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From: eLeader@mail.echampions2000.com Sent: Monday, November 27, 2000 3:55 PM To: fhoot@aol.com Subject: Important Election Update Dear eChampion, The following is the latest synopsis of important election news. Please share with your friends and family. Thank you. Contents: 1 U.S. Supreme Court Agrees to Hear Bush Appeal 2 Statement On Florida Supreme Court Rejection Of Gore Campaign Demand For Miami-Dade Recount 3 Facts On Illinois Ruling On Dimpled Ballots 4 What About Today's Action on Military Ballots? 5 The Greenwood Position: Now We Must Fight for Our Country 6 Washington Post: Gore Can't Heal the Hurt 7 Wall Street Journal: How Democrats Wage Political War 8 Exit Polling Says At Least 1.5% Of Americans Did Not Vote In Presidential Contest 9 Voting Instructions Were Clear in Palm Beach County ________________________________________________ 1 The U.S. Supreme Court agreed to intervene in the Florida presidential recount, saying Friday it will hear one of George W. Bush's appeals that seeks to bar hand-counted ballots in the disputed election. In a stunning development and a victory for Bush, the nation's highest court said it will hear arguments Dec. 1 on whether to overturn the Florida Supreme Court's decision that allowed manually recounted votes to be added to Florida's vote total. _______________________________________________ 2 Statement On Florida Supreme Court Rejection Of Gore Campaign Demand For Miami-Dade Recount "We are pleased with the Supreme Court decision. It was our strong belief that the Florida Supreme Court would deny this motion. The court had already extended the statutory deadline for an additional 12 days and Al Gore was asking them to extend it yet again. "Thursday night Al Gore thanked the canvassing boards for their hard work and praised the Supreme Court decision. Since then he has sued one of those canvassing boards and asked the Supreme Court to change its mind. It seems Al Gore wants the Court to keep extending the deadline until he can count the votes enough times to change the result." _______________________________________________ 3 Facts On Illinois Ruling On Dimpled Ballots ~ The Illinois Supreme Court Ruling was incorrectly cited by the Gore campaign and the Florida Supreme Court, and does NOT require dimpled ballots to be counted. ~ In fact, in the Illinois case, dimpled ballots were not counted at all. Illinois attorney Burton Odelson, who represented the challenger in the 1990 Illinois case, said, "the judge did not count ballots that were indented because he could not determine the voters' intent." ~ Contrary to the arguments made by David Boies for the Gore campaign, Cook County Circuit Judge Francis Barth said, "I don't believe the fact that an impression standing alone counts necessarily that this voter intended then to vote." ~ Of the 27 disputed ballots the Illinois Supreme Court ordered Judge Barth to examine, he rejected nine dimpled ballots because, as he said, the dents were insufficient to prove the voter's intent. He rejected four others with pinholes that were misaligned, accepted three "hanging chads," in which the perforation was partially attached, and approved five ballots punctured by pinholes. Six disputed ballots were withdrawn. ~ Michael Levelle, a Democrat lawyer representing the Republican candidate in Illinois, initially signed an affidavit on behalf of the Gore campaign saying to the best of his recollection, he believed Judge Barth counted indented ballots. But when later told that Judge Barth did not include dimpled ballots, Levelle recanted: "I couldn't remember details. The affidavit was more general than specific." _______________________________________________ 4 What About Today's Action on Military Ballots? ~ To protect the rights of our military men and women to have their votes count, the Bush-Cheney campaign today is asking a Florida Circuit Court in Tallahassee to require canvassing boards to immediately go back and review overseas military ballots for inclusion in the final vote tally. ~ We urge Al Gore to support this action. ~ One week ago tonight, in an orchestrated effort that included a five-page memo by a Gore attorney, Al Gore's supporters objected to as many military ballots as they could find. The Gore campaign never should have knocked out the votes of the men and women who wear our nation's uniform. ~ That's no way to treat the men and women who serve our country. They never should have taken that action in the first place. ~ Today is the day to right this wrong. ~ A State Judge will conduct a hearing at 2:00 today in Leon County to hear our case. We hope the Judge will ask the Boards to review these military ballots so our servicemen and women aren't disenfranchised. ~ Given the remarks made about counting military ballots by Senator Lieberman, Florida's Democratic Senator Bob Graham, and Florida's Democratic Attorney General (and chairman of Gore's Florida campaign) Bob Butterworth, we can't imagine the Gore campaign will once again oppose the voting rights of our servicemen and women. ______________________________________________ 5 The Greenwood Position Now we must fight for our country BY PEGGY NOONAN Friday, November 24, 2000 "We must fight. And we all know it. And it's fine. "We like to complain, those of us of a certain age, that history has never given us the gaudy challenges it gave our parents and grandparents. But we've had our traumas, and from the time we were children: assassinations, riots, Vietnam, Watergate, the ayatollah, a stuck economy, the fall of