[Mb-civic] Ohio Redux - More Weirdness with the Voting Machines

[Mike Blaxill]

Some (ahem) perspective on that close Ohio House
race..wake me up when the Dems grow a spine -
from blogger Billmon:

If you followed the [Hackett, Schmidt Ohio
election] returns last night, you may have
noticed that one county in the district --
Clermont -- was extremely late in reporting part
of its returns. Clermont is the second largest
pool of votes in the district and provided
roughly a quarter of all ballots cast yesterday.
It's also a GOP stronghold (in a GOP stronghold
district) and Jean Schmidt's home turf.

That being the case, it's not a big surprise
Schmidt did well there, carrying the county with
58% of the two-party vote -- less than what a GOP
candidate can usually expect, but enough to give
her nearly a 5,000 vote margin in Clermont, and
thus the election.

At about 9:00 PM ET last night, however, things
didn't look nearly as good for Ms. Schmidt.  With
88% of the district's precincts reporting,
including more than half of Clermont's, the count
was almost evenly split -- with Schmidt holding a
lead of less than 900 votes.

At that point, though, the Clermont election
bureau experienced a "technical malfunction" with
its optical scan readers:

The Board of Elections in Clermont County, east
of Cincinnati, says it's optical scanners haven't
counted all the ballots yet because it was so hot
-- and humid -- Tuesday.

Board member Tim Rudd says the ballots pick up
moisture when it gets hot, making it tougher for
the optical scan machines to sort and count.

the rest is here, please read (sigh..)
http://billmon.org/archives/002073.html