This is an excellent interview I had with Steven Freeman back in 2006, just before the mid-term elections. Steven Freeman holds a Ph.D. from MIT’s Sloan School of Management and is one of the nation’s experts on our voting system. We discuss his book, Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen?
I kick off the conversation by discussing electronic voting. Steven uses an excellent analogy, suggesting electronic voting is like handing your vote to someone behind the curtain. In this Wizard of Oz analogy, as a voter, you are therefore dependent upon that person behind the curtain to cast a vote correctly for you. Without your knowing it, they could change the vote or simply not vote at all. There’s no way for you to know. Electronic voting is a black box. We also discuss a Princeton study which showed how easy it is to hack into these electronic voting machines. Very troubling.
I discuss other forms of voting as well, but I thought it was important to bring exit polls into the discussion. In 2004, there were several prevailing theories (lies) about exit polls. Even if you were paying attention, you might’ve missed the spin. First, we were told that exit polls were not all that accurate…wrong. Dr. Freeman produces plenty of data in his book and in our discussion, proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that exit polls are extremely accurate. As a matter of fact, exit polls are used by international watchdog groups to monitor voting in places like the Ukraine and Georgia (the country, not the state…although the state could use a little monitoring). We were then told that the exit polls were preferentially answered by Democrats and not by Republicans. Of course, the data showed the opposite to be true. (Robert Kennedy, Jr’s excellent article from 2006)
Also, Rachel Maddow chatted with Robert Kennedy, Jr about election fraud on her show. I guess that this is an example of what was old (2000 and 2004) is new again (2008).
This is an excellent discussion. Enjoy!
Special Edition - The Errington Thompson Show with Steven Freeman PhD [18:16m]:
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Tags: Elections, Podcasts by ecthompson
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I speak with Brian Katulis, an expert on the Middle East from the Center for American Progress. We discuss Iraq and Afghanistan, where it is clear that the levels of violence are down but political resolution still hasn’t happened. 
