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I'll give my real feeling on who the vote should be for and my technical interpretation for each:

1) Real: Coleman - Technical: Toss it out

Obvious they wanted to vote for Coleman but the rules apparently say no identifying marks.

2) Real: Coleman - Technical: Coleman Toss it

Same as the Lizard People, he filled in the Coleman bubble and wrote in a name. Neither guy is happy about voting for the person  but who they intended to vote for is, I think, fairly clear.

3) Real: Toss It - Technical: Toss It

Having the one bubble on the entire ballot in pen makes it pretty damn suspect to me...I wouldn't trust it. It makes no sense for only one bubble to be pen...

4) Real: Coleman - Technical: Coleman

There is no way to know if a voter intends an X as cancellation or a vote. Its a mark in the bubble, with no appearence of trying to assert that it wasn't a vote, so I say it is a vote.

5) Real: Coleman - Technical: Toss it

Again with the identifying mark. Obvious that they wanted to vote Coleman but the rules say toss it.

6) Real: Franken - Technical: Franken

This one is silly, this is a clear vote for Franken to me.  It looks more like a blotch than an arrow to me.

7) Real: Coleman - Technical: Coleman

A fingerprint is a terrible standard of identifying marks. Nearly every ballot is going to have it's voters fingerprint and being able to see it makes no difference to that. Nobody can tell at a glance whose print it is anyways so the fact that it is visible or invisible doesn't matter. If the fact that it is a unique mark matters then we could throw out a ton more ballots with even the slightest smudge...so I think this is a dangerous road to go down because then in the process of counting or recounting a vote could be smudged and subsequently disqualified.

8) Real: No Idea - Technical: Toss it

If he had made it inside the box I would give him credit, but that's way off and could easily be someone testing their pen/pencil before voting.

9) Real: Franken - Technical: Toss it

Very clear he wanted to vote franken, but as I understand it these get tossed. I disagree with tossing it though.

10) Real: Franken - Technical: Toss it

Same as #9, it's clear they wanted to vote for franken but the rules say toss it. Again I disagree with that ruling.

11) Real: Franken - Technical: Toss it

I'd give this one to Franken, there are two marks (one left, one right). Also note this one has a fingerprint smudge as well in the top right.

12) Real: Coleman - Technical: Toss it

Coleman's bubble is bigger! I would probably lean towards tossing it, but I think the intent was to vote Coleman...but I'm not confident enough to call it a vote.

13) Real: Franken - Technical: Franken

Clearly Franken. Period.

14) Real: Barkley - Technical: Barkley

Clearly Barkley. Period.

15) Real: Barkley - Technical: Barkley

This person has terrible writing skills, but they still make it clear they want to vote for Barkley.

16) Real: Toss it - Technical: Toss it

I think they are trying to cross out Franken's name and vote for Coleman, but nobody can tell me they are confident enough about this ballot to call it a vote. I do love the way half of the line is an underline and the other half is a cross-out =P

 

edit: @Steven,

I absolutely agree.



To Each Man, Responsibility