BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two

Subject: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: mousethief
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 03:31 PM

Old thread was getting unwieldy.

Good point, skeptic. There may be no conspiracy, but if people feel cheated and misused, what does that matter?

Alex

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link added - JoeClone

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Jim Krause
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 03:45 PM

I prefer to take the long view. There's always next time.
Jim

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 03:50 PM

A friend sent me the following, and I think it sums things up well...

Q: I'm not a lawyer and I don't understand the recent Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore. Can you explain it to me?
A: Sure. I'm a lawyer. I read it. It says Bush wins, even if Gore got the most votes.
Q: But wait a second. The US Supreme Court has to give a reason, right?
A: Right.
Q: So Bush wins because hand-counts are illegal?
A: Oh no. Six of the justices (two-thirds majority) believed the hand-counts were legal and should be done.
Q: Oh. So the justices did not believe that the hand-counts would find any legal ballots?
A. Nope. The five conservative justices clearly held (and all nine justices agreed) "that punch card balloting machines can produce an unfortunate number of ballots which are not punched in a clean, complete way by the voter." So there are legal votes that should be counted but can't be.
Q: Oh. Does this have something to do with states' rights? Don't conservatives love that?
A: Generally yes. These five justices have held that the federal government has no business telling a sovereign state university it can't steal trade secrets just because such stealing is prohibited by law. Nor does the federal government have any business telling a state that it should bar guns in schools. Nor can the federal government use the equal protection clause to force states to take measures to stop violence against women.
Q: Is there an exception in this case?
A: Yes, the Gore exception. States have no rights to have their own state elections when it can result in Gore being elected President. This decision is limited to only this situation.
Q: C'mon. The Supremes didn't really say that. You're exaggerating.
A: Nope. They held "Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances, or the problem of equal protection in election processes generally presents many complexities."
Q: What complexities?
A: They don't say.
Q: I'll bet I know the reason. I heard Jim Baker say this. The votes can't be counted because the Florida Supreme Court "changed the rules of the election after it was held." Right?
A. Dead wrong. The US Supreme Court made clear that the Florida Supreme Court did not change the rules of the election. But the US Supreme Court found the failure of the Florida Court to change the rules was wrong.
Q: Huh?
A: The Legislature declared that the only legal standard for counting vote is "clear intent of the voter." The Florida Court was condemned for not adopting a clearer standard.
Q: I thought the Florida Court was not allowed to change the Legislature's law after the election.
A: Right.
Q: So what's the problem?
A: They should have. The US Supreme Court said the Florida Supreme Court should have "adopt[ed] adequate statewide standards for determining what is a legal vote"
Q: I thought only the Legislature could "adopt" new law.
A: Right.
Q: So if the Court had adopted new standards, I thought it would have been overturned.
A: Right. You're catching on.
Q: If the Court had adopted new standards, it would have been overturned for changing the rules. And if it didn't, it's overturned for not changing the rules. That means that no matter what the Florida Supreme Court did, legal votes could never be counted.
A: Right. Next question.
Q: Wait, wait. I thought the problem was "equal protection," that some counties counted votes differently from others. Isn't that a problem?
A: It sure is. Across the nation, we vote in a hodgepodge of systems. Some, like the optical-scanners in largely Republican-leaning counties record 99.7% of the votes. Some, like the punchcard systems in largely Democratic-leaning counties record only 97% of the votes. So approximately 3% of Democratic votes are thrown in the trash can.
Q: Aha! That's a severe equal-protection problem!!!
A: No it's not. The Supreme Court wasn't worried about the 3% of Democratic ballots thrown in the trashcan in Florida. That "complexity" was not a problem.
Q: Was it the butterfly ballots that violated Florida law and tricked more than 20,000 Democrats to vote for Buchanan or Gore and Buchanan.
A: Nope. The Supreme Court has no problem believing that Buchanan got his highest, best support in a precinct consisting of a Jewish old age home with Holocaust survivors, who apparently have changed their mind about Hitler.
Q: Yikes. So what was the serious equal protection problem?
A: The problem was neither the butterfly ballot nor the 3% of Democrats (largely African-American) disenfranchised. The problem is that somewhat less than .005% of the ballots may have been determined under slightly different standards because judges sworn to uphold the law and doing their best to accomplish the legislative mandate of "clear intent of the voter" may have a slightly opinion about the voter's intent.
Q: Hmmm. OK, so if those votes are thrown out, you can still count the votes where everyone agrees the voter's intent is clear?
A: Nope.
Q: Why not?
A: No time.
Q: No time to count legal votes where everyone, even Republicans, agree the intent is clear? Why not?
A: Because December 12 was yesterday.
Q: Is December 12 a deadline for counting votes?
A: No. January 6 is the deadline. In 1960, Hawaii's votes weren't counted until January 4.
Q: So why is December 12 important?
A: December 12 is a deadline by which Congress can't challenge the results.
Q: What does the Congressional role have to do with the Supreme Court?
A: Nothing.
Q: But I thought ---
A: The Florida Supreme Court had earlier held it would like to complete its work by December 12 to make things easier for Congress. The United States Supreme Court is trying to help the Florida Supreme Court out by forcing the Florida court to abide by a deadline that everyone agrees is not binding.
Q: But I thought the Florida Court was going to just barely have the votes counted by December 12.
A: They would have made it, but the five conservative justices stopped the recount last Saturday.
Q: Why?
A: Justice Scalia said some of the counts may not be legal.
Q: So why not separate the votes into piles, indentations for Gore, hanging chads for Bush, votes that everyone agrees went to one candidate or the other so that we know exactly how Florida voted before determining who won? Then, if some ballots (say, indentations) have to be thrown out, the American people will know right away who won Florida.
A. Great idea! The US Supreme Court rejected it. They held that such counts would likely to produce election results showing Gore won and Gore's winning would cause "public acceptance" and that would "cast[]a cloud" over Bush's "legitimacy" that would harm "democratic stability."
Q: In other words, if America knows the truth that Gore won, they won't accept the US Supreme Court overturning Gore's victory?
A: Yes.
Q: Is that a legal reason to stop recounts? or a political one?
A: Let's just say in all of American history and all of American law, this reason has no basis in law. But that doesn't stop the five conservatives from creating new law out of thin air.
Q: Aren't these conservative justices against judicial activism?
A: Yes, when liberal judges are perceived to have done it.
Q: Well, if the December 12 deadline is not binding, why not count the votes?
A: The US Supreme Court, after admitting the December 12 deadline is not binding, set December 12 as a binding deadline at 10 p.m. on December 12.
Q: Didn't the US Supreme Court condemn the Florida Supreme Court for arbitrarily setting a deadline?
A: Yes.
Q: But, but --
A: Not to worry. The US Supreme Court does not have to follow laws it sets for other courts.
Q: So who caused Florida to miss the December 12 deadline?
A: The Bush lawyers who first went to court to stop the recount, the rent-a-mob in Miami that got paid Florida vacations for intimidating officials, and the US Supreme Court for stopping the recount
Q: So who is punished for this behavior?
A: Gore, of course.
Q: Tell me this Florida's laws are unconstitutional?
A: Yes
Q: And the laws of 50 states that allow votes to be cast or counted differently are unconstitutional?
A: Yes. And 33 states have the "clear intent of the voter" standard that the US Supreme Court found was illegal in Florida
Q: Then why aren't the results of 33 states thrown out?
A: Um. Because...um.....the Supreme Court doesn't say...
Q: But if Florida's certification includes counts expressly declared by the US Supreme Court to be unconstitutional, we don't know who really won the election there, right?
A: Right. Though a careful analysis by the Miami Herald shows Gore won Florida by about 20,000 votes (excluding the butterfly ballot errors)
Q: So, what do we do, have a re-vote? throw out the entire state? count under a single uniform standard?
A: No. We just don't count the votes that favor Gore.
Q: That's completely bizarre! That sounds like rank political favoritism! Did the justices have any financial interest in the case?
A: Scalia's two sons are both lawyers working for Bush. Thomas's wife is collecting applications for people who want to work in the Bush administration.
Q: Why didn't they recuse themselves?
A: If either had recused himself, the vote would be 4-4, and the Florida Supreme Court decision allowing recounts would have been affirmed.
Q: I can't believe the justices acted in such a blatantly political way.
A: Read the opinions for yourself: http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/supremecourt/00-949_dec12.fdf (December 9 stay stopping the recount) http://www.supremecourtus.gov/opinions/00pdf/00-949.pdf (December 12 opinion)
Q: So what are the consequences of this?
A: The guy who got the most votes in the US and in Florida and under our Constitution (Al Gore) will lose to America's second choice who won the all important 5-4 Supreme Court vote.
Q: I thought in a democracy, the guy with the most votes wins.
A: True, in a democracy. But America is not a democracy. In America in 2000, the guy with the most US Supreme Court votes wins.
Q: So what will happen to the Supreme Court when Bush becomes President.
A: He will appoint more justices in the mode of Thomas and Scalia to ensure that the will of the people is less and less respected. Soon lawless justices may constitute 6-3 or even 7-2 on the court.
Q: Is there any way to stop this?
A: YES. No federal judge can be confirmed without a vote in the Senate. It takes 60 votes to break a filibuster. If only 41 of the 50 Democratic Senators stand up to Bush and his Supremes and say that they will not approve a single judge appointed by him until a President can be democratically elected in 2004, the judicial reign of terror can end....and one day we can hope to return to the rule of law.
Q: What do I do now?
A: Email this to everyone you know, and write or call your senator, reminding him that Gore beat Bush by several hundred thousand votes (three times Kennedy's margin over Nixon) and that you believe that VOTERS rather than JUDGES should determine who wins an election by counting every vote. And to protect our judiciary from overturning the will of the people, you want them to confirm NO NEW JUDGES until 2004 when a president is finally chosen by most of the American people.

