Democrat apparently wins by 8 votes in Washington state

[Omaha Steve]

OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) -The head of the state Democratic Party said late Tuesday that recount results from King County give Democrat Christine Gregoire an eight-vote victory in the closest governor's race in state history.

http://www.omaha.com/index.php?u_pg=1673&u_sid=1291331

[KeireG]

1. Yay!

8 votes!!!!

[SujiwanKenobee]

64. Stealing symbology

About 350 people gathered Tuesday to show support for Rossi in front of the Supreme Court, at a rally sponsored by a conservative talk-radio station.


The crowd chanted "No more fraud!" They held signs saying "Welcome to Ukraine" and wore orange, a tribute to the signature color of demonstrators in Ukraine who protested a fraud-marred election there.

------- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18672-2004Dec22.html

Gee--this sure sounds like co-opting the Dem symbology for the stolen election as in "why aren't we out in the streets protesting election results like the people in Ukraine?"
I'm sure that in every instance where a Dem might be shown to have prevailed, the right will use this as a turn-around to do a j'accuse! at Dems.

[Left Brain]

83. 350 Chanting "No More Fraud" --

All I can say to them is
WAH :P

When about the same number of protesters stood outside our state capitol and chanted the same thing a few weeks ago with regards to Ohio, Florida and the rest of the presidential vote farce, there wasn't so much as a squeak from the mainstream media.

Hypocrites in WA State, cry me a river and eat your words.

[deadparrot]

2. Oy. This'll be a mess.

[dweller]

3. count every vote

and look what happens!


sweet!
dp

[Brundle_Fly]

4. ahahaaahahahahahahahahahahahahah

hahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahaha

[NVMojo]

5. hmmmm, hmmmmm, hmmmmm ....this could get ugly...real fast...

didn't they have Sequoias in that State???

[BlueManDude]

51. When do the GOP Brownshirts arrive? n/t

[DoYouEverWonder]

54. They already have

I heard there were about 350 of them outside of a radio station somewhere.

That's okay let them make a bunch of assholes out of themselves. We want to win, but it is more important to win fairly. That is what they don't seem to understand.

[DBoon]

6. We won! We have a Man Date!

Why not?

[Just Me]

11. That would be a WO-mandate,...mind ya' *grin*. eom

[mzmolly]

7. Holy crap!

:wow:

[mom cat]

8. Fantastic!!!!!! Now for el Presidente!!!

[Renew Deal]

13. Generalisimo Bush

I think we're stuck with him.

[Name removed]

25. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Renew Deal]

29. I'll reference anyone I want.

Welcome to DU!! I hope you enjoy your stay. I have a feeling that it will resemble Alexander's stay in one way.

[kurtyboy]

30. I didn't hear Ted Rall's name mentioned---

AND--I don't think he's hurt anybody--

(Friendly-fire did kill a few, however....)

The Generallissmo label fits, Bush should wear it.

And when you said, "hurt us", which group were you writing about? Hurt who? The GOP perhaps....

I got my suspicions....

But WELCOME TO DU!!! Enjoy your evening.

[zann725]

36. Nope. Not yet. "No defeat...no surrender."

n/t

[mom cat]

48. Just keep fighting..Victory will come...Their laughter is turning to anger

:bounce:

[Just Me]

9. *grin*

FIGHT!!! FIGHT!!! FIGHT!!!!

I'm tellin' ya',...being "nice" or even "principled" don't work against power-mongering disease spreading across this country.

Be "winners"!!!

[evolvenow]

10. Funny how when the votes are counted, Dem wins!! YAY!!!

:bounce:

[BernieBear]

28. That's a great slogan

When ALL the votes get counted, Democrats win.......

[evolvenow]

47. Thanks BernieBear! Feel free to apply Liberally!!! As in Everywhere!!

:)

[katinmn]

12. Wonderful! It has to be accepted by the Repugs, too

each team of ballot counters included a republican and a democrat who each counted the votes separately and compared votes.

If there was any disagreement, the ballots were turned over to a new team and recounted.

:dem:

[SW FL Dem]

14. Just heard this on Faux

No I wasn't watching, I was channel surfing and it was the lead story at the top of the hour.

[Straight Shooter]

15. I congratulate my neighboring state!

Count the votes fairly and Democrats win. That's my new slogan :D

(Of course, they still need to count those 753 votes the Repubs are still squabbling about in King County.)

