Tom Barrow to ask court to remove Dave Bing as Mayor.

[ct_alum]

He's just mad because he didn't get the cemetary vote.....................

[Danny]

Sorry Barrow, the people of Detroit spoken. BING IS KING and Detroiters don't want another election like last year and months before.

[Fnemecek]

This guy is losing it.

I disagree.

From the Detroit News article:

Barrow lost to Bing in the Nov. 3 election by 70,060 to 50,757 or 58 percent to 42 percent. Barrow requested a recount, but upon discovering problems with security seals on some absentee container boxes, the Wayne County Board of Canvassers ruled that none of the 41,485 absentee ballots would be recounted and the board reverted to the original election night results.

The difference between these two candidates was only 19,303 votes and there are 41,485 ballots that cannot be verified. If that's not grounds for a legitimate law suit, I don't know what is.

[bartock]

I disagree.

From the Detroit News article:



The difference between these two candidates was only 19,303 votes and there are 41,485 ballots that cannot be verified. If that's not grounds for a legitimate law suit, I don't know what is.

I am not familiar with election law. I'm guessing you are not either. This probably works a bit like class actions, where there has to be some shred to suggest that the outcome could have been different.

I'm also no statistician, but I do remember from high school something about taking a sample of 300-400 people of a randomized class in order to get an outcome with something like a +/_ 3% accuracy. Call it 5% - I think absentee ballots would almost by statistical definition be a random sampling, so perhaps this is a lawsuit, but not a "legitimate" one. Taxpayer money could and should be put to better use.

[Fnemecek]

What's a better use than making sure that our elections are run properly?

[Fnemecek]

I'm also no statistician, but I do remember from high school something about taking a sample of 300-400 people of a randomized class in order to get an outcome with something like a +/_ 3% accuracy. Call it 5% - I think absentee ballots would almost by statistical definition be a random sampling, so perhaps this is a lawsuit, but not a "legitimate" one.

By the way, since we have 41,485 ballots that can't be verified, the stats work out to this being +/- 15.977%.

[bartock]

By the way, since we have 41,485 ballots that can't be verified, the stats work out to this being +/- 15.977%.

If 41,485 people in a random sample produced a margin of error of +/- 16%, there would be no point in polling. Random sampling I believe requires several hundred people to produce a margin of error of 3-5%. Thus, in a case where the margin of victory was 58-42, absent some smoking gun proof of fabrication of tens of thousands of these ballots [[somehow it never got to Kwame...but his reelection was probably more bought than fabricated), it is "statistically impossible" to change the outcome.

The bit about making sure elections are done properly...virtually every election has an error component to it as well, and without accounting for it virtually every election would necessitate a recount or even revote. There are also beaurocratic overseers, etc. I get the We The People stuff, but this situation is a windmill.