A Conversation about False Recall
Analyst
I see that you are still using False Recall to explain the 2004 Final National Exit Poll 43/37% returning Bush/Gore voter mix as well as the 2008 Final 46/37% returning Bush/Kerry mix. You have agreed that they are mathematically impossible since they imply that there were millions more returning Bush voters than were alive.
Naysayer
Correct. The mixes are not possible mathematically, but False Recall on the part of returning Gore and Kerry voters was why they misreported their past vote in favor of the previous winner – Bush in both cases.
Analyst
Even though Bush had a 48% approval rating in 2004 and 22% in 2008?
Naysayer
Yes. That is what the NES surveys have consistently shown.
Analyst
So you are saying that Final National Exit Poll weights and vote shares are the result of actual survey samples, and therefore include returning Gore and Kerry voters who misreported their vote at more than double the rate of Bush voters?
Naysayer
That is correct. The Final NEP returning voter mix and corresponding vote shares are based on actual sampled results.
Analyst
OK, then let’s compare the preliminary
Naysayer
Fair enough.
Analyst
I assume that you are aware that only 3168 respondents were asked how they voted in 2000 but all were asked whom they just voted for - and Kerry won the total sample by 51-48%. How do you explain that?
Naysayer
The exit poll was not completed at
Analyst
But there were only 613
additional respondents after
Naysayer
That is not the way to look at it.
Analyst
Why not?
Naysayer
The exit pollsters had to re-adjust the mix and vote shares based on voter turnout, among other things.
Analyst
So you now claim that the NEP was adjusted to force a match to the incoming vote count.
Naysayer
That is correct. It's Standard Operating Procedure.
Analyst
But you previously stated that the Final 43/37% Bush/Gore
returning voter mix was a sampled result
and that Gore voters misstated their vote
and told the pollsters they voted for Bush in 2000. And now you claim that the
pollsters forced the Final National Exit Poll to match the recorded vote. That
is a clear contradiction.
Naysayer
You just don’t get it, do you? You have never contradicted the NES study which indicates that voters misreport their past vote.
Analyst
You are changing the subject. You have just conceded that the 43/37 mix was not a sample; that it was an artifice to match the Final NEP to the recorded vote - along with implausible increases in Bush shares of returning and new voters. When are you going to give up the false recall canard?
Naysayer
And when are you going to stop trying to convince everyone that Kerry won the election and that the early exit polls were correct? You are setting back the cause of election reform. Your work is an embarrassment. That’s why I have been debunking your posts since 2005. It's my job to expose your crappy analysis.
Analyst
It’s your job? Oh.
But it's not just my "crappy" analysis that you find fault with. You
have also tried to debunk analyses of scores of researchers who have determined
that the election was stolen. You laud Farhad Manjoo of Salon, who tried to debunk the RFK Jr..
Rolling Stone article "Was the 2004 Election Stolen"?
RFK presented powerful evidence that
But I digress. Does it even matter what the voters said
about their past vote?
We know that Bush had 50.45
million recorded votes in 2000. We know that very close to 5% of Election 2000 voters passed on
before the 2004 election and therefore 2.5
million Bush 2000 voters died. Therefore, the maximum number of returning Bush voters was 48 million – assuming 100% turnout
of living Bush 2000 voters in 2004.
The maximum returning Bush voter share
of the 122 million votes recorded in 2004 was 39.2% (48/122).
So why do we even care what returning voters said about their
past vote? We only want to know how they
voted in 2004. We can test different turnout
scenarios. Even if 98% of Bush
voters turned out and just 90% of Gore
voters turned out, Kerry still wins by 7
million votes - assuming
Assuming a feasible turnout of returning voters, Bush vote shares have to be increased to implausible levels above those in the Final NEP to match the recorded vote.
New voters: from 41% at 1222am to 46% (2% MoE).
Bush voters: from 90% to 92% (1% MoE).
Gore voters from 8% to 15% (1% MoE).
So which argument are
you making?
Is it 1) massive Gore
voter defection or 2) Gore voter false recall?
1) Defection: You
require implausible Bush vote shares
(far beyond the MoE) applied to a feasible return voter mix. This means
that you must also believe that at
2) False Recall: Returning Gore voters misreported their past 2000 vote when they said that they voted for Bush in 2000. Yet they told the truth about their 2004 vote.
You have also agreed that the 43/37% mix is mathematically impossible:
a) For returning Bush voters to comprise 43% of the 122 million who voted in 2004 there had to be at least 4.6 million phantom Bush voters.
b) The change in the returning Bush/Gore voter mix from 41/39% at
The premise is that the returning voter mix was based on an actual sample of the 3168 respondents who were asked how they voted in 2000. It's also the basis of your False Recall argument. But at the same time you acknowledge that the exit pollsters always force the exit poll to match the recorded vote – a contradiction.
You cannot have it both ways.
It appears that False Recall is your primary canard, since that is the one that you constantly refer to. Perhaps it's easier to sell that myth than the ridiculous Gore defection rates that would be required to match the vote assuming fairly equal 2000 voter turnout. But you continue to promote both myths. You switch from one to the other depending on which is contextually most appropriate for misleading your diminishing audience.
Naysayer
So what if it’s a contradiction? You’re just as wrong now as you have always been. See you in 2010 when I will once again kick your ass.