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Good Riddance to Decade That Began With Theft of the Presidency
It is an amusing pastime that has some value, but only if we're focused on identifying the root cause of what made the Noughties such a miserable decade.
If we are serious about the task, there is not much mystery.
The original sin of the good-riddance decade came in December of 2000, when the United States Supreme Court intervened to stop a complete recount of the votes in Florida and then declared George Bush to be the president.
This extreme judicial activism was not merely a devastating assault on American democracy. It set in motion the Bush presidency, and with it the pathologies that the Bush-Cheney administration imposed on the country in the form of unnecessary wars, failed economic policies, assaults on civil liberties and crudely divisive and hyper-partisan governance.
Bush, Dick Cheney and aides are surely to blame for much of what ailed America during the 2000s, and for what will ail America for decades to come.
But it was the U.S. Supreme Court's unprecedented meddling in the presidential election process – an intervention that would have horrified the founders of a republic that was supposed to enjoy a separation of executive, legislative and judicial powers – made the Bush-Cheney interregnum possible.
Bush, it must be remembered, did not win the popular vote nationally.
In fact, the American electorate favored Democrat Al Gore over Republican Bush by more than 540,000 votes.
Of course, because the United States has a convoluted electoral system that does not award the presidency to the candidate who wins the most votes, the contest came down to a fight between the Bush and Gore camps for Florida's decisive 25 Electoral College votes.
Florida ran a confusing and disorderly election on November 7, 2000, and then conducted a ridiculous review of the close result that followed no standards except those imposed by Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris, a Bush campaign co-chair.
When the Florida Supreme Court finally ordered a full and consistent recount of all 6.1 million ballots cast by the state's voters, the U.S. Supreme Court halted the process and then declared Bush the winner of Florida's electoral votes and the presidency.
The problem with this unprecedented move by a conflicted high court was that more Floridians went to the polls with the intention of electing Gore than Bush.
This is not some radical notion, not some conspiracy theory.
It is the reality that was evident to scholars of voting behavior from the start.
As University of California at Irvine political scientist Anthony Salvanto, who conducted some of the first and most exhaustive examinations of contested ballots, noted: "There's a pretty clear pattern from these ballots. Most of these people went to the polls to vote for Al Gore."
Salvanto was not an outlier.
Media outlets that looked beyond the partisan spin to the reality of what the ballots revealed.
As The Associated Press noted, "Under any standard that tabulated all disputed ballots statewide, however, Gore erased Bush's advantage and emerged with a tiny lead that ranged from 42 to 171 votes."
The Washington Post was even more blunt, stating that, "If there had been some way last fall to recount every vote -- undervotes and overvotes alike, in all 67 Florida counties -- former vice president Al Gore would be the White House."
The Palm Beach Post, which conducted its own review of the ballots and also participated in a review by a consortium of media outlets, concluded: "Uncounted ballots and voter confusion cost Gore the election."
Actually, that's not quite right.
The Supreme Court's blocking of the full and consistent recount that could have sorted through the confusion cost Al Gore an election. But the consequences were far greater for the republic, which lost a decade of its promise and possibility to the excesses and abuses of George Bush's illegitimate presidency.
126 Comments so far
Show AllObviously ALL for NOUGHT!
Perhaps we shoudl term this the NOUGHT DECADE eh?
Gary
The Brits call it the "Nought-ies"
I keep having these memories of Republican Senators scrutinizing the records of judicial nominees to weed out any judicial "activists." Where were they when we needed them?
Two points about this well-intended but somewhat naive article.
First, in blaming the republicans for the 2000 election debacle, the author overlooks the fact that not one single Senator came to the aid of the members of the Hourse who challenged the results of that eleciton. Any Democratic Senator - including Gore himself - could have backed their challenge and forced the recount through to completion.
Second, why on earth does everyone seem to believe that the fact that we won't use a zero in the tens' column of the date will mean a change in anything? There appears to be no relief on the horizon from the massive problems which are destroying the US and other countries, keeping the world at war, and threatening human existence.
q
Al Gore was NOT a sitting US senator at the time, nor did his duties as President of the Senate allow for such an intervention.