Kathleen Clark
Visiting Professor
University of Michigan Law School
Rm. 924 - Legal Research
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1215

Cheers, Larry

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Marathon text reformat job done! - JoeClone (trying to get his breath back)

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 04:18 PM

As to the above, the format was different than I expected, as recent cut and pastes have maintained their format, and so, sorry about that folks...
Now to the past posts, Thanks to - aw hell the trouble with broken posts is that it takes a good memory to carry xy and z to part two... the post about the 14th amendment spoke well to the questions raised by troll, and saved me a responce, I would not add a thing. As to the post that Rush Limbau and Jessie Jackson are cut from the same cloth, I would point out that in Florida Jackson's protests were lawful and respectable, while the ones organised by the Republican party where In-your-face successfull attempts to terrorise the voting officials into abandoning the task that federal law assigns them to maintain our liberty...
Cheers, Larry

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 05:33 PM

Larry, first of let me say that the story of Republican protesters disrupting the count and intimidating the canvassers in Miami-Dade is a fabrication. I have addressed this earlier. Those people were bona fide watchers and thats ALL.
When the canvassers attempted to move the count to a set of locked offices on another floor where observation would have been dificult if not imposible, the watchers quite rightly raised a loud fuss. And thats all.
There were Miami-dade law enforcment officers on the scene. If it had been the "near riot" that the Democrats claimed, surely someone would have been arrested. But no one was. Because there was no "near riot".
Wait, I take that back. There WAS one arrest; a Democrat lawyer who tried to take a ballot out of the area by sticking it in his jacket pocket.
The canvassers wanted to move because they said they neded access to machines on the next floor. When the watchers protested and they agreed not to move, they realized that they would not finish the count by the deadline. They stopped so they could tally what they HAD counted and get the results to Tallahassee.
If you feel this is not accurate, please furnish the names of those arrested for what would definitely have been an illegal act had it in fact occured.
As far as Jacksons protests being "respectful and peaceful" people in the streets screaming "NO HAND COUNT! NO PEACE!" sounds neither respectful OR peaceful to me,but I guess we have different definitions.
Now lets take a quick look at the Miami Heralds attempt to "prove" that Gore won by 23,000 votes. Caddell was the pollster for President Carter and is now the co-producer of the hit NBC series "The West Wing," grew up in Florida and cut his political teeth on examining precinct returns in Jacksonville. He is highly skeptical of the Herald effort. (He notes that a previous analysis by the paper that used statistics to "prove" Mr. Gore would have won Florida by 23,000 votes in a "flawless" election was itself "terribly flawed.")

One problem: The latest Herald effort will be terribly misleading if it only looks at the "undervotes." Mr. Caddell points out that there are also 120,000 "overvotes"--ballots that registered more than one choice for president.

