Posted on 11/22/2005 5:45:52 AM PST by Liz
I stand corrected.
I was in Bahrain on a quick business trip. Got up Wednesday morning to watch the final returns and instead saw the nightmare begin.
There was the original recount of the original count. Then a recount of the recount. Then a recount of that and then selected recounts in Dem strongholds, with election officals trying to 'divine' voter intent from ballots rejected by the machines. It was voting in la-la land! Incidentally, these were all initiated by Gore - he could have stopped it at any time. GWB, as the winner, could not stop the recounting of the recounted votes.
Did "they" learn from 2000?..
Probably so.. interesting times DO await..
Hillary has not jumped the shark.. Hillary IS THE SHARK..
RINOS are barking seals..
.
That only came into play 6 days before the electoral college. The legislature was all ready to go.
They actually had...that was part of what the SCOFLA was intentionally ignoring. Additionally, by FL Law, the vote certification had to be done 26 days before the Electoral college met, and the SCOFLA forced it past that date, thus ensuring that Gore could not legally win.
Heck, they believe that only 5 justices disagreed with Floridas rulings, when in fact, none agreed. 7 found the ruling unconstitutional (Including Breyer); 1 agreed the ruling was wrong, but not unconstitutionally so (On the grounds that even if courts mangle law beyond recognition, they are technically not legislating); and one thought it was rude to so publicly and firmly slap down a State Supreme Court regardless of how peculiar their ruling was.
Ummm. Not exactly. That was only on the method for resolving the problem. That SCOFLA ruling was unconstitutional was 7-2.
The dissenting Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Breyer, were trying to throw away a precedent (Safe Harbor of 6 days) that the SCOTUS had unanimously affirmed roughly two weeks before, with no justification - else have the State of Florida come up with plans for a recount and execute it within a matter of hours, after SCOFLA having blown off the previous instructions to do so without even acknowledging them.
That, and the Gore legal team was repeatedly caught falsifying evidence given to their expert witnesses rather than working with what they did have. Ugh...people should have been prosecuted for the fake paper, and the re-arranged punch cards, and so forth.
...and when it became clear that that wouldn't work, he kept going in a clear attempt to undermine the new President.
Yeah...various studies were done with various grade elementary school students totalling more than a thousand kids. Not one failed to execute the ballot properly.
Yeah...various studies were done with various grade elementary school students totalling more than a thousand kids. Not one child failed to execute the ballot properly.
Probably not. Breyer, after all, decided that the SCOFLA ruling was unconstitutional. The 5-4 decision just blocked them from kicking things down the road a few days, to the point where various other parts of the election system would kick in and make the SCOFLA and the vote count legally meaningless - though perhaps still politically damaging.
Personally, I think it was the oral argument by Katherine Harris' lawyer Joe Klock that turned the tide. When asked by the justices what the substantive standards should be, Klock said:
JUSTICE SOUTER: Mr. Klock, will you address Justice Breyer's question of a moment ago? If there were to be a uniform standard laid down, I suppose, at this point, by the Leon County Circuit Court, or in any other valid way, in your judgment, what should the substantive standard be?I recall that wording to the effect that voters have a responsibility to follow the instructions in the booth, made it into the final decision.MR. KLOCK: I'll try to answer that question. You would think -- I would -- you would start, I would believe, with the requirements that the voter has when they go into the booth. That would be a standard to start with. The voter is told in the polling place and then when they walk into the booth that what you are supposed to do with respect to the punch cards is put the ballot in, punch your selections, take the ballot out, and make sure there are no hanging pieces of paper attached to it.
The whole issue of what constitutes a legal vote, which the Democrats make much ado about, presumes that it's a legal vote no matter what you do with the card. And presumably you could take the card out of the polling place and not stick it in the box, and they would consider that to be a legal vote. The fact is, is that a legal vote, at the very basics, has to at least be following the instructions that you are given and placing the ballot in the box.
-PJ
This has the potential of a very funny FReeper thread.
I still cannot believe it has been 5 years already. I was a basket case back in those days, until this thing was settled. The media and Gore did a great disservice to this country, and we should return the same to them.
Some humiliation might help.
Ironic, when one considers that Al invented the US Supreme Court.
The federal Safe Harbor law on elections states that if it isn't resolved by the 7th day before the Electoral college meets in a manner in accordance with the law in place prior to the election, that the State Legislature may pick the electors for their states any way they want. Thus, it didn't come into play until midnight Dec 12th. The Florida State Legislature had prepped everything and was ready to go, but couldn't act until after that deadline - or they'd be changing the law and thus be inviting the USHoR to ignore the electoral college ballots.
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