And? wasn't there any democrats among the senators. After all wasn't gore elected as a presidential candidate by the poeple affiliated to the democratic party?
The fault lies within the two party in the US, you know the declared winner takes it all.
What about constructing a real third party, not to freaking win but to influence the discourse thereby the policies and more to the point the knowledge of policies...
One Marxist is correct. I was stuck with the memory of Gore ruling the members of the Black Caucus out of order for objecting without the aid of at least one Senator so you are also correct.
I remember reading one account of the proceedings that blamed the Senate's refusal to support the objection on the fact that there was not one black in the Senate at the time.
q
"...that blamed the Senate's refusal to support the objection on the fact that there was not one black in the Senate at the time."
--That would make them even more contemptible, revealing a blatant racism, which is of course true enough and also disregarded by the public, who didn't care much more than the Senate that the election was defrauded and stolen. No significant protests, no outcry, no nuthin'. And of course this was because the MSM completely ran cover for the Supreme mafia dons, the Brooks Brothers thugs in Florida who suppressed the vote count, and for the return of the Bush crime family to rule and wreck the whole fucking country, not to mention half the Middle East, as it turned out.
That stuck in my memory, too. He seemed dismissive to me, beyond what his official duties might have called for. Maybe he was trying to demonstrate his impartiality, but I remember thinking that he seemed very cold and extremely unsympathetic in his rulings from the chair, which almost seemed enthusiastic. Probably wasn't an easy thing for him to do, I can only imagine -- and hope.
I was married on January 1, 2000. It was the worst experience of my life and ended in divorce six years later.
The world, led by the present empire, became a more mean, miserable, impoverished planet.
Obvious climate change continues to be ignored, even challenged.
If I were superstitious...
I can't encounter the word superstitious without hearing the fabulous Stevie Wonder and his funkin' clavinet and poppin' horns...thanks for that...
I am struggling ever more with 'purpose'...not only my own, but my childrens'...if business is detrimental to life, yet life is impossible without business, what is the right choice?
my son and his many friends believe their purpose is eventual conflict...
my only hope is we remove business from life...that my purpose, humanity's purpose, will somehow surface via that process...a merging back into the natural world, as opposed to hovering above and ladling out the desired portions, and damn the rest...
my worst relationships preceded the decade, so I can't count them...the one I have now is great, though, so maybe all of the other problems in the world will improve, as well...oh, let me daydream for a minute...
And ring in the new decade, where government by corporation completes its consolidation.
Had to check and it was the 2004 election during which Sen. Barbara Boxer stood up alone in the Senate to object to election results (in Ohio). Indeed, no-one including Gore himself said a word in objection to the borked 2000 election.
I know I watched the (lack of) progress of vote-counting during the FL debacle for nearly a month on tv. The Supreme Court decision that in effect gave Bush the win was truly shocking and does indeed set the tone for a decade of decline in America, more so IMO than the over-hyped 9/11 tragedy (per the Ted Rall piece today).
Sad that after the FL mess, we still do not have standardized verified voting, ranked (preferential) voting*, nor elimination of the electoral college.
* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_systems
Hmmm, Cheney or Lieberman....Cheney or Lieberman. What is the difference?
BTW, a rhetorical question: Do Iranian citizens have more guts than the American populace?
Amazing, chill-inducing speech of the year by a former Iraq War Veteran, Mike Prysner.
The next Smedlely Butler?
Must watch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akm3nYN8aG8&feature=player_embedded
Great speech.
Did you look thorugh the comments? It's not hard to tell which ones are profiting from this war and the other inequities which Prysner details.
q
The comments section on Youtube is almost always a trash heap.
Neither Gore, who would have won in a landslide if he hadn't chosen the whiny, corrupt Lieberman as VP, a political cancer if there ever was one, nor Kerry uttered the merest peep of protest over BOTH stolen elections. In this, the feckless, self-sabotaging Democrats proved themselves to be what they've now fully realized in Obama: the most worthless, useless bunch of dickweeds ever to pretend to be an opposition party to the fascist rightwingers who STILL control the debate and determine policy. Thanks a lot, Gore, Kerry and all your associates in cowardice. Too bad Nichols hasn't yet figured this out. He remains a Dem Party hopeful. What will it take to wake him from this risible slumber?
