1. I'm at Rossi's headquarters helping out. I'm not going to talk specificts, but other counties have come in, and we've actually gained a few votes. +7 when they are all talied up last I saw.

Posted by: Cliff on November 22, 2004 11:55 AM

2. More counties have reported...Rossi is down 7 votes. We are losing votes in mostly Rossi counties...this can't be a good sign, especially with King Co. officials furiously cheating on Gregoire's behalf.

Posted by: Kevin S on November 22, 2004 12:03 PM

3. Kevin,

Don't call it cheating until it's proven (a press release isn't proof). Otherwise you run the risk of sounding like many of the Kerry supporters who alleged fraud with little proof.

Mark

Posted by: Mark S on November 22, 2004 12:12 PM

4. My wrong on Pend Oreille. I got messed up on the old to the recount updates.

Posted by: steve on November 22, 2004 12:26 PM

5. Does anyone have a way of comparing the "swing" from the Gorton Cantrell (sp?) to this year? I imagaine the small numbers involved (as with any error rate) will make comparisons relatively meaningless but this has been an interesting process (as seen from Oklahoma!).

Posted by: John B on November 22, 2004 12:48 PM

6. I can't find the county by county results for the 2000 recount, but Cantwell gained 177 votes and Gorton lost 99.

On a slightly related topic, your misspelling made me wonder what sort of Senator Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains would make. I imagine that it would give a whole new meaning to the term "Political Party." The Cloakroom would certainly never be the same.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 01:06 PM

7. Pend Oreille recount results look highly suspicious. They counted 6262 total ballots in their original count. In the recount, they counted only 6114 total ballots. Where did the other 148 ballots go in Pend Oreille county?

None of the other counties reporting so far has changed the total ballot count by more than a handful -- usually five ballots or less for the entire county -- many with the exact same number as before.

Interesting also -- somehow 148 ballots disappear in Pend Oreille county, but they still count more votes in the Governor's race -- six more for Gregoire, two more for Rossi.

Posted by: Richard Pope on November 22, 2004 01:58 PM

8. I'm taking heart from the fact that there are only tiny numbers of ballots changing here.

Posted by: Sarah Schreffler on November 22, 2004 01:59 PM

9. When is the estimated completion date for the recount for each of the counties?

Posted by: Marc on November 22, 2004 02:00 PM

10. Richard,

The recount only counts ballots with valid votes for Governor. Many people voted only for President and left the remainder of the ballot blank. Those ballots would not be recounted and would account for the discrepancy you noticed.

Posted by: Nathan on November 22, 2004 02:18 PM

11. Richard,

Double checking the numbers, I stand by my earlier assessment. The initial return in Pend Oreille registered 6,104 votes for the three candidates. The recount added a total of 8 to the three-candidate total making it 6,112. The two vote difference between this number and your ballots counted number would be write-ins.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 02:27 PM

12. Ruth Bennett is surging!

Posted by: Marc on November 22, 2004 02:27 PM

13. "Ruth Bennett is surging!"

*sprays root beer all over his computer screen*

Do NOT do that while I'm drinking!

Posted by: Nathan on November 22, 2004 02:45 PM

14. Interesting, of the 14 counties that have reported so far only Yakima nailed their initial counts - straight zeros.

Posted by: Marc on November 22, 2004 02:58 PM

15. Marc,

I'm not surprised that only Yakima hit its original total dead on. Any time you count big numbers there are likely to be small mistakes, but on top of that there is the possibility that the canvassing boards could make decisions on and enhance ballots that were not counted the first time.

Don't be surprised if most counties report small increases in the vote totals. On the other hand, be skeptical if they report non-insignificant reductions in vote totals. That would likely indicate they messed up big the first time around.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 03:05 PM

16. Yakima County uses computer machine for casting the election day poll votes. Most changes in recount occur in election day poll votes, since those ballots have not been previously manually examined. Since poll votes in Yakima were cast on a computer, they should not be expected to change at all. If the absentee and provisional ballots (which are optical scan in Yakima) were carefully examined before being run through the counting machines, they should not be expected to change much.

Biggest worry (besides the King County nonsense) would be if a county had mistakenly counted a batch of votes twice previously. That is why Gorton's totals went down in the 2000 recount -- Douglas County had counted a stack of ballots twice in the original count.

Posted by: Richard Pope on November 22, 2004 03:10 PM

17. Snohomish County also uses computerized voting, so the same applies. The current mess is a very good argument for computerized voting.

Posted by: Timothy on November 22, 2004 03:13 PM

18. "if they report non-insignificant reductions in vote totals."

Don't I not love double negatives!

Posted by: jbas on November 22, 2004 03:16 PM

19. "if they report non-insignificant reductions in vote totals."

Don't I not love double negatives!
-----

*blush*

I plead guilty to crimes against the English language.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 04:02 PM

20. Benton just reported in. Gregoire +1, Rossi +2. That one had been worrying me a little.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 04:06 PM

21. Jefferson just reported (Gregoire +1, Rossi -3) as did Stevens (No change).

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 04:19 PM

22. Hey, go visit http://josef-a-k.blogspot.com/2004/11/scary-development-for-rossi.html, and check out Edition 5.4 - 3:50 PM to see what you can do to stop the theft of the election.

TO QUOTE A GREAT DEMOCRAT: "WE'RE COMING! YOU'RE GOING! DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU ON THE WAY OUT!"

Below is one scream for each marginal vote in proud Kerry-Edwards blogging tradition (just try going through that one time and you'll go silly)!:

DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO!
DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO! DI-NO!
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265 cries for Dino! Hard to ignore :-)!

Posted by: Josef on November 22, 2004 04:22 PM

23. The one that worries me starts with a K and ends with a G. And I'm pretty curious about Grays Harbor and if their late push for Gregoire is reconciled.

Posted by: Chris on November 22, 2004 04:24 PM

24. In my sweet silliness, I forgot to add the hyperlink to my blog to tell you all about how you too can help "Beat Back Brendt": Latest Update on the Recount With Call to Action - Edition 5.4.

I WANT MY STATE BACK! AND I'M A DINOCRAT! CHARRRGEEEEE!

(This is all intended in good fun. Sorry if I offend anybody.)

Posted by: Josef on November 22, 2004 04:25 PM

25. So far so good for Rossi with a net gain of one. Let's go Dino! Let's play the Bedrock Anthem (Weird Al song) when Dino wins.

Posted by: Efrem from Sacramento on November 22, 2004 04:27 PM

26. I am not worried about Pend Oreille County anymore. Their total number of ballots on recount appears to be the total number which have votes for Governor (probably including a couple of write-in votes for other candidates as well). And the fact that not too many votes were changed regarding what Gregoire and Rossi had. (+6 Gregoire, +2 Rossi) Not the best numbers of course, but nothing to be suspicious about.

I was pasting the 2000 results onto an Excel spreadsheet (comparing President, Senate and Governor) and will do the same for the 2004 results, to see the drop off in various counties -- i.e the difference between total ballots cast, and total votes in a given contest.

One interesting thing from 2000 was that Douglas County apparently double counted somewhere around 800 votes. The President and Governor statistics show that about 105% of the people who cast ballots in Douglas County voted for those offices. This was corrected in the Senate recount, so that only 98.09% of the people voted for Senator. Since Douglas County went 2-1 for Gorton, that probably cost him about 250 net votes in the recount.

I am predicting 500 to 600 additional votes in King County from ballot enhancement, and a 2-1 advantage for Gregoire, for a net gain of 150 to 200 votes for Gregoire in King County.

Probably none of the other counties are doing detailed manual examination or ballot enhancement, since Sam Reed's guidelines only said to check for write-in votes on machine undervotes and overvotes.

If Rossi is ahead after the recount is complete, the odds are virtually zero that a hand count could add more than a handful of votes for Gregoire out of King County, since the King County process is so thorough and efficient.

However, if Rossi is behind after the recount, the odds are very good that a hand recount of the other counties would put him back ahead -- since none of the other counties seem to be doing a thorough manual examination of undervotes and overvotes like King County is.

Posted by: Richard Pope on November 22, 2004 04:31 PM

27. Thurston just in- plus 2 Gregoire, plus 4 Rossi, net plus 2 Rossi. That is not good for Gregoire.

Posted by: Jim King on November 22, 2004 04:41 PM

28. Was Adams county using an abacus for their counting - my goodness!

Posted by: Marc on November 22, 2004 04:43 PM

29. That seems like a lot of votes for such a small county. I hope they have a good explanation.

On the other hand, Dino is going to need those votes to offset what is going on in King Co.

