Miltary Ballots Fraudulent

[Laurel]

All Clinton/Gore feelings aside (which we can discuss at a later date), do you agree that the votes should be correctly counted, as allowed by law? If the race leaned the other way - if it were Bush asking for a recount in a election this critically close - would you deny him a recount and award Gore the Presidency without all votes counted? I doubt it.

We're not talking about some strange procedure - recounts of this type have taken place often, just never in a Presidential election. If Bush truly is the people's choice, then a thorough recount of the entire state - in which representatives of both parties must approve of any questionable ballots - will only prove this. If not - if Gore really did garner more votes than Bush - then it is he that has won. Bush signed into law a mandatory manual recount clause in Texas, so all his protestations about the unfairness of manual recounts is a bit suspect.

Not counting the votes will not change the feelings of Florida or the nation. For any candidate to believe that he can count as many votes as he needs to win, then ignore all other votes and expect to be considered a leader when the majority of the population did NOT vote for him or had their votes nullified (whether they double-punched or forgot to sign their ballot or whatever the screwup was, it doesn't change their preference) is highly unrealistic.

George Bush is suing in FEDERAL COURT to stop a process that is mandated by Florida STATE law. He claims to be a proponent of states' rights, yet wants the Federal government to interfere in Florida.

In moments like this, we need to put aside our partisan feelings and ask what is REALLY fair and just and right. If situations were reversed, would we still feel the same way? Or are we asking that laws be bypassed so that our candidate can win?

Frankly, at this point I'd rather GWB won. It's like two dogs fighting over a rag doll - by the time the fighting's over, the doll's torn to bits. GWB will sit in office for 4 years, accomplish nothing (due in equal parts to the bitter partisan divide in Congress and GWB's lack of work ethic, experience, and leadership ability), and hopefully pave the way for a REAL leader in 2004.

 

[Weird Harold]

George Bush is suing in FEDERAL COURT to stop a process that is mandated by Florida STATE law. He claims to be a proponent of states' rights, yet wants the Federal government to interfere in Florida.

Not true. The law mandates A recount, which has been done. The state law does NOT mandate multiple recounts, or a recount by hand.

BTW, I don't consider it particularly hypocritical to sign something into law in one state, yet ask another state to follow their own law. Governers in many states have signed into law things they don't personally agree with, simply because they do not have the political support to oppose them.

In moments like this, we need to put aside our partisan feelings and ask what is REALLY fair and just and right. If situations were reversed, would we still feel the same way? Or are we asking that laws be bypassed so that our candidate can win?

If Gore wants an hand count of votes in Florida, let him petition for a hand count of ALL SIX MILLION PLUS, and not just those counties that are heavily democrat. Unless he can demonstrate that there is a significant statistical anomoly or other obvious error in the first two counts, he hasn't a prayer of getting a complete recount. I don't think he can prove the first two counts are legally flawed.

Have you read the four letters asking for consideration of amended counts? I think I would have granted amended totals for one of the three, where ballots were found to have not been counted. The other three were pretty pitiful attempts to change the mind of someone who had already said that the votes would be certified when and as required by law. (Which allows for some delays for "acts of God" like hurricanes, but makes no allowance for political wrangling.)

Since I voted for "nunya bums" I don't have a personal interest in who wins in the end. I do think that GWB is handling things much better than Gore is.

I do think that there are a lot of stupid people in the military. I worked with a good many of them over 21 years. Anyone who returned a ballot without a witness' signature should have their vote discounted as fraudulent. (Mostly those are NOT military absentee voters. The USAF at least provides "voting officers" to sign as witnesses and insure that USAF members know what it takes to have their votes count.

I am disturbed that many votes won't be counted because they have no postmark. None of my letters home from Vietnam were postmarked, because I was in an area that entitled me to write FREE in place of a stamp. I'm sure that there are areas where that rule applies now. (hazardous duty assignments, usually) If a ballot has a postmark, and that postmark is later than the deadline for mailing, then by law it must be disregarded. However, if there is no postmark, and it is received by the deadline for reception, it should be considered in the absence of any evidence it was mailed late under the innocent until proven guilty.

In the case of several thousand absentee applications that lacked a voter registration number, all I can say, is that I never knew my voter registration number the entire time I was in the service. (At that time, I voted in Oregon as it was my home of record.) Somebody in the election bureaucracy entered it on my applications for a ballot every time. Unless Florida law specifically prohibits assisting by looking up a number, then those votes should count as well.

