GOP was ready to chuck EC and call popular vote 'will of the people'...

[Q]

- Democrats should have learned one great lesson from the 2000 election: TO FIGHT INSTEAD OF ROLLING OVER and taking the easy path.

- How many Democrats are aware that Bushie Republicans were ready and willing to 'take to the streets' and argue the exact opposite of what they argued in 2000 if Bush* had won the popular vote and lost the electoral vote? That's right...they were prepared to call the Electoral College 'antiquated' and the popular vote the 'will of the people'.

- Democrats MUST LEARN to fight for what they believe in and never concede to bullies.

-------------

""Local business leaders will be urged to lobby their customers, the clergy will be asked to speak up for the popular will and Team Bush will enlist as many Democrats as possible to scream as loud as they can.."


November 10, 2000

The GOP's  Popular-Vote Hypocrisy

In the days before the Nov. 7 election, Republicans feared that Vice President Al Gore might win the Electoral College while Texas Gov. George W. Bush could win the national popular vote. The expectation then was that Green Party candidate Ralph Nader might siphon off millions of votes from Gore nationwide, but not enough in key states to keep them out of Gore's column. That could allow Gore to amass the 270 electoral votes needed for winning the presidency while blocking a Gore plurality in the popular vote.

To stop Gore under those circumstances, advisers to the Bush campaign weighed the possibility of challenging the legitimacy of a popular-vote loser gaining the White House.

"The one thing we don't do is roll over -- we fight," said a Bush aide, according to an article by Michael Kramer in the New York Daily News on Nov. 1, a week before the election. The article reported that "the core of the emerging Bush strategy assumes a popular uprising, stoked by the Bushies themselves, of course. In league with the campaign -- which is preparing talking points about the Electoral College's essential unfairness -- a massive talk-radio operation would be encouraged." "We'd have ads, too," said a Bush aide, "and I think you can count on the media to fuel the thing big-time. Even papers that supported Gore might turn against him because the will of the people will have been thwarted."

The Bush strategy to challenge the Electoral College went even further. "Local business leaders will be urged to lobby their customers, the clergy will be asked to speak up for the popular will and Team Bush will enlist as many Democrats as possible to scream as loud as they can," the article said.

"You think 'Democrats for Democracy' would be a catchy term for them?" asked a Bush adviser.

The Bush strategy also would target the members of the Electoral College, the 538 electors who are picked by the campaigns and state party organizations to go to Washington for what is normally a ceremonial function. Many of the electors are not legally bound to a specific candidate. Another article describing the Republican thinking appeared in The Boston Herald on Nov. 3. It also quoted Republican sources outlining plans to rally public sentiment against Gore’s election if he won the Electoral College but lost the popular vote. “The Bush camp, sources said, would likely challenge the legitimacy of a Gore win, casting it as an affront to the people’s will and branding the Electoral College as an antiquated relic,” said the article by Andrew Miga.

- http://www.consortiumnews.com/2000/111000a.html

[Q]

1. "preparing talking points about the Electoral College's unfairness"

"The article reported that "the core of the emerging Bush strategy assumes a popular uprising, stoked by the Bushies themselves, of course. In league with the campaign -- which is preparing talking points about the Electoral College's essential unfairness -- a massive talk-radio operation would be encouraged." "We'd have ads, too," said a Bush aide, "and I think you can count on the media to fuel the thing big-time. Even papers that supported Gore might turn against him because the will of the people will have been thwarted."

[lolly]

2. Plan came out in LATIMES before the election . . .

I remember reading an article in the Times before the election which quoted an anonymous official on plans for this strategy.

A few days after the election, when everybody was telling Democrats to be quiet and go away, I sent a LTTE of the TIMES quoting their earlier article.

It was never acknowledged, much less published. Damn that liberal media!

[Q]

3. It didn't get much press at all...although well-known...

...in political circles at the time.

- What this means is that the Republicans were willing to do ANYTHING to win. They don't see the obvious hypocrisy in calling the Electoral College antiquated and against the 'will of the people' after they LOST the popular vote and had to depend on the EC to 'win'.

- I'm not suggesting Democrats should have done the same. But they obviously lacked the PASSION of the right and didn't fight hard enough to counter the poor GOP arguments.

[Waverley_Hills_Hiker]

8. I knew about this..there was some discussion of this in the media

...and also online.

I think it shows that the GOP about as opportunist and party line as a stalinist front organization. Postively Orwellian, actually.

[saracat]

4. I knew that and that

is why I lost all respect for Gore. He should have fought and asked for the whole state to be recounted. He was a weinie and rolled over and will NEVER be redeemed in my eyes no matter how many too little too late wonderful speeches he makes. He was a gutless wonder with no fire in the belly. We must do better this time. I don't think Kerry is a wimp and I think he actually wants the job.

