# Behold a pale horse:and his name that sat on him was Diebold,and Hell followed with h **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 13, 2008, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367 "2008-01-13T06:13:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/21 "2008-01-13T19:11:18Z")
Georgia has Diebold machines with _no_ paper trail, and Obama and Huckabee are leading in the polls here. It will be interesting to see how things turn out. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/22 "2008-01-13T19:21:47Z")
As far as we know, has anyone ever before even tried to rig a **primary?** ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/23 "2008-01-13T19:36:04Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] Funny how exit polls were never once wrong until Diebold. Funny how they’re always wrong in the way that best benefits the GOP. [/QUOTE] In New Hampshire, the _pre-election polls_ were wrong. I have not heard anyone say the exit polls were wrong. Absent better evidence, surprising as New Hampshire was, I think the undecided voters just went for Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/24 "2008-01-13T19:39:55Z")
> [@](#): > > #1. Is this now the way elections are going to go? If your candidate doesn’t win a close race, or loses when he had been projected to win, are the cries “The other guy cheeted” going to ring out across the land? How depressing. How many blogs are there in the world? I mean, seriously, some lefty blog I’ve never heard of yelled “Diebold!” BFD. > [@](#): > > #2. This time it’s Democrat versus Democrat. No, it’s some nobody with a blog versus…the handful of people who care sufficiently about what he says to bother to disagree. Guess that means it’s this loon versus **Weirddave**. I’m on your side on this one, guy - but is it really worth the effort? BTW, longtime Great Orange Satan frontpager DHinMI [debunked this Diebold shit on Wednesday morning](http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/10/02623/2264). If you’re looking for a site that speaks for a big chunk of the lefty blogosphere, that’s as good as it gets. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/25 "2008-01-13T20:11:18Z")
I’m not inclined to believe some blog when there isn’t any evidence that Obama, or anyone on his staff, has made an issue of this. Or did I miss something where they did? The explanations that “the GOP” (as if it were a monolithic thing) has picked which candidate “it” wants to run against is pretty laughable, and the rest of the argument seems to go like: \*Well, they probably want this and they could do this, therefore they must have done this. \* ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [January 13, 2008, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/26 "2008-01-13T21:53:28Z")
I watched the Washington chatter shows this week, & was struck by how no one _considered_ that the multiple polls were right & the official results wrong. That’s how they get away with it. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/27 "2008-01-14T14:53:04Z")
I’ll ask this again - was there any difference between the final results and the exit polls? I’ve never heard anybody say before that pre-election polls, which are NOT the same thing as exit polls, were a cast-iron predictor of what was going to happen when people actually voted. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/28 "2008-01-14T14:57:19Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] In New Hampshire, the _pre-election polls_ were wrong. I have not heard anyone say the exit polls were wrong. [/quote] Quite the opposite. CNN’s \*exit \* polls, for instance, were dead on. The most likely interpretation is that there was indeed a late surge to Clinton among independents. In fact, the only statistically-significant disrepancies between exit polls and actual votes have been in the electronically-voting areas of Florida and Ohio in the 2000 presidential election. Anybody with a grounding in math knows the most probable inferencesto draw. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/29 "2008-01-14T15:24:02Z")
Exit polls or no, experience has taught me to be leery of Diebold-- experience in the form of the 2002 governor’s race. In Georgia, where we have no paper trail, Democrat Roy Barnes went from being ahead of Republican Sonny Perdue 48% to 39% in pre-election polls to losing to Perdue 52% to 45% according to Diebold’s machines. Which is why I am very curious as to what will happen in Georgia’s primary elections. ---
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/30 "2008-01-14T19:04:44Z")
I hate to say this, because I don’t know how to check my memory, but here’s my recollection of what I saw as I watched the New Hampshire primary coverage on MSNBC with Chris Matthews and Keith Olberman. They had red and blue boxes with various results appearing on the bottom left of the screen. Early on in the broadcast, the boxes were marked “Exit Polls” and were showing a lead of about 10 to 12 points favoring Obama over Clinton. Then, pretty early, maybe a few minutes after 8:00 PM (when the polls closed), they started showing actual counted election results, which showed a point or two or three advantage for Clinton over Obama, and also said something like “1% Reported”, indicating that only a small fraction of the results were included so far. I heard somebody comment that there were more small rural areas reporting their results, and that Obama would probably enjoy more advantage in the larger urban areas, so this was a possible reason why the early reporting disagreed with exit poling. However, the Clinton advantage never went away. By the time the reporting reached around 1.5% or 2%, they stopped displaying the “Exit Poll” data boxes. So, help me out - can anybody remember whether this broadcast was displaying “exit poll” results, and what they said? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/31 "2008-01-14T19:54:15Z")