 

[Unclebill]

I'll agree with you on Bush, Laurel, to a degree. He is NOT an inspiring leader. I did not vote for either of these clowns.

Given a choice between Bush and Gore, I'll take bush without the slightest reservation when Gore is the alternate choice. Why? Gore was in the office of VP with an oath of office to support and defend the Constitution and to enforce the laws of the United States of America.

He did neither in that he violated campaign laws which are largely the efforts of Democrats in Congress after the Nixon debacle of the 70's. He doesn't even have regard for laws HIS PARTY PASSED! The man has zero integrity or allegiance to the United States. He as well as Clinton took millions from the Communist Chinese government in campaign contributions. He supported and praised Clinton's actions in office even knowing (assuming he's not totally and completely stupid) that Clinton committed treason.

Look carefully at his proposed programs and his entire ideology; he's a Communist/Socialist with no respect for individual freedoms, rights or property. He evidences the collectivist principle of 'the end justifies the means' every bit as much as Clinton.

Bush does not inspire me as a leader by any stretch but he does impress me as NOT BEING A CRIMINAL. As governor of Texas, he has enforced the laws enacted by the Texas legislature. You can't legitimately accuse Gore of comparable/equivalent behavior.

It frightens me that there are enough people in the United States, a nation supposedly of free men with a government of laws not men, who are so gullible/stupid/inattentive that they are willing to even entertain the idea of voting for a thug like Gore or Clinton. It is MY life, freedom and property they are voting away.

I wish those who voted for Gore had to endure his governmental policies and those who voted for Bush had to endure his governmental policies and I had to live under Harry Browne's. I'll bet it wouldn't be long until Harry Browne got a LOT more votes when those voting for Gore and Bush could no longer steal my property and livelihood.

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

Bush signed into law a mandatory manual recount clause in Texas, so all his protestations about the unfairness of manual recounts is a bit suspect.

This argument isn't as hypocritical as you make it out be. As WH rightly points out, it's the Florida law that's in question here, not the Texas one. The two are very different. The Texas statute spells out explicitly how hand counts of punch card elections are to be recounted (for example, 1 hanging "chad" is considered a vote, etc). The Florida law leaves the determinations of ambiguously punched ballots to the individual counties.

The Republican argument is not that hand counts are inferior per se, but rather that without guidelines specifying what should be counted as a vote and what should not, individual counties are forced to what results is set standards on an ad hoc basis. There are potentially 67 different ways of determining the intent of voters who haven't entirely punched through their ballots. The Republicans argue that this unequal treatment the votes in different counties differently is thus a violation of the "equal protection" clause of the Constitution.

The Federal Courts seem loathe to intervene in how states run their elections, but as I see it, questioning this law this way is a legitimate argument, if not a winning one.

Not counting the votes will not change the feelings of Florida or the nation.

And neither will counting the votes if Gore is eventually named the winner following a recount. Approximately half of America will claim "justice has been done" and the other half will believe that Gore simply had better lawyers and strategists and managed to steal this election from under Bush's nose. This election is going to seem illegitimate to half the country either way. Continuing this only damages our electoral process further.

George Bush is suing in FEDERAL COURT to stop a process that is mandated by Florida STATE law. He claims to be a proponent of states' rights, yet wants the Federal government to interfere in Florida.

Yes. And I'm sure you've noticed that the Democrats have suddenly taken up the traditionally Republican states-rights position. The old saying is "Politics makes strange bedfellows" and in this case both parties are in bed with the opposition's usual argument on the proper balance of federal/state separation of powers in order to serve their momentary purposes.

[/i]Frankly, at this point I'd rather GWB won.[/i]

Does this mean you and I can party together at Bush's inauguration?


[Edited by Oliver Clozoff on 11-18-2000 at 09:50 AM]

 

[Cheyenne]

Does this mean you and I can party together at Bush's inauguration?

Can I come, too?

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

Of course! We'll sit back, have a drink, and clap as Laurel happily dances around with the "Internet Porn Madams Love Bush" t-shirt I plan on making for her.

 

[Cheyenne]

Of course! We'll sit back, have a drink, and clap as Laurel happily dances around with the "Internet Porn Madams Love Bush" t-shirt I plan on making for her.

LOL! I really WOULD go to see that!

 

[KillerMuffin]

• A Democratic Party activist filed suit in Seminole County on Friday seeking to invalidate at least 4,700 of the 15,000 absentee ballots cast before the election.

