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THE painfully slow manual recount of Florida ballot papers took its most acrimonious turn yesterday when Republicans accused the Gore campaign of deliberately excluding servicemen's postal votes to fix the election.
Governor George W Bush comfortably won the overseas absentee vote by 1,380 votes to Vice-President Al Gore's 750 but, after vigorous challenges by Gore canvassers, 1,527 of the postal ballots, many of them from soldiers and sailors on active service, were rejected.
With the two candidates just 930 votes apart, every ballot paper counts and is being intensely fought over by Democratic and Republican party officials. Gen Norman Schwarzkopf, the Gulf war commander who now lives in Florida, led Republican condemnation of a five-page guide which advised Democratic tellers how to raise objections to the postal votes. He said: "It is a very sad day in our country when the men and women of the armed forces are serving abroad and facing danger of a daily basis . . . and are denied the right to vote for the president of the United States who will be their commander in chief."
Democratic tellers were advised to block ballots if there was no clearly legible postmark on the envelope, which is frequently the case when letters are posted from military bases. Normally, these ballots pass unchallenged.
Opinions are now hardening and many Republicans are seething at the Gore campaign's tactics. Marc Racicot, the Republican Governor of Montana, said: "Last night we learned how far the Vice-President's campaign will go to win this election. And I am very sorry to say that the Vice-President's lawyers have gone to war in my judgment against the men and women who serve in our armed services."
The apparent effort to suppress the military vote put the Democrats on the defensive, particularly as it coincided with news that 39 prisoners, including murderers and rapists, had been allowed to vote in one Democratic-controlled county in violation of state law.
Senator Joe Lieberman, Mr Gore's running mate, appeared on yesterday's morning television shows to argue the case for the defence but he was non-committal when asked if he would instruct Democrats to allow the disputed postal ballots to be counted.
Thus far, Democrats have remained loyal to Mr Gore, publicly backing his decision to fight the election through the courts. But there is a growing sense of unease behind the scenes and a feeling that Mr Gore's interests in winning the White House may diverge from the Democratic party's interests in remaining respectable in the eyes of the electorate. The disclosure that the party tried to stop soldiers voting while apparently encouraging convicted criminals to do so could help turn public opinion against a sustained legal campaign from the Gore team.
With the Thanksgiving holiday on Thursday, there is a general desire to have the matter settled rapidly. Republicans sought to damage Mr Gore's credibility by seizing on every potential flaw in the hand recount now under way or planned in three Democratic-controlled counties.
Karen Hughes, Mr Bush's communications director, said: "We now have clear and compelling evidence from eyewitnesses that this manual recount process is fundamentally flawed and . . . distorting, reinventing and miscounting the true intentions of the voters of Florida." The Bush campaign was planning to send scores of extra lawyers and staff members to Miami today to oversee the hand recount there.
In Palm Beach, Judge Charles Burton, the Democratic county judge overseeing the hand count, pleaded with counters and observers for civility after a fracas broke out when a counter accidentally put a ballot in the wrong pile. He said: "You would have thought she'd killed 14 people."
In Duval county, a conservative area in northern Florida, 10 lawyers from each campaign scrutinised 600 or so postal ballots. Democrats challenged many of them, and 107 were eventually declared invalid after hours of wrangling. Jim Post, a Republican lawyer, said: "A large majority were military. They were trying to get rid of everyone because this area of the state is conservative."
Starting to get dirty?!?!
A little understatement for effect.
Its going to be hard for the Dems to dance away from this icky turn of events. The US media is doing all it can.
Let The Florida Supremes Here From You ... Before It's Too Late!
The Web Site for the Florida Supreme Court is
http://www.flcourts.org/pubinfo/sct.html
Chief Justice Charles T. Wells 850-921-1096
Justice Leander J. Shaw, Jr. 850-488-0208
Justice Major B. Harding 850-414-7643
Justice R. Fred Lewis 850-488-0007
Justice Harry Lee Anstead 850-488-2281
Justice Barbara J. Pariente 850-488-8421
Justice Peggy A. Quince 850-922-5624
General e-mail for the Florida Supreme Court is:
supremecourt@flcourts.org
Why is this surprising????
