A Joke And What It Reveals

[Plane]

This is kind of like your continued scoffing at claims of the stolen 2000 election, "without a shred of evidence," when the entire case is made in detail in the Vanity Fair article that I referred to and that Lanya found and posted here; when your similar "without a shred of evidence" rebuttals are offered to the "Bush Lied, They Died" claims, notwithstanding the multiple accounts of Bush insiders, published documents, etc. that litter these threads.

It is easy to be a sceptic , I don't know why I should respect Vanity Fair when they publish fiction more than any other rag, if the accusations were true it would be actionable with actions that no one seems interested in takeing. Are there no Lawyers in the Democratic party?

You may love it, but it is a lie.
Get some scepticism it is good for you.

[Michael Tee]

<<It is easy to be a sceptic , I don't know why I should respect Vanity Fair when they publish fiction more than any other rag . . . >>

I don't know if that's true or not, lots of magazines publish fiction AND investigative reporting, why single out Vanity Fair?  The article should stand or fall on its own, not on whether the zine publishes fiction.  Would you be so quick to write off a New Yorker or an Esquire article?  Playboy prints fiction AND nekkid wimmin with its investigative reporting, it doesn't seem to have an adverse effect on the veracity of the reports.  I think you're just grasping at straws, that argument sounds desperate, as most shoot-the-messenger arguments are.  You're just attacking a painstakingly researched article by three investigative reporters, none of whom have any taint of scandal attached to them, on a purely ad hominem basis.

<<if the accusations were true it would be actionable with actions that no one seems interested in takeing. Are there no Lawyers in the Democratic party?>>

That's at least a more credible line of attack.   There are several answers to that.  There may be interests that are so powerful in the U.S.A. that they will stop at nothing in certain instances to preserve a certain balance of power in the control of the country.  That at least would account for the lack of real differentiation in the policies of Republicans and Democrats, why for example BOTH parties' health-care plans avoid the obvious single-payer format so common in the rest of the industrialized world, why wars begun by Republicans are continued by Democrats and vice versa and why the oil depletion allowance continued for so many years.  As an indication of how far these interests are prepared to go when there is no realistic alternative, I give you the assassinations of JFK, Bobby and Martin Luther King.  And others.
In the case of the stolen 2000 election, a line may have been drawn in the sand.  I think any Senator can propose a challenge to election results and needs a seconder - - I believe that such a challenge was proposed but no seconder found.  The candidates themselves may have standing to pursue a legal challenge.  Gore chose not to pursue the matter.  It was considered the "patriotic" thing to do, but what were his real motivations?  We'll never know.

The other answer lies in the difficulty of proof - - it's hard to make a conspiracy case.  It could be a combination of both - - death threats and the likelihood of failure anyway.

Bottom line is, I don't KNOW why no legal action (after Bush v. Gore) was pursued, but I don't take the failure to pursue legal action as proof either way.  It is a factor to be pondered, however.

[Plane]

<<It is easy to be a sceptic , I don't know why I should respect Vanity Fair when they publish fiction more than any other rag . . . >>

I don't know if that's true or not, lots of magazines publish fiction AND investigative reporting, why single out Vanity Fair?  The article should stand or fall on its own, not on whether the zine publishes fiction.  Would you be so quick to write off a New Yorker or an Esquire article?  Playboy prints fiction AND nekkid wimmin with its investigative reporting, it doesn't seem to have an adverse effect on the veracity of the reports.  I think you're just grasping at straws, that argument sounds desperate, as most shoot-the-messenger arguments are.  You're just attacking a painstakingly researched article by three investigative reporters, none of whom have any taint of scandal attached to them, on a purely ad hominem basis.

<<if the accusations were true it would be actionable with actions that no one seems interested in takeing. Are there no Lawyers in the Democratic party?>>

That's at least a more credible line of attack.   There are several answers to that.  There may be interests that are so powerful in the U.S.A. that they will stop at nothing in certain instances to preserve a certain balance of power in the control of the country.  That at least would account for the lack of real differentiation in the policies of Republicans and Democrats, why for example BOTH parties' health-care plans avoid the obvious single-payer format so common in the rest of the industrialized world, why wars begun by Republicans are continued by Democrats and vice versa and why the oil depletion allowance continued for so many years.  As an indication of how far these interests are prepared to go when there is no realistic alternative, I give you the assassinations of JFK, Bobby and Martin Luther King.  And others.
In the case of the stolen 2000 election, a line may have been drawn in the sand.  I think any Senator can propose a challenge to election results and needs a seconder - - I believe that such a challenge was proposed but no seconder found.  The candidates themselves may have standing to pursue a legal challenge.  Gore chose not to pursue the matter.  It was considered the "patriotic" thing to do, but what were his real motivations?  We'll never know.

