever made on American television about anything. Keith is now America’s journalist as far as I’m concerned! He has REAL passion for this country and just couldn’t keep it in any more! Good for him and us!
…not only has that boat sailed, it sailed off into the distance until we couldn’t see it anymore…AND THEN IT SUNK!!! It ain’t coming back…the sour milk ain’t turning good again…can I get it across to everyone with anymore analogies? DO NOT THINK THAT WHEN THE CORPORATE MSM DOES THEIR JOB WITH ONE STORY, THAT THEY ARE BACK!!! PLEASE!!!!!!!! (see the soon-to-be Iran War)
TruthIsAllthanks for joining us. I’m sure that’s just the start with that data set. But it says a great deal, doesn’t it? Over 60 million voters from the last election think it was a “ringer” and that’s the mildest term I can come up with for Mr. Friedman’s august salon. Like Larry Bergan notes, this is a huge problem for any elected official who hopes to lead. The occupant is merely surviving, staving off investigations.
Big Dan seeing and hearin Olberman is like getting a drink after walking the Sahara without any nourishment. It’s exhilirating. But all of us know that the break throughs, usually a single story that’s devastating and then dropped, are all too infrequent and lack depth. As I quoted the Executive Editor of the Washington a few weeks ago:
Can you believe it. Len Downie Exec. Editor of the Post says, not my pay grade, nope, can’t connect those dots, that’s for the editorial page.
As long as people who lack basic common sense to avoid rediculous statements like this are in charge, how can we ever take corporate media seriously. After all, he’s the Editor, as in “editorials.” and he knows that it’s not the function of editorials to do reporting.
Len would do well to hire Robert Parry.
Correct link above at my name for http://www.electionfraudnews.com
Well – it sure seemed to be the same, the demographics were all questions in the poll I took as was the key question about trusting voting machines. Oh well – which ever it was I did give Busco and all he is associated with an F-.
I will have to go back to their website to check for results – none were listed when I first checked.
How many votes were switched from Kerry to Bush?
1) Assume the Census 2004 (0.30% margin of error) 125.7mm vote estimate is correct. The total recorded vote was 122.3mm.
2) Allocate the 3.4mm lost/spoiled votes to Kerry (2.5mm) and Bush (0.9mm). In every presidential election, about 2-3% of ballots are spoiled or lost .
The vast majority are in democratic minority districts.
3) Assume 95% of 2000 Gore and Bush voters turned out to vote in 2004.
4) Adjust the 12:22am National Exit Poll (NEP) “How Voted in 2000” weightings:
Change the impossible 41% Bush/39% Gore weights to a realistic 38.2% Gore/37.8% Bush mix.
The revised weights are calculated based on:
a) total recorded 2000 vote (Gore 51.0-Bush 0.45mm)
b) 0.87%/year mortality rate (3.5% over 4 years)
c) 95% turnout of 2000 Bush and Gore voters.
5) Use the same vote shares as the 12:22am NEP.
Code:
The calculated vote, using the revised weights (see below) is:
Kerry 66.0mm (52.5%)
Bush 58.4mm (46.5%)
Other 1.3mm (1.0%)
Therefore, 4.5mm votes were switched from Kerry to Bush.
Proof:
1)Start with the Recorded Vote count:
Bush 62.0mm
Kerry 59.0mm
Other 1.3mm
2) Allocate 3.4mm spoiled/lost votes (2.5 Kerry; 0.9 Bush):
Bush 62.9
Kerry 61.5
3) Calculate the total Kerry/Bush vote (see below):
Kerry 66.0
Bush 58.4
4) Calculate the vote switch:
Kerry: 4.5 = 66.0 – 61.5
Bush: -4.5 = 58.4 – 62.9
________________________________________
NEP (adj. plausible weights, 125.7mm votes)
How Voted in 2000 Demographic
Turnout:95%
Voted Weight Votes Kerry% Bush Other
No 21.77% 27.36 57% 41% 2%
Gore 38.24% 48.06 91% 8% 1%
Bush 37.83% 47.55 10% 90% 0%
Other 2.17% 2.72 71% 21% 8%
Total 100% 125.7 52.5% 46.5% 1%
Vote 100% 125.7 66.0 58.4 1.3
Kerry margin: 7.59million
__________________________________
Actual NEP (impossible weights,122.3mm votes)
Voted Weight Votes Kerry Bush Other
No 17% 20.79 57% 41% 2%
Gore 39% 47.70 91% 8% 1%
Bush 41% 50.14 10% 90% 0%
Other 3% 3.67 71% 21% 8%
Total 100% 122.3 51.41% 47.62% 0.97%
Total 100% 122.3 62.87 58.24 1.19
Kerry margin: 4.64 million
Mike, that is exactly the problem. The corporate MSM thinks they should give a forum to liars, and not say they are lying. It all happened when the liars called the MSM “liberal.” The liars call the truth “liberal”, and said they wanted “balance”. Balance isn’t the truth and a lie, which is what we have today. Liars are not filtered, just given an unchallenged forum. These liars are the people who for decades cried “liberal bias”, meaning that they didn’t like the TRUTH that makes their agenda look bad. So, the MSM caved and lets them on to tell their lies UNCHALLENGED. Rice’s lies were CHALLENGED by the MSM. So, we will hear “liberal bias” because their LIAR was challenged. Get it??? You don’t have to be a genius, just educate yourself. The truth is not liberal, the liars call the truth “liberal”. And that also tells you where the LIES are coming from: the right (wrong).