The suit contends that the county elections supervisor allowed Republican activists to write registration numbers on the contested absentee ballot requests -- nearly all of them from registered Republicans -- when the requests were mailed in without numbers.

The voters themselves were supposed to have written their registration numbers on the ballots themselves, the suit said. Seminole County voted 75,667 to 59,174 for Bush.

I'm not seeing the word military in here anywhere. The only place I did see military was here:

• Sen. John Warner, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, expressed "distress" Friday over reports that absentee ballots used by members of the military might not be counted because they weren't postmarked because of clerical errors.

In a letter to Defense Secretary William Cohen, Warner, R-Virginia, wrote: "My Senate office, and those of other Senators, are receiving calls and e-mails from constituents alleging that local elections officials are being asked not to count absentee ballots from overseas military personnel and their families which do not bear postmarks, although those ballots were received in the voter's state by the deadline set by state law.

"It is a fact, regrettably, that a number of absentee ballots from overseas U.S. military personnel do not bear a postmark," the senator continued, attributing the omissions to "human error."

Stupid military voters, forgot to hand cancel their own ballots legibly. For shame. Shame shame shame. How could those military voters be so unutterably stupid?

 

[Purple Haze]

Please allow me to articulate my sign language.

Laurel asked who's going to be the first one to call the military stupid, this was way too delicious to avoid. My experiences with stupidity in the Army are numerous, and I would tell about a few of them if I had the time, and I thought anyone was interested. I must point out however, that a lot of very intelligent people have chosen a career in the military, and had I stayed in the service, I would be receiving full retirement benefits today. Call me stupid.

Bigdog asked who would be the first one to call the Republicans stupid, way too tempting. After the shame and bullshit that came out of the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, the GOP could have the White House even if they had nominated a moron like Dan Quayle. Instead, they managed to find someone even less qualified. Is the Republican Party stupid? Mostly at the top. Dubyah will probably win, let's hope for the best. A vote for the Democrats is not that stupid.

Young Knave came right out and called the Democrats stupid. Spineless would be the better term. Let's put the blow-jobs in the Oval Office aside, and take a look at the record. Naturally a President in his first term has his eye on the second. For a "Card Carrying Liberal", Clinton was very moderate in his first term (only a right-wing extremist would argue this), and appealed to America's pocketbooks, assuring a second term (very much like Reagan). A President in his second term with no worries about re-election, could go ape-shit with his agenda if he wanted to. Our President continued to play it safe, politically, and eventually lost his power due to his penis. Very few Democrats showed support for their leader during the witch hunt. That would have been stupid, but it also would have shown some serious back-bone. As it turns out, this Democratic Party that turned it's back on the President (it's first two-termer since FDR, who was elected four times) ironically nominates someone from this tarnished administration. Stupid? (waves both arms) A vote for the Republicans is not that stupid.

Corruption? There's plenty to go around in both parties.

Half of America's eligable voters didn't think their vote would make a difference. Boy were they wrong! If they declared this one a draw, and forced a second nationwide election, how many people would vote this time?

 

[Ksss]

My thoughts on this election...scrap all of the votes, find two new candidates, and start over... I would like to cast my vote for Mickey Mouse! Btw, I didn't vote for either of them....

 

[Cheyenne]

My thoughts on this election...scrap all of the votes, find two new candidates, and start over... I would like to cast my vote for Mickey Mouse! Btw, I didn't vote for either of them....

And thank God for that, if you truly want to vote for Mickey. A basic requirement for voting should be that you have a brain and can use it.

Don't we look stupid enough to the rest of the world with this election mess without you providing yourself as an example of American voter stupidity? Mickey Mouse- give me a break!

 

[Ksss]

Actually, I should make a clarification here. My lame attempt at sarcasm, I am very sorry for that. I did vote, I do have useful and (most of the time) intelligent brain cells. I researched extensively all the candidates before I cast my vote. I have been reading the papers, watched the news. I know, just as every other American voter does what is occurring in this great country of ours, and I voted the way I saw fit, just as you did Cheyenne. Not saying any one party is right, but give me a break. With, how many states is it now??? 7??? recounting their votes?? Something/someone needs to intercede and say...this is the way it is going to be...how it always has been...this is it.

 

[Cheyenne]

Ksss- missed completely the sarcasm in your first post. Sorry. Guess I've run into too many people saying pretty much the same thing you did but they actually MEAN it!

