Chicken Man--We can discern how many folks didn't want to vote in the presidential election from the highly accurate optical scanner voting systems, which show 1 in a thousand choose not to vote for president. The punch-card systems, used in predominantly low-income more Democratic-type precincts, have an error rate of 22 out one thousand.
If you calculate the votes Gore actually got, but which, like in the four counties never got counted (dimpled and varying chads included, which you must count when compared against the optical scanner) Gore would have had a million or more votes that never got counted! Thus, any adjustment you'd theoretically make on absentee ballots would pale in this comparison.
If there's anything good to come out of this election, it's neither Bush nor Gore, rather it'll mean the end of the punch-card system and, thus, fairer elections in the future.
Not only all of the above, but Gore actually did win the national popular vote. Statistically, it seems he also won Florida and, therefore, the electoral college vote. |