Name some liberal lies, I can’t think of any. What the right calls “liberal”, is reporting on e-vote fraud, reporting Rice’s lies, reporting that Bush was AWOL, reporting polls that say 60% of Iraqi’s want American troops attacked, Bush’s approval rating is 30%, etc… Notice all of these things are just facts? They have labelled facts that make them look bad “liberal”. These 3 things are very effective and they know it, to squelch meaningful debate: 1) Calling truthful news “liberal” 2) labelling people who are trying to get a truthful story in the news “conspiracy theorists” 3) reporting anything on Israel that makes Israel look bad “anti-semetic”
So, this implies that everything labelled as those 3 things should get a double-take in all of our research. Don’t forget, Brad was labelled a “conspiracy theorist” early on by those who wanted e-vote fraud reporting suppressed. It worked for quite a while, which was their goal. It worked for years, now we have RFK, Jr. recommending Brad Blog. Enough said!
As to Bush cheating, everyone needs to remember the Bush-bulge story that the mainstream press refused to cover before the 2004 election. Yes, Bush had an electronic receiver and was being fed info during the televised debates. I have a whole chapter on this in my new book Delusional Democracy – Fixing the Republic Without Overthrowing the Government. If the NY Times, Wash. Post, LA Times that had been given the evidence had covered this, Bush would have clearly lost the election!!!
Joel S. Hirschorn thanks for dropping in. I agree on the “bulge” story. This one is simple enough – everyone would understand immediately…the guy’s a real “cheater.” But of course, expecting the corporate media to investigate and report on Bush is like is like expecting a board of directors to investigate and report on the company they supervise. It’s all the same group – “management.” This process does not work, at least over the mid term. We’ve reached that with the current administration. Those who benefited form the tax cuts and ability to toss filth into the environment, thereby saving a few dollars, not face a situation where we are reviled around the world and living in an economy that produces NO new jobs in the private sector, NONE.
Your book looks very interesting. I’ll be taking a serious look.
Things could be worse, Cheney could be President…oops, wait … Cheney IS the President.
This fixes a minor error in my prior post.
I have combined the small number of not sure/nonresponders into the “Somewhat Confident” category.
Based on the Zogby poll, these voters are NOT VERY CONFIDENT that Bush won fairly:
1)74.5% (3/4) of democrats/independents (56mm voters)
2)20.7% (1/5) of republicans (12mm voters)
3)55.7% (5/9) or 68mm of the 122mm who voted in 2004
Confident that Bush won fairly
All Voters
Party Pct No Somewhat Very
Dem 38% 59.0% 25.5% 15.0%
Rep 35% 4.7% 16.0% 79.0%
Ind 27% 34.0% 26.1% 40.0%
Total 100% 33.2% 22.3% 44.2%
Votes 122 40.6 27.3 53.9
Democrats and Independents
Party Pct No NotSure Very
Dem 59% 59.0% 25.5% 15.0%
Ind 41% 34.0% 26.1% 40.0%
Total 100% 48.8% 25.7% 25.3%
Polls like this make me ill, it proves what a FUBAR mess we are in.
When 45% of the country is stupid enough to think Bush won ANY election “fair & square” then we are in trouble.
The country has been stolen by a Cabal of Treasonous War Criminals and way too many Americans are totally oblivious.
TIA Thanks for the great stats TIA and the correction. In either scenario, these numbers are a devastating indictment of the current administration. They need to go. With Bob Woodward moving against *, this may indicate it’s time to “Say good night Georgie.”
NUNYABIZ the whole process of the last six years has been just awful. And now we lose habeas corpus, which took 4000 years of recorded civilization to realize. The one good thing about the poll might be, in your case, a relaization that the people don’t buy this nonsense, even without corporate media coverage.