"In counties that used optical scanning equipment and shipped those ballots to a central site for counting, you had a high percentage of nonvotes," he says. "I calculate there are 18,000 of those kind of votes statewide, many of them in heavily Bush counties." Voters may have filled in a presidential vote with a pencil, then made a stray mark that the scanner "saw" as a second vote, invalidating the ballot. In Bay County, an election official noted he had seen a ballot on which the voter had written: "I left my glasses at home. Please register my vote for Bush." There's no doubt about the intent of that voter--but write-ins for president aren't counted if the candidate is also listed on the regular ballot.

Mr. Caddell says "it's really dangerous" to have an independent count unless it's completely thought through first. "I was in favor of a complete statewide recount under a single standard, but neither candidate wanted that," he says. "I think Bush actually won more of the valid votes cast than Gore--especially since a federal judge has ordered that overseas military ballots without a postmark the Gore people successfully challenged are valid votes and must be counted. That would add a minimum of 225 to 300 votes to Bush's totals."

The Herald's effort may be made even more confusing if other media outlets conduct their own count. Deborah Phillips of the Voting Integrity Project, a watchdog group battling election fraud, says searching for votes in Florida's ballot haystack will distract attention from needed efforts to update election systems and clean up outdated voter registration rolls.
As far as your post from Kathleen Calrk, it sounds like Rush Limbaugh when he's on a roll: ask the question, give the answer which-a miracle!- leads to the next question.
Ms Clark also needs to get her facts straight. Al Gore did not win the popular vote in Florida. The law says he didn't and thats that. you may not agree with the law. You may not agree with the way the law was interpreted. But it's the law and until it is changed it is what we all live by.
The Supreme Court has had many shapes, from the Earl Warren court to the present one. The Warren court made decisions that I, personaly felt were not in the best interest of the country. This court has made and will make similar decisions.
A call to try to stall any nominations until you can elect someone who will pack the court the way you would like to see it is novel but a trifle juvenile.
It's reminiscent of the little child, on the floor, holding its breath because things didn't go its way.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 05:36 PM

That should have been "Pat Caddell" not Dogur. The column was from the Wall Street Journal.
Back to de-caf!

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Skeptic
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 05:51 PM

Spoke with friends in Miami. The "riot' was more a matter of creative television work than a riot. Not, I'll add, a liberal bias to steal the election, but the small group of protestors who were the most boisterous made better TV than the majority who were just picketing.

I miss the connection between the protestors and Limbaugh. My understanding was that the local Republican Party organized the protest and the media did what they do best, found something interesting to show on TV. Limbaugh used that to as another example to "prove" a liberal bias in the Media. Just as he intimated that Jackson was trying to cause a riot. Should I gather that the riot happened and the press covered it up?

Jackson fed the conspiracy theory fans, claiming that a series of events (bad in and of themselves) were part of a deliberate pattern of racial discrimination. Along the same vein as the election statistics thread. Deliberately provocative in the same post hoc ergo propter hoc way Limbaugh is so fond of.

Limbaugh and Jackson (and a lot of others) portray themselves in a sort of "more in sadness than anger" mold and then do their best to keep the pot stirred up. I make a distinction between unconscious and deliberate insincerity and see both Jackson and Limbaugh firmly in the latter camp: manipulative and hypocritical. There are those on both sides who are sincere. The Limbaughs and Jacksons drown them out. Both feel it is their duty to motivate and mobilize the faithful. Or save us from ourselves, perhaps. Both are the first to deny any responsibility for any negative events since they were just "expressing an opinion". They are both demagogues. That one or the other supports a view I may agree with doesn't make them any less dangerous. They manage to make the discussion about them, rather than the issues and makes a more moderate and rational response difficult. The bad money driving out the good, so to speak.

For various reasons, Florida didn't do much to fix a voting system they knew was flawed. The firm picked to validate the voter registration lists had already demonstrated its lack of credibility in other states. Blaming Katherine Harris is silly. The firm was picked by a fairly rigid procurement system. Where blame lies is that when the problems surfaced (and the State was notified) they did nothing. A Republican conspiracy?. Or the State following the letter of the law that it's the job of the local Supervisor of Elections to validate the names on a purge list. Because that's the way the people of Florida have wanted it for years. Local control. If Harris had tried to step in, the howl would have bene heard in London. And the struck down by the Florida courts.

Into these events Jackson read a racial conspiracy because so many blacks were on the list. Ignoring the sad fact that blacks make up a significant portion of felons in this country. Limbaugh saw it as a bunch of felons and (though never said but implied) low income blacks who wanted special treatment, wanted the law not to apply to them. So one demagogue plays off the other and the result is that the problem of people who should have been able to vote couldn't and those who shouldn't have did. No great conspiracy, just an inept system that never assumed an election would be close enough to matter. And solving the problem gets sidetracked into soothing the demagogues.

Regards John.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Bill D
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 06:09 PM

I don't 'know' who really won Florida...YOU don't know who really won Florida...Gore fought because he suspected he 'might' have gotten more votes if all counts had been fair & complete...various forces made sure that would not happen, and so Bush got more official votes....I doubt that wvwn the "Sunshine law" will tell us for SURE who won. Bush has the job and has to produce, there will undoubtably be changes in election procedures, and although I and others are not pleased at the final count, perhaps we have all learned something

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Skeptic
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 07:46 PM

Bill and others

And may learn more on the issue. When I left work today (around five) our county Supervisor of Elections had already received 8 or 9 public records request to see all the ballots from our County.(2 to 1 Gore, highest percent for Nader in the State) Per our Supervisor, its whats happening all over the State. So first we had the count, recount, court count, court non count, court count again and final court non-count. Having finished that game, we will now have a count by the press. But who to believe. The New York Times? Gannett Chain? The LA Times Syndicate. And what if different papers get different counts. Who'll arbitrate? And god only knows what Limbaugh will say. Maybe MTV can do a Press Count Special. And the big question: Who'll win the Pulitzer for the most accurate count?

What we need is to find something else to amuse us. Maybe a good earthquake or hurricaine. Me bitter? Never!!

Regards

John

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 08:02 PM

I can always amuse myself by watching YOU trying to make sense of the whole fuzzy mess...sort of like a kitten with a ball of yarn. ***BG**

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: GUEST,Burke
Date: 15 Dec 00 - 08:08 PM

What I want to see.

Have some enterprising grad students design a machine to read the ballots in detailed terms. It might take a while to do the development.

Not just the number of over votes but which 2 or more holes punched.

If the chads are dimpled just how many microns is it dimpled. Give counts of number of votes in the various ranges.

