I came home from school Friday to a package sitting on mydoorstep. It came from Florida and was sentby “Daley.” I opened it, expecting a joke of some sort inside.Instead, I found two thick stacks of election ballots.
A note accompanied them, and it read:
Guess who these votes belong to? Hint: It’s not Gore. I guess wemust’ve misplaced them. Oh well — they won’t count anyway becausethey’re past the deadline. Too bad, because your guy would’ve won ifwe found these in time. What are you going to do now, appeal? Ha ha.– Bill.
It was only a dream. Bill Daley wouldn’t send ballots to anyone;he would throw them in a river like his dad might have done in 1960.But the package didn’t surprise me, and neither did the note.
After this election, nothing surprises me.
That Gore would un-concede.
That his lawyers were in Florida Nov. 8.
That voting machines had ignored “the will of the Democrats.”
That Jesse Jackson had found yet another Selma.
That another Daley was assisting Democratic recounts.
That exactly 931 Democratic voters had been disenfranchised.
None of it surprised me.
What did surprise me was the classification system of chads –those damned paper bastards every voter must punch out of theirballots to cast a valid vote. I was surprised, though each ballot(excluding Democrat ballots) contains specific instructions to removeall chads completely, that people still cast “non-votes” because theyleft their chads hanging — hanging right there at the voting booth.
Actually, I take that back. I’m not surprised. I’m also notsurprised something like this happened in South Florida, becauseElian Gonzalez and Andrew Cunanan also happened nearby.
The Bermuda Triangle is near South Florida.
The chads that now matter most are “pregnant chads.” These arechads that have not been dislodged from the ballot — they’reindented, as if to say, “place vote here.”
These are “special” chads.
As a vote-recount observer wrote in National Review Online(Observer X, Nov. 21, 2000): “I did see quite a few of those, but,interestingly, only in the presidential column. Now, some ballotshave up to 20 holes in them (there were other people and things tovote for in this election, after all), all cleanly and confidentlypunched.”
Chads only become “pregnant” when a voter does not “vote”forcefully enough. But our observer noticed only presidentialpregnant chads, and most of these would be Gore’s.
The argument that voters got too tired to force the pin throughone last time is amusing; I assume these voters retained enough oftheir strength to remove their ballots from the machine, pull openthe curtain-thingy, deliver their ballots and carry themselves backto their cars.
Or, maybe voters weren’t tired; maybe they changed their mindswhile punching Gore.
I find this thought reassuring. Florida Democratic voters may notbe the brightest bunch on this side of a lawn flamingo, but they arephysically strong enough to vote for whomever they wish.
For whomever they wish — an interesting thought to ponder.
The Florida Supreme Court, surprisingly, ruled that hand countscould continue. Pregnant chads are still in limbo. Does anyone findit odd that this court, openly Democratic and judicially activisticas it is, would trample over the Florida legislature and lower courtrulings to advance their case?
The court was originally planning to abolish the Floridalegislative and executive branches, jail all Republicans for 30 days,allow all pregnant chads to count three times and mandate KatherineHarris to certify the election results using a French accent. Thatwas thought to be too openly activist; of course, the current rulingseems “restrained.” For my conservatively challenged friends (due togenetic defects, I’m sure), imagine this court was Republican, doingthe same thing to Gore. Not pretty, is it?
Let’s take a quick break. In other election news, Alec Baldwinstill stands by his earth-shattering announcement that he will leavethe country if Bush is elected. Having to watch “Thomas and the MagicRailroad: Part II” in English subtitles is indeed disturbing.
Speaking of intellectual candle-power, Senator-elect HillaryClinton has openly expressed her disdain for the electoral college.However, it is not currently politically expedient to advocate asystem where, if a slim national margin of victory were to occur, wecould have Florida situations in every county nationwide. That mightbe bad for the country. See Federalist No. 68.
I have a feeling the Florida situation has left many of my readersconfused and possibly suicidal. Why, they ask, must we count everyFloridian named ‘Chad’?
Is Chad a girl’s name? If not, why are so many Chads pregnant? Andwho is counting every Chad? Since these are manual recounts, how many’Manuels’ have been recruited as counters? Can other people who arenot named Manuel count ballots? Are the recounts taking so longbecause there are too few Manuels in Florida?
Is it Chad who must deal with canvassing boards? Why are weforcing pregnant Chads to lift heavy boards and canvas all day?
These questions aren’t important right now. The most importantthing to know is, if each political party had a recount song, theRepublicans’ would be “What U See (Is What U Get),” and theDemocrats’ would be “I Want It That Way” (how I know these songs isnot important right now).
What is important are the current covers of National Review andBusinessWeek. NR’s cover displays, in large old English type, thephrase “Thou Shalt Not Steal.” BusinessWeek’s cover feature, “The newpresident’s economy,” warns of slower growth, weaker profits andpossible recessions.
It’s a nice article. The situation in the Middle East is not good.Partisan gridlock in Washington seems inevitable, since the newpresident will have “stolen” the election. And if BusinessWeek’sscenarios of economic downturn materialize, I would enjoy withsadistic pleasure watching Al Gore destroy himself and his party.
Perhaps pregnant chads should be counted.
—Benjamin Abel is a social science junior. Send e-mail todaletter2000@hotmail.com.
–This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of TheDaily Aztec.