Posted by: Kevin S on November 22, 2004 04:47 PM

30. I'm having a "what the heck" moment with Adams county. It was a bit surprising to see such a big change in the recount. Does anyone know what they did to change the numbers that much? Were they systematically checking and enhancing the questionable ballots?

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 04:47 PM

31. Richard--
Double counting of votes was a real point of emphasis the past 4 years. In theory, it cannot happen if auditors follow procedures and reconciled voters voting totals from the voter registration list with total ballots counted. You can pretty much give that one a rest. Oh, and most reconicile every precindt. In Jefferson, they were off in 1 precindt by 5 votes. They ran that precindt again and it reconciled then. All this was supposed to be done before certification.

Posted by: Mr. Cynical on November 22, 2004 04:58 PM

32. Well I sent off an email to the Adams County Elections Administrator. Lets see if we get an answer.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 22, 2004 05:08 PM

33. IMO, these low deviations of less than 10 votes in the first half of the counties recounted (Adams notwhistanding) bode well for keeping King county honest (if possible). It will be a lot more suspicious to come up with and defend a huge deviation in favor of Gregoire when the remaining counties are so close to their original counts, no matter how big the county. And it's only 850,000 of the 2.7 Million votes in WA so the other two thirds of the vote being stable can't be ignored by the courts if it goes there. But I guess we'll see what happens.

Posted by: Chris on November 22, 2004 05:09 PM

34. Posted by Nathan Azinger at November 22, 2004 05:08 PM

Speaking of e-mails, Chris Vance has called for rallies and e-mails. Please read Editions Edition 5.4 and 5.5 about this of my running blog post HERE.

Well, as General Ike once said something to the effect of: We're going to have to fight with both fists!

Hope you all join me!

Posted by: Josef on November 22, 2004 06:14 PM

35. Good Point Chris.
You always closely audit and get a bullet-proof explanation on the aberations. Like Adams County. There must be a reason like they didn't reconcile the voter list count with the ballots counted...dozens of potential sub-reasons why the end result what it was but it should have been caught before certification. Hard to believe these were all previously some undervote..but possible their machine had a temporary glitch. Hell, I'm just guessing. Let's see what they have to say.

Posted by: Mr. Cynical on November 22, 2004 06:15 PM

36. We may be over the worst of it. It looks like King County has finally finished the process of "enhancing" the ballots.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=WA%20Governor%20Recount

There are about 500 "new" votes out of King County as a result of this process. I will guess-timate that Gregoire will have a margin of 30%-35% out of these ballots. But even if this margin becomes a ridiculous 40%, this will still add only 200 net votes to Gregoire's total -- not enough to elect her Governor. And King County's process is so thorough, that a hand count will be unlikely to add anything significant.

I was worried when the AP story referenced King County having 22,000 undervotes. The SecState website would indicate 23,310 undervotes. However, this does not include write-ins. The KC Elections website shows 1,240 write-ins (i.e. ballots with the write-in oval filled in), so that is consistent with 22,000 undervotes.

King County may be about the only county manually checking undervotes (or overvotes for that matter) to see if the circles are filled in correctly. Sam Reed's guidelines only called for checking optical scan ballots for write-in votes -- not for otherwise checking to see if the ovals were filled in correctly, or why the ballot wasn't otherwise being counted.

In any event, 500 "new" votes from 22,000 or so undervotes (or even 23,310, if we add write-ins to the denominator) is a conversion ratio of over two percent -- far higher than what any other reliably large county has reported in the recount process.

Chelan is the only optical scan county with over 500 undervotes which has reported in officially. Chelan added 4 "new" votes out of 584 undervotes, which is only a 0.6849% conversion ratio.

No punch card county has converted even as much as 0.55% of the undervotes into "new" votes. The largest punchcard county so far (and overall) is Clark County, which converted 10 "new" votes out of 9458 undervotes, for a 0.1057% conversion ratio.

Probably there will be few significant changes from any of the punch card counties, since Sam Reed's guidelines do not call for visual inspection of punch card ballots that register as undervotes or overvotes. (This applies only to optical scan ballots.)

The optical scan counties remain to be seen, since Chelan is the largest reporting so far, and it only had 584 undervotes. (Naturally, Adams County is an aberration.) Somehow, I doubt that other county auditors are taking it on themselves to do a thorough manual examination in excess of Sam Reed's guidelines, as is King County.

I think the person to blame in all of this is Sam Reed. The Secretary of State should have issued uniform statewide guidelines about what could and could not be done in the recount process, as well as applying the same standard to both punch card and optical scan ballots. All of the auditors appear to be following these guidelines, with some doing additional work.

So what we seem to have is (1) King County thoroughly examined all undervotes and overvotes, (2) most other optical scan counties simply checking these ballots for write-in votes (some of which are actually cast for Rossi or Gregoire, and must be counted), and (3) punch card counties simply running the entire stack of ballots through the machine again without further ado.

Posted by: Richard Pope on November 22, 2004 07:05 PM

37. I just did a tally of the additional counties that have reported in (6:14 pm update). There are now 24 counties reporting, and Rossi is up +25 which gives him a 286 overall lead (if my math is correct). Go Rossi!

Posted by: Gala on November 22, 2004 07:16 PM

38. Rossi's lead is now 25!

Posted by: Colin on November 22, 2004 07:16 PM

39. I meant expanded by 25... phew! (286 TOTAL LEAD)

Posted by: Colin on November 22, 2004 07:17 PM

40. I assume some pro-Rossi counties will turn in their results after King has certified its recount???? I certainly hope so!!

Posted by: Jo on November 22, 2004 08:09 PM

41. will all counties report tonight, some counties, or is it finished for tonight? gracias.

Posted by: jbas on November 22, 2004 08:19 PM

42. Counties do not HAVE to report until Wednesday- let's hope that King County is preparing to wrap tomorrow, since they are releasing some pretty complete numbers regarding their new votes.

Pierce is reportedly only awaiting its Election Canvassing Board stamp of approval, Spokane likewise started Saturday and should be complete.

Snohomish apparently waited until today to start? I've heard mixed reports.

But there really is no good reason that all counties shouldn't have reported by end of business Tuesday- but several probably won't because they don't have to...

Anybody notice that NONE of the proposals to require absentees to be IN by Election Day also move up the certification dates?

Posted by: Jim King on November 22, 2004 08:35 PM

43. King County is a mess!

Posted by: Alex on November 22, 2004 08:38 PM

44. What?

Rossi gaining?

After all the accusations that Dems are STEALING votes?

Because King county hasn't been counted?

But does a Rossi increase in non-King county mean Republicans are STEALING votes elsewhere?

What's going on?

Posted by: ray on November 22, 2004 10:04 PM

45. yeah, we are stealing the election with our measley 25 votes....get real. I heard earlier from a media report in King Co. that in one batch of 100 undervotes that were 'enhanced' by election staff, Gregoire gained 29 votes on Rossi. That more than offsets Rossi's gains statewide as of the time of this posting.

So, the question is, will there be enough such ballots to turn this race? Ideas, anybody?

Posted by: Kevin S on November 22, 2004 10:47 PM

46. Kevin, I'm not going to go there.

That said, my running blog entry has in Editions 5.4 and 5.5 how Chris Vance needs our here and is now at 5.7 noting that Rossi has 25 NEW votes!

The blog also notes the 306 "enhanced" ballots.

You can go to http://josef-a-k.blogspot.com/2004/11/scary-development-for-rossi.html to read the blog entry - remember to scroll down to the last one you read . If the HTML code could be preserved, I'd start anew. My focus, is obviously, on any attempt to steal the election.

Thanks for the traffic. Hope I'm helping. For some reason, I'm not getting comments.

Josef

Posted by: Josef on November 22, 2004 11:47 PM

47. Tonight on the 11:00 News - KIRO had exclusive information that Snohomish County has found hundreds of Ballots that had not been counted in the original election tally!
They did not go into detail on these found ballots but said more info would be out about them tomorrow........

I can't imagine what this is about? The news said they were unsure if these additional ballots would favor Rossi or Gregoire!
Though Snohomish County went in Rossi's favor overall......

Does anyone have more information on this?

