This is like saying that Obama’s victory in Indiana in 2008 must have been fraudulent because Indiana had been a reliably Republican state up to that point, dating back to 1968. At some point, these streaks get broken.
I asked this another thread, but since this thread has taken over the discussion, I’ll ask it here: how would we detect if the election results were fraudulent? We can actually go and touch and count paper ballots; how do we do a recount of electronic data?
I think if it’s purely electronic all they could do is examine the machines and verify they are operating properly. Many places that use electronic voting also produce a paper trail however. Ballotpedia-Voting methods and equipment by state
The problem with the paper trail is that it is a last-ditch fall-back. There is a video where a guy shows that he can hack the SD card before it is put into the machine to report a count that is completely different from what the machine read. The cards go to the county clerk, where the computer tallies them up and the totals are transmitted to the elections offices. If the spread is proper: narrow enough to be convincing and wide enough to be conclusive, the machines are believed and the question is settled. Really good manipulation of the totals is all it takes: the vote is in and no one (mostly) looks back.
The problem of course is that even in the smallest counties you’d need forty 10 gallon jars. Luckily we invented words and pencils so a paper ballot is possible.
I’m pretty sure we could put together a video showing how easy it is to stuff a paper ballot box. It may even look easier than hacking an SD card if we get David Blaine or Copperfield on board with the project.
Bill Palmer is the guy behind Daily Dust Bin. They are one of those “news outlets” that cropped up with a bias, in their case on the left. I harbor no illusions that this guy is unbiased, but he makes the following factual claims that can be looked at:
The article concludes:
So there’s a few legitimate claims that can be discussed. I cannot stand conspiracy theorists, they are scum who hurt people by accusing them of being “in on it.” But the thing is that it is easy for the rational to debunk the woo-peddlers factually. Yes you can’t get them to change their minds, but since I am not one of them, that’s not my goal. I want to know for myself. So let’s discuss these allegations… Are they facts? Exaggerations? Completely fabricated?
I am firmly of the belief that conspiracy theories should not be taken seriously until or unless they have an alternative explanation of their own. Merely saying, “Oooh, this looks fishy!” doesn’t mean anything. They need to tell us *how *it was rigged, who *was *rigging it, and how the rigging mechanism worked.
The argument used by Palmer sounds exactly like the 9/11 Truthers who try to lay out everything in as extensive and rambling a format to make something plausible sound far-fetched and implausible: 1. “You have to believe that not one, two, three, but FOUR planes were hijacked!”
2. “You have to believe that 19 hijackers managed to smuggle weapons past airport security.”
3. “You have to believe that 19 hijackers received flight training in the USA without incurring suspicion.”
4. “You have to believe that no Air National Guard jets were scrambled in time to shoot them down, or that the chain of command couldn’t get its act together quickly enough.”
5. “You have to believe that the FBI and CIA and 14 other intelligence agencies couldn’t foil this plot.”
For ALL of these things to happen simultaneously? It’s a conspiracy, I tell you.
I agree with this, and I’d love a Nate Silver (remember him?) article about if there is any way one could actually tell if an election was rigged from the data.
He makes a reasonable case. But we could never prove it to the sticking point, they got the lawyers, guns, and money, and not the slightest hesitation to use them all.
Another sticking point: if they could rig it that good, how come they didn’t rig it all the way? By last count, Hillary won the popular vote by a million and a half. If they could fuck us, what would stop them from fucking us harder?
I don’t exactly see the correlation. Was voter turnout for the '16 primaries greater than in '08? And even if it was, remember John McCain wrapped up the GOP nomination fairly early, which probably stifled turnout in later primaries.
It’s noted above that turnout was lower than in '12, but not dramatically. Did this guy follow the election campaigns? Yeah, a lot of us cared, but we also acknowledged that both candidates suck. Hard to ramp up turnout for crappy candidates.
Subtract a traditional 3%MoE from those numbers and you get none of those states being legitimately favored to go blue, except that you might have a feeling that they ought to.