One word - Tennessee . . . Al Gore's home state, which he did not carry in 2000.
As an 'expatriate' Tennesseean, now residing in Oregon, I asked my folks why Al Jr did not carry the Volunteer state, and was told it seemed to folks he had taken their votes for granted.
If he'd carried his home state, Florida would've never been an issue.
T
Too true, and yet one more reason not to blame Ralph Nader for the presidency of George W. Bush.
If the popular vote was that close then it shows that roughly half of the American people wanted Bush/Cheney and that's good enough to say that, knowing what the Bush/Cheney team could and would do in their administrations, the American people made their bed and now they shall have to live with the consequences. As a non-voting citizen who would feel soiled and in need of a bath if I got within 100 feet of a polling place, I can only stand by and watch in astonishment as the American people prove in election after election that half of them have a modicum of intelligence while the other half are the stupidest people on earth.
Sioux Rose
JOE2 AT: If you factor in the influence of a hypnotic-style mainstream media and its endless feedback loop of lies and/or skillfully rendered misconceptions, those designed TO manufacture consent (for egregious policies), then you would essentially be holding accountable a people purposely placed under a form of psychic, moral and political sedation for acts rendered in their name, by the choice of their leaders. IF the popular vote was a true reflection of choices borne out of a genuine understanding of facts, policies, and actual events... then YOU would have a case.
So true. The facts about George W; Bush were censored from the news reports that most people used to form impressions while Gore was made fun of for noting he DID help create the Internet. If people had known Bush went into the goverorship of Texas with a surplus of 5 billion thanks to Democrat Ann Richards and left a 7 billion debt the voters might have thought twice about giving their vote to Dubhua. not to mention he was a former druggie war shirker who made damned sure he didn't have enough flight hours to qualify for combat, while campaining for a friend of pappy on our ticket. To note just a few things about GWB that might have alerted folks to what was running.
As for Gore getting us into two wars just like Bush and the boys I say nonsense. Doesn't fit his character.
Gary
You might want to read what this author, John Nichols, had to say about the book, "Al Gore, A Users Manual." and then get the book and read it yourself. It has actual facts!
http://www.commondreams.org/views/101800-101.htm
My advise: Look at the the records and deeds of these politicians before jumping on any kind of band wagon. I remember Al Gore giving speeches that HW Bush didn't go far enough in the 1st war on Iraq.
Sioux, I hold the stupid half accountable for their choice. Enough was known about Bush and Cheney to know they were dangerous and it was freely available on the Internet if they'd only just removed their tushes from the TV sofa and placed them in their computer chairs to check. Their ignorance was mostly born out of carelessness, not lack of the facts. The tiny minority who voted third party/Nader knew what Bush/Cheney were.
If Bush had stolen the presidency from Nader, then yes there'd been a real crime against the American people but who really cares about 2000, really? The Democrats are not a real party. The Bush presidency was a disaster of biblical proportions, true, but Democrats were his facilitators & co-conspirators every step of the way. Gore with rabid Lieberman as VP would've given us the same horrible presidency doing its best to export American jobs with NAFTA, illegally invading countries like Clinton did and throwing the poor off welfare like Clinton did while giving the filthy rich more and more tax breaks (like Clinton did).
Pelosi and Reid not only protected Bush and Cheney from being investigated for his many crimes during 8 years (forget impeached and removed from office which is what should've happened) but also gave them even more money than they had asked for their 2 illegal wars. Number of Democrats filibusters during 8 years of Bush: 0.
Speaking of 0, fast-forward to Obama, as senator he spoke against the wars but voted to fund it, now as president he's escalating them. As senator he spoke against the FISA bill but voted for it. His record as senator was appalling.
