Are Palm Beach residents really ignorant or is their intelligence being insulted?

[mietla]

isn't this delicious, Democrats voting Buchanan  

[Nash]

I aplogogize if that disgusts you regurge - but I stand by it.

Palm Beach County is a Democratic stronghold. Much the same as Orange County used to be a Republican stronghold. There's no harm in making an assumption such as this.

Yet overnight,  It turns out that this liberal population with its many Jewish voters has become the bastion of ultraconservative Buchanan's Reform party?.... giving him a surprising 3,407 votes -- more than three times the votes the candidate received in any other Florida county, and almost 20 percent of his total in the state.

I feel safe in my assumptions Regurge. Appearantly so does even Buchanen himself, saying "it seems to me that these 3,000 votes people are talking about -- most of those are probably not my vote and that may be enough to give the margin to Mr. Gore."

Coupled with the fact that there were many many ballots that ran Dem all the way down the line - then suddenly veered to the Reform party for the Presidential vote. Doesn't strike you as a bit odd?

I don't think I'm going out on a limb on this.

[Fatty]

Right Nash, nobody is silly enough to make the claim of outright fraud, I should have avoided that term replying.  You can however make a case for a confusing layout on any ballot if you wanted to though, which is why the ballots are given out for preview prior to use, and the parties are given a chance to object to the layout.

[Eagler]

 

Originally posted by mietla:
isn't this delicious, Democrats voting Buchanan  

Then Buchanan saying on national tv that he couldn't possible get that many votes and that he believes they are Gores! What a nutcase...

Eagler

[Fatty]

PS - Deciding election mistakes based on what you think people think is extremely dangerous.

[Eagler]

Back to the topic heading, after watching Palm Beach interviews on CNN for the last hour, I do not think there is a danger of the latter happening.

Nice display of ignorance for the world to see  

Eagler

[Paxil]

“Yep, to dumb to read directions, too dumb to vote.”

Ha ha! Very funny. Next we’ll hear blacks are stupid or country folk or stupid… this  is ridiculous. I supposed anyone who didn’t vote for who you did is stupid?

“One of the stories I read on this earlier said the head of elections in Palm Beach is a democrat And it says they sent out test samples of the ballots before the elections, and noone said anything about them then.”

You know… no one is accusing an ‘Evil plot’ with the ballot… and it matters not whether a Democrat or Republican approved it, they obviously made a mistake. Also… how many voters see a ballot before they step into the voting booth? Yeah it may have been posted somewhere… but how many actually looked at it?

“I don't see why these morons should be able to vote again? If they get to then the whole nation should be able to.”
They shouldn’t. You can’t do that. It is unfortunate, and maybe even unjust… but I don’t think they should be allowed to revote. Calling people morons because they were confused is pretty damn ignorant though. Ideally, you’d like to believe that the person meant to vote for is the person who gets your vote… but obviously that doesn’t always happen.
“No matter how the Dem's try to spin this, the simple fact remains: The ballot is clear about where to punch for your chosen candidate.”
This is downright silly thing to say when you know 19,000+ votes were already thrown out! And yes, I’m sure some of ‘em were Republicans trying to vote for Cheney as VP.

Bottom line is… you have to go by the law… and there are no provisions for people being confused with the ballot. No do-overs . Voting is important, they should have asked someone if they were confused. It is really a shame though…  The margin of error of the machines counting the votes is probably greater than the final margin will be. I personally think it doesn’t much matter who wins now… ½ the population is going to be pretty upset and see everything they do as negative. It will forever be a black mark on our history, Rep, Dem or other. The supposed world leader in Democracy can't hold even an election now without controversy.


[This message has been edited by Paxil (edited 11-09-2000).]

[Regurge]

Well you have a point Nash, a lot of those Buchannan *probably* were meant for Gore.

It is unfortunate that those people mis-voted but at this point, anything done to rectify the problem would be far worse. Theres no way of knowing how many people made mistakes on their ballot, and even if you did know, it's not fair to let them re-vote unless the entire country gets to do it too.

Anything other than letting the votes stand as they are smacks of changing the rules while you're still playing the game.

[J_A_B]

The non-voters got it right.  Voting is over-rated.


It's obvious that, with the Electoral College, a single vote doesn't matter--hell, 200,000 don't matter (I don't like Gore much, but he DID win the popular vote).

Also, the Non-voters are completely satisfied with the design of the Florida ballot.  Only voters are whining.

Heck, most non-voters would probably be happy if their government didn't even allow people to vote at all!  Now THAT is an easy group to please!


THAT, AND THE CHOICES SUCK!!   Bush is unworthy,  Buchannan is a borderline Fascist, Gore is a blatant liar (and to think I used to like Gore), and Nader is....well....unsafe at any speed    

Why can't they clone Lincoln?  Or Teddy Roosevelt.....yeah, clone Teddy!  We need a good war or two!

I voted for some guy whose name I had never seen before and will probabaly never see again--just to spite the "main" candidates.    I felt like it was a waste of my time.

J_A_B

[Karnak]

Obviously there is no fraud here by anybody.
Now that that's off my back, here is what appears to have happened:

There was a lot of pressure to vote quickly because of the high turnout and a lot of people didn't take enough time. They looked Bush, then one down saw Gore and since he was the 2nd listing they punched the 2nd hole. Palm Beach is VERY heavily Democratic and given Bush's simpler place on the ballot (See Bush at top, punch top hole) Gore would pick up at least 2/3rds of the miscasts (I'm being VERY generous to Bush here) and would win by about 13,000 votes.

