My Candidate Lost - By .004 percent

05/12/2008

[Responsibility2nd]

Saturday we had local elections in and around Bexar County. The City of Live Oak had a race for City Council Place 2. The incumbent Patricia "Pat" Kauts was running against former council member Loretta Kusek.

Kusek lost. By 4 votes.

Kauts.....509 Votes
Kusek....504 Votes

[Responsibility2nd]

There have been tighter races, of course. But this only serves as a reminder that every vote counts.

[ican'tbelieveit]

0.4%

[Always Right]

Actually it is 50.2% vs. 49.8%, which amounts to 0.4%.

[gridlock]

Every vote counts, unless you are a Democrat living in Florida or Michigan.

[Lazamataz]

0.0000004%

[Always Right]

2 posted on Monday, May 12, 2008 9:45:17 AM by ican'tbelieveit

3 posted on Monday, May 12, 2008 9:45:17 AM by Always Right

That was close. We almost bumped heads on those posts.

[F15Eagle]

no offense, but isn’t that 5 votes?

typo?

:)

[ican'tbelieveit]

Can’t even claim seconds difference... dang. I was amazed when I posted your reply showed up at the exact same time.

[Cicero]

You are certainly right.

Whatever anyone decides to do on the presidential line this November, everyone should certainly get out and vote for state and local candidates. And if you can’t justify contributing to McCain, maybe you can find someone else to donate to, in another state if necessary. There are plenty of good candidates—if not on the national level.

And I suspect they will need our help all the more, since enthusiasm and momentum are likely to be even lower than they were in 2006.

[Responsibility2nd]

I knew some math majors would find my math a lttle fuzzy.

Question: is .004 the same as .04%?

I think I should have left the % sign off in my title. Or expressed it as you did: .04%

[DBrow]

So go the Saul Alinsky route.

Spread rumors that the election was tainted, maybe people were disenfranchized or the ballots were not properly designed. A single mom, an older person, someone unassailable can be a vocal poster child for this effort.

Then demand a recount, and make sure that it’s your people who do the counting. It may take three recounts.

The second your guy is one vote up, declare victory, throw a party, and never let the media print a single doubt of your just victory.

[Responsibility2nd]

....typo?

Geez! My fuzzy math is worse than I thought!

[Always Right]

Question: is .004 the same as .04%? I think I should have left the % sign off in my title. Or expressed it as you did: .04%

0.004 translates to 0.4%. But since 0.004 is a unitless number, it is meaningless, so it needs to be expressed as a percent to define what you are talking about.

[Responsibility2nd]

TYVM.

[Dutchboy88]

Not to be picky, but I think your number should be three votes...
509 v 504 (actual)
508 v 505 (1 vote change)
507 v 506 (2 vote change)
506 v 507 (3 vote change and your guy wins)

[Responsibility2nd]

Good point. I guess I need to read...

[Ravenstar]

.004 is equal to .4%

My Batchelors degree was in Mathematics which almost automatically means my grammar is horrendous and I don’t spell very well.

Ravenstar

[dpwiener]

Don’t give up yet. I don’t know what the election procedures in Texas are, but here in California the fat lady hasn’t sung until all the late absentee and provisional ballots are counted, which can take several weeks.

Back in 2000 a good friend of mine, Kate O’Brien, ran for a seat on the local Park district. There were three positions available, and the top three vote getters would get elected. On election day, Kate came in fourth by several dozen votes (out of about 95,000 cast). But a couple of weeks later we were stunned to learn that she had won by 3 votes!

Of course with such a narrow margin the losing candidate paid for a recount. The way it worked is that it cost him about $1200 per day for a recount which would take about a week to complete. He could pick the order of precincts to recount, and he could stop at any time, but in order to overturn the result all the ballots would have to be recounted. If the result was reversed, then he wouldn’t have to pay anything.

I was one of the observers during the recount, and there was some day-to-day fluctuation. Some days Kate was ahead by 4, others by only 2. After 5 days Kate was ahead by 5 and the opponent threw in the towel, which meant we reverted to the official victory margin of 3 votes.

So maybe your candidate still has a chance.

[seanmerc]

It’s actually six. Five votes would give you a tie. :-)

[F15Eagle]

LOL, but 5 wouldn’t have been a “loss”. I started to put 6 but went for the tie.

Then they could have arm-wrestled.

But yeah it’s good to remind folks to vote.

[Rebelbase]

Kauts.....509 Votes
Kusek....504 Votes

The names are close enough in spelling with K’s, U’s and S’s that it could easily be that people were confused when they pulled the lever and voted for the other guy—on both sides.