Here is my theory about Rove's peculiar "Ohio Moment" on Faux

[BlueStreak]

This is just a theory without much evidence.

Shortly after Faux declared Ohio for Obama (after all other networks had alreday done so) Rove said (I am paraphrasing), "Wait, you can't declare Ohio. I'm on the phone with Husted and there are lots of votes out there. We're going to win this one." Then shortly after that, we learned Husted went home about 10PM (as I recall) saying, basically "That's it. I'm done. It's over." (again my paraphrase based on the reporting)

I believe Husted and Rove had a plan to flip a lot of votes, and the discussion between Rove and Husted was not about the real vote but was actually about just how much flipping they would have to do. But Husted was only willing to do that if he thought Romney would be elected because otherwise an Obama Department of Justice very well might put him in prison. When Husted saw IA, WI, And PA drop and he saw the FL, NV, and CO were going Obama's way, he said "To Hell with you Karl. I'm not going to prison for your millionaires" and went home.

I mean seriously, after everything Husted did to try to influence this election, how could he just walk out at 10PM?

If you are the chief election official in one of the key states and you have had a passionate interest in this, do you just walk out right in the middle of things?

[flamingdem]

1. Good point, Husted saw it slipping away

but check out the fudgey numbers noted at:

freepress.org

[loudsue]

37. Holy shit!

Thanks for that link. I wandered over to the article about the nuclear plant in Vermont. MAN THAT SUCKS!!!

[kath]

43. Do you a link (or a title) for the specific article(s) you're talking about at freepress.org?

[Spitfire of ATJ]

46. Link

http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2012/4801

[brush]

53. Here's another link

This one is real comprehensive, with plenty of other links explaining how the Rove/Romney "fix" was thwarted.

http://markcrispinmiller.com/2012/11/score-one-at-last-for-the-election-integrity-movement/

[Whisp]

84. thanks for that link. some really juicy stuff there.

one led to Bradblog vs. Chuck Todd - Chuckie tweeting that electronic machine fraud is as conspiracy as Trump's birtherisms.

But Brad put down that ugly dog good on his blog - smacked the asshole back to last Monday. I wish it would have been face to face but looks like ole fake Chuckie wouldn't invite him to talk face to face on his show.

Gold mine of info in that link - thanks again.

[woolldog]

2. I dont think he said he was on the phone with husted.

He said he was on the phone with Romney's head ohio campaign guy and he was on the SOS website hitting refresh every few seconds to get updated returns.

[robinlynne]

27. He said he was on the phone with Husted.

[LisaL]

73. I don't think so.

He was just talking about votes being out there for Romney. Haven't mentioned Husted at all, as far as my recollection goes.

[robinlynne]

82. I remember clearly. It was an important moment.

[woolldog]

89. Let's look at the video shall we?

&feature=player_detailpage#t=104s

The relevant portion of the video begins at 1:40. He does not say anything about being on the phone with Husted. You're mistaken.

[robinlynne]

98. well. the other man says: Karl was jsut on the phone with somebody . Rove says; the secretary of st

state, then changes the subject .. a few moments later Rove says: I have the director of the Romney campaign on the other line. He is checking the web, etc."

[MightyMopar]

3. It was funny how the percentage of vote counted for Ohio stayed so long at 65%

It was funny how the percentage of vote counted for Ohio stayed so long at 65% and then when it became obvious that Ohio wouldn't be needed because of Obama carrying Virginia and Colorado, then Ohio fell.

[loudsue]

38. We've seen this before on DU.

This is how they've been stolen in the past.

[Ghost Dog]

49. Affirmative. n/t

[DCKit]

4. He still did bad things.

I'm pretty sure the men in black are still going to show up at his door. It's not about "degrees" of badness. I'm against the death penalty, but those who would subvert the vote, not so much. They're more dangerous than serial killers.

[grasswire]

5. I have been thinking along a similar line

My thought was that there was indeed a plan to steal Ohio, and that for some reason it malfunctioned.

But I like your theory better. In it, Husted would walk out early precisely so he would not be suspected of anything that Rove might try.

