ADD the WASHINGTON POST to THE DOOM IS FINALLY HERE REALIZATION GROUP - LOL - even they aren't as stupid as Boies is to try and spin this
washingtonpost.com
By David S. Broder
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, December 5, 2000; Page A01
Vice President Gore's last-ditch legal struggles became much more politically difficult yesterday in the wake of two judicial rulings that most Democrats viewed as virtually exhausting his options for overcoming George W. Bush.
Despite a formal endorsement by the party's congressional leaders for Gore's latest filings in Florida courts, Democrats across the spectrum conceded that his prospects for victory appear dim. Some said he should begin weighing the best time to withdraw.
"I think we're entering the Hail Mary phase of this election," former Clinton White House chief of staff Leon D. Panetta said in a telephone interview. "The choice is whether you engage in a scorched earth legal process . . . or you recognize that we're beyond the time we need to select a president for this country. That's the choice, and we have to see what choice he [Gore] makes."
In a round of calls to other Democrats, the Gore team made it clear he would continue the legal battle, not just in appeals to the Florida Supreme Court but with suits challenging thousands of Republican absentee ballots in two Florida counties.
Nonetheless, Democrats appeared increasingly resigned to a Bush victory. "Step by step, closer to finality," said Sen. John Breaux of Louisiana, a leader of moderate Democrats, in a tone of resignation that was widely echoed around Washington.
"It's virtually over," said a veteran Washington lawyer with close ties to the Democratic nominee. "All his open windows are shutting down."
Republicans said the flat-out rejection by Leon County Circuit Court Judge N. Sanders Sauls of Gore's effort to contest Bush's certification as the winner of Florida's 25 electoral votes ought to be the cue for Gore to concede Bush's presidential victory.
"There's no way they can spin the Florida decision," said Sen. Robert F. Bennett (R-Utah). "Gore was slam-dunked. "They may have to go through the motions [of appealing to the state Supreme Court] but my instinct is, it's over."
The Democratic leaders of Congress, Sen. Thomas A. Daschle (S.D.) and Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (Mo.), issued a statement endorsing Gore's appeal to the Florida Supreme Court. "We believe this appeal is in keeping with Florida law and American democracy," they said. "It is vitally important that every vote is counted and that this election is resolved as accurately as possible, so the American people have confidence that their next president was the candidate who got the most votes."
Centrist Democratic Reps. Calvin M. Dooley (Calif.) and James P. Moran (Va.) issued a statement declaring that "only the Florida Supreme Court can provide the finality needed."
But interviews with a number of congressional Democrats found little optimism that the Florida Supreme Court would take the political risk of reversing Judge Sauls. Several said the seven members of that court – six Democrats and an independent – would be cautious about their actions after the Supreme Court in Washington yesterday unanimously sent back for clarification their earlier pro-Gore ruling that delayed certification of Bush's Florida victory and permitted more vote-counting.
Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), a member of the House Judiciary Committee and leading liberal voice on Capitol Hill, said of Gore: "He has one more appeal to the Florida Supreme Court, and he'll probably lose it, and then it's over."
New York lawyer Joseph A. Califano Jr., a senior official in two previous Democratic administrations, said, "It's going to be very hard to overrule that judge. He heard the evidence and the law gives him a lot of discretion in weighing it." A Washington lawyer who served in the Clinton administration with Gore agreed. "The finding of the trial court has a lot of weight in a case like this," he said.
Nonetheless, most Democrats said they were not surprised that Gore would order his lawyers to exhaust every possible legal avenue. Rep. Collin C. Peterson of Minnesota, a member of the group of conservative Democrats known as the "Blue Dogs," said, "If I were going to do it, I would probably pack it in, but he's got a right to appeal and I expect he will."
But in the wave of phone calls Gore and his running mate, Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (D-Conn.), launched to Democratic senators, representatives, governors and mayors, soliciting statements of support after Judge Sauls's ruling, they left the impression that they were changing legal strategies.
Those Democrats were told that Gore could still prevail on the basis of challenges to absentee votes in two Florida counties – Seminole and Martin – which have been filed by local Democrats, ostensibly acting independently of the Gore campaign.
Those suits allege that Republican election officials in those counties allowed GOP workers to add voter identification numbers and complete other paperwork on absentee ballot applications from prospective Republican voters, who are supposed to do all that themselves.
The suits ask that thousands of absentee ballots in the two counties be discarded – a shift that would put Gore far out front in the statewide tally. The larger of the two suits, in Seminole County, will be heard on Wednesday.
Iowa Gov. Tom Vilsack (D) said he had been told that "the facts are clear, the law is explicit and the remedy is available."
Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.) said he had received a similar briefing, adding, "I think he [Gore] will bring it to finality with the pending absentee ballot cases . . . and that will be it." But Gore spokesman Mark Fabiani said the vice president is not formally joining those suits, and some congressional Democrats questioned whether a victory achieved that way would stand up politically. One said, "That would involve throwing out the ballots of thousands of people who legally voted. I don't know how you square that with the [Gore] position that every vote should count."
Republican pollster Bill McInturff said, "If he [Gore] were to become president by throwing out 15,000 [Seminole County] votes, I would hope he would see how injurious that was to his reputation."
Breaux, who has been courted by Bush in recent days, said he hoped the absentee ballot cases would be considered, along with Judge Sauls's decision and the remanded ruling from the Supreme Court, in a single hearing before the Florida Supreme Court. "And I hope that ruling is definitive," he said.
Breaux said that he was confident Gore would accept the final decision of the Florida Supreme Court, even if it went against him, but feared that a last-minute legal victory by Gore would trigger political retaliation from the GOP. He suggested that the Republican-controlled Florida legislature might name a slate of Bush electors to contest the outcome before Congress. "That would be a terrible mistake," Breaux said, "but I can see it happening."
Republican sentiment seemed to be hardening yesterday behind the view expressed Sunday by Bush's running mate, former secretary of defense Richard B. Cheney, that it was time for Gore to concede – even though Bush, in comments from Austin yesterday, said that was a decision only Gore could make.
Houaw Republican Conference Chairman J.C. Watts (Okla.) said, "The vice president must face up to one cold, hard fact. George W. Bush won the election. . . . All the recounts and appeals in the world cannot change that."
Ohio Gov. Bob Taft (R) said Gore "ought to give serious consideration to conceding now. It's time to give some finality to the process."
And some Democrats were arguing that Gore ought to consider the cost of further delay. Geoff Garin, a Washington pollster with many Democratic clients on Capitol Hill, said, "He's at a stage now where he needs to weight the potential of prevailing against the downside of being thought of as a spoilsport if he proceeds and fails. . . . There's still a graceful exit strategy for him right now. But after the next appeal . . . the exit strategies become a lot less graceful." But Vilsack said Gore should not be worrying about his own reputation. "The only external factor he ought to consider is whether this would do irreparable harm to the republic by continuing this four or five more days," the governor said. |