 

[Ksss]

No problem cheyenne, I hope no offense was taken, none was meant. I sometimes forget that when typing people can not feel the inflection of the way words are meant to be taken. I too feel this is a very serious matter and am tired of hearing the jokes and whatnots surrounding this sorry affair. In my 40 years of life I can not ever remember an election which has been "popularized" like this one has.

 

[RisiaSkye]

Dump the Damn Electoral College Already

It occurs to me, as it has many times during this long, strange election, that it all comes back to that electoral college that we love so much. Institutionally, the Electoral College was allegedly to make sure that small (in population) states got fair representation in the election process. However, this is a lie in several ways.

1) Fair representation would be one person, one vote. Just because you draw lines around some of the people doesn't mean that your state has inflated worth in the election process of the entire nation. The electoral college ACTUALLY ensures that Californians and New Yorkers have devalued votes--a fact which is interesting, but not often discussed. Want some statistics? Arizona represents less than one percent of the actual voting population, yet almost 2 percent of the Electoral College votes. Consider it from the other side: California represents just over 1/8 of the voting populace, but counts for approximately 1/10 of the EC.

2) Those "high population" states which are being devalued by the electoral process contain large urban centers. These large urban centers have a statistically less "white" populace than many of the over-represented "small" states--like Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, etc. The Native American populations of many of these states have some of the lowest voter turnout records of anyone, incidentally. I'm sure this is only coincidence. But a potentially very politically important one.

3) The Electoral College was originally proposed by Southern Plantation owners, who were (at the time) responsible for an enormous part of the GNP, but had very few of the "people"--because most of their population was slaves--ineligible voters. The rationale is very similar to the 2/3 Law for Congressional representation, under which slave holding states were allowed to count slaves as *2/3 of a person* in order to get more representation in Congress.

4) If you actually believe in Individual Liberty, like many Libertarians and others suggest that they do, how can you justify a system which takes votes out of peoples' hands, and gives the state authority to decide who can vote for the entire population? Does the fact that it's the State, and not the Feds somehow make it less bureaucratic and more accountable? Hardly. Some states split their electoral college votes, some go all-or-nothing, and occasionally, someone "squirrels," ignoring the will of their State's voters in order to vote their "conscience." Remember that the EC voters have no standards, or job training. There is NO accountability.

It is interesting to me that while Republicans are crying about the election that Gore is trying to "steal," Libertarians are bitching about losing to the Commies and the Rednecks AGAIN, and Democrats are whining about ballot stuffing and unfair voting practices, pretty much everyone is united in the belief that the EC should stay.

Like my vote, my complaints don't really matter, despite the fact that Senate-Elect Clinton is already proposing a move to eliminate the EC. THIS WILL NEVER HAPPEN--there is no way that "small" states will just cede the enormously disproportionate power they were alloted 200+ years ago. The fact that this setup was largely designed to preserve the economic (and hence political) might of the Plantation South despite the fact that their slave population couldn't be counted as Human, much less as a voting constituency, doesn't make one bit of difference. Eliminating the EC would require a Constitutional Amendment--good luck getting that through the Senate, Hillary.

As a Californian, I, for one, still feel very confident that my vote DOESN'T count---a look at the popular vote vs. the inevitable election result tells me that, loud and clear. And don't go getting all gushy about Florida's large population and it being the swing state. The fact is, the only reason it came down to Florida is because they counted slower, and the electoral votes of the "small," conservative states had given Bush just enough gas to make a believable claim on the Presidency--despite being behind in overall votes, as well as the EC totals.

I'm a Californian, and thus only worth *2/3-4/5* of a vote. It's not that I'm so infatuated with Gore, either. It's a means to making a point: this is an incredibly liberal state, by and large--and it makes no difference that the enormous voting bloc of CA voted for Gore. Hell, he won the popular vote, in no small part because of California, but lost the election. So tell me again that my vote counts. Whatever your party--if you vote in another state, you're worth more.

 

[Laurel]

Well said, Risia. One person, one vote.

 

[ANiceGuy]

Me thinks we all lose in this election no matter who "wins"

If bush gets declared the winner over half the population will believe he did it by the republicans in Florida fixing the vote. Wether they have or not with all the legal fighting most of the population that voted for gore will feel cheated. 9and remember most of the countries population voted for gore)

If gore gets florida's electorial votes thrown out via court desisions most of the republicans will think he cheated in the courts and stole the election from them.