[pointsoflight]

12. Or the gap was bigger than they anticipated, so their suppression/stealing wasn't enough.

It's a tough game to play. You can swing things too much or it'll be obvious. So I think it's very possible they thought the gap was 2 or 3, they pulled crap that they thought would get them that 2 or 3, but it turns out that Obama had more support than that, so they fell short.

[robinlynne]

29. I believe you just described the 2008 election, exactly.

[Scuba]

56. +1

[Firebirds01]

71. in 2008

Obama won ohio by only 22 votes per precinct. How hard would it be to flip a couple dozen in every county? They saw that it wouldnt be enough and dropped the plan.

[LisaL]

77. Obama won OH by a larger margin in 2008 than in 2012.

[loudsue]

40. Rove, Inc. will knee-cap him if that's the case.

We'll watch & see if Husted gets Wellstoned or not.

[LuvLoogie]

41. It's Rove who'll end up as a stinking bag of gas floating down the Cuyahoga.

Or maybe he'll just lose a pinky.

[SubgeniusHasSlack]

6. Rats, sinking ships,

same as it ever was.

[loudsue]

7. I agree. But I also think that "software patch" that Husted put in that

had never been "tested", was where the fix was supposed to take place. AND, if you'll remember, Anonymous had SPECIFICALLY WARNED KARL ROVE that they knew he was trying to fix it, and that he wouldn't get away with it.

THAT, I think, is a big part of what Husted was being paid to do by Karl Rove out of his brazillionaire's purse. That, I think, is why Rmoney was so totally confident that he was going to win that he only had an acceptance speech and had his fireworks ready to roll.

The fix was in. Like Rove did in the past. I just hope they still get caught somehow.

[BlueStreak]

16. If that patch was truly a tabulation-only thing, that suggests the game plan was

1) Push hard in the days leading up to the election to make sure all the MSM (not just Faux) was repeating the narrative "Oh Dearie, this is so complicated. I declare there has never been an election closer then this one." And they definitely accomplished that, which was astounding in the face of so much obvious evidence that the swing states weren't really close at all.

2) Create a smokescreen of chaos. They definitely did that in Florida with all those long lines, and tried to do likewise in Ohio.

3) Pull the big flip and get the networks all to declare for Ohio. Just like Florida in 2000, somebody would eventually go through all the records and discover the problem. But by then Romney would be in the WH, or at least the networks would have christened him the winner and any attempt to question it would be reported as sour grapes. This is exactly what happened in Florida 2000. It was months later that the NY Times completed an evaluation of the votes in all counties and determined beyond any doubt that Gore was actually the winner and actually was the rightful President. But they published that on page 35 because they knew nobody would do anything about it.

And that would have worked. The problem is that Obama won enough states that were not rigged, and Husted wasn't willing to go through with the plan.

It would be interesting to see if there is any evidence (last minute software patches, etc) of a similar plan in Florida. I have not heard any, but I think they assumed that they could make life so miserable in the minority precincts that those "shiftless takers" would just go home. They didn't need to flip votes. Polls had it within 1% and they could discourage more than 1% of the Dem voters. Boy were they wrong about that one.

[BlueStreak]

23. This was way too close for comfort. Don't forget that the lasting consequences of 2000 and 2004 are

A mountain of debt
A war still ongoing in Afghanistan
John Roberts
Samuel Alito
Citizen's United

[robinlynne]

30. They actually never published it. It was all of the news organizations together who paid the

Univeristy of Chicago to count the votes. Every single news outlet in the consortium knew Gore won. ABC, NBC, all of them.

[BlueStreak]

64. I had heard that the NYT actually did have a short article on it

buried deep in the paper. Nonetheless, Rove knows this is a PR exercise, not an academic vote counting exercise. If he could get the networks to call Ohio for him, and he honestly believed the disenfranchisement in Florida had that one in the bag, and Virginia was winnable -- If he could get all three of those things to happen, he had a great chance to get the vote rigging in Ohio to stick because everybody was so sick of the election process already.

