The chaos is over, let the chaos begin.

Yawn. Second thoughts are common among thoughtful people. Ralph Nader is an admirable man in many respects, but I'm uninterested in his constitutional views. The recounts are important because they show that GWB would have won in any case.

 

How easily you dismiss O'Connor's recognition that the SC never should have taken the case. A mistake leading to the conservatives reversing themselves from prior opinions by usurping the authority of state's courts out of obvious partisanship. Notably, adding in their opinion that the ruling should not be applied as precedent for any other case. What a telling admission of a carve out to make Dubya prez.

Al Gore, not George Bush, should be sitting in the White House today as the newly elected president of the United States, two new independent probes of the disputed Florida election contest have confirmed.

The first survey, conducted on behalf of the Washington Post, shows that Mr Gore had a nearly three-to-one majority among 56,000 Florida voters whose November 7 ballot papers were discounted because they contained more than one punched hole.

The second and separate survey, conducted on behalf of the Palm Beach Post, shows that Mr Gore had a majority of 682 votes among the discounted "dimpled" ballots in Palm Beach county.

Don't get me started on the purge of about 20K likely Gore voters from the voter rolls overseen by Shrub's bro.

 

“The presidential election process described by the original Constitution left it to each state to decide its electoral vote. No case, no precedent, no original understanding gave the Supreme Court the jurisdiction—the authority—to consider, much less condemn, the process that the Florida courts were following to decide Florida’s vote.”
https://scholars.law.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1508&context=nlj

 

OH! Now I see what you're really saying... that when you make pronouncements about you think is FACT and what is NOT FACT, your dictum is predicated on the assumption that what you say "CAN be proven"... right? Then you try to posit that all your statements are as easy to prove as "elephants can't fly... or something like that"... right? That's true where elephants and the laws of physics governing flight are concerned, but you apply the same overly 'broad brush' to EVERYTHING you pontificate about -- your self-proclaimed theories about phenomena like "racism", "right-wing extremism", "reparations", etc., etc., etc.

THAT, my dear Golem, is where you make a mockery out of your own signature-line, which extols your self-proclaimed commitment to scholarly research and "due diligence"! Don't you see it yet? We can sit here like two idiots and nod our heads up and down about your revelation that "elephants can't fly" -- but the same kind of claims about "racism", "right-wing extremism", "reparations" and many more subjects are merely vacuous opinions when presented without supporting documentation from named sources!

But the worst aspect of doing this kind of thing is that you dismissively criticize those who debate with you, as we see in your exchanges here with @Overitall , demanding that your opponents must show "proof", while you so often do not! Is this not the epitome of hypocrisy...?

There's yet another example of your using the "Everybody knows ____________ (fill in the blank)" mechanism that you use SO often.... Did you really make statements like that in debates at the college-level without being brushed-off "with a belly laugh"?
Hint: if one is going to make rash pronouncements about what "Everybody knows", then one had better be able to PROVE it!

 

As I said, second thoughts are common among thoughtful people. As for the election itself:

The Florida Recount of 2000 - FactCheck.org
https://www.factcheck.org › 2008/01 › the-florida-reco...

Jan 22, 2008 — Q: When the votes were recounted in Florida, who won the 2000 presidential election? A: Nobody can say for sure who might have won.

According to a massive months-long study commissioned by eight news organizations in 2001, George W. Bush probably still would have won even if the U.S. Supreme Court had allowed a limited statewide recount to go forward as ordered by Florida’s highest court.

Bush also probably would have won had the state conducted the limited recount of only four heavily Democratic counties that Al Gore asked for, the study found.

On the other hand, the study also found that Gore probably would have won, by a range of 42 to 171 votes out of 6 million cast, had there been a broad recount of all disputed ballots statewide. However, Gore never asked for such a recount. The Florida Supreme Court ordered only a recount of so-called "undervotes," about 62,000 ballots where voting machines didn’t detect any vote for a presidential candidate. . . .

 

It was Gore who put the matter in the hands of courts.

On this day, Bush v. Gore settles 2000 presidential race
https://constitutioncenter.org › blog › on-this-day-bush-...

On December 12, 2000, the Supreme Court ended a Florida vote recount in the presidential election contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore.

". . . On November 26, 2000, Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris certified that Bush had won the election by a 537-vote margin. Gore then sued Harris because all of the recounts had not been completed when she certified the results. On December 8, 2000, the Florida Supreme Court sided with Gore, ordering that all statewide “undervote” ballots, or punch-card ballots that had been cast but not registered because of a problem called a “hanging chad,” needed to be recounted.

