A question to Americans?

Question

Hi,

I live in Australia, and we soon have a new federal election coming up and I know you guys do too and I've always wanted to ask this question

I know it is a long time ago, but I'd like to know from democrats/repubicans/etc how do you guys feel/how did you feel about the illegal election of Bush in 2001. Are you worried something like this could happen again?

Thanks!
Anna

Im not trying to antagonise anyone at all
I really wanted to know
and yes I was under the impression that Bush did not win, but they called the election early and the supreme court supressed a recount

WAYNE...I'm oxygen deprived???
I find that very insulting and childish to be honest. And I'm not Australian...I live here. Im actually from England.

Well I've almost finished 2 degrees and Im about to start Medicine, getting in the top 2% of the entrance exam, so I cant be THAT stupid.

Just because I may have been MISINFORMED that doesnt mean that I'm stupid. I was honestly under the impression that George Bush did not get the majority vote - something I have read in various sources.

YOU clearly need some lessons in logic
Oh and attacking a person's intelligence is quite a low form of debate...as well as making yourself look like a jerk

Can I just say a good portion of your responses have kind of disgusted me.

Not because you pointed out that I was wrong about an illegal election (which I'm not sure I believe I will do some extensive research after this) - but the way you ridiculed my honest, non-loaded question and even attacked my intelligence and the country I live in (making slurs about kangaroo meat...thats just pathetic)

I was honestly and seriously interested in the opinions of real Americans about what I thought was an event which really happened - thats why I asked a question, instead of posting a statement for you to discuss.

I thought you would give me your opinions, instead a good portion of you ridiculed and mocked me.

Obviously you dont take kindly to people (who due to them living in other countries may not be as familiar with your electoral processes as you)

Im so sorry for showing a ******* interest in a governmental system outside of my own and having the AUDACITY to ask a question.

Answer 1

yes, what happened in 2000 is embarrassing and pretty scary, there was a great documentary on HBO about how the electronic voting card can be hacked ... and, more to the point, there was hidden firmware in them


the fear is that our government is already too powerful for the people to overthrow, we will learn allot about ourselves and our government in this next election

Answer 2

Hi Anna ,

...There is basically two votes ...one the popular vote ,which is the people, and than we have an electoral college , each state has so many electoral votes..California has like 55 and some of the smaller states has around 3..there is a total of 537 electoral college votes these are the votes that determine who will be president and vice president ..not the popular vote ....in 2000 Gore won the popular vote but lost the electoral vote..this has only happened a few times in our history..but the truth of the matter is the people's vote is not the deciding factor in a presidential election....the electoral college decides who the president will be ...not the people......in theory .. 99.9% of the population could vote for one candidate and the candidate would still not win the election if the electoral college vote goes in the other direction......

In 2000 the electoral college vote was close ..with Florida having 27 electoral votes it could definitely have swayed the election... Bush ended up with 271 votes and Gore ended with 266 ..with only a 5 vote difference ...there was no surprise in question being asked...

As to your question ,and no doubt many thumbs downs ,about this up coming election..yes, I am worried..but not so much about the ending but who we will have to end up choosing from...it looks to be another election of the "lesser of two evils" type of thing again..which is a worry ....they call this thing in Iraq "Bush's war" but the truth is it couldn't have happened if our congress hadn't backed it...and the candidates that is running for president are the same lot that voted to put us there in the first place...so ,as things stand now..don't look for to much change and it matters not if it is a democrat or republican they are all pretty much the same ....



now, since I answered a political question...and some people on here seem to live ,eat,and breath politics... and if a person doesn't fit in a particular category they seem get irate....I need to clarify the "LeftField360" does NOT refer to politics... it is a referral to baseball.....I had this ID long before I even knew what a "lib" or a "con" meant on these forums..... I am not a democrat or a republican and I have never been one or the other.......

Answer 3

There was nothing illegal about the 2000 election. The results were close, and, in every election there are some irregularities at some polling places (it's a big country, polls are staffed by volunteers, there are going to be issues). Gore called for a re-count, and, when the results weren't what he wanted, disputed them. The controversy dragged on until the Supreme Court finally settled it.

It was not the first time that a close presidential election yielded questionable results. 40 years earlier, election fraud may have given Kenedy the presidency but, Nixon declined to press the issue, and accepted the official results. The fear was that if he had contested the results it would have undermined confidence in the electoral process.

As it turned out, that's exactly what has happened as a result of Gore contesting the 2000 election results so vigorously. Many Americans - and, it would seem, at least one Australian - have had thier faith in the democratic process shaken.


And, yes, it's likely to happen again. The Democrats already laid the groundwork for it heading into the 06 elections, fanning fears that the new digital voting machines could be hakced, and, in effect, saying "if we don't win, the election will have been rigged." They won, so the election was fair.

