Voting and Counting
/If the election were held today and the votes were counted fairly,
Senator John Kerry would probably win. But the votes won't be counted
fairly, and the disenfranchisement of minority voters may determine the
outcome. Recent national poll results range from a
three-percentage-point Kerry lead in the A.P.-Ipsos poll released
yesterday to an eight-point Bush lead in the Gallup poll. But if you
line up the polls released this week from the most to the least
favorable to President Bush, the polls in the middle show a tie at
about 47 percent. This is bad news for Mr. Bush because undecided
voters usually break against the incumbent - not always, but we're
talking about probabilities. Those middle-of-the-road polls also show
Mr. Bush with job approval around 47 percent, putting him very much in
the danger zone. Electoral College projections based on state polls
also show a dead heat. Projections assuming that undecided voters will
break for the challenger in typical proportions give Mr. Kerry more
than 300 electoral votes. But if you get your political news from cable
TV, you probably have a very different sense of where things stand.
CNN, which co-sponsored that Gallup poll, rarely informs its viewers
that other polls tell a very different story. The same is true of Fox
News, which has its own very Bush-friendly poll. As a result, there is
a widespread public impression that Mr. Bush holds a commanding lead. [more]
- 52% Of African Americans Believe Their Votes Won't Be Counted. The Wall Street Journal (10/22, A4, Harwood) reports in its "Washington
Wire" column, "A 52% majority of African-Americans worry it's 'very' or
'somewhat' likely their votes won't be counted, while 20% of whites do.
But
blacks express higher election interest. Journal/NBC pollsters Peter
Hart and Bill McInturff say Kerry's 83% support may understate his
final total; Gore got 90% in 2000. Bush's party worries more about
fraud. Some 44% of Republicans say it is very or somewhat likely that
Americans who are ineligible will vote anyway; only 28% of Democrats
voice that concern. Voters overall split, 48%-47%, on the likelihood
that computer technology will bring more corruption or miscounting." [more]
- Fighting Voter Suppression in Florida [more
]
