Did Al Gore rightfully win Florida?

[GuitarDaddy]

There is no question to an informed person that Gore was the people's choice IMO.

:thumbsup: I concur

 

[Craig234]

There were many recounts after the fact, using many different methodologies. In all but one, Bush won.

You are a liar.

The consortium created nine possible rules for the recount; in 4 of the 9, Gore won.

In EVERY method that included overvotes - which were constitutionally required to be counted, because the constitution says every vote where intent is clear has to be counted - Gore won. As I explained before, overvotes are when the voter makes duplicate voting on a ballot, usually punching AND writing the name.

 

[hal2kilo]

You are a liar.

The consortium created nine possible rules for the recount; in 4 of the 9, Gore won.

In EVERY method that included overvotes - which were constitutionally required to be counted, because the constitution says every vote where intent is clear has to be counted - Gore won. As I explained before, overvotes are when the voter makes duplicate voting on a ballot, usually punching AND writing the name.

Not to even mention all the voter caging and other shenanigans the RepubliCons pulled to deny the vote to the people.

 

[OCGuy]

The tears in this thread make me smile.

 

[werepossum]

You are a liar.

The consortium created nine possible rules for the recount; in 4 of the 9, Gore won.

In EVERY method that included overvotes - which were constitutionally required to be counted, because the constitution says every vote where intent is clear has to be counted - Gore won. As I explained before, overvotes are when the voter makes duplicate voting on a ballot, usually punching AND writing the name.

I referenced this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A12623-2001Nov11.html

In all likelihood, George W. Bush still would have won Florida and the presidency last year if either of two limited recounts -- one requested by Al Gore, the other ordered by the Florida Supreme Court -- had been completed, according to a study commissioned by The Washington Post and other news organizations.

But if Gore had found a way to trigger a statewide recount of all disputed ballots, or if the courts had required it, the result likely would have been different. An examination of uncounted ballots throughout Florida found enough where voter intent was clear to give Gore the narrowest of margins.

You are right about one thing; the consortium did identify four ways in which Gore could have won, and five in which Bush won.
wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_election_recount

Candidate outcomes based on potential recounts in Florida presidential election 2000
(outcome of one particular study)[8][clarification needed]
Review method Winner
Review of all ballots statewide (never undertaken)
• Standard as set by each county canvassing board during their survey Gore by 171
• Fully punched chad and limited marks on optical ballots Gore by 115
• Any dimples or optical mark Gore by 107
• One corner of chad detached or optical mark Gore by 60
Review of limited sets of ballots (initiated but not completed)
• Gore request for recounts of all ballots in Broward, Miami-Dade, Palm Beach, and Volusia counties Bush by 225
• Florida Supreme Court of all undervotes statewide Bush by 430
• Florida Supreme Court as being implemented by the counties, some of whom refused and some counted overvotes as well as undervotes Bush by 493
Unofficial recount totals
• Incomplete result when the Supreme Court stayed the recount (December 9, 2000) Bush by 154
Certified Result (official final count)
• Recounts included from Volusia and Broward only Bush by 537

Interestingly, every method of counting requested or demanded by the Gore team had Bush winning. The one method he rejected - a full statewide recount - was the only way he could have one. (Of course, that's assuming the Democrats would not have continued to manufacture votes - a bloody poor assumption.)

Also interestingly, I happened to be in Florida (specifically in Bradenton) the day of the election to meet with the city officials. The meeting never happened because they were all aflutter trying to solve an election crisis. Seems that on election day the Gore team had dispatched teams of lawyers to many if not most districts to specifically challenge military absentee ballots. Florida had a few years back been taken to federal court by the federal government over this very issue because, since military ballots mailed from deployed posts do not have postmarks, they did not meet the letter of Florida law and were disqualified. Most city officials were unaware of the agreement reached, where Florida agreed to accept federal law in federal elections per federal law and count military absentee ballots, and thus had no idea how to answer this disenfranchisement. I've always wondered if the disqualified military ballots were ever recounted. I've also thought that a premeditated mass effort to disenfranchise the very people deployed to protect our democratic republic is about the lowest political stunt I've ever seen. Had I had any doubt that Gore is a total lowlife - and a clear majority in his native Tennessee obviously had no such doubts else he'd have been President - that would have removed them.

