Bush's Legitimacy as President

MDLarson

MDLarson

Registered
I don't profess to be an expert on the events of the 2000 presidential election, but here's what I think I know:

A) Gore won the popular vote - nationwide, he garnered more physical votes than did Bush.

B) With every recount in Florida, Bush actually gained votes. In spite of this fact, the Bush campaign wanted to stop the recounts, and went on to try their case before the U.S. Supreme Court, and won. Bush became president.

C) Our nation uses an electoral college which essentially spreads out the weight of a state's vote, puting campaign emphasis on the whole of the nation, not just on the most heavily populated areas. This way, presidential candidates can't afford to ignore less populated areas.

Because we use an electoral college, the facts say that Bush is indeed a legitimate president. So, with some people still screaming "BUSH IS ILLIGITIMATE!!!", I'd like to invite those people to explain the situation to me.
 
There are some people that still refute this aspect. Without counting the ballots myself, I guess there's no sure way to know which result is correct -- everyone can't be right; and in fact everyone has a motivation to lie.

Assuming though that it IS true, then yes -- Bush's election does pass legal muster. He is only the 3rd president in history to lose the popular vote but win the electoral vote, a situation which, though legal, I feel is very unhealthy for the country. (You know, like smoking -- legal, but unhealthy.) I would like to see the process changed, though I think it would take a constitutional amendment to do it.

Just the same, there is evidence that there was a considerable effort at manipulating the outcome of the election, especially in Florida. And it is very unfortunate that the Supreme Court became involved; even if we accept that the final counts went in favor of Bush, as I recall at the time of the SC's decision to halt the recount, there was reason to believe that the recount would go to Gore. This gives the clear impression that Bush was READY to set aside some legitimate votes to win.

I think of it this way: Imagine a crook breaks into a house and kidnaps a baby, meaning to hold him for ransom. As the crook is sneaking out, by pure coincidence,the furnace explodes and the house burns to the ground. The cops show up and see the crook with the baby in his arms, running away from the burning house -- and they thank the crook profusely for rescuing the baby from the fire. He's a hero!

That's how I view Bush's 2000 victory, at least in my more cynical moments.

Ok, let the barbs fly...
 
brianleahy

I think it can be good to have complex election processes: it can give more power to minorities. If you only count voices on one global ballot, you will give more power to the large cities than you give to farmers and other minorities.

You may not like the result of complex votes when you are part of the majority, but respecting the minorities is a factor of stability and peace.

BTW if there would have been a strong of majority against Bush, he wouldn't have won. So if you don't like the result of the election, instead of discussing the election process, try to understand why so many Americans voted for him... and maybe you will be able to convince some of them to make another choice next time.
 
Wouldn't a ballot be appropriate in such cases? When two of several candidates seem to have gotten the same share of votes, a second round of elections is held with only those two remaining candidates. In the rare case that even this is a draw, then a supreme court could make the decision.

I suppose that such a second round / ballot would have cleared beyond any doubt who won.

This would indeed require a constitutional reform of the election process.
 
I'm not sure I understand how the electoral college gives more voice to minorities. Can you explain that?

I have an even harder time believing that a majority of minorities (now there's a phrase for you) voted for Bush.

According to http://www.fec.gov/pages/ecworks.htm

Each State is allocated a number of Electors equal to the number of its U.S. Senators (always 2) plus the number of its U.S. Representatives (which may change each decade according to the size of each State's population as determined in the Census).
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So far so good, BUT:

The political parties (or independent candidates) in each State submit to the State's chief election official a list of individuals pledged to their candidate for president and equal in number to the State's electoral vote. Usually, the major political parties select these individuals either in their State party conventions or through appointment by their State party leaders while third parties and independent candidates merely designate theirs.
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That's right; there is actually an entire slate of dedicated electors picked per candidate.

Then:
Whichever party slate wins the most popular votes in the State becomes that State's Electors-so that, in effect, whichever presidential ticket gets the most popular votes in a State wins all the Electors of that State. (The two exceptions to this are Maine and Nebraska where two Electors are chosen by statewide popular vote and the remainder by the popular vote within each Congressional district).
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So the popular vote actually only determines which complete slate of oath-bound electors get to cast the state's votes. Nobody can tell me that this is logical or intuitive. For that matter, with this system there seems to me absolutely no point whatsoever to having actual flesh-and-blood electors -- since they are duty bound to vote a certain way, they are entirely redundant.

This system guarantees that all the electoral votes for a given state go to the same candidate. THAT bugs the hell out of me. It means that (as was the case in Florida) as many as 49.9999...% of the population of any given state may in effect get no actual say in the election. It'd be another story if the electors voted in the same proportion as the popular votes - but that's not how it works.