Neither will have any type of a mandate for any action and the congress is so evenly divided no one can get a real big plurality on any significant legislation.

The only person with any high card is Allen Greenspan. If bush boots him the country would get economic jitters real bad and maybe go into depression.

If gore wins he must appear to be doing what has kept the economy going good for the past few years and that is letting Greenspan do his thing.

In the mean time we can look forward to 4 years of a weak president with no mandate and a tarnished vote appearance no matter who is sworn in in January.

Sounds like we can figure on visiting Literotica a lot and having fun reading sexy stories for four years. That maybe the only untarnished thing in this election!!!! Thank you Laurel and Manu

ANiceGuy

 

[Weird Harold]

and remember most of the countries population voted for gore)

Consider:

The latest population figure I have for the USA is 250,150,000 (250 Million)

The only numbers I can find quickly on the poplualr vote, are "More than 100 million votes" and "96 million votes cast for president."

I make that as 38.4% of the population voted for president. Or Less than 19% of the population who voted for either Bush or Gore.

In other words, 2/3 of the USA abstained. Possibly because they were not presented with a viable candidate?

BTW, I have no idea how many of the 250 Million are elgible to vote. I think I remember a newscaster saying that 52% of elgible voters turned out. In any case, there were less than 25% of the elgible voters who voted for either Bush or Gore, which is nowhere near "most of the country's population"

 

[RisiaSkye]

Clarification/Correction

The slave counting for votes law was actually the 3/5 law--they were counted as 3/5 of a person, not 2/3. If you read my earlier post, I thought I'd correct myself before anyone else did. My rhetoric got ahead of me.

 

[Oliver Clozoff]

Good post, Risia. You bring up a very good question about what amounts to "equal voting". You argue that each individual's vote should carry equal weight as any any other person's regardless of their location. There are many arguments to be made for that position (and you made a lot of them well), but as a student of history, you know that that giving each voter perfectly equal vote in Presidential elections wasn't the founders intent.

The electoral college wasn't simply a white Southern planter tool foisted on the rest of the nation because of their economic power as you claim. It was born in the founders' fear of demagoguery and inherent distrust in the voting public to reject demagogues.

The "one person, one vote" doctrine that you mention is a legal interpretation of this clause of the 14th amendment: Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state....

I'm not a Constitutional scholar, (but I took 2 semesters of Constitutional law in college) and from what I've read, the framers' intent was to correct the process of apportioning representatives and presidential electors according to population by requiring the counting of blacks as whole people and not three-fifths of a person. Ever since its ratification, courts have been using the amendment to invalidate the redrawing of congressional districts.

The inequity in Presidential electors that's responsible for the disproportionate amount of power in the hands of smaller state voters, however, is not due to inequities addressed by the 14th amendment. Across the United States of America, each Congressional district contains approximately the same number of people (per the latest census) in accordance with the principle of "one-man, one-vote".

What is responsible for the increased amount of power given to voters of smaller states is the fact that there are 2 electors for each state representing the state's 2 senate seats. Under this system, of course, Alaska has the same number of Senators as California, causing Alaska to have proportionately more say than California when these 2 seats are added to the equally apportioned number of representatives. However, this is NOT a violation of the one-person, one-vote principle, since that principle was meant to apply to the election of Representatives.

The founders' intent for creating the electoral college was also to protect the interests of the states (something that's sometimes forgotten today). Look at the name of our country: The United States of America. It's not the "United People of America" or simply "America". The Constitution is drawn explicitly to divide power between the states and national government. The creation of the Senate with 2 Senators from each state was an attempt to give all states an equal voice in their national government.

If the people of America want to change this system, there is an established and time-honored method of amending the constitution. It's been done 26 times before. There isn't a monolithic support of the electoral college as you assert. I've read that it's been the most frequently challenged part of the Constitution in history. But you're right that it's certainly been resilient.

Will we get rid of it? Maybe, but I hope not. I live in a small state and don't want to see the Presidential election decided in the big cities of America. As it is, candidates are forced to come to us and make us promises in exchange for our electoral votes.

The best argument I've heard for keeping the electoral college, though, doesn't have anything to do with states rights. In an election decided by about 200,000 votes out of about 100 million, can you imagine the utter havoc that would be created by a national recount? Look at the madness in Florida and multiply it by 50.

That's the most frightening thought of all.

