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Wednesday, December 13, 2000
THAT REPUBLICAN RIOT
This is long enough that I thought it ought not be put in mail:
THE RIOT
This is a description from the Republican side of events in the Miami-Dade "Recount Riot." ------------------ What a Riot: Republicans in Miami By Terence P. Jeffrey “I was wearing Liz pants, a Talbots shirt, and sandals,” says Sheila Moloney. “I was hardly intimidating.” A woman near her, she says, was wearing quite a chic little red dress. Another was sporting a string of pearls. These were the Republican ladies who helped make up the “mob” that Vice President Al Gore is now claiming caused the Miami-Dade County Canvassing Board, on the day before Thanksgiving, to throw the U.S. presidential election to Texas Gov. George W. Bush. The charge was first leveled by the Conscience of the Senate. On November 24, Joseph Lieberman strode out onto the lawn of the vice-presidential residence in Washington, D.C., and declared that he was “deeply disappointed by reports of orchestrated demonstrations” in Miami that he concluded “were clearly designed to prevent a simple count of votes from going forward.” “This is time to honor the rule of law, not to surrender to the rule of the mob,” said Lieberman. If any doubted that claiming a mob had intimidated the Miami-Dade County canvassers was the calculated strategy of the Gore campaign, Vice President Gore personally confirmed it a few days later. “And this would be over long since except for these efforts to block the process at every turn,” said Gore in a nationally televised statement. “In one county, election officials brought the count to a premature end in the face of organized intimidation.” ‘Really Comical’ Last Monday, the Gore campaign formalized the accusation in a legal filing to a state court in Tallahassee. The filing demanded that the court itself hand recount more than 10,000 ballots from Miami-Dade, which, when counted twice by machine, showed no vote for President. The Miami election officials, Gore’s lawyers told the court, “simply stopped counting votes in the face of orchestrated intimidation that included screaming, door-pounding and physical assaults.” This, they argued, proved that “the need for the judiciary to transcend mob action in Miami is clear and urgent.” Gore’s argument is as simple as it is bold: He would be the 43rd President of the United States if a mob in Miami had not stopped local election officials from counting the winning ballots. This is the argument that Gore formally made to a Florida judge. This is the argument that history will judge him by. But as Sheila Moloney puts it—punctuating her words with a hearty and spontaneous laugh—it is also “really comical.” Amidst the crowd of 25 to 35 Republicans that Gore’s lawyers now say constituted a “mob” when they assembled on the 19th floor of the Miami-Dade County government building last week were, according to eyewitnesses, several tassel-loafered lawyers, a surgeon, an elderly Cuban-American gentleman, a number of yuppie congressional staffers, and even a municipal judge from another state. Their principal act of aggression was to advocate that journalists be allowed into a remote backroom where the county canvassing board had reconvened to hand recount the “no-vote” ballots—almost in secret. Their battle cry? “Let the press in. Let the press in. Let the press in.” Not one of these yuppies, lawyers, doctors or judges was arrested. Nor did the sheriff’s deputies watching over the room in which they allegedly became a “mob” ever even ask them to leave. In fact, says Moloney, at one point several county workers came to the other side of a long teller’s window that separated the “riot” room from the offices of the canvassing board. They rapped on the window to get the attention of the receptionist who had sat calmly at her desk for about ten minutes watching the “mob.” When the receptionist failed to notice that her friends were trying to get her attention from the other side of the glass, one of the young ladies in the “mob” leaned over to her and whispered, “Ma’am, I think they are trying to get your attention.” What brought this “mob” to the 19th floor? Two and a half days of frustration with the unprofessional and apparently corrupt behavior of the Miami-Dade County Canvassing Board. Most of the Republicans who assembled on the 19th floor on Thanksgiving Eve were official Republican observers of the Miami-Dade recount. I spoke to several of them and they all told the same story. On Monday morning they had shown up at the building and gathered in a large open room on the 18th floor, where the board had assembled a number of counters—mostly county workers—to help them conduct a hand recount of more than 650,000 votes cast countywide. From the outset, the board seemed committed to frustrating the ability of the observers to actually see the ballots as they were counted so they could make sure the job was accurately, fairly and honestly done. Unlike in Palm Beach and Broward counties, the board did not establish a procedure for the official counters to hold up each ballot, and show it front and back to the observers, so that they could see where and how it was punched and if it was otherwise marked. Instead, they played a game of musical chairs: The counters were put at the two sides of an