posted on November 11, 2000 09:54:26 AM
There Are NOT 19,000 People Who Did Not Vote
Mary Matalin did some legwork on this ballot issue, and found that those 19,000 double-punched ballots were not the ballots of 19,000 people who were disenfranchised.
When you double punch a ballot, it's disqualified. A ballot, which selects two candidates where only one is allowed to be chosen, is automatically disqualified. It's not discrimination or anything else. It's not new or specific to Palm Beach County.
It's the law and has been for decades.
Regardless, Mary Matalin called a poll worker in Palm Beach County and guess what she learned? These disputed 19,000 ballots were discarded. They came from people who went on to recast their vote after having made a mistake - a mistake that was caught and corrected.
In other words, it's not 19,000 people who double punched a ballot, turned it in, then had it discovered and thrown out. These are people who knew that they had made the mistake of double punching the ballot, requested a new ballot, and recast their vote.
This revelation puts an entirely different light on those 19,000 ballots, so why is it that Mary is the only one who has called this poll worker to questions about it?
posted on November 11, 2000 10:09:56 AM
Meya, I heard this yesterday, and its funny how it wasn't reported more widely thru the media.
Those 19,0000 votes that they kept saying were disqualified all this time, were in fact, NOT. They did what in our state they call: Spoiled. The person will bring it back to the worker, and tell them they made a mistake, here they are marked Spoiled on both sides and NOT torn, but put in a separate place. Then the voter is given a NEW ballot, and this is exactly what happened in Florida. (Though I don't think they call or mark them spoiled, I don't know what they do with them)
So those people actually did vote.
I was not putting in anything into any discussion boards, but will add this here:
The Republican party (AS would the Dem. party if reversed) is NOT wanting a manual count because there IS more human error in a hand/manual count. If a worker finds any loose 'chards' or whatever is on that ballot, they may decide to put it down to the closest they think. It HAS happened, and that is why there are machines to count, and holes to punch, CERTAIN areas to mark, if its done with pencil.
Whether those ballots were hard to figure out, I don't know. I like the voting system that Southern CA? put in place, the touch screen monitor. They should, I suppose, add on to it, something like a computer would do:
You 'touch' which one you want, then a second screen should come up, saying Are you sure?
And this is not making fun of any Senior citizens in Florida, hell, my dad lives in St. Pete for the winter, he is 78 years old, and votes, he may have gotten mixed up, I don't know the ballot system in that particular county.
The first lawsuit I saw was from a guy, who did not look like a senior citizen. And how does he know for sure he cast a vote for Buchanan? Names are never on the actual ballot, so they cannot sort thru each one, and grab names off of them. It would be hard to prove in a court, but you never know what will become of that.
posted on November 11, 2000 10:26:02 AM
Without making a whole lot of comment on this situation, here's a funny observation made by my 19 year old son who is taking political science this sememster:
"If Al Gore invented the internet, then why doesn't he trust computers to count the votes?"
posted on November 11, 2000 10:29:14 AM
Mary Matalin is a professional "spinner" for the Republican Party. She is married to James Carville, who is a professional "spinner" for the Democratic Party. Wouldn't you love to be a fly on the wall in THEIR house? Now they must TRULY be in LOVE.
posted on November 11, 2000 12:45:04 PM
Yes, let's do put our faith in the one nameless little poll worker who is privvy to knowledge that no one else has, apparently not even his/her fellow little poll workers.
There's so much crap flying around that we'd all be better served if we first consider the source of such nuggets and then take a moment to actually think about whether they make any sense.
posted on November 11, 2000 01:09:55 PM
Not only is the guy who filed the first lawsuit not a senior citizen, he is a Democratic activist!
"It turns out that Andre Fladell, a supposed "confused" Palm Beach County voter, who was trotted out to the media as someone who inadvertantly cast his ballot for a candidate other than his choice, is a longtime Democrat activist.