[Edited by Oliver Clozoff on 11-20-2000 at 10:18 AM]

 

[Unclebill]

http://www.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/11/17/president.election/index.html

A Democratic Party activist filed suit in Seminole County Friday seeking to invalidate at least 4,700 of the 15,000 absentee ballots cast before the election.

The suit contends that the county elections supervisor allowed Republican activists to write registration numbers on the contested absentee ballot requests -- nearly all of them from registered Republicans -- when the requests were mailed in without numbers.

The voters were supposed to have written their registration numbers on the ballots themselves, the suit said. Seminole County voted 75,667 to 59,174 for Bush.

- - - - - -

Florida old people mess up their ballots and everyone calls them stupid. The military, apparently, can't follow instructions either. Who's going to be the first to start calling the military stupid?

*silence*

Thought so. Interesting.

First question is how do you identify party affiliation on a secret ballot? Mine have never had party affiliation on them. None have ever had a registration number either. Just required a signature and post mark. The witness signature is only required if the voter cannot sign his name and must have his 'mark' witnessed.

For military personnel serving in a 'combat zone' aka 'hostile fire zone', there is no postage and thus no postmark required. That hardly fits the 'human error' posed by a congressman explaining the lack of a postmark.

If the ballots arrived late, they should be excluded like any others arriving after the cutoff date. The fervor of the Democrats' pursuit is tacit acknowledgement that the military people who have been disrespected and put in harm's way by the thug currently infecting and infesting the White House while masquerading as a leader occasionally have only one way to express their dissatisfaction and that is at the ballot box. Gore has no better record with the military than his idol so he knows to expect that absentee ballots many of which are military personnel will go heavily against him. Not a guarantee, but a really good bet if you're into wagers.

Having read the cited link, I failed to find the reference to registration numbers. I've never put one on an absentee ballot which I use every election. As to non-out of state postmarks invalidating an absentee ballot, perhaps it's local laws but it's non-sensical to me that you can't vote absentee if you choose whether you're at home or not.

There's also a difference between properly filing out the ballot and making an error in not postmarking it. If it wasn't signed, it's invalid and should not be counted but the postmark is a false argument for those in certain geographical locations.

And the outcry about the 'confusing ballot' wasn't an issue until the Democratic pollsters stirred up enough people to get on their let's steal the election bandwagon. That's why the Algore team wants the military vote discounted. Notice they're already starting to double play this one because of public backlash and some of the Algore camp are saying let the military ballots be counted. Again, he's playing both sides of the fence, about the only thing he does well.

And I've admitted before to having spent over a quarter century in the military. Trust me, they have their share of stupid and they're not all lower enlisted grades. But by and large, military people are honest and honorable and certainly they have enough exceptions to prove that rule as well. Did you also note the news reports that thousands of military personnel who requested absentee ballots never received them? Am I off the mark by suggesting that Clinton and Algore managed to mismanage this little administrative chore to disenfranchise military voters who they could very reasonably expect to vote against them? Certainly I could not suggest such a thing of an honorable Democrat!? But then that begs the question isn't that an oxymoron? Or is it merely a contradiction in terms?

But perhaps that is unfair. After all, I'm only making such statements based on eight years of observation of a routine behavior pattern carried out by the likes of James Carville (sp?), et al.

...what would we do if we ever got a honest man in that position???

You have the ability to put one there. Vote Libertarian! If there weren't so many voters out for a handout (Democrats/Socialist/Green/Socialist Workers/etc.) or out to exert control over the lives and property of others (Republicans/Socialist/Green/Socialist Workers/etc.), we would have a Libertarian government and we would not have military personnel all over the world being killed for the political future of some asshole like Clinton or Algore.

I'm not sure...I think that they're trying to take the high road - to be the kinder gentler party - and it's failing miserably. They need to start calling shit when they see it instead of being all mealy-mouthed. It pisses me off too.

I'm a bit mystified how character assassination is taking the high road. Look at the Democrat political hack attacks on the Florida Secretary of State. All she did to invite this vicious personal assault was act in accordance with existing law (perhaps Algore should try that once in awhile). And most of the advisors she consulted were Democrats in the Florida state government. But by her acting on their advice and their interpretations of existing case law, the Algore camp starting a siege of character assassination against her similar to that mounted by Clinton against Ken Starr, Paula Jones, Kathleen Willey, and the legal persecution of Linda Tripp. It's just more of the Democrats practicing the tactic they have raised to an art form, throw enough shit against the wall and some of it is bound to stick. Whether any of it is true is never a concern.