[QUOTE=Two and a Half Inches of Fun] Obama is a not a Muslim any longer. He is a Christian. He was not sworn in on the Koran. The only federal elected official I am aware of that was sworn in on the Koran was Keith Ellison of Minnesota’s 5th district. [/QUOTE] I think **Sage Rat** is whooshing. ---
**Author:** ![Baldwin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baldwin/32/7264_2.png) [@Baldwin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baldwin)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/32 "2008-01-14T20:34:14Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] In New Hampshire, the _pre-election polls_ were wrong. I have not heard anyone say the exit polls were wrong. Absent better evidence, surprising as New Hampshire was, I think the undecided voters just went for Clinton. [/QUOTE] Well, the [NPR News Blog](http://www.npr.org/blogs/news/2008/01/kucinich_calls_for_recount_in_1.html) reports that the exit polls matched the reported vote. Also (from the article): > [@](#): > > Scanlan said that New Hampshire’s use of electronic voting machines is different than states like Ohio or Florida. The electronic machines are not linked, and all the electronic votes are backed by paper ballots. I wish it were like that in Georgia. So, it seems more likely to me that people changed their minds and voted differently than they had polled. Why? Who knows; maybe it was Clinton’s perfectly-timed display of human emotion; maybe they just had second thoughts. ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/33 "2008-01-14T20:37:59Z")
[QUOTE=Magiver] Interesting controversy. Those machines replaced the reliable punch cards in Ohio, which already provided a paper trail. The same people who were hysterical about getting rid of the punch cards want to get rid of the new machines. They want a piece of paper that people can point to and fill in with a marking device (thus providing a hard copy of the transaction). This is what we had before with the reliable punch cards. I hope they didn’t throw the old machines out. Maybe we can get them back. They were so simple to use. [/QUOTE] (cough) dangling chads (cough) A good solution, which at least some places have, is a machine with an electronic interface which then prints out an easily-human-verifiable paper receipt, which is presented (behind glass, so it can’t be tampered with) to the voter, who verifies it before finalizing the vote. Any necessary recounts can be done using these paper printouts. Or something along those lines. California has scantron-y things, which seem to work pretty well, although depending on precisely how the ballot is printed, they might be susceptible to butterfly-ballot-esque shenanigans. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/34 "2008-01-14T20:59:43Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] In New Hampshire, the _pre-election polls_ were wrong. [/QUOTE] [Not really](http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Pres/Maps/Jan13.html): ```auto **Candidate Poll avg. Final** Hillary Clinton 29.8% 39.1% Barack Obama 36.7% 36.4% John Edwards 18.8% 16.9% Total 85.3% 92.4% ``` > [@](#): > > The polls hit Obama’s percentage nearly spot on. They were off by 0.3%, well within the margin of error of 3-4% for this kind of poll. Notice that the sum of the polls is 85.3%, meaning that about 15% were either undecided or for one of the second-tier candidates. What happened on election day was a small loss for Edwards and a big break of the undecideds for Hillary Clinton. ---
**Author:** ![tds1273](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/df705f/32.png) [@tds1273](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tds1273)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2008, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/35 "2008-01-14T22:44:55Z")
On ‘A Daily Show’ following the NH primaries, they had on the main guy(sorry, I forget his name) who does the polls. At the very end of the interview he and Stewart raised an interesting point only to leave it hanging at the commercial break. How is it that the poll/results for the Democrats were so very wrong, but the Republican results were exactly what the polls predicted they would be? The interviewee, the poller, was very candid in his replies, and seemed very much shocked by the results and the contrast. Would any who one else saw this interview care to elaborate a little better than I can? Or help explain to me what the implications of this particular anomaly might be? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 15, 2008, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/36 "2008-01-15T01:39:21Z")
