me giggles a lot

[Sputty]

http://www.freep.com/news/statewire/...1_20041008.htm

Misprinted ballots raise concerns before being replaced
October 8, 2004, 7:16 PM


LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Nearly 70 voters in Alma who applied for absentee ballots got misprinted ballots that some feared could cause their votes for Democrats John Kerry and John Edwards to go to Republicans George W. Bush and Dick Cheney.

On the absentee ballots, voters mark their choice by filling in a space between the head and tail of the arrow. The misprinted ballots had arrows shifted down one position so the arrow pointing to a vote for the Republicans, who were first on the ballot ahead of the Democrats, was missing.

Some people said that could cause votes for Kerry-Edwards to be miscounted, because the arrows were in the wrong position.

The error was pointed out by a voter on Tuesday, Department of State spokeswoman Kelly Chesney said Friday.

As a result, the Alma clerk -- who is nonpartisan -- has issued corrected ballots to all the voters who got the misprinted ballots. A process also has been put in place to ensure that the initial ballot will not be counted, Chesney said.

Even if the ballot misprint hadn't been caught by a voter, extensive pre-election testing would have discovered the error, she said.

The situation was being treated on some Web logs as a repeat of the infamous "butterfly" ballot that caused some voters to miscast their votes in the 2000 Florida presidential election.

But Chesney said the incident was simply a printing error that was corrected as soon as it was discovered.

Michigan Democratic Party spokesman Jason Moon took the mistake in stride.

"We were made aware of it. We informed our lawyers. To our knowledge it was a printing error and it has been taken care of," he said.