Jakob Nielsen rates Bush campaign email newsletters as far more effective and lists the reasons why. For the national campaign, I’m forced to agree, but if he were to judge the campaign in Pennsylvania, Nielsen would have give the Kerry campaign proper compliments on the criteria he is using.

Voters Unite has an easy to follow list of voting machine troubles across the country.

Even if you are one of those who feel that no election deciding fraud has taken place, you need to admit that these kinds of problems are unacceptable.

I’m looking forward to seeing a resolution on these concerns (Wired).

You agree that every vote must count, don’t you?

Not too long ago, we talked about how we were “bowling alone”. We were moving towards a disconnected future: disconnected family, disconnected friends, disconnected past times, and ultimately – disconnected democracy.

Tools have emerged that empower us to reconnect (The Nation), just when stakes have become highest in a generation. And we are using them! This isn’t as sudden as some might suggest, and it’s been happening under the radar of one too many pundits. Myself included. I got a feeling politics will be redefined as much as the music and publishing industries have been.

Despite the outcome of the election – I think it’s an exciting time.

It seems to me, and the numbers seem to bear this out, that where Bush, won, he did so by the slightest of margins. He had no overwhelming majority in any state comparable to some of the states that backed Kerry. What this map shows is that Bush won by convincing a certain number of Democrats to vote for him.

Mr. Bush drew more Republicans (93 percent) than Mr. Kerry drew Democrats (89 percent). More Democrats (11 percent) voted for Mr. Bush than Republicans (6 percent) voted for Mr. Kerry. Independents were split equally between the two.

NYTimes – Moral Values Cited as a Defining Issue of the Election: 11/4/2004

I am just an amature, but my gut tells me, and I’m sure I can find the figures to back this up, that similarly, Clinton drew similar numbers of Republicans, and Reagan drew similar numbers of Democrats in their election contests.

So who are these people that aren’t loyal to their party? Well their people like myself. A person who was very willing to vote for John McCain in 2004. You know why? I liked him. There, I admit it. I liked him and on some personal level, I trusted he would be a great President.

…Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter got elected because they were comfortable with their faith,” said Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, a former Clinton aide. “What happened was that a part of the electorate came open to what Clinton and Carter had to say on everything else – health care, the environment, whatever – because they were very comfortable that Clinton and Carter did not disdain the way these people lived their lives, but respected them.”

He added: “We need a nominee and a party that is comfortable with faith and values. And if we have one, then all the hard work we’ve done on Social Security or America’s place in the world or college education can be heard. But people aren’t going to hear what we say until they know that we don’t approach them as Margaret Mead would an anthropological experiment.”

NYTimes – Electoral Affirmation of Shared Values Provides Bush a Majority: 11/4/2004

If you think this kind of moral talk is anathema, you’re the sort of person Karl Rove wants to be running the Democratic Party. Get out, or get a new attitude. Nearly 60 million people came out to vote for George W. Bush yesterday because they think that he represents their values and that you don’t. Prove them wrong and you’ll be the majority party again.

Slate – Democratic Values – How to start winning the red states: 11/3/2004

In the end, a small slice of America, across many, many states, decided the election. It’s in this part of America, the folks who didn’t realize that Kerry was a person they could trust, and in the end voted on their feelings alone, that the greatest opportunity lies for the Democratic party. Moving further to the left or to the right is not the answer. The Democrats need to stand for what it stands for and communicate its values and principals in a way that more people can relate to. The heartening thing is it sounds like the DLC agrees with me.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – A computer error with a voting machine cartridge gave President Bush 3,893 extra votes in a Gahanna precinct.

Franklin County’s unofficial results gave Bush 4,258 votes to Democratic challenger John Kerry’s 260 votes in Precinct 1B. Records show only 638 voters cast ballots in that precinct.

Matthew Damschroder, director of the Franklin County Board of Elections, said Bush received 365 votes there. The other 13 voters who cast ballots either voted for other candidates or did not vote for president.

Damschroder said he received some calls Thursday from people who saw the error when reading the list of poll results on the election board’s Web site.

He said the error would have been discovered when the official canvass for the election is performed later this month.

Damschroder said after Precinct 1B closed, a cartridge from one of three voting machines at the polling place generated a faulty number at a computerized reading station.

The reader also recorded zero votes in a county commissioner race.

Damschroder said the cartridge was retested Thursday and there were no problems. He couldn’t explain why the computer reader malfunctioned.

Workers checked the cartridge against memory banks in the voting machine Thursday and each showed that 115 people voted for Bush on that machine. With the other machines, the total for Bush in the precinct added up to 365 votes.

Information from: The Columbus Dispatch

Original story here.

Check it out. via Boing Boing.

This just strengthens how I feel and I will have more to add later.

That’s a bumper sticker idea from Charlie Miller, MoveOn Precinct Leader and my meetup friend, commenting on how we can continue to go foward in my earlier post.

After all is said and done, I believe important foundations have been laid. Whether it be how Meetup and organizations like MoveOn have empowered folks to get involved, or the tremendous turnout, you need to admit that the energy and enthusiasm you saw was an awesome thing. It means that a growing number of people care about activism and politics again. I’m already looking forward to new ways to get involved.

