In any polling, there can be glitches. But when a contest is as incredibly close as the Florida presidential race, the level of scrutiny of the count rises enormously. That's because in any election, glitches inevitably happen. From balky counting machines to misplaced and mangled ballots, there is a troublesome list of potential pitfalls. Human error often comes into play.
Polls can close a tad early or a tad late.
Problems with individual ballots are mostly few, far between and lost in the crush on election day. America, despite this week's turmoil, is far from an electoral banana republic. One voter said she got a sample ballot in the mail, filled out all the little circles, then took it to the polls. It wasn't until she saw the discussion later in the news that she realized she had picked the wrong circle. The glitch results from the use of the punch-card voting system, to this day the dominant method of casting a ballot in the nation.