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

To: mph who wrote (653)	12/8/2000 1:47:46 AM
From: Original Mad Dog	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 14610

mph, I think your analysis of what issues the FSC will look at is correct, but my question is more fundamental: If 10,000 ballots were outsorted by a machine as registering no votes, and one of the candidates alleges that we should look at the ballots with human eyes to see if the machine might have been making a mistake, what more of a threshold showing do you need? How is he supposed to prove that looking at the ballots will change the outcome unless somebody looks at the ballots? Sometimes courts get too caught up in the verbal formulas and "tests" and "showings".... this is not the careful mixing of chemicals in a lab or the minute etching of a microchip.... it is simply an argument as to whether 10,000 pieces of paper say one thing or another, or nothing at all. And the best way to determine what a piece of paper says or means is to look at the piece of paper. I learned that way before law school. In law school, they tried to teach me that it isn't always so. I guess I didn't believe them. <g> OMD P.S. Who is fighting for truth and justice now??? LOL

To: mph who wrote (653)	12/8/2000 10:12:23 AM
From: mph	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 14610

<<I guess my question is, the burden of proving what? That the ballots were not counted? Or that the ballots, if counted, would change or probably change the outcome? For me, it is enough that they were not counted. Every vote deserves to be counted, and demands to be counted....even the ones for Gore.>> Philosophically, I agree with you. Realistically, it's another story. The 10K ballots are among those in Miami Dade. They were machine counted, but the machine count did not yield a vote for president, though they were counted as to other races. (This should tell you something) Miami Dade officials had the discretion whether or not to proceed with the re-count, which included, but was not limited to, these 10K ballots. They elected not to, and they made this decision after having re-counted all the heavily Democratic precincts and before they commenced on the precincts that leaned toward Republicans. Florida law, for better or worse, vests discretion over manual recounts in local officials. As I understand it, there is always of margin of error in voting. It just so happens that in this case the margin is significant since the election was so close. The Democrats have done a masterful job of framing the controversy as a concern over assuring that every vote is counted. This is the concern you have been expressing. But focusing on the 10K votes is not likely to achieve a fair result and could very well run afoul of the Constitution. Simply, the entire state would probably have to be recounted in order to really be fair, and that just won't happen at this point. Any court ordered recount must be based on a showing that the outcome of the election was affected by irregularities complained of. And you can't focus on just the 10K votes because that is likely unconstitutional. So there you have it.