...WHERE EVERY STORY IS COUNTED BY HAND.
Forget the 19,000 double votes for president. Put aside the smattering of ballots for Pat Buchanan in Jewish districts. The real focus of today's manual recount is a block of 10,361 Palm Beach County ballots that named no president in Tuesday's election. If the Democrats can somehow turn some of those nonvotes into Al Gore votes, Florida's 25 Electoral College votes go to him. And Gore goes to the White House with more than the required 270 electoral votes.
"There's no way all those people didn't vote for president," said Monte Friedkin, head of Palm Beach County's Democratic Party. "Do you really think that people wanted to vote for the clerk of courts, but not the leader of our country?" The only way to really check, Friedkin said, is with today's hand recount of nearly 4,300 ballots. By eyeballing each ballot from three specially targeted precincts -- areas with high numbers of blank presidential ballots or double votes -- the Democrats hope to spot things the machines couldn't detect.
In a step aimed at preventing such scrutiny, Gov. George W. Bush gave James Baker -- the former secretary of state who's representing the Texas governor's interests in Florida -- authority Friday night to seek a court order stopping the Gore campaign from securing manual recounts of contested ballots in Florida, The Associated Press reported, citing several GOP officials involved in the discussions. The officials said it was very likely the injunction would be sought, but stressed that it was up to Baker to make the final decision. A source close to Baker said the former secretary had not decided. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity. The decision, however tentative, underscores the Bush campaign's concern that a widespread manual recount could undermine his fragile lead over Gore and perhaps force Bush to seek recounts of his own in Florida and other close states....
The GOP is suspicious of the Gore campaign's requests for recounts in Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade and Volusia counties -- all places where Gore won big. The Gore campaign says the counties were chosen because they were rife with complaints. Democrats hope to find so many irregularities in the three designated Palm Beach precincts that the canvassing board will feel compelled to recount by hand all 462,657 ballots in Palm Beach County. There are no laws that specify how many problems would be needed to justify a recount. The stakes increased with the results of the state-mandated recount of Tuesday's vote, which narrowed Bush's lead in Florida from more than 1,700 votes to 327. Gore picked up 600 votes in Palm Beach County alone, causing the GOP to ask for a third electronic recount today. It will happen at the same time as the manual recount. Both parties will have representatives in the recount rooms, which are under the supervision of the county's canvassing board. The three-member board, consisting only of Democrats, granted the recount requests Thursday as protesters and lawsuits against Palm Beach County's "butterfly" ballot piled up.
With so few votes separating the two candidates, the outcome of the presidential election may indeed lie in the hands of the county workers who will spend today picking one by one through the ballots -- especially if they find "dimples" or other marks in places suggesting that uncounted votes were intended for Gore. By law, the Democrats get to choose which three precincts will be recounted, and Friday night the Gore team and its lawyers were sifting through precinct data hunting for an advantage. The 15 precincts they focused on were largely Democratic and contained high numbers of problem votes, either uncounted ones or votes that were disqualified for choosing more than one candidate. According to the results of Wednesday's recount, Precinct 82, a largely black neighborhood in West Palm Beach, voted overwhelmingly for Gore over Bush: 1,156 to 21. Buchanan got 18 votes. But 150 ballots, nearly 11 percent of the precinct, recorded more than one presidential vote. Twelve blank presidential ballots were also found. Some of the other precincts under consideration had as many as 184 ballots that did not indicate a choice for president. The Gore campaign also was comparing demographic data to the poll results, hoping to show that districts with large numbers of elderly voters had the most problems. --Palm Beach Post, 11/11/00
"As Florida officials prepared to begin the laborious process of counting votes by hand in four counties, Texas Gov. George W. Bush decided to take legal action today to try to block the manual recount, and his advisers accused Vice President Gore's campaign of trying to "unduly prolong" the process of determining who won Tuesday's presidential election.11/11/00
Once again, a Bush spokesman said that Gore backers couldn't do what Bush backers were doing, and claimed it was for the good of the country. This time it was the former Sec. of State during the Bush administration, James Baker. Here's what he said in an interview this morning:
"The Gore campaign has also tried to make a lot of the fact that double-marked ballots are not counted. A key principle in American elections is one person, one vote. If we have ballots with two votes, of course we can't count them, and of course we can't guess about them.
