Was the 2000 Election lost to fraud?

[iamthebandfanman]

I had a 'discussion' with someone who posted a video they had made... in it they blamed bill clinton (as one of the main reasons)for the loss in 2000(the monica deal) and denies there was fraud in the 2000 election(even tho he thinks there was in 2004).

so i was just curious to what people as a whole on DU thought about this. i know i believe there was massive voter fraud in florida. while i know there were obviously other variables, i believe this to be the MAIN reason(because all other reasons are irrelivant if the votes arent counted).

so what do you believe ?


Was the main factor in the 2000 lost election the result of FRAUD?

[leftofthedial]

1. 2000 was a coup

[bluedawg12]

44. Remember the repug thugs: BrooksBros rebellion? yup! n/t

[Wanet]

2. I voted yes

There definitely was election fraud of many kinds, topped off by the Supremes stopping the Florida recount. But Bill Clinton's activities while office made it hard for Gore to run on his record, making it close enough to steal. -- Wanet

[iamthebandfanman]

3. indeed

plus it didnt help they were throwing away ballots WHILE the courts were looking into the recount.

also, 55,000 votes being lost to fraud is a lil more than making it close dontcha think ? specially when u see gore lost by less then 700.

i wish i could find the link again, but back in 2003 i remember seeing a video of these people who got a freedom of information act to go look at ballots at a warehouse... when they got there they werent let in. later in the day a judge called the warehouse n ordered them to be let in. once they got in tons of ballots were missing and some were discovered in trashbags in a dumpster behind the building.

[ieoeja]

4. 55k African-Americans turned away from the polls. n/t

[iamthebandfanman]

8. yup, not to mention

all the other racist tactics used to keep ethnic voters away. i had heard that in 04 there were fliers in ohio giving false information about polling location and times in low income areas.... this also happened in florida in 2000 as well. infact there used to be a copy of one of the fliers up on the net somewhere.

then u factor into that thousands of jewish people 'accidently' voting for buchanen(whos a horrible bigot, even to the jewish people)

[Brigid]

5. I didn't want to believe it at first, but . . .

the election(?) of 2000 was stolen. There is no other word for it. And those responsible for it will never be held accountble. :banghead:

[gateley]

6. A friend of mine was in Tibet at the time and he was asked how the American

people felt about the coup. That's honestly how they viewed it.

[aquart]

26. As I recall, we were in shock.

I was at Salon's Table Talk and I pray those Florida threads were donated to an historical archive because I have never seen anything like that recorded, instantaneous response to events as they happened. There were five thousand posts a day on that one thread, and I skipped hundreds at a time in order to keep up.

We couldn't believe it. And the media pretended it wasn't happening. But we SAW it was. That was the beginning of the change. WE validated what we were seeing to each other. WE checked sources and information coming in. WE knew the press was not covering what we were seeing. If the media had been honest, I don't know if the internet today would be anything like it is. But they literally forced us to find other means of informing ourselves.

[gateley]

29. I wasn't involved at the time - far from it, so my impression was that it was

a non-issue!

It's people like me (how I was) who we have to get through to. People just don't understand what's being done to us.

Thank you and others of your ilk who have been concerned and on top of this for so long! :headbang:

[peace13]

7. Remember the group of people who went to Florida

and insisted that the recount be stopped? A look at the photo of this group afterward shows faces such as John Bolton and other Rthugs! Start the search at how the Florida count got stopped and go from there. Peace, Kim

[KansDem]

55. You mean these thugs?

I never understood why this mob was permitted to intimidate election officials and stop the recount. :shrug:

[peace13]

58. It was all a staged event and the people were too stupid

to realize it. These people are not Americans in my book. Thank you for posting this. Going to bookmark. I am sure we will need it again. Peace, Kim

[Irishonly]

9. Florida was a mess

I never understood why the NAACP didn't proceed with the court cases. I also heard DUI check points were set up in the poorer districts. If the DUI check points in Florida are like California they are license check points I received an email about it and then nothing happened.

[defendandprotect]

46. What could have been more OPEN than the GOP FASCIST rally outside of

Miami-Dade Election HQs in order to stop the vote counting mandated by the Florida Supreme Court---!!!

Actually, it was more of a riot --- without the police being called in to protect the votes!!!

And the corporate-media KNEW that this was arranged and paid for by the GOP ---
they knew the hotels, the trailer they were using ---

in other words, the corporate-media helped them hide it until the counting was stopped and it could
be hidden no longer --- !!!

[defendandprotect]

47. I also understand that Al Gore told Jesse Jackson to quit the protests in

in the area where we had the butterfly ballots ---

That situation deserved to have a re-vote on new ballots ---

[peacetalksforall]

10. Bill Clinton was a factor because of the exquisitely orchestrated armies

of propaganda operatives across the board to paint Dems as immoral.

There were many ways the coup-election took place aside from the character assassination of the Clintons (and Gores to some extent).

There may have been deliberate ballot design causing heavily Dem areas to vote for Buchanen.

There was voter obstruction - telling Black-Americans the wrong day, the wrong place.

There was supposedly cooperation by the Sheriff in one place - closing off the road or roads to the polling places in heavily Black American neighborhoods.

There was cooperation by corporation networks.

It came from every angle.

And it ended in a Supreme Court disgrace.

