Erik Vistica writes:

>What really concerns me is that the numbers from the recount don't
>*exactly* match the first count. Don't even bank tellers balance their
>cash drawers to the penny? OK, now we gotta count 'em a third time to
>see which of the first two counts was the correct one. Do you think this
>is the *only* county in the USA that has an incorrect count? If you
>can't trust the counting machines then we better figure out a reliable
>method of counting that we can trust instead.

Actually, this has also puzzled me. I can understand that recounts would
produce different results (different to > 1 part in 1e6) when
hand-counted or mark-sense ballots are used. But punched cards? I suppose
that chad sticking to the ballot on the first pass and knocked off on the
second could account for a small difference, but .1% seems like a really
high error rate for punched cards.

Does anyone know if the results of recounts are analyzed to determine
sources of error? Or if "unofficial" (post-certification) recounts are
done in order to check for problems?

-- Bruce


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