[EL] Vote fraud -- evidence vs. belief

[Lillie Coney]

It is a case of perception and reality.  In the 90's starting about a week prior to a major election local broadcast news began featuring stories about people working to prevent voter fraud.  The voice overs would talk about preventing voter fraud while the video showed minorities voting.

The sources of "voter fraud" charges has changed but the presentation of the "problem" through local news broadcasts to voters, which includes poll workers peristalsis.  For a very long time I thought the "vote fraud" alarm was rung for poll workers who might over react to voters like the people in the video images.

Now it seems that the vote fraud pr-election primer over a decade of major elections really can reach further than poll workers to the general public.



On Jul 20, 2012, at 3:08 PM, "Jim Gardner" <jgard at buffalo.edu> wrote:

> The lack of evidence to support charges of vote fraud raises a more interesting and profound question: Why do people continue to believe in it?  The answer, it seems to me, has nothing to do with evidence – so arguing about the evidence is probably a waste of time – and a lot to do with culture, specifically the culture of contemporary politics. 
>  
> I think the problem here is that many on the right have managed to convince themselves that it is impossible – literally impossible – for people in any kind of numbers to support liberal policies.  Since people can’t possibly support such policies, they can’t possibly vote for liberal candidates.  Consequently, if liberal candidates win, it can only be the result of fraud because nobody could actually vote for such people. 
>  
> This problem is cultural.  It reveals a very sad fact about our current politics, namely that the views, beliefs, and experiences of other human beings are so completely dismissed and devalued in some quarters that many find it impossible to take seriously the possibility that their fellow citizens could  actually hold certain views (much less actually take those views seriously or engage with them on the merits).
>  
> I hasten to add that the political valence does not always run in the same direction.  For example, the “What’s the Matter with Kansas” analysis holds that working class voters couldn’t possibly support candidates who support policies that disadvantage them economically, although proponents of this view explain it by brainwashing rather than vote fraud.  But this explanation doesn’t take seriously the possibility that social and symbolically resonant issues could actually be more important than economic ones to some segments of the population.
>  
> Until we start taking each other seriously as political agents, we’re not going to extract ourselves from the current impasse.
>  
> Jim
>  
> ________________________________
> James A. Gardner
> Joseph W. Belluck and Laura L. Aswad
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