The Current Numbers In NY-20: A Tie!!!
And the current leader in NY-20 is...nobody. It's a tie!
The Schenectady Daily Gazette reports that the numbers right now, as the counties go through the standard procedure of proofreading their spreadsheets, are 77,225 votes for Democrat Scott Murphy, to 77,225 votes for Republican Jim Tedisco.
Murphy led by 65 votes on election night, then 25 votes Wednesday afternoon, and Tedisco might have taken a small lead yesterday. The numbers are still in flux, as some counties are still checking everything out -- who knows, these numbers could even be out of date right now, minutes after it was reported.
Also, these numbers do not include even one absentee ballot, as those haven't been counted yet -- and as I reported yesterday, those appear to be roughly tied, as well.
In other news, Jim Tedisco has resigned his position as state Assembly minority leader, officially in order to focus on his transition to Congress in case he has won. But the Albany Times-Union reported that there was another reason -- if he hadn't stepped down, he was on the verge of facing a no-confidence vote from his caucus.
Late Update: The state Board of Elections has now begun posting the unofficial results online -- which New York doesn't usually do, by the way. But for this race, they're making an exception.
Late Late Update: And in just a few minutes the tie was broken, with Murphy taking the lead -- for now -- with a pickup of 198 votes in a single county.
Josh
Matt
Eric
Brian
I'm pretty sure they won't be tied for long. It looks as if Murphy just picked up 198 votes in Washington County.
April 3, 2009 4:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is a clear repudiation of Barack Obama.
April 3, 2009 5:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
These super close elections... anomalies or a hint at underlying forces at work?
I refer primarily to this one and the MN Senate race, but we've had quite a few close races recently. Are these coincidental statistics or what?
One thing I see is that pre-election polling drives spending, so there is a tendency to drive the vote towards 50-50 in a two-way election. In Flordia in 2000 and Ohio in 2004, the Presidential race came down to virtual handfuls of votes amid claims of conspiracy and tampering.
So it's partly a Battle of the Bucks, as resources are developed and allocated to spread the word or the bullshit as the case may be, for or against a candidate or other ballot measure. What this relies on is largely ignorance. People are ignorant and so they are swayed by bullshit. Then we have the Battle of the Bullshit which includes not only dirty smear campaigns but positive not fully truthful spinning in favor of a candidate.
All this begs a deeper question: Are there "forces" at work creating these very close calls besides the obvious Battles, or driving the Battles behind the scenes?
For starters: Conspiracy theorists who believe in vote tampering via electronic voting or other means surely have their ideas on this.
April 3, 2009 5:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I guess this is as close as you can get. Why can't we get some blowouts? Very frustrating.
April 3, 2009 5:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
Obama best just stay in France.
Clearly America has rejected him
April 3, 2009 8:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
I refer primarily to this one and the MN Senate race, but we've had quite a few close races recently. Are these coincidental statistics or what?
One thing I see is that pre-election polling drives spending, so there is a tendency to drive the vote towards 50-50 in a two-way election. In Flordia in 2000 and Ohio in 2004, the Presidential race came down to virtual handfuls of votes amid claims of conspiracy and tampering.
m65 kamagra
June 6, 2010 8:12 AM | Reply | Permalink