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I'm absolutely willing to accept that very few people are (e.g.) voting twice in different states, filling out ballots mistakenly sent to their address, and sim

I'm absolutely willing to accept that very few people are (e.g.) voting twice in different states, filling out ballots mistakenly sent to their address, and similar small-scale stuff. But I do share your skepticism that when the stakes are this high, nobody's trying to meaningfully affect this. Especially this year when anyone could have told you the election will come down to the same small number of states waiting for days to count ballots in a small number of precincts. We know how well the TSA does because we actually try to send people through with weapons to see how often they get caught. In 2015, the answer is that 95% of weapons get through. I think we need the same kind of thing for elections. How tough is it to get / remove a few boxes of ballots overnight from wherever they're stored prior to being counted? When you do, is that immediately detected and reported, or is it presumed to be a mistake and just accepted? How many people does it take? [1] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/investigation-breaches-us-airports-allowed-weapons-through-n367851 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/investigation-breaches-...

matwood 6y ago
> But I do share your skepticism that when the stakes are this high, nobody's trying to meaningfully affect this. Thing is, it's much easier to impact the result legally through voter suppression. https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54380684 https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54380684 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-locations/southern-u-s-states-have-closed-1200-polling-places-in-recent-years-rights-group-idUSKCN1VV09J https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-locations/so...
- moduspol 6y ago
  That's a separate conversation, though. I agree reducing poll locations can make some people less likely to vote, but it's not in the same category as fraud.
  - matwood 6y ago
    To commit fraud at the level required though just isn't plausible in a national election. Even in a close state like PA, we're going to end up talking about 45k+ votes. In MI, 100k+ votes, WI 20k+ votes, etc... All these states have mixes of R/Ds running things, and any fraud claims quickly ends up in grand conspiracy fallacy territory. This is not some 1000 vote situation like FL in 2000 (which was actually much more complicated than everyone paints it out to be).
    - moduspol 6y ago
      Philadelphia received over 350k mail-in ballots [1]. Biden's current winning margin for the whole state is under 46k [2]. Wayne county (Michigan) received over 430k [3]. He's won Michigan by 148k [2]. In Wisconsin, the margin is just 20k [4], with the most populous county representing 459k votes. In Georgia--same kind of thing. Normally I agree with the dismissive "it's so decentralized, you couldn't do it." But it's different this year. Anyone could have predicted that the pro-Trump areas would finish counting faster, and then the pro-Biden areas would have multiple days and nights to count, all in staunchly pro-Biden areas capable of swinging the election. Of course we expected mail-in votes to lean Biden, but that doesn't mean anywhere from 51-99% indicates "no fraud." I'm not saying any fraud happened. All I'm saying is that it's not rational to presume it couldn't have happened without being detected. And it's worth some efforts to see how well we'd catch it if it were occurring. [1] https://whyy.org/articles/pa-election-2020-results-thousands-of-philly-mail-ballots-still-left-to-count/ https://whyy.org/articles/pa-election-2020-results-thousands... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-michigan-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/... [4] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-wisconsin-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/...
      - matwood 6y ago
        So you're arguing that absentee ballot by mail is the problem? None of the states in question did automatic mail in voting. Each voter had to apply for absentee. And given the politicization of the pandemic, Trump made it a virtue signal to vote day-of in person. So of course the absentee vote was heavily D, and it came in from heavily D areas to start. I voted absentee and honestly it felt more secure than any in person voting I've ever done. I had to apply, fill out, and then drop off my vote in a box. My wife wasn't even allowed to drop off my vote, and instead I had to do it personally. I was then able to track it online and verify it was counted without an issue. Contrast this to when I hit some buttons in person and have no idea what happens after that. The point is, you have to trust the process at some point, and in this case fraud is so unlikely across multiple states with 10s of thousands of votes.

matwood 6y ago

> But I do share your skepticism that when the stakes are this high, nobody's trying to meaningfully affect this. Thing is, it's much easier to impact the result legally through voter suppression. https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54380684 https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54380684 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-locations/southern-u-s-states-have-closed-1200-polling-places-in-recent-years-rights-group-idUSKCN1VV09J https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-locations/so...

moduspol 6y ago
That's a separate conversation, though. I agree reducing poll locations can make some people less likely to vote, but it's not in the same category as fraud.
- matwood 6y ago
  To commit fraud at the level required though just isn't plausible in a national election. Even in a close state like PA, we're going to end up talking about 45k+ votes. In MI, 100k+ votes, WI 20k+ votes, etc... All these states have mixes of R/Ds running things, and any fraud claims quickly ends up in grand conspiracy fallacy territory. This is not some 1000 vote situation like FL in 2000 (which was actually much more complicated than everyone paints it out to be).
  - moduspol 6y ago
    Philadelphia received over 350k mail-in ballots [1]. Biden's current winning margin for the whole state is under 46k [2]. Wayne county (Michigan) received over 430k [3]. He's won Michigan by 148k [2]. In Wisconsin, the margin is just 20k [4], with the most populous county representing 459k votes. In Georgia--same kind of thing. Normally I agree with the dismissive "it's so decentralized, you couldn't do it." But it's different this year. Anyone could have predicted that the pro-Trump areas would finish counting faster, and then the pro-Biden areas would have multiple days and nights to count, all in staunchly pro-Biden areas capable of swinging the election. Of course we expected mail-in votes to lean Biden, but that doesn't mean anywhere from 51-99% indicates "no fraud." I'm not saying any fraud happened. All I'm saying is that it's not rational to presume it couldn't have happened without being detected. And it's worth some efforts to see how well we'd catch it if it were occurring. [1] https://whyy.org/articles/pa-election-2020-results-thousands-of-philly-mail-ballots-still-left-to-count/ https://whyy.org/articles/pa-election-2020-results-thousands... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/... [3] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-michigan-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/... [4] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/results-wisconsin-president.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/11/03/us/elections/...
    - matwood 6y ago
      So you're arguing that absentee ballot by mail is the problem? None of the states in question did automatic mail in voting. Each voter had to apply for absentee. And given the politicization of the pandemic, Trump made it a virtue signal to vote day-of in person. So of course the absentee vote was heavily D, and it came in from heavily D areas to start. I voted absentee and honestly it felt more secure than any in person voting I've ever done. I had to apply, fill out, and then drop off my vote in a box. My wife wasn't even allowed to drop off my vote, and instead I had to do it personally. I was then able to track it online and verify it was counted without an issue. Contrast this to when I hit some buttons in person and have no idea what happens after that. The point is, you have to trust the process at some point, and in this case fraud is so unlikely across multiple states with 10s of thousands of votes.