Posted by: Deborah on November 22, 2004 11:59 PM

48. Snohomish County is a Democrat County: so make 2 + 2...

Posted by: +++Luc+++ on November 23, 2004 12:21 AM

49. MYSTERY IN SHOHOMISH---On anothr blog site I have been posting concerns about Snomish county since Thr. pm, when King 5 interviewed a very flustered auditror who said clearly in several interweaving attempts - "the counting was bad and my count will be off because the machines jammed a lot and we don't know if in the midst of all the jams we fed the old ballots back in or left them in a pile and never fed them in or fed them in twice...." etc. .....and a minute more.

Why was the fellow covering his ass the day after sending in a flawed count, and why did they not recount at once with help from Sec of State. King county worked over the weekend, where has Sno. been? Great question.

Factoring in King and unknown
Sno - Pierce? Well as a Greggie it sure spices up my life a bit for the final 48. Regards. (Handcount to be in all punch card voting counties and in all precincts where there was any change, other counties. You can do hadcount by precincts, not just counties- plenty of cash for that, brings the slogan Every Vote Counted into reality. Think the dems are winning the PR war, someone tell Van to quit braying, low score in the court stuff, you need some semlance of a case even with free attorneys)......

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 02:00 AM

50. I assume if Gregoire had been up by "a measely" 25 votes, the assumption here would have been that Dems are stealing votes.

The only thing worse than politics is partisans pretending their side is right, fair and equal and the other is wrong, unfair and cheating.

This is done by both sides and such recounts bring it all out.

How about we let the peopole do their jobs, monitor appropriately and let the results stand?

NO...of course not. If Rossi is behind at the end, lawsuits galore (the Rs have already filed at least 2 -- clearly baseless ones -- to protect Rossi's lead at all costs). If Gregoire is behind, lawsuits galore.

Please...do the Rs a big favor and help Vance understand the right thing to do is accept the outcome (even if Dino is behind). The Ds should tell Berendt to do the same (even if Chris is behind).

But neither will. We'll end up in court and our state will be all the worse for it.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 05:02 AM

51. indeed, ray, both sides "cheat." its that the DEMS cheat so much more and are so much better at it. look around the country - how many times is it said "the Reps stole the election!" (OK, several times during the late 1800's!). No, its the Reps who wonder why so many times its the DEM candidate who pulls out a questionable victory (N.O., Los Angeles, Chicago, etc., etc.), or come amazingly close (Miami-Dade 2000, etc.) and some folks try to make it all "equivalent" between the parties. it isn't.

Posted by: jbas on November 23, 2004 07:33 AM

52. I don't think the Republicans cheat as much as the Democrats do, not because Republicans are more virtuous, but because they could never get away with it. The media conveniently look the other way when Democrats cheat, as in St. Louis or Philadelphia in 2000 --- or treat it as a joke, as they have done in Chicago probably dating back to AmerIndian times. ("Running Wolf says the spirits of his ancestors cast 97 votes for him to be Chief.")

Posted by: Matt J Kurlander on November 23, 2004 07:49 AM

53. Cheating? This stuff is very penny ante for cheating. If you are going to risk felony conviction, you steal enough votes to be SURE your candidate is in a position to pardon you.

We are seeing the normal outcome of correction of human error. Snohomish finding 224 more ballots that were inadvertantly not counted should be a near wash as to the balance of votes. Someone stacked an empty trasy on top of one that still had ballots- boo hoo. It isn't a big problem.

One would think most of you have never been through meaningful recounts before...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 08:15 AM

54. Posted by Jim King at November 23, 2004 08:15 AM

Well, I'm mad at Snohomish County. If they can't secure their ballots, then there's a problem.

My latest update isn't much more than a blurb about it with hyperlinks to more news. The local newspaper over there has done a story HERE.

BUT Chris Vance, Dino Rossi and I still need you all to send the e-mails I blogged in Editions 5.4 and 5.5 that you can read about HERE.

Posted by: Josef on November 23, 2004 08:41 AM

55. Well, I don't think either party has a leg up on cheating. It's the ones who lose who assume the other side was better at it. In fact, our system is set up to allow such cheating over and over again.

I was struck by a letter to the editor in today's Seattle Times. Instead of doing these recounts and letting the person ahead move ahead based on what is clearly controversial recount procedures, why not change the law to say if a vote is close, just do a runoff between the top two.

"Close" isn't defined -- but could be within typical cheating range (whatever that is) or within the ranges that now automatically generate a recount.

Seems that such a plan would reduce the "cheating" effect but giving both top finishers an even playing field to get out the vote fto win the runoff.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 09:12 AM

56. Sorry, but these are NOT controversial recount procedures- too many people (but still a negligible part of the population) have too much time on their hands and too much imagination.

I can just see the public reaction to having to have ANOTHER ugly campaign on top of the last one!

Ah, the nefarious plot takes hold in Republican Walla Walla, as a net 22 votes are delivered to Gregoire...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 10:09 AM

57. Walla Walla's large change isn't too much of a surprise--they use the ESS Opscan voting system, just like Adams and Kittias. They account for the vast majority of the changes so far. I've posted an analysis of the numbers so far based on vote machine type over at Flag of the World if anyone's interested.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 10:16 AM

58. Timothy - Why are the ESS Opscan machines the least reliable of the counting methods? I would have guessed punchcards, then Opscan, then electronic voting. Is it simply because people haven't filled in the circles dark enough for the machine to read them? Thanks, and like you analysis.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:28 AM

59. I don't have any idea why--I'm just looking at the numbers. Grant just updated with some very different numbers, and they also use Opscan (even though I left that out in my post, oops), so that continues to bear it out.

It may just be old technology. King County's Global Accuvote system has worked very well in Chelan, San Juan and Klickitat counties, so we should not see similar numbers from them.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 10:32 AM

60. The point is, changes are expected- it is not some nefarious plot. Grant and Grays Harbor just came in- Grays Harbor with eleven more votes, 5 for Dino, 6 for Gregoire; and Grant with 70 more votes, 44 for Dino and 26 for Gregoire. If Grant, with under 26,000 votes, can have 70 more votes, what is happening in King is not out of line, either. Same logic holds true when looking at the other small counties with significant changes. People, this is the process!

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 10:32 AM

61. 101 vote change in Walla Walla out of only 88,000 votes cast seems like a lot to me.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:33 AM

62. Jim, you're wrong. As I said above, Grant County uses a completely different voting system than King County, one that has proved much more unreliable. King County's voting system has, in other counties, proved to be very reliable. There should not be much more than 130 total changed votes in King County.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 10:34 AM

63. Jim King - I agree completely. Please don't take my questions out of context. I sincerely believe, that in this day and age with the checks and balances plus observers that it is virtually impossible to "steal" an election behind closed doors. Gore 2000 almost pulled it off, but that was in the open, everyone could see what they were trying to do. I am not thinking this is some plot. But, I am surprised that some of these counties are coming up with as many votes as they are for how small they are. Just an observation, nothing else.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:36 AM

64. Tim, I wish it was just the equipment we could cite...only a 130 vote swing would be great, but the election workers "divining" intent and modifying ballots in this "machine recount", as Stefan just posted, is going to add more than 130. My only comfort is that if they do it now they won't be able to do it in the hand recount that is looking certain. But then again, given another round, they'll find other ways to whittle away the lead.

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 10:46 AM

65. Marc- I understand- I am asking the same questions, just because I would rather the county auditors were busy drafting legislation to fix the actual problems- the first count should be much more accurate, like Yakima- than the false issue of absentees being mailed Election Day.

Even as I believe problems are being fixed as we go through this process, why not have the higher level of accuracy in the first place?

And Timothy- King County is dealing with a much higher raw amount of human error from the start, no matter what voting system is used- but the level of correction is not out-of-line with other contemporary or historic results. NO FRAUD!!!

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 10:47 AM

66. I'm from California and have been following the recount with some interest. Without taking up too much of your time, can somenody tell me where this stands right now?

Thank you.

Posted by: KittyBurglar on November 23, 2004 10:50 AM

67. Jim-- This is not a small difference--we're talking 5 times the amount that would be expected. They're obviously doing something different in King county to get that much higher a number, unless you really think that King County residents are 500% more inept than the residents of San Juan, Chelan and Klickitat counties. Can you point me to King County's recount numbers from 2000? That number might explain some things.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 10:59 AM

68. First, I question your basis for "expectations", as you do not even take into account historic data, but even with that, YES, it is much more likely that a voter in King County will have problems in filling out a ballot- and five times more likely is not a great reach. Take a look at the differences in demographics, education levels, etc.

