In my youth I worked for Dems and always voted Democratic. Can remember the jubilation of the Kennedy win and how Nixon did not want to force an unstable condition by putting the nation through a questionable and expensive process. The electoral college was set up the way it is because our Founding Fathers did not want any giant state or states to negate the power of the smaller states. I believe Carter tried to change some of these voting "structures" and got clouted by his own party for the effort. It's so ironic that 40 years later Major Daley the Elder's son is crying foul in Florida for exactly what his father accomplished on a much larger scale in in Cook County in 1960. Ever hear the expression "What goes around comes around?"

Hey Bush ([email protected]) in your
11/10/2000, 2:47 pm ET message:

"The same people who frothed at the mouth and spent five years and millions
of taxpayer dollars to investigate one land deal now want to tell us that there doesn't need to be any investigation here, oh no, everything's fine."

Is from Jon Stewart from the 11/10/00 Today show. If you are going to steal material, please give credit to your source. To not do so is copyright infringement, one of the beliefs in the Constitution of the USA.

Just like a Bush person to plagerize!

Someone said today (and I really sorry folks that I can't cite the source) "Now we begin to separate the adults from the children." Food for thought, guys. What is it that you all think you're going to accomplish here?

Yes, we all know what a noble character Nixon was. He merely waited a few more years before creating an unstable situation in the country.

The electoral college was based on the assumption of the Founders that since the average person did not have the ability to make a sound judgement about the qualifications of presidential candidates, the decision should be left to a small group of electors - poliical elite who would have the necessary wisdom to choose the nation's two highest offices.

As it operates today, it violates some of the major tenants of political equality. Not every person's vote counts the same, as the influence of a vote depends on upon the political situation of one's home state. If you voted for the "losing" candidate in your state, it's just like you didn't vote at all, under the rules of the electoral college. But the electoral college also perpetuates the two party system, and the parties in power will be about as likely to disassemble the electoral college as they would be to vote salary caps and term limits for themselves.

P.S. to give credit: Every single person here and everywhere is quoting what they hear on the news, as a free press is the means for Americans to receive information about all of this.

Amazes me how people can play 20 cards of bingo, fill out the teeny little boxes on golf score cards and lottery tickets and not be able to see or figure out a ballot!

OliveOil, you make a lot of good points. But the argument I tried to explain isn't that Florida voters knew the laws about how the ballot was to be constructed, and were confused when the ballot was different. The argument is that the rules on how the ballot is constructed exist for only one reason: to prevent voter confusion. If the rules were violated and if people were confused because of it . . . well, that's the issue.

As for the figure of 23,000 miscast ballots, that is the double punches plus the Buchanan.

As for your argument that this ballot was approved by the Democrats, I haven't been able to sort that out yet, and it is an important point. But Florida law says that "any candidate, taxpayer or voter" can challenge an impropriety in an election. If the Florida Democratic party approved the ballot, then I think that precludes Mr. Gore personally from challenging it. This may be why he personally has not filed suit yet. It would not preclude any voter or taxpayer (or huge group of say 19,000 voters) from challenging it.

As for America First, who said my summary of Florida law is incorrect, you proved my point. My point is that the media coverage of this has been atrocious, and I have yet to see any news organization print the actual text of the Florida statute. Some of us like to read that stuff and think it is important. If it says what you say it says (that the rules I mentioned don't apply to punched ballots), then Gore is out in the cold, in my opinion. No need to call me names, though.

It would be very interesting to hear from the teachers out there. They have probably heard every conceivable excuse from students about why they failed their tests. (The questions were too hard, the answer sheet was too difficult to figure out, the test wasn't fair, etc.) How many teachers allow a retest just because unprepared, dense students complain? Further, everyone who has graduated from school can cite hundreds of tests taken that simulate the style and conditions of the Palm Beach County ballot. Those Gorons are simply mental midgets who are looking for scapegoats.

Teacher, Here's an example. Imagine that the SAT test questions were misnumbered and did not line up with the answer sheet. Alert students could figure this out and raise the point during the test, or maybe be bright enough to just sort it out and correct their own test on the fly. Less alert students miss it completely and flunk the test. Do you suppose the less alert students would just say, "Oh well. The test was defective and I was confused, so I guess I'll just forget Harvard and go to a community college instead"? No. They would demand a re-test, and they would get it.

Food for thought.

I see what you are saying Cindy, thanks for the clarification.

Have only a minute but wanted to address your question on the birth of that ballot. (Partial birth?--sorry, couldn't resist). I'll quote from the Tampa paper to be accurate (or as accurate as they are anyway):

"Congressional leaders, Democratic officials, and Gore aides blamed the PBC election supervisor, Theresa LePore. LePore, who redesigned the county's ballot this year, said she had hoped to make it easier to read for the county's many elderly voters. LePore is a Democrat." After it was redesigned, a Republican party official had to approve it...sorry can't quote that source, or who that person was, but I know that is in fact how it came about.

I too was thinking I'd heard this refrain all through school. And we all know how those got resolved...better luck next time....of course that entailed just a grade, not the election of a pres.

Thanks, Olive, for answering my question. That sounds consistent with the little bit of info I heard, which was that the person who designed the ballot was a government bureaucrat who happened to be a Democrat, in the same sense that I am a Democrat. In other words, she supposedly doesn't have the ability to act on behalf of the state or national Democratic Party in any official capacity. But like I said, I think this part is still plenty fuzzy, and I'm glad I'm not the judge who has to sort this out.