And Rove knows better than anybody that the media has zero interest in truth or fairness. It is not as if the MSM has become more diligent in the practice of journalism since 2000 or 2004. How ridiculous does it sound to even say that last sentence?

This was not 2000 or 2004. The Obama team had a huge force of lawyers on the ground in Ohio, and others have mentioned Kerry being on the scene -- perhaps the general already positioned at the front of the battlefield. For anybody who wants to blow this off as a wild conspiracy theory. well, that means Team Obama belied in that same conspiracy theory.

I am glad the Kerry army did not have to go into battle, but it really sucks that the reason is because we won enough states that were not as corrupt.

[robinlynne]

86. I wish Kerry had counted every vote in 2004. "gone into battle", as it were.

I find it amazing that so any people know for a fact (the consortium) that a presidential election was stolen, and let it be buried.

[ProudProgressiveNow]

99. +1 nt

[byronius]

45. BlueStreak, that's way too coherent.

Really. Clear. Nice job.

[1ProudAtheist]

39. I Personally Believe

That the reason that KKKarl was figiting around like he crapped his drawers, was because he had just found out that his "fix" had been hacked by Anonymous, and he couldn't dare say anything because then he, himself, would have landed in prison. I really believe that the hack got hacked, and he was just finding out about it at that time. He felt sure that he could steal it, and found out on live TV that he couldn't.

[marlakay]

48. That would be great!

Wouldn't that make a exciting movie?

[GCP]

57. That's exactly what my husband and I said

We were certain dirty tricks had been foiled. These points make so much sense. I hadn't realized Anonymous had made an announcement, but I did posit them doing something like this.

[Spitfire of ATJ]

47. Oh please, oh please, oh please let Husted turn squealer and see Karl go to jail for bribery.

[patrice]

8. I'm wondering also how Husted felt about having THE Ohio vote-stealing expert, John Kerry, in his

state, kind of waiting in the wings.

Kerry went there just after Husted decided to load that experimental software into selected voting systems. He did solidarity activities with labor while there, but don't you think if there's anyone who could deliver the precise goods on who/what/when/where/how the vote stealing works, after everything that happened since 2004 and given Kerry's vast personal resources to find out what went down (and responding also to what happened to Ken Blackwell), it'd be Senator Kerry and all he needed was somekind of incident to become part of whatever legal action was already under way.

I think Kerry must have had quite a chilling effect on the whole project to steal Ohio, though, ultimately that wasn't going to work anyway because the turn-out was so heavy that if they stole that many votes it would have been noticed, so Husted gave up.

[Cha]

22. Glad Kerry was there..thanks patrice

[patrice]

95. Me too! He's a Democratic treasure! nt

[ProudProgressiveNow]

100. +1 nt

[politicasista]

101. Kick

An eye opener. Hope more peeps hear it.

[pointsoflight]

9. I'm not going to speculate on the cause, but the vote total in OH is clearly wrong.

If anything, the polls underestimated Obama's support across the country. OH was the only heavily polled state that went in the opposite direction. Obama's internal numbers were similar to the public polls, too. Then you have Romney's internal numbers, which were heavily skewed in other states to the tune of something like 6 percentage points, and even their numbers had Romney down by 5 in OH.

No way was Obama only at +2 .

Were votes flipped? I don't know. I agree that Rove acted very suspicious. But I also think it's possible they were expecting to shave several points off of Obama's totals using standard suppression methods--cutting early voting, forcing long lines, forcing tons of provisionals, etc.

Whatever the case, this shit needs to get fixed. I hope Obama is serious about pursuing this and pursues it hard. We need to get election policies out of the hands of local, partisan officials and need much stronger national standards. This crap should not happen in the U.S.

[farmbo]

60. Remember... today's numbers don't include provisionals and some ABs

Over 200,000 provisional ballots remain to be counted. They will break 2 to 1 for PBO.

Also this year-- for the first time ever-- Husted mailed every Ohio voter a request form for an absentee ballot.