And historic data is much more than just the 2000 recount...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 11:03 AM

69. If you could point me to any historical data you would like, that would be great.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 11:06 AM

70. The Walla Walla auditor reports that the 101 votes were part of the original count that did not scan because they were either write-in's or undervotes. (An example of an undervote would be where the voter marked the R or D next to the name of the candidate but did not fill in the oval.

Posted by: Tim Ford on November 23, 2004 11:08 AM

71. Tim Ford - Thanks for the explanation. So, they basically were doing the same think King County is doing with their votes. They looked at undervotes to determine if there was actually a vote there. Makes sense I guess.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 11:13 AM

72. Jim,

Urban areas are populated by many more Democrats than Republicans. You've stated that the demographics in King County are such that it's at least four times more likely that the residents there will have trouble filling out a ballot.

That being your thesis, kindly explain to me why it is that Democrats have become so fond of their new claim that the Republicans who voted for Bush are a bunch of poor, ignorant rednecks?

Please reconcile this dichotomy of Democrat thought.

Thank you.

Posted by: KittyBurglar on November 23, 2004 11:13 AM

73. I'm from California and have been following the recount with some interest. Without taking up too much of your time, can somenody tell me where all this stands right now?

Thank you.

Posted by: KittyBurglar on November 23, 2004 11:15 AM

74. Jim-- I just checked the census data. King County residents actually have, as a whole, a higher level of educational attainment than the state average, and about twice as high as both Chelan and Klickitat. The same is true (in reverse) for the poverty rate.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 11:17 AM

75. Kittyburglar - Short version is this. Rossi, the Republican is up by 279 votes with about 28% of the votes re-counted. But, the key county is King County (Seattle) which went heavily for Gregoire, the Democrat by about 20%. There is a dispute over some ballots that are being "enhanced" by election workers in King County. The guess is that there are 700+ of these ballots. Since King County is heavily Democrat, it could be enough to overcome Rossi's 279 vote lead. King County most likely will not report until tomorrow. This is a machine count only (in theory). But, most likely a hand re-count will happen after this re-count. This may be to Rossi's as punchcard ballots were used in several Rossi favored counties. Hopefully this explains it.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 11:21 AM

76. It all comes down to king county. Everything else is secondary.

Posted by: Frank Martin on November 23, 2004 11:32 AM

77. Thanks for your reply.

This sounds like FL '00 redux - the 'rats just want to do actual ballot examinations in its biggest stronghold. Is this legal in WA?

Are there no large 'pub stronghold counties where this can be done as turnabout?

Did the 'pubs try to get the rejected 'pub provisional ballots re-signed and taken in by third-party for counting? Did the 'pubs file an appeal to this Judge Lum's unfair decision?

Posted by: KittyBurglar on November 23, 2004 11:36 AM

78. I've been following the blogs here at Sound Politics for several weeks now regarding the WA gubernatorial race. There have been a lot of inflamed comments on both sides and there's been a lot of less emotional, analytical comments on both sides.

However it must be noted that Jim King, while generally staying calm is reflexively naive and defensive regarding almost every action that the obviuously partisan King Country vote counters and election board leaders have undertaken.

It's highly unlikelly (like winning the lottery) that any county would deviate by more than a small statistically relevant amount in either direction unless there is either human error or intentional manipulation of the counting process. This is just plain mathematics, and the numbers will tell the story. If King County "finds" more than a statistically probable number of ballots for Gregoire, then the only possible explanation is either error or manipulation.

The fact that election board members are attempting to "divine" the intent of a voter in the case of uncertain ballots is a disgusting example of the failure of objectivity in our elections process.

If the vote is not clear, the ballot should be discarded. If a voter is incapable of following the simple instructions for voting, then they should not be voting.

Posted by: Jeff B on November 23, 2004 11:50 AM

79. Wow, look at Pierce Co!!!

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 12:00 PM

80. "Cheating? This stuff is very penny ante for cheating. If you are going to risk felony conviction, you steal enough votes to be SURE your candidate is in a position to pardon you.

One would think most of you have never been through meaningful recounts before..."

On the contrary, Mr. King, the trick is to steal Just Enough Votes to win. Winning by the smallest possible margin is the only way to keep doing it. Your passivity and acceptance is interesting.

Posted by: jbas on November 23, 2004 12:09 PM

81. What I'm asking is is anybody going to do anything about what's going on in King County, or are the WA 'pubs going to cave in and roll over like they do everywhere else when these situations arise?

Posted by: KittyBurglar on November 23, 2004 12:09 PM

82. Mr. Jim King makes a great Democrat apologist, I must agree.

Posted by: Kevin S on November 23, 2004 12:16 PM

83. As a lifelong Republican, active in campaign management for over three decades I

(KittyBurglar) Have no clue as to what idiocy possesses the liberal Democrat mind when they start going on about uneducated Republicans.

But the King County average isn't what makes it more likely that there will be problems with the ballots- it is the raw number of people from various demographics that have problems filling out a ballot. (And I did not say that there would be four times more... I said five times more would NOT be surprising- it ain't worth doing the statistical modeling to calm your overreactions.)

(Jeff B et.al.) I have substantially more experience in recounts and close elections than anyone I've seen on this blog (or any of the others)- unless "Landslide Irv" and Anne Goos mean something to you, you haven't a clue...

There is no need to push a panic button, and what is happening in King County is matched by the process in Pierce (which Kevin Shannon reported to us was so very clean and competent- 514 more votes, Kevin, from write-ins and ballot enhancements...) and elsewhere.

And KittyBurglar- there ain't no need to "do anything"- nothing fraudulent is going on.

Dino has had this in the bag, and there ain't no fraud. So take your hands off the panic buttons, you are only looking as foolish as his Grand Excellency the Chairman of the Politburo....

Kick back and enjoy the coming Rossi Revolution...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 12:22 PM

84. Mr Shannon- given your first hand report about how clean Pierce was, reconcile the results from that county, and the percentage of enhanced votes reported, with what you thought you saw. You haven't demonstrated you know shit, quite frankly.

You make a great example of Republican ineptitude- ought to go to work for the panick-stricken Mr. Vance, while the rest of us continue our implementation plans for January.

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 12:27 PM

85. Since jobs, contracts, influence, power, and much else is riding on the outcome of the Governor's race it will be amazing in the extreme if the Dems (who control recounting in King County) don't find a devious and likely foolproof way of coming up with 500 more votes for Gregoire. So, like Florida 2000, it may all come down to the courts again.

God, how I hate living in a a one-party region.

Posted by: Stan Wood on November 23, 2004 12:34 PM

86. Kitty dear- get a grip. The R's have lost all their attempts at court action - four so far in both federal and state courts, JOKE cases- Need a case not just partisan PR. Read the Wahington statutes, they spell the whole process in smallest detail. And at the State level, the Secretary of State has been old guard R for about 30 years

You need to understand King county is the most overwhelming Demo Core in the country- if not first, high up there. Seattle has no Republican party to speak of and the national political debacle has hardened the dems- knocking out and challenging Rs in the suburbs.

There will be no voter fraud, massive crap like Florida would trigger revolt here. People don't wait 7 hours to vote, all our laws encourage voting- we have had the provisional ballots in place for 25 years- over 50 percent by mail.

If you are really concerned watch OHIO- total recount of entire state on its way. Greens, Libs and now Dems have filed suit and have the cash. That recount will make this look like small game, which it is.

Also remember King has hundreds of thousands of ballots- some counties have barely 4 or 5 thousand. By the way, King County Prosecuter is an arch R- and has his people right there on full camera at the counting. To the easily influenced frothing Rs, do you really think Norm Malieng and the deputy prosecuters right there at the counting site, and part of the canvassing boards, are in on the fraud you keep assuming? Call Norm'soffice- no sue him- and tell him that.

GO GO Cristine

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 12:47 PM

87. Rudy, should a write-in vote for "Cristine" be accepted as a vote for Christine Gregoire in King County, or for another candidate? :)

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 12:53 PM

88. Rudy- these newbies don't even know people like Norm Maleng or Dan Sattenburg, and the only reason they know Sam Reed is because they saw a yardsign...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 12:58 PM

89. Good question . . .I wonder if something like that has occurred? You have to think that with the all of the ballots counted being a fly on the wall would uncover some very strange things. . . .that being one of them . . . .

I think that in King County an X somewhere on the ballot my go to CG . . .

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 12:59 PM

90. Good question . . .I wonder if something like that has occurred? You have to think that with the all of the ballots counted being a fly on the wall would uncover some very strange things. . . .that being one of them . . . .

