Most Minn. Senate 'undervotes' are from Obama turf

[underpants]

Source: AP

ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — An Associated Press analysis of votes in the tight, still-to-be decided race for a U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota shows that most ballots lacking a recorded choice in the election were cast in counties won by Democrat Barack Obama.

The finding could have implications for Republican Sen. Norm Coleman and Democrat Al Franken, who are headed for a recount separated by the thinnest of margins — a couple of hundred votes, or about 0.01 percent.

About 25,000 ballots statewide carried votes for president but not for the Senate race. Although some voters might have intentionally bypassed the race, others might have mismarked their ballot, or optical scanning machines might have misread them.

A recount due to begin Nov. 19 will use manual inspection to detect such ballots.

Read more: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gMpTmr96V5hKIfyHT4Av4jsVQgrQD94AHS080

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Meanwhile, Coleman is using the state's open records law to ask Minnesota and all 87 counties for access to voting data and other records, questioning gains Franken has made since Election Day.

Coleman campaign manager Cullen Sheehan complained of "statistically dubious and improbable shifts that are overwhelmingly accruing to the benefit of Al Franken."

Secretary of State Mark Ritchie said it was unfortunate that the Coleman campaign was questioning the integrity of the election, noting that adjustments are a normal part of the canvassing process.

[PearliePoo2]

1. Under votes in Obama's turf suggests............

Franken will win this.
The odds are overwhelmingly in his favor.
If so, this would be....what....57 or 58 senators?

[Lance_Boyle]

5. 58

Oregon gave us 57. Than there's the Stevens seat, which will be unoccupied if he wins, so subtract one from the R side either way that one goes.

[cloudythescribbler]

6. As for the Alaska senate election, see THIS URL about election fraud:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/shannyn-moore/alaska-on-ebay-election-n_b_142021.html

[MNReformer]

25. Plus there is a runoff election in Georgia.

I never believed Chambliss held that seat honestly in the first place.

[The Wizard]

2. Could this be the test case needed

to abolish all electronic voting. Both sides should sue for an honest vote count. The discovery process will expose enough flaws to cause every state to abandon systems that encourage election rigging.
Paper ballots deposited in locked clear plastic boxes in the middle of the room for all to witness to be counted at the end of the day by all who care to watch is so simple. Purple thumbs or some form of identifier to ensure people don't vote more than once is also required.
The idea of counting election results in secret is just so Stalinist.
Free and fair elections are the bedrock upon which democracy is founded. Yes we can. Yes we must.

[truthisfreedom]

8. I've never felt a sense of mistrust here in Minnesota. We've had optical scan machines, the same

units, as far as I know, for as long as I've been voting, and I'm 48. The problem with the machines may be that they're not being cleaned properly.

At least we have clear paper votes that can be read by hand. No hanging chads, no butterfly ballots, just simple optical ovals filled in with pens, right next to clearly-printed names.

[MNReformer]

26. I have had a lot of distrust of these systems.

And made it clear, along with other activists, that we needed better laws and we got some. The problems with ES&S and other optiscans are well-documented and we have made sure our SOS knows about them.

Under our former SOS, an evil Republican, Mary Kiffmeyer, there was a lot of doubt about our elections. There were some very odd results in particular in the sixth district in 2004. Screen shots from election night were taken that showed an excess of votes in the third-party columns in at least three counties. The next day the SOS website had been changed to reduce these totals. Kiffmeyer is on record (it was in the paper) as trying to pass the irregularities off to "absentees", which never made sense. Our current SOS is aware of this situation and was provided the screen shots. So was Mark Dayton, in an effort to convince him to challenge the EV in 2004.

[LisaL]

11. Oh please. It will take forever to count the votes manually.

We wouldn't know who the president is for weeks. Do you not remember hanging chads?

[bagrman]

17. So what, getting it right can take a week. He doesn't get the job till the next year. VOTE BY MAIL.

[NikolaC]

20. Oh Please

Many countries have paper ballots that are counted by hand and the results are in that evening. For now, that seems to be the best option. The machines have been nothing more than a tool to aid in election theft.

[applejuice]

23. Yes, the reality is that hand counting can take LESS time...

Think about it, each precinct in a city may have several hundred voters - if you have a Dem and a Rep sit down together for each precinct and hand count several hundred ballots it is not going to take any longer than sending 50,000 to 100,000 ballots to a central building and then load them into a machine.

Many countries hand count the votes and they still have the results that evening.