Least you think he was being helpful to voters with this gesture, he wasn't. Once an Ohio voter turns in a AB request and receives the ballot, he/she is checked off in the poll book. If they show up at their polling place they are required to vote provisionally-- which 10s of thousands had to do this year. Mailing out unsolicited AB requests to every household was yet another-- more subtle-- attempt to shift real votes to provisional ballots.

OFA's internals were right-- the spread will probably be between 3- 4%.

[karmaqueen]

10. Very possible.. I don't trust any of them

I always think about when they said Gore won Fla.. The Bush boys jumped off the couch and said it was impossible and ran out the door. I remember the feeling that something fishy was going on...

[gravity]

11. You give Rove way too much credit

Karl Rove isn't an evil genius.

He freaked out on Fox because he realized he wasted $100 million trying to influence the election which had zero effect on the results. His political career is now over. Apparently he is not as bright as we once feared.

[DrToast]

18. +1

[loudsue]

31. No. We aren't giving him "too much" credit. And the billionaires gave him $400 MILLION

because they already knew the kinds of magic he pulled out of the hat for bush. Rove and his ilk are dangerous. VERY dangerous to democracy, to millions of dead Iraqis, Afghans, and thousands of American soldiers. None of that would have happened but for Rove.

[BlueStreak]

66. Much of that was from Adelson. And there was a very simple reason for that.

Adelson was paying that money so that Rove would be on the inside, able to do the same kind of system-rigging to fix Adelson's various problems with the government.

http://www.propublica.org/article/inside-the-investigation-of-leading-republican-money-man-sheldon-adelson

It is just another investment. He is in the gambling business. Not every bet pays off.

[WeekendWarrior]

72. BINGO!

[niyad]

13. maybe rmoney cut off husted's credit card too early?

[Tumbulu]

15. That is a good one!

Thanks for the nice laugh!

[Hermes Daughter]

14. Chilling...

It makes perfect sense. I didn't know about Anonymous but wondered why they didn't get involved and take over the machines. I'm glad to know they were on it. And I didn't know Kerry was in the state. How close we came to having Rove and his satanic crew take over!!! Is there any way to expose this now?

[BlueStreak]

17. Somebody should be impounding some of those ESS tabulation machines with the "experimental" patch

If you have your hands on it, there are definitely forensic tests you can do.

Hell, give one of the machines to Anonymous. It would probably take them less that 24 hours to figure it out.

[loudsue]

32. I wish someone would do just that, and that Anonymous would blow the whistle somehow

without getting themselves in trouble.

[starroute]

75. Anonymous is setting up a secure, open source whistleblower site

I don't know if it will work or not, but their intention is to have a secure site -- like WikiLeaks but without centralized control -- and invite submissions by whistleblowers, people with a line on local corrupt officials, or anyone else with a story to tell. It's supposed to go live between December 12 and 21 and would be just perfect for something like this.

It's called Project Tyler (Fight Club reference, apparnetly), and there are a lot of references to it online, but they're pretty short on details. So I guess we shall just have to wait and see.

[Hermes Daughter]

105. Thanks, Starroute. Very interesting. n/t

[loudsue]

52. Here is a link to Anonymous warning Kkkarl Rove

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/10/28/1151819/-Anonymous-gives-warning-to-Karl-Rove

[BlueStreak]

65. I had not seen that. It is very troubling that we have to depend on

a band of people working outside the law in order to protect what is left of our democracy.

Where is the Department of Justice in this case? They should be in there with a court order to impound those ESS machines for analysis.

I love much of what Obama does, but the consistent pattern is that he is all about himself. He did virtually nothing to try to get a favorable House -- because he was afraid that might cost him votes. He will do nothing to go after election fraud -- because it will never affect him again.

I am glad he will be the President rather than having Rove's people on the inside again, but if we don't make major changes, they will be there in 2016. Obama is an extraordinary candidate and he ran an extraordinary campaign -- and still just barely slipped by. (the EC numbers look great, but a half percent would have resulted in a completely different outcome.) There is absolutely nobody on the scene that can match Obama's performance in 2016. Without fixing this problem we will lose in 2016.