I think that in King County an X somewhere on the ballot might go to CG . . .

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 12:59 PM

91. Auto-updating Excel spreadsheet to track the recount:

http://www.murdoconline.net/archives/001745.html

Posted by: murdoc on November 23, 2004 01:07 PM

92. So sorry my keyboarding does not excel- but I wear freshly starched and ironed Nordstom white shirts with $100.00 French and Italian ties.

Rumor has it that several ballots were marked as write ins for Bossi- how should they be counted???.....as I suggested put up or shut up. Sue, right now, Norm Malieng, the the old gurard R who is prosecuter for participation in voter fraud as his deputies are on the counting boards in King County. Tell vapid Van that should be the next R folly case.

GO GO CHRISTINE, BOO BOO BOSSI

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 01:09 PM

93. Nice work on the sheet . . . .

Interesting idea there 'If Bennett had not run'

:)

Ebbtide

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 01:17 PM

94. OK, now the $60,000 question . . .does anyone know when (maybe IF) King will come in?

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 01:18 PM

95. Rudy and Jim King have reduced there comments to straight insults. Where is a rational liberal voice? Anyone? Please...

Posted by: Mike on November 23, 2004 01:19 PM

96. Wait a minute, Mike- are you implying I am a liberal? I was out working for Ronald Reagan in the '76 election! If insults have been sent, it has been in response to the insults flung my way by folks who have no clue as to what they are talking about, but are so sure they are right...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 01:24 PM

97. In the spirit of rational -- here's a thought:

Republicans are partisan and Democrats are partisan. Both are doing exactly what the other would do if they were in the other shoes (with respect to vote leads, county majorities, etc.).

Here's one more: Rossi won't be as bad as Democrats fear and Gregoire won't be as bad as Republicans fear.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 01:32 PM

98. Jim, you've been abrasive, condescending and generally a jerk to anyone that's dared question the sanctity of the King County procedures, and you wonder why people assume you're a liberal?

If your goal was to calm down fellow Republicans who are worried about fraud, you've done a miserable job of it. If your goal was to tick people off, well, nice work.

I'm still waiting for that historical data.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 01:33 PM

99. Rudy - A write in for "Bossi" should not be counted, nor a write in for Rossi or Christine. Nothing except a single filled in bubble should be counted. The ballots that went through the machines the first time should count, the ones that did not, should not, unless they were torn or damaged by the election workers. A machine recount should be a machine recount, unless you're a democrat and don't know what language means (or wish to construe it for you advantage). The purpose of a machine recount should be to verify that the first count was accurate, so we have confidence in the process. It should not be to re-examine votes to try to determine the intent of the voter. If you do that, it is a hand recount, and since the counties that used punch cards are not hand recounting (where you look to see whether two or three sides of a chad are punched), Rossi gets screwed by a King County hand recount, even if all other counties that use optical scanners also hand recount. I think (as a non-practicing attorney) that this is a violation of the equal protection clause of the state and federal constitution, and other folks believe so too. So if the KC hand recount changes the outcome, a lawsuit is not only reasonable, it is desirable. It seems to me you completely miss the point, Rudy, most all of the time.

Posted by: S Rogers on November 23, 2004 01:33 PM

100. Conjecture (to prove previous thesis): If Rossi were down by 297, S Rogers would no doubt argue that "every vote be counted" and that a write-in vote for "Rossi" was clearly a vote for Dino Rossi.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 01:36 PM

101. Timothy- after days of trying to rationally explain to some of the yahoos that nothing evil is going on in King County, I got tired of being nice. And when they start applauding results that favor them, in Pierce, derived from the same process they deplore, in King, well they deserve to be shat upon...

And if you want historic data, go look it up- I've already indicated it ain't worth my time.

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 01:39 PM

102. Ray, you may think what you wish. I would never argue that "every vote be counted" because I believe it is acceptable for someone to disenfranchise themselves by failing to follow the instructions for voting. Having the inalienable right to vote does not mean that if a person spits on a ballot I have am bound to figure out what it meant. If DR were down, and ultimately lost, but the votes were recounted according to the common sense definition of a machine recount, vs a hand recount, then I would simply understand that he lost. But he is not and did not. Picture this: if the first count percentages were used to calculate the winning distance of two marathon runners, Dino would have finished the 26 mile race 37 feet ahead of Christine. That is a clear winner. We're only going through this to be assured of the process, not to make sure every vote counts. What a load of crap.

Posted by: S Rogers on November 23, 2004 01:45 PM

103. THESE EXCHANGES-I think it is more like added pith-my daddy was a logger.

My mom used to say put up or shut up all the time. As close to swearing as a 100 per cent Mormon mom would ever come.

If all posters are factual, low key and grounded in reality, be glad to play that way. But don't nit pick my typing with silly snide boofing.....and expect to be taken seriously.

By the way, took my own advice, called Norm's office and told an assistant how glad I was he was protecting the ballots from cheaters from any corner.....and to ignore the braying.

Final count will be close- look for hand counting, go join a counting board you doubters of the process folks. Those boards are more serious than a chuch inquisition. Very civic, very deliberate. Jury duty is lightweight by comparison.

Yes, on the 6 star Right Wing Blog, I still hope my candidate of second choice wins, C G. I supported Sims in the primary.

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 01:47 PM

104. I think that some voters never had to take the bubble tests in grade school . .remember to listen to directions before starting and always use a number 2 pencil.

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 01:49 PM

105. "We're only going through this to be assured of the process, not to make sure every vote counts. "

Now that's a good distinction. So obvious, yet no one has said it yet. When so many hundreds of thousands did follow the instructions and voted correctly, why should a few incorrectly spelled or marked ballots change what everyone else did correctly. I consider that disenfranchisement for the 2.7M that voted correctly. But someone else posted that the law doesn't see it that way. I wonder how many of our 50 states do?

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 01:53 PM

106. Rudy, If the nitpicking your typos comment was meant for me - I didn't see Bossi as a typo. I thought you were putting a written "Bossi" in the same catagory as "Cristine": how do you interpret the mispelled incorrect vote? And I assumed you'd think I'm OK with someone saying that a written "Bossi" counts as a vote for Rossi. I'm not, but if the rules have been interpreted so that 2=3, and machine=hand, and a written "Cristine" equals a vote for Christine, then the written "Bossi" had better count as a vote for Rossi.

Posted by: S Rogers on November 23, 2004 01:58 PM

107. Rudy, relax buddy. The typing nitpick was a joke that illustrated a point about recounting and write-ins. If all you saw was a spelling nitpick and have to bring out the "ironed Nordstom white shirts with $100.00 French and Italian ties" crap to defend your insecurities then you aren't worth my time to read. There are plenty of other bloggers, Democrat and Republican, with valuable comments that are worth my time. Lets move on.

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 02:00 PM

108. Jim King has just demonstrated the charm and style that has made the Republican party so successful in Washington State.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 02:03 PM

109. Timothy, if you really want to get into a match, I could REALLY cut loose. So just stop being irked because I won't do your research. You want freebies, vote Democrat.

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 02:07 PM

110. S. Rodgers- You should be on the legal team, it sems some judges, three so far, have ignored your hyper R arguments- in total.

And now the theme moves from catch phrase politics like judical activism to the clueless voter who can't follow exacting instructions.

Glad I am reading R wing stuff, didn't really know how far over the edge you folks can go. Perhaps new standards about who can acually vote- good old ideas like poll taxes, color of your skin, long residency requirements, strict absentees, ownership of property, no motor voter- go for it.

I prefer COUNTING EVERY VOTE, EVERY VOTER VALUED, EVERYTIME......even the ones with Parkinsons, encroaching blindness, and those withour black pen or who thought circling the name was a surer way of marking the ballot. No doubt there. Big circle. Whew...how will we survive the recount in Ohio....

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 02:12 PM

111. Jim--
Yes, please do cut loose. I'm sure we're all waiting for that.

I'm not the one irked here, sir. Were I irked, I might be using terms like "yahoos" and "shat upon." But I'd rather this discussion climbed out of the Internet gutter it's descended into. This is the sort of petty bickering I expect to see at aintitcoolnew.com, not the comments at Sound Politics.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 02:16 PM

112. Cowlitz reported. What's the net difference?

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 02:19 PM

113. I get Rossi +40 and Gregoire -29. Is that right. That is huge!

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 02:20 PM

114. Murdoconline.net's spreadsheet just changed to show a projected Gregoire win, but I dont know who came in . . .
Will have to wait and see ..