After all, the democratic party is "led" by someone who not only refused to serve his country when called,,,,but also went 'on the record' as LOATHING THE MILITARY!!!
No surprise here!!
Anything better?
They sow the wind and reap the whirlwind. (Hosea 8-7.)
Even Chelsea clinton was brought up to loath the military. During clinton's first term she climbed into one of the official limos, saw a military officer who had been assigned to the function sitting in the back seat next to her, and ordered him out because she refused to ride or associate with anyone in the military.
David Aman, a supporter of Republican presidential candidate Texas Gov. George W. Bush, wears military
garb to protest the discarding of some military absentee balllots, as Department of Public Safety Officer
Amier Gantt looks on, outside the governor's mansion, in Austin, Texas, Sunday, Nov. 19, 2000.
(AP Photo/David J. Phillip)
Eeeww, a poster for the cause. Great shot!
I hope this destroys the democrat party enough that they can't put the Commander-in-Chief wanna-be Hillary in office in four years. It's also ironic they are attempting to make sure the "will of military people" is squashed the same weekend all the clintons are cavorting with the Viet Cong.
Please e-mail the Florida Supreme Court with your sincere thoughts and opinions. A personal letter in your own words carries much more impact than form letters with your name plugged into the blanks.
It may mean nothing to them, but at the very least you stood to be counted.
I e-mailed the following to supremecourt@flcourts.org
Your Honors,
That team Gore would ask for a full and fair vote count out one side of their mouths and whisper documented instructions on how to invalidate military personnel ballots out of the other is an act that many Americans such as myself look upon as borderline treasonous.
I pray that you find that factually the will of the people has been counted once, counted twice, and counted again in favor of George W. Bush.
I pray that you find that Florida law has been upheld in accordance of the law by SOS Katherine Harris.
I pray that you find that inclusion of the manual counts to be outside the realm of Florida law. In my view these manual recounts are now tainted and corrupt, the resultant number provided by these manual recounts is not to be trusted.
To quote Edward G. Robinson as Johnny Rocco in the movie Key Largo:
"Yeah. How many of those guys in office owe everything to me? I made them! Yeah, I made 'em just like a, like a tailor makes a suit of clothes. I take a nobody, see, get his name in the papers, yeah, pay for his campaign expenses, dish out a lot of groceries and coal, get my boys to bring the voters out, and then count the votes over and over again until they added up right and he was elected. Yeah."
We Americans know what's happening here. We expect you to call it where it lies.
Respectfully,
Add this to Clinton's pandering visit to Vietnam (in which he apologized for slavery and the treatment of women in America's past, and also allowed the Vietnamese flag to fly higher than the stars and stripes) and you get a good idea about these people's opinions of our military (past and present).
This dispicable stunt of robbing servicemen and women of their Constitutional right to vote should write finis to the Algore campaign and the loathsome RATS in general. Even the most ignorant and apathetic booboise should be outraged at this crime.
Anything better?
Oh, let's see...sex, paella, a motorcycle tour of Canada, scuba diving in Belize...
Then go ahead and leave the country.
Even the most ignorant and apathetic booboise should be outraged at this crime.
I know I am.
Yor last couple of posts to me have been non-sequiturs. Since you're new here I would like to invite you to explain further what you getting at. Let's start over: "Is there anything better?"
Than what?
With this act of treason the Democrat Party shows they do not understand how precarious is our nation's position in this dangerous world.
If the Democrat operatives succeed in getting Gore the White House, by this vile action against the most patriotic members of this society --our last institution of this nation still unquestionably loyal to the Constitution, the mass exodus from the military will so weaken our forces that our enemies will be encouraged to adventures against our positions, world-wide. The terrorism will begin on foreign soils, but it will eventually become domestic also. What could be our impotent response? Nuclear threat? Hah, a hollow suicide option to be ignored by our enemies.
When the Gore and Democrat Party operatives assaulted the integrity of the election process with their obscene army of filthy lawyers, they showed contempt for US. But when they sought to cancel the sovereign right of the military personnel to cast their ballots in the presidential election, they pissed in the water supply from which we all drink. This is more serious than anyone in the knee-pad Democrat media has even imagined! We will quickly be in a critical situtation should Goron be installed in the White House.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
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