The other answer lies in the difficulty of proof - - it's hard to make a conspiracy case.  It could be a combination of both - - death threats and the likelihood of failure anyway.

Bottom line is, I don't KNOW why no legal action (after Bush v. Gore) was pursued, but I don't take the failure to pursue legal action as proof either way.  It is a factor to be pondered, however.

Gore did persue the matter and was highly motivated , if he had found as few as five hundred hidden votes he would have been President Gore.

[Michael Tee]

<<Gore did  persue the matter and was highly motivated , if he had found as few as five hundred hidden votes he would have been President Gore.>>

I believe that what Gore took to the Supreme Court was the issue of the voting irregularities but not the deliberate suppression of the black votes through the purging of the electoral rolls.  He took that as far as he could, and the court decided on ideological lines 5/4 to hand it to Bush.

As far as I know the issue of the suppression of the black vote was never addressed in the courts.  Or in the Senate, although one Senator did make the challenge, but no seconder could be found.

There are several possible explanations for this, but I don't believe the failure to prosecute this in the courts or the Senate is a real answer to the charge that the election was stolen.

[Plane]

<<Gore did  persue the matter and was highly motivated , if he had found as few as five hundred hidden votes he would have been President Gore.>>

I believe that what Gore took to the Supreme Court was the issue of the voting irregularities but not the deliberate suppression of the black votes through the purging of the electoral rolls.  He took that as far as he could, and the court decided on ideological lines 5/4 to hand it to Bush.

As far as I know the issue of the suppression of the black vote was never addressed in the courts.  Or in the Senate, although one Senator did make the challenge, but no seconder could be found.

There are several possible explanations for this, but I don't believe the failure to prosecute this in the courts or the Senate is a real answer to the charge that the election was stolen.

Gore searched for some way to snatch the win , if he could have found some evidence of fraud he would have used it and this is quite certain , he did use everything he really had .

The fantasy of voter supression is belied also by the fact that each district that had a problem was run by a Democratic comission.

So yes Gore being unable to find such evidence with the resorces at his command and the motivation he had represents a thourough search , in detail, of the accusation and a non finding in reality of something that would be easy to find if it were real.

[Michael Tee]

<<Gore searched for some way to snatch the win , if he could have found some evidence of fraud he would have used it and this is quite certain , he did use everything he really had .>>

100% pure Grade-A speculation on your part and nothing but.  Probative value:  zero

<<The fantasy of voter supression is belied also by the fact that each district that had a problem was run by a Democratic comission.>>

Not so at all.  The bulk of black voter suppression was accomplished by the "purging" of the voter rolls by a private, Republican owned corporation, a job outsourced by the State of Florida (Jeb Bush, Guv'nor) without being let out for tenders.  Also by "spontaneous" fake-document checks launched "randomly" at motorists who happened to be in their cars on election day who happened to be black.  Imagine, by some incredible coincidence, the State Police picked the day of the election as the SAME DAY out of all 365 in the year to launch this "spot-check" campaign.  Both these actions were taken at the state level.

<<So yes Gore being unable to find such evidence with the resorces at his command and the motivation he had represents a thourough search , in detail, of the accusation and a non finding in reality of something that would be easy to find if it were real.>>

Proving nothing.  Gore could have seen, or been made to see, that there were certain limits beyond which the water would no longer be safe.  Alternatively, Gore could easily have fallen short in his resources - - the resources he had in ferreting out the truth would have been necessarily inferior to the Governments' (Florida and Fed) resources to suppress it.

[BT]

Not so at all.  The bulk of black voter suppression was accomplished by the "purging" of the voter rolls by a private, Republican owned corporation, a job outsourced by the State of Florida (Jeb Bush, Guv'nor) without being let out for tenders.

You might want to fact check that statement. You have been corrected on that misstatement numerous times.

[Plane]

<<Gore searched for some way to snatch the win , if he could have found some evidence of fraud he would have used it and this is quite certain , he did use everything he really had .>>

100% pure Grade-A speculation on your part and nothing but.  Probative value:  zero

No ,Gore really did go to court , Florida really is full of Lawyers, the state supreme court of Florida was sympathetic to Gore  , the Federal Government was on his side and the Democratic party was willing to spend money on the project.


What is supposed to be the speculation?

With no proof at all you are willing to beleive that the state patroll stopped thousands  of prospexctive voters on the road with state troopers (many of whom are democrats themselves), how would this be hidden if it were true?

You are doing the speculateing , I am doing the reality based thinking and Gore did the hard work of proveing that a good search turns up nothing.

[Michael Tee]

<<No ,Gore really did go to court , Florida really is full of Lawyers, the state supreme court of Florida was sympathetic to Gore  , the Federal Government was on his side and the Democratic party was willing to spend money on the project.

