The Presidential race is over, Barack Obama had a landslide victory, picking up electoral votes in such places as Indiana and even one of Nebraska's. Nothing like Florida in 2000 or Ohio 2008 happened and the race was called early at 11pm EST. Yet after many of us went to bed, the polls closed in Alaska one hour after the crowds were cheering for Obama and the results from up north are extremely troubling.
From RawStory:
A possible "Bradley effect" in the opposite way is one possibility for Stevens' narrow margin that puts him ahead of Mayor Begich, but it doesn't add up for the other races at the Presidential level and for the Congressional seat. If I had to put on my Captain Obvious glasses, I might just see that Democratic votes were wiped off the tallies. Now who would do such a thing?
Even though the polls this year have generally been pretty accurate, they were way off in Alaska. Stevens was running between 7% and 22% behind his Democratic challenger in the polls, but now he is narrowly ahead in the vote count
Polling analysis website 538.com comments, "The emerging conventional wisdom is that there was some sort of a Bradley Effect in this contest -- voters told pollsters that they weren't about to vote for that rascal Ted Stevens, when in fact they were perfectly happy to. Convicted felons are the new black, it would seem. The problem with this theory is that the polling failures in Alaska weren't unique to Stevens."
The polls also consistently showed Rep. Young as losing by at least 6%, but he is currently ahead in the vote count by 8%. Even in the presidential race, where polls showed McCain leading by 14% or less, the vote count has him winning by 61% to 35% -- precisely the same margin as George Bush in 2004. That represents a polling error of at least 11% to 14% in all three races.
At the same time, total voter turnout appears to be about 11% lower in Alaska this year than in 2004 -- despite over 20,000 new registrations, heavy turnout in the primaries, record early voting, long lines at the polls on Election Day, and the state's own governor being on the ballot, all of which had led to an expectation of record participation.
Well can you guess who tallies the vote up in the Last Frontier State? If you said "Diebold" then congratulations, but for the voters in the state, I apologize. Of course, Alaskans already know the company's miserable track record, with possible illegalities in 2004 as well as the primary race in 2006 with a state that scoffs at those that would dare question Diebold's accuracy. It is still early, but one thing is for sure, this whole thing smells fishy.
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