It’s pretty hard to assess voter fraud from afar, especially given the reality that most Americans tend to presume the worst about regimes we don’t like. I’m not suggesting that foreign correspondents are making things up, but I will say that Ahmadenijad has already been found guilty in the court of American columnists.
But let’s run down what we do know.
The reason tampering is on everyone’s minds to begin with is, in the weeks leading up to the election, top Ahmadenijad challenger Mir-Hossein Mousavi was gaining ground, and even surpassing the incumbent president in some polls.
Here’s a run-down of some such polls, from FiveThirtyEight.com:

Now, as 538’s Renard Sexton cautions, these polls were conducted with somewhat dubious methodology, by American standards, and there may have been some push-polling going on. Nevertheless, as the numbers of undecided voters waned, support for Mousavi grew, which is not out of the ordinary for a surging challenger.
One thing you’ll notice immediately is that not a single poll has Ahmadenijad anywhere close to the 62 percent share he earned on election day. In fact he only reached the 50 percent plateau needed to avoid a run-off in one.
So this is the initial basis for skepticism. Again, doesn’t prove a thing, but it should certainly raise eyebrows.
Continue reading ‘Evidence of Iranian Vote Fraud?’