Bush immediately appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which ordered the recount halted on December 9, 2000 until it could hear arguments in the case. The Justices faced a legal deadline: Under federal law (3 U.S. Code § 5) known as the safe harbor provision, a state must determine its electors six days before the Electoral College members meet in person. In 2000, that deadline was December 12 and the arguments would be held on December 11, giving the Court one day to reach a decision.

On December 12, 2000, the divided Court issued an unsigned per curium main decision, with concurrences and dissents written by specific justices.

Link: Read The Decision

In the first part of the decision, seven justices (including liberals Stephen Breyer and David Souter) agreed with Bush that his Equal Protection rights were violated because there was no existing legal standard to recount the punch-card ballots.

Another part of the decision, a 5-4 vote along ideological lines, said that any solution to the recount problem couldn’t be put in place by December 12, the safe-harbor deadline. The Florida Supreme Court of Florida, the majority said, indicated that the Florida state legislature wanted Florida’s electors to “participat[e] fully in the federal electoral process” by honoring the December 12 safe-harbor deadline.

The Supreme Court decision, in total, went against the Florida Supreme Court, remanding the case back to it for further action. But since the safe-harbor deadline was passed, Bush remained as the certified winner in Florida, and Gore conceded the next day. . . ."

 

Leaving us with the SC intervening in a case it had no right to hear.

“The presidential election process described by the original Constitution left it to each state to decide its electoral vote. No case, no precedent, no original understanding gave the Supreme Court the jurisdiction—the authority—to consider, much less condemn, the process that the Florida courts were following to decide Florida’s vote.”
https://scholars.law.unlv.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1508&context=nlj

 

As soon as Gore took the matter to court in Florida, he opened the path to the SCOTUS. All litigants in any state court have the right of appeal to federal courts.

 

Of course they do. But Gore seeking recourse in the courts to have all the votes counted didn't so much open the door for the SC to intervene as the SC kicked the door down.

 

No, again. The case had to be brought to the SCOTUS.

 

I'm not disputing what you're saying, Jack, but isn't the usual 'dodge' that lets the Judiciary escape having to deal with politically 'unpleasant' controversies that whole mysterious thing about "standing"...? I'm not a lawyer, but on more than one occasion, and concerning vitally-important issues involving the Constitution itself, we've seen the Judiciary refuse even to allow a case to be brought before it because it was determined (by someone) that those bringing a matter to the court lacked "STANDING".

This "standing" thing has been one of my pet-peeves for a LONG time! And it's especially infuriating when the courts turn away accredited attorneys in good-standing... they don't even get a hearing! I've never understood how something like that is fair....

 

In a dispute about presidential election vote counts, a presidential candidate has standing.

 

But the SC didn't have to take the case. And as noted by O'Connor it was wrong to do so. See post # 78.

The stay of the Florida court’s mandate, issued on Saturday, December 9, was so extraordinary that Justice Scalia, acknowledging that “it is not customary for the Court to issue an opinion”16 in such situations, nonetheless felt the need.17 In it he asserted what must be the most bizarre finding of irreparable harm anywhere in the law books: “The counting of votes that are of questionable legality does in my view threaten irreparable harm to petitioner Bush, and to the country, by casting a cloud upon what he claims to be the legitimacy of his election.”18 The “cloud” over his “legitimacy” was, in reality, that Bush may not have received enough actual votes to win! We usually call that losing the election. As Stevens, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer complained in their dissent from the Court’s order, this blatant repudiation of Florida’s Supreme Court was a marked departure for a Court that thrived on federalism and state’s rights rhetoric, and that “[o]n questions of state law, . . . [has] consistently respected the opinions of the highest courts of the States.”19 Moreover, [c]ounting every legally cast vote cannot constitute irreparable harm. On the other hand, there is a danger that a stay may cause irreparable harm to respondents—and, more importantly, the public at large—because of the risk that the entry of the stay would be tantamount to a decision on the merits in favor of the applicants. Preventing the recount from being completed will inevitably cast a cloud on the legitimacy of the election.”

 

The SCOTUS agreed 7-2 that there were grounds to take the case, with Stephen Breyer and David Souter joining the majority.

 

Not the first time the majority opinion has been wrong. Not just in taking the case but in the way it was decided.

 

Thank you for you easy-to-understand reply, Jack. I guess I'm still butt-hurt over this whole "standing" thing, along with about a dozen other things in the way that our government is 'handled', but it's been that way, more or less, ever since about the year 2001. No matter.

 

Nope! Read my post again. This time try to focus. As an example I said I cannot prove "elephants can't fly". Even though I WOULD state as an undisputable fact that they don't. There are many many similar things that I might or might not be able to prove, but I certainly wouldn't bother trying to prove to you.