[peacetalksforall]

3. Trust. Where did it go? 1) The machines are failing and they are still being purchased.

2) I always assumed that each candidate who won and went to Washington had a mind of their own, a dream for the country, and idea of what they could do for it, and most importantly, strived to represent their constituents - for the good of all people.

Norm always seems to me to be a bought and paid for Senator representing someone who can't quite be identified precisely. It has seemed that he was hand picked because someone knew he could be given certain jobs. Or, perhaps, he presented himself to someone as someone who would do what was asked - to the point that he would embarass most and walk away and do it again. Now he is saying embarassing things in this phase of the recount.

Al Franken is representing us well. No drama. No game playing. Just the facts. No givng up. No shrinking.

(Yet, nationwide, worldwide right wing corporate tv people are still calling him - The comedian, Al Franken.)

[ananda]

4. Go Franken! And go paper ballots!

The entire nation needs to move to paper ballots.

[Wilms]

10. They ARE using paper ballots.

Everyone was so concerned about getting rid of Touch Screen DREs that they forgot to mention that paper ballots are counted by optical scan...a computer.

In this case the margin was such that a recount was triggered.

It doesn't always happen that way.

[peacetalksforall]

13. OK OK. PAPER BALLOTS and PAPER COUNTING. And PAPER TALLIES AND TRANSMITTALS.

If Obama does things right, there will be no shortage of volunteers to do the work on both sides of all ages). Our vote, our work. NO PRIVATIZED machines owned by Republicans and none founded by Senators like Hagel or Friends of Cheney or Bush.

[LisaL]

15. Right.

Whatever on Earth gives you an idea that people manually courting votes is going to be any more accurate than machine counts?
Try to add couple of numbers in your head and then use a calculator to get a clue.

[peacetalksforall]

16. Counting numbers in my head doesn't relate to counting ballots.

[NikolaC]

21. Sooo

In those countries where the paper ballots are counted manually (Canada is a good example), the people would be so confused and dumb they would make a lot of mistakes counting? That is a very simplistic and insulting view, IMO, of counting votes by hand.

[MNReformer]

29. Exactly. We count ballots by hand in the caucuses.

Why not count them on election night? We can get enough volunteers and watchdogs.

[merwin]

27. At least it is on paper so a recount can be done properly.

[MNReformer]

30. A computer that has secret programming. Not good. n/t

[LisaL]

12. Minnesota is using paper ballots.

Which are scanned by optical scanner.
There is nothing so far to indicate that these machines have failed.
There might be undervotes because the voter didn't properly fill the ballot, but if the intent of the voter is clear, those ballots would be counted during manual recount.

[John Q. Citizen]

18. These machines have a built in failure rate. If you run the ballots through twice you

almost always get a different tally. The difference, is however, usually a small amount.

Mandatory random hand counts of a significant sample size of the paper ballots is needed to insure the process is fair. And of course strict chain of custody for the original ballots. When that is also done, optical scanners are a pretty good solution.

In cases where the vote is almost identical, you need to count them all by hand.

[MNReformer]

28. MN has some good random auditing procedures

But the machines are hardly fool-proof. All the experts agree anything electronic can and will be hacked. The most worrisome thing is that these machines are manufactured be Republicans who are hard partisans and heavy donors and who have made a lot of money from their sales. The other problem is that their software is secret and secretly programmed. The ballot definition files can be changed with hidden programs. Tabulators can be fixed and the results can be changed in the databases. And the machines are tested by labs that a Republican partisan Donetta Davidson at the Elections Assistance Commission approved. In 2006 she released machines for use that had been certified by a lab, CIBER, that had lost its accreditation.

[Claire Beth]

7. Hang in there Al !!!!!!!

[Kolesar]

9. Posting at DailyKos.com indicates that voters did not like the negativity & withheld votes

...for Franken or Coleman. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/11/6/20279/1127/736/656240

[Zorra]

14. Hey Norm: Is this just the tip of the iceberg? n/t

[senaca]

19. Could this affect the Bachman nomination? Could 25,000 votes make a difference?

Edited because I realized that 25,000 votes were statewide.

[elocs]

22. It's too bad we need to confuse people with the facts like MN already uses paper ballots,

as we do here in WI. We also use optical scanners here in WI and I am confident in their accuracy while knowing they are not perfect. Strictly hand counting ballots is not perfect either since humans are involved, but our paper ballots that are optically scanned to be counted may be hand counted if the need arises and it is fairly straightforward to determine intent.

