Ohio challenge

[agcatter]

Our election system is not "a mess".  It's served us well for 200 years.  It suddenly became "a mess" when Democrats weren't dominating elections anymore.  How convenient.

[opebo]

Our election system is not "a mess".  It's served us well for 200 years.  It suddenly became "a mess" when Democrats weren't dominating elections anymore.  How convenient.

It has always been a mess when elections have been close, and there has always been a lot of cheating.  2000 was just a little worse than anything previous.

[Andrew]

Our elections are a mess even when they aren't close; it's just that nobody notices.

In every Presidential election, millions of votes are thrown out.  We have machines that leave no paper trail.  Why do we expect a recount to always produce different totals?  Because we know that the votes are not counted accurately.  The counts are usually pretty close--but why is "pretty close" considered good enough?

Both major parties work hard to keep minor parties off the ballot, unless it suits their purposes.  The Republicans seem to be more interested than the Democrats in keeping certain groups from coming out to vote, but both major parties are eager to find ways to disqualify the ballots of those who don't support them.

It's a mess.  And almost nobody cares.

[A18]

It is impossible to count 100% of the votes correctly unless you're willing to go to a computerized system.

[Andrew]

The computerized systems do not count the votes with 100% accuracy; both Snohomish and Yakima Counties in Washington, which use computer touchscreens, saw the results change with the recounts.  The results in Snohomish even changed during the machine recount.

That said, I don't have a problem with using the new DRE machines, as long as they provide a voter-verified paper trail.  Otherwise, we are just asking for fraud.

[A18]

And the recount results are less accurate.

[Andrew]

The COMPUTERS in Snohomish got different numbers each time.  How is that 100% accuracy?

[Alcon]

And the recount results are less accurate.

I have never heard anyone claim this before. Mind backing this up?

[jimrtex]

This happened in county after county.

Which counties?

[Andrew]

This happened in county after county.

Which counties?

You can read observer accounts from most of the counties at http://www.votecobb.org

According to one of their regional recount coordinators--I can't recall his name right now--only 2 of the 88 counties chose the test precincts randomly.  When you read the observer accounts, you will see many of the situations I described.

[jimrtex]

This happened in county after county.

Which counties?

You can read observer accounts from most of the counties at http://www.votecobb.org
According to one of their regional recount coordinators--I can't recall his name right now--only 2 of the 88 counties chose the test precincts randomly.  When you read the observer accounts, you will see many of the situations I described.

I looked at the report for Champaign County.  Why are the observers anonymized?  The affidavit on the web site misreported the total vote in the county by a factor of 10X (180,000+ votes).  Who is responsible for this error?  David Cobb?

[Andrew]

I looked at the report for Champaign County.  Why are the observers anonymized?

I don't know; this seems to be the case for every county.  It's curious but unimportant, I think.

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That is obviously a typo:  190,808 instead of 19,088.  This is made clear by the rest of the sentence:  "three percent of this total is 572."  The important part of that paragraph is the next sentence:  "Precinct chosen for recount was Salem North with 605 votes; chosen because it was closest precinct equal to or larger than 572."  This violates Ohio's recount regulations, which require the county to select the precincts for hand recount RANDOMLY.

It's not in the affidavit (which is at the bottom of the page), by the way; it's in the report (at the top of the page).

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I would assume that David Cobb is ultimately responsible for any errors, even typos, on his website--although the fault probably lies with either the person who filed the report or with the webmaster.

[agcatter]

yawn

[Andrew]

Don't be a tool.

If you're not interested in the topic, don't read it.

[J. J.]

The members of Congress challenging admitted that they didn't really question the results.  It was for political purposes and it backfired.

[Andrew]

Most of them didn't question the results, but they questioned the process.

How did it backfire?  People who care about election reform appreciated what they did.  People who were already angry continue to be angry.  Most people have no idea it even happened.

[J. J.]

Most of them didn't question the results, but they questioned the process.

How did it backfire?  People who care about election reform appreciated what they did.  People who were already angry continue to be angry.  Most people have no idea it even happened.

Because they did it under the guise of challenging the election.  It, by using that vehicle, becomes another example of "Sore Loserman."

[Andrew]

I think it's more an example of "things that happened that nobody knows about."

[J. J.]

I think it's more an example of "things that happened that nobody knows about."

There were other ways to do that, that would have been appropriate.

[Andrew]

There were other ways to do that, that would have been appropriate.

I think it was very appropriate, but that really has nothing to do with whether or not it "backfired."  I'm assuming that by "backfire," you mean that it made them look bad to the public.  I don't agree, because I don't think most people have any awareness of it at all.

[handler]

The reason most people don't know about it is because most rational people know Bush won Ohio.  There is no issue.  I was for Senator Kerry.  He lost Ohio, and it wasn't all that close.  Let's move on please.

[J. J.]

There were other ways to do that, that would have been appropriate.

I think it was very appropriate, but that really has nothing to do with whether or not it "backfired."  I'm assuming that by "backfire," you mean that it made them look bad to the public.  I don't agree, because I don't think most people have any awareness of it at all.

The only thing that it generated was a soundbite, and the soundbite was, "We're challenging the electoral vote count."  That's how it sounded and was reported.

[jimrtex]

I looked at the report for Champaign County.  Why are the observers anonymized?

I don't know; this seems to be the case for every county.  It's curious but unimportant, I think.

The election law permits each candidate appoint a recount observer in each county.  Surely the candidate must provide some documentation as to whom they have appointed, and this must be have validated by the county election board before admitting the observers to the recount (in Champaign County it was noted that the GOP had sent two observors, one for Bush and one for Cheney, and one was denied admittance.  So the name of the observers must be a matter of public record, and likely included in the documentation of the recount by the county election board.  So it seems totally bizarre that they were anonymized.

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That is obviously a typo:  190,808 instead of 19,088.  This is made clear by the rest of the sentence:  "three percent of this total is 572."[/quote]
Who is responsible for the error, and why hasn't it been corrected?

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Is there a written version of Ohio's recount regulations available on the web?

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I would assume that David Cobb is ultimately responsible for any errors, even typos, on his website--although the fault probably lies with either the person who filed the report or with the webmaster.[/quote]
If Secretary of State Blackwell is going to be responsible for every mistake in Ohio, why shouldn't candidate Cobb take responsiblity for the recount effort that he has instigated.

[Andrew]

Who is responsible for the error, and why hasn't it been corrected?

I would guess that nobody has called it to their attention.  Have you called it to their attention?

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There is:  http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/news/guide/recount.pdf

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Actually, no.  That's part of Blackwell's job, too.

[Andrew]

The votes were counted and there was then a RECOUNT.

There was a recount, and it would have gone a long way toward eliminating any suspicions, if it had actually been done in accordance with Ohio law.  But it wasn't; it was a joke.  The local boards ignored the state's recount provisions, and did everything in their power to avoid counting ballots by hand.  They had an opportunity to put the issue to rest, but they failed.

I hate to say, "I told you so," but I told you so:  http://www.ballot-access.org/2007/01/25/the-final-chapter-in-cobb-badnarik-2004-recount-requests/.