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Professor: Residual Votes in the 2008 Minnesota Senate Race likely favor Franken over Coleman
dartmouth.edu ^ | 11-15-08 | Michael C. Herron

Posted on 11/17/2008 7:42:34 PM PST by GraniteStateConservative

The 2008 United States Senate race in Minnesota is one of the closest electoral contests in recent history: as of this writing, out of over 2.9 million ballots cast only 206 votes separate incumbent Republican Senator Norm Coleman and his Democratic challenger, Al Franken. The Minnesota Senate race is slated to be recounted starting on November 19, 2008, and a key issue in the recount will be the approximately 34 thousand residual votes associated with it.

A Senate residual vote is, roughly speaking, the product of a ballot that lacks a recorded Senate vote, and in the Minnesota Senate race there is no doubt that the number of residual votes dwarfs the margin that separates Coleman from Franken. We show using a combination of precinct voting returns from the 2006 and 2008 General Elections that patterns in Senate race residual votes are consistent with, one, the presence of a large number of Democratic-leaning voters, in particular African-American voters, who appear to have deliberately skipped voting in the Coleman-Franken Senate contest and, two, the presence of a smaller number of Democraticleaning voters who almost certainly intended to cast a vote in the Senate race but for some reason did not do so. Ultimately, the anticipated recount may clarify the relative proportions of intentional versus unintentional residual votes. At present, though, the data available suggest that the recount will uncover many of the former and that, of the latter, a majority will likely prove to be supportive of Franken.

(Excerpt) Read more at dartmouth.edu ...


TOPICS: Government; Politics/Elections; US: Minnesota
KEYWORDS: electionussenate; howtostealanelection; votefraud
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To: GraniteStateConservative

They are attempting to again prove that Democrat voters are stupider than Republican voters.


21 posted on 11/17/2008 8:07:42 PM PST by Mike Darancette (I have nothing to say - Oliver Hardy)
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To: Minn

Hey, Maybe the voter wanted to vote for Obama but found Frankin so repulsive they didn’t vote for anyone for the Senate seat, because they refused to vote for a Republican—this should not be!!!!!!!!!!!!


22 posted on 11/17/2008 8:08:47 PM PST by RightLady
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To: GraniteStateConservative

Under-votes are the result of folks being too dumb to know how to use a ballot.

It is important that “all” ballots be counted.

Therefore, stupid people will determine who we send to DC.

Explains a lot to me!!!!!!

Can we start a new USA somewhere?


23 posted on 11/17/2008 8:09:06 PM PST by bneal
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To: milemark

ping


24 posted on 11/17/2008 8:10:14 PM PST by Glacier Honey
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To: flintsilver7
this paper is definitely suggesting that no-votes on the Senate ticket who voted for Obama should be cast for Franken.

That's not my take on it. I read though the whole thing, they are predicting that the recount will find more Franken votes than Coleman votes. They are basing this prediction on an analysis of the voting totals for other candidates in the precincts that had the highest under-votes in the senate race. Since the margin of victory is so small and the number of under-votes large it will only take a small percentage of "hanging chads" to throw the election to Franken.

25 posted on 11/17/2008 8:11:41 PM PST by SC Swamp Fox (Join our Folding@Home team (Team# 36120) keyword: folding)
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To: GraniteStateConservative

This is pure unadulterated BS. It is dangerously close to the Thought Police. If they left it blank I don’t give a damn what they intended. I can sort of follow the logic that anyone too stupid to vote is probably a vote for Franken.

What was or was not intended has passed. Elections should not be won or lost on intentions but on actual votes. The right to vote, to choose, should not be usurped by would-be mind readers.


26 posted on 11/17/2008 8:15:18 PM PST by WildcatClan (The Marxist will reycle the Clintonistas and call it "change".)
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To: GraniteStateConservative

There’s times I’ve not voted for either candidate.

Either they both sucked really bad or there was no information available on the people running, like for a judge.

It certianly did not mean that screwed up my ballot.


27 posted on 11/17/2008 8:17:12 PM PST by DB
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To: GraniteStateConservative

Does the fact that Jesse Ventura was elected Gov. in MN tell you anything about the mental capacity of the MN electorate.


28 posted on 11/17/2008 8:20:28 PM PST by golf lover
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To: GraniteStateConservative

The new pathology,

“Residual Votes” from “Residual Voters”.


29 posted on 11/17/2008 8:21:18 PM PST by headstamp 2 (Been here before)
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To: LiteKeeper

:Why?”

Because Democrats are retarded and can’t fill out a ballot?


30 posted on 11/17/2008 8:21:53 PM PST by DemonDeac
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To: bneal

“Therefore, stupid people will determine who we send to DC.”

