-Caveat Lector- Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.iht.com/IHT/TODAY/SAT/FPAGE/absent.2.html"> Long Ignored, Expatriates Discover They Really �</A> ----- Paris, Saturday, November 11, 2000 Long Ignored, Expatriates Discover They Really Count Doubts About Recount Harden Partisan Tone ------------------------------------------------------------------------ By Warren Obr International Herald Tribune ------------------------------------------------------------------------ John Woyten of Key West, Florida, who is studying economics at the London School of Economics, said Friday that he found the intense interest in his state's absentee voters a little daunting. ''It's kind of strange,'' he said, ''being 22 years old and maybe deciding the leader of the free world.'' As unofficial tallies tightened the Florida vote count to a razor-thin margin, Mr. Woyten was part of a group of voters who not only could play a crucial role in deciding the next U.S. president, but who also have never been polled and often feel ignored by the U.S. government: Americans living overseas. Dorothy van Schooneveld, an American Citizens Abroad official who works for the World Health Organization in Geneva, said she hoped that situation would now change. ''This election,'' she said ''is an incredible boon to all of us at home and abroad who have clamored for appreciation of the absentee voter.'' Ask Andy Sundberg, a co-founder of American Citizens Abroad and now a businessman in Geneva, whether he is happy that the Florida election recount had focused world attention on the potentially decisive role of American voters overseas, and he reels off facts and figures and anecdotes and arguments. The short answer is ''yes, absolutely.'' Americans abroad, whose numbers Mr. Sundberg puts at 4 million (using State Department figures that do not include the military), are numerous enough that if they were a state, they would be 24th in population, with two senators and five or six representatives. If a foreign country, he said, they would have more people than 70 UN members, he said. Overseas Americans outnumber Puerto Ricans and residents of the District of Columbia, who do have representation in Congress. ''It could be the best thing that ever happened to put us on the map,'' Mr. Sundberg said in a phone interview from his Geneva home. ''Maybe, just maybe, some candidates in the future will say, 'We ought to think about addressing some of their concerns.''' Mr. Sundberg, who was Democratic Party chairman overseas from 1981 to 1985, added that he liked to think that even the slightest acknowledgment from either candidate before Election Day might have had an impact in Florida. John G. McCarthy Jr., who headed the Republicans Abroad organization from 1989 to 1993, had a slightly different take. ''My feeling is the Republican Party has paid a lot of attention to the overseas vote,'' he said. Mr. McCarthy pointed out, and the world has learned recently, that it was because of votes from Americans Abroad that Senator Connie Mack, a Florida Republican, went to bed on election night in 1988 thinking he had lost but awoke to find out he had won. Mr. McCarthy also said that absentee overseas voters helped make the difference in a narrow House election won by a former U.S. Navy ''top gun,'' Randy (Duke) Cunningham, in California. It is because of races like these, Mr. McCarthy said, that he prefers a system that allows overseas Americans to have even a marginal impact on many races across the United States as opposed to a system Mr. Sundberg favors, in which they would elect their own representatives to Congress. Jim Hearne and Maria DeLong, husband and wife living in Guatemala City, where they publish a newsletter about retiring to Guatemala, also said they generally did not think that Americans abroad were underserved or underrepresented by the current U.S. political system. ''Personally, I feel there is no problem,'' Mr. Hearne said. ''I believe ex-pat Americans, no matter where they are living, should not seek being placed in a special class or constituency. The large majority are in the ex-pat position by choice. For employees of state or other governmental agencies, they should address their concerns within that organization and not from behind the shield of another real or quasi-lobby group.'' By one measure, complacency was the only unifying political thread among Americans overseas. Of approximately 45,000 Americans living in Hong Kong, for example, only a few hundred, in roughly equal numbers, have registered with either Democrats Abroad or Republicans Abroad. Mr. McCarthy said that historically the turnout among overseas voters had been in the high 30 percent range. Mr. Sundberg said that part of the reason for the low participation was lack of information among those overseas about their rights and about how to go about registering and voting. Once they learn those things, he said, they tend to vote at a high rate. Nonetheless, a record number of people, more than 1,000, turned up for an Election Day party at the Ritz-Carlton in Hong Kong. ''With such a close race, I think you will find that more overseas Americans participated in this election than in previous ones,'' said Don Meyer, chairman of Republicans Abroad in Hong Kong. ''I would think most Americans overseas would support the Republican position of keeping the tax exclusion for nonresidents.'' With both Democrats and Republicans claiming increased support in Hong Kong, however, there was no hard evidence back up any trend in voter preference. ' 'This is purely anecdotal, but I personally I do sense a demographic shift of expatriates as we move toward a service economy,'' said Michael Ceurvorst, chairman of Democrats Abroad in Hong Kong. ''It used to be that American expatriates were a CEO-driven community, more Republican. Now I sense that there are more folks on the ground, the kind of people who make things happen, Democrats.'' For one absentee Florida voter living abroad, the importance of voting remained the main lesson of the tight election. ''This really should teach people that every vote counts,'' said Sandra Collins-de-Lange, a Florida resident now based in Hong Kong, who said she had recently scolded a Florida-registered serviceman from a U.S. Navy ship visiting Hong Kong who had not voted. That sentiment was echoed in London by Kim Gold, a 20-year-old from Jacksonville, Florida, who is studying economics at the London School of Economics this year. She said she was proud that her first participation in a presidential election could be so decisive. ''You never think you're going to count, there are so many people in the United States,'' she said. ''I feel important. I feel like I didn't throw my ballot away, and I didn't vote stupidly.'' Another Florida resident who lives in London, Frances Deak, a retiree from Marion County, said she was ''a little embarrassed about what's happening in Palm Beach, but I'm proud that Florida is the pivotal state.'' Mrs. Deak was in charge of voter registration for Democrats Abroad in Britain, which signed up nearly 10,000 Americans for absentee ballots. She said she expected Mr. Gore to do well among Florida's absentee voters and dismissed Republican suggestions that the armed forces would swing the absentee tally to Mr. Bush. The State Department estimates that 6 million Americans live overseas, of which only 283,000 serve in the military, Mrs. Deak said. Mr. Bush, however, can apparently count on the support of most American GIs stationed in South Korea, at least to judge from the comments of a number of them in the nightclub district near the U.S. Army headquarters in Seoul on Friday. Private First Class Kyle Robinson, 19, from Tampa, Florida, said he preferred Mr. Bush because ''he cares'' about Korea. Obviously not all GIs voted for Mr. Bush, but those who favored Mr. Gore seemed more likely to admit they had neglected to cast absentee ballots. In a small Korean restaurant, several U.S. Army officers debated the merits of the candidates and the trouble with the count. ''I think they should have a revote in Florida,'' said First Lieutenant Guy Filippell, 25, of Cleveland. ''This election does two things. It proves that every vote counts. These other countries look at us and say our democracy is weak, but this shows anyone can win an election.'' Lauren Little, a 19-year-old theater major at Pepperdine University who is participating in the California school's London program this fall, never expected her vote to carry such importance when she sent her absentee ballot for Mr. Bush to Florida's Orange Country two weeks ago. ''The fact that it's the first time I'm voting and it's counting so much is exciting,'' she said. ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. Omnia Bona Bonis, Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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