I believe we can win on a level playing field. I do not believe anybody but Obama could win with the playing field we faced this year.

[Coyotl]

88. That's not Anon! Anon is a friend of mine and

[KT2000]

19. the suit filed against Husted

showed him that people were watching. And as you said - an Obama Dept. of Justice would not turn a blind eye.

[BlueStreak]

24. I'd like to think so. Holder hardly inspires confidence.

Maybe he would work in an election fraud case right after he takes care of some of the 2008 banking crimes.

[Cha]

20. Wouldn't walk out in the middle of it..only after everything had

been done that possibly could be done to suppress and flip votes to romney. When that obviously wasn't producing desired results and it was OVER for rmoney in OHIO..then it was time to go. and, 10pm, you say? That's an early night.

Your analysis makes sense, BlueStreak.. will we ever know for certain what went down in Ohio in 2012 when Obama Won even though Karl Rove was dead set certain that mitt would emerge the winner?

What happened in 2004? Karl Rove on the horn with Ken Blackwell..and it all went a lot more smoothly? Dunno

[targetpractice]

21. Or perhaps, it was simply a moment of incompetence and desperation caught live on TV...

I watched the events unfold on Fox live, and it seems clear to me that Karl thought there was only a 900 vote difference when he freaked out when Fox called it... However, there was actually more than 10K+ difference at the time. The Fox decision makers were looking at the data with the 10K+ difference.

The fact that Rove was looking at incorrect information plus his obvious stake in the outcome along with a dose of denial and desperation to deliver for his donors... is a more simple explanation of his "Ohio Moment" than a conspiracy involving anyone other than himself.

I believe these folks were independent operators... not conspirators. I think you are right about Husted, but I do not think they were collaborating... just Kool-Aid drinking believers.

As a rule of thumb, I don't assume "ill will" when incompetence+ideology can explain the same outcome.

[BlueStreak]

25. I don't think so.

In the little drama that Megyn Kelly conducted, walking back to the techie room (whatever they called it), she screwed up and said (paraphrasing) "When we rehearsed this little drama, my wireless microphone dropped out right about here."

Nobody seems to even be showing that bit of film today. What's with that.

That scene with Rove was not impromptu. It was deliberately staged. I'm not sure what that was all about. Maybe it was just the producer thinking a little extra drama would be good teevee. And maybe he saw it as an opportunity to prove that "see, we really are fair and balanced. We aren't toeing the Karl Rove line."

I am willing to give Faux the benefit of the doubt on that one. That is why I think it was a case of Rove pleading for just a few more minutes because he thought he could convince Husted to do the deed and Faux was actually playing it straight (other than the added little drama which I don't object to.)

[thesquanderer]

61. Rehearsing the walk

I didn't see it, but to be fair, what you posted doesn't prove the Rove scene in particular was planned. From what you posted, it sounds like it could have been a rehearsal more like, "if there's any kind of development that prompts you to want to go talk to the people in there, here's how we'll do it."

[Z_I_Peevey]

63. Even in the edited clips we see now, it is obvious

that we're watching a rehearsed, pre-planned segment. They already had a second camera PRE-POSITIONED for the newsbunny's turn down the hallway.

[BlueStreak]

67. I think that is definitely plausible. And when Rove threw his tantrum, that was the opportunity

for the producer to do the bit they had rehearsed. Indeed, if Roger Ailes had been in the room, he might not have allowed that because it really did undermine Rove.

My sense of that scene was that Rove was in the process of trying to get Husted to flip Ohio and Husted got cold feet. Rove had to dig in on that and missed the fact that every other network had already called Ohio -- so getting Faux to rescind their call would accomplish very little. I think it was a moment of panic for Rove because he had a very clear vision of how the night was to go, and it all fell apart on him in real time.

[BlueStreak]

26. Ill will is more likely than incompetence, IMHO.

[robinlynne]

33. You are too kind.

[alittlelark]

42. That makes no sense.

A choreographed end game was made up of 'independent operatives'...... that's just nuts.