Things were so hopeful. I went door to door in three wards yesterday in our get out the vote and I gotta tell ya, my legs are killing me. I had the option of going to three different election related parties, but choose a quiet night at home with Richelle, with some popcorn and some wine, to take in the results. The early exit polls reported were very positive, but then our appetites disappeared as the states fell one by one. Voters were saying a candidate?s morals and values weighted more importantly than the economy or the war on terror. We stayed up until 3:30 AM, our stomachs twisting and depression mounting.

Pennsylvania did its job. Philadelphia did its job. I feel proud of the reality-based community here. We came out in force and the efforts of MoveOn, ACT, and PA Victory, and so many other groups were impressive. I’m very happy to have been a part of that and to have met so many great folks. I feel very bad for Joe Hoeffel, Tim Kearney, and Ross Schriftman; all three were very deserving of the posts they were pursing, but at least Allyson Schwartz won. I’m looking forward to her serving us in Congress.

So what happened everyplace else? Well Bush and Kerry both reached out to their bases, and the Republican base has more reliable voters than the Democratic one. That?s the bottom line. This enabled Rove to craft a strategy that played just a few notes and played them well. The strategy allowed it to focus and ignore the rest of the country.

There will be those that say the Democrats lost because they didn?t communicate with their base well enough, for example, by nominating Dean, and if they did, they would have won. I don?t think so. The problem is the Democratic base isn?t as simplistic as the Republican one. It?s the big tent. It takes more to reach these folks, to let them know that their votes matter, that they have a candidate that has a chance to succeed. So many are disenfranchised don?t vote in the first place. In short ? they need a Bill Clinton.

Let’s get this clear: many, many more did vote this year. They voted in record numbers, and without them, it would have been a landslide in the G.O.P.’s favor. You have to take heart and know it is something to build on. Saddly, in proportion, Republicans are statistically more likely to vote, and that trend continues with this election. Trends like that can change. Importantly, candidates like Bill Clinton have shown a way to reach across the divide and encourage votes that might not normally happen.

I really like John Kerry. I like his story, I like what he’s done, I like his take on the issues, I like the way he thinks and I like his vision for the future. I felt he would be a great President who would work hard to fix the damage that’s been wrought these past four years. But it’s clear: the country is divided. But it’s not by political party. Don’t fall for that. It is divided by how it decides who to trust.

Did the Internet play a role in this campaign? Yes it did. It provided the tools for Democrats to get close, but in the end it all comes down to election day and turn out. No matter how good your operations are ? if the voters don?t come the polls, you?re not going to win.

Speaking of the polls, there 1754 election related incidents in Ohio and 26,990 incidents reported across America so far. This isn?t over yet. (Update: it is over, Kerry has conceded, even with all these election day incidents unresolved).

The stories and questions of this election:
1. Internet empowered community and campaigning works, but it all comes down to how many vote.
2. Morals, faith, and social issues matter (NYTimes). Get it through your head. You can?t win unless you recognize that a large portion of the country votes based on how they feel about a candidate instead of what they know. This is frustrating, and makes me want to run to Canada.
3. Simplicity in message and candidate matters (Slate). People trust things (people, messages, damn near anything) that seem simple. By and large, more people trusted Bush than Kerry. That’s despite the reality-based reasons they should have felt otherwise.
4. You can extrapolate this and ask yourself, what will become of the right to choose for women, and will gays and lesbians ever share the same spousal rights as the rest of us? Will the government’s increasing encroachment into our private lives grow? Will stem cell research atleast occur off shore? The Supreme Court is going to be changed for a generation and the Republicans still control all three legislative branches of government.
5. Where did the center go?
6. What role did the new voting machines (especially Diebold) play? Will we ever know the real winner?
7. How come the big discrepancy in exit polls vs. actual votes?
8. How did this election compare, numerically, to 2000? Did anything actually change? Bush won the popular vote. Think about it.
9. Bush was elected (yeah I know, shut up will ya) in 2000 without a mandate. He then pursued a radical agenda that divided this country. Will he look at the results and think he is justified to further his ideological aims (NYTimes) even more aggressively?
10. The results appear to be: 57 million to Kerry, 60 million to Bush, and 100 million to “Whatever”. “Whatever” wins again! With minimal campaign effort to boot (bogarted from a Metafilter thread but what the hell).

I am very proud of the those I worked with and look forward to continuing the friendships so many of us have started along the way.

Halliburton is having a good day on the stock market I hear. Oh well.

This morning I helped with what is simply called “visibility”: standing on a street corner (not saying which right now) with a honk for Kerry sign along with a bunch of other fine folks 🙂 And it was loud! Very loud. Rocking. A few Bush supporters attempted to join us, with their own signs, but it just wasn’t working out for them. I felt so sad for them.

Afterwards my team went canvassing in one of my old neighborhoods. We covered a huge stretch and I gotta tell ya – the turnout is going to be kicking.

Get out there and vote. That’s where I’m going right now, and then it’s back to work volunteering!