-Caveat Lector-
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: THE REAL STORY IN FLORIDA; The Elite's Mess in Florida
Date: Mon, 27 Nov 2000 22:41:38 -0600 (CST)
From: Michael Eisenscher <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Organization: ?
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
San Francisco Examiner
November 25, 2000
The Real Story in Florida
By Conn Hallinan
I told myself I wasnt going to write a column about the elections or the
Florida vote. What''s the point? Do you know a columnist who hasn't? And
won't it be over before it's printed? But dammed if the whole craziness
doesn't pull one in, like a sort of political Event Horizon, that bizarre
zone bordering a Black Hole.
At first, the cynical part of me dismissed the media's non-stop obsession
as little more than proof of the late A.J. Leibling's Second Law of
Journalism: "There is an inverse relationship between the number of reporters
at an event, and the importance of the event."
But then the numbers began coming in: The TV audience for the returns was
bigger than the audience for the last "Survivor" show. The bored voter index
dropped from 48 percent to 17 percent. Want to start a conversation? Walk
into a, 1) Grocery store; 2) Laundromat; 3) Elevator, and ask anyone, "So,
what do you think about the election?" Instead of a shrug or a blank stare,
you are likely to get a real discussion.
Media obsession, however, has not necessarily translated into good
journalism.
First off, the job the networks did on election night played no small part in
starting the whole mess. First CBS, ABC, NBC, and CNN called Florida for
Gore, then reversed field, and finally stampeded for Bush when Fox News
declared the Texas Governor the winner. Now it turns out George Bush's first
cousin, John Ellis, was at Fox's helm, and in constant contact with the
Republican campaign throughout the night. Fox apologized, and the other
networks are conducting a review of their own conduct.
Second, the media has deep sixed what may be the real story of the Florida
election: The systematic disenfranchisement of African-American voters and
direct violations of the 1965 federal Voting Rights Act. In a November 14
letter, the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) called on Attorney General Janet
Reno to investigate what it called "substantial evidence" for systematic
irregularities and discrimination in Black and Haitian precincts.
According to testimony gathered by the NAACP, thousands of African-Americans
were denied the right to vote, required to show photo IDs when whites were
not, and had polling places moved without forwarding addresses. Haitian
Creole speakers were denied assistance, even though Florida law allows
interpreters into the voting booths. In a number of cases, police demanded to
see voter IDs.
The CBC letter also points to similar incidents in Virginia, North Carolina
and Missouri. So far, however, the Black Caucus' complaint has gone largely
unreported. Given the closeness of the count in Florida, this hardly seems an
issue the media should go silent around. Nor does one have to be paranoid to
suggest that pre-election polls showing overwhelming preference by
African-Americans for Gore over Bush might influence the behavior of certain
overly partisan voting officials. Florida Secretary of State Katherine
Harris' duel role as election arbiter and Bush For President state co-chair
is a case in point.
Sooner or later, of course, all this will pass. Someone will be
President, the public will change channels, and the media will go back
to - what? The temptation will be more of the same: Four years of partisan
bitterness, civil war and political gridlock leading up to a sequel in 2004:
"The Bush vs Gore Rematch."
Or the media can learn a very valuable lesson from this imbroglio: their
audience is a lot more engaged with political issues than it thought.
Americans are not apathetic or cynical, they're ambivalent. With the campaign
(and the candidates) we all just went through, who can blame them? But
ambivalence is not disengagement.
Further, regardless of what finally happens in Florida, there are still some
stories out there that ought not vanish down the memory hole when the dust
settles.
First and foremost, was there an attempt to systematically disenfranchise
minority voters in Florida, and other parts of the nation? Given that
"minorities" now make up close to 30 percent of the population, and are a
majority in California, that is not an abstract question
Secondly, what role did the media itself play in influencing the behavior
of voters on election night?
Some serious sanity just might come out of all this craziness.