Those same fears are being dreged up ahead of the 2008 election.

Answer 4

The election wasn't illegal.

Facts:

1. The media was calling states in favor of Gore with only a very small percentage of the votes in (maybe 30% or less), but not calling states for Bush until about 70% or more of the votes were in. (Bigtime media bias going on there).

2. By the media calling Florida early for Gore, and with the Florida panhandle being in a different time zone, many folks in this region cancelled their trip to the polls, and were very angry later when they realized their votes would have counted.

3. Military votes, largely believed to be for Bush, were not counted.

4. State-wide vote recounts were done twice.

5. A pro-Gore person working on the vote recount board was illegally punching out votes in favor of Gore, before being discovered and tossed out.

6. The Democrats came up with the inane story that elderly voters could not comprehend the Florida voting ballot forms, when such voters had lived in Florida for years and voted all their lives.

7. The Democrats wanted selective vote recounts only in counties of their choosing.

And despite ALL of this, the Democrats still lost. Their cheating only narrowed the margin, but they still lost.

And now some Democrats have the audacity to want to change the electoral college. But what can you say? A cheater is never satisfied and will always lose in the long run.

President Bush won election two times and fairly.

Answer 5

Technically the election was not illegal. Based on our system each state counts the votes within that state then based on who gets the most votes in that state, the state will cast all of its electoral college votes for that candidate. For the first time in U.S. history the electoral college did not pick the person with the most overall votes. Therefore the election was not illegal, and just for the record neither party can put forth a good candidate. Partisan politics are a joke. I'd like to start an anti-trust law suit against the Democrat and Republican parties. I think we should have at least 10 or 15 viable candidates to choose our president from and I'd prefer if most of them were not politicians.

Answer 6

I am not sure what you are talking about. There was no illegal election. There has been no illegal election in US history.

BTW. Every recount of the Florida ballots had George Bush winning. The Illegal part was attempting to do a partial recount of the state and the was kaboshed by our Supreme court.

Also, if your entire legal system from the Supreme court on down rules in the same direction how could any rational being call that illegal?

Answer 7

"Those who cast the votes decide nothing; those who count the votes decide everything."
Joseph Stalin

"Intolerance of dissent is a well-noted feature of the American national character."
Senator J. William Fulbright

"A well-functioning democracy has a culture of free speech, not simply legal protection of free speech. It encourages independence of mind. It imparts a willingness to challenge prevailing opinion through both words and deeds. Equally important, it encourages a certain set of attitudes in listeners, one that gives a respectful hearing to those who do not embrace the conventional wisdom. In a culture of free speech, the attitude of listeners is no less important than that of speakers."
Cass Sunstein

"The people will believe what the media tells them they believe."
George Orwell

"Americans are too broadly underinformed to digest nuggets of information that seem to contradict what they know of the world ... Instead, news channels prefer to feed Americans a constant stream of simplified information, all of which fits what they already know. That way they don't have to devote more air time or newsprint space to explanations or further investigations."
Tom Fenton, CBS foreign correspondent

"This country is in the grip of a President who was not elected, who has surrounded himself with thugs in suits who care nothing about human life abroad or here, who care nothing about freedom abroad or here, who care nothing about what happens to the earth... The so-called war on terrorism is not only a war on innocent people in other countries, but it is also a war on the people of the United States: a war on our liberties, a war on our standard of living. The wealth of the country is being stolen from the people and handed over to the superrich. The lives of our young are being stolen. And the thieves are in the White House."
Howard Zinn

"The United States has only one party - the property party. It's the party of big corporations, the party of money. It has two right wings; one is Democrat and the other is Republican."
Gore Vidal

Answer 8

There wasn't anything "illegal" about it. The results of the presidential election were disputed. Bush and Cheney brought a lawsuit.* And the Supreme Court ruled on that lawsuit. As a result, Bush was declared the winner of the election. Gore even conceded the election. What was illegal?

*By the way, despite rumors to the contrary, Bush and Cheney were indeed the petitioners of the Supreme Court case. Source: http://www.supremecourtus.gov/docket/00-949.htm

Answer 9

Explain why the election was "illegal"? These accusations must be supported by facts and law otherwise they are just bulshi* remarks.

I have heard this accusation over a thousand times in the last 7 years and NOT ONCE has anyone provided a single piece of evidence to back it up.

Answer 10

I felt horrible. I thought we had a real constitutional crisis and that the election was stolen from Al Gore.
Am I worried it could happen again? I'm embarrassed to say YES. Between questionable voting machines with no paper trail to questionable voter registration practices it could happen again.