Then instead of x for Bush & X for Gore we have a picture of how clear or ambiguious it really is.

I thought the vote count was & is a bit of a red herring. All the counts of hanging chad don't do a thing for all the over votes & Buchanan mis-votes. If a hand count had given the election to Bush it would lend him legitimacy that, based on what seems to have been the voters' real intent, should not be there.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 04:40 AM

So troll, you say that there were probably lots of votes for Bush that weren't counted. And that is supposed to be an argument against carrying out a proper check on the voters????

Pardon me if I shout, since the point seems to keep on getting passed over. IT DOESN'T MATTER WHO THE FALSELY INVALIDATED VOTES WERE FOR. THIS ISN'T ABOUT THE RIGHTS OF THE CANDIDATES, IT'S ABOUT THE RIGHTS OF THE VOTERS WHOEVER THEY VOTED FOR.

Bush voters ought to be just as indignant about this as Gore voters. Unless they really think that party loyalties are more important than democratic processes. It seems pretty clear that a lot of them do think that. And these are the people who claim to be so patriotic?...

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: bob schwarer
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 06:28 AM

One last time!!!

Gore fought like hell to make sure all the votes were NOT counted. He wanted no part of the absentee votes which were heavily in favor of Bush.

Bob S.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: kendall
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 08:55 AM

Because they were not legal! they arrived AFTER the deadline, and, without postmarks! Naturally the republicans fought to have them counted, they had spent millions of dollars overseas to influence the GI's

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 08:59 AM

"Gore fought like hell to make sure all the votes were NOT counted. He wanted no part of the absentee votes which were heavily in favor of Bush."

What on earth has that got to do with it? Gore could be the biggest villain of all times, and Bush could be a saint. That kind of thing is relevant when deciding who to vot efor. It is not relevant in any way when it come to making sure that the votes are counted fairly.

The point, and the only point is, who did the voters choose? Once again: IT DOESN'T MATTER WHO THE FALSELY INVALIDATED VOTES WERE FOR. THIS ISN'T ABOUT THE RIGHTS OF THE CANDIDATES, IT'S ABOUT THE RIGHTS OF THE VOTERS, WHOEVER THEY VOTED FOR.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 10:22 AM

Hi Kev:
As to the expectation of indignation on the part of Republicns at the votes not being counted, well, that presuposes a nature that is no longer within the American spirit, that of good sportsmanship. I remember, oh... about 1978, I think, when Kerry won the Sam McQuire cup. The opposing team captain had been knocked out during the game. Kerry footballers carried him to the podium, his head still bloody, and had him raise up the cup with them, in recognition of a game well played. It that were an American football game, the winner would have likely kicked the looser as he left the field.
" The following was posted by the IRSP yesterday... "The IRSP have been contacted by many concerned parents who were not contacted by the schools concerned to see if they would allow their children to take part in the Clinton visit. Many parents who are pacifists and attempt to teach their children that war is wrong have been deliberately undermined in their own homes. Bill Clinton, whatever his dubious contribution to the process here, remains singularly responsible for the mass murder of world citizens including children in Iraq and the Balkans, not to mention the ongoing economic embargo on Cuba which is causing untold misery, starvation, and death."
In conclusion the IRSP representative said;
"The cause of peace in Ireland is important and peace is something that we all strive to achieve, but are the Irish people honestly saying that we want that peace to be achieved on the back of Irish support for American imposed misery, starvation and death of ordinary people elsewhere. We think not! but then nobody thought to ask the ordinary people here!" "
My respoce to my comrads in the IRSP is the recent elections show, not many of us get consulted either...
Cheers,
Larry

PS THANKS JOE - You are a hero!

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: GUEST,Lucius
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:46 AM

Hey Troll I'm looking throught the news to find some story about a Democratic lwyer that was arrested for swipping a ballot. Where did you hear this? Lucius

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: katlaughing
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 03:47 AM

Troll said, "A call to try to stall any nominations until you can elect someone who will pack the court the way you would like to see it is novel but a trifle juvenile. It's reminiscent of the little child, on the floor, holding its breath because things didn't go its way."

Am I mistaken in thinking that is a lot of what the Republican majority in Congress has done to Clinton over the past eight years? Not necessarily in the Supreme Court, but in other lower courts and other appointed positions? I seem to recall them stalling many of his appointments, some for actual years. Seems to me there ought to be a deadline about such things.

kat

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: rabbitrunning
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 09:17 AM

I'd like to see all the various agencies that want to use the sunshine laws to count the ballots get together in one of the convention centers and work as a team. And I'd really love it if we got a breakdown of what the "problem" ballots looked like. I.E., on those butterfly ballots, just how many of the overvotes were "gore-buchanan" and were there other kinds of errors. That kind of statistical information would help us create an analysis that would lead to better voter information in the future, as well as (hopefully!) better balloting methods.

And I don't want to see just the undervotes/overvotes counted again. I'd like to see the undisputed votes counted again. Computers can have programming errors that add votes here and there. (Sometimes deliberately.)

As for the absentee ballots -- well, absentee ballots are more susceptible to fraud than any other kind of ballot. Florida law does allow unpostmarked ballots to be counted if the material inside is dated according to one thing I've seen on the internet, and it is the job of the county election commissioners to know election law -- so no unpostmarked ballots should have been tossed until the inner information was checked. (And if that was incorrect, and unpostmarked ballots are invalid under Florida law, then it was the Florida legislature who disenfranchised those military voters, not the democrats.) Again, what I really want to see is a statistical analysis. Which ballots were disallowed and for what specific reason.

Couldn't get to the first thread to see if someone already suggested this. Sorry if it's a repeat.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: flattop
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 10:06 AM

The piece below came through from the Cape Breton Politics list server this morning. I suppose it might have been posted to another thread, I don't have much time to read mudcat these days.