[cry baby]

16. I can't believe something that great could happen!!!

:bounce:

[cry baby]

17. I'd love to be a fly on the wall in freeperland! Ha Ha

[kurtyboy]

18. Gee Whiz! I wrote about this last Friday!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=184&topic_id=2513

I actually figured on this---sort of! BTW, this means Gregoire and the Dems get back ALL of the $700,000 placed as a deposit to have the manual recount.

I wonder what they'll do with the cash?

INNAUGURAL PARTY!!!!

EDIT--And one more thing, this margin represents twenty-eight ONE-HUNDRED-THOUSANDTHS of one percent. Cripes, that's close!!!!

[Sydnie]

19. Maybe they can share it for a recount in NM!

This is great news!!! When they count them all -- WE WIN!!

[kurtyboy]

20. Actually, they haven't counted them all yet.

The state Supreme Court will rule tomorrow on whether another 753 ballots can count (I think they'll find for Gregoire, saying they will count). If they rule for counting these ballots, you may expect a different outcome--or not. Look for Rossi to withdraw his suit ASAP if he thinks he lost on the recount anyway--he'll want those 753 votes counted, as his last chance---GOP Hypocrite that he is.

If he sticks with the suit, and gets the relief he's asked for, then the court will likely also rule that other counties that added votes must subtract them--which would be to his great detriment statewide....A new hand recount, and a couple hundred lost votes for him.

He is now officially between a hypocritical rock-and-a-hard-place. I hope he chokes on it...

[Sydnie]

22. I hope it falls on him! n/t

[baby_bear]

23. excellent analysis, kurtyboy

How is Vance going to respond to this?

"Count all the votes!"

heh heh heh

But by the way, the Dems must abide by that as well. We have always wanted all legitimate votes to count.

Thank goodness for Councilman Phillips, who is the only one of the disenfranchised who had a voice that made a difference. If not for him, the rest of the disenfranchised would reamain anonymous and disenfranchised.

b_b

[Pachamama]

41. Rossi knows he lost - regardless of whether those additional 753 absentee

ballots are rejected or counted...having lived in King County when I was formerly known as a Microsoftie, King County is a rich, dark shade of Blue....and in the same area, its what won the state for Sen. Maria Cantwell when it was real close w/ Slade Gorton and its Congressman is Jim McDermott...need I say more? And meanwhile, the Pro-Rossi rally of fascsts gathering outside of the radio station (as reported on Yahoo webpage too) and somehow claiming that they are suffering what the poor people in the Ukraine is a page right out of Karl Rove's handbook.... puhleez...Rossi knew it was over when she demanded a recount of ALL Counties and that King County would end up pulling Gregoire out ahead....I predict that regardless of tommorrow's case decision from the WA Supreme Court on those remaining 753 uncounted absentee ballots (with nothing wrong with them other than that the workers didn't do their job and cross reference the signature books (only the online scans) that Gregoire not only wins, but Rossi concedes by Friday...

Merry Christmas Christine....and the State of Washington!

[Liberty Belle]

69. They should give the $$$ to the Ohio litigation fund.

One Rep down, many more to go!

[nickshepDEM]

21. The shits gonna hit the fan now.

You know the repugs are gonna find a way to get this into the courts.

[Spiffarino]

24. No way! They HATE trial lawyers

Why, it would be completely hypocritical of them to do that!

:eyes:

[Newsjock]

26. RADIO STATION holds pro-Rossi rally

And this from a later version of the AP story:
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/12/21/state2327EST7145.DTL

... About 350 people gathered Tuesday to show support for Rossi in front of the Supreme Court, at a rally sponsored by KVI, a conservative talk-radio station.

[Pachamama]

42. A page right out of Karl Rove's gamebook...rally like the victims...

..,Puhleeze...reminds me of the Rethuglican "outrage in Miami in 2000" that was staged....

:grr:

[Politicub]

59. And the lapdog media will faithfully report on it, just like Miami

Man - I wish I had some dirt on these mush mouth reporters like the GOP must have.

[musette_sf]

68. Tell me again

why we aren't massed outside 1600 Penn Ave chanting "GET OUT OF KERRY'S HOUSE!"

[Pachamama]

72. Excellent question Grasshopper....WHY aren't we? I ask myself that every

day and wonder the same....here we are, like Michael Moore has said "the battered wife syndrome" victims, and yet we don't protest or fight back. Meanwhile (if I can take that analogy further), the "batterers" are the ones out fighting and protesting....