[Q]

6. Gore didn't 'roll over' and he's not a 'weenie'....

- There were larger politics at play. Democrats didn't realize until it was too late that the Bushies were prepared to do anything to win. Democrats were more concerned with fairness and justice.

- It really bothers me when people blame the victim (Gore and the American people) instead of the criminals (Bush* and the Republican party).

[saracat]

I don't exonerate Bush and the Repugs.

They stole the election.But Gore let them.And if Democrats didn't realize until later what Bush was cabable of ,they were incompetant politicians. I don't think they were. I think they wouldn't go the distance. LBJ or JFK never would have wimped out. The Dems weren't always overconcerned with "fairness". We have "bought" many an election and we have fought fire with fire in order to win. And Team Gore didn't do it. They wouldn't even "sully" themselves by having Clinton stump for them. And Clinton knew that he could have turned the election. Thats why he was so angry with Gore after the election.He thought Gore threw away a golden oppotunity and he was right.
And why , pray tell, when Gore had the moral high ground, and the overwhelming support of the Party, after looking like a candidate for 2004, and determinng that he could get the nomination, did he refuse to run?He had no fire in the belly. He wimped again and betrayed all his supporters. I am sorry to say there is a pattern here.

[saracat]

18. I don't exonerate Bush and the Repugs.

They stole the election.But Gore let them.And if Democrats didn't realize until later what Bush was cabable of ,they were incompetant politicians. I don't think they were. I think they wouldn't go the distance. LBJ or JFK never would have wimped out. The Dems weren't always overconcerned with "fairness". We have "bought" many an election and we have fought fire with fire in order to win. And Team Gore didn't do it. They wouldn't even "sully" themselves by having Clinton stump for them. And Clinton knew that he could have turned the election. Thats why he was so angry with Gore after the election.He thought Gore threw away a golden oppotunity and he was right.
And why , pray tell, when Gore had the moral high ground, and the overwhelming support of the Party, after looking like a candidate for 2004, and determinng that he could get the nomination, did he refuse to run?He had no fire in the belly. He wimped again and betrayed all his supporters. I am sorry to say there is a pattern here.

[saracat]

Delete Dupe.

[saracat]

Delete Dupe.

.

[saracat]

Delete Dupe

[saracat]

19. delete dupe

[saracat]

20. Delete Dupe

.

[bhairava]

21. Hear! Hear!

I remember it vividly and was prepared to see the EC's demolition. I also remember that the Choicepoint voter purge was purposely
ignored by both the Florida democrats and national ones. Gore made choices. He chose wrongly. Politics is sometimes about instincts.
His was to defer to the ruling class of which he is a member. I'm sure he thought to himself, like the media pundits did, " After all how different would life be under a Republican president? , Reagan wasn't that bad. " Gore was a conservative Democrat ( and never a real friend to non white non straight or non men, those of us in any of these categories voted for him anyway) He sided with these folks over his own boss, Clinton. His running mate and a few other top Dems
were ready to concede immediately.

And further, how any one can be surprised by the tactics and tenacity of the Republicans in November and December 2000 is beyond me.
The party of Gingrich, Helms, DeLay, Gramm, James Baker, the October Surprise, Iran Contra and most importantly the Arkansas Project (which SUCCEEEDED! Clinton was impeached and nearly was turned out) surprised NOONE who had eyes to see in the last 15
years. Similarly, the party who controlled Congress and gave Reagan what he wanted (with his best bud Tip O'Neill leading the way),
who didn't try hard enough to impeach the criminal Reagan, who brays at the idiot irrelevancy that is Nader (whining like losers, unlike
Repugs who did NOT do the same re the insane fool Perot), who then did not unite defeat the Ashcroft's confirmation (a racist who
lost to a dead man and spent years trying to block implementaion of the Brown v Kansas decision.), who confirmed Whitman unanimously (not ONE senator was troubled by her own racist defense of and participation in(!) racial profiling not to mention her far
from impressive record in New Jersey, and why was she let off the hook for hiring illegals ?), and finally the party who let Bush have his tax cuts, war, and continuing assault on families' livlihoods. Gore is a weenie as is Kerry if they really can't see what kind of people they are dealing with. A colleague like Inhofe joking about federal workers playing hookey after the OKC bombing is NOT honourable. Nor are any kind of bigot. But again after 8 years of unrelenting attempts to unseat an elected POPULAR president, you'd think they might have had a clue. Again, instincts. Bush's mendacity, ignorance, and truculence are apparent to most of the world.

