Need All Volunteer Open Public Exit Polling--2006/2008

[davidlynch]

Friends, I don't know all of the particulars yet, but I think we need to form a nationwide organization to do precinct by precinct, open, all volunteer exit polling.

The organization would be completely volunteer, voter supported, perhaps with the support help of MoveOn, UFPJ and Carter Center.

Volunteers would staff every precinct in the United States with an OpenExit sign (I realize this will cost). Each volunteer would have a laptop computers or PDA, allowing them to report results on a question-by-question basis to a central server.

Unweighted data would be available in realtime (down to the precinct level) with weights added for ease of online viewing, but these weighting factors would be completely transparent and would in no way "pollute" the raw data.

The system would be completely auditable with paper trails and so on to prevent tampering. It would use the same techniques as those pioneered by Mitofsky, but would not produce a proprietary result.

[SnoopDog]

1. It is a good idea and it should be done. Another idea is

to insure that no one is disenfranchised By that I mean:
1. Ensure precincts have adequate voting machines
2. Ensure precincts are not changed at the last minute.
3. Have our people present to ensure voters are not hoodwinked.
4. Ensure dirty tricks such as ‘Dems vote on the 3rd’ are not repeated

Basically, be present to assist voters from the Repub-thugs.

[juajen]

2. This would only work if it was non-partisan

It is a good idea and one I would surely support, but it has to be as pure as we can make it. None of that repeat "bad exit poll" crap. Additionally, it is is little more complicated than that and does take a lot of expertise. That said, it is doable and should be bankrolled by individuals, not corporations or political parties.

[waz_nc]

3. great idea

It would probably be fairly expensive, but I would be just as happy to donate money for an independent non-profit exit poll as I was to donate to the recounts in Washington and Ohio or to blackbox voting. You can get an idea of what it might take by looking at the exit polls conducted by a group of universities in Utah (http://exitpoll.byu.edu/)

It may be possible to contract with an existing organization such as the National Opinion Research Center (http://www.norc.uchicago.edu/). Alternatively, although I'm not sure if professional organizations do things like this, I would guess that a sub-group of members of either the American Political Science Association or the American Sociological Association would be interested in consulting on something this if not actually conducting it. Just a thought.
Bill