I for one am tired of watching this dysfunctional response by Democrats....I for one am going to DC on Jan 4th and plan on standing on the National Mall in front of the joint session of Congress on Jan. 6th. The night before, I'm going to a reception party for Barbara Boxer and I'm going to point blank look her in the eyes and ask her to stand behind the Black Congressional Caucus on a vote against this election, even if she is the lone Senator....

Even if nothing changes, I'll atleast be able to live with myself...I'm not going to cower to the abuse.....

Welcome by the way to the DU Musette_SF :hi: I'm here in Marin County!

[Mike Niendorff]

49. "KVI", locally known as "K-K-KVI".

MDN

[neverforget]

27. "I believe Dino Rossi should concede" I love it! Eat shit you fascist

fucks.

[zann725]

37. And he ALMOST had a victory party, didn't he?

Oh well....

Maybe that's an omen for Inauguration!

[goodboy]

31. this is what democracy looks like. too bad kerry didn't fight like

gregoire....


flame away.

[Pachamama]

43. No flaming...I agree....

:hi:

[Name removed]

32. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[JohnLocke]

33. Everyone should pressure Rossi to concede.

[Newsjock]

34. Dems play tough with anti-Rossi website

http://accidentalgovernor.com

YAY, finally! some backbone!

[ScrewyRabbit]

35. Suck on that, GOP

[zann725]

38. And just wait 'til Jan 6!

n/t

[fortyfeetunder]

39. Let the fight here in WA State inspire other states

like Florida, Ohio, and other close call Pug winners that HELL NO, you don't have to just sit there and take in the shorts. Fight to get every vote counted. Every single fricking vote.

Had the Dems fought like that in Florida and Ohio, the chimp would not be in power. Ever...

[fortyfeetunder]

40. Attack coming...

Watch Dubya, Rove and company pounce on this in the morning. I expect a full frontal attack on Christine Gregoire's character and also to Paul Berendt, WA Democratic leader..

[saracat]

44. And didn't Conyers say that the Senators would be watching WA as a

benchmark to determine which way to jump concerning the electoral protest? This will get interesting!

[Quetzal]

45. Hey, Is Republican SOS Reed pulling a fast one here?

Reed says county has right to fix error, tally 735 ballots

OLYMPIA — If the state Supreme Court stops King County from counting 735 disputed ballots in the governor's race, it will invalidate recount totals in other counties, according to court papers filed yesterday by the Secretary of State's Office.

Attorneys for Secretary of State Sam Reed say counties across the state made errors that were corrected by canvassing boards, which resulted in new votes being counted.

Attorney Thomas Ahearne argues that if the court now rules that King County can't correct errors during a recount, other counties will have to comb through results in both the completed machine recount and the hand recount to pick out any votes that they had added when correcting errors. The hand recount has been completed in all but King County.

Reed maintains that King County has the same right as every other county to correct errors during the recount. Rulings on the validity of ballots are made by local canvassing boards, three-person panels in each of 39 counties. If the court rules that King County can't count the 735 disputed ballots, Reed says, that means no county should have been able to reconsider ballots after the initial count.

more...

Reed says county has right to fix error, tally 735 ballots

[merwin]

46. No, not all repubs are evil :-) n/t

[Lerkfish]

62. I've seen no evidence to support your claim :)

[Skarbrowe]

50. It may be too early am for me, but if this is true, why bother recounting

at all, like ever, if no new votes found are to be counted. I am sooooo confused. WTF is wrong with this country?

EDITED TO ADD..hey if this count holds up..YEY!! I can't believe it. A Democrat actually fought the repug machine and won! Oh lordy it gives me such hope.

[DoYouEverWonder]

55. This is why the Dems picked WA for their first battle

Most of it was under the MSM radar and we had a better chance of controlling the legal process to get favorable rulings. The legal groundwork that is being done here will set the precedents for everything to come.

Now onto OHIO.

[mamalone]

58. When do we hear about the other 700 or so votes?

When will the court make it's decision known as to the fate of those votes? I'm very anxious to hear as that will solidify things a bit.

[Rose Siding]

61. Reed came out with that before Chris pulled ahead

I believe he just did the right thing.

