The propaganda groundwork is already being laid, should McCain "win" in a November election, in which the nation's votes are "counted" in secret by private corporate interests (84% of NH's votes are "counted" in secret by Diebold Corporation). The corporate media controlling the message reports on the corporate election results, and voila, America has new leaders. The explanations for a McCain "victory" are already mantra talking points in the corporate media and talk shows: "Palin will take Hillary's women votes" and "Palin pushes up McCain poll numbers". Are we really that dumb? We have given away our elections to private interests, and in so doing have given away our country. Election 2000? Fool me once. Election 2002? Fool me twice. Election 2004? You get the picture....As long as we all prefer to sit on our tushes and pretend that we still have democratic elections, rather than to rise up and oust the private corporations controlling them (and the public officials supporting this treason), we deserve what we get. The problem is, our collective laziness affects the lives of everyone else on the planet too.

SOURCE: Huffington Post

BY Seth Colter Walls

September 9, 2008 05:01 PM

This week's mainstream coverage of the presidential horse-race has
been dominated by a series of polls showing the McCain-Palin ticket
with its first stable lead over Obama and Biden. Gallup's tracking
poll, USA Today and CBS News all show the Republicans with some kind
of lead over the Democratic ticket. But, interestingly, all three
polls were also conducted using a higher sampling of Republican voters
than in July, raising a question of methodology.

In a year in which Democrats have a lead of 11 million registered
voters over Republicans, and have been adding to that advantage
through a robust field operation, are pollsters over-sampling
Republicans?

Despite a raft of advantages in the electorate for Democrats, in
September's first Gallup tracking poll, an equal number of Republicans
and Democrats were surveyed (including "leaners") from Sept. 3-5,
compared to a 10-point Democratic identification advantage two weeks
ago. That partisan makeup of the polling pool resulted in a 5-point
lead for McCain in Sept. 5 tracking poll. Meanwhile, the new CBS poll
features a 6-point swing in partisan composition toward Republicans,
which plays some role in the poll's two-point lead for McCain.
Finally, the latest USA Today poll, which claims a four-point edge for
McCain, was arrived at after a 10-point swing in partisan makeup
toward GOP respondents.

Some polling experts say the changing state of party affiliation in
the field is slow to be reflected in polls themselves. Democratic
pollster Anna Greenberg told the Huffington Post that "when it comes
to registration and turnout, the polls often do a very bad job of
taking those factors into account," because newly registered voters
aren't in the voter files used by firms that survey public opinion.
"You could make the argument they are under-representing new
registrants," she said, which would mean that the Democrats new edge
would not be taken into account.

Monday's USA Today poll had a 48-47 split between Democrats and
Republicans surveyed. That represents a nearly 10 point shift in party
identification toward Republicans since USA Today's July polling. When
asked for comment, USA Today polling editor Jim Norman wrote that
"it's possible" that their latest sample includes too many
Republicans. Though he added, "it's also possible that we have too
many Democrats," because "there's always the chance of an over- or
under-representation" in polls.

Still, Norman admitted that the GOP identification in the latest
survey has spiked. "The party ID in our most recent poll does show a
shift away from what Gallup has been getting in earlier polls, going
all the way back to 2005," Norman said. "But previous conventions --
the Republican one in 1988, the Democratic one in 1992, the Democratic
one in 2000 -- have also shown shifts in party ID toward the party
that had the convention, and those shifts seemed to last, to greater
or lesser degrees, though the election. Further, I've been told by
Gallup that their tracking poll has shown a similar shift in party ID
since the Republican convention. ... I guarantee you we will be
watching closely in all of our polls between now and election day to
see whether there are further shifts in party ID in either direction."

And it's true. Gallup's own GOP identification (including leaners) has
swung six points in the last month, from 42 percent of voters to 48,
according to tables provided to the Huffington Post. Meanwhile, solid
and leaning Democrats have fallen from 52 to 48 percent of those
polled. For political scientists who believe that partisanship is
largely stable over time -- and who take note of the advantage in
voter registration being experienced by Democrats during the same
period -- the newly GOP-heavy poll samples can raise eyebrows.

Emory University political scientist Alan Abramowitz is highly
skeptical of the new Gallup, USA Today and CBS polls. About the
latter, which showed a statistically insignificant two point lead for
McCain, Abramowitz said: "One reason for the dramatic difference
between the two recent CBS polls is that the two samples differed
fairly dramatically in terms of partisan composition. The first sample
was 35.2% Democratic, 26.2 percent Republicans, and 38.6 percent
independent. The second sample was 34.9% Democratic, 31.1% Republican,
and 34.0% independent. That's a change from a 9 point Democratic
advantage to a 3.8 point Democratic advantage. That alone would
probably explain about half of the difference in candidate preferences
between the two CBS polls."


If these polls are improperly reflecting the partisan makeup of the
electorate at large, it certainly would go part of the way toward
explaining anything beyond the quick "dead cat bounce" after the
Republican convention. And if the convergence of polls around a small
McCain lead has anything to do with sampling error, it would render
any claims about a new equilibrium in the race somewhat moot.

One day before USA Today announced its new poll numbers, it also ran
an Associated Press story with the headline "Democrats Post Big Gains
In Voter Registration." In that article, the AP noted that, during the
primary season, "more than 2 million Democrats were added to voter
rolls in the 28 states that register voters according to party
affiliation. The Republicans have lost nearly 344,000 thousand voters
in the same states."

The article proceeded to lay out a variety of statistics that favor
Democrats:

Nationwide, there are about 42 million registered Democrats and
about 31 million Republicans, according to statistics compiled by The
Associated Press.


The Democrats have posted big gains in many competitive states,
including Nevada, New Hampshire, Iowa, Colorado and Florida. They have
also been targeting historically Republican southern states.

Since 2006, the Democrats have added 167,000 voters in North
Carolina, while the Republicans have added 36,000.

Still, that doesn't discount the fact that Republicans have definitely
made some gains. As Greenberg notes, "Sarah Palin came out and gave a
really good speech. She certainly exceeded the low expectations. And
then more people watched McCain's speech than Obama. And now it
appears there was a bigger bump for McCain than there was for
Obama. ... But there always been more room to grow his vote."
Greenberg says the prior lack of enthusiasm among Republicans could
have resulted in an inflated rate of survey respondents identifying as
independents. "The CBS panels show most of the movement came to McCain
from undecided voters, people who were probably holding back from
McCain," Greenberg said.

Despite that, Abramowitz simply doesn't think the overall spike in
Republican sampling among all three polling firms is an accurate
reflection of the electorate. "It's just not likely," he says. Given
how important polls can be in the coverage of the race, even a slight
assist to McCain during a period in which he is exciting the
Republican base could help him solidify a new narrative in the race,
regardless of the partisan facts on the ground.