[QUOTE=tds1273] How is it that the poll/results for the Democrats were so very wrong, but the Republican results were exactly what the polls predicted they would be? [/QUOTE] I didn’t see the interview, but it doesn’t matter. The pollsters accurately predicted the Republicans, _and all but one of the major Dems as well_. The only thing they missed, apparently, was a last-minute swing of the undecideds towards Hillary. ---
**Author:** ![Weirddave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/919ad9/32.png) [@Weirddave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirddave)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2008, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/37 "2008-01-20T18:06:07Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] How many blogs are there in the world? I mean, seriously, some lefty blog I’ve never heard of yelled “Diebold!” BFD. No, it’s some nobody with a blog versus…the handful of people who care sufficiently about what he says to bother to disagree. Guess that means it’s this loon versus **Weirddave**. I’m on your side on this one, guy - but is it really worth the effort? BTW, longtime Great Orange Satan frontpager DHinMI [debunked this Diebold shit on Wednesday morning](http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/10/02623/2264). If you’re looking for a site that speaks for a big chunk of the lefty blogosphere, that’s as good as it gets. [/QUOTE] Of course, it’s easy to dismiss as simply coming from the fringe of the fringe, but now it’s in [Daily Kos](http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/19/162953/644/790/439573) (site motto: the best website Soros’ money can buy), and the quoted source is “Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe”. So, is this still the province of the black helicopter boys or is there something more to it? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2008, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/38 "2008-01-20T19:10:02Z")
[QUOTE=Weirddave] Of course, it’s easy to dismiss as simply coming from the fringe of the fringe, but now it’s in [Daily Kos](http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/1/19/162953/644/790/439573) [/quote] True, in the sense that it’s in a Kos diarist’s diary. IOW, it’s ‘in Daily Kos’ in the same way that you could register a username there and post a diary saying the same things. Diarists on DKos speak only for themselves. Haven’t we covered this ground about a zillion times on this board? > [@](#): > > (site motto: the best website Soros’ money can buy), Cite, please. (Speaking of rumors that seem to refuse to die.) > [@](#): > > and the quoted source is “Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe”. And what’s he being quoted on? Oh, something entirely different. It’s about problems in Nevada, and from the quote at the link, there’s no indication that any of them involved voting machines - Diebold’s, or anybody else’s; touch-screen machines, or any other type. Did you even read your own cite? > [@](#): > > So, is this still the province of the black helicopter boys or is there something more to it? So far, no evidence has been produced in this thread that anyone of more stature than the black helicopter boys is raising this issue. ---
**Author:** ![Weirddave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/919ad9/32.png) [@Weirddave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Weirddave)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2008, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/39 "2008-01-21T17:46:49Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] Oh, something entirely different. It’s about problems in Nevada, and from the quote at the link, there’s no indication that any of them involved voting machines - Diebold’s, or anybody else’s; touch-screen machines, or any other type. Did you even read your own cite? [/QUOTE] Voter fraud is voter fraud. The method is unimportant, but this response is so typically you “Oh, you were talking about Diebold machines before, this doesn’t involve them so it’s not related”. Rather than admit possible wrongdoing on the part of any Dems, you prevaricate, deny and change the subject. BTW, now the story is in [The Washington Post](http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/01/20/after_nevada_caucuses_charges_1.html)\*. Is it still a non-issue confined to the lunatic fringe? \*Here, I’ll save you the trouble of typing, you can just C&P this: “That’s just a WP blog, it doesn’t mean anything. _whine_” ---
**Author:** ![gonzomax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e8c25b/32.png) [@gonzomax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gonzomax)\ **Post date:** [January 21, 2008, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367/40 "2008-01-21T20:45:39Z")
[http://www.bradblog.com/](http://www.bradblog.com/) The Brad Blog has followed Diebolds problems for years. When you scroll down you see in New Hampshire Diebold Clinton 683 recount 619 Edwards 255 217 Obama 404 365 They are , I thought ,supposed to provide an accurate count. If they can not do that what good are they. Bradblog has been following this story for years. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/behold-a-pale-horse-and-his-name-that-sat-on-him-was-diebold-and-hell-followed-with-h/433367.md?page=3)