Here is one man's account:

 

Ronald Kessler, a recently retired dentist from Delray Beach, said his vote proved the ballot confusion spanned age groups and political parties.

A registered Republican who doesn't qualify as a senior citizen, Kessler said he's certain he mistakenly voted for Buchanan even though he intended to cast a crossover vote for Gore. Kessler said he never even saw Buchanan's name when he zeroed in on the circle he thought meant a vote for Gore.

"They should have a new vote," said Kessler, who realized his error after talking to his wife after voting. "I feel that people were misled by the ballot. I usually don't make mistakes like that. Buchanan never would have been my choice. He is diametrically opposed to everything I believe in."

That said, I don't think there can be a revote.  It would set a VERY bad precedent.  We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

If Bush does win though, he will unfortunately be in the position of having been placed in Office despite losing the popular vote and only winning in Florida because of a poorly designed ballot.  He will lack even the small validation that would come from a clean win in the Electoral College.

While this IS very interesting to watch, I wish that either Bush or Gore had won outright.  I think it would have been much better for our country.

Peace

Sisu
-Karnak

[StSanta]

<gets pop corn and beer>

I am watching history being made here.

That's quite cool. Not up there with the fall of the Wall in Berlin, but sorta cool envertheless.



------------------
StSanta
9./JG 54 "Grünherz"
If I am understanding this correctly, he died while campaigning. Then afterwards, he won the election.

Voting for a dead guy.

This one goes to the book of "Stupid Laws Around The World".

That's beyond stupid. It's...BISHROOK!

Here, if ya die, yer outta politics. Yer party finds a replacement. And it ain't gonna be your wife, unless she's the best candidate.

Pretty easy solution. Sort of like "if you're dead, you ain't got a place as a forward in Barcelona. And if you held the place and died, your wife ain't getting it."

Hey, can I vote for Elvis? .

--
StSanta
while(!bishRookQueue.isEmpty() && loggedOn()){
30mmDeathDIEDIEDIE(bishRookQueue.removeFront());
System.out.println("LW pilots are superior");
myPlane.performVictoryRoll();
}

[Mighty1]

I keep hearing how Gore won the popular vote but all the votes are not in and with the absentee votes from the military it is very possible that Bush could win.

The recount is done and Bush still won. When the absentee votes are counted Bush will still win. Let's let this end and get ready for a new President.

[Eagler]

StSanta
How does the average democrat in Palm Beach that CNN is interviewing appear from the other side of the big pond? They appear pretty ignorant to me. It is an embarrassment. You have to believe me when I tell you they are not an accurate representation of the average Florida citizen. The media is assisting the Jesse Jacksons' by giving the crowds the attention they are looking for. Have to love the professional manner the Democrats are conducting themselves by. Typical.

Eagler

[Fury]

This quote from Ronald Kessler sorta goes to the title of the original post.  This man is a prime example of ignorance in action.  The quote from the story that hits me the hardest "Kessler said he never even saw Buchanan's name when he zeroed in on the circle he thought meant a vote for Gore."

A)  Mr. Buchanan's name is clearly printed on the ballot.  Mr. Kessler chose not to see it.

B) "he thought meant a vote for Gore".  The circle for Mr. Gore is clearly connected from Mr. Gore's name to the circle intended for Mr. Gore.  The key words are "he thought".  Plain and simple, he thought wrong; whether he did not take the time to read the ballot or did not ask if he was confused.  He voted wrong and there is nobody but himself to blame for that.  I could care less what his "will" was; he executed his will incorrectly.

First of all, I don't live in Palm Beach county and my ballot was not a punchout ballot.

When I sat down to vote, I had to take a lot of time reading the ballot.  "Vote for no more than two".  "Vote for no more than four".  "Vote for no more than one".  I had to make sure that the catagories did not continue to the next column.  I wanted to make sure my vote was correct the first time.  (Our ballots are the kind where you use a felt-tip pen to connect the arrow).

Any opinion I have on the subject is based only on the link in the first post.  The link shows a sample of the ballot used in Palm Beach county.

Being unfamiliar with the ballot until I went to the link, I have no problem understanding what to do.  I don't care if the hole does not line up with the names on the left.  The arrow pointing from the candidate's name to the proper hole to punch is incredibly clear.

If a person was confused by the ballot and did not ask questions, that is their fault.  If they sped through the ballot without looking closely, that's their problem.  If they double-voted, that's their problem.  They either voted for the wrong person, or they gave an invalid ballot.

The responsibility for their ignorance is their own to take.  Rather than take responsibility for voting incorrect/invalid, they would rather complain about it.  Blaming the ballot for their own ignorance, confusion, and inability to ask for clarification on something as important as voting is just passing the buck, something that this country does quite nicely (it disgusts me).

The best part about any comments that I have made pertaining to the whole Palm Beach issue is that if Mr. Gore wins, my feelings about Palm Beach will not change.

Fury

[Dowding]

I heard today about how some ballot papers were spoiled by the paper not having the whole punched properly. There's also pictures of an unopened ballot box (No. 248).

The difference is now down to 300 votes - considering the number of votes cast, to be confident of such a difference is not possible considering the error involved in counting.