BTW, did you have a point? Or are we just wasting our time here trying to figure out how many angels can dance on the head of a pin? Tell me now so I don't waste any more time.

 

In hindsight, it is clear that the Court lacked jurisdiction to hear and decide the equal protection question because it was not ripe for review. The Court’s holding was that equal protection would be violated if similar ballots were treated differently. But there was no way to know if this occurred until the ballots were actually counted. Judge Lewis said that he would resolve any disputes over uncounted ballots. If he used the same standard for all ballots, which one would assume that he would, then there would be no inconsistencies in their treatment.
The Court’s clearest mistake – and it was evident on December 12, 2000 – was in ending the counting in Florida rather than sending the case back to the Florida courts to decide how to proceed. As Justice Stevens noted in his dissent, if the lack of standards for counting was the problem, the solution was to send the case back to Florida for the creation of standards and subsequent counting. The per curium opinion rejected this by saying that the Florida Supreme Court had indicated, as a matter of Florida law, that the state wished to have its counting done by December 12 to gain the benefits of the safe harbor provision for choosing delegates to the electoral college. Bush v. Gore is a powerful reminder that Supreme Court decisions are a product of who is on the bench and their ideology and views.
https://www.acslaw.org/?post_type=acsblog&p=11257

 

I'm just glad the witch is gone.

 

Excellent idea... let's not waste any more of each other's time. You can go right on making claims that amount to no more than opinion, and I'll often do the same... BUT -- the big difference? When I stake out a claim that is not (NOT) clearly based in a commonly-held fact (like, "elephants cannot fly"), I will continue to supply at least one link to credible information to support my claim. I invite you to do the same thing!

. And remember, there are exceptions to almost every rule!

 

I know we don't usually agree on much, Lee, but your point is made well with this lesson from history. And what possible remedy could there be at this point? We can't get in a time machine, go back to the year 2000 (Oh, if ONLY we could!), and sort this out again, knowing what we know now....

Looking back on the whole thing with the advantage of hindsight, maybe -- just maybe -- it might have been better if Gore had won. I can't believe I'm saying that because in the very beginning, it looked like "W" Bush could be a great improvement over what Clinton had been over his two terms. But, what a sickening disappointment "W" turned out to be (and I voted for him, twice! ).

 

Great! Thank you for letting me know right off the start that you actually didn't have a point.

 

Thank you for your opinion.

 

Oh, I can't take claim for making any spectacular 'points', although I had written my Posts #24, #46, and #69 before I saw that you had hopped on Overitall for not providing 'proof' for his observations to your satisfaction. THAT was just too much hypocrisy to take lying down, so, I 'pointed' out to you examples of how you had actually done what you were accusing Overitall of doing. I know you disapprove... everyone does when "the shoe is on the other foot"....

Now, back on topic.... As I was saying and "pointing" out (forgive me!), we are now in for a two-year epoch of some of the worse 'trench warfare' we've had in this country in a long time. The battle lines are drawn. We used to be a country of spirited debate, frequent disagreement, and ultimately, intelligent, hard-won compromise (Bill Clinton's 2nd term comes to mind).

Now? It's all sunk to the level of angry, partisan "woke-ism" and, alternately, a strict, constitutional "nationalism" -- none of whose adherents are willing to compromise with each other the least bit... except, seemingly, in a blind, destructive willingness to plunge the country even deeper into a chasm of DEBT never dreamed of before, as each of the major factions panders for votes (like we saw Congress do merely ten days ago). In that sense, nearly every crudball in the room in Congress stepped up to "thrust their knives into Caesar" -- Republicans, as well as Democrats!

Today? Our major American factions thoroughly hate each other's guts, and this sad, sick situation couldn't have come at a worse time for anybody, except our adversaries throughout the world... Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and others.

Now, please counterbalance my 'opinion' by reminding us all of how deliriously wonderful the next two years will be under Geriatric Joe, and the glorious effect he and his Senate will have on what remains of American 'government'....

 

The next 2 years will be some of the worst in our History (surpassed only -in the negative sense- by Trump's 4-years, and most of the GW Bush administration), with a House of Representative controlled by a handful of MAGA extremists and one of the weakest speakers in this nation's history. If anything good happens, I would write the Vatican to consider starting the process to canonize Joe. But I doubt it will.

If you were looking for something to happen, you should have elected more Democrats. NOTHING that requires the legislative branch will get done in the next 2 years, IMO.

As for the rest, that was a loooong post just to explain that you didn't have a point.