Posted by: Ebb on November 23, 2004 02:24 PM

115. Murdoconline.net's spreadsheet just changed to show a projected Gregoire win, but I dont know who came in . . .
Will have to wait and see ..

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 02:24 PM

116. Rudy -
When I was a Democrat I favored counting only legal ballots. And I didn't change my mind about that when I became a Republican.

Posted by: Jim Miller on November 23, 2004 02:24 PM

117. Ooops. My bad.

Gregoire 20,207 - 20,236 = -29
Rossi 20,047 - 20,087 = -40

They must have double counted some votes and then backed them out in the recount?

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 02:25 PM

118. Still waiting on the big Kahuna and I have not really heard anything official as to when it will be done. I know of a couple people that were viewing and I have not heard anything on this yet, and it is not like I have not asked . . .

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 02:28 PM

119. Let's not forget Poor Ruth Bennett in all this Cowlitz talk. She lost a vote too! Her hopes are now shattered.

Posted by: Chris on November 23, 2004 02:30 PM

120. yeah but she got her picture FRONT PAGE on the times . . .she got her 15 minutes already!

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 02:41 PM

121. See? Mocking Libertarians. That's the sort of thing I expect to see here. Isn't that better than inter-party cuss-outs?

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 02:57 PM

122. Er, that should be "intra-party cuss-outs," since mocking Libertarians is very nearly an "inter-party" cuss-out, except not necessarily with the cussing.

You know, if you count them as a party.

Posted by: Timothy on November 23, 2004 02:59 PM

123. Spokane just came in. Rossi +134, Gregoire +121.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 03:00 PM

124. Hey, and dont forget . .next election they have to get signatures since they did not attain the 5% of the vote required to retain 'major party' status.

What a pain . . . time to go stand in front of Safeway/Top Foods/Albertsons like the Communists/Green Party/Workers of the World or whatever they call themselves.

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 03:03 PM

125. Well Timothy, they are sort of like a party, one that runs out of beer at about 8PM.

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 03:06 PM

126. The most astute line I've seen in a long time: "And when they start applauding results that favor them, in Pierce, derived from the same process they deplore, in King, they deserve to be shat upon."

Well, I wouldn't agree with the suggested action..but the premesis is exactly right. When we do it, it's ok -- when the other side does it, it's cheating. That's bad either way.

Though he's less PC, I think Jim derserves huge kudos for reasoned analysis and looking at things through non-partisan glasses.

If only both Rs and Ds could follow the example Jim sets with his logic (and logic only ;-) I think we'd be in a much better place.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 03:08 PM

127. Skagit came in and Rossi gains a net 18 votes. R+89 and G+71. Dino up to +317 overall. This is getting interesting.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 03:37 PM

128. Anybody want to hazard a guess as to how this thing is going to turn out? If Rossi's lead is 300+ votes and only King County is left to report, I will be surprised if they can find the votes. The 700 votes would need to go 500 - 200 Gregoire or 71% - 29% for her to pull it out. I can't imagine either candidate winning by more than 100 votes at this point.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 03:55 PM

129.
anybody know when King County is going to report?

Posted by: Ed on November 23, 2004 03:56 PM

130. As for how this is going to turn out: there are those 224 extra votes from Snohomish County. The effect should probably be negligible -- although any change in a race this close could be significant. Also, the 710 enhanced ballots we hear about from King County -- is that the only change or are there more. If not, then I agree with Marc that Rossi should win this, I think by about 100 votes.

Posted by: Terry Mueller on November 23, 2004 04:03 PM

131. King County will report last obviously. That is the only way they will know how many votes they need to overcome Rossi lead in other counties. This method was perfected by Cook County, Illinois Democrats in 1960 and it is a tried and true route to post-election victory.

Posted by: Mark Q. Rhoads on November 23, 2004 04:05 PM

132. Snohomish County just reported: Rossi picked up three net votes, taking his net gain in the recount to 59 and his overall lead to 320. 64% of all ballots statewide have been recounted so far.

Posted by: Darren on November 23, 2004 04:06 PM

133. King 5 is now reporting that 36-39 counties are in and that Dino is up 320...

This pushes the total % of votes counted over 60%

Posted by: gustafm on November 23, 2004 04:06 PM

134. Nice... I'm glad Snohomish is out of the way...

Only one dragon left to slay... King...

Posted by: gustafm on November 23, 2004 04:09 PM

135. King 5 website now says Snohomish is +1 Gregiore, 316 vote lead for Dino

Posted by: South County on November 23, 2004 04:25 PM

136. Gustafm--I think I know that name. Yes King County left to slay; however, remember we are not only fixed on the 710 but they are recounting as well, which should give her a few votes as well (how many are hard to say). So hit the 710 with a 60/40 split; and the Tobacco Queen is still around 150 short. Even if you double the most votes any candidate has gained from any county, she is still around 90 votes short.

Is this republican still a bit worried, yes. But no dispair yet.

Posted by: TheDuke on November 23, 2004 04:29 PM

137. Yep secretary of state is giving her plus one in Snohomish as well.

Posted by: TheDuke on November 23, 2004 04:30 PM

138. State election recount page has snohomish +1 for Gregoire.

Posted by: RogerA on November 23, 2004 04:31 PM

139. Duke,

Yah, did we go to college together or something? haha.. Nice to hear from you!

Snohomish coming in helps - takes one huge wildcard out of play... My concern is that it has been the lesson of Florida 2000 that Democrats are incompetent at filling out ballots... That is what makes me concerned that the King County 710 ballots are going to be heavily Dem.... 60/40 might be a little optimistic on our part... I think Dino will hold her off, but by only a few dozen, I suspect...

Posted by: gustafm on November 23, 2004 04:33 PM

140. So, it looks like Rossi will be ahead after this recount and the Demos will pay for a hand recount. My question would be in King County, would they be able to add any more ballots to the already enhanced ones ???

Posted by: DRE on November 23, 2004 04:40 PM

141. My guess would be that the hand recount wouldn't add much to Gregoire in King... They already are doing the damage they are going to do...

But I don't put anything past dems...

Posted by: gustafm on November 23, 2004 04:43 PM

142. Now it's entertaining.

First it was guaranteed Dems cheating.

Now as the votes come in, with Rossi leading, there is no mention of Dems not cheating.

What gives?

BTW, I haven't seen anywhere people claiming Rs cheating to give rossi a bigger lead than after the original vote. If anyone has such a source, please post it because my belief is both sides act the same way.

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 04:59 PM

143. Ray, maybe your belief is wrong.

Posted by: Dave on November 23, 2004 05:03 PM

144. How many votes from the hand recount will be ballots that were provisional and hadn't been verified at the earlier KC report?

Posted by: X on November 23, 2004 05:04 PM

145. Ray,

Although I'm skeptical about King County's processes, I'm stopping short of accusing anybody of cheating.

At the same time, as I mention in this post (did you bother to read it?), although the recount has so far produced a few more votes for Rossi, it has actually narrowed his percentage lead slightly.

Posted by: Stefan Sharkansky on November 23, 2004 05:05 PM

146. Whitman has recount numbers posted on its site- loss of 10 for Gregoire, loss of 5 for Rossi, loss of 1 for Bennett- net gain on the margin for Rossi of 5...

King County Canvassing Board began meeting at 4:30pm, have a meeting scheduled for 3pm tomorrow- let's hope it is not needed, that they wrap tonight...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 05:07 PM

147. It was just reported on KIRO TV that of the 224 extra ballots found in Snohomish County, 214 had votes for governor. 111 went for Rossi, 96 for Gregoire, and 7 for others. So +15 for Rossi in that batch. They were counted, but also set aside in case there is litigation.

Posted by: Terry Mueller on November 23, 2004 05:09 PM

148. Terry,

Are those votes (+15 for Rossi) included in this count? (ie, the count that Snohomish County reported this afternoon with Gregoire gaining a mere one vote?)

Posted by: gustafm on November 23, 2004 05:12 PM

149. My understanding is yes to your question, Gustafm. At least these numbers have been reported on Secy of State's website. So if we wouldn't have had those ballots, Gregoire would have gained 16 votes in Snohomish rather than the 1 that is reported.

Posted by: Terry Mueller on November 23, 2004 05:16 PM

150. Prediciton:
Since Rossi's lead in the newly found recount votes has been half his lead in the original count, lets be generoaus and assume Gregoire gets double his original margin in King:
710 devine ballots by 35% = 255 for Gregoire
In addition King uses the least accurate voting system: GES Global Accuvote. Based on the other GES Global Accuvote counties one can expect about 128 vote changes at 35% excess to Gregoire = 45
Total Gregoire net from King 300 vs the current 316 Rossi lead, for a final Rossi win of 19.