<<What is supposed to be the speculation?>>

The speculation is this:  <<Gore searched for some way to snatch the win , if he could have found some evidence of fraud he would have used it and this is quite certain , he did use everything he really had .


<<With no proof at all you are willing to beleive that the state patroll stopped thousands  of prospexctive voters on the road with state troopers (many of whom are democrats themselves), how would this be hidden if it were true?>>

The Vanity Fair article had the proof and even the excuse (random stops coincidentally scheduled for Election Day, coincidentally underway in black areas but not white ones)

<<You are doing the speculateing , I am doing the reality based thinking . . . >>

That is demonstrably false, and I just demonstrated that.

<< . . .  and Gore did the hard work of proveing that a good search turns up nothing.>>

Gore missed some of the best evidence that the election was rigged.  Maybe it's his lawyers' fault.  He never considered black voter suppression that resulted from purging the rolls and he probably never knew about the "random" traffic stops of black voters because it took time for someone to connect all the dots.  Gore was focused on the hanging chads, defective machines, lack of paper trail stuff and it's quite natural that he missed the Big Story, black voter suppression.  Happens all the time - - lawyers focus on the most obvious issues, and somewhere lurking or sleeping is the Mother of All Issues, which, maybe because of distraction and misguided focus, seems to escape all the investigators' notice.

[Plane]

That it appears in "Vanity Fair " is not proof.

If it happened in the real world what would have hidden it from the well motivated and litigious Gore?

What prevents it from being litigated now ?

Other than its totaly ficticious nature?

There isn't a reason for Gore to ignore any such fraud in his court appeals , he would have if he could have.

Suppose I found a donkey starved to death on a trail , I might consider that to be pretty good proof that that bit of trail was short of donkey food could I not?

[Michael Tee]

<<That it appears in "Vanity Fair " is not proof.>>

If I see an article by three investigative reporters alleging certain facts in Vanity Fair, I believe what I read initially if the story is plausible, makes sense to me and does not contain assumptions (such as, if Saddam had the weapons, he would attack the U.S.A.) that are laughable and ridiculous.  If the article is refuted by other articles, if the reporters who wrote it are shown up as frauds, liars, fabricators or otherwise discredited, I may stop believing in the story.   We're at the stage now where I read the story, found nothing ridiculous or inconsistent with it, it fits what I know of Bush's character (he has lied repeatedly on a variety of subjects, from the war to his own insider trading) which means that his associates and confidantes would in all likelihood be the same kind of lying, lowlife scum as he himself is, and most importantly, none of the allegations in the article have ever been refuted.  Furthermore, if absence of lawsuits is proof of anything, why weren't the three investigative reporters and the publishers of Vanity Fair sued for libel?

On balance, that is why I believe the Vanity Fair story.

<<If it happened in the real world what would have hidden it from the well motivated and litigious Gore?>>

The "well-motivated" Gore might have been well motivated by more basic needs like survival and a good, healthy and soundly based fear of "lone nut" assassins "acting alone" than by the need to park his ass in the Oval Office for four years.  The "litigious" Gore?  You must be smoking that locoweed again, plane.  Remember, it was "Bush v. Gore," not "Gore v. Bush" that Bush and not Gore took all the way to the Supreme Court of the U.S.A.

<<What prevents it from being litigated now ?>>

"Patriotism" for official reasons, a.k.a. good healthy fear of covert operations by rogue security officers, lack of solid evidence, water under the bridge - - your guess is as good as mine.

<<Other than its totaly ficticious nature?>>

It has no "totally fictitious nature."  It's a good description of what actually happened.

<<There isn't a reason for Gore to ignore any such fraud in his court appeals , he would have if he could have.>>

Sure there is.  He can read the Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore, count the votes, figure out that five is more than four, and make an educated guess as to the ultimate result of any further litigation he wants to engage in over the election, if he should live long enough to hear the Supreme Court's views on the subject.

<<Suppose I found a donkey starved to death on a trail , I might consider that to be pretty good proof that that bit of trail was short of donkey food could I not?>>

or that the donkey starved to death somewhere else and was dumped there.  Or suffered from some GI tract obstruction.  Or metabolic disorder.  But we're not really talking about dead donkeys in a dead horse saloon are we?

[Plane]

<<That it appears in "Vanity Fair " is not proof.>>

If I see an article by three investigative reporters alleging certain facts in Vanity Fair, I believe what I read initially if the story is plausible, makes sense to me and does not contain assumptions (such as, if Saddam had the weapons, he would attack the U.S.A.) that are laughable and ridiculous.  If the article is refuted by other articles, if the reporters who wrote it are shown up as frauds, liars, fabricators or otherwise discredited, I may stop believing in the story.   We're at the stage now where I read the story, found nothing ridiculous or inconsistent with it, it fits what I know of Bush's character (he has lied repeatedly on a variety of subjects, from the war to his own insider trading) which means that his associates and confidantes would in all likelihood be the same kind of lying, lowlife scum as he himself is, and most importantly, none of the allegations in the article have ever been refuted.  Furthermore, if absence of lawsuits is proof of anything, why weren't the three investigative reporters and the publishers of Vanity Fair sued for libel?