Ballots that are double-marked can't be evidence of the voter's intent to vote one way or the other. No jurisdiction in the United States of America would accept such a ballot as a valid vote, and Florida law specifically does not. This happens in every precinct and in every election.
And the procedure is very clear. Those ballots have to be disregarded.....The purpose of our national election is to establish a constitutional government, not unending legal wrangling.
We will, therefore, vigorously oppose the Gore campaign's efforts to keep recounting, over and over, until it happens to like the result. For the good of the country, and for the sake of our standing in the world, the campaigning should end and the business of an orderly transition should begin."
We find Mr. Baker's position hypocritical, as the following account by a Florida Bush Watcher indicates. (Corroborating media accounts here and here.)
"As you are aware heavily Republican Seminole County Florida was the last to finish its mandatory recount. The margin was down to about 229 and Seminole County votes added another 98 (net) to Bush. The reason for Seminole County's delay is that they voluntarily provided the complete recount, including rejected ballots, sought in Palm Beach etc. Yesterday Afternoon local TV news carried pictures and an interview with a member of the Seminole County election board (Supervisor of Elections?) and local Republican congressman John Mica who was present and interviewed. They were running each individual ballot through the voting machines. ANY BALLOT THE MACHINE REJECTED WAS THEN EXAMINED BY HAND, AND IF THE "WILL OF THE VOTER" COULD BE DETERMINED. THEY PREPARED A NEW BALLOT TO REPLACE THE ORIGINAL REJECTED BALLOT AND ADDED THIS NEWLY CREATED BALLOT TO THE COUNT. Naturally in a county Bush carried almost 2-1 this resulted in a net increase of Bush votes. Now in the Republican Seminole County Florida, under the leadership of Congressman John Mica (R-Fla) acting on behalf of Bush.. The rejected votes were examined and added to the official totals. If the Bush camp thinks that it is proper to examine by hand the rejected votes in Republican Seminole County Florida, and to substitute new ballots for those rejected, how can this possibly be proper when done in Seminole County Florida and then be improper when done in Palm Beach County Florida?"11/10/00
As if discovering a ballot counting machine Tuesday night showing a Gore deficit of 16,000 votes was not enough, while moving the ballots to another building to get ready for a full hand count tomorrow, officials discovered three unsealed ballot bags, one with the paper votes actually spilling out. Unofficial results in Volusia show Gore with 97,063 votes and Texas Gov. George W. Bush with 82,214. It will be interesting to see what tomorrow will bring in this district that supposedly voted for Gore over Bush by 15 thousand votes. At the very least, as Republican Seminole County demonstrated, Volusia County counters should be able to decide the "will of the voters" in a substantial number of ballots rejected by the machine. Anecdotal reports from Palm Beach County have indicated that on some of the double punched ballots that were rejected there, the "will of the voter" was indicated with hand-written circles and arrows over the correct punch of the double-punched ballot. With only 1% of the votes being hand-counted, one would hope that such ballots won't be missed. --Politex, 11/10/00
BAKER GIVES NATION A WARNING FROM BUSH In an interview that concluded a little after noon eastern time, Bush Florida point man and Poppy's former chief of staff and Sec. of State James Baker gave the nation a warning, saying that on the basis of the informal, unofficial, and uncertified AP report that the Florida recount came out in favor of George W. Bush by 327 votes, Al Gore should acknowledge that George W. Bush won the election and give such an announcement prior to Florida's official announcement scheduled a week from today. If this is not done, Baker implied that Bush could retaliate by beginning formal challenges to pro-Gore vote counts in states such as Wisconsin and New Mexico, which would, in his implied estimation, lead to a national crisis. After the interview, the CNN reporter then went over those editorials and columns in today's papers that ask Gore to stop his challenge in the name of healing the nation as quickly as possible. Some referred to Nixon's decision to do so in a previous presidential election. However, in an opinion column in the Boston Globe this morning, Joan Vennochi pointed out that the Nixon decision is irrelevant and "we shouldn't let politics muddle the quest for truth."
