Russian Pres Election 2012

[GMantis]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Considering the kind of opposition facing Putin, there is not really much need to falsify the results.

[I left.]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Considering the kind of opposition facing Putin, there is not really much need to falsify the results.

Isn't it still generally accepted that he does? Whether he needs to or not?

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Putin is at 99.73% in Chechnya? You know, they could have at least tried to make these results believable.

[asexual trans victimologist]

Is Yamal-Nenets also usually fertile ground for UR 'landslides'?

[Proud Lieberal from Northeast]

Putin is at 99.73% in Chechnya? You know, they could have at least tried to make these results believable.

Silly. Kadyrov is the 99.73% of the Chechen electorate.

[Χahar]

Is Yamal-Nenets also usually fertile ground for UR 'landslides'?

United Russia did very well there in the parliamentary elections. There's oil there, so there are a lot of ethnic Russian workers, although the results there might also have to do with an overzealous local government.

[smoltchanov]

Rather boring. The only question for me was - who will be third (luckily it was Prokhorov) and what exact percentage Putin will get.(up to 60% - almost absolutely fair election, 60-65% - strong government pressure, but without open mass scale rigging, more then 65% - big falsifications). That's all. Besides that everything was VERY predictable...

[GMantis]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Considering the kind of opposition facing Putin, there is not really much need to falsify the results.

Isn't it still generally accepted that he does? Whether he needs to or not?

The results in Chechnya and Dagestan are of course falsified, but that might be the local warlords overpalying. As for the rest of the results, there are probably some problems with the election, but not in a very large scale. After all, the results are close to the polls before the election, including those made by opposition polling agencies.

[Sibboleth]

Of course what makes these elections a joke isn't just the fact that there's clearly been widespread poll rigging.

[Tender Branson]

Putin is at 99.73% in Chechnya? You know, they could have at least tried to make these results believable.

Silly. Kadyrov is the 99.73% of the Chechen electorate.

True.

If you don't want to wake up the next day in a barrel full of acid or with a bullet in the head, don't mess around with Kadyrov.

[smoltchanov]

Of course what makes these elections a joke isn't just the fact that there's clearly been widespread poll rigging.

Probably - not in Moscow (where i reside) or St. Petersburgh - results are plausibly there too. But in autonomous regions (especially North Caucasus) and remote areas - of course...

[Old Europe]

Yeah, the correlation between strong Putin results and (insanely) high turnout on one hand and weak Putin results and low turnout on the other hand is pretty obvious.

You could just as well refer to a Russian turnout map as the "Russia ballot stuffing map".

[Insula Dei]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Casting a vote you know won't have any real tangible effects at all? Isn't that the essence of Swiss federal elections?

[Sibboleth]

Of course what makes these elections a joke isn't just the fact that there's clearly been widespread poll rigging.

Probably - not in Moscow (where i reside) or St. Petersburgh - results are plausibly there too. But in autonomous regions (especially North Caucasus) and remote areas - of course...

Well, quite. What I was also getting at was that in proper free-and-fair elections the range of non-Putin candidates might be somewhat more appealing, to say nothing of the media and so on.

[angus]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for ... to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Any Iowa GOP caucus voter could answer that.

[asexual trans victimologist]

I sat down and worked it out and, looking things over north to south within European Russia, Putin suddenly starts getting higher totals even outside the ethnic republics once you get into the Golden Horde.

[ZuWo]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

Casting a vote you know won't have any real tangible effects at all? Isn't that the essence of Swiss federal elections?

You have a point here.

But when I cast a vote the effects of my vote are not the most important to me anyway - it's the knowledge that my vote will be counted just like the vote cast by my neighbour. At least I have some reason to assume that I as a citizen am taken seriously by the government this way.

[Gustaf]

I have a Russian-born friend who's an active libertarian. His Facebook status the other day was that "this is the first and hopefully the last time I vote for a Communist"

And this is a guy who is seriously anti-communist.

[smoltchanov]

I have a Russian-born friend who's an active libertarian. His Facebook status the other day was that "this is the first and hopefully the last time I vote for a Communist"

And this is a guy who is seriously anti-communist.

I know a lot of such people. The logic was "i will vote for a candidate, not named "Putin", who is most likely to get most votes". Though personally Zyuganov is no more then old hardline party hack. I was'n convinced by this "logic" and voted Prokhorov

[crypto-fascist superhero]

Voting for Zyuganov to stop Putin would seem to me to be missing the forest for the trees.

[Insula Dei]

Amazing Zyuganov (funny way of writing the name, you Anglos have) may well be the only major Russian politician from the 1990s to still be relevant in some way.

[Old Europe]

Amazing Zyuganov (funny way of writing the name, you Anglos have) may well be the only major Russian politician from the 1990s to still be relevant in some way.

Zhirinovsky?

[pillage the village, trash the scene]

Amazing Zyuganov (funny way of writing the name, you Anglos have) may well be the only major Russian politician from the 1990s to still be relevant in some way.

Zhirinovsky?

LOLNO

[pillage the village, trash the scene]

I'm just back from voting

What is it like to cast a vote in an election where you don't know whether your ballot will be "corrected", dumped in the nearest river, compensated for by 10 Putin votes that come out of nowhere or be chosen as one of the few non-Putin ballots the electoral commission has to accept in order to render the result still somewhat believable?

There is a one lil' trick in Russian elections - if you boycott it, they find your name in the voter list, and cast your ballot for guess who?

[pillage the village, trash the scene]

Guess who first send their congratulations to Putin.
http://www.zman.com/news/2012/03/05/121767-print.html
http://www.zman.com/news/2012/03/06/121842-print.html
Asad and Ahmadinedjad.