[Vidar]

52. Congratulations, Washington.

[GOPBasher]

53. How close can an election get? Wow!

[Bono71]

56. Jimmy Fallon: 8 votes. Once again proving my vote would not have counted/

[Politicub]

57. Yay!

When every vote was counted, we prevailed!

And Gregoire is riding the wave of a massive mandate!!!!!

:bounce:

[quaoar]

60. Yes, but has the US Supreme Court voted yet?

Surely they will be called on to install the Republican. That's their job.

[w4rma]

63. "apparently"? They wouldn't have used "apparently" if the Repuke had won

by 8 votes.

[neverforget]

65. They would've used "crushing victory" if Rossi had won

[lonestarnot]

66. Woohoooo!

Yeah Christine!

[PeteGammons]

67. It makes me laugh...

... to read through this thread. "When all the votes are counted, we win." Yeah, right. When we get to hold back our counties until we know how many votes we win, THEN we win.

Great job out there in King County. I'd like to congratulate the Democratic vote counters, who managed to do the right thing...

[Pachamama]

74. Glad your getting your "laughs"...laugh away-who will have the last laugh?

Yes, its true Pete! Believe it or not, "WHEN ALL THE VOTES ARE COUNTED, DEMOCRATS WIN" - Amazing little fact....you see, when votes are actually "hand counted", as opposed to machines, they are more accurate and obviously the "True numbers" come to light. Machines (especially without a paper audit trail) can't be audited. Having personally worked at Microsoft for over a decade, being incredibly familiar with the security flaws of the software, I can assure you that computer voting machines are seriously vulnerable to corruption and an election could easily be programmed/rigged to do as the programmer says. Optical scan machines can easily be flawed too, because, once again, as machines, they do as programmed. Also, if a ballot was inproperly fed into a scanner, it too gives inaccurate results. Handcounts, like the ones in Washington state, are being done with observers from BOTH parties, so your insinuation that the "DEMOCRATIC VOTE COUNTERS" managed to somehow "swing things the way of the Democrats" is not only an ignorant statement, it clearly sounds like you have some sour grapes Pete?

I lived in King County, still have a house there and yes, its a deep shade of Blue...no surprises there. But before you start going off on Christine Gregoire and the Democrats, know that she requested a full hand recount of the state and in the case before the Supreme Ct. of WA, she is asking that ALL Votes, including the 753 absentee ballots that were signed and valid that did not get counted would have, had the DEMOCRATIC Election workers, not cast them aside since they didn't bother to check the official handsignature logs that would have verified their signature.

All I know dear Pete, is wouldn't you want your vote to count if it was one of those 753 absentee ballots in question? I know I would...and we both know where your vote would have gone, so geez, you sure as heck would have wanted it counted, eh? :eyes:

[PeteGammons]

88. Who will have the last laugh? We will.

We won.

But it's just silly to pretend that this was some pure-as-the-driven-snow process. Stop and think about how you'd feel if
a) Gregoire had won on the first count
b) Gregoire had won on the machine recount
c) A heavily Rethuglican county had "found" misplaced ballots that cut the lead, including one that had a write-in for "Dino Gregoire" that they counted as a Rossi vote
d) That same heavily Rethuglican county had been the last county to report on the hand recount and had miraculously found enough votes to give Rossi an 8-vote lead.

Now honestly, in that scenario, would you say, "gosh, I guess they counted all the votes and the 'thug won." Or would you suspect, let's say, some hanky-panky?

And all of you that think that there's never any cheating on our side, God bless your innocent souls, have no idea how the election process actually works in this country.

So I say again, congrats to the good guys in King County, Washington. They got it done. And there's not a fucking thing that the 'thugs can do about it. To quote Doyle Lonegan, "what am I gonna do, call him out for cheatin' better than I do in front of the others?"

[CAcyclist]

90. You think that way

because you don't think cheating is wrong. We think cheating is wrong.

This isn't about partisan politics. It's about counting the votes of the voters. This is about fairness and accuracy, something that you know nothing of.

It is so typical for a bully, when caught cheating, to immediately turn around and accuse their victim of being the cheater instead.

[spotbird]

77. You guys keep whining that the absentee ballots

should be excluded when it is easily verifiable that they were honestly cast votes. It makes your position that you only want the votes counted that will help you to win very transparent.

Other than complaining that you won't win, why shouldn't votes that can be determined to be valid be counted? I've yet to hear the reason you want them excluded, and doubt I will here.

