[Cruxus]

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/10/ ... index.html

So Californians turned out en masse to say that they want a governor who will terminate taxes and bad government. Even if they ultimately decide against recalling Grey Davis, the whole event has been one huge mess.

The recall election violates democratic principles of majority rule. Out of the multitude of candidates running, the winner only needs to receive a plurality of the votes. It is hypothetically possible that the next governor of California will have received only 5% of the vote! Maybe a second ballot system, as used in the presidential election of 2002 in France, would be better. At least the winner would require a majority vote in the second round in that case.

[Nox]

The recall election violates democratic principles of majority rule.

You just told on yourself and gave away the secret that you are a Democrat. This is the Democratic Party line.

However, Democrats are ALWAYS consistent in what they say ... majority rule. Short history lesson: In 1992 Bubba won the Presidency with 43% of the vote ... same percentage as Adolph Hitler won with 50+ years earlier.

So much for your "majority rule" argument.

Nox

[pheared]

It's a shame that people can be so taken by a catch-phrase spouting media magnet. He managed to terminate all questions by terminating his opponents with clever and witty Terminator phrases. I'll be back. Terminate! Ah!

[Classical Liberal]

The recall was a travesty, even for bourgeois politics. I am appalled and bewildered at the results. When you hear of something like that outcome, you get this weird, sick feeling in your frontal lobe, and you realize that you've just gotten dumber. I just want to know one thing, Nox...are you against Arnold being governor? You are, right?

http://www.presidentelect.org/e1992.html

And another thing, it is true that Clinton got 43% of the popular vote, old Bush got 37.4%, and Perot got about 19%. But since we all love the elctoral college power to tell us who the hell to shove into the White House, we know from this site that the states went to Clinton with 370 electoral votes to Bush's 168 elctoral votes. You probably already knew that, but I just had find out myself considering my age. We know about Bush vs. Gore. Gore still won the popular vote, as small as it was, without the full recount. Bush had a majority in the college and was installed.

[smashthestate]

The recall election violates democratic principles of majority rule.

It was majority rule that put the recall law into the Califonia constitution, and it was majority rule that got Davis recalled.

Recalls have been tried I think 31 times before in California, but Mr. Davis was the only one that managed to piss off most Californians.

How was this recall against majority rule, when the majority voted for it?

[Classical Liberal]

I think what he's trying to say is that the election of the candidates itself may not be democratic. If a majority of Californians want Davis out, then that's democratic. But what do I know?

[Nox]

Gore still won the popular vote, as small as it was, without the full recount.

Since you put in the phrase, "without the full recount", I will add to your history lesson ... After "the full recount" Bush still won Florida. By the way, did I mention that the only way you get dangling/dimpled/pregnant chads is when more than one card is run through the machine at a time? Did I mention that the only counties that had dangling/dimpled/pregnant chads just happened to be around where a Democratic Party operative was found with a chad voting machine in his car?

Now for the real issue: The Electoral College. For the folks living in California, Texas, New York, and Florida ... they don't like the College. And they don't like it for the same reason the founding fathers put it in ... to protect the small states.

One other small point I didn't make before ... When Davis was re-elected ... he DID NOT have a majority of the votes either. Yet the Democratic Party screams about the "will of the majority".

O well.

Nox

[Classical Liberal]

Whoops, silly me. It depends on whom you ask.

Democrats

Or that oh so biased liberal media

[Buck Williams]

I think this site states my views on this recall quite clearly

http://www.doonesbury.com/strip/dailydo ... e=20030928

[Nox]

Whoops, silly me. It depends on whom you ask.

Let's add that great 'Republican' newspaper ... The Miami Herald (who oversaw the total recount) who in the final analysis showed Bush won by more than the 500+ he was certified for.

As far as the Demo party and the New York Times ... well ... these well known bastions of truth and integrity (remember 'slashing social security' and 'starving the children' along with the Times reporter who wrote first hand accounts of places/people/events where he had never been).

I understand your point about who's stuff are you going to believe ... I submit that you look at the track record of same.

Nox

[Kewpie]

Let's also remember that those 500 votes came after a recount where Bush had 1,000+ more votes, and those 500 votes were well within the margin of error for the particular voting system, and around 60,000 votes were being disputed. And also the very close vote by the supreme court which decided to halt the hand recount. I still agree with the court's decision under the basis of the equal protecion act and that there was no uniform method in which the under and overvotes were being counted, but it's true--how would the federal court know what the state of Florida could and could not do before a deadline better than Florida's supreme court?

Doonesbury rules

[Locke]

So Californians turned out en masse to say that they want a governor who will terminate taxes and bad government.

oh, I would not say en masse. More like 45% voted not to have him recalled and 55% did. Besides, Arnold got less than 1/2 the vote for governor.

Didn't Miami-Dade county refuse to re-count their ballots after a small posse of Bush -supporters banged on the door of the room county officials were in? Was there really a "full recount?"

By the way, did I mention that the only way you get dangling/dimpled/pregnant chads is when more than one card is run through the machine at a time?

Actually, no. I worked the (punch card) polls for the recall election and I did see several single ballots with swinging chads. And those were only the ones handed to me. I saw a few people at the booth pulling off hanging chads before they brought the ballot over to drop it in the box...and how would people get "more then one card"? Everyone gets one card when they check in to vote.