Talk:U.S. presidential election, 2000/Archive 2

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

There appears to be quite a bit of repetition in the page. For example, compare the second bulleted paragraph in the "Controversy in Florida" section with the bulleted paragraph just before the Greg Palast statistics. Also, the fact that there is a heading "The 2000 Presidential Election" half way through the article is confusing, as that is the subject of the article itself. I'm not game to make any edits to address these issues right now, as I don't know enough about this complicated and contentious subject. - Molinari 01:28 3 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Can someone add the total number of people with the right to vote to the table on top of the page? And the number of people over 18 that don't have this right because their incarcerated would also be interesting here. guaka 00:55 5 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Since there is a 'Florida Statistical Abstract', then a 'Florida Statistical Abstract Census' has a credible ring. May we see a bulleted website reference added just under there? Those '1000 voters' seems like such a nice round number... Wetman 13:36, 20 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I remember a newspaper led recount that showed that had the Democrats got the recounts they wanted they would have lost and had the Republicans got the ones they wanted the would have lost. Anyone remember the details and who did it? Rmhermen 16:07, Nov 21, 2003 (UTC)

If I recall correctly, the most publicized and largest recount effort was led by USA Today. Their findings match your description and the Republicans also had a wafer thin slight edge in the majority of recount methods — not including the recount method favored by the Republicans (although I believe the Republicans favored using original totals given that they were ahead in those). Daniel Quinlan 21:05, Nov 21, 2003 (UTC)

Removed "Following the election, an official media recount showed that Bush indeed had more votes than Gore and that he would have still won the popular vote in Florida had the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the recounts to proceed." As far as I have identified there has been no authorative academic study to back this statement. There have been various attempted recounts which have come to different conclusions some favouring Bush and some favouring Gore. :ChrisG 12:35, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

All the serious studies have shown that Bush would have won had the recounts proceeded. In particular, a study by the major news media (who were very much hoping for a different result) found that Bush would have won. Suggesting otherwise is just wishful thinking. If you want to contest this, start citing studies.

Mcarling 16:44, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

The count by the media suggested that a recount with merely undervotes counted would have resulted in Bush winning. A recounted with undervotes and overvotes would have resulted in Gore winning, no matter what the standards used for counting the undervotes. The judge who was directing the recount has said that he might have recounted the overvotes as well. Mickey Kaus has some stuff along those lines, if you search the Slate archives, probably. And please, the media weren't hoping for a different result. It was right after September 11, and they were extremely eager to say that Bush would have won anyway. If they hadn't been, they could easily have spun the story in a different way. john 20:08, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

I don't see why we should give special treatment to "the method requested by Gore." We could just as easily say "the method which counted all legally cast votes would have resulted in a victory for Gore." (Which is true - counting legally cast overvotes as well as undervotes gives Gore the win, no matter what counting standard is used). We should either a) not mention any specific ways of counting the votes in the introduction, and go into the details later on; or b) explain the whole thing in some detail. To discuss in detail the ways of counting that Bush won, and then to largely dismiss the ways that Gore won, is POV. john 18:32, 19 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Can someone explain that "No electoral vote cast (DC)" cell in the main table? --Lowellian 20:54, Mar 20, 2004 (UTC)

I modified the D.C. elector section slightly to reflect that D.C. does have one shadow delegate in Congress and to improve the grammatical flow slightly. Despite her lack of full formal voting powers, Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) does get things done in Congress on behalf of the District.

--Xinoph 19:12, Mar 28, 2004 (UTC)

In relation to the "scrub list" issue in Florida, we say "While the story was widely reported from November in countries such as the UK, the US media refused to publish it until many months after the elections." While I know nothing about the issue, it is absurd to characterise "the US media" as a single entity which "refused" to do something. This needs to be rephrased by someone familiar with the issue but not prone to conspiracy theories. Adam 07:09, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)

It is incorrect to classify the Supreme Court vote on Bush v. Gore as anything but 5-4. The Court issued one per curiam ruling. They did not issue two rulings. Four justices dissented. They did not concur in part in dissent in part. They simply dissented. Therefore, five justices agree with the ruling, and four did not. Therefore, the vote is 5-4.

