New Hampshire Primary: Thoroughly fucked.
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Last time the US attempted to elect a president, we saved the poll discrepancy shenanigans for the final round of voting. But where would the fun be this time around if we didn't try to outdo ourselves? The first state primary passed without any major trouble, except for the fact that Iowa's Republicans voted in favor of the Second Coming. Then along comes New Hampshire.
Ron Paul has missing votes all over the place, and Hillary miraculously came back from a significant deficit in the pre-election polls, and defied the exit polling data (which suggested that independent voters leaned strongly towards the Democrats, and Obama in particular) to overtake Obama's seemingly commanding lead. Even the Clinton camp's own internal poll data predicted an 11% win for Obama.
WHAT IN THE FUCK?! I mean, SERIOUSLY people. We are not some shitty third world nation, who's electoral process is in the pocket of some corrupt general who wants to guarantee his best buddy a win. Now I know a fuckload of people are sitting around thinking polls have a margin of error anyhow, so no big deal. But the margin of error of any reputable poll is 2-3% … not 10% or more. And the polls were oddly right on the money for all candidates' results except Clinton/Obama. This is fucking pathetic.
(excellent coverage of the details over at BradBlog.com)
The question, of course, is what in the fuck actually happened?
First off, consider that approximately 80% of New Hampshire's votes are counted by easily-hackable Diebold optical scan machines. There are paper ballots that could be re-counted, but only if a candidate requests a recount, and ponies up over $60,000 to pay for it.
If Diebold cheated for Bush Co. last time around, what are the odds they're going to suddenly switch allegiance to the Clinton camp now? Approximately none.
If someone wanted to rig up a nice vote-fraud scandal against the Democrats, on the other hand? The irony would be hard to choke down, trying to nail the Dems for the same fucking thing Bush Co. pulled off last time, but today's Republicans seem to have a bottomless appetite for hypocrisy.
Or what if the Repubs figure their only chance at winning is nominating Clinton, who is, in my estimation, the least liked of the Democratic front-runners?
I'm personally hoping for an anonymous prankster, who's trying to make a political point … but mostly because that would be so UN-nefarious. And it would make me laugh.
One wonders, with all the hubbub that's kicked up around ye olde interwebs over this little fuckup, will whoever did whatever happened in New Hampshire actually have the nerve to do it again? Will Clinton get railroaded into the Democrats' nomination on a wave of bullshit primary results?
And what of Ron Paul's missing votes? Maybe the string pullers figure the only way they can beat Clinton is if Paul is definitely NOT the candidate running against her?
I mean, I'd hate to think what would happen if he got elected, but how in the fuck does a town "accidentally" not count every single one of his votes? Sure, the charming town of Sutton only "lost" 31 Paul votes, and they gave them back as soon as voters started publically reporting they'd actually voted for Paul … but how in the fuck did they LOSE the votes in the first place? And how many other votes may have been lost elsewhere in the state?
I am utterly disgusted. After all the problems with the last Presidential election, jack shit has been done to fix the problem. Recounts are still not easily obtained. Votes are still counted by private corporations, on terribly insecure computerized systems, with no oversight from any independent parties.
When I was going to university, our student union elections were all hand counted, and each candidate as well as the student newspapers sent a handful of representatives to watch the whole process. It was totally transparent, supervised, and reliable … and those elections really didn't matter for shit in the larger scheme of things. What in the hell does it say about our country when a bunch of half-assed college students can run an election better than the fucking government?
And the scariest question of all: Will the voters just roll over and take it up the ass again, like they did last time around? It wouldn't surprise me a bit.
From what I understand there were a high number of mail in votes this time. That could account for it. Thing is if you look at the numbers, the reality is they essentialy tied for # of delegates.
10th January 2008 at 9:32 pm | permalink |The thing that bugs me is that they have a reason for saying polls have a margin of error of +/- 2-3% … until the last few years, election polls were pretty consistently accurate. And it's oddly in the electronically counted precincts that things go screwy … which, if nothing else, suggests that greater oversight ought to be used in those areas.
And that still doesn't even touch the issue of Ron Paul having votes go completely uncounted …
10th January 2008 at 11:36 pm | permalink |@ larry
That's before you count the super delegates, which sadly Hillary seems to have more of at the moment.
11th January 2008 at 7:11 am | permalink |They are recounting the vote in NH. Interesting.
@davidgx: I forgot about that.
13th January 2008 at 7:07 pm | permalink |@larry: A recount. That's fucking sweet. Kucinich rocks … and I will totally contribute to pay for it, if he's taking donations.
14th January 2008 at 10:00 pm | permalink |