Recount? What recount?

Great Debates
#1

I recall many people talking about how once the elections were over, someone (I dunno who) was going to use the Freedom of Information Act to gain access to the “uncounted” ballots (quotes used due to the disputation over whether they were actually counted or not) from the Florida elections to prove conclusively just who actually won there. I have since heard not a single solitary thing. Well, I’ve heard some speculation, but nothing conclusive.

Has anyone mounted a recount? If so, have they finished? If so, what were the results?

~~Baloo

#2

The recount is being done by a whole bunch of different newspapers, some working together (including the NY Times, Washington Post and AP), others, such as the Miami Herald, separately. It’s still going on, and Gore’s gaining, even in Republican counties using optical scanners. Here’s a story about the recount from Slate, with links to other stories:

http://slate.msn.com/code/KausFiles/KausFiles.asp?Show=1/28/2001&idMessage=6962

#3

I also heard a report on the news that they’re not only doing a total recount of all the votes, but they’re classifying each individual ballot in more categories than just “Definitely Bush” and “Definitely Gore”… they’re sorting the ballots into categories such as “Dimpled chad”, “Pregnant chad”, “Undervote”, “Overvote”, “Vomit-stained”, etc.

Well, okay, maybe not “vomit-stained”…

#4

Wait a minute… I just noticed something odd about the article. It says:

It then goes on with the rest of the article assuming that Gore should have gotten 366 more votes.

What about the other 1334 “recovered” votes? Wouldn’t those have gone to somebody else? Or are they saying that, out of the 1,700 recovered votes, Gore got 366 more of them than Bush did?

Damn these ambiguous 'Net articles… can someone clarify?

#5

Yes, “net” votes would mean that (if all those votes were for Gore & Bush only) Gore got 1033 and Bush 667.

#6

There are at least 3 groups currently assessing Florida ballots.

1-The National Opinion Research Center, a nonprofit firm
affiliated with the University of Chicago, plans to build a database of the 180,000 ballots that did not register a vote for president during machine counts.

They will be overseen by The Associated Press, CNN, The New York Times, The Palm Beach Post, St. Petersburg Times, Tribune Publishing, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

They goal is 'is to inspect and classify these ballots, and certainly not to challenge the certification of results."

Among other things they will assign punchcard ballots by degree of chadness-whether dimpled, hanging by a corner or multiple corners, missing, dimpled, etc.

2-The Miami Herald is reviewing the estimated 60,000 undervote ballots that were rejected statewide.

3-The conservative group Judicial Watch, gadfly or watchdog depending on your biases, is conducting its own review.

My own feeling is group 1 is driven by the academic desire to quantify phenomena, group 2 sees a Pulitzer in the future, and group 3 is looking to provide political cover for Gopers if groups 1 and 2 show up embarassing data.

#7

So, has Harry Browne passed Pat Buchanan in the recount yet? :wink: