GWBUSH

Dear friend, <BR>So many responses in such a short time! <BR> <BR>I want to assure my friends in Europe that I will work for world peace! I will send my Sec. of State to Northern Ireland to have serious talks with both sides, and bring the two nations together, the Moslems and Jews. <BR> <BR>I am sure that the conflict in Kosovo can be resolved! I will ask my Sec. of health to send medical supplies to fight the Aids epidemic there. <BR> <BR>I am also all for helping Russia in trying to emerge from a state of a third world country! I will ask my Sec. of housing to send American construction workers to build more houses for the impoverished Russians in the Gaza Strip. <BR> <BR>And I will ask my Sec. of Defence to demand from Israeli president Arafat to make love not war. <BR> <BR>My fellow European, the United States is your friend, and as of January 20, the White House will have me, as the president of America -- your best friend. <BR>I also hope to visit your wonderful Europe. I already asked my Sec. of Transportation to schedule my first trip to Hong Kong, I want to see the famouse Eifel bridge there, and taste their wonderful Falafel. <BR>So long, my fellow European. May god bless you all. <BR>George.

Buyer

Now THAT (see above) was funny!

SharonM

A Zimbabwe politician was quoted as saying that children should study <BR>the US election event closely because it shows that election fraud is <BR>not only a 3rd world phenomenon. To illustrate the point, he made the <BR>following comments: <BR> <BR>Imagine that we read of an election occurring anywhere in the 3rd <BR>world in which the self-declared winner was the son of the former prime <BR>minister and that former prime minister was himself the former head of <BR>that nation's secret police/intelligence agency. <BR> <BR>Imagine that the self-declared winner lost the popular vote but won <BR>based on some old colonial holdover from the nation's pre-democracy <BR>past. <BR> <BR>Imagine that the self-declared winner's "victory" turned on disputed <BR>votes cast in a province governed by his brother. <BR> <BR>Imagine that the poorly drafted ballots of one district, a district <BR>heavily favoring the self-declared winner's opponent, led thousands of <BR>voters to vote for the wrong candidate. <BR> <BR>Imagine that members of that nation's most-despised caste, fearing for <BR>their livelihoods, turned out in record numbers to vote in <BR>near-universal opposition to the self-declared winner's candidacy. <BR> <BR>Imagine that hundreds of members of that most-despised caste were <BR>intercepted on their way to the polls by state police operating under <BR>the authority of the self-declared winner's brother. <BR> <BR>Imagine that six million people voted in the disputed province and <BR>that the self-declared winner's "lead" was only 327 votes, fewer, <BR>certainly, than the vote counting machines' margin of error. <BR> <BR>Imagine that the self-declared winner and his political party opposed <BR>a more careful by-hand inspection and recounting of the ballots in the <BR>disputed province or its most hotly disputed district(s). <BR> <BR>Imagine that the self-declared winner, himself a governor of a major <BR>province, had the worst human rights record of any province in his <BR>nation and actually led the nation in executions. <BR> <BR>Imagine that a major campaign promise of the self-declared winner was <BR>to appoint like-minded human rights violators to lifetime positions on <BR>the high court of that nation or choice ambassadorships. <BR> <BR>Would any of us deem such an election to be representative of anything <BR>other than the self-declared winner's will-to-power? Wouldn't we <BR>wearily turn the page, thinking that it was another sad tale of <BR>pitiful pre- or anti-democracy peoples in some strange elsewhere? <BR>

SharonM

...can't believe I finally took the political bait in here, but felt the above had an interesting twist. <BR> <BR>Good Will to All. and Peace on Earth <BR>Happy Holidays!

noname

I agree. We need the UN to send in a team of Zimbabian investigators to oversee the irregularities in the USA election process.

nancy

To American <BR>You asked what other president accomplished so much in the Middle East. <BR>While I am not knocking Clinton, infact I think he is a pretty good president, (except for the fact he never learned his lesson about keeping it in his pants while he was in office,and avoiding more "scandal") <BR>I was wondering what you thought about Jimmy Carter, bringing Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin together at Camp David, and the signing of the Peace Treaty. <BR>*That* was historic!! <BR>nancy (not the one you responded to before) <BR>I am not the first nancy

topper

According to a new survey, the United States is the third-happiest country in the world overall, behind Denmark and Australia. When asked why he thought we were behind Denmark, George W. Bush said he didn't know, but we're ahead of Wal-mark and K-mark. <BR> <BR>Just trying to fit this thread on this forum....

american

Second Nancy--I agree. JC was a good president and the best ex-president we have had in this century and maybe the last. The moment was historic and I should have mentioned it. (But I was in the 5th grade at the time and more interested in learning to throw a curve ball) I still hope Bush is successful and I do hold a glimmer of hope, it will be his "side-car" of cold warriors that scares me. They will run the show and tell Bush what to say. Remember in Regan's last couple if years when he was napping with the Pope and starting his decline, the people around him ran things for their own power. I support the president elect but my guess he it will be a great 4 years on SNL.

anon

I don't know if the "Zimbabwe politician" story flooding the internet (you know, the one invented by Al Gore) is real or not. But just to touch on a few points it attempts to make.... <BR> <BR>So what if the President-Elect has a father who formerly held a position with an intelligence agency? Does it mean his father got all his old friends to rig ballot boxes in all 50 states? <BR> <BR>What about the current Vice President's partner, the President? Does he not have any power like the former CIA guy? Why then can't he stuff ballot boxes too? <BR> <BR>And what about the fact that his brother is governor of Florida? Does that mean he was SO POWERFUL he forced the election officials, including those of opposing political parties, of Florida to design and approve a ballot that does not conform to election guidelines? <BR> <BR>And let us remember the people (that's us). Were there any of us who really knew how to push the desired buttons, or pull the desired levers, or push through the desired chads? Or did "the winner" make us unable to vote correctly and purposely confuse so much of the population that they later realized that they didn't know how to follow directions on a ballot that had been used many times before? <BR> <BR>But I must say that I'm glad things in Zimbabwe are going so well that their leader has so much time to reflect upon the state of our nation, our electoral system and our elected officials.

cmt

The article quoted above, Florida Through a Third World Lens, was written by Philip Tajitsu Nash for Asian Week (www.asianweek.com). He said it was OK for the article to be reproduced and circulated so long as it was credited to the source. It shouldn't have been quoted and passed along without attribution.

SharonM

Thank you, cmt. <BR> <BR>it was sent to me via email from a good friend... (no original source was ever given, even to her) <BR> <BR>My humble apologies, Philip Tajitsu Nash.

Sue

Al--where can we find the article on the Accidental President? We have looked at bookstores, but the issue of the Economist is Dec 9-15. (We stopped our subscription last year.) We see the article on the internet, but you have to subscribe. Is it next week's? <BR> <BR>GWBUSH--You are obviously a Brit: watch your spelling.

Paul

Gore won the popular vote by less than 0.034% (~105mil vs. 340k). If you take into account the media's giving Gore the win by taking Florida before half the country's voting places closed. And the Democrats getting illegal voters to the polls, felons and illegal aliens registered. In '96 they did it legally by granting 100's of thousands citizenship a few months before the election. The 2000 race was basically a tie in reality. Whether you believe this or not (5000 felons voted just in Florida alone!) you must believe the ~.034% popular vote win by Gore. Now _why_ did half the country vote against Gore if he is such a great man who should be the only one to lead the country??? And why did *all* the courts except the Florida Supreme Court (6 Democrats & 1 so-called Independent) vote to uphold Bush's win? What lies did Bush tell? Compared to Gore's half-truths "I want _all_ the votes counted" when he _only_ wanted the votes counted from the 3 areas _HE_ picked out of _67_ in Florida? The Democrats _never_ asked legally for a total 67 counties recount and only tried it at the very end when they lost everywhere else. The "Punch Card Ballot" was not a machine it is a device. You take a slim metal rod and punch out a perforated area (chad) on a _cardbord_ card except for a "swinging door" chad which would have to go almost exactly back into place during a machine recount to be not counted, the system is foolproof. There was not 1 voting machine malfunction during the election and no one complained of any malfunction or jamming??? But suddenly _after_ the election everything was wrong even if this system had been used for years??? The day after the election it was the Palm Springs illegal ballot which caused basically Jewish voters to vote wrong, then they passed on that and went to the undervotes in 3-4 counties vs 67, then it became the Afro-American vote denied when they were losing on that, then adding numbers to a _application_ which _only_ affected the Republician registered ballots because there was no computer error on the Democratic ones, which Gore also forgot to mention in his speeches of unfairness. Funny that no one has tried to duplicate a "dimpled" chad in the courtroom, supposedly Rush Lumburgh (sp) tried and couldn't do it or so I've read. Bottomline, What's the problem _push_ a rod thru a hole and break a perforated cardboard chad, no physical strength or rocket science required??? BTW I voted for Nader, Thank God.

