Michael> remove it and then attempt to add it but the
  Michael> maCHINE WON'T let me. It says that I have a
  Michael> group with to similar of a name. I look in
  Michael> my groups listing and there is a group
  Michael> called 'downloads' 

groupdel downloads

But first consult the man page for groupdel(8) because
there are some minor considerations.

Your situation suggests that the original user was
removed improperly or incompletely. Most Unix/Linux
systems these days are set up to create a group by the
same name as the user and make that the new user's
default group. If the user's name is simply whacked out
of the password file, the group name remains, and you
can't create a new user with the same name because the
old group name remains. But groupdel, which is not
needed often, will get rid of a group for you.

-- 
Lynn David Newton
Phoenix, AZ