Is it fair to do a recount in heavily Democratic areas, because most of the errors that turn up will be in favor of Democrats? I mean, say Palm Beach voted 80% Democratic and 20% Republican. About 80% of the errors would be for Democrats, right? But then take another county, 80% Republican, 20% Democratic. The same situation, but they don’t get to do a hand recount, even though there were likely errors there, too! Is that statistically fair? I mean, shouldn’t the hand recount be done all across Florida, which would probably make it even out in the end?
The Republicans waited too long (past the deadline) to request hand counts- perhaps a tactical error (at the time, they were saying the hand counts weren’t useable). Also, there apparrently more errors in the Palm Beach and southern Florida area, due to the butterfly ballot, and punch cards- which were not used in the Bush area. Thus, a hand count in the Bush areas would probably not turn up as many new votes as they are in the Gore areas.
IMHO, the same ballot and same counting method should be used state-wide, to avoid this kind of disparity.
Arjuna34
Well, the Republicans gained votes in manual recounts of six Republicna counties, which alone would more than double Bush’s lead. I don’t know why we’re all focused on the recounts in Democratic counties… I say recount the whole state manually, but that’s just me…
Why recount all the counties ? Both sides had several days to decide whether they wanted recounts, and in which counties to apply for them. The Bush team never asked any counties for recounts and the legal deadline for making such requests has passed. Obviously they must be content with the number of votes they already have, but this is no reason for them to deny the recounts legally requested by the Gore team. Hand recounts have been around for ages as a tool for settling close elections, up til now it seems that very few people have questioned their legitimacy, and it doesn’t seem that thre are any factors that make them especially suspect in this race.