Those who cast the votes, decide nothing. Those who count the votes, decide everything.

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An Appropriate qoute from Joseph Stalin.

-- SydBarrett (dark@side.moon), December 11, 2000

Answers

He was close, but it should read "Those who cast the votes, decide nothing. Those who count, recount, manually recount selected votes, and then manually recount selected votes of the selected votes decide everything.

-- Dr. Pibb (dr.pibb@zdnetonebox.com), December 11, 2000.

Pibbs:

I am kind of sick of the whole thing. I do not trust the vote in Florida any way you slice it. Optical Scanner machines have a 4 tenths of one percent error rate-this according to the Bush Brief to the us supreme-we know the error rate on the votamatic is up to three percent. The election will be decided with a margin of victory smaller than the error rate of even the more accurate machine.

And we have a legislature posturing to select electors regardless of how the popular vote may have really went down.

This is why I think the qoute appropriate. The fact that it has been brandished about that the legislature, because of Article II of the Constitution, can really do whatever they want, is appropriate testament to the Stalin qoute.

-- SydBarrett (dark@side.moon), December 11, 2000.


Not to take anything away from the quote (it is plenty perceptive enough) no one seems to be able to find a source for it that actually connects it to Joseph Stalin. The attribution is probably an urban legend, kind of like that hilarious 'Commencement Speech' that was attributed to Kurt Vonnegut, but no one actually knows who wrote it tha last I heard. Did anyone ever come forward to claim authorship for that one?

-- Brian McLaughlin (brianm@ims.com), December 11, 2000.

Syd:

You seem to contradict yourself in a subtle but revealing way.

First, you point out (IMO very correctly) that the margin of error in Florida FAR exceeds the margin of victory, especially considering the voting method used by most Floridians. Bottom line -- because of this error margin, any "real" total vote can never be accurately determined.

Second, you imply that by "select[ing] electors regardless of how the popular vote may have really went down", the legislature is somehow overriding the "will of the voters". But you already argued that how the vote "really went down" cannot be known! So just how is the legislature overriding what you yourself admit cannot exist?

Legally, the legislature could ignore even an overwhelming victory for one side, and appoint a slate of electors for his opponent. In such a case, it would be up to the US Congress to accept or reject that slate. So the Florida legislature, in selecting a slate, is doing nothing remotely illegal.

And since the Florida voters really didn't make a choice (remember that error rate again), the legislature MUST take this responsibility upon themselves. This may not be direct election by the people, but it's not totally arbitrary. The people of Florida REALLY DID elect those legislators, remember?

So what's the problem? Other than the sheer irony that in a tie the winner should hardly matter, yet this is when it seems to matter the most. We are like the cow that starved to death exactly halfway between two haystacks, unable to pick the closer one to go eat.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), December 11, 2000.


So why not have a run-off vote?

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), December 11, 2000.


Brian:

The only attribution of that quote to Stalin that I know was part of a propaganda piece by our former colonial masters in the late 20's or early 30's. What I read was totally undocumented so may be wrong. Now, about my writings?

-- Kurt (Kurt@cat's.cradle), December 11, 2000.


Lars:

Only if I'm given the opportunity to change my vote too. Based on pre- election polls, it seemed that if we'd had the election every day for a month, each candidate would have won about half of them. So I think it's entirely correct that (ordinarily) whoever wins was the more popular candidate *on that day*, for everyone.

I doubt anyone wants to hold this election all over again, in the hopes that *somebody* might have become enough more popular so that the margin of victory exceeds the margin of error. But this isn't like a makeup test because the electorate failed the first one. The time has come for the legislatures (Florida and US) to pick up this ball. We the people dropped it.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), December 11, 2000.


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