Biden his VP is essentially a neocon, always thirsty for wars. A major player for the credit card companies, he helped them pass the new bankruptcy law in 2004 (and so did Hillary) which hurt consumers like nothing in recent congressional history.
Democrats and Republicans are the same, so you 2000 Sore Losermen get over yourselves.
Let's not forget that Florida, led by Secretary of State Katherine Harris, purged over 170,000 people, mostly Democratic voting minorities, from the voter rolls.
The story, exposed by Greg Palast, was censored from virtually all media.
http://www.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/12/04/voter_file/
Sioux Rose
CYGNUS: Thank you for mentioning this key fact. I hope this article finally puts to rest the nonsense used by some in this forum who blame NADER for Bush having been handed the presidency. A number of nefarious factors contributed to the debacle, so blaming Nader is and always will be a cheap shot aimed at a person of rare integrity, one who has dedicated his life to making the US safer in the face of the corporate profit model that would otherwise bulldoze over every living being without pause or apology. What a ridiculous target to aim their angst at!
Sadly, most Americans still get the majority of their information from radio and t.v.
Hopefully the history books will not censor Mr. Palast's work of the purging of the Florida voter rolls and the theft of the 2000 election.
Maybe in the future, if people are better informed, we'll be able to put the "blame Nader" nonsense to rest.
*** Message deleted by administrators for using all capital letters ***
Oh for heaven's sake, you get deleted for using capital letters? No wonder the world is in the mess it's in. Get yourselves some wiggle room, folks. If we don't like capital letters, we just won't read it! No one is hurt! I want to read what "kerros" wrote.
Please, kerros, be an obedient boy or girl and take away those evil big letters and replace them with smaller ones. Thank you.
Do you know all caps is considered shouting and considered very rude?
My sincerest apologies to the administration and forum participants and readers:)
After the increased betrayal by Lieberman with his switch to the Independent Party to steal the Senate seat from a Democrat, and his latest call for war on Yemen, I'm not too bothered by the stealing of the election in 2000.
In my way of thinking, the Democrats and Republicans have been stealing the elections for a long time. Does anyone remember that Democrats successfully kept Nader off ballots in States, fearing his voters would 'lose' the election for Gore? How 'Democratic' is that? Many of my 'progressive' friends still blame Nader for Gore's loss. How naive.
My only hope for this country is that when real democrats see that Obama was never a saviour, just another K Street puppet, they will call for real democratic elections.
'Public funded elections now, public funded elections tomorrow, public funded elections fo'eva.' - George Wallace - paraphrased of course.
Right on with your editorial! The only thing I would add is that the US Supreme Court Justices that exceeded their constitutional mandate by "appointing" Bush/Cheney are also responsible for the deaths that occurred from the wars these unelected leaders started.
As a side note: "Choice Point" was not that the Texas firm that eliminated and confused the voting lists?
It should also be noted that TWO of those who voted to let Bush steal the election were directly tied by family to Bush, and should have reclused themselves. Boy, was this a fixed operation -- Baker must of been real proud of himself.
Gary
And both Bush and Cheney were warned that an attack like 9/11 was going to occur in August of 2001 by middle eastern terrorists and did nothing to secure our airports and screen all passengers.
Why???????
The neocons have stolen our country, and God has one place in their plan, control the Christian right until the take over is complete.
Hitler took over Germany with a false flag attack on a government building, shut down the german constitution , and blamed Zionists for the attack. Then he took Europe.
We went into the middle east, and used the same kind of propaganda to scare a nation into stealing oil.
Its that simple, but acts of treason , buy those who have power and money and are experts at slander, deception, and misdirection is hard to prove.
Throw in a corporate run main stream media, and a military industrial complex with greedy bankers, and you have a recipe for a world war on terror than is self perpetuating.
The longer we are in the middle east, the more people we kill, the more terrorist we cultivate.
Good bye America and its constitution, the land of the free has been enslaved by fear and the war on terror.
To think, it took right wing gang stalking torture for me to find the truth, 3 years , 24/7 as of dec 1 this year, to come to the conclusion we are headed to the dark ages again.
