Brief note

Wish I had more time to write at this moment. Briefly: Both Slate and my readers have assailed one part of my take on the election, though not (I am relieved to say) the more important part.

My argument came down to disparities between the exit poll numbers and the final tallies in various states. Two facts struck me as suspicious: 1. The "false positives" -- I like that term and I'll keep using it until someone suggests a better one -- early in the day always went to Kerry. 2. False positives occurred in states lacking paper trails for e-voting, not in states with paper trails.

No-one has mounted a serious challenge to, or explanation for, point 1.

Slate has challenged point 2. Perhaps justifiably. I must confess that right now, I am not on my home computer (where I have my files stored) and thus cannot give you the URL of the site from which I drew my info.

That said, is the main argument substantially weakened? If false positives for Kerry (or undervaluations of Bush) occurred in New Hampshire, Nevada and Illinois as well as in New Mexico, Florida, and Ohio -- well, isn't that a little like a coin coming up heads six times in a row?

Actually, the "coin" metaphor doesn't really work. The exit polls offer three possibilities: 1. An undervaluation of the Bush vote, 2. An undervaluation of the Kerry vote, and 3. Accuracy. Possibility number 1 seems to have occurred in every instance.

I stopped taking math classes after Intermediate Algebra (and that ordeal occurred quite a few years ago), and therefore never took a course in statistics. And a statistician is just what we need right now.

Consider this column a call to those who have taken such a course. What is the likelihood? What are the odds against exit polls undervaluing the Bush vote in every battleground state?

So far, I've confined the inquiry to a small group of swing states. But perhaps we should look at other areas of the country as well. If exit polls undervalued the Bush vote in red states, then the situation becomes even more striking.

Why, you may ask, would anyone "massage" the vote in Bush's favor in a hard-core red state (or, for that matter, in a state that ultimately went for Kerry)? The answer should be obvious. A solid popular vote win gives right-wing news outlets, such as the Daily News in my own city of Los Angeles, the opportunity to scream "MANDATE" across the front page. If a manipulator switched a few hundred thousand votes to the Bush column in Texas, who would notice?

Face it -- the explanations we've heard for the pattern of exit poll disparity are not credible. (Sort of like Bush blaming his tailor for the bulge.) Perhaps, some have suggested, Bush voters are less likely to talk to pollsters. Those who consider Republicans averse to making their voices heard have met few Republicans.