Some people have tried to extrapolate from the dissenting opinions that there were other rulings, and that some of the dissenting judges voted for them. But that is irrelevant in determining the final vote. Five justices joined in the majority opinion, and four dissented, so it is a single ruling with a 5-4 vote.

To be precise; 7 justices held that having different standards in different counties / no single overseer violated equal protection, 5 found that stopping all recounts was an appropriate remedy, and 3 were over-ruled in their belief that the Florida Supreme Court had improperly applied the intent of the Florida legislature. CBDunkerson 23:31, 28 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Not a consipiracy theory, really. A generalization, perhaps. But it is a vaild point. Whether or not it belongs on this write up I make no claim, but the US media does at times act as a single unit, or at least the mainstream does. At any rate, it is sad that those of use attempting to voice our opinions often do not do so in a suitable manner, and in doing so make the rest of this look worse. I say this in response to the revision in which someone said that the Bush regime "cheated," thus depriving Gore of the election. While I hold this to be true in light of the evidence quoted in this writeup, it is absurd to try and make that claim in a forum such as this writeup. We can offer evidence and facts, and let those who will see whether or not Bush cheated. Cgranade 01:38, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

There was no "Bush regime" during the election period. I think a certain Mr Clinton was in office at that time. Adam 01:50, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Granted, but that wasn't my point. Besides, it could be argued that insofar as Florida goes, there was: his brother was governor, and the elections supervisor was his campaign manager. Anyway, understand your point, and yet remain with mine. Cgranade 03:56, Apr 6, 2004 (UTC)

My view, for what it's worth, is that Gore lost the election because he was a lousy candidate. If he had carried Tennessee and / or West Virginia, both of which should have been certainties for him, he wouldn't have needed to carry Florida. And he lost Florida principally because of the misleading ballot paper in Palm Beach, which was designed by a local Democrat official and had nothing to do with the Bushes. Adam 05:14, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's all water over the dam now, but I have my doubts about the validity of the arguments about the "butterfly ballot." Have you seen the ballot? There is a big arrow pointing at the hole to punch. Nevertheless, let's assume that somehow people ignored the big arrow. I was a printing foreman for many, many years. The rule of thumb is that you place the result of a multiline paragraph (as when showing a page number, a total, or something to check off) at the bottom of the paragraph, because that's where people expect to see it. The argument is that people mistakenly went to the top of the paragraph and voted for Buchanan. I've never seen anyone else mention this, but any printer would know.

Perpective view of the infamous 2000 Florida 'butterfly ballot' as it would be seen by the voter, showing how difficult it can be to match the hole to the proper candidate. Gzuckier 16:55, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Another point was some of the hype associated with how they ostensibly learned that all these people voted for Buchanan when they wanted Gore. I recall one Democratic official on TV claiming that he peronally saw "hundreds" of hysterical crying seniors in the parking lot outside the polling place when they realized that they had voted for Buchanan by mistake. Putting aside the hyperbole of "hundreds" and the slur on the emotional stability of seniors, how did so many people manage to punch the wrong hole cluelessly but then have a revelation a few minutes later that brought them to tears. Cecropia 05:26, 6 Apr 2004 (UTC)

This was all extensively described at the time. As an party election worker myself I know how easily elderly people get confused by ballot papers, and the Palm Beach precincts in question were heavily populated by elderly Jewish people, FDR Democrats all, who were misled by the layout of the ballot. This was not of course the only defect in the Florida count but it was enough on its own to cost him the state.

-- I just pulled this off the page because it didn't match up with references at the bottom and I don't have time to straighten it out. ==Major campaign sponsors== ===Republican Party=== * [[AT&T]] – $2,702,871 * [[Global Crossing]] – $967,293 * [[Microsoft]] – $1,586,635 * [[Philip Morris]] – $2,124,562 ===Democratic Party=== * [[AT&T]] – $1,479,834 * [[Global Crossing]] – $1,261,152 * [[Microsoft]] – $1,276,413 * [[Goldman Sachs]] – $1,291,975 (I did fix the Democratic AT&T number in the above table - a vandal changed 1 to 2 in the millions column. But AT&T wasn't the biggest contributor[1]. What are we trying to present in this section? -- ke4roh 19:34, Jul 1, 2004 (UTC)