Something is rotten in the state of Alaska?

[Ramo]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Well, leaving aside tinfoil hats and all that, and not even considering discrepancy with the polls, there is a simple question here:

How is it that overall voter turn out for this election topped 2004, but in a state where the governor was on the presidential ticket and there was both a high-profile senate race and a high-profile congressional race, turnout in Alaska was down something like 30-35% compared to 2004? (FWIW, turnout in Arizona was about the same as 2004, and turnout in Delaware slightly higher; and as far as I can tell, only one similarly big, empty, deep-red Western state -- SD -- saw turnout fall, and that was only by 2-3 points).

That may not point to mischief, but is is a glaring sociological/demographic/historical anomaly, and requires an explanation. "Fraud," whatever you think of the people yelling it, is a pretty compelling explanation. But there may be other compelling explanations.

Anybody? Anybody?

edit: xpost with Thue, who makes the same point just above.

There are still roughly 80k uncounted ballots (absentees, early votes, and provisional ballots), so the actual drop-off was fairly negligible. It's worth pointing out:
a.) The exit polls show that Stevens was winning.
b.) Hawaii had a similar drop-off in turnout (despite having a favorite son, of sorts).

I think the fact that the election was definitively over before polls closed is a good explanation as any for what happened.

So, I'd lean against there being massive fraud. And Begich still has a very real shot at winning (he needs to win the outstanding ballots by ~5%). Berkowitz, OTOH, looks well done...

[DanS]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
How is it that overall voter turn out for this election topped 2004, but in a state where the governor was on the presidential ticket and there was both a high-profile senate race and a high-profile congressional race, turnout in Alaska was down something like 30-35% compared to 2004?

I don't follow your math. The turnout figures seem to suggest a decline of less than 3%.

Edit: It appears that Ramo and I crossposted regarding the same topic.

[DanS]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Fair enough. But I think that it is important, when there are at least superficial irregularities in the data that people are extra careful about verifying the results.

Who said there were even superficial irregularities? Seriously, looking for a box of ballots in the trunk of every late model Oldsmobile because you should have won is corrosive to the electoral process.

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by DanS


Who said there were even superficial irregularities? Seriously, looking for a box of ballots in the trunk of every late model Oldsmobile because you should have won is corrosive to the electoral process.

I didn't say anything about looking for ballots. There are statistically strange things going on here. I therefore want further statistical analysis of the data. If ballots were disappeared then they are gone. I'm not talking about depositions and subpoenas. I'm talking about research.

[DanS]

So where are the superficial irregularities?

[Ben Kenobi]

I didn't say anything about looking for ballots. There are statistically strange things going on here.

Such as? There are perfectly rational explanations for what happened that do not rely on 'voter fraud'.

I therefore want further statistical analysis of the data. If ballots were disappeared then they are gone. I'm not talking about depositions and subpoenas. I'm talking about research.

The analysis has been done by the folks who know what they are doing, and nothing funny went on in Alaska.

All that's left is to count all the absentee ballots.

[Thue]

The Washington Post has an article on it: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/was...news-col-blogs

[Ben Kenobi]

Nothing in there but speculation.

[KrazyHorse]

There are still roughly 80k uncounted ballots

Where is this from? The numbers I've seen suggest much lower numbers than this (~50k)

There's a big difference between these two. I don't see very much strange if there are 80k left.

[Ramo]

That number looks like just absentees.

http://www.elections.alaska.gov/files/08GENR/remaining_absentee_early_question_numbers.pdf

[KrazyHorse]

a) Then news reports were completely mistaken on this, because those I'd seen claimed that number as absentee+early+questioned

b) How many questioned ballots end up getting counted? Do rejected ballots count toward turnout or not? What was the number of questioned ballots in '04?

[Bosh]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi




You think I like Stevens? It's a fact. McCain's turnout dropped precipitously on the coast.

That didn't take long though. 1 day and the liberals are whining about voter fraud.

You won, get over it.

No it is just that whenever BK predicts that something is the case, the opposite is almost always true.

[Arrian]

It seems to me that:

1) It can be hard to poll rural Alaska, thus introducing a higher-than-normal margin of error.

2) Stevens may be a bastard, but he's their bastard and he brings home the bacon.

3) Apparently he advertised heavily in the days right before the election.

4) Turnout wasn't great.

Add that up, and I could see a Stevens win w/o fraud. It's definitely a WTF, Alaska? moment, but really, are we THAT surprised?

And he hasn't won yet.

-Arrian

[KrazyHorse]

I'm just pissed that the AP was reporting the wrong numbers.

[Ramo]

With something like a third of the outstanding ballots counted, the margin between Stevens and Begich has been reduced from 3257 to 971. Given that the remaining districts are more Begich friendly than this batch, he's likely to win at this point. Woohoo!

http://www.elect.alaska.net/data/results.htm