Fladell, in a story by New York Times Broward-Palm Beach Online in dec., 1999 said 'Politics is the greatest challenge. It's where the best and worst in people comes out. You get the adrenaline of war without having to physically hurt anyone'"
This is from an article in Free Republic.com, sorry, I can't remember how to post a link.
posted on November 11, 2000 06:12:09 PM
There are also 25,000 plus similar ballots in another Florida county - only this county went 60% Bush and 40% Gore. Obviously, we will have to recount and "interpret" the intention of these voters as well. Let this process go on forever and the US House of Representatives will eventually settle this in favor of Bush. The only negative is that the Senate may end up giving the VP slot to Lieberman. That would be pretty funny, eh?
posted on November 11, 2000 06:38:28 PM
As a long time public official who has had to certify many elections, I can tell you that there are MANY spoiled ballots. The returnees of the spoiled ballots are given fresh ballots and allowed to revote. However in pragmatic Maine, when the ballot is *spoiled* the registrar of voters marks it spoiled in red ink, the same way you would void a check.
In each district the registrar of voters is ultimately responsible for compliance. Think of that the next time you vote.
posted on November 11, 2000 06:53:26 PM
[i]Not only is the guy who filed the first lawsuit not a senior citizen, he is a Democratic activist!
"It turns out that Andre Fladell, a supposed "confused" Palm Beach County voter, who was trotted out to the media as someone who inadvertantly cast his ballot for a candidate other than his choice, is a longtime Democrat activist.
[/i]
Sweetpea, is there some reason his "democratic activist" status should disqualify him from trying to pursue his legal rights?
posted on November 11, 2000 06:54:10 PM
Actually he was on the today show with matt lauer & bill bennett on thursday. He wasn't too excited. He was pretty laid back , surprisingly.
posted on November 11, 2000 06:56:56 PM
James Carvelle was on the Today Show Friday morning along with a spokesman for the GOP as well.
James said he thought that they needed to send someone into the newsrooms across the country and start shooting people with tranquilizer guns!
While I don't normally agree with Carvelle, that comment had a great deal of merit. The media has been feeding this frenzy in a totally unresponsible way. They give half the story and call it truth. They continue to hang on the vote totals from the AP, and ignore the totals given by Florida election officials. The true story behind the 19,000 so called thrown out ballots has been twisted and edited down to perhaps half the truth, which just incites people who insist on believing everything that comes from the pen of CNN or MSNBC, or the King of twisted news, the AP.
The sad fact is, with the media handling it the way they are, the American people will never really have the entire true story. If a revolt starts, it should be revolt against mainline media. The American people, no matter which side of the political fence they happen to be on, deserve truth, not just what the media wants you believe.
posted on November 11, 2000 07:03:27 PM
Meya~ that was pecisely the newscast that I saw.Maybe it was FRiday morning I was in the ellipse trainer working out. I was actually surprised at Carville's astute remarks. He pointed out quite APTLY that the media is keeping this story front and center due to lack of world news. Now we are looked at as buffoons on the world stage.
I agree with him. We will have a new president sooner or later.
I think Al Gore's greatest fear is HILLARY in 2004. Maybe HILL will divorce BILL and Al will divorce Tipper. CLINTON+GORE 2004!
While I don't normally agree with Carvelle, that comment had a great deal of merit. The media has been feeding this frenzy in a totally unresponsible way. They give half the story and call it truth. They continue to hang on the vote totals from the AP, and ignore the totals given by Florida election officials. The true story behind the 19,000 so called thrown out ballots has been twisted and edited down to perhaps half the truth, which just incites people who insist on believing everything that comes from the pen of CNN or MSNBC, or the King of twisted news, the AP.
I saw that interview too. He wasn't his usual self at all.
What you said above about the news media shouldn't be a surprise. It's a well-known fact that the media has a strong democratic/liberal bias. Don't expect any story to be told in a light favorable to Bush or the republicans. It just isn't done.
posted on November 11, 2000 07:06:51 PM
Exactly! I've flipped back and forth from CNN to MSNBC and I'm so sick of hearing the snide remarks from these so-called "news reporters" and seeing the smirks on their faces (anybody wanna guess which one on MSNBC)?? that I quit watching for awhile. Why can't they just give us the news and leave out their own bias opinion?
posted on November 11, 2000 07:45:19 PM
I grit my teeth and watch a bit of CNN and MSNBC for "balance" (well, you know what I mean), but I've found the most arms'-length coverage seems to come from Fox. They think BOTH parties are full of jerks
But you want to see REAL jerks? Take a peek at any of those three networks' chatboards. krs, for example, is positively smoochy in comparison.