-------- Original Message -------- Subject: View from developing world Date: Tue, 12 Dec 2000 16:43:46 -0800 From: To: Subject: View from developing world

View from developing world

1. Imagine that we read of an election occurring anywhere in the third world in which the self-declared winner was the son of the former prime minister and that former prime minister was himself the former head of that nation's secret police (CIA).
2. Imagine that the self-declared winner lost the popular vote but won based on some old colonial holdover (electoral college) from the nation's pre-democracy past.
3. Imagine that the self-declared winner's 'victory' turned on disputed votes cast in a province governed by his brother!
4. Imagine that the poorly drafted ballots of one district, a district heavily favouring the self-declared winner's opponent, led thousands of voters to vote for the wrong candidate.
5. Imagine that the members of that nation's most despised caste, fearing for their lives/livelihoods, turned out in record numbers to vote in near-universal opposition to the self-declared winner's candidacy.
6. Imagine that hundreds of members of that most-despised caste were intercepted on their way to the polls by state police operating under the authority of the self-declared winner's brother.
7. Imagine that six million people voted in the disputed province and that the self-declared winner's 'lead' was only 327 votes; fewer votes, certainly, than the vote counting machines' margin of error.
8. Imagine that the self-declared winner and his political party opposed a more careful by-hand inspection and re-counting of the ballots in the disputed province or in its most hotly disputed district.
9. Imagine that the self-declared winner, himself a governor of a major province, had the worst human rights record of any province in his nation and actually led the nation in executions.
10. Imagine that a major campaign promise of the self-declared winner was to appoint like-minded human rights violators to lifetime positions on the high court of that nation.
None of us would deem such an election to be representative of anything other than the self-declared winner's will-to-power. All of us, I imagine, would wearily turn the page thinking that it was another sad tale of pitiful pre-or anti-democracy peoples in some strange elsewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: catspaw49
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 10:30 AM

Well we got it wrong this time no matter who won. Or maybe we got it right. At least there were no tanks in the streets.

What should be obvious (and I keep saying this) is that the punch card machines need to go the way of the Edsel. We use them here and they are certainly well proven to be fallible after this latest mess in Florida. since the high court has jumped all over states rights now, it would seem to be a good time to mandate different machines.

There are plenty of them out there and several are about as accurate as you can get on a mass scale. Why not just subsidize the purchase through the Federal government so that all precincts have reliable equipment? I'm sure there are any number of idiots who will stand up and say, "The Feds can't do that! Its the right of the people of the state to choose to squander their votes by using machines that are pieces of shit!"

I think it would be a small price to pay to eliminate this shinola in the future. What really makes us look ridiculous here is that in the most technologically advanced country on earth, we're using such antiquated technology to vote.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: flattop
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:02 PM

We could also be a little more understanding of problems other countries with fewer resources have running their governments.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:20 PM

I'm not sure spaw, we have some degree of technolgy in the UK and use old fashioned pencil and paper but it works!

The technology used was only a small part of a much bigger problem which includes the design and lack of testing of a form and questions over whether everyone who was entitled to vote got a fair oppertunity to do so, which votes should be counted, etc.

It is the whole system that needs reviewing. In computing, there is a saying "garbage in, garbage out" and although in this instance, better technology would have helped, it certainly would not have cured everything.

Anyway, I guess it is time for all of you to put this election behind you and accept the result but it is also time to look at ways of ensuring that such an event can never happen again.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:25 PM

I'd suggest that the sunshine law recounts should be delegated to outsiders. Maybe Canadians would be the best people, since they managed their election so easily.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:37 PM

Jon, the problem with paper and pencil-at least in our elections- is that we don't have JUST the presidential election on the ballot. There are Senate and House races, state and local questions, Judicial questions, referendums, (referenda?) etc. Trying to count all that would be a nightmare and would take days.
The ballot in my home county was two pages long.
Our precincts tend to be large-several thousand- and machines really are the most efficient way to go. I saw some figures somewhere, but I don't remember where that hand counts were less accurate than machine counts. Maybe Skeptic knows He keeps up with this sort of thing.
McGrath, you may have a point there; at least there wouldn't be partisanship like we will certainly have here on any sunshine law count.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: catspaw49
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:55 PM

Sorry Jon, I wasn't demeaning anyone else's technology, just demeaning us here in the States for not using what already exists. There are numerous reliable and easy to use voting machines that do not present the problems we saw with the punch cards. In every one of those that I have seen, the ballot design is straightforward and difficult to confuse. There will always be mistakes and people who "mess up," but not on the grand scale we saw in Florida.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:01 PM

Lucius, I read it in a column from, I think, the Washington Times but it could have been World Net Daily. And I should not have said "arrested" He was taken away by the police for questioning. The arrest was an unwarranted assumption on my part. His name, I believe is Geller. I'll try to find out more.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:08 PM

Thought this might be of some interest. troll

By THOMAS HARGROVE Scripps Howard News Service December 14, 2000

- Official registration lists in the United States have become so faulty that scores of counties claim to have more voters than actual adult population.

Sloppy bookkeeping led 190 counties and the state of Maine to appear to be more than 100 percent registered in the 1996 presidential election, according to a Scripps Howard News Service study of election records in 3,189 counties and voting districts.

The study found that at least 167,968 people in these areas were still eligible to cast ballots even though they had died or moved away.

Maine had 1,001,292 eligible voters even though census estimates pegged the voting-age population at no more than 945,000. That means Maine was 106 percent registered four years ago.

"That was not a good thing," said Rebecca Wyke, Maine's assistant secretary of state.

The quality of America's voter rolls is deteriorating. Easier sign-up provisions under the National Voter Registration Act of 1993 and overworked or incompetent election supervisors have contributed to often grossly inaccurate lists sent to the local polling places to determine who should vote.

"This is an accident waiting to happen," said Curtis Gans, director of the Washington, D.C.-based Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. "The problem is real and could pose a danger in that people can vote in the names of those who have died or moved away. We must create a better standard for cleaning the lists."

Election officials in Maine were able to reduce their voter rolls to 882,337 by June of this year, still giving the state one of America's highest registration rates at 93 percent. Meanwhile, Alaska's lists deteriorated to the point that by October of this year the state was 108 percent registered.

"I'm very happy to pass this honor over to Alaska," Wyke said. "Our problems really were based in Maine law not requiring any kind of systematic purging of the voter rolls."

The federal registration act - often called the "Motor Voter Bill" since it authorized citizens to register while applying for drivers licenses - provided a mechanism to remove apparently inactive voters. But many local election supervisors are overwhelmed by the task of regularly preparing lists of voters who have not cast ballots in recent elections.

Maine and Alaska apparently are the first states - at least in modern times - to report more voters than eligible population. But the inaccuracies are even more apparent at the local level.

The most over-registered county, according to the Scripps Howard study, is rural Issaguena County in west-central Mississippi. The county had 1,669 registered voters four years ago, even though census estimates put the adult population at only 1,102 people, making the county 151 percent registered.

