Graph Shows Fraud in Russian Elections 406
gaika writes "A graph in the best traditions of Edward Tufte shows how the voting was rigged in Russian parliament elections. Initially some regions were showing higher than 100% attendance, but later on everything was corrected, or way too much corrected, as the correlation between winning party's vote and attendance now stands at 90%. I guess the people who have rigged the vote have never heard about Correlation Cofficient."
I heard they forced people in hospitals to vote (Score:2, Interesting)
Well what did you expect? (Score:5, Interesting)
Not surprising (Score:2, Interesting)
Compare 2004 Ohio and 2000 Florida returns (Score:4, Interesting)
Rigged or not, Putin's party would still win. (Score:2, Interesting)
I didn't realize the extent of this until I started dating a Russian, who introduced me to many Russian viewpoints, friends and relatives.
Detailed tests? (Score:5, Interesting)
I've had some statistics but I was never really good at it... I developed a radar for lousy statistics, though. Hard numbers please.
Troll? (Score:2, Interesting)
Putin lifted millions from poverty (Score:3, Interesting)
Putin has been successful in changing all that; I would imagine the giving people enough to eat and decent housing can excuse a lot of police-state abuses.
For example, that WSJ article covered a Soviet-era glass factory that was originally a very outmoded, inefficient industrial plant, but with the result of millions of dollars of foreign investment, is now earning lots of export rubles by manufacturing automobile windshields.
You know what they said about Mussolini: "At least he made the trains run on time".
Explanation (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Whoopsie! (Score:2, Interesting)
and you could clearly hear, how even then he tried to cover his accent, while his use of the german language was overall very good.
Many Elections are rigged in Favor of Two Parties (Score:5, Interesting)
If the way of voting was always rigged to favour one particular party, we would be up in arms, but having a system rigged in favour of two parties is not much better.
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
Realistically, United Russia was going to win about %50 in "unrigged" elections. This is a simple majority, sufficient to pass regular laws. However, Putin needs constitutional majority (which is defined as 2/3 of the votes) to be able to pass constitutional amendments and various important laws related to status of Russia in union such as union with Belorussia. Now 2/3 for those advanced math majors is about %66
Re:"rigged Elections" (Score:4, Interesting)
Yes, very similar things happended in 2004 (Score:4, Interesting)
At another Precinct in Gahana, Ohio, 4,258 votes were cast for Bush and only 260 for Kerry, while only 638 people were registered as having voted.
Another source. [verifiedvo...dation.org] These sorts of ridiculous "errors" could be seen when searching the online results at the time.
Re:Compare 2004 Ohio and 2000 Florida returns (Score:3, Interesting)
Not quite what you're after, but how about Canada, 2006 [minns.ca]?
Re:"rigged Elections" (Score:3, Interesting)
No, I think he was confused by the fact that it resembles the revolutionary right-ism in the United States so much that it is difficult to distinguish them.
The political landscape is a sphere, go far enough in ANY direction (right or left, progressive or conservative) from freedom at the "top" and you always eventually get to dictatorship, down at the bottom.
Re:Putin does not need to rig any election. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, cronies and henchmen in remote regions are a completely different story.
Realistically, the feudalism never went away in the Soviet Union (and Russia for that matter). Many of the remote places and nearly all of the so called "autonomous republics" and "autonomous areas" are ruled in a feudal manner. In fact usually the rule inherited from father to son.
It is essential for a vassal to demonstrate his true loyalty to the ruling feudal. In the middle ages it was the oath of allegiance. Now it is votes. This is exactly what is happening here. Chechnia, various tatar states and other fiefdoms demonstrating their loyalty to the king. Move along people, there is nothing we can do to fix it for at least a 100 more years. Old habits die hard. Really hard.
Also, they are a blip on the overall statistics radar. In total we are talking about less votes than Moscow and St Petersburg which were not rigged and had the highest opposition representation which were not rigged this way. In fact I would expect less than 2-3% of the overall vote to be subjected to such rigging (the fiefdoms in question are not particularly large).
The real killer was the strict prohibition on foreign funding.
There were anything between 30-200 million of American money behind every mid-right wing win in Eastern Europe for the last 15 years (I have personally seen some of it). Without this level of support none of the right-wing "blue" muppets would have gotten even close to winning an election in Bulgaria, Romania, etc. By yanking the plug and making sure that none of the local oligarghs gives money to the opposition Putin has guaranteed his win. The 7% was simply a topup just to make sure.
Cover up the accent... (Score:4, Interesting)
Hmmm, he wants to blend in with the natives... I wonder why? hmmm, let's think on this one...
Oh yeah I got it, maybe because he was a spy?
I remember when Bush met Putin for the first time and said, "I looked the man in the eyes..."
At that point I thought, Bush, are you daft? The man in front of you was (is?) a spy and he would try to make himself appear like the Dali Lama himself...
I once asked a Russian when Putin was elected whether he was good or bad for the country. He replied, "does it matter?" I was completely surprised by this answer. He explained himself and said, "Mother Russia has always been ruled by an iron fist, and no politics whether communism, a tzar or free market will change that. Russia is one of the few places where a powerful person will drive over the shoes of a policeman, and the policeman will smile and say, "thank-you you are free to do that again""
Re:"rigged Elections" (Score:3, Interesting)