David Cobb provided an election recount update on Friday, a video social-media update that I reviewed at that time. One of the main points that Cobb made at that time had to do with how hand recounts weren't necessarily going to be done in the recounts, something he seemed disappointed by. On Monday, December 5th, in a social-media update regarding the recount efforts in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, Cobb re-iterated that point. He also communicated suspicion regarding president-elect Donald Trump following last month's election.

Cobb compared Clinton/Trump to earlier counterparts

David Cobb, in Monday's update, drew upon experience from early in the current century to make a comparison between the current recount and one from 2004.

He claimed that George W. Bush never took an interest in a recount from the 2004 election, however Donald Trump's team is taking a major interest in the 2016 recount: "The Trump campaign is fighting tooth-and-nail," Cobb claimed, "to try to prevent any recount from happening." Cobb also noted that Hillary Clinton's team has taken an interest in the recount although the Democrats are not playing an active role.

Anomalies fueled the recount initiative

The recount efforts stem from anomalies between the expected results of elections based partly an exit polls and observed results. The matter does not seem to have a lot of momentum and the implications seem complicated. For instance, what happens if a recount proves that something unfair happened?

Does that mean that the whole election was a sham? Furthermore, the college electorates go to vote in a couple of weeks. How much time will the legal matters and recount take on this time-sensitive matter? If the recount follows the same procedure as the original counting method couldn't this just duplicate the result even if there were original underlying issues?

Perhaps the inquiries and efforts to prod into the vote-counting system may lead to a smoking-gun kind of revelation as to the shortcomings of American democracy. This could in turn could undermine the Trump presidency if he is viewed as having won a rigged election. It certainly doesn't help Trump's claim to legitimacy that he trails Clinton by about 2.7M on the popular-vote front.

However, where the recount is going isn't too clear at this point and a ticking clock is certainly to the advantage of the Republicans.