Dang. Woke up this morning and realized I'd been stooopid. I owe you an
apology for something I said below, John, so let me apologize now: where
I say "patent falsehood" I don't mean to accuse you of a lie, I just
meant I thought the statement incorrect. My bad. I keep telling myself not
to post when I'm in a lather at 3 AM, but I never listen. Sorry
about that. -marvin
On Sat, 11 Nov 2000, Marvin Long, Jr. wrote:
>
> Sorry, one more quibble...
>
> On Fri, 10 Nov 2000, John D. Giorgis wrote:
>
> > The central point, however, is that we all agreed beforehand that a
> > recount would be the final arbiter of the count of the election.
>
> That is a patent falsehood. Everybody agrees beforehand that all will
> abide by final election results, once each state has counted all the votes
> and once each state has certified its outcome. That's a given. The
> recount in this case was not a negotiated method of determining the winner
> upon which the two parties decided...it's just the law in Florida that you
> have an automatic recount if the margin of victory is below a certain
> threshhold. The threshhold has gotten even lower, and there are more
> ballots still to be counted than there are votes separating the parties;
> moreover there are several more days for ballots to trickle in. We simply
> don't *know* what will happen.
>
> When candidates concede before the election is final it's because they
> know that mathematically they can't win the electoral college, or that the
> chance of winning is vanishingly small. It's good form because it saves
> time and fuss, but they're not obliged by law to concede an election until
> it's over. And nobody agrees that the AP news service is the final
> arbiter of elections. In this case, to lean on your football metaphor,
> Gore's gonna have to make a 55-yard field goal in a crosswind to win the
> superbowl, but as long as there are seconds on the clock he gets to take
> that shot. It's his right, and it's *my* right as a voter to see the game
> played to the end.
>
> Instead the Republicans have taken the stance of saying, "Look, Gore, it's
> a disservice to the fans if you take that kick. You know you can't make
> it, right? So just go home. There are only 5 seconds left on the clock
> anyway. The fans will be much happier if you just give in."
>
> As my doddering grandmother would deliciately say, "Horsefeathers!"
>
> If this were football, the fans would riot.
>
>
> Marvin Long
> Austin, Texas
>
>
Marvin Long
Austin, Texas
