August 26, 2005
#190: A Grudging Correction from the streets of Qum
KRUGMAN TRUTH SQUAD
Paul Krugman had to make an embarrassing correction of his column Don’t Prettify Our History (08/22/05) concerning the 2000 election in Florida and the subsequent unofficial recounts. Anyone who followed that election even casually could see this one coming from a mile away. The Times public editor must have been overwhelmed by popular objections.
However, as important as Krugman fact checking is (we do it ourselves when he cites the research of others), in this case it misses a much larger point. It is not so much about his “lying” as it is about the demented state of mind that leads him and other Democrats to say such preposterous things about that election. In a word, they are crazed!
Think about it. From the halls of academia to the corridors of leading businesses and law firms there are grieving liberals whose career dreams were shattered by the Gore defeat. The narrowness of the election makes it hurt all the more. They simply cannot get past it and the outpouring of woulda, coulda shouldas takes many forms including distorting the facts of the recounts. They blame the ballots, they blame the machines, they blame Katherine Harris, they blame Gore himself and even themselves. When we think of self-flagellation we normally picture Iranian Shiites marching in the streets of Qum whipping themselves about the head and shoulders. But as Krugman’s column illustrates the Democrats have a trip going all their own. And it is self-destructive.
That of course is good news. They will never win the White House until they stop whining and get over Florida in 2000. Happily, they show no signs of doing that. To slightly restate the refrain of Brando’s Terry Malloy in On The Waterfront “They coulda been contendas.”
[The Truth Squad is a group of economists who have long marveled at the writings of Paul Krugman. The Squad Reports are synopses of their discussions. ]
Speaking as someone who closely followed the reporting of the consortium's examination of ALL votes in Florida, 2000, Krugman was exactly correct. The headlines all trumpeted the conclusion "Bush Would Have Won Anyway", but in fact he only won on the limited recount scenarios (including the recount Gore had requested).
But each recount that ignored the wishes of the candidates (which is what should have happened because the aggrieved parties in FL weren't Bush or Gore, they were the voters of FL whose votes were tossed, ignored and denied) concluded Gore actually won Florida.
And lets face it - the most extreme example of "judicial activism" we're likely to ever see in our lifetime was having five conservative judges on the Supreme Court assume to themselves judicial powers NOT given to them by the Constitution for the sole purpose of shutting down any recounts. Indeed, the Constitution very clearly lays out procedures for EXACTLY what happened in FL, and the SC was not part of that process.
Um, Zoomie, the federal Constitution is silent on how the states conduct Presidential elections, except to say that each state's Electors shall be chosen by the states' legislatures. It so happens that all the states in the Union delegate that choice to their citizens, and the legislatures then rubber-stamp the voting results. The Fourteenth Amendment gets into the act only to the extent that a process of voting for Electors by the citizenry is used. And it's clear from the post-election shenanigans that the Florida Supreme Court was hell-bent on denying ALL the citizens of the state equal protection of the laws by making up recount rules on the fly, to be applied only in certain jurisdictions, rather than applying UNIFORMLY on the entire state the procedures laid out in the relevant state laws. The federal Supreme Court's intervention was merely the imposition of adult supervision on the childish acts of a state court that didn't like the results on Election Day.
Posted by: Hale Adams at August 26, 2005 02:48 PMZoomie,
According to USA Today, the Miami Herald/USA Today Consortium found:
----------------
The vote totals vary depending on the standard used:
Lenient standard. This standard, which was advocated by Gore, would count any alteration in a chad — the small perforated box that is punched to cast a vote — as evidence of a voter's intent. The alteration can range from a mere dimple, or indentation, in a chad to its removal. Contrary to Gore's hopes, the USA TODAY study reveals that this standard favors Bush and gives the Republican his biggest margin: 1,665 votes.
Palm Beach standard. Palm Beach County election officials considered dimples as votes only if dimples also were found in other races on the same ballot. They reasoned that a voter would demonstrate similar voting patterns on the ballot. This standard — attacked by Republicans as arbitrary — also gives Bush a win, by 884 votes, according to the USA TODAY review.
Two-corner standard. Most states with well-defined rules say that a chad with two or more corners removed is a legal vote. Under this standard, Bush wins by 363.
Strict standard. This "clean punch" standard would only count fully removed chads as legal votes. The USA TODAY study shows that Gore would have won Florida by 3 votes if this standard were applied to undervotes.
Because of the possibility of mistakes in the study, a three-vote margin is too small to conclude that Gore might have prevailed in an official count using this standard.
------------
Evidently you didn't follow the recount quite as closely as you think. Or maybe, like Krugman, your standards aren't very high.