[global1]

28. The DOJ Now Needs To Put Husted On The Hot Seat...

and get him to crack. If your theory is true he can bring down Rove which would be the catalyst to election reform & a voters rights movement. Hell - it could also bring down 'citizens united'.

[loudsue]

34. From your lips to God's ears.

Or DOJ's ears.

[BlueStreak]

68. Anything like that must start with a new AG

Eric Holder is the weakest AG in my lifetime. I cannot think of a single significant thing he has done in 4 years.

[global1]

85. Is There Any Indication That Holder Will Be Replaced In This Second Term?......nt

[BlueStreak]

94. Yes. He is being asked directly if he is staying on and he has been hedging

[world wide wally]

35. They lied...They cheated... but they couldn't steal!

[hifiguy]

36. Agreed.

I think that there was a fix in between KKKarl and Husted. Either the trigger event for putting it into operation never happened or Husted simply bailed after deciding that the possibility of a lengthy stretch in the federal slammer wasn't such a terrific alternative considering that he has already mightily pissed off a fed district court judge with his earlier shenanigans.

There is no honor among thieves, and no one in their right mind - Repuke shitweasel or not - is gonna take a lengthy stretch in the Big House just to protect Rove's crooked ass.

[Sedona]

55. Two Words.....

Scooter Libby.

Then again maybe the Repuke shitweasel had W's promise to commute the 30 sentence in the federal penn.

[UCmeNdc]

44. Could software installed on the machines flip vote counts?

http://www.freepress.org/images/departments/4797_Dunihoaffidavit.pdf

[FrenchieCat]

50. I usually don't subscribe too much to conspiracy theories, but this one....I do....

Because the polling (538) was right on all but Ohio....where OBama won by a much smaller margin.

I think they just couldn't shave off enough vote....and that Obama actually won by the percent reported,
plus the 5 points they shaved off! That would explain the Fox "number cruncher" saying that there were
just too many Obama votes.....

[PossumSqueezins]

51. I live in Ohio and it's happened before

And I think you're right. With so many people watching, it wasn't worth the risk.

Next time they will try to have less early voting days and half the machines in Democratic counties.

[silvershadow]

54. I just cannot imagine why on earth, with *everyone knowing about that software

that you are wrong. I though that was the plan all night long. I just wonder now if those machines are going to be investigated in any way? I mean, you cannot blatantly do this kind of thing in the open, and yet here we are. I would like to know what is next about this...We can't let this go, either. Who knows where it could lead? Maybe in order to stay out of jail he could turn on Rove or others??

[GCP]

58. Thank you, Bluestreak, for putting in words everything I've been thinking

There was too much weird stuff going on, including Romney's not even writing a concession speech. We all remember going to bed in 2004 being sure Kerry had won, and waking up to find Ohio had gone to Shrub despite his being down in the polls the night before, and despite the fact that the exit polls were for the first time ever, wrong. They showed us all these handy-dandy little graphics about how Rove had pinpointed specific counties and districts to get out the Shrub vote, but it never made sense to me that they could outweigh massive urban districts. I always said they stole Ohio, and I think they were caught in the act trying to do it again.

[DCBob]

59. That does seem plausible.

Even though they didnt go through with it this needs to be investigated.

[Coyotl]

62. There may be some truth in your analysis, albeit ...

This decision--to steal or not to steal or where to steal and where not to steal--is likely made some days before the election. Polling will indicate if the big enchilada is doable.

Where are there very close races? Those are the ones vulnerable to theft.
Where did they get caught? In Oregon in a very pivotal county that could swing the state House red!

BREAKING: Ballot tampering suspect identified - and she's a right-wing activist
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1014292507

Predicting where the vote stealing will need to happen to salvage Romney's losing effort
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251193817

[BlueStreak]

70. Strategy may be set long in advance, but it has to play out in real time

Going into election day, they thought they had Florida. And indeed, Florida is still being counted, and would turn into another ... well Florida, if it was the deciding state.

