Why is the election not called -- is it because of the voter discrepancy reported at one location? Is it because some ballots are missing?
Not looking good. Allen ran a really miserable campaign.
He'll run again in '08 when Warner reires, and hopefully conduct a better campaign.
Allen and his stupid macaca butt are done. Unless there are thousands of miltary absentee ballots in his favor, there is nothing left for him.
I think its a good decision.
Allen has as good a chance of overturning a 3% margin as Richard Nixon has winning the 1960 Presidential election.
I've been going by the official State Board of Elections website; you can get to it by going to
http://www.virginia.gov
And the "live election results" link is prominent on the front page.
If you drill down onto their list by locality for the Senate race, it's showing three precincts still not counted--the absentee votes in Isle of Wight County, one of the two absentee votes "precincts" in James City County, and the Roberts B precinct in James City County. (Then again, I think Roberts B is a screwup on the webpage, because there's actually *two* "Roberts B" lines--one has votes, one doesn't.) Virginia groups all absentee votes for a county or independent city into one or more precincts under that county/city, usually called "central absentee precinct" or something similar. They have been counted for everyplace in the state except Isle of Wight and James City.
Now, does that mean that everything's right in the 2200+ precincts that have reported? Of course not. But as of now (just after 3:00), only the absentee ballots out of two fairly small counties hadn't reported. Everything else had sent the State Board of Elections something, right or wrong.
Here's the numbers as of 3:00 pm EST:
Office: U.S. Senate
Precincts Reporting: 2440 of 2443 (99.88%)
Registered Voters: 4,555,629 Total Voting: 2,367,032 Voter Turnout: 51.96 %
Candidates Party Vote Totals Percentage
J H Webb Jr Democratic 1,172,913 49.55%
G F Allen Republican 1,165,557 49.24%
G G Parker Independent Green 26,212 1.11%
Write Ins 2,350 0.10%
View Results by District Locality Total: 2,367,032
Webb has a 7,356-vote lead. There's no way that those three missing precincts can deliver that kind of push for Allen. So if Allen is going to make up any ground, it's going to have to come from the canvass, and if there's any votes that are not included in the State Board of Elections' website. I don't know if military ballots, for example, are rolled into the absentee votes, or if they're handled separately.
Bottom line: It's going to take a miracle, or it's going to take the discovery of a major accounting cock-up in Webb's favor somewhere in the vote-counting process. There was a FReeper last night that said he didn't even see his son's precinct on the list for a given (Allen-leaning) county, but I don't know which county or precinct.
}:-)4
Allen should just GIVE IT UP...
Let's AMerica see what 2 years living with Dims brings.
The end tally was very close, I think they can get a recount with it so close. No reason to concede just yet.