 

[DucatiMonster696]

http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/when_the_votes_were_recounted_in_florida.html

In all likelihood Bush would of won either way you cut it.

 

[Greenman]

You can`t be so clueless as to think that Mccain & Palin could be doing any better????

They probably wouldn't have done much worse, and would have been about three trillion cheaper.

 

[dali71]

http://www.factcheck.org/askfactcheck/when_the_votes_were_recounted_in_florida.html

In all likelihood Bush would of won either way you cut it.

Shh, liberals don't want to hear anything that challenges the myth of the "stolen" election.

 

[Craig234]

Fact is, the Florida constitution required counting 'every ballot where the voter's intent could be determined', and that included overvotes - so that while they were not in the current recount ordered, not in the requst by Gore, there is an issue that they would have come up and have had to be added to the recount - but more relevant to the discussion of 'who really won', they clearly show that voters intended to elect Gore.

And as I said, that's just the 'official ballots', putting aside all the other election flaws.

 

[manimal]

I always think the voter registration fraud outcries are to hide the real voter counting fraud via electionic paperless voting..


How voting reform hasnt been adressed I have no idea...



When a third world country has a cleaner election than the US we have some problems....

 

[Craig234]

I always think the voter registration fraud outcries are to hide the real voter counting fraud via electionic paperless voting..


How voting reform hasnt been adressed I have no idea...



When a third world country has a cleaner election than the US we have some problems....

Something with electronic voting is that there's no 'smoking gun', as there is for several issues with Florida 2000.

There is some strong statistical evidence that there are issues, where highly reliable exit polls were wrong in ways that can't be explained, but no 'hard proof' of fraud.

However, the simple facts of the possibility of fraud that lack measures to catch it is a problem, whether fraud is proven or not.

 

[Infohawk]

You guys are being trolled by Anarchist. He's got skills.

 

[ProfJohn]

Fact is, the Florida constitution required counting 'every ballot where the voter's intent could be determined', and that included overvotes - so that while they were not in the current recount ordered, not in the requst by Gore, there is an issue that they would have come up and have had to be added to the recount - but more relevant to the discussion of 'who really won', they clearly show that voters intended to elect Gore.

And as I said, that's just the 'official ballots', putting aside all the other election flaws.

Fact is the US constitution states that all voters are to be treated equally (14th amendment) so the hand recount of votes in Democratic counties but not in Republican counties would have violated the constitution. 7 out of 9 Supreme court judges saw this as a problem.

Al Gore screwed himself by not asking for a state wide recount.

 

[Genx87]

You can`t be so clueless as to think that Mccain & Palin could be doing any better????

How you arrived at that has to be an amazing story.

 

[JEDIYoda]

How you arrived at that has to be an amazing story.

You can`t be that clueless.....well I guess you can!!

I will say this one more time anybody else elected would have done far worse that Obama..

 

[Craig234]

Fact is the US constitution states that all voters are to be treated equally (14th amendment) so the hand recount of votes in Democratic counties but not in Republican counties would have violated the constitution. 7 out of 9 Supreme court judges saw this as a problem.

Al Gore screwed himself by not asking for a state wide recount.

What was needed was a *statewide* recount, which is what the State Supreme Court had ordered.

As for consistency, *every state* lacks 'consistency' across counties, and if the Court applied that standard, every state and nation election would be invalidated.

Hence, the Supreme Court making this decision - some reports say it's the only time they have done so - not a precedent for any other case, only applying to this one state in 2000.

And by the way, that was the issue, it was not the issue of only limiting the recount to the challenged counties - which was the official procedure.

Rather, it was the invented issue that in the *statewide* recount, there was no statewide standard for exactly how to recount that was the same.

