Can you spell H-Y-P-O-C-R-I-T-E?

I can hardly imagine the level of BS that we'll be seeing if Bush assumes the presidency.

-- Shrub-a-duh-Dub (hanging@by.thread), December 08, 2000

Answers

Shrub-a-duh-Dub,

Can you show me ANYWHERE in the Florida laws that the Florida SC can do what they did today?

All that is being asked to be done is to STOP THE LAW FROM BEING BROKEN! Did I say that loud enough? The justices cannot write law. They are trying to do just that, as the Chief Justice so noted in his harsh words to the four baboons.

Show me the law, and I'll shut up!

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 08, 2000.

Do you hear circus music?

-- helen (b@c.k), December 08, 2000.

Here you go Sheeple:

102.166 Protest of election returns; procedure.--

(1) Any candidate for nomination or election, or any elector qualified to vote in the election related to such candidacy, shall have the right to protest the returns of the election as being erroneous by filing with the appropriate canvassing board a sworn, written protest.

(2) Such protest shall be filed with the canvassing board prior to the time the canvassing board certifies the results for the office being protested or within 5 days after midnight of the date the election is held, whichever occurs later.

(3) Before canvassing the returns of the election, the canvassing board shall:

(a) When paper ballots are used, examine the tabulation of the paper ballots cast.

(b) When voting machines are used, examine the counters on the machines of nonprinter machines or the printer-pac on printer machines. If there is a discrepancy between the returns and the counters of the machines or the printer-pac, the counters of such machines or the printer-pac shall be presumed correct.

(c) When electronic or electromechanical equipment is used, the canvassing board shall examine precinct records and election returns. If there is a clerical error, such error shall be corrected by the county canvassing board. If there is a discrepancy which could affect the outcome of an election, the canvassing board may recount the ballots on the automatic tabulating equipment.

(4)(a) Any candidate whose name appeared on the ballot, any political committee that supports or opposes an issue which appeared on the ballot, or any political party whose candidates' names appeared on the ballot may file a written request with the county canvassing board for a manual recount. The written request shall contain a statement of the reason the manual recount is being requested.

(b) Such request must be filed with the canvassing board prior to the time the canvassing board certifies the results for the office being protested or within 72 hours after midnight of the date the election was held, whichever occurs later.

(c) The county canvassing board may authorize a manual recount. If a manual recount is authorized, the county canvassing board shall make a reasonable effort to notify each candidate whose race is being recounted of the time and place of such recount.

(d) The manual recount must include at least three precincts and at least 1 percent of the total votes cast for such candidate or issue. In the event there are less than three precincts involved in the election, all precincts shall be counted. The person who requested the recount shall choose three precincts to be recounted, and, if other precincts are recounted, the county canvassing board shall select the additional precincts.

(5) If the manual recount indicates an error in the vote tabulation which could affect the outcome of the election, the county canvassing board shall:

(a) Correct the error and recount the remaining precincts with the vote tabulation system;

(b) Request the Department of State to verify the tabulation software; or

(c) Manually recount all ballots.

(6) Any manual recount shall be open to the public.

(7) Procedures for a manual recount are as follows:

(a) The county canvassing board shall appoint as many counting teams of at least two electors as is necessary to manually recount the ballots. A counting team must have, when possible, members of at least two political parties. A candidate involved in the race shall not be a member of the counting team.

(b) If a counting team is unable to determine a voter's intent in casting a ballot, the ballot shall be presented to the county canvassing board for it to determine the voter's intent.

(8) If the county canvassing board determines the need to verify the tabulation software, the county canvassing board shall request in writing that the Department of State verify the software.

(9) When the Department of State verifies such software, the department shall:

(a) Compare the software used to tabulate the votes with the software filed with the Department of State pursuant to s. 101.5607; and

(b) Check the election parameters.

(10) The Department of State shall respond to the county canvassing board within 3 working days.

Any more requests?

-- Shrub-a-duh-Dub (hanging@by.thread), December 08, 2000.

Shrub where in that does it say that the Florida SC can order a recount of partial counties? Where in it does it say that anyone other than the canvassing board can authorize a recount?

try again.

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 08, 2000.

Sheeple,

A) Who said anything about partial counties? They are recounting the UNDERVOTE, ie. the cards that could not be determined by the laser scanners.

B) The canvassing board is REQUIRED to authorize a recount under the circumstances listed in the statute I posted, which were met by the case underway Florida.

Did you even read it?