What else is new? Its the reason we have the govenrment we have.


31 posted on 11/17/2008 8:22:36 PM PST by DemonDeac
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To: GraniteStateConservative

This is Orwellian.

It used to be that election theft happened in back rooms in the dead of night.

Now the bastards are boasting about it on page one.

We are so f___ed.

The incoming POS-OTUS and the Demo-Nazi Congress will ensure that we never have another free and fair election in this country.

We used to be governed. We will henceforth be ruled by tyrants.


32 posted on 11/17/2008 8:25:56 PM PST by Yankee
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To: GraniteStateConservative
what the Hell is this?...conjecture in place of voting?

tell you what...lets have them vote again....this time maybe that crazy libertarian will support the only sane choice for Senator and therefore, giving Coleman nearly 1/2 million more votes...

33 posted on 11/17/2008 8:26:11 PM PST by cherry
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To: LiteKeeper

According to the article, the higher the education of the voter, the more likely they were to vote for Coleman. The less educated voters were more likely to vote for the funny guy.

What is interesting, the educated voters were most likely to not only vote for president, but also for the other offices down the ticket. However the less educated voters were most likely to just vote for the top of the ticket and leave everything else blank. Now the big problem comes up when they look at each actual ballot. Since most educated voters were used to reading (and able to read) directions telling them to fill in the bubble) they did just that.

However the less educated ones may have bubbled the presidential race in properly and then made an “X” over the other candidates down the line. (possibly in their hurry to get things over with) Since the bubble is hardly filled, the machine would read that as not being filled in, and presto, an undervote. Now when we look at the ballot and see the “X” over the “trying hard to be funny” guy’s name an nothing elsewhere, we might have to assume that voter was wanting to vote for that candidate

Since it was most likely that the educated voter actually filled in their senate selection properly (they voted “R”) and the less educated apparently didn’t (they voted “D”) it is highly likely that we may find more random (possibly) marks that the machine didn’t pick up that were actually votes for that haha guy ( so we better count them that way since we wouldn’t want to disenfranchise those that only know how to mark an “X” as their signature...

It is interesting to note that the more educated the voter is, the more likely they are to care about races on down the line to the local politics...

Sheesh.... We’re screwed if that is how it turns out...

I wonder if any of the gun clingers had trouble filling in circles because their fingers were still in a curl.. Or maybe they marked an x over Sarah’s name “I want her...” Alas we may never know


34 posted on 11/17/2008 8:28:51 PM PST by beaware
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To: GraniteStateConservative; All

I guess from now on we are going to have to put “none of the above” on all ballots for all races just to keep this kind of crap from happening.


35 posted on 11/17/2008 8:29:28 PM PST by calex59
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To: GraniteStateConservative
WTF is the spineless republican party doing about this? These idiots couldn't fight their way out of a wet paper bag. The election continues to be stolen and nobody gives a fat rat's ass.

Really, I think many know what needs to be done. It's now a question of who has the guts to start it.

36 posted on 11/17/2008 8:30:14 PM PST by meyer (We are all John Galt)
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To: All

The easiest way of stealing this election is for the Democrats to at some point mark a small percentage of those ballots which show a vote for Obama and no vote for Senate for Franken and few McCain ballots for Colman, just enough to put them over the top.

My guess is the Democrats who control the election process in the high population areas have already made the changes.


37 posted on 11/17/2008 8:32:22 PM PST by Jonah Johansen ("Coming soon to a neighborhood near you")
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To: Jonah Johansen
The easiest way of stealing this election is for the Democrats to at some point mark a small percentage of those ballots which show a vote for Obama and no vote for Senate for Franken and few McCain ballots for Colman, just enough to put them over the top.,/i>

It doesn't seem to matter what they do. They're stealing it, and the worthless, candy-ass, spineless, braindead, yellow-bellied, sh##head republicans are standing there with their thumb up their own butts scratching their genitals with the other hand and not saying a friggin word. Morons - all of them, morons. They'll never get another vote from me. Never. I hate cowards!

38 posted on 11/17/2008 8:35:38 PM PST by meyer (We are all John Galt)
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To: GraniteStateConservative
Intellectual justification for stealing the election? In Washington State they call this “a model of democracy” since in Orwellian new speak democracy has nothing to do with the people choosing, instead it now means one party rule by a cabal that calls itself Democratic.
39 posted on 11/17/2008 8:37:40 PM PST by Libertarianize the GOP (Make all taxes truly voluntary)
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To: milemark
What’s a circus without a clown?

You mean, what's one more clown? The Senate is already a clown car.


40 posted on 11/17/2008 8:37:43 PM PST by Clock King (Radical Conservatives, arise!)
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