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Politics : Piffer Thread on Political Rantings and Ravings -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Original Mad Dog who wrote (651)	12/7/2000 8:19:26 PM
From: jcky	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 14610

MadDog, Philosophically, yes. Pragmatically, no. Should Judge Saul have taken a look at the ballots for the sake of completeness? Probably. Would this very criticism plague his case for not viewing the ballots. Yes. What could have been accomplished by viewing hanging, pimpled or dimpled chads? Probably nothing. It's important to realize that there were never any allegations of physical ballot tampering to alter the status of the election by the plaintiffs. Similar ballots have already been reviewed thoroughly from the more experienced vote counters of the canvassing board of Miami-Dade County. And really, couldn't the Gore camp have played the Devil's advocate even if Judge Saul had examined some of the ballots? Would examining 100 ballots be thorough enough? How about 500? Or maybe 1000? And wouldn't the actual event of examining the ballots potentially alter the status of some of the ballots, if not handled properly, should Judge Saul have chosen to rule in favor of Al Gore to proceed in the manual recount? In a murder case, is it inappropriate for a judge or jurors to not physically exam the deceased victim in order to ascertain the cause of death? Are photographs of the victim or testimony from the coroner sufficient? Judge Saul did hear the testimony of ballot counters and read their affidavits. That should be sufficient. The burden of proof lies on the plaintiff, and there were never any allegations of physical voter ballot tampering. Regards,

To: Original Mad Dog who wrote (651)	12/7/2000 8:53:00 PM
From: mph	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 14610

It depends on whether Sauls' legal analysis is upheld. He did not review the ballots themselves because he determined that the plaintiff did not make the requisite threshold showing. Had he done so, review of the ballots would be the next step. I'm not troubled by the fact that the court did not review them because I think it's correct that a threshold showing of some kind must be made. The question is whether Sauls applied the right standard, and I'm not sure what the answer is as I haven't studied that issue in enough detail. Suffice to say that if the FSC determines that the wrong standard was used, it will remand to Sauls to reconsider in light of the "correct" standard. Since Sauls appears to be committed to his position, he will then "re-evaluate" the evidence based on the "correct" standard and again rule in favor of Bush. JMO!