Reply #2: FL: Palm Beach Editorial: Bush vs. Gore it isn't, but it still matters [View All]

[freedomfries]

Bush vs. Gore it isn't, but it still matters

Randy Schultz
Palm Beach Post Editorial Page Editor
January 07, 2007
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/epaper/2007/01/07/a1e_schultzcol_0107.html

Neither Vern Buchanan nor Christine Jennings wants to acknowledge what almost certainly happened in their congressional race, because it would not be in either's interest to do so.

Combined, the two raised more than $10 million in their battle for Katherine Harris' District 13 seat. Mr. Buchanan, a car dealer, spent at least $5.5 million of his own money. Counting what all nine original candidates raised, it was the nation's most expensive House race.

After a recount, Mr. Buchanan was declared the winner by 369 votes. But there were a whopping 18,000 under-votes - no stated choice - in Sarasota County, the largest of five counties in the district. Ms. Jennings carried Sarasota by 7,000 votes, and is contesting the result. She argued in court that failures of the county's touch-screen machines, made by ES&S, cost her the election. Mr. Buchanan, who was sworn in Thursday, argues that whatever caused the under-votes, it wasn't a machine problem.

This hasn't been Bush vs. Gore, but it might have come close. Suppose that the District 13 result had been the one to determine control of the House? All the lawyers would have been back in Florida. How familiar that all sounds.
...
So it's a good bet that most of the 18,000 under-voters missed District 13 because the governor's race caught their eye first. Then they failed to check their choices before recording their vote.

Of course, if Mr. Buchanan agreed with that scenario, he would be admitting that he might have reached Congress on a fluke. If the under-votes were proportional with the votes that counted, Ms. Jennings would have won. And if Ms. Jennings agreed, she would undercut her case, since her lawsuit alleges machine error, not ballot error.

No more 'stupid voter' comments

Still, voter error from a bad ballot is just a theory. That's why Ms. Jennings deserves to win her suit that demands a review of the source code, the touch-screen machine's electronic brain.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/epaper/2007/01/07/a1e_schultzcol_0107.html