Peter Lewycky wrote:
>
> How many may have wanted to vote for Buchanan but got Gore instead?
Assuming that errors take place at the same rates, [rather than making
any unwarranted and invidious assumptions about relative intelligence of
Buchanan
and Gore voters], and assuming that (as the regression model suggests)
about
2500 of the 3407 Buchanan votes were intended for Gore, the answer is
about 1 in 1,000
intended votes - that is to say, 1.
I
> don't have the all the stats at hand but Buchanan got something like
> 3000 votes. Is it the claim by the Democrats that all these votes
> should've gone to Gore?
I do not know what the Democrats claim. My own regression suggests that
about 2500 ofthem should have, if Palm Beach fits the pattern of the
rest
of Florida. According to this morning's paper, it was claimed by
Buchanan - not,
as I understand, a Democrat - that most of them probably should have.
There were 19000 spoiled ballots due to double
> marking this year. In 1996, 14800 ballots rejected for the same reason.
> Where's the evidence that this year's ballot was more difficult?
Right there, I'd say... if we assume no change in difficulty or voter
intelligence the variation would be due only to Poisson sampling
variation.
[I'm assuming equal turnout here.] Best fit would be Poisson(16900), SD
= 130.
That's about 16 sigmas. Enough?
-Robert Dawson
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