Posted on 10/21/2001 3:35:12 PM PDT by Timesink
First, read the SMH's story, from Monday morning's edition, about the media's Florida rerererererererecount:
By Charles Laurence in Washington
The most detailed analysis yet of the contested Florida votes from last year's presidential election - with the potential to question President George Bush's legitimacy - is being withheld by the news organisations that commissioned it.
Results of the inspection of more than 170,000 votes rejected as unreadable in the "hanging chad" chaos of last November's vote count were ready at the end of August.
The study was commissioned early this year by a consortium including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and The New York Times and the broadcaster CNN. The cost was more than $A2million.
Now, however, spokesmen for the consortium say that they decided to postpone the story of the analysis by the National Opinion Research Centre at the University of Chicago for lack of resources and lack of interest in the face of the enormous story after the September11 attacks.
Newspapers were saying last week that the final phase of the analysis, counting the 170,000 votes, had been postponed.
"Our belief is that the priorities of the country have changed, and our priorities have changed," said Steven Goldstein, vice-president of corporate communications at Dow Jones, owner of The Wall Street Journal.
Catherine Mathis, a spokeswoman for The New York Times, said: "The consortium agreed that because of the war, because of our lack of resources, we were postponing the vote-count investigation. But this is not final. The intention is to go forward."
However David Podvin, an investigative journalist who runs an independent Web page, Make Them Accountable, said he had been tipped off that the consortium was covering up the results.
He refused to disclose his source other than to describe him as a former media executive whom he knew "as an accurate conduit of information" and who claimed that the consortium "is deliberately hiding the results of its recount because [former Democrat vice-president Al] Gore was the indisputable winner".
He also claims that a New York Times journalist involved in the recount project had told "a former companion" that the Gore victory margin was big enough to create "major trouble for the Bush presidency if this ever gets out".
"The goosiness, the sensitivity, that the press which organised this analysis is now showing to publishing the results and the persistence of questions about the Florida ballots raise questions," said Dr John Mason, a professor of political science at William Paterson University, in New Jersey.
"There is a sensitivity over the legitimacy of this president."
National Opinion Research Centre staff have been puzzled by the idea that the media would lack the resources because, they said, they had computer programs already designed and fitted for the final count.
Now, read the original version of the story, from Sunday's Telegraph. I have italicized the paragraphs that the SMH intentionally deleted.
Did Al Gore win after all? US newspapers would rather not say
By Charles Laurence in New York
(Filed: 21/10/2001)
THE most detailed analysis yet of the contested Florida votes from last year's presidential election - with the potential to question President Bush's legitimacy - is being withheld by the news organisations that commissioned it.
Results of the inspection of more than 170,000 votes rejected as unreadable in the "hanging chad" chaos of last November's vote count were ready at the end of August.
The study was commissioned early this year by a consortium including the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times, the nation's most powerful newspapers, and the broadcaster CNN.
It was regarded as a means of supplying final answers to the nagging questions over President Bush's razor-thin victory margin. The cost was more than £700,000.
Now, however, spokesmen for the consortium say that they decided to "postpone" the story of the analysis by the National Opinion Research Centre (NORC) at the University of Chicago for lack of resources and lack of interest in the face of the enormous story of the September 11 attacks and the subsequent "war on terrorism".
Newspapers were saying last week that the final phase of the analysis, the actual counting of the 170,000 votes, had been "postponed" but would become known at an appropriate time.
America's liberal newspaper establishment originally set up the commission in the belief that it would discover that Al Gore was the winner of the Florida count.
Their hope for a Gore victory appears to have been sacrificed on the altar of patriotism and a perception that America needs to be led into war by a strong president.
"Our belief is that the priorities of the country have changed, and our priorities have changed," said Steven Goldstein, the vice-president of corporate communications at Dow Jones and Co, the owners of the Wall Street Journal.
Catherine Mathis, a spokesman for the New York Times, said: "The consortium agreed that because of the war, because of our lack of resources, we were postponing the vote-count investigation. But this is not final. The intention is to go forward."
However David Podvin, an investigative journalist who runs an independent web page, Make Them Accountable, said he had been tipped off that the consortium was covering up the results.
He refused to disclose his source other than to describe him as a former media executive whom he knew "as an accurate conduit of information" and who claimed that the consortium "is deliberately hiding the results of its recount because Gore was the indisputable winner".
He also claims that a New York Times journalist who was involved in the recount project had told "a former companion" that the Gore victory margin was big enough to create "major trouble for the Bush presidency if this ever gets out".
He believes that the inspection, carried out over months by a team from NORC, proves that Mr Gore won Florida and, therefore, the election.
That theory, however, is countered by the NORC staff who say that they designed the inspection programme so that no one has yet counted the votes and no outcome could be known.
Dr John Mason, a professor of political science at William Paterson University, in New Jersey said: "The goosiness, the sensitivity, that the press which organised this analysis is showing to publishing the results and the persistence of questions about the Florida ballots raise questions. There is a sensitivity over the legitimacy of this president."
Staff at NORC have been puzzled by the idea that the media would lack the resources because, according to them, they have computer programs already designed and fitted for the final count.
Julie Antelman of NORC said: "They are all ready to go, and could have the count and the result within a working week."
She added: "We very carefully kept our distance from the political implications of whatever the result may be. We do not know the outcome, and do not want to.
"Our job was to prepare the raw data which goes into the counting programs: we are simply waiting for the order to deliver this data to the consortium, which we expected within the first two weeks of September."
NORC analysts studied each of the 170,000 votes which were discarded because they were considered spoiled or simply unreadable. Each ballot paper has now been analysed and recorded to the ballot box and constituency where it was cast.
French and Canadian newspapers suggest that the black-out can only raise suspicions, and the issue is being increasingly aired on the internet.
Dr Mason said: "It would be responsible to complete this study and produce the result, whatever it may be."
Let this be a lesson to us all: NEVER trust anything published by a newspaper that intentionally rewrites stories to ADD LIBERAL BIAS! Spread the word!
During recounts, discarded ballots are not included. Prior "recounts" dealt only with the issue of the chads and dimples. This sounds like it was a much wider set of ballots than was ever considered before. However, I suspect that they didn't bother to examine military ballots discarded due to problems with the postmarks.
This says it all.
If you are to stupid to fill out a ballot properly don't vote.
This is my final comment on this subject,it's old news,if I see another post about it I won't waste my time responding.
I was already shown that if the recount was conducted on Gore's terms, that Bush would have won by an even larger margin.
Bush won the count, the recount, re-recount, the re-re-recount under Gore rules that were later rejected by the Supreme Court as unconstitutional...and the media recount.
Now these losers invent brand new definitions of what a vote is, and count "votes" that have never been legal at anytime and want to tell us therefore Gore really won.
These liars will never stop fabricating more lies in order to avoid facing reality.
I hope they are making themselves miserable.
"We don't have time for this stuff anymore." Tony Snow
However David Podvin, an investigative journalist who runs an independent web page,BARF ALERT! Make Them Accountable
First of all, Mr. Podvin is merely a contributor to the site quoted, not the one who runs it. This is from their front page where a person named Caro makes that correction.
Second, this site is obviously a left-wing online gossip page dedicated to proving albore won the election.
Would have been nice if the story writer, either from the Telegraph or the Sydney Morning Herald, had checked the source for validity and bias.
But, I shouldn't expect much from a leftist media...
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