To Cindy:

I didn't call you a name; I called you a Democrat - unless you consider that name calling. Everyone is doing themselves a great injustice by listening to the views of the liberal press and the Gore hatchlings. If you want to know the truth about any of these laws; go to the source, look them up and read them yourselves. What you'll find is what you're being told and what's the truth are two totally different things.

To give credit:

You misspelled the concept you were attempting to point out, "plagiarize."

If you had any knowledge of U.S. copyright law at all, you would know that a copyright does not protect ideas, only the specific ways in which those ideas are expressed, such as a company logo. Copyright exists in the original works of authorship fixed in any tangible medium of expression, defined as:

Literary works
Musical works
Dramatic works
Pantomimes and choreographic works
Pictorial, graphic or sculptural works
Motion pictures
Sound recordings

Ideas expressed by someone on a talk show are not copyrighted. Video footage of the talk show is.

You also attacked your own party with your own misinformed insult, "Just like a Bush person to (sic)plagerize!" What you meant to say, no doubt, was that a Gore person would plagiarize.

But then again, you're exactly the type to follow a mental giant like George W. Bush.

Sorry, America First. When you typed DemocRAT, I thought you were calling me a rat. If you say it was a typo, I take it all back.

Enough on this thread from me, I think. Back to travel?

This whole thing has turned into a circus! Don't you people realize that the people who really run this country are the lawyers!

I think it's absurd for Bush Jr. to be demanding Gore concede now when there is only a 300+ vote difference in Florida and still over 8,500 absentee ballots not counted yet. Bush Jr is acting like a small boy who grabbed a toy and is trying to run away with it.

Above here a person who calls themselves olive oil says: "The recount has been completed (by machine) and unofficially Bush has won FL by 327 votes. The absentee ballots aren't all in. They have until next Friday to be counted and it's generally felt that Bush will win that as well." Generally felt? By whom(other than the Republicans)? So you and it seems George Bush Jr. "feel" these absentee votes will go to Bush Jr. so that means that is reality? You can read the votes/minds of people you have no idea about? You don't know who these many thousands of people are or where they live or why they would be out of the state of Florida on election day and yet you "feel" most of them will vote for Bush Jr. so the rest of the country should just give in because of your "feeling"? I voted absentee in my state and it wasn't because I was in the military but because I travel for business and had to be away then. Who are you to assume (feel) that I would have voted for Bush Jr just because I voted absentee? Is there some sort of law I don't know about that says anyone who votes absentee must vote for only Republicans? And is this country to be governed by people who are so controlling they can award a presidential election (which was won by Gore by popular vote nationwide)to a man just because he "feels" or "assumes" or "knows in his own mind" what many thousands of people he knows nothing about chose to do? I didn't know mind reader was one of Bush Jr. talents.

If the voters in Florida were so concerned about their vote, they should have studied the ballot which was published at two different times in their Florida newspaper. For an election of this magnitude,EVERYONE should have been prepared to vote for their choice. Most people vote carefully, examining their ballot after declaring their choice. In this election, nothing could be more important to an impassioned voter, than to make sure that his or her wishes were conveyed. And, if a person feels he or she made a mistake - the time to point it out is then - to an official, who can help them correct it at the time. Not after several hours, and upon hearing that "your man" had lost. This is very sad, what the algore group is doing to our beloved country.

I'm a Democrat who agrees that there really shouldn't be do-overs on voting unless outright fraud is involved. However, I also think we have to wait until all absentee ballots are counted, in fairness to those voters at the very least. Gore should concede conditionally, subject to the absentee count and any relevant court orders. I hate saying that, believe me . . .

...BUT I'm also firmly convinced that were the shoe on the other foot -- if Bush were the loser in Florida by the same slim margin and there were as much outcry about problems with the voting -- that the Bush camp would be screaming just as loudly and employing every legal move in hopes of shifting the balance. Don't anyone doubt that for even a second.

As a matter of fact, in the last weeks of the campaign the Bush Camp had already begun to wag fingers about what an injustice it would be if someone (Gore) won the electoral college and someone else (Bush) won the popular vote. I don't hear any of that now, of course.

It's a mess. I'm sick of it. I suspect most everyone is getting sick of it. No matter what happens, we'll have gridlock in Washington and business-as-usual otherwise. I'm going to bed. For at least four years. Good night.

Yup, that's right, Raoul, "anyone who votes absentee must vote for only Republicans". Clever...no one thought of that before, maybe that'll be an amendment on the next butterfly ballot. heheheh...and instead of arrows drawn straight to the holes we could make mazes people could trace with their #2 pencils to the correct hole where they'd then switch to push pins to punch the hole, ONCE, please.

Calm down and read it again. I said the "consensus" is the absentee ballot will go to Bush. Consensus is an opinion held by most, not me, not Bush. This is past voting patterns. It might not hold up this election; little else has.

More importantly, (and this is a cut and paste from my post above):...."my hope is that the two parties will agree in advance to accept the results of the recount, WAIT ON THE ABSENTEE BALLOTS,(next Friday's deadline), and that the loser will graciously concede and urge his supporters to drop their legal challenges." No one was advocating the absentee ballots be ignored and victory awarded after the recount to whomever.

Forgive the Civics lesson, but the office of President is not won by the popular vote, but by vote of the electoral college, which is a huge part of our problem at the moment. If Bush had the popular vote as well, I doubt we'd be in the midst of today's fiasco.

We are setting sail for the weekend so I'm outta here. Here's the Republican torch...if anyone else wants to grab it.

As an observer watching from another country (Canada), I was wondering why your news media can announce results in one area or time zone, when the polls have not been closed in another?? Do you not think this influences others who have not voted? Just curious!