God Bless America my A$$, if Christians don't choose to speak up and save the constitution and end these wars, we will have no God or church to bless us.
The numerical decade may be gone, but the Corporatist-Militarist Party, with its RepubliKKKlan and Demonrat wings, carries on.
The more things change...
I learned nothing from this article; little more than superficial pap; which is what I expect from Nichols.
The Supreme Court and GOP of the time felt strongly that the 'ends justified the means', even though experience teaches us repeatedly that this is not true.
Nichols is reminding us what we may not have felt entirely true at the time: that a stolen election has consequences. Bush won not just because Republicans abetted a theft, but because Democrats, Gore included, let them. Even today we've refused to recognize the link between this passivity toward our loss of Democracy and the global catastrophe known as GW Bush that followed. I think its useful to pound that lesson in until we admit our culpability in letting Bush happen.
In my opinion, this is all very superficial. Election fraud has not been addressed. The US is the only democracy not to have standardized election rules. Every state and county can have different rules and fraud is all too easy. The Supreme Court are merely politicized elite group with no accountability.
The winner takes all election system is highly dis-proportionate and un-democratic.
The legal framework that gives corporations the rights of individual human beings is un-democratic.
The interest representation system and legal framework that equates money with free speech is highly un-democratic.
The corporate media oligopoly is highly un-democratic
The corporate media sponsored and managed election campaigns and "debates" are highly un-democratic.
The largely un-regulated big money elections are the most expensive in the world by a huge margin, and are highly un-democratic.
We need to look behind the curtain and under the hood and fix the systemic and structural barriers to the democratic process.
That is too difficult and boring in our dumbed-down soundbite society I guess. Better to stick our head in the sand and pretend the democratic process is the best in the world and works just fine.
You do have a point! Nichols undercut his whole piece, in my opinion, by calling great attention to the highly irrelevant fact that Al Gore won the popular vote -- nationally. That would matter only if we did not count electoral votes by state; but we do, so the national popular vote outcome doesn't matter. Period.
To the degree that it doesn't matter in our 'democracy', it is our democracy that doesn't matter, not the popular vote. That has become more and more clear with each year since that benighted election.
I'm getting pretty tired of people saying, 'oh, but in OUR democracy, you see, majority rule doesn't quite apply'. The proper response to that is: 'well, then YOU don't have a democracy'.
In CA it takes a 2/3rd's majority vote to raise taxes or even pass a budget. Do ya call THAT a democracy? It essentially is saying that the vote of ONE Republican is worth the votes of TWO Democrats.
In the U.S. Senate, it takes a 60-40 majority to pass legislation. Call THAT a democracy? bvll. Its time to get back to what a democracy IS: majority rule. Period. No 'electorates', no 'supermajorities', no referendums. Just vote in your representative and he or she has the SAME voting power as everyone else.
Its not like the U.S. Senate is a democracy to begin with (not when 2 Senators from Wyoming wield the SAME power as two Senators from California).
And now, with the Democrats in control of both houses of congress and the white house, there will finally be some action taken to fix the voting system in the US. After all, the problem is a life-or-death matter for their party and for democracy itself!
Or maybe not.
-Hope is cheap.
Yes, talk is cheap and hope is a belief in irrational expectations
Hope is anything but "irrational" but a sense of what might and should be. How is not not a logical viewpoint?
Gary
You have one interpretation and definition of the word. However, the word has been used as a PR tool to stoke irrational expectations (despite actions otherwise). Bill Clinton used the term heavily in his campaign and Obama made it into s full-blown buzz word. Unfortunately the word in popular discourse has been emptied of meaning to a large degree. Wishful thinking is quite different from working for social justice.
Then you should have said "wishful thinking" instead of hope. Let's keep our terms clear least we do just what you say was done by the Clinton and Obama campaigns with the word " hope." Good point once you clarifed it though.
Gary
Yeah, "wishful thinking" is a more accurate synonym for cheapness, but it just doesn't have the same zing as "HOPE".
Imagine that big famous picture of Obama emblazoned with the words "WISHFUL THINKING".