SwiftVets.com

[shawa]

http://www.nbc4i.com/politics/4006859/detail.html

Fallen Hanging Chads Leading To More Votes For Kerry, Bush
Bush Gains 303 Votes, Kerry 443

POSTED: 3:59 pm EST December 17, 2004

CINCINNATI -- Hanging chads that came loose when punch-card ballots were handled again or rerun through tallying machines explain most of the additional votes President George W. Bush and Sen. John Kerry are picking up in Ohio's recount, election officials said Friday.

With 45 of Ohio's 88 counties reporting final recounts to The Associated Press Friday, including the large urban counties of Cuyahoga, Hamilton and Franklin, Bush has gained 303 votes and Kerry has gained 443 votes.

Neither campaign expects the recount to change the outcome. The Republican Bush won Ohio's 20 electoral votes by a margin of about 119,000.

Franklin and Cuyahoga counties were among the many reporting little or no change from the recount. In Cuyahoga County, home to Cleveland, Bush lost six votes while Democrat Kerry gained 17, which election workers attribute to hanging chads and worker error.

The largest change was in Hamilton County, which includes metropolitan Cincinnati, where Bush gained 212 votes and Kerry 180. Kerry also picked up 125 votes in Mahoning County.

The biggest loss to date was for Bush in Knox County, where he dropped 13 votes. Kerry lost 8 votes in the central Ohio county.

Pamela Swafford, deputy elections director in Hamilton County, attributed the differences to chads falling out of punch-card ballots during re-handling.

Observers from the Bush, Kerry and third-party campaigns have been watching as teams that each include Democratic and Republican election workers inspected ballots with loose chads to determine voter intent.

"Just barely touching them, they pop, they come out," Swafford said. "That's not unusual. When you're talking about that many ballots, that's bound to happen."

Libertarian and Green party presidential candidates who received less than 0.3 percent of the Ohio vote requested the statewide recount and paid $113,600 for it, saying they were concerned about reports of election irregularities and wanted to ensure that all votes were counted.

The Kerry campaign supports the recount, while Republicans have called it a waste of time.

Ohio law requires an election board to manually recount a randomly selected 3 percent of ballots. If the totals match certified results for those precincts, all the county's votes are then machine-counted. If the hand count is off, a county must manually recount all its ballots.

Election officials said the 3 percent hand-counts matched in virtually all the recounts done so far.

Election officials also attributed changes to voter error in filling out paper ballots for optical-scan voting machines, and election worker error in hand-recounting of stacks of ballots.

In Ashland County in northern Ohio, Bush gained 38 votes and Kerry 20 because election workers examined optical scan ballots by hand that weren't read by the machines, elections director Kathy Howman said. The ovals on those ballots were filled in with ink instead of the required pencil.

"Most of these were absentee ballots, and maybe people did not read the directions," Howman said. "But the voter intent was clear, so the board decided to count those ballots."

The recount revealed other trends in the many counties with little or no change.

Bush gained one vote in Delaware County, also likely due to a hanging chad, elections director Janet Brenneman said, making his final victory there 53,143-27,048.

The county had 632 ballots with no vote for the office of president and another 89 where two or more candidates were punched, invalidating the vote.

"If they don't like any of the candidates, they'll punch them all out so that no one can mess with their ballot," Brenneman said.

[azTrish]

Dems still itching to somehow, someway take away some of the b*tt kicking they soundly got, what with all the harrassment. vandalism (sp), punching kicking and screaming. cheating lying and sheenanigans, not mention all the states catching them paying to garner invalid registrations.

God forbid they took loosing with grace (Liberal mentality, what's grace, doesn't that have to do with GOD?)

Trish

[Grampa]

While I agree that the Dems are merely gaming the system to keep alive the propaganda that "BusHitler" stole yet another election, I don't think that doing a legal recount is ever a waste of time. It re-affirms the victory and shuts some opposition up and it helps democracy by being open to scrutiny.
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Iraqi Freedom 2003-2004. We won't take any of that 1960s crap when We come home!

[scotty61]

Notice how they mention what the Green Party is paying and not what the recount actually costs. One of the reasons the repubs are calling this waste of time is that the cost is expected to be several times what the Greens have to pay and the taxpayers have to foot the bill. So the Greens, funded with Kerry money, are punishing the state of Ohio for voting for Bush.
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John Kerry. A Neville Chamberlain for our times.

[GM Strong]

All this is irrelevant, the vote was certified and the electoral college voted. The Liberals need to get over it already. It's FINI !!
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8th Army Korea 68-69

[tony54]

The Democrats want to keep recounting Ohio, even if not enough to win it, but enough of a difference so they can whine about it for the next four years.
Also with all the money they spent, and their supporters spent, they want something positive to talk about.

I got something positive for them to think about:
You have very few respectable Democrats, if any.
Next time run someone like Zell Miller, and it would be a close and respectable race.
"Heck I might be tempted to vote for Zell"
Run Lurch or PIAPS or the Breck Girlie-Man and you get screwed again.

[GM Strong]