Bush Has It

It's down to Ohio, with 20 electoral votes. Now it hangs on provisional ballots.

Bush leads Kerry by 136,483 votes counted. Kerry's canpaign manager expects there are some 250,000 provisional votes outstanding. How much could that tip the balance?

The county in Ohio with the highest percentage voting for Kerry is Cuyahoga county, at 66.41%. In 2000, 90% of the provisional ballots wound up being valid. Let's assume the same percentage are found valid this year, and they break toward Kerry at the same percentage that the most pro-Kerry county did.

250,000 * 90% = 225,000. 225,000 * 66.41% = 149,423. That leaves 75,577 for Bush. That erases some 73,486 of his lead. I think that's the largest probable boost for Kerry.

If all 250,000 provisional votes get counted, the lead shrinks by 81,231 votes.

If all 250,000 provisional votes get counted, Kerry would have to win 77.30% of those provisional ballots to achieve a tie.

And of course, that depends on the 250,000 being the right number of provisional ballots. One person on the news last night said there were 100,000 provisional ballots in 2000, "and there are some 30% more this year." You can do the math on that one.