============================================================
Subject: THE ELITES' MESS IN FLORIDA
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED],
[EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
LEFT MARGIN
The Elites' & the "Structures of Political Authority"
By CARL BLOICE
Two years ago, on the "most partisan and flimsy of reasons," the Republican-
controlled Congress voted to impeach the President, the first time in history
the Articles of Impeachment had been invoked against an elected President,
observes Chalmers Johnson in his intriguing new book "Blowback."* While the
matter was being debated, President Bill Clinton carried out missile attacks
on Afghanistan, the Sudan and Iraq. The effect these moves, writes Johnson
was "a further weakening" of "the structures of political authority."
"Congressional willingness to resort to so untested device as impeachment
combined with a president willing to try to divert attention through warlike
actions suggests a loss of prudence, even a recklessness, on the part of
American elites that could be fatal to the American empires in a time of
crisis," writes Johnson, a University of California at San Diego professor.
Johnson's words were penned before Florida.
As this being written, our country's elites have been reduced to an
internecine battles pitting the two major political parties — like two
turkeys going at it in mud — over a relative handful of votes and dire
warning about the instability of their shared political authority.
Thanksgiving Day readers of the New York Times were treated to columnist Bob
Herbert accusing the apparently intransigent Republicans of "coming
dangerously close to breaking faith with the system." "That is not the
American way," he wrote. "That is breaking faith in the system." On the
opposite page, the Times editors warned that the GOP "risks undermining the
rule of law and the office he hopes to occupy."
"The resolution has dawned," wrote Gerard Baker in the Financial Times
Thanksgiving edition, that "... if things go on as they are now, it will be
the country that suffers a loss far greater than any individual's failed
ambition." He continued, "The hostility of the exchanges threatens to poison
the country's political institutions in a way that could be even worse than
the partisanship of the impeachment drama."
The ruling class has worked its way into a fine mess and from which it is
finding it difficult to extract itself. It's actually been somewhat amusing
to watch. The Los Angeles Times which has taken a far less alarmist view of
the affair than the NYT says it has "taken on aspects of farce," a Saturday
Night Live version of Alice in Wonderland. "Only it's not very funny and the
stakes are all too real," conclude the LAT editors. The stake are indeed
high, the most important centering on the public's confidence in the system
and the people in charge.
By essentially excluding the views of the left and the right of center, the
Bush and Gore campaigns moved the restricted the national political debate to
only that which was acceptable to the center. Having done so, the power
groups surrounding each of the two candidates believe they each have the
right to represent the manufactured consensus. Not surprising considering the
amount of money they each laid out for the opportunity. But there is far more
on the table in Florida than the personal ambition of two outrageously
ambitious men, for to the victory goes the spoils.
Taking a battle over less than a thousand votes to the Florida State Supreme
Court and the United State Supreme Court is as unprecedented and reckless as
the attempt to impeach the President or attacking other nations to divert
public attention. The President in question is a Democrat and the Senate that
vote impeachment is Republican. The Florida Supreme Court Democrat-dominated.
The Nation's Supreme Court that could overrule it is hardly so. Whatever the
eventual outcome of the battle partisanship will be seen as far more
important than legitimacy.
A time of crisis may be upon us sooner than later. With serious economic
problems clearly on the horizon public confidence is fast eroding amid this
partisan bickering. In reality the current gyrations of the stock market are
provoked by declining profit rates but small investors threatened with losing
their shirts are already blaming it on the troubles in the Sunshine State.
As the days wear on there is further weakening of the structures of political
authority. The ebb in public confidence was obvious long before this election
in the increasing numbers of people who have stopped bothering to vote. If
they need justification for their absence from the polls consider this bit of
astonishing cynicism from the page of the New York Times. Regular columnist
Thomas L. Friedman, who comes down heavily on the side of Al Gore, wrote
November 11: "Mr. Bush needs to remember that there is a difference between
what you can say about your opponent during the campaign and what you can say
about him after the election is over, with the outcome too close to call, and
with each side legitimately seeking to ensure that every vote is properly
tabulated. Smearing your opponent during the campaign is politics as usual;
smearing him during the recount after a vote to close to call is a threat to
our institutions and the next presidency." Really?
And people like Friedman see fit to lecture the world about the virtues our
particular form of democracy.
* Blowback, the Costs and Consequences of American Empire, Metropolitan
Books, New York, 2000.
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