They thought they had a fair shot at Colorado and Virginia. And even if they didn't get CO, they might get NH. So all they needed was OH. And they knew they didn't have the votes in OH. it is absolutely impossible to believe Rove didn't know that. Ohio polling NEVER favored Romney -- not one poll. And the range of polling had it 2-6% at the end. I refuse to believe that Rove didn't look at that.

There is lots of evidence that the Romney campaign honestly thought they were going to win. While some people might have been going on wishful thinking, my reading of Rove is that he thought he had Ohio covered. He did have a strategy. it was planned in advance. It just unraveled.

My theory is that Husted was the key and he cot cold feet when he saw where things were headed in IA, VA, FL, CO, and NV. But it might be simpler than that. It might have simply been Cuyahoga. Remember these people have a very condescending view of the sort of people who live in the big cities. They are lazy, shiftless, drunks, who aren't interested in working and just want to live off the government dole. No way they will show up to vote in numbers that will made the difference.

But Cuyahoga County DID show up. And maybe that was the thing that ultimately spooked Husted -- that together with Obama doing pretty well in the Cincinnati area. Maybe that was the "Oh shit" moment. "I was prepared to flip 2% of the vote, but I could do that and still lose this thing."

Why is it always Florida and Ohio? How many times do we have to go through this nightmare?

[Coyotl]

74. Rove is not some kind of Magician or Wizard or All-Powerful Overlord

and he sure wasn't in control of either Romney's campaign or the RNC apparatus. He is a lightning pole for the left though, and there are a lot of people who ascribe to him powers no mortal has.

People throw out these wild theories without there being a reality-base to their suppositions. Where is the detail on "how" an election theft is pulled off? The numbers don't just magically change at election central. Counties know their tallies when they report them. The numbers don't go to Tennessee and come back different while everyone ignores the change from what they sent in and counted. But still, people believe that happened in 2004 when actually Ohio was voting mostly punch cards.

There are ways to rig elections, and some may have been rigged this time too. If Rove was doing such, he would not have been on camera. In fact, the people who specialize in such activities are never, ever going to be on camera or even know to pundits, etc. Rigging elections are covert operations. Guys like Rove are handy distractions, the hand they want you to watch and speculate about! You may be doing your part in their cover-up.

[loudsue]

81. Are you new to DU? Have you read all the thousands of hours of research on election theft

and how the numbers never add up? How 'bout 18181??

And, yes. Rove is part of a party mafia that has almost destroyed this country.

[Coyotl]

87. No, not new to DU

But I have been an election integrity activist for longer than there has been a DU! I'm published and have several film credits too!

If it's on DU, first question it! DU is one of the leading fountains of disinformation and cover-up on the election integrity front. Why? Because the cover-up runs that deep and is proactive in distractions, disinformation, and derailing valid inquiries. The opposition is framing the consensus, and the consensus is completely off-based.

On edit: Thousands of hours is what I have personally spent on election integrity studies, literally, not on discussions but on real work, analysis, statistics, producing films, writing, etc.

[loudsue]

91. Don't even pretend that you've done more research on election fraud than has been done on DU.

DU (it's members) was the leading edge of the electronic voting machine problems research.

[Coyotl]

93. Actually not true.

things get reported here. We activists do the work and it gets discussed here.

All too often, DU is the leading edge of disinformation in this area.

Show me some "original research" on DU, just one post please.

[loudsue]

96. Wow! If that is what you think, then you are misinformed, and

are probably such a know-it-all that everyone else is going to be wrong, anyway.

I'm not going to engage further. Nor will I bother to provide you with any material to continue to try to bash DU and our researchers. Adios.

[Coyotl]

97. Wow! Couldn't find even one link, as I suspected.

That says it all.

[TwilightGardener]

69. I agree.

[NYC Liberal]

76. Or, Rove was just the idiot he's always been. Lots of right-wingers threw tantrums that night.

Rove is not a particularly brilliant guy.

[jeepnstein]

78. They just can't count.

Rove made an assumption about the Ohio election that was quite faulty. They really believed they had it in the bag. When that didn't happen it took a while for them to process the situation. That was why Team Romney was slow to concede. Can't blame them, really. Rove is right far more than he's wrong, even if he is a scum bag.