"Yes, I've been told that," said Circuit Clerk Erline Fortner who oversees the voter rolls. "But I've never looked into this to analyze it. I just don't have the time to do that. I know some people who have family here but no longer live here do come back to vote. But I don't know if that could account for such a large number."

Mississippi and Michigan are tied for having the largest number of counties with impossibly bloated voter lists. Each has 28 counties that report more than 100 percent registration rates.

Michigan's Iosco County on the shores of Lake Huron had 22,901 registered voters four years ago, even though population projects indicate no more than 16,779 residents are of voting age.

"A lot of those are military people who have to be maintained on our list," said Iosco County Clerk Michael Welsch. "We just can't purge them from the system. Under the law, they can maintain their residence wherever they want to."

The rolls became wildly inaccurate following the 1992 closure of Wurtsmith Air Force Base, which cost the county about 8,000 adults.

"Once they register to vote or get a drivers' license in any other state, in a perfect world either act is supposed to change their voter registration. But that certainly doesn't always happen," Welsch said.

Twenty-seven states had counties with bloated lists, including Texas with 23, Missouri with 19, Maine with 15, Kentucky with 12, Nebraska with 10, South Dakota with seven, Colorado with six and Illinois and Idaho with five each.

Election experts agree that any county with an apparent voter registration rate of 90 percent or greater almost certainly has ineligible voters on their rolls. (In 1996 the national registration rate was 74.6 percent, or 146.5 million registered voters out of a voting-age population of 196.5 million.)

This means there are at least 681 counties and voting districts with suspiciously large voter rolls.

"A bad list can cover up any sort of fraud that could be going on," said Kimball Brace, president of Election Data Services, which advises election supervisors nationwide. His group assembled the data used in the Scripps Howard study. "And a bad list can be indicative of sloppy procedures."

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:10 PM

I can believe that Troll but the point I was really trying to make is it does not matter how good or efficient the actual counting mechanism (human or machine) is if the data coming in is unreliable.

Here is one from my days at Hotpoint: When we introduced a new MRP system, we had a lot of problems with negative stocks. The comments from the shop floor were "this system is useless". My answer was "no it is just highlighting a problem that has always existed". The reason for it was that people were borrowing stock from one production line (maybe a delivery had got delayed or failed a QA test - these things happen) to feed another line. I will admit that in an ideal world the borrowing should not have been necessary but the system was getting screwed because people were not submitting the piece of paper that we asked for to keep the system informed of where the stock was.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:30 PM

Thanks for your last post, Troll. I had not seen it when I made my last one. It certainly is of interest to me and my thoughts on accurate data collection!

spaw, I hadn't read you as demeaning anyone elses technology. I was just using your comments to try to pick up on the point that the greatest technology in the world can not resolve more fundamental problems.

Jon

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: catspaw49
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:44 PM

And you're right too Jon. Much work needs to be done. There has always been folks who screwed up and I'd like to see more detail into looking at remedies to make ballot design and voting more foolproof. On the other hand, there are plenty of documented situations from precincts all over the US using the punch card machines where counts have had a problem and recounts are questionable.

Here in my own county, we had a similar problem six years ago when a close vote demanded a recount and ended up with three because none matched and there were questions about what the machine count actually was. The precincts where the discrepancies occurred all used cards, whereas the others where there was no problem used either scantron or lever machines. And this was on a Issue vote, not a candidate.

I think what gets me is that these machines have been outmoded for years and we keep writing off the problems. We need election reform in many ways, and campaign finance reforms too. Replacing these machines would have to be included in any thing to make it meaningful. You can't do a reliable recount with punch cards and the equipment used to machine count is not reliable.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 02:11 PM

I prefer to stay out of political and religious threads completely, but...

I've always voted in Kentucky, which as most of you know, kinda has the reputation for being a bit backward...'nuff said. But we've always had electronic voting machines. I asked relatives in Atlanta and Florida just what is this bit about punch cards. They explained that the precincts are so large there that they've often had to use the cards. They actually have to wait in long lines to vote. This is totally foreign to me. Anytime I've voted there have been 20 people max, and most of us know each other.

I still don't understand how there can be sooooo many problems, but perhaps Kentucky can send some of our machines south.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: flattop
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 02:27 PM

You got a tie in the election. The quibbled part is less than any margin of error, machine error, errors from human judgement and errors from our natural human tendencies to be dishonest, be we of the right or be we of the left.

It would have been nice for folks to feel that their vote counted but close outcomes upset people. Researchers found that most people would be more upset if they missed a plane by 5 minutes than if they missed a plane by 30 minutes. (I believe the study was on game theory and gambling addictions.) Democrats missed the plane to Florida by a second or two.

I once heard a hockey coach tell a room full of grumbling kids between periods, "When you get a five goal lead, the refereeing won't matter." Similarily, if a few thousand of those who forgot to vote Democrat had voted in this election or if they had earlier elected a Democrat government in Florida so that the Democrats in their unquestionable wisdom and fairness controlled the cheating in Florida, we'd have a different hockey game.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 03:39 PM

"overworked or incompetent election supervisors"

Well, incompetent is a subjective kind of thing, but "overworked" is I'd suggest a key elemetn here.

What seems to keep coming up are indications that these kind of problems are prevalent because people are trying to cut corners and do it in the cheap. Not having enough people to do the counting, so that mechanised systems have to be used, and a manual recount is a big problem.

Then there are reports about how poor counties have inferior machines, and about places where there aren't benough voting styastions and voting booths, or not ebnough people to process the voting or advise the voters.

And this is in what is far-and-away the richest country in the world, where incredible sums of money are spent in the course of the elections. But not on the things the money needs to be spent on, not on ensuring that it is fair and efficient.

It is like that not because of some inevitable difficulty in conducting elections in a big country, but because important people have decided that it doesn't really matter, so long as they can get elected.

It seems pretty clear that the people in charge don't have much regard for the ordinary voters. Which is consistent with the way this whole thing has been discussed with the focus on the rights of the candidates, as if that was what really mattered.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 03:58 PM

flattop, in states' defence, until a couple of years ago Federal laws didn't allow the purging that needed to be done.

Since then, Alaska has been purging diligently. Part of the problem is that as was mentioned above, when the military, for instance, maintain their 'residence' in Alaska we have to accept that. They may never come back to Alaska, they may even be registered elsewhere, contrary to law, but that can't be ascertained.

The person does not have to provide any kind of proof of residency except for the address they used while they were posted in state, which is used solely for placement in the system.