On balance, that is why I believe the Vanity Fair story.

<<If it happened in the real world what would have hidden it from the well motivated and litigious Gore?>>

The "well-motivated" Gore might have been well motivated by more basic needs like survival and a good, healthy and soundly based fear of "lone nut" assassins "acting alone" than by the need to park his ass in the Oval Office for four years.  The "litigious" Gore?  You must be smoking that locoweed again, plane.  Remember, it was "Bush v. Gore," not "Gore v. Bush" that Bush and not Gore took all the way to the Supreme Court of the U.S.A.

<<What prevents it from being litigated now ?>>

"Patriotism" for official reasons, a.k.a. good healthy fear of covert operations by rogue security officers, lack of solid evidence, water under the bridge - - your guess is as good as mine.

<<Other than its totaly ficticious nature?>>

It has no "totally fictitious nature."  It's a good description of what actually happened.

<<There isn't a reason for Gore to ignore any such fraud in his court appeals , he would have if he could have.>>

Sure there is.  He can read the Supreme Court decision in Bush v. Gore, count the votes, figure out that five is more than four, and make an educated guess as to the ultimate result of any further litigation he wants to engage in over the election, if he should live long enough to hear the Supreme Court's views on the subject.

<<Suppose I found a donkey starved to death on a trail , I might consider that to be pretty good proof that that bit of trail was short of donkey food could I not?>>

or that the donkey starved to death somewhere else and was dumped there.  Or suffered from some GI tract obstruction.  Or metabolic disorder.  But we're not really talking about dead donkeys in a dead horse saloon are we?

Gore first went to court , there is no reason to think he feared assination when he went to the court and he brought with him a team of lawyers to make the best case he could , we are talking about a big team of Democrats who were on the scene , the really did go to the sites and turn over the rocks , finding nothing that was usefull to them in court.

Your supposition of Gores cowardace is belied by the fact that Gore went to court with all that he had and won in the state court, the US Supreme court was appealed to by Bush because the Florida Supreme court was ignoreing the law and attempting to appoint Gore contrary to law.

It went up and down the State and federal supreme courts twice with everyone getting exasperated , but to suggest that Gore was holding back even a little is rediculous.

Lets talk about the Sasquatch , he is basd on stronger evidence than the Vanity fair article , at least with the Sasquatch there are supposed to be a small number of Sasqui so that their hideing is not so hard , the mythical Suppressd Florida voter is supposedly numerous yet still impossible to find.

To my mind it is a sort of meaness that preserves these lies in the face of extremely strong disproof .

[Xavier_Onassis]

Lets talk about the Sasquatch , he is basd on stronger evidence than the Vanity fair article , at least with the Sasquatch there are supposed to be a small number of Sasqui so that their hideing is not so hard , the mythical Suppressd Florida voter is supposedly numerous yet still impossible to find.

===================================
Why don't you tell us what evidence there is of sasquatch? At most, there is one grainy ten-second shot of what could be a guy in an apesuit.

[Michael Tee]

<<You might want to fact check that statement. You have been corrected on that misstatement numerous times.>>

That the purging was outsourced by the Jeb Bush administration to a Republican-controlled corporation that purged many blacks but few Hispanics erroneously?  IIRC the only "correction" of that "misstatement" was that the firm was originally contracted out by a Democratic administration.  However the "errors" complained of were complained of at the time of the 2000 Florida elections and the contract could have been pulled any time by the Jeb Bush administration for reckless purging.  My theory is that the firm behaved itself initially but in concert with the Bush family went rogue at the time of the 2000 election and stole the election for Bush.

[BT]

The bulk of black voter suppression was accomplished by the "purging" of the voter rolls by a private, Republican owned corporation, a job outsourced by the State of Florida (Jeb Bush, Guv'nor) without being let out for tenders.

That was your original statement.

We see now that a dem controlled state legislature passed a law requiring the dem governor to put out for bid the project. The contract was awarded by the dem gov. Lawton Chiles I believe. The ACT was in response to the City of Miami elections.

The company awarded the contract was publicly traded. How does that translate to Republican owned?

The purging was done according to the contract specifications set at the time of bid. Written by a dem administration. There was a remedy built into the purging to allow those who were erroneously purged to be reinstated.

What part of your original statement withstands examination.

Your source is Greg Pallast. He was published in Vanity Fair. Which is why the author and the magazine have fallen into disrepute.