Last evening an Emory University reporter observed on CNN that both sides have moved from a consideration of legality to a consideration of politics. "What we are seeing," he said, "is a battle for public opinion." It seems clear to us that the Bush campaign is employing the strategy it had previously promised, outlined in a Daily News story last week, to be used if Bush lost the electoral college vote. The new goal is to get Gore to remove himself from the fray so that Bush can win. The working explanation is this would be for the good of the country, but if Gore doesn't act soon, the Bush team will retaliate, moving the country into chaos. Think about the logic, here. The way the strategy was described and the way it applies here is that, first, Bush spokesmen would take a negative view of Gore and his plans. This began on Wednesday. Then, the media would be manipulated to reflect the Bush point of view. This began yesterday and has doubled today. Then, more Bush spokesmen would be employed to reinforce the views expressed in the media. This has happened with Mr. Baker. The next step would be to get the man on the street involved through phone calls, e-mails, and talk shows. This will begin today and continue through Saturday. Then, the Bush people would try to use various members of the clergy to extend the Bush message. Finally, Bush spokesmen would reappear to announce that the will of the people demands that Gore stepdown, even though he is presently ahead in both the popular vote and the electoral college vote. This will happen on the Sunday morning talk shows. The swift movement of the Bush propaganda campaign suggests that this will continue on Monday. Clearly the Bush team is feeling the heat of the charges of corrupted voting in key election districts in Florida. --Politex, 11/10/00
FLORIDA NEWS UPDATE...Bush leads Gore by 327 votes with all counties reporting, according to the AP. This total does not include any outstanding absentee ballots, which must be received in county offices by next Friday. Also, the present total is informal and is subject to change when the state of Florida provides a formal report of the votes on Tuesday or Wednesday. Further, the total is subject to change on the basis of tomorrow's hand counts in Volusia County (a 100% hand count) and in Palm Beach County (a 1% hand count). As of 7 a.m. ET Friday morning, there is no word on what Dade and Broward counties plan to do, if anything, about the Dem request for hand recounts in those counties. On the legal front, according to CNN a Florida state juedge has ruled that the votes from Palm Beach County may not be certified prior to a scheduled Tuesday hearing. On the political front, the Bush campaign has asked Gore to "cease" any activities to overturn the informal AP unofficial report and give the win to Bush, a request that theGore campaign finds absurd. As a Gore spokesman said, "This is just the beginning of the process." An Emory University political observer observed that what we are seeing is "the battle for public opinion," but in order to give legitimacy to the eventual winner, the eventual loser must acknowledge the winner, something that neither Bush nor Gore is willing to do at this point. --Politex, 11/10/00
BUSH WATCH: THE NOVELby Jerry Politex
I drove my silver Audi down Mesa Drive, the spine of Cat Mountain, hung a left at the cat's tail, drove quickly up the hilly, winding 2222 in low gear, took a right onto Balcones Drive, and came to a stop in the rear parking lot of Che Zee.
Another sunny, warm early spring day in Northwest Austin, Texas. The lunch crowd was pretty much thinned out by now, so I had choices of parking spaces. I got out of the car (love to hear those turbines winding down) and stood by the rear entrance to the restaurant, a pretty-good place for not very expensive Southwestern food. I didn't have long to wait.
He came into the parking lot in an old, rattletrap Nissan pickup. Paint worn off in places, rusty, dusty, squeaky. I recognized him from the description the moment he got out. Looked to be in his fifties. Grizzled. Kind of rusty, dusty, and squeaky. A stringbean of a guy with pale white skin, reddish hair, which was short but unkempt. He was wearing a black polo shirt with the tail out. Denim shorts that had shrunk to a tight fit over his bony hips, short enough for the front pockets to stick out of the frayed cuffs. A pair of old, once-white but now gray, paint-spattered tennis sneakers. Austin casual for a yuppie restaurant, ten minutes from the glass buildings of the city's burgeoning silicon gulch , a world of high tech hopes in buildings springing up like overnight mushrooms.
"Name's Wayne," he said with a crooked, good-natured smile, coming across the parking lot with his arm outstreatched like a spear, eager to shake my hand. "Recognized you right away, Jerry. Good description."
to be continued next Wednesday...
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