This is also totally different from the House Of Representatives, where the members are essentially free to vote any way they like, but (if they want to stay in office) try to represent the best interests of their constituents - that is, those in their own particular district. The granularity in the House is by district, not by state, an arrangement which seems to me far more egalitarian, especially in highly populous states.

And don't misconstrue what I'm saying - I'm not calling for any sort of retroactive changes in the 2000 election, and I'm not saying that the current laws should be ignored, while they stand. At all costs our elections MUST be strictly legal and above-board. But laws can, and sometimes must, be changed. Much of the original rationale for the electoral college is moot at this point in history (illiteracy was a concern originally), and I think it bears reexamination. That's all.

EDIT: I like the way Maine and Nebraska do it a lot better...
 
I shall not criticize or propose anything for US elections, as I am no US citizen.

As a Swiss citizen, I can explain how we do (very, very complicated, I make it simpler here):
1) not all votes or elections use the same rules
2) we vote laws and elect people at 3 levels (at different time, with different rules, and rules my change form one location to another within Switzerland): commune, canton, and country
3) for some votations at country level, a decision is taken only on majority of people (global) and majority of cantons (small cantons have the same weight as large cantons, even if they may have more than 10 times less inhabitants)... this gives more power to small cantons, often mountain places.
 
This was just votations (and it concerns only laws proposed by the population, laws proposed by the government are easier)... elections are far worse !
 
brianleahy said:
Just the same, there is evidence that there was a considerable effort at manipulating the outcome of the election, especially in Florida. And it is very unfortunate that the Supreme Court became involved; even if we accept that the final counts went in favor of Bush, as I recall at the time of the SC's decision to halt the recount, there was reason to believe that the recount would go to Gore. This gives the clear impression that Bush was READY to set aside some legitimate votes to win.
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I don't want to push the issue too much, but what exactly was the evidence that the recount would go to Gore? Every single count went to Bush. And if "EVERY VOTE COUNTS", as the Democrats chanted, why then, did Gore not want some military ballots that arrived too late via ship counted?

Anyway, you guys sound reasonable enough; I wanted to duke it out with the idiots who have "Re-Elect Gore in 2004" and "Re-Defeat Bush in 2004" (Yes, I've seen them both, and yes, they're very clever :rolleyes: :) ).
 
Brian - You said that under the electoral system, the wishes of up to 49.99...% of the voters in each state are not only thrown out, but in fact subverted (since the electors corresponding to their representation in the population actually vote against those wishes). In fact, that only holds true if you assume a two party state. If a third party were to gain significant influence, then it would be up to 66.66... % of votes that would be subverted; with four parties it would be 74.99...%, and so on.

I suspect (and feel even more free than usual to ignore my opinion, since I'm not even an American) that this fact contributes to keeping the US a two party state, which in turn stifles real political debate - the parties don't have to really distinguish themselves, just sort of jockey for the middle of the road, to catch those few swing voters in crucial states. Other parties may have really good points, but they are ignored, because a vote for a third party is a throw-away vote even more certainly than a vote for, say, the Democrats in Texas...

It also seems to me that the electoral college system is bad for keeping candidates unanswerable to their voters. For example, since Texas will vote Republican no matter what, no one has to pay any attention to what Texans want - the state will vote Republican, so Texan Republicans can safely be ignored just as much as Texan Democrats. The same goes for strongly Democrat states like Hawaii.

Incidentally, the Canadian system has its own particular goofiness - each riding elects a representative, and the party that has the most representatives ends up forming a government. This means that there's an electoral college-like problem within each riding. Only one candidate gets elected per riding, and there's only one round of voting, so if there's n candidates in a riding, then a candidate could win with as little as 1/n % +1 votes. You get silliness like the last election:
Code: 
Party          Seats   % Seats     % Votes
Liberal         135     43.8        36.7
Conservative    99      32.1        29.6
BQ              54      17.5        12.4
NDP             19      6.1         15.7
Other           0       0           5.5

For an extreme example, in the province of Saskatchewan (where I'm from) the Conservative party got 42% of votes, and 93% of seats.
 
but what exactly was the evidence that the recount would go to Gore?
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I seem to recall hearing that a count that was in progress when the Supreme Court's decision came down was, at that point, leaning towards Gore. I can't at the moment find a source for that, so I may be wrong. But I thought I'd heard that.
 
brianleahy said:
I seem to recall hearing that a count that was in progress when the Supreme Court's decision came down was, at that point, leaning towards Gore. I can't at the moment find a source for that, so I may be wrong. But I thought I'd heard that.
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I believe that a person should not believe either side of this issue. We are being told each side's propaganda about the 2000. At the time it was important. Well, to me it is now in the past and we should focus on this year’s election to make sure controversy stays far away for the ballot box. Both Republicans and Democrats should not step in the actual poll and tell me how I voted. My vote is my private decision and is no one else’s business!
 
