Betrayed - The Bush vs Gore Election

Although this happened sometime ago I am reminded of it now. I not only voted for Gore in the 2000 election, I actually made a tiny contribution. I am very much a tight wad when it comes to giving money to organizations and charities and for good reason. But I really hated Bush's politics; so when the beautiful woman came to the door, for the first time I couldn't refuse.

But we all know how that election turned out. Florida was in a mess. The election was so close in that state that the normally nominal voting errors and corruption mattered. For the record it is clear that Gore actually and truly won that state but the voting procedures were against him.

A large number of people made voting errors in certain counties because of the ballots used. Pat Buchanan, a right wing extremist also running for President, conceded that a large number of votes (more than enough to undisputedly declare him the Florida winner) he received were obviously meant for Gore based on historical voting results, the liberal nature of the county and the screwy nature of the ballot used. But by and large they focused on questionable ballots and recounting the ballots by hand. The ballots were questionable in the sense of ballot machine error and determining what the votes were, from not thoroughly punched holes and "hanging chads."

The Governor of Florida, the one in charge of the executive branch of the state, was Bush's very own brother and quite naturally his officers were conservative republications that wanted the Governor's brother to win. The woman in charge of declaring the winner of the election made a surprising move to declare Bush the winner when the matter was still before the courts.

The matter went before the Florida State Supreme Court as it should and they ruled the matter unresolved. The court is the ultimate arbiter in the matter of elections. They make decisions as to the law and implement it, when the law isn't clear enough, it's up to them to resolve the matter. The judicial branch decided, the executive branch implements. What they decided and that which I disagree with is that recounting should continue. I didn't know how the recount would go at the time but I felt that it would probably still be so close that the final results would be moot. The writing was on the wall, what they should have done is immediately, especially considering the results of the counties with fishy ballots, was to invalidate the election results and reorder a statewide election to decide the winner of the presidential electors. They could have done this one week after the election when it was clear there were problems but they didn't and instead ordered that the recounts go on. A weak and indecisive decision.

But then the Unites States supreme court got involved, a republican controlled court I might add. They shouldn't have gotten involved because although it was a federal election it was a state matter. And ironically it's the Republicans on the court that are the staunch supporters of State seventy and rights. They strangely decided that state courts shouldn't be involved and that the executive branch of the state had the undisputed right to declare the winner of the election and as history records, Bush was sworn into office. But if the courts shouldn't be involved they why did they get involved? I disagree with their decision. They shouldn't have gotten involved but a better decision that would have resulted in Bush being sworn and the court retaining some credibility was to declare the election undecided and turn it over to the newly elected congress to decide which being Republican controlled would have resulted in the election of Bush. Instead they choose the quickest way to get their man sworn into office.

But Gore was the biggest disappointment of all. If it were as simple as whomever had the greatest number of votes naturally then Gore was the clear winner, more Americans voted for him. But instead we have a point system where points are divided up among the states and it's either a winner takes all situation or points are awarded according to the state rules and election results. And when it comes to intention, Gore did win Florida, but the powers that decided the confusing electoral ballots, the usual political corruption that usually doesn't matter finally did. But what did Gore do, the people choose him, did he in the least fight for us that voted him into office? Did he make a big stink about political corruption or take leadership in creating better voting machines and establishing nominal nationwide elections policies to at least address the problem? Did he trade his acquiescence for getting rid of the electoral process and going to a popular vote? Did he trade his acquiescence for a backroom deal for unofficial backseat powers and lessen Bush's right wing leanings? No he did none of this. He ran away. He betrayed me and the American people and he doesn't deserve to be president of this great nation. Because of him we had 911 and 8 years of Bush.