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Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

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Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#401

Post by tptacek »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #326
tptacek wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Half a percentage of the AZ vote is over 16,000 votes. See why this crime doesn't make sense?

16,000 votes is only a half a percentage of people in AZ committing voter fraud, and that's assuming they each only submit one fraudulent ballot. Apparently people have been caught submitting dozens of ballots in the names of people they didn't have any right to. If 0.02% of people did that, it flips the state. You can also make the "doesn't make sense" argument about voting itself, since exactly zero of the states w…

What do you think a fraudulent ballot is? You can't just make a person up; there are voter rolls. Whatever means you find of coming up with a name and address that will be accepted as a vote, you have to do it (here, hypothetically) 16,000 times. If you use real people's names, which you have to because, again, voter rolls, many of them have already shown up to vote. The epollbook shows that on the screen, and you're standing there being asked for ID by a suspicious poll worker. Meanwhile, you would need thousands of coconspirators, and count on none of them ever leaking. You face the prison sentence to end all prison sentences (we put someone in prison in TX for years for casting an invalid vote accidentally) and, if you pull it off, you have... a chance? of altering the outcome if the election is very close?

There's a reason this just doesn't happen, and it's because it doesn't make sense. As a prediction: America is not going to spend a lot of time and energy making you feel safer about it.

My advice to you is, next cycle, sign up as a pollworker. It's so much more of a shitshow than you can possibly imagine, but I came away from it feeling paradoxically better about the process.

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#402

Post by hiram112 »

matwood wrote: post #346
jbjohns wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not fraud but she did write an entire book blaming Russia, and a whole host of other things.

The big difference is that it's been clearly shown that Russia did interfere [1]. The arguable point is did Trump's campaign know and direct the interference? And if we're really talking about shaping elections, disinformation and voter suppression is the way to get it done. Once votes are cast, it's too hard to move enough in order to have any meaningful change. There are too many checks, rechecks, and processes in…

Russia has been meddling in our elections since the Cold War began[1]. China, Israel, and every other power "interferes" in our elections, too, just like we do to them.

What was disingenuous of the US media was to make a huge deal out of 2016 shenanigans by Russia without any context, making it appear to the average voter that it was both significant and unique, neither of which is true.

The intel community and major media spent 3 years and tens of millions of dollars looking for something illegal or even unethical that the Trump campaign did related to Russia, and nothing was found.

The idea that there are "too many checks, rechecks, processes ... to commit fraud at the scale needed for a large election" is absurd in the US where the whole national election can be determined at the end by a single large county in one swing state, as happened in 2000. Now realize that 45 states were required to haphazardly design and implement, in 3 months, a mail-in voting system on a scale with which they had no experience, we'd expect a lot of errors that aren't even malicious.

Add in a flurry of state governments quickly passing various laws to swing things to their favor as happened in all the swing states, and you have a recipe for disaster as we're seeing.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/17/sunday-review/russia-isnt...

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#403

Post by ttmb »

barbacoa wrote: post #374
gitrog wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And please, kicking out GOP poll watchers (and only GOP poll watchers) and blocking their ability to observe Could you please provide a source for this?

That is what is being alleged in multiple swing state lawsuits by the GOP. https://youtu.be/DAh_stm5Bdc

> "I have not yet had the benefit of reviewing the underlying proceedings..."

Ah, vloggers. Same desperate need to fill airtime as the 24-hour news channels, with even less resources for actual journalism.

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#404

Post by tptacek »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #335
alphabettsy wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no evidence of widespread voter fraud is what’s being said. It’s on the accusing party to provide that evidence and they haven’t. It also strikes me as strange that they’re targeting only the cities that they are. Detroit for example when it was actually Oakland and Kent Counties that most altered the outcome in Michigan for Trump. Election officials have many ways to audit elections for example knowing exac…

> It’s on the accusing party to provide that evidence and they haven’t. But that's what I'm saying. What measures can we put into place to allow them to do that if it's actually true, or rule it out if it isn't? I'm asking for a good way that someone could find evidence that someone else e.g. mailed in a large number of ballots fraudulently, and you're telling me that there is no evidence of that happening. Well yeah…

Before you ask for people to help you preclude that anyone mailed in a large number of fraudulent ballots, I think it's fair to put to onus on you to describe how that actually could have happened. Start at step 1 and talk us through it: what does the "thousand ballot mail-in attack" look like? Bear in mind voters are registered with ID and proof of address into every state's voter rolls, states have records of when people die, and every election authority watches for duplicate votes; those are the table stakes mitigations you need to get past. Go ahead, I'm interested in hearing this out.

