Reprinted from
Preemptive Karma with some additions:
The sloppy and dubious efforts by Sound Politics blog continues.
Despite being soundly debunked at this blog here and here as well as in The Seattle Times, they're still trying to alledge that military voters from Washington State were disenfranchised.
The first factual error on the Sound Politics post from today is in the first sentence:
Unfortunately, the question whether King County issued all of its military absentee ballots in compliance with the Oct. 7 deadline, has not yet been answered.
The deadline was not October 7. It was October 8.
(more after the jump)
And then there's this gem:
It's possible that all of King County's military ballots went out on time. I've heard credible but as yet unconfirmed reports that a significant number of the ballots did not go out by the deadline, but I need more confirmation to settle the question one way or another. So I'm going to keep asking questions. The latest Times article which only confirms that some of the military ballots went out on time does not in any way put this controversy to rest.
Were these the same "credible" sources that gave them the errant October 7 deadline? I certainly hope these "credible" sources are more reliable than the one that was used last week citing a King County bulk mail permit as evidence of late mailings...when it turned out that permit wasn't the one used at all. (I am still working on that individual's initial claim, fyi. I can find no evidence that the USPS gives out that information by simply walking up to the counter and asking...as was alledged).
The sloppiness continues (bold print added by Carla):
Let's take a close look at the facts. If we give King County the benefit of the doubt and assume that the most recent version of their "Fact Sheet Military and Overseas Ballots" is correct, we learn that:
Number of military/overseas ballots issued on that date:
On Oct.1, 246 ballots were issued
On Oct.7, 3055 (emphasis-Carla) ballots were issued
For the Oct.7 mailing, King County prioritized our mail-out to ensure military and overseas ballots were mailed as soon as they were available and within the timeframes required by state law and guidelines from the United State Department of Justice.
Total number of military/overseas ballots issued in the General Election:
15,289 ballots that were issued were designated in voter categories that would include military personnel and overseas voters (any RS, RM, Subs).
First, note that they are not making any distinction in their numbers between military ballots and overseas ballots.
Except if you keep reading...the Times does. They quite carefully explain the number of mailed out military absentee ballots. Here are the two relevant passages:
"The log of outgoing mail shows that 1,853 ballots destined for armed-forces members (emphasis-Carla) were delivered to the International Station post office in Seattle on Oct. 7."
"King County Elections Superintendent Bill Huennekens said the last of 3,055 overseas military ballots (emphasis-Carla) went into the postal system Oct. 8 -- meeting the federal deadline."
1853+3055=4908. So in fact based on the Times story there are 4908 military absentee ballots mailed out on October 7 and 8.(There's that pesky October 8 deadline again).
These are very different things. "Overseas" ballots would go to non-military expatriates and are handled differently from military ballots.
What is meant by overseas expatriates ballots "handled differently"? Their bulk mailing might be slightly different. I can't see how there would be a major appreciable difference there. But in terms of returning and counting...they'd certainly be handled the same from the research I've done so far.
Indeed, we have no idea from county information how many truly military ballots are in question. The Seattle Times article does not help answer the question. All we learn is this:
The log of outgoing mail shows that 1,853 ballots destined for armed-forces members were delivered to the International Station post office in Seattle on Oct. 7.
and
After delivering the first batch of military ballots to the post office, King County election workers took the remaining ballots to a mailing contractor in Snohomish County later that day and on the morning of Oct. 8.
Let's try it again.1853+3055=4908
The county Fact Sheet shows that a total of 3,055 military/overseas ballots were issued on Oct. 7. The article says that 3,055 ballots went into the mail on Oct. 7.
The logs apparently did not show how many of these were military.
The Times quotes Huennekens as saying "3055 overseas military ballots" as going into the postal system on October 8. Not October 7. Further, we know how many of them were military. All of them. The article says so.
From the Fact Sheet we infer that there are still another 11,988 military/overseas ballots that were issued after Oct. 7. The article seems to explain 5,478 of them.
That still leaves 6,510 military/overseas ballots unaccounted for.
No, actually it doesn't.
The facts as we know them so far:
15,289 military/overseas ballots were issued in total. (source: King County fact sheet)
"Several hundred" (246?) military overseas ballots were mailed between Oct 1 and October 7.(source: King County Fact Sheet)
4908 military overseas ballots were mailed out October 7-8.(source: Seattle Times)
5478 mailed to armed forces within the United States.(source: Seattle Times)
1342 federal military ballots received on time by King County (source: King County fact sheet). The number "issued" isn't given on the fact sheet. We can perhaps safely assume it's more than what is received, but to be fair, I'll go with the 1342 number.
16 federal military ballots received too late to be counted (source: King County fact sheet)
4908+5478+1342+16+246=11,990.
15,289-11,990=3299.
It's entirely possible that 3299 could be the nonmilitary ballots sent out. We can't know for sure unless the county differentiates between the military and overseas ballots in the 15,289. But the numbers hardly seem out of line.
Once again, sloppy reporting and inaccurate fact checking are causing a stir up where one need not be.
Additions:
The folks at Sound Politics are getting a lot of TV and radio face time over this. Stefan Sharkansky was on today's Special Report with Brit Hume (or so he was scheduled according to his post on Sound Politics). I missed the show (it aired 3PM) here. He's also speaking at a Republican lunch being held Wednesday in Gig Harbor, WA.