POLLSTER: GORE WON 2000-PREMATURE CALLS BY MEDIA GAVE IT TO BUSH (Globe)

[kpete]

Pollster: Bush 2000 win due to media calling race
September 28, 2006

CONCORD, N.H. --A former national pollster argues in his new book that Al Gore really won the 2000 presidential election, but premature calls by the media for George Bush took Gore's victory away.

Moore, a former University of New Hampshire professor, said he knows his premise is a "hard sell" and insists the book is not partisan.

His former bosses -- the Gallup Poll -- disagreed and fired him after he told them about the book last spring, he said.

Gallup General Counsel Steve O'Brien told the Concord Monitor on Wednesday that writing the book was a "colossally stupid" thing for Moore to do given the polling firm's nonpartisan mission. O'Brien scoffed at the idea that any book with such a title could be impartial.Moore disagrees and believes he was being "as objective as you can be about what really happened."

MORE AT:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/new_hampshire/articles/2006/09/28/pollster_bush_2000_win_due_to_media_calling_race/

[Liberty Belle]

1. kicking and recommending. Too bad it took 6 yrs to tell the truth.

[autorank]

2. Great post. K&R More reasons...thanks, you rock!!!!

This is the prime analysis...read the whole thing. It's amazing...

Whose Votes Don't Count?: An Analysis of Spoiled Ballots in the 2000 Florida Election

Philip A. Klinkner, Associate Professor of Government
Hamilton College 198 College Hill Road Clinton, NY 13323 315-859-4344
[e-mail]
http://www.hamilton.edu/news/florida/KlinknerAnalysis2.html

As the tables indicate, the adjusted r2 is now quite high-the model explains over 92 percent of the variance in spoiled ballots. In addition, the percent of black voters remains significant. Finally, in areas where the combined result of multiplying the percent of voters who are black by the voter margin for Bush is positive, there is a positive correlation with spoiled ballots. To put it another way, not only does being black matter in the model, it also matters where you are black. Strongly Republican areas that also had a sizeable proportion of blacks had a greater incidence of spoiled ballots. While this finding is only suggestive, it is exactly what one would expect to find in a situation where racial disenfranchisement is likely to occur--black voters are a sizeable part of the electorate, but lacked the political power to ensure that their ballots are counted accurately and fairly.

In conclusion, this analysis offers two important findings:

1. There is no evidence that higher rates of spoiled ballots resulted from such individual factors as education and literacy. Instead, the factors influencing spoiled ballots were systemic. Thus, rather than speaking of individuals who spoiled their ballots, we should speak of individuals who were placed in situations in which it was more likely that their ballots would be spoiled. Furthermore, this finding indicates that any effort to reduce the rate of spoiled ballots must focus on systemic solutions--improved technology, more and better election workers, and stronger efforts to investigate and prosecute any instances of corruption and/or racial disenfranchisement.

2. Even after controlling for other factors, rates of ballot spoilage remain higher in predominantly black areas than in other areas of Florida. As the last model indicates, with all else being equal, for every 1-point increase in the percentage of registered voters who are black, there was a .07 percentage point increase in spoiled ballots.

In addition, these rates were even higher where substantial numbers of blacks were found in counties with large margins for George W. Bush. All of this corresponds to and further reinforces the findings of the USCCR that there is evidence of racial disenfranchisement in the 2000 election in Florida. Consequently, it is important that federal authorities should investigate this matter more thoroughly.

[nam78_two]

3. K&R/nt

[Der Blaue Engel]

4. I thought that the independent recount proved that five years ago

:shrug:

[Viva_La_Revolution]

5. 5! whooohooooo!

this book will definitely be on my list! :)

[Kool Kitty]

6. K & R.

:grr: :argh: :banghead: :cry: :cry:

[blue cat]

7. Reading this book

is going to make me cry.

[marmar]

8. Yet another chapter in a future "What Led to the Downfall of America" book

K&R

[Rex]

9. Yup, a year later and it was PROVEN that Gore won, but did Bush

move aside and did Gore take his rightful place? No. And THAT is why everything has gone wrong.

[WinstonSmith4740]

10. And let's not forget...

That the FIRST member of the media to call the election for Junior was his cousin at (where else?) Faux News. Are we surprised?:banghead:

[sueh]

11. When will people who think I'm a *sore loser* believe this to be true??

[Maraya1969]

12. All the news channels called it for Gore until Fox stepped in and called

it for bush. It is in the beginning of Fahrenheit 9/11

[mnhtnbb]

13. They called for Gore, retracted and then FOX called for Bush in early a.m.

[The Count]

16. It was W's cousin John Ellis who was the point man on this

They had an interview with the Bushes earlier who were very calm about Florida in spite of the results announced - I think W even joked about trusting his brother.

[Proud2BAmurkin]

14. The big recount by the media settled this years ago. Gore won.

DUH

[newyawker99]

15. ...

:kick:

[The Count]

17. Gallup: you're fired! We're non-partisan, you commie pinko traitor!!!

This is Bob Boudelag worthy!

[emmadoggy]

18. I'm disturbed by the last paragraph of the linked article...

"Bush won Florida by 537 votes.
A media consortium conducted a manual recount of contested ballots and found that Gore would still have lost if the recount he had sought had been done. Gore wanted a recount in a few counties. The consortium said a statewide recount probably would have given Gore the election by about 100 votes."

I thought the consortium found a much bigger lead by Gore - that it was a pretty difinitive win. Anyone have any stats on this?? And what's up with the last sentence above? - a statewide recount PROBABLY would have given Gore the election". I thought they DID a recount and had a number. Maybe my memory on this report is off, or my understanding of it and how it was done, but this just doesn't seem right to me. Anyone know??

[procopia]

20. NORC study found very narrow margin for Gore

HOWEVER, that doesn't take into account the thousands of voters illegally purged from the voter rolls, the illegal military ballots, the illegal tampering by Republicans of absentee ballot applications, etc.

[emmadoggy]

22. Thanks for the clarification.

I think I have some info on this buried somewhere in all my bookmarks, but dang! I have so many it's hard to find things sometimes, lol.

Thanks again.

[0rganism]

24. don't forget the "overvotes"...

thousands upon thousands of ballots where the voter punched the wrong chad, then punched the Gore-Lieberman chad and marked the ballot "I meant to vote for Gore" and such, that were disallowed in the recount even though the intentions were clear.

[DeeDeeNY]

19. The role of the media

is also covered by Mark Crispin Miller
in "Fooled Again", a great book.

[brettdale]

21. kick

kick

[me b zola]

23. .

[AtomicKitten]

25. bittersweet

particularly in light of the utter chaos created by Junior

I firmly believe Al Gore deserves a do-over in 2008 and hope he throws his hat in the ring.