-- Shrub-a-duh-Dub (hanging@by.thread), December 08, 2000.

I read it... explain to me when the Florida SC became the canvassing board?

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 08, 2000.

Besides, it says that the canvassing board MAY AUTHORIZE a manual recount. Did you read it yourself?

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 08, 2000.

BOTTOM-LINE=WHATS BUSH AFRAID OF????

-- al-d. (dogs@zianet.com), December 09, 2000.

Shrub:

Post the law regarding contests-you have the wrong statutes-it is .168.

-- SydBarrett (dark@side.moon), December 09, 2000.

al-d,

I would say that Bush is afraid of Daley. If the kid is even half as good as the old man was at fixing elections, if you give Daley enough recounts, Bush would lose by a margin of more votes than were originally cast in the entire state of Florida.

-- J (Y2J@home.comm), December 09, 2000.

Friday, Dec. 8, 2000 7:06 p.m. EST

Florida Supreme's Chief Justice Pens Scathing Dissent

Nobody seemed to appreciate the danger of Friday afternoon's bombshell 4-3 ruling by Florida's Supreme Court more than its own chief justice, Charles Wells.

In a scathing excerpt from his minority dissent later cited by Bush spokesman James Baker, Wells wrote:

"I believe that the majority's decision cannot withstand the scrutiny which will certainly immediately follow under the United States Constitution.

"The majority's decision to return this case to the circuit court for a count of the undervotes from either Miami-Dade County or all counties has no foundation in the law of Florida as it existed on Nov. 7, 2000, or at any time until the issuance of this opinion.

"The prolonging of judicial process in this counting contest propels this country and this state into an unprecedented and unnecessary constitutional crisis.

"I have to conclude that there is a real and present likelihood that this constitutional crisis will do substantial damage to our country, to our state and to this court as an institution."

-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), December 09, 2000.

Shrub posted the LAW. The reason for the SC to step in was/is because Harris and Company figured they could just ignore the LAW and rush the thing through fast enough there could be no manual recount.

Toss-in Bush and his army of high-priced lawyers filing everything and anything to halt/stall the legally mandated recount process, and we are where we are.

Read 5-a-b-c. Also clearly Al Gore was/is perfectly within the LAW to ask for the three counties to be recounted he did. May "look" like he is trying to contest counties he has already won. May "look" like he is digging for votes in "his areas",,,,and guess what? He is, and the LAW says HE CAN.

Why many in this country cannot deal with the Law has to do with the fact many don't really give a shit bout no laws. Unless however they benefit them. You have been fed all sorts of crap from the RightWing talkingheads. One scan of the LAW shrub posted and one would hope your eyeballs would open and you would understand you are being taken for fools by conmen who really only care about their dumb newsletters and radio shows, not you or this country.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 09, 2000.

Doc,

It says that (5 c) manually recount ALL ballots. Not the undervotes/novotes, ALL of the ballots.

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 09, 2000.

Yep so let the counting begin!!!!

If Bush does have the most votes, lets eliminate all the freaking doubts.

The reasons against a full manual recount are as lame as the people spewing as much. What are they afraid of? If they have their own observers present, the counts are open, and it doesn't go their way, tough shit. If Bush's lead holds and confirmed, his presidency will be alot more legitimate than it otherwise could be. Do his supporters want him for four years with a cloud over his head? are you all that desperate for "justice"? for getting Clinton finally?

The games the Republicans have played, the money flushed and all the legal jockeying has now reduced the recount to "under-vote" ballots,,,I hoped you memes are proud of your efforts.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 09, 2000.

I'm not crazy about either of these yahoos, but I do think that Gore has a point. I agree with Doc- recount the entire state by hand and let that stand. If Bush is so certain he won, then he has nothing to fear from a recount.

-- Tarzan the Ape Man (tarzan@swingingthroughthejunglewithouta.net), December 09, 2000.

Doc, are you saying that they are recounting all of the votes not just selected ones? That is not what I heard on the news.

Also, did the Gore follow the time constraints within the law?

-- Dr. Pibb (dr.pibb@zdnetonebox.com), December 09, 2000.

Also, why did the Chief Justice of the Florida Supreme Court word his dissenting opinion in such a manner:

. "I believe that the majority's decision cannot withstand the scrutiny which will certainly immediately follow under the United States Constitution.

"The majority's decision to return this case to the circuit court for a count of the undervotes from either Miami-Dade County or all counties has no foundation in the law of Florida as it existed on Nov. 7, 2000, or at any time until the issuance of this opinion.

