Rock the vote?

Mexico | Calls for a recount in Mexico awaken memories of Florida 2000 | John Dawson

We have won the presidency," leftist Andrés Manuel López Obrador announced in Mexico City at 11 p.m. on election night, July 2. "Triumph is irreversible."

This "triumph" probably is, because conservative candidate Felipe Calderón of the National Action Party (PAN) outpolled him in the first count of votes and, as of July 6, the recount. Calderón took 36 percent of the 41 million votes cast. López Obrador of the upstart Democratic Revolution Party (PRD) tallied 35 percent. Roberto Madrazo from the Institutional Revolutionary Party, which held Mexico's presidency for seven decades until 2000, finished a distant third with just 22 percent of the vote.

Displaying shades of Al Gore circa 2000, López Obrador initially asserted that at least 3.5 million votes were not counted. He said he would challenge the outcome before the Federal Electoral Tribunal, which has until Sept. 6 to certify the president-elect. He also called for street demonstrations.