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#405

Post by hiram112 »

rhinoceraptor wrote: post #370
thu2111 wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not the type of problem that usually happens with postal voting. Intercepting votes like that on a large scale would be indeed hard. But what people do get caught doing quite regularly and not just in the USA are things like: 1. Going door to door and giving people blank ballots, pressuring people to fill them in, right in front of them. As a 'helpful service'. 2. Dominant members of the families taking the ba…

> he has been strongly encouraging his supporters to vote in person He also attempted to sabotage the USPS, and cast doubts on mail-in ballots as a whole, with the obvious intent of suppressing opposition voters, and/or having reason to question the election after the fact. The only party with anything to gain from suppressing voters are the Republicans. Look at the map of states that didn't ratify the 24th amendment…

> The only party with anything to gain from suppressing voters are the Republicans.

> And just this election, the Republicans put up fraudulent, illegal mail-in ballot drop boxes.

So which one is it?

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#406

Post by gitrog »

ttmb wrote: post #361
jcadam wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are being willfully obtuse when they say the kind of fraud being alleged isn't possible. A certain political party spent that last six months forcing rule changes on swing states vis a vis mail in voting that you can't compare this year's election to any that came before. Most of the fraud allegations (at least the ones where the numbers would be large enough to make a significant difference) revolve around th…

> these unsolicited mail in ballots and the extended deadlines which we've never had before in this country. Many states added new procedures like these to this election, but I don't believe any state added procedures that weren't already used in one or more other states.

Also, if it was organised in advance, then what exactly is the problem? This year hasn't exactly been like any before in living memory either...

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#407

Post by moduspol »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #398
moduspol wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So you're arguing that absentee ballot by mail is the problem? No. It's just one factor. For the rest, respectfully, you'll have to actually read my comments. Your responses haven't yet taken into account anything in my comments. It's like you saw the word "mail-in" and just typed out a response.

Is there a small amount of fraud? It wouldn't surprise me at all to find some in every election. How about a thought experiment: If you wanted to do it on a large enough scale to swing an election, How would you do it? Say you knew that there are three states which are going to be very close, and you wanted to add 10000 votes for your preferred candidate in each state. What would you do?

Excellent question. I don't know the answer. That's why I think we need a "red team" or "bug bounty" program to investigate.

How many ballots can fit in a mail truck? What does the chain of custody look like for all the different ways people can vote? What does the process look like when that chain of custody is suspected to have been broken? We've all seen how easily technological systems can be compromised through social engineering. Are there any gaps in the processes that could be exploited?

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#408

Post by DiogenesKynikos »

tastyfreeze wrote: post #373
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We the People of the United States, ..." The United States is not a union of separate republics. The method of electing the president is supposed to reflect the sovereignty of the people, with most of the electoral votes being apportioned according to population. The Great Compromise did give the small states disproportionate representation (an extra two electors, independent of population), but most electors are st…

So you are arguing for no more states. I very much enjoy the ability to move to another state on a whim if I dont like the state government. Under a popular vote we might as well disband congress. No need for state representation in a direct democracy.

> So you are arguing for no more states.

Where did I argue for that? I'm arguing for the state one lives in having no impact on how much one's vote for president counts. I never said that the US should eliminate federalism and run everything directly out of DC.

> Under a popular vote we might as well disband congress.

I don't follow your logic here. Based on my reasoning, it would make sense to either make Senate representation proportional to population, or to disband the Senate altogether, but some representative legislative body obviously has to remain. The House of Representatives is just such a body.

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#409

Post by guscost »

matwood wrote: post #325
guscost wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This pretty much adds up, and invalidates the whole analysis in my opinion. But I still believe that the first conspicuous batch of mail-in ballots being dumped in the witching hour, after poll watchers were told the counting was done for the night, is fishy , and I will not be surprised if the court considers it part of a larger pattern of behavior which causes ballots (legitimate but unverifiable, in many cases) to…

The first couple days the big counties were counting 24/7. The managers were on TV talking about their teams, and you could watch live streams on many of the counting areas. The court is likely throwing nothing out. The no poll watcher lawsuit was already laughed out of court when the lawyers had to admit a 'non-zero' number of poll watchers were present the whole time [1]. Trump might be fine lying on Twitter consta…

There are many sworn affidavits being filed in court right now, from poll watchers claiming that they were kept too far away to validate a single ballot, or turned away entirely. We’ll see, it will definitely go to court.

Re: Looking for Voter Fraud (In Old Elections) with Data Visualization

#410

Post by tastyfreeze »

cycomanic wrote: post #252
tastyfreeze wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People in population centers tend to think similarly due to a similar environment. What a city desires in the nation's leader does not necessarily align with rural voters. You must see the danger in a few, albeit large, groups having the majority of the population. Say LA and New York decide that a communist leader would be best for the country. How the hell do residents outside the cities stand up against that in an…

People in rural areas think similarly due to a similar environment. What a rural area desires in the nation's leader does not necessarily align with city voters. You must see the danger of minority having the majority of the voting power. Say Louisiana and the mid-west would decide that a fascist leader would be best for the country. How the hell do residents in the cities stand up against that in any way but force.…

Ok, accepting it can go both ways. Why would you want one small portion of the country deciding the direction of the country instead of each state having an equal say? Isn't an equal say more fair for all states?
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