the wall. We've had our moments. "And now we face a great trial. "And we're up to it. "So let's go." Full Story: http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/?id=65000671 _______________________________________________ 6 Washington Post Gore Can't Heal the Hurt By Richard Cohen Friday, November 24, 2000 "I voted for Al Gore. I did so because I have known him since he was a congressman from Tennessee. I admire his intellect, his seriousness of purpose, his capacity for hard work and study, his political values, his experience and his knowledge. That being said, I now think that under current circumstances he would not be the right man for the presidency. If I could, I would withdraw my vote. In the terminology of the moment, put me down as a hanging chad. "I still think precisely as I have about Gore. But those 'current circumstances' I just mentioned change everything. Given the present bitterness, given the angry irresponsible charges being hurled by both camps, the nation will be in dire need of a conciliator, a likable guy who will make things better and not worse. That man is not Al Gore. That man is George W. Bush. "Bush has incessantly proclaimed himself as that sort of guy--'a uniter, not a divider.' The tendency is to dismiss that sort of chest-thumping as campaign nonsense, but in Bush's case it appears to be true. After all, the Bush boomlet began among his fellow Republican governors, each of whom probably thought the next president should be none other than himself. "So it says something about Bush that the governors were able to coalesce around him. Some of these governors knew Bush quite well, some hardly at all, but the fact remains that they all seemed to genuinely like the guy and respected his leadership abilities. "You hear the same sort of thing from people who worked with Bush in private enterprise. I talked with one of them once, a Democrat who disagreed with Bush on many issues. Yet he, too, praised Bush's leadership abilities, his talent for bringing order out of chaos and for reaching some sort of consensus. That man's testimony impressed me. His disagreements with Bush were real, his admiration for him profound. "Gore, on the other hand, has little of those abilities. His own party is sore at him for taking the one-two punch of peace and prosperity and running a race that is still not concluded. His performance was as erratic as his uniform-of-the-day: earth tones on Tuesday, business suit on Wednesday. The country sensed that either he did not know himself, or what he did know the country would not like." Full Story: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A55133-2000Nov23.html _______________________________________________ 7 Wall Street Journal How Democrats Wage Political War -Controlling the government is imperative to the party's survival. BY CLETA MITCHELL Monday, November 20, 2000 "In case you're bewildered by the machinations of the Gore campaign-turned-law-firm, let there be no doubt that the goings on in Florida are perfectly in keeping with the way Democrats normally think and behave. Lawsuits are a key part of the Democrats' political strategy, so nothing about Florida should surprise anyone who has spent time in the Democratic Party. "Until 1995, I was a Democrat. I've been a Democrat elected official, a party official and an active party member, so I know how Democrats think. "Democrats know and internalize, understand and are motivated by, certain ideas, concepts and principles that seem to be foreign to Republicans. And Democrats are elated that Republicans don't know or function under the same ideas. These basic rules of Democratic thinking are at work in Florida. This primer should help explain what makes the Democrats tick. "Rule 1: If we don't win, we don't eat. "Rule 2: State courts are 'home' to Democrats. "Rule 3, the 'golden rule': He who makes the rules wins the gold." Full Story: http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=65000648 ____________________________________________________________ 8 Exit Polling Says At Least 1.5% Of Americans Did Not Vote In Presidential Contest While the Gore campaign says dimpled ballots must be counted because every voter obviously intended to vote in the Presidential contest, FOX NEWS reports that at least 1.5% of voters told exit pollsters on November 7 that they did not vote in the presidential race. Experts say this understates the actual percentage of people who voted in down ballot races, but NOT in the presidential contest. The number of "undervoters" in the three Florida recount counties the Gore campaign is trying to mine for additional votes is roughly 1.5-2.25%, well within the range suggested by the exit polls. ____________________________________________________________ 9 From the voting instructions card for Palm Beach: "AFTER VOTING, CHECK YOUR BALLOT CARD TO BE SURE YOUR VOTING SELECTIONS ARE CLEARLY AND CLEANLY PUNCHED AND THERE ARE NO CHIPS LEFT HANGING ON THE BACK OF THE CARD." From the Official PALM BEACH COUNTY SUPERVISOR OF ELECTIONS website. Link to the "Voting Instructions" card for Palm Beach: http://pbcelections.org/Sample%20Ballots/instruct.jpg Or from this page, under "Voting Instructions": http://pbcelections.org/Sample%20Ballots/sampleballot.htm Conclusion: These instructions show that the voter was given advice to avoid dimple and hanging chads. ----------------------------------------------------------- If you wish to unsubscribe from the eChampion mailing list, simply click here: (unsubscribed line removed by fh)
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