Satcomer said:
I believe that a person should not believe either side of this issue.
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Umm, that's kind of dumb I think. Either Bush is legitimate or he isn't. There are still people who believe he isn't today, and I am challenging that belief.
 
MDLarson said:
Umm, that's kind of dumb I think. Either Bush is legitimate or he isn't. There are still people who believe he isn't today, and I am challenging that belief.
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First all, I am sorry if you think propaganda did come into play during the hype around the Florida 2000 election. I tend to have some faith in the Supreme Court. If their vote wasn't legitimate then all other Supreme Court decisions in the past should be called in question. It's is absolutly crazy to think the Supreme Court did not take a Constitutional look at the whole case. They made their decision and that made it legitimate for me, and the Constitution. The last time I looked, their decision was final unless the Constitution is changed or another Supreme Court makes different decision.
 
brianleahy said:
He is only the 3rd president in history to lose the popular vote but win the electoral vote, a situation which, though legal, I feel is very unhealthy for the country.
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I disagree. The way it's done now gives power to the states, which does more than guarantee campaigning to lesser-populated areas. It's a key part of nourishing the unique centralized/decentralized nature of the United States. I think it's very healthy to ensure that states have a great deal of real power, as opposed to a purely centralized government. With the way it is now, the president has to cater to the desires of the states, not just the masses in general.

This enables states to work as testbeds for ideas, policies, laws, forms of government & etc. That way one section of the nation can make a big mistake (like California's implementation of energy deregulation) or discover a grand idea (uh, what's a grand idea example?) or take different sides on a hot topic (California Proposition 22 vs. gay marriages being legalized in Massachusetts). Issues can be tackled in different ways with different laws and with a different ideals in each state and the others can observe and learn. The whole nation doesn't have to be thrown one way or the other immediately on important issues and ultimately, if the states have power, people can choose to live in a state that more closely matches their ideals.

Of course, some things need to be nationwide, but isn't it nice that the first go-rounds on many of these issues happen in states where debate and analysis can occur before the nation as a whole has to make up its mind on the issue? And also isn't it nice that some things can just be different from state to state?

There are many things which create this atmosphere, of course, but one important part is that when electing the nation's executive leader, each state speaks individually with the collective voice of its people.
 
baggss said:
WOW! What a fascinating thread this is!
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WOW! What a fascinating post that was! :rolleyes: If you don't think the thread has value, don't post in it. It will eventually go away.
 
This is an excerpt from an article discussing an on-air debate between Fox News' commentator Bill O'Reilly and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. I don't have any real interest in debating the strengths of the two commentators, but as you can see, part of the excerpt is germane to this thread. Apparently, there are some recount scenarios in which Gore would have won...

The entire article (with links to the various recount studies) is here:
http://mediamatters.org/items/200408100003

...as MMFA previously explained, is that the University of Chicago's National Opinion Research Center (NORC) studied Florida's disputed ballots and concluded that Gore emerged the winner in at least four recount scenarios, as reported in The Washington Post on November 12, 2001.

Moreover, O'Reilly's listing of various recount investigations is highly deceptive: Only two significant independent analyses of disputed Florida ballots occurred, not four, as O'Reilly suggested. The Miami Herald and USA Today were partners in a single investigation. And what O'Reilly called "the University of Chicago investigation" is actually the same as what Krugman cited as "the National Opinion Research Group." The Orlando Sentinel and Associated Press (whose summary of the NORC findings Krugman read in the above passage) -- along with numerous other news organizations including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, CNN, and The Tribune Co. -- were all partners in the consortium that commissioned the NORC study.

The Herald study, which only examined approximately 60,000 so-called "undervotes" (votes for which counting machines failed to register any vote for president) study was more favorable to Bush -- since Gore gained votes in the NORC study which examined all 180,000 uncounted Florida ballots, primarily from so-called "overvotes" (ballots for which vote-counting machines registered votes for more than one candidate). Even so, the Herald identified recount scenarios in which Gore would have won, even in a recount involving only the undervotes. Thus, even if we interpret O'Reilly as intending to refer only to that study, his July 19 claim that "Bush would have won no matter what" is still false.
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Good post. There's a couple of points I could bring to debate, but I don't think they'd be very important. However, in my browsing I came across this quote from "anonymous" on the comment boards:
Everyone seems to focus only on Florida, there is and will continue to be games played with votes, and voters. Here in our area, Democrat drivers who were giving elderly voters rides to the polling places were telling them that if Bush is elected medicare would be closed down immediately. As for recount after recount, after the first recount there is no valid way to tell from the damage done to the punch cards what the results are. Run them through the machine, and the tally is the tally. All the inspections, deciding what the voter wanted, is nothing but trouble and outright fraud. The machine is the counter take the count and report it.
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That seems to make the most sense to me, in the end.

However, does someone still interested in this thread have a list of tallies of all the counts and recounts of 2000? That would be interesting to me.
 
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