Missed Opportunity

I think Bush handled the recount thing all wrong. From the beginning, he should have agreed to a state-wide manual recount with a consistent, but conservative, standard. This was a win/win proposal. If the count showed he really won, he wins, and everyone would admire his courage in risking the White House to do the right thing. If the count showed him losing, he could have declared that the importance of a citizen's right to vote is more important than his own political fortunes. His act of courage would have caused everyone to have seem him as the most moral, honest, upstanding politician that has ever existed. It would have guaranteed him a victory in 4 years. In the meantime, he could bask in the adoration of people who understand the importance of doing the right thing, no matter what. <BR> <BR>Instead, he takes office with more people in the country having voted for someone else, at the beginning of a recession, and wincing at periodic headlines in the future that reveal he never even won in the first place. Final national vote totals gave Gore a victory of over 539,000 votes!

Paul

Opps: make the 0.34%, I tried to retract it after I hit the reply button)) <BR>

Jeff

Fascinating discussion or debate or argument. Though it has little if anything to do with travel (as far as I can tell), it beats threads about footwear, if you ask me. In review, I guess it is safe to say that while we all agree about the pleasure of European travel, we may not all agree on politics. My two cents: Like him or not, GWB is our president (elect) and we must stand behind him, for the greater good (i.e. for the good of the country). For those of us who are his advocates, I hope he makes us proud. For those us who are his critics, I hope he surprises us. Until he takes office, discussion about whether he is bright or dumb, or will be a good president, is simply speculation and talk show fodder. For the good of the country, though, I hope he is a good president and I hope my optimism or hopefulness is shared by all here(whether voluntarily or reluctantly). I think we have had a good ride financially under Clinton, but we have lost some solidarity as a people that I hope a new leader will help us regain.

Huh?

Paul, here are some facts: <BR> <BR>Punch card machines have a known error rate of about 3%. In some punch card counties, the candidate's name is not on the ballot, only on the machine template. So once you pull the card out, you can't easily check it for errors. Very bad design. <BR> <BR>Plenty of people complained about confusion and machine errors on election day. Lots of folks couldn't get their ballots to line up. <BR> <BR>It is quite possible to mark a ballot in a way that the machine doesn't read, and expert witnesses for both Bush and Gore agreed on that in the trial before Judge Sauls. They also agreed a manual recount is the only way to be sure of the result in a close election. <BR> <BR>Rush Limbaugh is not the source you should consult if you wish to understand voting errors. In the trial before Judge Sauls, the Gore expert demonstrated how a dimpled ballot could happen, and he dimpled one in the courtroom. <BR> <BR>No, all of the courts did not support Bush. Recall that Bush lost in federal district court on his bogus equal protection argument. Recall that he lost twice before the Eleventh Circuit court of appeals. The Supreme Court did buy it, and I won't bore you with all of the reasons the decision was exceptionally lame and designed to put a particular guy in the White House. 'Nuff said there. <BR> <BR>On the felons issue, Ms. Harris circulated to the counties a list of felons who should be deleted from voter rolls. The problem was that the list contained so many errors that some counties refused to abide by it. So if felons voted, Ms. Harris should be taken to task for screwing up on the job. <BR> <BR>Hope this helps.

Carole

Paul, I am so tired of you self-righteous Pharisee Republicans that think that Democrats cannot be Christian, honest or ethical. There are plenty of examples of the mess in your own party that you need to clean up your house before you get into ours.

Huh?

This just in: according to NBC news, the Orlando Sentinel has completed its own recount of Lake County, which is a small, conservative county that Bush carried. Gore picked up 130 votes. <BR> <BR>For those of you keeping score, Bush won by 537 votes. Give Gore 215 from Palm Beach and 157 from Miami Dade, and Bush's lead is down to 35 votes. <BR> <BR>Good thing the U.S. Supreme Court stopped the recount. Whew!

Liz

Gore, smart? You got to be kidding me?! The idiot flunked out of DIVINITY SCHOOL. 'nuff said. <BR> <BR>Europeans don't care about who our president is - just as long as they keep getting billions of our tax dollars in foreign aid. <BR> <BR>Although I could see how they would prefer the Socialist, Al Gore, as president. Big government, big taxes, socialized medicine. Hell, he might as well be Prime Minister of England