The Democrats are THE primary reason I'd like to see truth in advertising laws applied to political ads with some stringent penalties for violations. Unfortunately, that will never happen because the Democrats would have to stop advertising because they can't seem to create any kind of public relations campaign based on truth or reality. Without lies and character assassination, they have no cards to play.

So I'm really puzzled about your reference to taking the high road. If you see that as the high road or being kinder and gentler, you give me cause to question your principles, morals and ethics.

And thanks to Risia's quote below for another point on the Algore high road: in a black church he made a statement to the effect that Bush would make appointments to the Supreme Court which would revert to blacks being counted as 3/5 of a person. High road? Kinder gentler? Whatcha smokin? Oh, ya didn't inhale? I see!

The slave counting for votes law was actually the 3/5 law--they were counted as 3/5 of a person, not 2/3. If you read my earlier post, I thought I'd correct myself before anyone else did. My rhetoric got ahead of me.

[Edited by Unclebill on 11-21-2000 at 09:12 AM]

 

[Guest]

Look carefully at his proposed programs and his entire ideology; he's a Communist/Socialist with no respect for individual freedoms, rights or property. He evidences the collectivist principle of 'the end justifies the means' every bit as much as Clinton.

To the rest of the world hearing republicans calling Democrats "Communists" and Democrats calling Republicans "Fascists" is a source of never ending amusement at how ignorant Americans are.
Here is a lesson. It's a quick lesson because you Americans have a short attention span.

All politics is a continuum. Picture it as a straight line like this:

<1-------------5.5-------------10>
Left Right

The extreme conservative ideologies from around the globe are clustered around the right end (ie, points 8-10). Examples include the fascist Central American governments.

The extreme left ideologies from around the globe are clustered around the left end (ie, points 1-3). Examples included the old Eastern Bloc governments which are no longer in existence.

Most Western European countries including the UK, as well as Canada and Australia, would be clustered around the 4 to 5 section of the continuum.

Now we come to the USA. If the GOP is at point 6.1 on the continuum then the Democratic party is at 5.9.

In plain English: there is very little fucking ideological distance between the two.
You base your votes on personalities: eg, "I'm voting Dubya cuz he wears a cowboy hat and would have a beer with me without making me feel intellectually inferior!"

Yet you dummies act like its White Russians battling Red Russians.

Morons!

 

[Laurel]

LMMFAO! and those arrows at each end curve around a circle and end up point touching point. Communism and Fascism are quite similar in practice if not in theory. That's why I always say that truth lies in the middle, NOT at the extremes.

There are so many points on this thread that I want to respond to, but it would be a book of a post and I'm neck-deep in other stuff right now. Someone bookmark this thread for me and send it to me after I get back from Switzerland, will ya?

 

[Daytripper]

Got to keep your eye on the moving ball.

4,9XX votes in Seminole county, Bush votes, improved by Bush election officials, under the gun-suit filed to throw them out.

If that flies, Bush will be in the hole by 4 K votes-don't you know the Bushies know that.

Incidently, local Jax TV relates that Duval has ALWAYS thrown out unpostmarked military ballots and has done that as far back as anybody can remember. Duval was and is a heavily Republican county.

 

[Daytripper]

Another thing: I can't help but notice that the GOP has made the most outrageous, misleading and false statements:

* manual recounts are flawed and not more accurate than machine counts. (False)

* Buchanan votes in Palm Beach Co. could have been legitimate votes (preposterous and statistically shown to be off by >2000)

* Butterfly ballot was designed by a Democrat and therefore could not be detrimental to Democrats. (Stupid.)

* Rejecting overseas ballots lacking postmarks is deliberate effort to disenfranchise "our men in uniform." (Has always been the policy in the past due to likelihood of fraud from absentee ballots.)

* Voters in panhandle were "disenfranchised" because the election was "called" for Gore 15 min. before polls closed. (No evidence reported from those counties, no corrolation shown from studies around the country, and voters would have CHOSEN not to vote in this case.)

* Fallen chad is evidence of wrong-doing in manual counting process. (Chad falls in the machines as well. Irrelevant.)

* Democratic counters are EATING the chad to hide evidence. (Insane!)

It goes on and on. The repubs will lose their court cases, I predict. The GOP is so accustomed to being able to feed their illogical pablum to gullible people throughout the country that they are unprepared when faced with a bench of intelligent, bullshit-detecting judges.