"The prolonging of judicial process in this counting contest propels this country and this state into an unprecedented and unnecessary constitutional crisis.

"I have to conclude that there is a real and present likelihood that this constitutional crisis will do substantial damage to our country, to our state and to this court as an institution."

-- Dr. Pibb (dr.pibb@zdnetonebox.com), December 09, 2000.

No they are not doing a full statewide recount, not needed anyhow. What is needed is a full hand recount in areas which used the "butterfly" ballot. Areas which used an SAT type of pencil fill- in the box don't need to be hand recounted as they do not suffer from the same problems.

Did a big old search one night about butterfly ballots, the company Votematic I think it was(who is now somebody else), and concluded for myself these type of ballots have a legendary past of being very inaccurate. There exists online minutes of city council meetings from all over America dealing with debates over should they be using this type of voting scheme. I have seen documents from the manufacturer stating up a 5% error rate could be experienced.

The current election(although not where Gore wanted to count, but the whole)is as close as any election for president ever. If these butterfly systems are 1% off this is compelling and requires a manual recount. Without this knowledge it may appear from all the samples, Gore loses all of them, fulls or mere samples. Maybe he does, but based on the long history of these terrible ballot systems a recount is required. Fact the counts are all over the board and vary from count to count is showing the inherent difficulty with these ballots, is it not? The two initial machine counts were off at least a thou, were they not? Bush's lead, pre-SC ruling of Friday was 537.

The judge rambling on here, and others elsewhere, simply do not understand how damn inaccurate these voting schemes really are.

Look, if Pat Buchanan has publically stated he doubts he had that type of support in Palm Beach, and some are filing lawsuits because they know they didn't vote for Pat, and statistically we have a clear indication at least 2,000 or more of these Buchanan votes are probably bogus, is this alone not an indication the integrity of these voting systems is highly questionable?(nice sentence Doc). All this in the context of an election less than 600 votes apart? or 200 as the FSC has now acknowledged?

I think the judge here from the SC needs a vacation.

The Lewis and Clark decisions about the Absentee Ballots Applications I think sets the precedence here. While finding there was clear misconduct(I feel criminal), they ruled even with this misguided action by the Florida Republican Party to add Voter Registration numbers after the fact, the vote was not degraded because of it(I disagree that they don't know that, what they did know is violations existed and the legal requirement was met). They voted the Will of the Voter must be heard in spite of the law. They basically said the Legislative law, the rules governing voting material integrity did not apply.

Like Lewis and Clark, the "crisis" in Florida has to do with Judges and Courts NOT following the LAW. That is what the US SC opinion was initially. The votes in Seminole and Martin should have been tossed, PERIOD.

The process has become a big Political Football. We should have had full manual recounts of Broward, Palm Beach, and Miami a freaking MONTH AGO and this whole damn thing would be over now. We have NOT had Miami. And they have not resolved the "undervote" issues in many other places including Broward and PB from my understanding.

I will at some point, tonight or tomorrow, link to the documents showing just how damn inaccurate butterfly ballots are. How there is a longstanding concern from many places over their use.

I doubt it will do anything to sway the opinions of most here. Little fact actually ever does.

I was absent around these boards for about a month after a thread about Phil Greenspun and a question about error notices saying an AOL Server was in use. NOBODY, not even resident techie-types presented the reason AOL Server error notices were appearing on some postings, or attempts.

I am also the guy who last year attempted to have the old TB2000 removed from the same Greenspun servers running over MITNet, a partially publically financed network. Based on that incident ALONE, one should understand why AOL Server notices appear on these boards. Sadly it doesn't and even a simple click to LUSENET and then to Phil's Book is not enough for many here who apparently do not want to really know things.

Notices appear because Phil Greenspun uses and is the legendary guy who improved the original AOL server scheme. IT IS his whole deal. The issue is at the heart of this board structure, the IT Dept at MIT and Phil himself. It is NO secret and links above go right to the damn information.

So when I post here, I understand I am posting in an environment where most are "chatting" frankly. I think many understand this and it is why many leave. The level of discourse is rather petty most times. Nothing inherently wrong with that. It is however tiresome and pointless to debate with people who do not know the facts, over and over. If many here cannot even explain an AOL SERVER notice using Lusenet, one is jumping in sheer lunacy to think they will be able to understand why this election a court issue.

