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September 12, 2002

Florida, and other global trouble spots Max Sawicky with the weblog post of the day:
EU DEBATES MEASURES TO RESTORE ORDER AND DEMOCRACY IN FLORIDA. [From Le Monde et La Merde, September 12, 2002] BRUXELLE — The storied war cabinet of the European Union continued to meet today, deep in deliberations on restoring order to the rapidly deteriorating situation in Florida, U.S.A. Sources said debate bogged down initially over disagreements over whether order had actually prevailed in the first place.

EU Minister of Information & Household Appliances Bo Husqvarnaquistholm from Sweden reported to the group on the present situation: “We have an across the board breakdown of the state’s social and public services. The Child Welfare Department has been taken over by people who believe in flogging disobedient minors. Law enforcement agencies let perpetrators of drug offenses walk away from arrest. They prefer to focus on conducting surveillance on houses of prostitution. Election officials are ignorant of election laws. Election workers are ignorant of how to administer elections. Governor Jeb Bush is ignorant of the fact that elections are a state government responsibility. Dogs and cats have begun to try to eat each other, while alligators are eating them both. Janet Reno evades apprehension and is liable to eat anything.”

[05:01 PM]
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Comments on Florida, and other global trouble spots:

Nancy ::: (view all by) ::: September 12, 2002, 11:47 PM:

... and Jeb Bush's daughter has been found with cocaine in her possession -- again -- while still in the confines of a substance abuse treatment center.

For real.

Lenny Bailes ::: (view all by) ::: September 13, 2002, 03:11 AM:

Sarah Vowell, an occasional Salon columnist and author of _The Partly Cloudy Patriot_, was Jon Stewart's guest on tonight's Daily Show. She made some pointed comments about it not being rocket science to check whether voting machines are plugged into wallsockets.

Bill Humphries ::: (view all by) ::: September 13, 2002, 06:16 PM:

I just read an excerpt from the 9/11 comp.risks digest on these machines.

http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/22.24.html#subj1

Looks like it's time to agitate.

Andrea Harris ::: (view all by) ::: September 13, 2002, 06:43 PM:

There wasn't any trouble in my part of Florida, but then again, I don't live in one of the "blue" counties. Make of that what you will.

Tony Hursh ::: (view all by) ::: September 14, 2002, 02:29 PM:

Nancy: The drug problems of Jeb's daughter are not relevant (not to mention petty). It's not like there's a lack of substantive grounds for criticizing the Bush clan.

You might reflect on the fact that Al Gore's kid has just been arrested for DUI, or the fact that numerous Kennedy offspring have gone through drug and alcohol rehab. On the other side, some people act as if W's daughters are the only college students in the history of the world to drink alcohol before they turned 21.

I'm no fan of Jeb, W, Gore, or the Kennedy family. I've been known to say harsh things about all of them from time to time. Criticize them for what they do in their public life, not for what they do in private, and certainly not for what their kids do (oh, yeah ... and I don't really care how many hummers Clinton was getting in the Oval Office, either. I just wish he'd had the guts to be honest about it).

To get (more or less) back on topic, computerized voting systems scare me shitless. It's too easy to put the records down the Memory Hole and "make it didn't happen". Imagine what Daley the First would've been with voting records that were just files on a hard disk.

Jon Hansen ::: (view all by) ::: September 14, 2002, 05:03 PM:

I think one thing that's a little eye-catching is a detail I saw regarding election recounts:

"...the office of Secretary of State Jim Smith decided not to grant the recount because the margin between McBride and Reno was not small enough to trigger a manual recount under state law...Host [spokesman for Smith] said that while local elections officials can add any new votes they discover to vote totals already submitted, state law no longer allows them to initiate a full-scale recount."

Is it just me, or does that suggest all anyone would have to do avoid a recount in a close election is arrange to "misplace" some votes for a little while, then come back later and revise the figures?

Todd Larason ::: (view all by) ::: September 14, 2002, 10:48 PM:

http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/09/13/reno.mcbride/index.html
"Former U.S. Attorney Janet Reno Friday requested a statewide manual recount of ballots cast in Tuesday's problem-plagued Democratic primary for governor"

"Reno campaign officials ... are requesting only a review of ballot counts on electronic voting machines in about 330 precincts Miami-Dade and Broward Counties, not a statewide recount"

Can someone offer an interpretation of those bits such that they don't contradict each other?

Jon Hansen ::: (view all by) ::: September 15, 2002, 10:43 AM:

Elsewhere in that article it says they requested the statewide recount to meet "a Friday evening deadline for recounts set out in state law." But the second quote suggests all they care about having recounted is the "troubled" precincts in Miami-Dade & Broward.

In other words, they're required to ask for the whole thing when all they really want is one small part. Not unlike buying a bulk lot on eBay, when all you want are a couple things out of it.

Bob Webber ::: (view all by) ::: September 15, 2002, 01:25 PM:

Since this same problem was an issue in the 2000 Presidential election (partial recounts vs. state-wide recounts), it seems clear that the net "reform" of Florida election procedures has just made it easier to tamper with the vote and harder to prove tampering.

Not surprising, with the same blackguards in power for the original election hijack and the supposed reform. Disappointing, depressing, but ultimately not surprising.

