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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (80155)	11/17/2000 5:50:52 PM
From: HighTech	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

Question: *But if a voter followed directions correctly and his vote is not being counted because the hole was not completely punched and the machine didn't read it properly, then that's wrong and there should be a hand recount.* Answer: As I said before, this happens all of the time all over the nation, it's a built-in error rate that machine counting produces. But since these kind of errors when applied in the entire country in each and every county and precinct spread evenly and randomly over all of the candidates, the errors occur fairly among the candidates. And when you select heavy dem-controlled(officers and voters) counties to count and you do it only in counties that use chad-type ballots as opposed to ballots in which hand counts would not produce similar errors, you are selectively, disproportionately and unfairly taking the advantage that is inherent in such selected counties for the specific type of error that chad-ballots present. In counties where Gore has a 2:1 margin if you take those ballots that have not been counted due to machine error, not only will the number of ballots produce an inherent advantage(in the ratio of the margin victory of the victor to the total votes cast of the uncounted ballots) to the winner in that county, but there is an additional, not-equally-applied(and therefore not fairly applied)advantage that chad ballots have over non-chad ballots, and that is that the standards set can be manipulated to give a larger share of votes to the known winner. For example, if there are ANY chads that have a small pimple, some counties don't count these while others do as a vote. A pimple might mean that the voter intended to vote for the candidate but it also might mean that the voter gave second thought and decided not to vote for that candidate(where pimple was) or might have decided not to vote at all for either one or any of the candidates. So for the county officials in heavy-dem-controlled counties to stack these primary two factors in their favor is simply unfair. Bush should have the opportunity to go to heavy repub areas anywhere in the country where they have chad ballots and do the same recount by hand if fairness is applied. It is a fact that most repub counties in Fla don't use chad ballots, which is where the advantage can be exercised through judgement, as is the case in those selected counties in question in Fla now. So Bush would therefore not be on a level playing field with Gore by accepting a state-wide manual recount. If we don't really care about being fair and just want our guy in no matter what, well that is another thing. HiTech

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (80155)	11/17/2000 5:52:10 PM
From: amadeus	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 769667

except bush did not request them, and gore did. I still contend this whole ordeal is because bush was outmaneuvered by gore regarding the hand recounts requested in the 72 hour period. the republicans have had to resort to extreme measures to try to stop recounts with lawsuits, federal injunctions, partisan actions of the secretary of state, and demonizing hand recounting in the media. clearly the anomalies of palm beach county do warrant a hand recount... not sure about any others.

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (80155)	11/17/2000 5:58:54 PM
From: TigerPaw	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 769667

The only reason Gore is getting more votes is because the counties adopted new rules for counting vote. Really, if you are not going to pay attention in class you should stay after school. The punch card machines are prone to missing votes (because of hanging chad etc.). The punch card machines are faster in counting, and so are located in the biggest most populous counties. These counties tend to have democratic majorities. Recounting lost votes in these counties produce more votes for democrats. The republican counties are more rural with smaller towns. They don't use punch cards, they use optical scanners. The optical scanners don't have many errors or missed votes. Recounting these counties don't turn up much because there weren't many lost votes to begin with. Got that? Now write it out 100 times. TP (You, more than anyone Mr. Watson, should know the vagarities of punch card machines).