eight-foot table, while two observers were stationed at the far end of the table, side by side, in chairs that straddled and blocked the aisles between the tables. Then the counters were put side by side on the same side of the table, with the counters at one end, so the counters could hold the ballots between each other and sometimes obscure the view of the official observers. When Republican observers officially challenged the scoring of a ballot, the canvassing board often ignored the challenge—which only they could legally settle. Rather than actually look at the disputed ballot, they routinely sent their deputy, Ivy Korman (nicknamed “Poison Ivy” by Republican observers) to tell the official vote counters to ignore the challenge and count the ballot as a vote. Matt Clark, a Republican congressional staffer who was in Miami as an official observer, described how it worked. “The frustrating thing that I found,” he said, “is that we were told to raise our hand if we thought a ballot should be contested. But twice when I made a challenge it did not make it to the canvassing board.” He described a ballot that was punched in both the 6 hole—a Gore vote—and in the 3 hole. Ivy Korman, he said, distributed an instruction sheet summarily awarding all such votes to Gore because there was no candidate for the 3 hole. When he challenged the double-punched ballot “Poison Ivy” came around and said, “That’s clearly a vote for Gore. Check the sheet. Odd numbers don’t count.” She then took the ballot from the box for challenged ballots and put it in the Gore pile. Later, Clark challenged a ballot that had six or seven names on the back written in pencil in cursive. Two of the names were crossed out in red ink, the rest in black ink. There also was number—Clark believed it was 583-84—written on the back. The ballot had a punch in the 6 hole—for Gore. But Clark had been told Florida law disqualified ballots with markings on them. He challenged it—which should have required a ruling from the board. “Poison Ivy” came over and unilaterally declared: “That’s clearly a vote for Gore, that doesn’t need to go up to the board.” Another Republican observer said that sometimes the counters developed a rapport with the observers and would begin slowing their pace and actually allowing them to view the ballots as they were counted so they could check the accuracy of the count. When this happened, this observer said, Poison Ivy would rush around like a pit bull and tell them to speed it up. This observer said he challenged a ballot that had a punch in the 4 hole—a Bush vote—and a punch in the 6 hole—a Gore vote. But it also had a significant crease between the 6 hole and the 7 hole—the kind of crease the observer thought a thumbnail might make if it was trying to punch out the 6 hole and nullify a Bush ballot by voting it a second time for Gore. Rather than bring the ballot to the canvassing board, he says, Ivy Korman unilaterally disqualified it as a spoiled ballot. This was the atmosphere that prevailed on Tuesday evening just before the Florida Supreme Court ruled that the hand recounts in Miami-Dade, Broward and Palm Beach counties could go on until 5:00 p.m. the following Sunday. At 8:00 a.m. Wednesday, the day of the “mob” action, the three members of the county canvassing board met to continue their recount. But now they decided to count only the 10,000-plus ballots that the machines indicated had not been voted in the presidential slot. And rather than count them in the large open room on the 18th floor, in the presence of the Republican observers, a large number of reporters and about 25 video cameras, they decided to move to another room on the 19th floor. In this new room, they would allow only two observers from each party, and no cameras or recording equipment. One pool camera would be allowed to peer through a small window at one end of the room, which was sequestered behind walls in some remote section of the canvassing board’s offices. ‘Three Blind Mice’ The Republican observers retreated to a cafeteria on the ground floor of the building in despair. They believed that if they did not have numerous reporters in the room and a video record of every unvoted ballot the canvassers ruled on, it would be impossible to trust the final outcome of the count. They thought the election was going to be stolen behind closed doors. Spontaneously, they decided to go up to the 19th floor and demand that the press be allowed in to observe. About 25 to 35 made their way up the elevators to a small foyer on that floor. It was a T-shaped room. Elevators faced each other at the bottom of the T. At the top was a wall-long window with tellers’ trays. In front of that was a reception desk, and to each side of the window was a door leading into the offices. The doors were flanked by sheriff’s deputies. Once in this foyer, some of the lawyers sat down on the carpeted floor. The room was never fully packed. Duane Gibson, the investigative counsel for the House Resources Committee, who was there, said, “It was the Brooks Brother’s Revolt for crying out loud. There was no threat of intimidation.” He said that after he sat down with a group of lawyers, they started up a series of chants: “Let the Press in.” “Stop the Count, Stop the Fraud.” And “Three Blind Mice”—referring to the three members of the canvassing board. The one moment of real drama was provided by Joe Geller, chairman of the Miami-Dade Democratic Party, who entered the room unrecognized by the Republicans. Gibson said that Geller—who at that moment was not known by the observers to be the local Democratic chairman—walked up to the window and talked to a woman on the other side. She went away and came back about five minutes later with two other women—carrying a ballot in her hand. “She slipped it through the tray to the guy in the dark black suit,” said Gibson. “I said: ‘That guy’s got a ballot. They gave him a ballot.’ And I pointed and yelled.” According to Gibson, the man “took it, looked at us, and then with his left hand he pulled his suit away from his chest and shoved the ballot in his suit pocket the way you would an airline ticket.” “I couldn’t believe it,” said Gibson. “As observers we were not allowed to touch ballots, and here they were passing one out.” Sheila Moloney witnessed the same scene. “I saw him grab the ballot off the teller tray and open his coat, and put it in his pocket and turn around,” she says. “And I was following him saying, ‘Sir, what are you doing? Sir, you can’t take a ballot. Why do you have a ballot, sir?’ ” “He didn’t say anything,” she says. “He looked at me kind of smug.” One of the Republican lawyers followed Geller down the elevator to the ground floor where Matt Clark saw what happened next. “The man got off the elevator,” said Clark. “I was hearing somewhat of a commotion. Someone was yelling, ‘Stop right there. Stop right there. This is a citizen’s arrest. Please, step up against the wall. Do not go outside. I need a police officer. Please, I need a police officer.’ ” Clark says that a Miami police officer named Stan, who had spent the previous two days in the parking lot telling the press where they could leave their cars, arrived on the scene. Officer Stan escorted Geller to a corner. “Then the sheriff’s office set up a semicircle around Geller and the policeman and did not let anybody near Geller, except for a couple of people who were with him, one woman and one man.” “There was not anyone antagonistic near him,” says Clark. “I have a hard time believing he was touched.” A crowd now formed, chanting, “Search him. Arrest him. He stole a ballot.” The police then escorted him back upstairs. Officer Stan told Matt Clark that Geller had told him he had a “sample ballot” and showed it to him to prove it. Clark said all the Republican demonstrators were peaceful and that he was personally responsible for escorting some of them up to the 19th floor where the demonstration took place. “I took a couple of Cuban-American lawyers one time,” he said. “And then I took an elderly Cuban-American gentleman who had showed up because he had asked if he could go up there also.” To get there, Clark had to go by a security desk. “There was a security desk right next to the elevators and you had to show your ID as you went by before you went to the elevator,” he said. “And the security guard never told me not to go up.” (Geller did not return a call to the Miami-Dade County Democratic headquarters asking for his version of the story.) Later that day, the canvassing board decided to move their hand recount back down to the 18th floor where the press and Republican observers could watch them. Then they voted to terminate the count because they did not believe they could do it in time for the Sunday deadline. The board denied it had been intimidated by the demonstration. Elections Supervisor David Leahy told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “No, I wasn’t intimidated. I’ve been through so much with Hurricane Andrew and the City of Miami [vote fraud] and dozens of other things and most stuff doesn’t bother me. What I saw were some of the same people who had been downstairs as observers. I never looked at this crowd as one who was violent in nature. They made a protest—and they made it well.” And that is the story of the “mob” that Al Gore, Joe Lieberman, and their lawyers claim stole this presidential election. ________________ Mr. Smith is King of England. © Human Events, 2000 Thanks to Trent Telenko for that, and for the following: Hello! trent telenko has sent the following Jacksonville.com story to you. Comments from trent telenko: The mob vioence you did not hear about on the networks. ELECTION: MOB VIOLENCE The fevered quest for the presidency reached a new low when a 13-year-old boy was beaten in the nation's capital because he supported George W. Bush. The Washington Post briefly mentioned the beating, in a one-sentence paragraph buried deep in a general election-controversy story, but newsmax.com filled in the details by taking a statement from the boy's father. To read this story in full, please visit http://www.jacksonville.com/tu-online/stories/120100/opi_4759539.html - Dear Dr. Pournelle, Wednesday I sent you an e-mail where I said that the Republicans in a county in Florida had been allowed to modify absentee ballots. I was wrong, they had modified absentee ballot *requests*. Story in the Washington Post http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7728-2000Nov30.html My apologies for the mistake. I need to check these things out a little more before I start talking about them. Sincerely, Kit Case Thank you. That was my understanding too.
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