Avram ::: (view all by) ::: September 15, 2002, 01:33 PM:

Tony -- Not relevent to what? If politicians and their families can routinely get away with crimes for which me and mine would get real prison sentences, that's sure as hell relevent to issues of law and justice.

Andrea Harris ::: (view all by) ::: September 15, 2002, 11:28 PM:

Not relavent to the discussion of the ballots. Unless you can somehow tie Ms. Bush's drug problems in with the ballot problems. But what do I know. I just live here. Maybe Florida's enmeshed in one huge gooey web of Republican corruption; kind of like a Carl Hiaasen novel, only without any good-looking single moms who have to strip for a living.

Avram ::: (view all by) ::: September 16, 2002, 02:54 AM:

But then the stuff about Al Gore's son and the Kennedys shouldn't be relevant either, right? But Tony suggested that we reflect upon it. Went on about it at several times the length of the original post. What's that about?

Look, if you think something's irrelevant, then say so. But if you go on to talk about it some more, then you clearly must think it relevant, otherwise you wouldn't be talking about it.

Tony Hursh ::: (view all by) ::: September 16, 2002, 11:30 AM:

Acually, "reflect on it" might not have been the best way of phrasing it.

I don't think the fact that family members of politicians sometimes have drug and alcohol problems is relevant. I do think that people making a big deal out of it is relevant. Those aren't quite the same things, and the latter irritates the crap out of me.

It's no news that politicians and their families sometimes get away with things for which you or I would be thrown in the pokey, but come on... the Bush daughters? Every day the college paper here prints a list of kids busted for underage drinking. They pay a small fine and that's the end of it. It's been going on, well, for ever. The difference is that Joe Fratboy's kegger doesn't make the national news. It's on the same level as the press making a big deal out of Chelsea Clinton spending the night with her boyfriend. Yeah, some people (not me) think there's something morally wrong with that. So what? It's none of their business.


The DUI for which Bush himself was busted (mumble) years ago IS relevant, though I don't think particularly so, any more than Clinton and Gore's youthful marijuana use bothers me. Now if Bush were mainlining heroin in the Oval Office, or Clinton had been smoking crack right before negotiating an important treaty, yeah, that's important.

Avram ::: (view all by) ::: September 16, 2002, 12:35 PM:

Tony, you're moving the goalposts. You're the one who brought up underage drinking. The comment of Nancy's to which you were replying was about cocanie possession.

And while the fact that politicians are a de facto royalty, immune to many of the laws that they inflict upon us, isn't news, it's still not right.

And you still haven't answered -- relevant to what?

Andrea Harris ::: (view all by) ::: September 16, 2002, 01:38 PM:

Well, I don't think Gore's son's DUI is relevant to the ballot discussion either. To a discussion on signs of corruption and the misuse of privilege by those in power, well, that's another discussion. Or is it? You could say that the "special treatment" (if there has been any) afforded to Bush's daughter or Gore's son is part and parcel of an atmosphere that treats voters like interchangeable parts. But I hardly think that corruption is endemic to one party over another. If there is misuse of power going on, then Democrats as well as Republicans are engaging in it. Nobody's got a halo here.

Tony Hursh ::: (view all by) ::: September 16, 2002, 10:05 PM:

Avram: Relevant to discussing (or arguing about) politics. Relevant to deciding who to vote for.

A fair test would be: Would I really care one way or another if this were the kid of Joe Schmoe across town, rather than the kid of someone whose politics I dislike? If the answer is no (or perhaps something sympathetic, along the lines of "poor kid, poor family") then I don't consider it relevant. It's just a cheap shot.

Now if Jeb turns out to be pulling strings to keep her out of trouble (as Patrick seems to be suggesting in a later post), that's extremely relevant. Put his ass in the dock.

Of course, sometimes being prominent means that you don't get away with it when you otherwise would have. Does anyone really think that Michael Skakel would've been convicted at this late date if he (and his victim) hadn't been the offspring of wealthy and politically connected families? If Moxley and Skakel had lived in a trailer park, that case would've ranked somewhat lower in priority than solving the disappearance of Judge Crater.

Don't get me wrong. I think he did it, and I'm glad he was convicted.

Avram ::: (view all by) ::: September 17, 2002, 01:35 AM:

If you didn't think it was relevant, why did you bring up Gore's son's DUI, or Dubya's daughters' underage drinking?

If you're going to take the high road and not stoop to what you consider cheap shots, fine. If you're going to take the low road and use your own cheap shots in reply to someone else's, also fine. But you don't get to try both and retain any credibility.

Tony Hursh ::: (view all by) ::: September 17, 2002, 03:08 PM:

Asking someone to consider how they would feel if these tactics were used by someone on the other side and providing an example of how those tactics have been used is a "cheap shot"? Umm... okay. I don't see how you got that out of what I wrote, but that's not at all what I was driving at.

Try reading this paragraph again (quoted from above):

I'm no fan of Jeb, W, Gore, or the Kennedy family. I've been known to say harsh things about all of them from time to time. Criticize them for what they do in their public life, not for what they do in private, and certainly not for what their kids do.

(end of quote)

It might also be a good idea not to make assumptions about which side I'm on.