Lead Slimming

Eliot Spitzer's lead over incumbent state Attorney General Dennis Vacco continued to dwindle as another batch of updated election results was reported. Democrat Spitzer has maintained a narrow but wobbly lead - anywhere from 8,738 votes to 20,218 votes - as local districts firm up their vote counts on a daily basis. Preliminary figures reported Tuesday by the state Board of Elections put Spitzer ahead of Republican Vacco by 6,047 votes out of more than 4 million cast. That's the slimmest lead state officials have shown for Spitzer since the polls closed Nov. 3. Adjustments to the count Tuesday were due to recounts of machine votes in a number of upstate counties - notably Erie and Schenectady. It also reflected partial paper ballot counts from some upstate areas. It did not reflect modified figures from New York City, where Spitzer ran the strongest. The counting of some 230,000 paper ballots began across most of the state Monday, and will start Thursday in New York City. State election law sets precise standards for paper ballots and the tedious process of checking all of them is expected to last into next week. Both the Spitzer and Vacco camps have dispatched workers to local election boards to scrutinize the paper ballots. A clear winner in the race could emerge within a week, but there is still the possibility that any number of paper ballots could face court challenges.