Transcription:
HEAD TO HEAD
Elections is over – Bush wins
By Anne Scuffham
Our nation held an election Tuesday. The results showed Texas Gov. George W. Bush was the winner. An unofficial recount total in Florida seems to confirm it.
The Democrats have requested a selective recount of ballots in four counties. But we simply can't go on Anne is of counting until Vice President Al Gore gets the results he wants. The only votes left to be counted are the over-seas absentee ballots, which in the past have favored Republican candidates by a large margin. Republican presidential candidate Bob Dole had 54 percent of the state's absentee ballots in 1996, compared to 40 percent for President Bill Clinton, though Clinton won by a landslide across the nation and in the state, according to a Republican National Committee press release.
Let's set the record straight about Florida.
Democrats would have you believe the ballot in Palm Beach was confusing, causing many voters to choose two candidates for president, or choose Reform Party presidential candidate Pat Buchanan instead of Gore by accident.
In 1996, an election year with much lower voter turnout, a similar number of 14,872 ballots were invalidated in Palm Beach County, according to the RNC press release. 1n Cook County, III., Tuesday, 120,503 votes were invalidated.
As the Palm Beach Post explained Nov. 10, ''If a voter makes a mistake on the ballot, he or she can vote again. If a voter still has the ballot, poll workers are supposed to write, 'void' on that ballot and give the voter another. They may give the voter as many as two do-over ballots, or three ballots total."
Manual counts are far less accurate than electronic counts. This is why we use electronic counts instead of manual counts. Manual ballot counts can be compromised by human error, human interpretation or tampering, which can all be avoided in electronic counts.
The Palm Beach Post reported Nov. 10 that manual counts in some cases could be the equivalent of "mind reading." It quoted election officials saying they were trying to "reconstruct" the "intent" of the voter. Election results should not determined by election officials trying to read minds.
It is important we make sure the counts in this election are accurate. Doing manual counts reduces Florida's ability to make sure that happens and could undermine confidence in the process.
The vote in Florida has been counted. It has been recounted. Bush won both counts. The Gore campaign will not accept the finality of these results. They now want to proceed with a third recount - this after they have filed at least eight lawsuits in Florida challenging the results of the election.
There is no reasonable end to this process if the vice president continues to pursue it. Gore should accept the recounted vote of the people of Florida.
Let me address those of you who think the Republicans would do the same thing if the symbolic shoe was "on the other foot." You are wrong. There is precedent here.
In the election of 1960, then-Vice President Richard Nixon did not contest the election despite allegations of serious irregularities in Chicago. For the good of the country, Nixon stepped down and allowed Democrat John F. Kennedy to become the president-elect.
In 1976, President Gerald Ford was faced with a choice similar to the one Al Gore faces now. Ford also lost a close election then-Gov. Jimmy Carter in 1976. He was urged to call for just one recount. Ford said no. He put the country's interests first.
If the Gore campaign decides litigation is the route, we start down a slippery slope with no foreseeable end. For the Gore campaign to keep recounting ballots until it likes the results is neither fair nor responsible.
This election is over. We've had a count - and a recount that has confirmed the count. It's time for this process to come to a close. It is time for Gore to do the right thing - to choose patriotism instead of partisanship.
Each vote matters in a close race
By Travis R. Thickstun
Three hundred twenty-seven people might well decide who will succeed President Bill Clinton as commander-in-chief of the United States. That's the number of students on just a few floors of a dorm on this campus. That's the number of people in one Y103, Introduction to American Politics, 1ecture. That's far fewer than the number of college students the IU College Democrats registered to vote this semester.
While Vice President Al Gore leads the country in the popular vote by about 200,000 votes, our system of elections uses the state-centered method of the Electoral College, which disregards that number in favor of each state's overall winner.
Let me reiterate what I said in this column on Election Day: Today we decide what direction we want the country to go. Every four years, mil-lions of Americans choose to let someone else decide for them how much they pay in taxes, the quality of their schools, how safe the air they breathe and water they drink is and whether they have quality, affordable health care. They let someone else decide whether a woman has the right to choose, whether to enact campaign finance reform and in what direction our economy will go. We're letting someone else choose who will appoint the next few justices on the Supreme Court, who have the position for life.
If you didn't vote, who made your decision for you? More than half of the voters in Monroe County chose to let someone else vote for them, a lower turnout than the national average, and while turnout among IU students was up slightly from two and four years ago, it fell far short of what it should have been.
The lesson from this election is not about the Electoral College, which we've all heard about in great detail now from news anchors, political pundits, legal experts and average citizens. The lesson is that when it comes right down to it - we count. We can now truly say each person's vote matters when elections are as close as this one.
Think about it: out of more than 250 million people in this country, a few hundred might choose whether we continue on a path of prosperity, with more jobs, lower crime rates and the strongest economy ever, or whether we will go down a different path to an uncertain future.
It is my hope that from this election, regardless of who wins, students on this campus and throughout the United States will realize the importance of their votes and make it count in four years.
Think how many students there are in Florida. Now think about what it would be like to have the candidates focus on issues that concern us -such as education, jobs and the environment -every time they travel the country seeking support.
Gore and his running mate, Sen. Joe Lieberman, have worked hard on those issues and many more that particularly concern college students. Democrats always have.
The results of this election are still uncertain, as we await-totals from hand counts in several Florida counties. And it appears this election might be decided in the courts. Gore and Lieberman can't yet concede defeat, because they might not have been defeated.
But whatever the results of this election, let's give Democrats the edge they need in four years to keep the White House working for us. This election should teach us that our votes and our voices in this democracy are critically important, and in four years, we must remember that lesson.