Complicating the issue is that as long as someone maintains residence in Alaska, that person/family is eligible to receive the annual Permanent Fund Dividend, which last year was almost $2000 per person. In a five-person family that is a great incentive to keep their 'home' address here.

In Alaska, a non-voting gap of 4 years is required to elicit questions about purging. Three efforts are made to reach that person to ascertain whether that person is in fact still in the state. It's a long process. If the letter is not returned by the post office- for instance, if the new tenant at that address throws away the letter- we have to assume the registered person is still at the address.

It's all predicated on the premise of voters rights.

Ebbie

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 04:38 PM

It is not the job of the Federal Govt. to furnish the states with voting machines. That is left up to the individual counties. The machines are VERY expensive and in many counties the choice of how to spend the operating funds for the next year focuses more on social services and street repair than on the latest in voting machines.
Yes, scantron machines would certainly help. So would adequate help throughout the year to work on keeping the rolls current just for an example.
Mary, small precincts are nice but in some of our larger cities you'd have to have a precinct every few blocks. It simply is not practicle to do that. The expense alone would prevent it. And PLEASE don't bring up paper ballots AGAIN McGrath. The opportunities for fraud with the paper ballot are overwhelming. That's why we went to voting machines in the first place; to try to ensure more honest elections. Maybe you don't have these problems in England but we do and your solutions will not work for us.
Jon, glad I found thar column. Interesting, isn't it.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 04:55 PM

Hmmmm.... lets count the score here, Voting IS a fundimental right when it comes to NOT counting the votes, but not fundimental enough to use federal funds to create a dependable system to cast votes in the first place..., forgive me, but after scoring in the one hundred percentile nationwide in the LSATS, I fail to see the logic, maybe I've lost grey cells somewhere... I give up, heard anygood ballads lately? - Larry

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 04:56 PM

PS the sentence should have read 100 percentile in logic... not all three parts, to be quite accurate...

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 06:11 PM

"It is not the job of the Federal Govt. to furnish the states with voting machines. That is left up to the individual counties. The machines are VERY expensive and in many counties the choice of how to spend the operating funds for the next year focuses more on social services and street repair than on the latest in voting machines."

I'd have thought that factors like that would mean that it is a Federal matter, ensuring that everyone in the country has an equal crack at taking part in Fedeal elections.

If that means the Federal Government paying for machines, or for additional election workers, so be it. You can't get much more Federal than electing a president. Maybe the Supreme Court might restore a little of its damaged reputation by determining something along these lines.

Economising on the voting process - badly maintained machines, insufficient polling stations and voting booths, insufficient people supervising the polling stations, and not enough people doing the votings and so forth, - means people are unable to vote, votes don't get counted, mistakes get made, recounts are seen as a problem, and fraud is easier.

And all this can mean that sometimes the winner isn't actually the one whom people voted for. (And that might be a Republican or a Democrat - this isn't something that should divide on party lines.)

And that applies whether it's machines or paper ballots or coloured stones dropped in an urn.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Troll
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 06:57 PM

There are only two parts of the Constitution that deal with elections. One says that any law pertaining to the election must be in place on the day prior to the election. The other states that the state legislature shall choose the electors.
The rest of it is left up to the states. I really do not believe that the Federal Govt. should interfere in areas not specifically delegated to it by the Constitution.
I am equally sure Larry, that you do not agree. But I also believe that the Fed.Govt. does not WANT to get involved. This is a matter of states rights.
And, Larry, what makes you so sure that voting would be any better if the Fed. ran things. Is there no graft in the Federal Government then?
McGrath, I think this should answer some of your questions as well.n There is a thing called the Law of Dimimishing Returns which states, briefly that you can reach a point where the cost of doing something is so great that it isn't worth the money spent. So how much is a vote worth? I would not try to answer that one for all the tea in China. Let us just say that the Counties, the States, and the Federal Government are very aware of that law.
At one time it was easy to find poll workers. People volunteered for the job. Now the County has to hire them and they STILL have a hard time finding enough.
Times have changed and people no longer feel that they are part of a community any more. They live in one place and work in another and pursue leisure activities in a third. They move constantly. They have no ties to a particular place, hence no loyalty to it.
I know, I know, I'll get a post back that "I've lived here since I was born and so have my family all the way back to Adam."
Goody. You are the exception in todays society.
BTW it is not the job of the Supreme Court to make law. It is their job to determine constitutionality and that is ALL.
I've rambled long enough. Over to you Chet.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: flattop
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 07:01 PM

Forgive me Ebbie. I'm not sure what point of mine you are defending on. I'm confused.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 05:14 AM

"So how much is a vote worth?" A lot more than a president.

The amount of money spent on campaigning, I believe, was far far more than the amount spent on the voting process. That's arsy-versy.

Uneven access to the voting process is unconstitional, I would have thought, whether it's because of intentionally discriminatory literacy tests, or unintentionally, because of economic factors that mean some places can't afford to provide the needed facilities.

The Supreme Court to some extent picks and chooses which cases it takes on, with a view to determining the laws it has decided need clarifying. I'd be surprised if a case doesn't arise which would allow it to deal with these kind of issues, even if the people raising it did get slagged off in coded language as "demagogues".

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: InOBU
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 08:22 AM

My dear Troll: You have to forgive me saying you exibit classic republican logic... It is an abridgement of state's rights for the feds to buy better voting machines, more dependable technology, but it is not an abrigment of rights for the Surpreme Court to appoint a president not chosen by the voters of the nation (here we go around again, eh?) Republicans don't trust government until it is time to abrige the rights of young women or there is a threat to the afirmative action for rich white guys that makes it possible for a c- student alcoholic drug user to run for the highest job in the land. What can I say, the American dream is a nightmare!
Cheers
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 11:39 AM

Troll makes a good point about the economics involved in supplying every precinct with new voting machines. Really close elections like this one are an anomaly -- perhaps it's been upsetting enough to all of us that we will support candidates who vote to allocate federal funds for this, perhaps not. But up to now it has been a state concern, which is handled on a local level. And the localities have a lot to spend their money on without buying new voting machines (in my community it seems we're always juggling new school expenditures, sewer projects, and other infrastructure improvements).

