Wednesday, November 03, 2004

Explaining the election results

I suspect Nader was the deciding factor again, but not in the way most people thought he would be. Nationwide he drew only 1 percent of the vote this time.

Alert readers will recall that many Florida voters were stricken with guilt and embarrassment over their failure to vote for Gore in 2000. That election's "protest votes" for Nader, along with the "accidental votes" for Buchanan on the confusing butterfly ballot, clearly deprived Gore of Florida's electoral votes. With those, he would have easily taken the Presidency. So this time around, I think thousands of Florida voters, or perhaps even tens of thousands, resolved to undo their past mistake.

They made sure they were properly registered to vote.

They made sure they understood the voting rules.

They made sure to get to the right polling place.

And they made damn sure to vote for Gore this time.

Four years too late, maybe, but hey, it's the thought that counts, right?

Mark my words! A careful analysis of the Florida write-in vote will be needed to verify my hypothesis, but you heard it here first.


0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home