Posted by: zorkpolitics on November 23, 2004 05:18 PM

151. It's true that not all posters accused the Dems of intentional fraud -- but re-reading posts suggests the number of comments that assumed the Dems would infiltrate the process and "steal" the election is significant.

I'm still looking for a site that suggests Rs are doing the same (though I can't find any). One post above suggests that maybe my belief is wrong (that is that Dems didn't think from the beginning that Rs were trying to steal the election). I find that hard to believe. But, I haven't found any (ths most i found were posts saying Rs are unfair for suing to prevent votes being counted). But I didn't see the "stealing" theme which is so prevalent here.

As an independent observer of this process, I find such a prevalent theme just another indication of the division in our country and the belief (not by all...but by many) that "we're right, you're wrong -- and we'll say/do many things to get our way" yet another sad commentary on our society. We need that feeling of unity that Reagan and Clinton created -- why can't we find presidents (regardless of party) that can bring us further together?

(Note, with Clinton, the 1994 house cleaning did a good job at ending the bipartisan coooperation for a decade). Is it too late? Are we in for another decade of red vs. blue and no purple?

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 05:29 PM

152. and then it's on to a hand recount where a few more (hundred) votes will be discovered in King County -- Dino's been had....

Posted by: Lew on November 23, 2004 05:30 PM

153. "We need that feeling of unity that Reagan and Clinton created -- why can't we find presidents (regardless of party) that can bring us further together?"

You mean like, say, Lincoln? 600,000 dead later, we realized he was the best of the best, and there is much more to a nation than its citizens living only for their own interests. Live free or die. Zell is right about his party, sadly.

Posted by: jbas on November 23, 2004 05:37 PM

154. Any idea what happened with the Whitman County votes? Jim posted at 5:07pm that Gregoire lost 10 votes and Rossi lost 5 and that this info was posted on their website. The official Whitman County website is www.whitmancounty.org and there doesn't seem to be any results on this site and the Secy of State hasn't updated its site.

Posted by: Terry Mueller on November 23, 2004 06:46 PM

155. Observing what is happening in King County, I just want to let you know that we had a controversial mayor's race in San Diego. The judge ruled that the write-in candidate was not entitled to a vote because the voter only wrote the name and did not fill in the bubble per the ballot's instructions. I am sorry, but if the person did not follow instructions, the vote should not be counted.

Posted by: Efrem from Sacramento on November 23, 2004 06:56 PM

156. I totally agree with Efrem. This "will of the voter" is totally absurd. Think about any bubble test you took, be it high school, college, GED, MCAT, whatever, when one takes a exam, if that bubble isn't filled in correctly, it doesn't matter what your "will" is, you could even "write in" the correct answer next to the bubble you are suppost to fill in, your answer doesn't count. Period. How hard is it to follow directions? And if you don't, then your vote doesn't count. Why can't we just stick to this??? Think of all the annoyance it would save us!

Posted by: Brian on November 23, 2004 07:14 PM

157. Like I said,

"I think that some voters never had to take the bubble tests in grade school . .remember to listen to directions before starting and always use a number 2 pencil."

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 23, 2004 07:43 PM

158. Efrem - need to remember that each state has a different consitution and set of election laws. Washington, bles her holy soil, is very strong about the intent of the voter and counting votes in favor of the voter. Makes good sense to me.

Noticed recently the R's not doing too well in Calif. Terminator is more democrat than republican-

Was it here that someone was quoting a former ally of the KKK, Zell Miller? An old deep South segregationist who will go to his death convinced that Florida needs to keep its Negros under control.

King county, the motherlode- whose liberal politics are a legend world wide. Now named after Dr. King, full of Asian, African, and homo minorities.- twenty languages in the city- cosmopolitan, world class.

I have the feeling it will be close- recounted agin in many counties and Christine will win in the end. And no Judge will intervene-no fraud, just laser accuracy and corrected mistakes.

Posted by: John Bossi on November 23, 2004 08:09 PM

159. "...whose liberal politics are a legend world wide. Now named after Dr. King, full of Asian, African, and homo minorities.- twenty languages in the city- cosmopolitan, world class..."

How ridiculous. Seattle is a puny town, a veritable armpit, full of self-important hedonists. Cosmopolitan? Sh*t. You need to stop smoking crack.

As a refugee in this hellhole I have to say this election is an embarassment. I can only count the days until I move back home and forget I ever knew who Jim McDermott, Patty Murray, and Maria Cantwell are. Good riddance to Christine Gregoire too.

Posted by: Michael Smith on November 23, 2004 08:28 PM

160. "counting votes in favor of the voter. Makes good sense to me."

Well, that's liberal logic - no, votes are counted in favor of the...candidates. Maybe a criteria should be that every vote counts "if cast." And that means you follow the instructions. Or it wasn't "cast."

Miller a segregationist? Not true at all unless you believe in guilt by association with Maddox & the South, in which case you can count Bill Clinton in that mix, and I'd wager when Zell ran for public offices in GA, he received >70% of the black vote. Maybe more. And please don't say GA blacks, or your term, Negros, aren't smart enough to understand the candidates' positions: that would be demeaning and racist.

Back to the topic - anyone know if any more counties will be reporting tonight?

Posted by: jbas on November 23, 2004 08:42 PM

161. I first started watching this site immediately following the general election. Pretty impressive. The comments were from people who were providing analysis of their own and I appreciated the insight and point of view of most of them. Somewhere in the last few days the comments have degraded into a series of complaints about conspiracies, into challenges to the intelligence of some posters, into name calling and general finger pointing. It's a shame. I'm more interested in what people think the outcome is going to be based on their analysis of the known facts. Great site with great info, though. Thanks.

Posted by: troy colley on November 23, 2004 08:48 PM

162. Troy, I agree. One-lawsuits will not determine the race. Two, yes, it is all in the hands of the Seattle/King County voters. Three, since the last batch of ballots are pulled from all sectors of the giant total vote it will break for Gregoire. All guess work at this point, as to what degree.

That is all the agnst......should those votes come more from the 43rd or more liberal even, the 37th- Gregoire could squeeze by. Have been telling friends it would be Gregoire by 15 votes, but this site doesn;t like that possibility.

There will be more counting by hand. Both parties will buy some hand counting. Too close to give up- this is real time real dead dog two party winner take all politics. Many millions invested from each side, opinions strong.

Something interesting not explained. King county canvassing board meeing for the last time at 3 pm tomorrow. Either more ballots/ballot problems or just they love the suspense. Remeber there is a deputy prosecuter on the canvassing/counting board. All the fraud bellowing is crack head green monster stuff. Too many cameras, too many observers- and two courts watching, federal and state.

Any party cheating would end its future in the sunshine- as in strict disclosure, etc.- state for two generations- neither Florida, Ohio, or Cook county will work in Washington.

Posted by: rudy on November 23, 2004 09:21 PM

163. Were that I wish it were so.

Unfortunately, history tells us that it's likely that the courts will decide. Whoever is on the losing end will persist. And persist.

I don't think this is what the founding fathers had in mind. Of course, they didn't trust the common "man" with votes anyway....

Posted by: ray on November 23, 2004 09:31 PM

164. Whitman County participates with many smaller counties in VoteWashington.org. Following the link from the Secretary of State's listing of Auditors and Election Departments would eventually take you to the appropriate webpage- http://www.votewashington.org/results/recount.tpl?c=38
and the Whitman County recount results.

They will probably get posted in the morning on the Secretary of State's site...

Posted by: Jim King on November 23, 2004 09:56 PM

165. Kitsap and Whitman have reported. Whitman +5 Rossi, Kitsap +34 Gregoire. Down to the wire.

Posted by: Voice of Reason on November 23, 2004 10:06 PM

166. Wow, this is a barn burner. Unfortunately, it will not be done tomorrow either. This will simply be too close. Well, it looks like 2 counties to go and Rossi +321 measly votes. I think Gregoire will pick up 250 votes from the 710 "enhanced ballots" to cut the lead to 71 votes. She will pick up another 50 from the "pure recount", but will come up about 20 votes shy. It will then go to a hand recount. We aren't going to know a winner for a couple more weeks I think.

