Krugman and the Florida recount

I just watched O'Reilly vs. Krugman replay on CNBC. The Krugman Truth Squad has lots more on this. Check out Man Without Qualities, Poor and Stupid, Croooow Blog. At one point Krugman (pronounced Kroogman, and here all along I thought it was Krug like slug) disputed something O'Reilly said about the Florida recount in 2000.

Prof. KRUGMAN: But Fox News was the first network to change its call...

Mr. O'REILLY: Yes, because we were right. And that call be...

Prof. KRUGMAN: ...and that was--and that--were you right?

Mr. O'REILLY: Oh, oh, oh, this is--no, I'm glad you brought that up.

Prof. KRUGMAN: Here.

RUSSERT: All right, let...

Mr. O'REILLY: I'm glad he brought it up.

RUSSERT: Let him have a say. Mr. Krugman, go ahead.

Prof. KRUGMAN: Yeah, because I've got you saying that, 'Everyone has said that no matter how you count the votes, Bush won Florida,' and that turns out to be flatly not true.

Mr. O'REILLY: Oh, is that right? How about The Miami Herald investigation?

Prof. KRUGMAN: OK. Here we are.

Mr. O'REILLY: How about USA Today? How about the University of Chicago?

Prof. KRUGMAN: Here we are. Published by AP in November 2001, the National Opinion Research group, they looked at statewide counts under six standards, prevailing standard, two-corner standard, most conclusive, least conclusive, county by county, Palm Beach standard, and under every one of those Gore won.

Mr. O'REILLY: OK. Look, if you want to think that, fine.

Prof. KRUGMAN: Hey, guys ...(unintelligible), Russerts...

Mr. O'REILLY: All right? Now I'll--hold it, hold it, hold it.

Prof. KRUGMAN: ...you can check this out.

Mr. O'REILLY: You can check this out.

Prof. KRUGMAN: You can get--do it by Google.

RUSSERT: But Moore has said every...

Mr. O'REILLY: Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, I gotta get this in.

RUSSERT: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Let me just...

Mr. O'REILLY: Miami Herald, Orlando Sentinel, USA Today and the University of Chicago investigation all went in and repudiate what he just read.

Prof. KRUGMAN: This is not true.

Mr. O'REILLY: Four--yes, it is.

Prof. KRUGMAN: Not true. I mean, again, folks, this is the modern world. You can go check it.

Mr. O'REILLY: You can go check it.

Prof. KRUGMAN: You can do Google, you can check it. Look for--look for Florida recount. Now what is true is that if you'd done the recount that Gore wanted, which was a limited recount, Bush would have won. But at every statewide recount scenario had it going to Gore by tiny margins, but this is just not true.

Mr. O'REILLY: Look, I agree. You should go into and look at what those four investigations came up with and decide for yourself.

You might think he was engaging in some hair splitting, on the point of whether or not all recounts had Bush as the winner. But Krugman stated that it was actually Gore that won all the recounts, implying, of course, that actually Gore was the winner. I excerpt my excerpt.

Prof. KRUGMAN: Here we are. Published by AP in November 2001, the National Opinion Research group, they looked at statewide counts under six standards, prevailing standard, two-corner standard, most conclusive, least conclusive, county by county, Palm Beach standard, and under every one of those Gore won.

So I accepted Krugman's challenge to Google "Florida recount" which according to him showed Gore to be the winner. Not.

Right at the top of the list, CNN: Florida recount study: Bush still wins

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A comprehensive study of the 2000 presidential election in Florida suggests that if the U.S. Supreme Court had allowed a statewide vote recount to proceed, Republican candidate George W. Bush would still have been elected president.

The National Opinion Research Center (NORC) at the University of Chicago conducted the six-month study for a consortium of eight news media companies, including CNN.

Salon: The Florida recount continues!

And according to the latest numbers, Bush has regained a narrow lead.

USA Today: Florida recount, count by county

Florida Undervote Count Totals

Latest results from the recount of undervotes in the presidential race in Florida. Republican George W. Bush led Democrat Al Gore by 177 votes in the statewide vote, which includes new unofficial vote tallies reported by some of Florida's 67 counties that were ordered by the Florida Supreme Court to recount disputed ballots. The AP county-by-county tally is an unofficial survey of ballots. The vote totals are the subject of federal legal challenges. Results from Miami-Dade, Orange, Osceola, Pinellas, Santa Rosa and Suwannee counties are incomplete and represent only a portion of the hand count of undervotes. Escambia, Liberty, Madison, Manatee and Palm Beach totals are complete recounts. Overseas ballot gains had boosted Bush's total to 930. The lead was reduced to 537 votes when the secretary of state certified results last month. Additional manual counts in Palm Beach and Miami-Dade reduced the margin to 193 before additional counts began Saturday.

TOTALS: Bush - 2,913,321 Gore - 2,913,144

The Drudge Report: BIG MEDIA FLORIDA RECOUNT:

GORE TOPPED BUSH IF ALL UNDER/OVER VOTES COUNTED; LEGAL STRATEGY DESTROYED CHANCES

Bush would have narrowly prevailed in the partial recounts sought by Gore, but Gore could have "reversed the outcome -- by the smallest of margins -- had he pursued and gained a complete statewide recount," according to one interpretation of the database compiled by the monstermedia consortium. (My emphasis)

It wouldn't have taken much for Krugman to make an honest statement. All he had to do was concede that Bush won some of the recounts and he made his case. You have to wonder what is wrong with the man.

Updated 8/10.