I realize that voting by mail is hailed as the greatest thing since sliced bread, but I wonder why when I go to the post office to mail a letter or package I am asked if I want confirmation of delivery or insurance? My god! It's the mail! What could possibly go wrong? And for exactly how much would I insure my vote?

What will our reaction here at DU be if a hand recount shows Coleman to be the winner? Will we refuse to accept any result that does not match our expectations, or will it continue to be a tinfoil hat conspiracy? Will we refuse to accept that maybe a good number of the undervotes were actually people who chose not to vote for a Senate candidate? A good many may, but there will always be the ones who view any Democratic loss as a conspiratorially stolen election.

[EFerrari]

32. When vote flipping and undercounts stop showing up only in Dem precincts

I'll hang up my :tinfoilhat:

[elocs]

34. There is no vote flipping in MN with paper ballots

and undercounting is a matter of how or if the ballots were marked and can be easily remedied with a hand recount. We have very similar voting methods in MN and WI, using paper ballots that are counted by optical scanners and I have great confidence in our systems here. If anyone can present a 100% foolproof and tamperproof system which is also 100% secure and accurate and perfect, then please present it, but as long as we are dealing with people and machines then there will always be mistakes.

[EFerrari]

36. Yes, no flipping on OpScan. We have the same system here.

And unless we have big enough audits, there is no way to know if the counts are accurate or not. Paper ballots are only as useful as the transparency of their counting.

It was via OpScan ballots that election officials in OH tried to stack the 2004 recount. That wasn't exactly a mistake and people went to jail for it, which is nice.

[elocs]

37. You use "vote flipping" differently than I would.

I look at vote flipping as where a voter selects a candidate using e-voting hardware and the machine counts the vote for another candidate. Although my vote is counted by a machine, I do not vote on a machine, but mark the ballot myself using a pen. I am totally confident with the paper ballots and optical scan counting that we use here in WI.

[EFerrari]

38. Vote flipping typically refers to touchscreens -- because you can see it

"fliP", right? IIRC, it's possible to program OpScans to "flip" votes, too, but it would be invisible to the voter.

The key to using OpScans is to have a good enough manual audit to check the machine totals. Just having the paper ballot doesn't mean much if no one counts them.

[MNReformer]

24. They should not have "access".

They want to mess with the records. Now we shall have a recount with good laws and a good, honest, informed Secretary of State. Couldn't have happened in a better place than my home state. We have been working on our election process and making it a "model".

[Peace Patriot]

31. Coleman complained of "statistically dubious and improbable shifts...

"...that are overwhelmingly accruing to the benefit of"...a DEMOCRAT!

Holy Toledo! Hell must be freezing over (or unfreezing...or whatever). The columns of the Bushwhack palace crumbling, the earth opening up, it's raining frogs, the sky is falling, the sky is falling....

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[EFerrari]

33. This weekend is a lot different than that miserable weekend after 2004.

Lovin' it! :hi:

[Peace Patriot]

39. Oh, Lordy, yes! But sfexpat2000, did you see this?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=405x9608

Chiquita's death squad attorney is being floated for A.G. I am...appalled.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dan-kovalik/lawyer-for-chiquita-in-co_b_141919.html

Please God, no!

:grouphug:

[EndElectoral]

35. Have absentees and early voting been counted yet in MN?

[Peace Patriot]

40. MN is doing it now.

There is some discussion of it here:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x4402676#4415074

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"Early voting" is really a misnomer, isn't it? You vote early, and your vote gets counted LAST, way after the election, sometimes in the midst of a hot recount controversy. Doesn't seem fair.

[customerserviceguy]

41. I think everybody's missing the point on this story

These are not votes that "should have" gone to Franken, but didn't get tallied because they weren't read properly. These "undervotes" are where a person voted at the top of the ticket for a President, then just didn't vote in a race that was under that. Happens all the time when people aren't familiar with the candidates on a lesser publicized race, and the voter just doesn't want to vote a straight party ticket.

Being as most of the undervotes are in places where Obama did well, the implication is that people who were motivated solely to vote for Obama went in and did just that, they really didn't care enough to figure out who else on that ballot would help them realize their goals. Nobody's saying anything, but there may be an implication that most of the undervoters were African-American.

I got a lot of experience with undervotes in the 2004 gubernatorial election in Washington State. I was one of the vote counters in Grays Harbor County, and we had a number of people who it was clear intended to vote for President, and maybe a few people down the ballot that they didn't know, but did not want to make a pick in the governor's race. They knew how to blacken a circle, they just didn't care if it was Gregoire or Rossi at that time.