We Checked the Iowa Caucus Math. Here’s Where It Didn’t Add Up. (still counting)

NY Times ^ | 2/14/20 | Keith Collins, Denise Lu, Charlie Smart

[Libloather]

Since the troubled Iowa caucuses on Feb. 3, the state Democratic party has revised the results for about 100 of the state’s 1,765 precincts, and officials are still scrambling to verify dozens more precinct results after reports of widespread inconsistencies.

There has often been some fuzziness in the way the results of the Iowa caucuses were calculated and reported. But this is the first year that Iowa Democrats released raw vote counts. The transparency provided the public with its first opportunity to check the complex math that determines which candidates get the delegates they need to win the Democratic nomination.

And in many cases, the math did not check out. In such a close race - Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Ind., is leading Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont by a tenth of a percentage point - even small mistakes can add up.

Here are some of the inconsistencies and errors The New York Times uncovered in an analysis of the Iowa Democratic Party’s results.

[Libloather]

What it means When the totals don’t match up, it is difficult to determine which count is accurate.

Whew! Good thing that the NY Times points that out for those who can't figure it out for themselves. Just thinking, no matter how bad the USPS may be, should the results be mailed in next time? It would speed things up a bit.

[Zathras]

“Math is hard”
1-2-3-4-5...

[cgbg]

It looks like we now know how many New York Slimes reporters it takes to screw in a light bulb—three!

[Enterprise]

That pretty much sums it up. They’re DEMOCRATS, and math is hard.

[gibsonguy]

Mission Accomplished they kept Bernie from winning. They could not allow Bernie to win the first two primaries. He would have too much momentum and the screw job would be too obvious.

[The people have spoken]

complex math

Nothing that can't be done in Excel.

[Still Thinking]

Whew! Good thing that the NY Times points that out for those who can't figure it out for themselves.

Well, I mean to be fair, they are writing for people who'd read that rag.

[exDemMom]

There has often been some fuzziness in the way the results of the Iowa caucuses were calculated and reported. ... The transparency provided the public with its first opportunity to check the complex math that determines which candidates get the delegates they need to win the Democratic nomination.

It's math, it should not be complicated. How hard can it possibly be to tabulate the results and use them to proportionally allocate delegates?

I'm thinking that any fuzziness or complication are more for the purpose of giving the DemocRATs a way to manipulate the outcome without being too obvious about it.

[fproy2222]

They need to hire a republican accountant to figure it out.

[Pilgrim's Progress]

And on valentine’s day, just just might work . . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dyEq-EEHYkQ

[Gay State Conservative]

NY Times = lie,after lie,after lie,after lie!

[dynachrome]

Math is easy. Fraudulent math is harder.

[catnipman]

well, i’ll give NYT credit for one thing: they can at least do election math (unlike your garden variety Democrats) ...

[M. Thatcher]

the screw job would be too obvious.

It's still obvious.

[Billthedrill]

“Complex math”? Um, no, partial differential equations is complex math. This is addition and multiplication, with a healthy dose of thumb-on-the-scale. The complex part is not getting caught.

[yesthatjallen]

They were using the app as a cover to manipulate the tally.

When the app failed they panicked.

It's taking a long time because they have to find a way to reconcile the actual numbers and the manipulated numbers.

[motor_racer]

Common Core math

[VanShuyten]

I'm not really surprised that they've screwed up so badly. Iowa, home of the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, has gone from always being near the top in the nation in math and reading to the great middle of the pack. Undoubtedly, the Dim portion of the population has caused most of the slide.

[Qiviut]

I looked down the mistakes list & with some proper attention to detail, it looks to me like the “boo boos” should have been caught - the greater majority, anyway. What a cluster ... Dems can’t be trusted to do anything, but we knew that already.

[DBrow]

The big problem is that, this time, the count was done with chain of custody and accountability. That app fer shur messed things up!