But with all that said, I will research and provide the links to the problems with butterfly ballots.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 09, 2000.

Have a runoff election.

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), December 09, 2000.

as promised a link,

Just one as this article pretty well sums up the problems, concerns and includes some history.

http://the.wiretapped.net/security/textfiles/ri sks-digest/gauchat.voting

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 10, 2000.

So let me see if I understand this correctly Doc. In a very long winded fashion you just said that although section 5c is the law, we don't need to follow it.

-- Dr. Pibb (dr.pibb@zdnetonebox.com), December 10, 2000.

Course it needs to be followed, has been to a point and stopped.

This whole thing is absolutely a freaking NO BRAINER. Why is there opposition to a full manual recount? An open recount of votes cast using historically inaccurate methods, in an open way with observers from both interested parties. In an election for the President. In an election where the vote margin has bounced around from +2,000 to now +160 or so.

Sorry, the opponents have NO reason why a manual recount should not be done, and it has not been, even in the 3 areas Al Gore asked for a full month ago.

All BULLSHIT is what the Republican response has been, BULLSHIT.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 10, 2000.

Doc:

Once again you have things backwards. Does this come natural to you, or do you practice it all the time?

You write:

[Sorry, the opponents have NO reason why a manual recount should not be done, and it has not been, even in the 3 areas Al Gore asked for a full month ago.]

But this is manifestly NOT the way it works. By law, Gore must show WHY a recount should be done. It is NOT up to Bush to show why a recount should NOT be done. There were two counts, and Bush won both. Nobody alleges fraud, mistake, mechanical failure, act of God or anything else. The law says that absent these causes, a recount shall not be done. Gore is merely claiming that *MAYBE* he can "fahion" enough votes out of the undervotes, provided he gets to pick the counties and the rules! The law does NOT permit "fishing expedition" recounts simply because an election is close.

Let's make this clear and simple enough so that even you can understand. The recount opponents have the law on their said, not "NO reason." You may not LIKE this law since it doesn't permit "creative counting" until your guy wins, but it is the law.

And yet, despite what you say, the recount WAS done in two of those three counties. The USSC threw it out, the FSC put it back, and the USSC is about to throw it out again.

I'm starting to agree with Maria. Can you *really* dress yourself?

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), December 10, 2000.

No Flint, in the cases brought by the Republicans,,,it is UP TO THEM to show evidence why the legally mandated recounts of the 3 counties cannot proceed.

The ruling was,,,recount. Republicans for now a full month have stood in the way of the law.

Not that it matters, you are still under some delusion I give a crap who wins. Well I DO, it is called our Nation.

Have to be honest here, we may not make it and many will point to this incident as the beginning of the end. I am hoping most people are not paying much attention and will just carry-on with carrying on.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 10, 2000.

The Democrats wanted the recount in Miami-Dade. When the canvassing board said that they saw no reason to recount, the Democrats threatened to take them to court. My my my, seems like the Democrats don't even want to listen to their own people. Seems like the 3 precints that they had hand counted, were the only ones which would produce a gain for Gore. The rest of the precints were heavy Cuban, and went for Bush.

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), December 10, 2000.

Get your facts straight. The reason Miami-Dade stopped their counts was because there was insufficient time to do them.

-- Doc Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), December 11, 2000.

Doc,

That was the second time. I'm talking about the first time. You get your facts straight. The Dems threatened to take Miami-Dade to court if they didn't do a count.

-- (Sheeple@greener.Pastures), December 11, 2000.

Folks,

There is a difference in Florida law (and probably all other states' electoral laws) between "protest" and "contest".

According to my understanding, the "protest" procedures occurred (or, at least, started) before the certification by the Florida Secretary of State. The "contest" procedures are to "contest" that the certification was invalid in some respects and were started after the certification.

Although there might be (I don't know) some remnants of "protest" matters in legal cases still in progress, the legal cases currently in progress (such as what is now -- Monday, December 11 -- being argued before the U.S. Supreme Court) are mainly concerned with "contest" of the certification.

Now, a "contest" of the certification might _refer_ to "protest" matters that are alleged not to have been properly executed or something like that, but it should be understood that deadlines, time limits, and so forth specified for the "protest" period do NOT necessarily apply to the current "contest" period.

Shrub-a-duh-dub posted a section of law about the Florida "protest" period. Can someone post the corresponding section about the Florida "contest" period?

-- No Spam Please (nos_pam_please@hotmail.com), December 11, 2000.