[glitch]

80. The hand count was done by Democrats and Republicans with a recorder

overseeing and observers viewing them all.
Just to be very clear: each ballot was viewed by a Republican and a Democrat.

[Timefortruth]

82. It could be that he doesn't like facts to influence his opinion.

Judging from the fact that he thinks the votes were counted only by Democrats he doesn't know a lot about what went on in Washington.

[Name removed]

70. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Bugaboo]

71. now *thats* a win!

nt

[femme.democratique]

78. Waving hi to the freepers....*one fingered salute*

Happy Holidays, fascist piggies! }(

[caligirl]

73. Wa supreme court on cspan live now. Arguing the SOS case first

[countryjake]

75. Whoa, thanks for the heads-up!

[lakelly]

76. History in the making!!

Thanks for the heads up. I have C-span on now. Fasten your seat belts boys and girls its going to be a bumpy flight.
Go Governor Gregoire

[sonias]

79. Count all the votes

Every vote in King County should be counted. Gregoire won by more than 8 votes if all those votes are counted as they should be. You can't have different standards for each county. If they corrected votes in other counties then they have to allow King county to do the same. Result is that Christine Gregoire wins by an even larger margin, although 1 vote over her opponent is all that is legally required. She already has 8 so either way Rossi loses.

Congratulations to Gregoire and Washington state!

Sonia

[warrens]

81. you have that wrong

It's count all REPUBLICAN votes, silly liberal.

[maxsolomon]

84. vance wants military voters who didn't get their ballots in time...

to get a chance to vote.

yeah, that sounds much more fair than counting on-time votes the county fucked up.

hey pete, king co. completed their votes last because WE HAVE THE MOST VOTES TO COUNT. kee rist!

8 votes! suck it GOP haters!

[BearsCubs]

85. Bunch of voters have the same address...

This will be a big mess.

[GoddessOfGuinness]

86. What's your source for that info?

FUX SNews?

[mountebank]

87. OMG - More than one voter per household? Impossible! n/t

[Pachamama]

91. OMG! Maybe there are roommates? Or married couples w/ kids over 18 living

at home? Hmmmmm...highly suspicious....NOT! :eyes:

[rfrrfrrfr]

92. OMG

My mother, Father, Grandfather,sister and myself all live at the same address. Does that mean if we all vote there is election fraud. OMG OMG we committed voter fraud becasue we are all individuals residing at the same address. The shock the horror.


/end sarcasm.

Get real, according to Rossi and Chris Vance votes should only be counted when they are votes for Rossi. The vote was close enough to trigger an autmatic machine recount and that brought it close enough for the dems to ask for a hand recount 42 votes is well within the machines margin of error.

A hand count is the most accurate way to count the ballots. They knew the hand recount would result in a Rossi loss which is why they were opposed to it.

[jellybelly]

89. only 8!

I'm happy, but by only 8 votes:wtf:

[JMS825]

93. ok let me get this straight

The Dems win Wa. finally and all of the sudden the courts decide to include the votes they refused to count when the repubs was leading?

[zann725]

94. Repugs always re-write the rules! Think by now we'd know.

Face it Pukes, Washington is 'Blue!'
Na-na-na-na!
:bounce:

[Bugaboo]

95. It's two different batches of ballots...

the votes the court *refused* to count were questionable votes - the kind where they would have to contact the voters to determine intent. The dems wanted those votes should be included in the recount and the court (righfully, in my opinion) disagreed with them.

The votes in question NOW are different votes - legitimate signed ballots that arrived on time but didn't have electronic signatures. They should have contacted the voters to verify sigs. But they ended up in the wrong pile, the voters weren't contacted and their votes weren't included in the count. The mistake was discovered when a King County Councilman found his name on the list of the aforementioned questionable ballots and contacted the election commissioners, saying he knew his vote had been valid, signed and on time.

If those votes had been handled properly, Gregoire would have won in the first place. Governor Gregoire should make voting reform #1 on her agenda.

[truthisfreedom]

96. i hope this makes the fweepers tear their hair out.

by the roots.

[eridani]

97. Heard on KOUW that the 753 ballots must be counted.

Ballots that were similarly screwed up BY THE STATE in every other county were counted, and Gregoire did not object to that even though it was to Rossi't gain. Seems only far that King County voters are owed the same, and the court agreed.