OK, now I see that they're reporting this as 2.1% of the precincts reporting. Again, I don't quite understand why they've updated it in this way, but take it FWIW.
I went to the site and noticed this...
'Precincts Reporting: 2.71% '
did not Kerry have to gain 137,000 votes to beat Bush?
Did you click on the county link on the Provisional Ballot Page? Bush is winning 70% to 30% in CLINTON COUNTY!!
I am guessing those are final totals for ALL ballots in counties that have reported provisionals. (i.e. votes from election day + absentees + provisionals, ONLY for those counties that HAVE reported provisionals)
They clearly aren't provisionals only, because it is listing 137,000 votes, but the large counties (Franklin, Cuyahoga, etc) haven't reported any ballots yet when you go into county breakdown.
For example, in Adams County, 11,735 votes were reported on election night. In the new data, Bush gains 173 votes and Kerry gained 91 votes. The total new vote count is 11,999. (Adams is a very conservative county that voted for Bush by 2:1.)
You get a similar situation in Clinton County, for example, with provisionals falling roughly in line with total vote count. Athens County, however, is unusual because their new vote count is same as original vote count.
That number is not the total number of provisional ballots, but the total number of votes in the counties that have reported their new numbers that includes absentee and provisional ballots. The current provisional ballot total is just under 140,000 and will continue to shrink as more counties continue to toss out bad ones from mainly democrats that were not registered to vote.
There was over 155,000 provisonal ballots. Over 15,000 have allready been tossed out, mainly in heavily democratic counties like Cuyahoga & Lucas. If things continue to go the way there going, Bush Counties will have more provisional ballots to count than Kerry ones. Clearly because there was higher levels of non-registered voters trying to vote in democrat counties, and more of the ones in Republican counties were registered and valid new voters that came out to support marriage.
But regardless of the number of provisional ballots, like others have reported, the results will be consistent with the way the election day voters voted. So in counties that Bush won by 60-70%, he'll get about the same percent, and the same goes for Kerry gaining votes in the ones he won. Such as in Warren County which hasn't been added to the total, Bush took 69% of the votes, gaining 868 votes.
Kerry will only gain votes in about 17 counties, while Bush based on the statistics should gain votes in 71 counties that he won. Thus based on my caculations, when all the provisional and absentee ballots are counted, Bush's margin of victory increases by 1,564 votes at the least. He'll gain even more if a higher percentage of ballots are rejected in democrat counties, which appears to be happening based on the current data. So Bush will win by even more votes, which is clearly why Kerry decided to concede so quickly.
Current projected provisional ballot breakdown by candidate:
Bush 70,886
Kerry 69,322
Bush + 1,564
There he goes stealing even more ballots...... /sarcasm off.
http://polipundit.com/index.php?p=5361
They’ve apparently counted about 137,000 provisional and absentee ballots in Ohio.
And the breakdown?
Bush = 56%
Kerry = 43.5%
I say there should be a recount. I mean, seriously, how could Bush have won? Nobody I know voted for him . . .
http://election.sos.state.oh.us/Results/RaceSummary.aspx