Look at the Republican Party's base and you'll see the problem for Romney. They made an assumption about the religious right that was not correct. And it cost them the election. They didn't have anywhere else to go for votes because Obama had pretty much nuked Romney during the primaries as far as independents and swing voters were concerned.

Husted decided to just cut his losses and try to live to fight another day. I don't see how he could have influenced the election results. You just can't "flip" votes that way. No doubt he wanted to just go hide under a rock and let his staff do their jobs, which is really minimal once the polls close in Ohio. The counties tally up the votes and just relay the numbers to the SOS.

[OregonBlue]

79. I think it's possible someone found a way to unhack the machines. It's also possible that Dem

precinct votes were delayed enough that Karl and Husted did not know how many votes needed to be flipped. I'd like to know which precincts came in late as opposed to the 2004 vote in Ohio.

[smorkingapple]

80. This is 9/11 missiles on planes shit right here. PLEASE STOP WITH THIS ABSOLUTE FUCKING NONSENSE!!

Seriously?

Really?

Rove couldn't get a single fucking state to flip his way except NC. But somehow he had this conspiracy to flip the votes for Obama?

They go thru all these motions to suppress the vote and on TOP, they're going to try to pull off some illegal shit? Why even bother to use legal means to suppress the vote then if you can do it behind the scenes?

Jesus guys, why can't it be as simple as this:

Rove fleeced the Republican donor establishment for millions of dollars, selling them lies about chances to beat Obama. He knew deep down how hard it is to defeat an incumbent but hustled them anyway. There was no plan or cabal to steal the election across multiple states.

[loudsue]

83. Yeah, yeah. We're making it all up. Bunch of conspiracy theorists.

Sorry. We've just had too many thousands of hours of research over the past 12 years on DU that have shown without any doubt how the elections are stolen.

Hell! EVEN FORBES CAME OUT WITH THE ARTICLE ABOUT COMPUTERIZED ELECTION THEFT!! Just this week!! So we're all
supposed to act like it's impossible? No! That's how you steal tens of thousands of votes at the stroke of a key.

That's why Anonymous warned Kkkarl Rove. We've done the research. What? Now there's no such thing as global warming?

[GCP]

90. I guess you haven't seen this?

http://www.ukprogressive.co.uk/breaking-retired-nsa-analyst-proves-gop-is-stealing-elections/article20598.html

or this

http://harpers.org/archive/2005/08/none-dare-call-it-stolen/4/

[LongTomH]

92. Put me down as one of the people who believe that Ohio was stolen in 2004

I went to be thinking Kerry had won; when I got up the next day and found that Ohio had flipped, I sent out an email saying: "The bastards stole another one!" Somewhere, somehow, they fucked up this time!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

102. if they were to tamper with election they should be in jail

[RomneyLies]

103. I have a more plausible theory than your conspiracy theory bullshit

Rove actually believed his "unskewed" numbers.

[Batt1eRatt1e]

104. Rove can go away into a cave now

Well let him stick around, he´s good comedy!

[Texin]

106. That's what I thought might have been happening too.

I agree that when it became pretty clear that this thing wasn't going to be close enough to fudge those votes and make any difference in either OH or the other states that were on the edge of being called for Obama, Husted decided to play it safe called it a night. My abiding belief (hope) was that regardless of party loyalty, there aren't that many true believers out there that would be willing to undergo a Justice Department inquiry for vote fraud, especially in light of how this was going down that night. By the time Rove was on the phone with Husted, the election looked to be well on the way to being called for Obama and in enough critical swing states that it just didn't matter enough to risk federal prosecution. Back in 2000, the Florida governor was Shrub's baby brother and the SOS was a Bush loyalist. In '04, Shrub was the Resident and had has own man in the Justice Department. I think if anyone is going to steal an election, that it's probably safer when you're the incumbent or you've got a family member that'll cover for you. Romney didn't have those luxuries even if he did have all that loot the CU ruling was able to send his way.