This was nothing more than the Bush team coming up with a pretense the pro-Bush justices could use to hide behind - exposed with their 'applies to this one case only' limit.

By December 8, 2000, there had been multiple court decisions regarding the Florida presidential election[8] and on that date the Florida Supreme Court, by a 4-3 vote, ordered a statewide manual recount.[9] On December 9, the U.S. Supreme Court voted 5-4 to stay the Florida recount, because according to Justice Scalia:

...The counting of votes that are of questionable legality does in my view threaten irreparable harm to petitioner Bush, and to the country, by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election. Count first, and rule upon legality afterwards, is not a recipe for producing election results that have the public acceptance democratic stability requires.

So, Scalia was *assuming* Bush would win, and that *counting the votes* could 'irreperably harm' Bush by casting doubt on the legitimacy of his election! As the four dissenters said, you don't cause irreperable harm by counting all votes.

 

[dmcowen674]

Did Al Gore rightfully win Florida?

I think he may have, but I don't know what Party Florida's legislature was at the time, so I don't know for sure. Their Sec. of State was Republican and Bush's brother was Governor and a Republican, if in name only, so iI'm really puzzled as to whether Bush or Gore won.

The fact that SCOTUS snatched the case out of the Florida State Legislature's hands boggles my mind even more.

I personally think the Florida State Legislature should've had the final word, even if they didn't choose Dick and Bush.

Possession is 9/10th of the law as evidenced by Wisconsin now

 

[colonel]

Fact is the US constitution states that all voters are to be treated equally (14th amendment) so the hand recount of votes in Democratic counties but not in Republican counties would have violated the constitution. 7 out of 9 Supreme court judges saw this as a problem.

Al Gore screwed himself by not asking for a state wide recount.

that means Neocons stole the election 2000

 

[Jaskalas]

There were many recounts after the fact, using many different methodologies. In all but one, Bush won. So had the votes been counted one particular way, Gore would have won, otherwise Bush won. Of course, as Senator Franken shows, had the Dems been allowed to recount enough times, Gore would doubtless have won. When Dems really, really need votes, they tend to appear in Democrat-controlled districts.

They appear in the back of car trunks, with absolutely no chain of custody.

 

[MovingTarget]

SCOTUS should have never taken the case they way they did. With the controversies surrounding florida, their delegation should not have been seated in hte EC. This would have ensured that it got kicked to the house of representatives. Bush still would've won, but he would have won legitimately then.

 

[Jaskalas]

The tears in this thread make me smile.

Their delusions of Gore winning are quite distant from reality, and require ignoring the news reports from the following year. This dissonance should not make you smile, it should make you wonder how there hasn't been a great deal of bloodshed.

There is only room for one reality, the longer the two sides persist the more likely they are to collide.

 

[Anarchist420]

I think that Craig makes some good points.

The main thing that makes me think that Gore probably won FL is that voters confused him with Buchanan on the butterfly ballots in counties with large Jewish populations.

Still, Bush was the lesser of the two poisons and people who think Gore wouldn't have gone into Iraq or done something equivalent are complete idiots. With Gore, we still would've had the equivalent of the PATRIOT Act, the citizens would've been even more disarmed and we would've at least had the equivalent of Iraq (he defended nation-building in the debates, Lieberman would've been VP, and Gore voted for the first Gulf War while then-Governor Bush was against nation-building).

 

[Anarchist420]

:thumbsup:

Their delusions of Gore winning are quite distant from reality, and require ignoring the news reports from the following year. This dissonance should not make you smile, it should make you wonder how there hasn't been a great deal of bloodshed.

There is only room for one reality, the longer the two sides persist the more likely they are to collide.

 

[Genx87]

You can`t be that clueless.....well I guess you can!!

I will say this one more time anybody else elected would have done far worse that Obama..

I am asking how you arrived at me calling Obama Bush 2.0 equals me saying McCain would be better? Talk about being clueless.