She tells us that her efforts in getting recounts in WI, MI & PA aren't to help Hillary...
Then why not a recount in NH?

Does she really believe that the public won't notice or something?

Wonder where the cost of the recounts are coming from. Suspect not from the meagre green party purse

She took donations of (I believe) $7 million (it was a Kickstarter kind of thing).

There's a lot of fishy things about the terms & conditions; a lot of people (myself included) that would favor these recounts held off because there's a risk we were just donating to the Green Party.

From what I can tell, it seems like she's just trying to get Green Party funding up by preying on the subset of Clinton supporters who're grasping for straws. Certainly wouldn't have an easy time getting people to support a recount in NH- Trump supporters already won, they have no reason for the same sort of desperation we're seeing among the Clinton recount crowd.

As Nate Silver put it (paraphrased):

I'm not saying Jill Stein is running a scam, just that if she were, it would look a lot like this.

Edited 11/28/2016 19:33:18

Jill Stein probably thinks that this whole stunt will make her look like a heroic figure to some of Clinton's voters, voters who Stein hopes might become Green supporters in the next election.

On the other hand, it's possible that she's just desperate to stop Trump and thinks these recounts might do that, but that's a very unlikely case.

The Green Party also tasks itself with "maintaining election integrity"; I don't think Jill Stein is interested in looking like a hero to Clinton supporters, because she continues to regularly bash them. I'm willing to bet that a significant chunk of donations here will fund Green Party candidates (possibly Stein herself) in the near future.

Oh come on indi, I can't for a minute believe that you think Jill is doing this to get voters. How would that even work?

average voter at polls in 2020 "Well, Jill tried to get Hillary elected with a recount, so I'm going to vote for her!"

Perhaps I misread your posts, but is that what you're imagining is happening? I'll ask you to clarify before I offer a rebuttal, just to make sure I'm not wasting my time conjuring a reply to an argument you didn't make (or mean to make).

Edited 11/28/2016 21:31:03

It's funding Jill Stein 2020

I fully support Jill Stein in her effort. It won't lead to anything, but if she gets dem votes 2020 then she can be useful.

no RainbowBrite, i'm suggesting that this is being funded indirectly by the Dems.
Could be wrong, but looks very fishy to me

This was funded by Dems- again, it was a campaign on Jill Stein's site, and the vast majority of donors were likely Clinton supporters.

Now if you're saying it was the Clinton campaign itself or the Democratic Party burning money on this, I've got a bridge to sell you.

What i don't understand is that the Clinton campaign didn't like the 3rd parties getting so many votes from Hillary. Why would she want to collaborate with them?

She's jumping into a recount effort. That's not any meaningful collaboration with a third party. It's like putting your name on a petition- pushing for the same goal, in the sense that you're both making separate requests (compiled together) for the same thing to take place. I believe Stein's covering the filing fees, though.

no RainbowBrite, i'm suggesting that this is being funded indirectly by the Dems

How is this relevant? Why do you care?

Edited 11/29/2016 21:00:58

I've got a bridge to sell you.

Really, which bridge?

There's no chance the recount will amount to anything. They will have to flip ALL of WI, MI and PA, and Trump's PA lead is... 70k votes.

The whole thing is an obvious scam, but its easy to see why Jill Stein does it.

Anti-Trump sentiment on the left is high, by doing this she gets attention, probably steals some of the left's votes and support in the future, and she will get to keep and spend the leftover money.

Notice how the amount of money they ask for keeps going up. Easy win for her.

Edited 11/30/2016 03:03:41

What's interesting, though, is the other groups- the Clinton campaign, FiveThirtyEight, etc.- jumping in to back the recount after initially having opposed it. Like Pulsey pointed out, it's extremely unlikely (and I mean extremely- think the sort of odds Princeton's Sam Wang gave Donald Trump) that this recount flips even a single state.

But there's some other small things to be gained- data that's much more accurate than exit polls (for FiveThirtyEight), checking election integrity and potentially weakening Trump's perceived mandate (for the Clinton campaign), etc.- that just aren't worth $2-10 million. But hey, if someone else is footing the bill and all you need is some cheap, light involvement to get in on things, put a finger or two on the steering wheel, and reap any benefits- why not, right? It would've been embarrassing for any of the parties jumping into the recount to have done it themselves (especially for Clinton, after already conceding and already having checked and found no reasons that a recount or audit would do anything- from her campaign's perspective, this is just as futile as trying to flip electors), and it certainly wouldn't have been cheap- but crazy Jill jumped in and swallowed the costs. It's an interesting win-win coalition. No one's really stupid; everyone's just playing their interests and running basic cost-benefit analysis.

Still, I'm willing to bet nothing big's coming out of this. Trump will be our president come January- maybe not with 306 EVs but still president. The only odd thing is that betting markets already have him at 40% to not be president for a full 4-year term, but the freaking out over there is also a little bit risible.