[tom_paine]

22. "Bush's mendacity, ignorance, and truculence"

Yes, they are known world over but their are sme advantages to constructing a propaganda Infrastructure that made Hitler and Goebbels look like children in a sandbox (not referring to the violenec here, just the Pravda...hows that for mixing my metaphors).

[HawkerHurricane]

5. The tactics the pubbies used...

the smears, arguements, supreme court case, riots, etc... were all from their projection of a 'worse case scenario' or what DEMOCRATS would do if the popular vote was against them and the electoral vote was in thier favor. They just turned the tables in their planning, doing what they assumed the Democrats would do... and then accused them of doing what they had planned to do to counter it...

[WilliamPitt]

7. It's worse than that, actually

We need to cowboy up against people for whom truth has no meaning, for whom inconsistency is merely a necessary adjunct of victory.

How many here are willing to get that ugly? "Telling it like it is" hasn't gotten us very far, it seems.

[Q]

9. And notice that they planned to use the media, pundits, business and...

...DEMOCRATS to help convince Americans that the popular vote winner reflected the 'will of the people'. They were actually prepared to argue that Gore was 'stealing the election' with ONLY an Electoral College win.

- And as we approach November...Democrats need to remember that even if Kerry wins...this massive RWing propaganda/smear machine will still be in place.

[tom_paine]

23. Yep. I noticed. A reggalar Beer Hall Putsch.

I only wish I'd realized what MONSTERS we were up against (though thankfully non-violent for the moment, tat could change at any time) long ago.

I mean, I still thought they were Fellow Americans. But they're not, are they? They finally convinced me of that.

[maggrwaggr]

10. I'm not sure what you're getting at

but I'm willing to get pretty ugly.

[AndyTiedye]

12. How Long Would PNAC Have Let Gore Live?

with such a willing warmonger as Lieberman waiting in the wings?

[Q]

13. They would have simply pulled a 'Clinton' on him...

...harassment, intimidation, impeachment threats, bogus charges and hearings. They would have kept him off balance and prevented him from advancing any kind of Democratic agenda. Look for this to happen with Kerry.

[AndyTiedye]

17. More concerned about them pulling a "JFK" than a "Clinton"

They couldn't pull a "JFK" on Clinton, because Gore would NOT have cooperated with PNAC.
We now know that Lieberman would have been a willing tool of PNAC had he become President.
His incessant cheerleading for the Iraq war and the Likud leave no room for doubt.


One of the good things about a Kerry/Dean ticket is LIFE INSURANCE!
We would be pushing an all-Yankee ticket, but after an all-Texas-oil ticket, serves 'em right.

[saracat]

25. Amen ,Will

We must go back to old style Dem polotics . Whatever happened to the arm twisting of LBJ and the Daly machine? Machine polotics. Now ther's a concept. For the more ethical amongst you, it's what we dems used to use to have our people vote in the lockstep the repugs now use.I say, bring it back.We are over anaylyzing the vote. Vote Dem. Vote Kerry. At least for this one election. No questions asked.We win .They lose.Keep it simple, stupid!

[killbotfactory]

11. Yeah, that's surprising.

:eyes:

[Elidor]

14. And all of this was BEFORE they held the power they hold now

2000 was small-scale compared to what they are prepared to do this time. And having gotten away with the mass-disenfranchisement of tens of thousands in Florida, they're doing it again. These monsters will do anything.

It will be a very ugly election and aftermath. Interesting times we live in.

[Piperay]

15. I knew that...

they actually thought that chimp would win the popular vote! :eyes: What fools they are. :argh:

[tom_paine]

24. Well, they DID disenfranchise a lot of people and vote a bunch of extra

times.

I don't wonder they thought they were going to "win" the Popular Voter.

Unfortunately, it made them realize just how hard it is to do wholesale disenfranchisement.

But they got better. Look at 2002 Georgia & Minnesota.

Now with Touchscreen Stalin machines...

[NashVegas]

16. I Have THE ORIGINAL Story on My Hard Drive

On edit: nevermind, Bartcop has it posted:

http://www.bartcop.com/111tie.htm

Excerpt:

So what if Gore wins such crucial battleground states as Florida, Michigan and Pennsylvania and thus captures the magic 270 electoral votes while Bush wins the overall nationwide popular vote?

"The one thing we don't do is roll over," says a Bush aide. "We fight."

How? The core of the emerging Bush strategy assumes a popular uprising, stoked by the Bushies themselves, of course.

In league with the campaign — which is preparing talking points about the Electoral College's essential unfairness — a massive talk-radio operation would be encouraged. "We'd have ads, too," says a Bush aide, "and I think you can count on the media to fuel the thing big-time. Even papers that supported Gore might turn against him because the will of the people will have been thwarted."