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:07 PM

167. Well, with Kitsap's number being a surprise +34 for Gregoire I think Gregoir wins by about a dozen votes. How can Kitsap by +34 for Gregoire in a county won by Rossi?

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:15 PM

168. Well, largest difference in any one county is only a net 34 votes (Kitsap). All of the counties combined only resulted in a net 26 vote change (over 1.8M total votes recounted). Will King County be able to get away with a 300 net vote change, I hope not, but I fear it is so ...

Posted by: Marc on November 23, 2004 10:41 PM

169. If the Kitsap news is correct, we are currently at Rossi +287. If the 710 votes in King break 2:1 for Gregoire (473-237), that still leaves Dino +51. Through the recount, how many would be expected to change?

Posted by: Terry Mueller on November 23, 2004 10:52 PM

170. "Will King County be able to get away with a 300 net vote change, I hope not, but I fear it is so ..."

Again with the implied cheating/stealing.

How sad.

Even sadder: I project that when the counting is done and if Rossi is ahead, there won't be any discussons of cheating/stealing. Cheating/stealing only happens when the other candidate pulls ahead.

Of course, if Gregoire ends up ahead, the cheating mantra will be momunmental.

That said, if Rossi wins, I project many Dems will claim unfairness in the vote gain Rossi got in many other counties.

Either way...a recount (and cheating accusations) will continue....so very sad

Posted by: ray on November 24, 2004 07:07 AM

171. Ray - The proof is in the pudding. Lets see if King County can basically overcome a mathamatically/statistically insurmountable lead assuming normal mathametical outcomes as Stefan does in his top post today. I am not implying that King County is cheating. Everyone knows they already "enhanced" ballots, 700+ of them. All I am saying is that King County has come up with votes in past recounts, it wouldn't surprise me if they came up with votes again. Tell me this, 63% of the ballots have been counted and the net change was 26 votes. Would you be surprised if King County counted 37% of the votes and came up with a net 300 gain? If you can honestly say no, then you have more faith in the system than I do.

Posted by: Marc on November 24, 2004 08:22 AM

172. There seems to be positive statistical correlation of the results for the reporting counties, except for Kitsap. I.e., small/large changes in one candidate's votes usually means a similar small/large change in the other candidate' votes, and in the same direction (except for several counties with very nominal amounts...less than 5 votes, etc.). If King Cty shows something different, it would be statistically significant, like Kitsap.

Posted by: jbas on November 24, 2004 09:02 AM

173. EAT TURKEY AND CRY - I think Gregoire will win- not big, but might be a surprise- all very statistical. King county has 850,000--- to process, some errors will correct and if there is any correlation with other counties we need to allow that that number might be substantial. One county I was watching corrected 100 votes and that included the cows.

Pierce had 216 ballots new marked for machine counting, By contrast King has only 710. Given the difference Pierce has a much larger problem- but any way he guy who runs this site says his friend prdicts they are very, very Democratic.

Think Rossi is a cooked turkey - all over but the eccentric behavior of Christ Vance.

Posted by: joe kennedy on November 24, 2004 09:12 AM

174. I can see that kind of thing coming from a Kennedy!

Posted by: Ebbtide on November 24, 2004 09:14 AM

175. Earth calling jbas - You are looking at a giant donkey, also called an ass in the Holy Bible, in King County. Inside this ass are hundreds of thousand of the most partiaian democrats on the west coast. Well ove 100,00 homo pinkos, all the old unionists left in the state, femi nazi by the tehs of thousands, and grannie who are protecting the cash cow that is their social security. Evan still have a militant NAACP, buckets of money too boot when thy are all working.

Ain't no republicans to speak of, the ones who hang on become mainstreamers.

POINT here- no correlatuion to voting demographic of any place else in the holy state of George Wahington.

Buy a bottle get drunk tonight, eat turkey tomorrow, Christine regoire will be the next Governor and yes, it is that damned King freaking county....Amen

AIN'T like any othe Washington county

Posted by: jack kennedy on November 24, 2004 09:24 AM

176. I was asked: "Tell me this, 63% of the ballots have been counted and the net change was 26 votes. Would you be surprised if King County counted 37% of the votes and came up with a net 300 gain?"

Yes. It doesn't suggest that such is likely given the vote totals thusfar.

I was also surprised that some Gregoire counties show Rossi gains and some Rossi counties show Gregoire leads.

But none of this implies fraud (unlike the rantings of the party leader suggest).

In the end, I hope the Rs dump Vance and the Ds dump Berendt and start over with more reasonable people. Both represent their parties poolry with hyberbole and decisions that move us backwards much more often than moving us forward.

Posted by: ray on November 24, 2004 09:38 AM

177. Sad quote from today's paper: "This is not a good precedent to set — for Republicans to cut a deal with the Democrats to get around the majority of the Republican caucus," said Councilman Rob McKenna, a Bellevue Republican who will be stepping down next month to become state attorney general.

I guess parties working together for the benefit of citizens is not likely to happen if our soon to be elected AG is involved -- his comment suggests Party politics are more important than reaching across the aisle -- or doing what's best for citizens.

Posted by: ray on November 24, 2004 10:20 AM

178. jbas to earth (Jack Kennedy) - that WAS my point. If King county's results do not correlate like the other counties (excluding Kitsap), that would indicate a meaningful difference exists, and further analysis could indicate vote manipulation OR significant difference in counting/evaluative processes OR something else, certainly including non-malicious actions on the part of the poll workers OR nothing at all.

If someone calculated the coefficient of correlation on these numbers, I've got to believe it would be unusually high. Real world numbers in areas other than voting don't often match-up like these seem to.

Posted by: jbas on November 24, 2004 11:14 AM

179. Where are we getting the Kitsap numbers? I don't see it posted on the Secretary of State's website.

Posted by: Nathan Azinger on November 24, 2004 11:54 AM

180. jbas- the most obvious and simple explanation for King county- get ready- hundreds of thousands of hard core Democrats....voting, voting even with bad pencil and the shakes.

It is funny to watch the nervous try to correlate King to counties that went two to one for Rossi, incluing the graveyard and some cows. Please explain Adams- maybe need a grand jury there.

But I do understand the strain- and the angst of the poor losers....Vannie looks like he will explode into a million vinyl pieces.

And Rosi does have a political future, mayor of Sammish.

Posted by: C Royer on November 24, 2004 12:17 PM

181. King 5 just called the race for Rossi - he wins by 42 votes!!!!!!!!

Posted by: Brian on November 24, 2004 12:50 PM

182. So they could steal only 240 votes! And needed 300. But it's not over. With a King Cty recount now guaranteed they need only 50 more. Should be guaranteed.

Posted by: Stan Wood on November 24, 2004 01:08 PM

183. Sam Reed said on 570AM two days ago that if Gregoire only requests a partial handcount, say in King County, and the count changes the results, then he is required by State law to then order a hand count in all 38 other counties. So... I don't think it's in the bag for Gregoire, despite any King County shenanigans. Let the Democrats drain their treasure chest on yet another recount. Three strikes and she's out!

Posted by: Jeff on November 24, 2004 01:22 PM

184. Nearly had a stroke. Sec of State's had Rossi down by 1400 or so votes, but then I noticed that Kitsap County had not reported in. Every news outlet has Dino winning by 42. I wonder who those 42 people were who were not going to vote, but at the last minute decided to do their civic duty. Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Posted by: Chris from CT on November 24, 2004 01:58 PM

185. Today Gregoire said, "Every vote should be counted. The race continues. A 42-vote margin, my friends, that is a tied race." Does that mean that if another recount shows HER ahead by 42 votes, that it's still tied?

This is the logic that we've come to expect from liberals.

Posted by: Jeff on November 24, 2004 08:19 PM

186. This is the most corrupt election process I have ever seen. Count every vote--every democrat vote!
I say let's throw out the entire registration of voters and have everyone re-register providing name, address, Social Security number and party afiliation.
Let's get rid of the dead, the illegals and the double registrations, not to mention the Canadians' and whomever else is in here illegally.
Let's change the laws to two recounts only and only those votes which were tallied the first times--no add on's and no "oh look what we found!.
Let's get some balls in our pants and stop these democrats from manipulating until they get the results they want!

Posted by: Stephanie Turlay on December 27, 2004 11:24 AM

187. I am from Okanogan,County the biggest county in the state.When we vote it seems like it doesnt realy matter.So I would like to get a hold of Dino Rossi and see if we could split the state in half.Then maybe our vote will make a differance.

Posted by: nate kruse on January 10, 2005 05:48 PM

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