Fellow Freepers, please forgive me posting this. I do so only in the spirit of "know thy enemy" and pertains to what Al Franken has been drooling out on his unentertaining radio show. He was commenting on this topic and told his microscopic audience that the "Bush Won the Recount" only applied to the selected counties involved, but that the media recounts done state wide, regardless of which standard was used, showed clearly Gore to be the Florida winner. How much of this is Franken-spew or is there any merit in this claim? I worry that this may turn into two conflicting stories in the media and the truth will be lost in the polarizing nature of the topic.
George W. Bush (W) 2,912,790 48.850 Republican
Al Gore 2,912,253 48.841 Democrat
2) The Supreme Court decision stopping the recounts was 7-2, not 5-4 as widely revised. Check it out and check out the reports from when it was given.
3) There is no evidence that minorities were disenfranchised. Ask a person making this claim to provide evidence if they claim there is some.
4) The state was called for Gore at least 10 minutes before the polls closed in the panhandle by several networks. There are claims, more credible than those that minorities were disenfranchised or elderly people misplaced their votes, that Bush voters on the panhandle got out of line rather than voting, costing Bush votes.
The reality is that the Florida election fell within the "margin of error" such that a minor adjustment here or that could have given either candidate the win. But in every reasonable recount by the press, Bush won, and the number of voters that Bush lost in the panhandle likely cancels any possible case of minority voter disenfranchisement that can be considered. What about all those Buchannan votes? It's entirely possible that hundreds voted for him in Palm Beach County. I believe he owns a house there. And the bottom line is that we can't assume that everyone who didn't vote for Gore would have any more than we can assume that every bad ballot was an intended vote for Bush.
Also, ask any Gore supporters if they are troubled by the legendary voter fraud in the Democratic Northeastern cities. My stepmother (a widow who married my father) had to tear the voting card for her first deceased husband out of the voting book in Hudson County, New Jersey to stop him from voting while dead. Does that sort of stuff trouble the Gore supporter as much as the unsupported allegations of voter disenfranchisement in Florida do? And while you are at it, ask them why Democrats consider asking a voter for identification to prove that they are who they claim to be before they vote "harassment". This demonstrates that Democrats have zero interest in fair elections. They will simply say anything and do anything to win, which is why leftist thugs need to be kept out of power.
Once you do that, your sources will be challenged.
Therefore, you are well-advised to include some credible liberal source.
A good one is...
http://www.midnightbeach.com/jon/US-Constitution.htm
"Each state shall appoint, in such manner as the Legislature thereof may direct, a number of electors, equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress: but no Senator or Representative, or person holding an office of trust or profit under the United States, shall be appointed an elector."
This means that they have to go by the rules that were made by the state legislature. And these rules must be made before the election takes place.
The Democrats in Flroida tried to change the rules by use of the courts. And they tried to make these changes after the election had already taken place.
The U.S. Supreme Court said you can't do that.
If you want to change the rules, then you must do it through the state legislature. And you must do it before the election takes place.
Also, if you're going to have a recount, it must be across the entire state. The Democrats only wanted recounts in heavily Democratic districts.
They did many counts and recounts. Bush won every count, and every recount.
This isn't a short answer. However, if they throw any obsure inanity your way, this page probably has the answers. You'll just have to get back to them
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/election/electionfaq.htm
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/election/electiontime.htm
How about, "Go f*** yourself!"
Don't knock yourself out trying to change your brother's mind. Liberals cheat, including using family relationship to keep conservatives from being more effective.
1. Bush wanted to follow the rule of law. (Gore wanted to change the rules.)
2. Bush wanted to treat all counties equally. (Gore wanted vote-expanding recounts only in a few counties where he knew that would expand his vote count.)
3. Bush won every count ever made.
4. The SCOTUS voted 7-2 that the Gore-proposed, SCOFLA-adopted selective recount was illegal.
IIRC, the extensive post mortems all concluded not only that Bush would have won under the improvised ballot standard Gore was demanding, but also that Bush would have won under any counting methodology with regard to the undervotes.
That leaves the overvotes (more than one choice for President). Overvotes, of course, were automatically discarded per Florida law, and Gore never asked that overvotes be examined. The open question, I think, is what would happen if you counted the ballots where someone punched Gore and then wrote in Gore at the bottom (or both punched and wrote in Bush).
Try, "Wait until you see how many he steals this time!"
Your opponent will usually respond with a really stupid, somewhat sad or angry reply.
Because, if Bush was able to steal the election while not being President, obviously nothing is going to stop him this time.
Thus, you may lead them to consider the logical conclusion of their stupid "stole the election" premise - to stay home and not vote because the whole thing is fixed - our desired result.
Then they can remain extremely angry about the fact that they live in the freest and most prosperous country in human history and Bush is corrupt and stupid or something like that.
He interviewed Gore poeple, Bush people, poll workers, military guys who had their absentee votes thrown out, all sorts of people.
The loss of the military votes alone should make him furious. I just read this book although I have read Sammon's other books; I just couldn't face reading about the whole mess in 2001.
Bush is president, Gore is not.
Turn it around, Bush won every count, every recount, every time. He won the media recount by some of the most hard left media in the country, and by a larger margin than the official count!
Make them show you one instance where AlGore won a count.
Tell him to just go, now what was it that Cheney said?
www.glennbeck.com/news/08092004.shtml