The Constitutional issue is one that should be examined. Again, Troll's point about people's diminishing attachment to their local communities is a good one. It also suggests, though, that the Constitutional allocation of federal vs. state responsibilities should perhaps be reexamined -- "states' rights" is kind of an anachronism these days with respect to a lot of issues that have become nationalized (or even globalized) in the last 200 years. This could be a good time for a proposed constitutional amendment aimed at establishing clear nationwide voting standards and procedures, at least for national elections. However, I wonder whether this has fatigued everyone so much that there won't be much public enthusiasm for continuing to hash over this issue.

As an aside, I heard over the weekend that both MIT and CalTech are planning to conduct a study of ways in which voting procedures and technology could be standardized nationwide -- in recognition of both the technology and the economics of the issue. If they can keep politics out of it and just deal with it as a technological and economic problem to be solved, maybe the techies will come up with a better mousetrap. (Or maybe they're just hoping to get their Republican and Democratic alumni into a bidding war?)

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Skeptic
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 12:39 PM

Re: Federal Government buying voting machines: The Federal Government can buy or provide money to buy the machines. They cannot mandate there use. Or mandate any other specific way of voting, for that matter. Their responsibility is to ensure equal access to whatever system the States want. Under the Constitution, unless the right or duty is given to the Federal government, it's reserved to the States. So the Feds could offer a grant to states to buy machines and the Supreme Court can be used to ensure that the right to vote isn't impeded, could even set standards that might lead to a limited field of technology, but that's about it. In Florida, that's the power of the State Elections Office. They establish general standards. The Counties have the right to decide how to meet those standards. Like it or not, that's how the law works.

Some real-time numbers for costs:

My county upgraded to a scantron like system last year. The software and hardware (not including the voting booths themselves) was $399,930.00. This included the scanners, modems to transmit counts from precincts to the Supervisors office, initial training and one year, a server to collect the data and one year warranty.

On going warranty and upgrades to firmware are estimated at $45,000/year. If you assume a 10 year live span, that's about $850,000 total life cycle cost. That's about $7500 per precinct up front and $850 per precinct annually. Add to that cost, the fact that poll-workers are paid. They volunteer and they get paid to work the polls, ranging from %525 - $6.15/hour.

We have 53 precincts and 86,000 voters. And even with the scantron system we have lines at some precincts, btw.

troll,

McGrath is right. Who did or didn't want the votes counted is not the issue. At issue is should they have been counted. And despite waffling, the Supreme Court said, yes, all things being equal and time allowing, there should have been a recount.

Arguing about what the results of the recount might be is futile speculation, but given the opinion of the Supreme Court, I'll have to say that the attempts to block recounts by Bush were wrong. I happen to think that the attempts by Gore to block the absentee ballots were wrong too.

The bottom line is that there is a good probability that votes that were cast in good faith weren't counted. That is the central issue to the vote, not who won or lost.

It seems to keep getting lost in the "who can we blame game". (Yes, Pogo was right but that takes the fun out of it). As if blaming one side or the other somehow takes the animus out of a highly probable disenfranchisement of voters.

The article was indicative of a problem that is national in scope. (Glad you finally learned how to cut and paste without a call to the help desk). And while I agree that hand ballots probably wouldn't work, I could also argue that it probably wouldn't be much worse than the current mess.

Since candidates spent roughly 2 billion dollars on campaigns this election cycle, even handouts seem cheap in comparison.

Regards John

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: Ebbie
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 01:12 PM

My apologies, flattop, I was mistaken- I was responding to Troll (at 1:08).

My thoughts on the cost of uniform, tested voting machines and trained personnel is that every year on our tax forms we can check off a dollar or two to be used for campaign financing: Why couldn't there be such a box for elections? It would provide millions of dollars for purchase and maintenance. Annually.

Ebbie

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: mousethief
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 01:31 PM

We should have a box allowing us to spend or not spend $2 on the latest military boondoggle that the Pentagon says it really doesn't want, but which is made in some congressman's pork barrel district.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 01:57 PM

I suppose the logical compromise would be to have a uniform voting system for the elections for Federal ofices, and leave it to people locally to organise the arrangements for all the numerous other local votes takingh place at the same time.

Since, as I understand it the only Federal offices involved would be for a Congressman or woman, a Senator, and a President, the uniform electoral system for them could just be a paper ballot and a pencil, together with enough scrutineers etc.

Incidentaklly, when troll wrote: "It is not the job of the Federal Govt. to furnish the states with voting machines. That is left up to the individual counties. The machines are VERY expensive and in many counties the choice of how to spend the operating funds for the next year focuses more on social services and street repair than on the latest in voting machines" - I took it he was just explaining the current system, rather than actually saying he thought it was saying it was a fair and sensible one.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 02:18 PM

I would add to the above "view from the developing world" imagine if you had an election in the third world where one candidate had a slight lead in the popular vote but ultimately it came down to a close call in a province governed by the self-declared winners brother and then to a tribunal made up mostly of appointees by the self-declared winners father (and his predecessor) would the US recognize such an election as valid. I leave that up to you but I doubt it.

Personally my cynical view is that the Supreme court voted completely along partisan lines (the Equal Protection line has got to be the lamest reason for their decision - because under the electoral college system peoples votes are weighted differently anyway - and there are completely different machines and ballot designs used all over Florida) I believe a just decision would have been to call for a complete hand recount in all of Florida) This will taint the supreme court jesters for years.

"The opportunities for fraud with the paper ballot are overwhelming" Troll Youve got to be kidding Troll.

And there arent with machines? Any programmer will tell you it would be trivial to throw an election based on a computer system - and undetectable. I certainly would never trust one.

In Canada, we just had an election and counted 13 million votes (on paper ballots) in under 4 hours, whats the problem down there? And what is wrong with waiting a few days to hear who the winner is, oh yeah we live in an instant society.

Anyway Good luck with president Cheney. I mean Bush. Petr.

Subject: RE: BS: AND WE HAVE A WINNER part two
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Dec 00 - 03:14 PM

O.K, if we are going to offend each other by talking about politics on this list, let me say that the election was settled in accordance with the LAW. I know this can be an impediment to a liberal, but it helps prevent fraud and chaos. Face it, Gore lost because he didn't get enough votes (even after cherry-picked hand recounts) to EVER take the lead. The democrats are infamous for votinf fraud, and there was plenty of evidence during this election. Students voting multiple times, homeless shelters raided with gifts of free cigarettes, more votes in certain precincts thatn there were registered voters. Voters finding, upon showing up at the polls, that someone had already voted for them by absentee ballot. Dead people, insane people, felons, children - all voting democrat. Gore's people in Florida blew it! The fix was in, but they underestimated Bush's support.