Republican operatives from Washington pretended to be Miami-Dade residents and put on a mini-riot to prevent the recount.

From every angle. Every angle imaginable coming from Rovian minds.

Bill Clinton's private life was not enough for them to win on their own. They stole and obstructed. Many people were disgusted about the low down sewer strategies and tactics to get him out of office and/or make Gore weak. By stealth they twisted everything to make it appear that Dems must be saints and nothing less. They used the FBI to build a case against Clinton.

Pure theft. Pure crime.

[iamthebandfanman]

12. right

there were alot of factors that helped play into it

but i think the first 4 ways you said go under the corruption thing too. it was a highly planned 'coup' as people like to call it. it had been planned out back in 1997-98 from what i can tell..


i just dont think its right to blame bill clinton for the loss... or nader... or al gore for that matter.

it does make ya wonder how involved some democrats mite of been tho since they didnt hardly try at all to fight it.

[aquart]

28. They HAD to steal. 72 million of us. 55 million of them.

Not to mention all that prosperity and financial solvency under bad Bill Clinton.

Except Ken Lay knew his solvency was fake. And he really needed to own the government that would be investigating him.

[SPURGEMAN23]

11. I am sure it was

We need to investigate the NFL and MLB, first though. Sarcasm.

[Vogon_Glory]

13. Florida Voter Rolls...

The woman in charge of overseeing the Florida voter roles, Katherine Harris, deliberately allowed a flawed database that listed dozens and dozens of solid, upright Florida citizen-voters as convicted felons and dropped other voters as dead. When I said solid and upright, I meant citizens who had never committed a crime.

Katherine Harris had been a senior official in then-Florida Governor "JEB" Bush's administration. JEB Bush was George W. Bush's brother. Katherine Harris had also been heavily involved in the George W. Bush presidential campaign. The voters wrongly listed as convicted felons were mostly Afro-Americans or other minorities, minorities that usually tended to vote Democratic.

This may not have been fraud committed at the ballot box, but it is vote-tampering nevertheless.

[Deny and Shred]

16. She also let the FLA RNC set up shop IN HER OFFICE

where the votes are confirmed and certified. According to 'The Best Democracy Money Can Buy', 156,000 votes were never counted. They simply stopped counting Gore votes until GWB was ahead.
Don't forget that on election night, hours after FLA had been called by every network, Bush predicted a comeback - and got it right on queue.
Hmmm, could his brother Governor had anything to do with it?

[defendandprotect]

48. YEP . . . makes you wonder why we're voting again in 2008 ....!!!!

Everything has been trampled ---
and I think it has succeeded so well because Americans so much believed in their country ---

"Harry Stoner"/Jack Lemmon tonight on AMC in "Save the Tiger" about how much he loved and
believed in his country --- up until 1973 . . .

"When I heard the national anthem, I'd stand up at home ---
I worshipped that flag . . . "

[ieoeja]

33. Dozens? There were over 80,000 innocent voters kicked off the rolls!

Of whom roughly 55,000 showed up to vote and were turned away.

Forget the recounts, the butterfly ballot and everything else. 80,000 Africa-American voters were kicked off the rolls via illegal means. That dwarfs everything else done.

This is why, when Florida 2000 voter fraud ever comes up, the Republics immediately chime in about the butterfly ballot. They want to deflect the argument from the 80,000 Blacks denied the right to vote.

And it usually works. If you see them arguing with someone inevitably that someone starts arguing about the stupid ballot. Forget the ballot. Remember the 80,000.

[Vogon_Glory]

39. I Didn't Have Exact Figures On Hand

Thank you for providing a more accurate estimate. I didn't have exact figures on hand. I low-balled the numbers of Florida voters dropped from the Florida voter rolls by-accident-on-purpose to stay credible when debating Rethugs and Conserva-crooks.

I'd appreciate a link to something that more accurately counts the number of voters dropped by Katherine Harris to use when debating Rethugs in the future.

[LeftishBrit]

14. Yes.

If not for Jeb Bush, Katherine Harris and their crooked pals in Florida, President Gore would probably now be completing his second term, and the Iraq war might never have happened.

[ashling]

15. I voted yes - now let me qualify that

As I have often argued with Nader voters, a political campaign is a dynamic thing. Wins, losses, momentum, etc. are the product of so so many things. That's why campaign managers are paid so much, but I digress.

The election of 2000 was hit by "a perfect storm" (sorry for that reference - now a cliche- but I'm afraid it will always be with us.) There were a lot of thisngs that went wrong. They added up to an imbecil in the White House. If one or two of them had gone differently, the outcome may have could have been different.

Nader support and backbiting drew time, money and energy from the campaign that should have been spent elsewhwere.

There were some real boneheaded decisions on Gore's part. The Gore "cult" (sorry, another cliche) should remember that this is the man that brought us Joe Lieberman. I mean Joe Lieberman!?! good Gawd!

Media malfeasance? Big Time!

Dirty Tricks and voter supression? They're Republicans after all.

Fraud? You Bet.

In the final analysis, the thing that lost the election for us was the Supreme Court.

But why did it all come down to Florida in the first place? How in God's name was it ever that close?

Fraud. Yes!

Main factor? Go figure.

[spanone]

17. if you add in the american and iraqi deaths it was a bloody coup

[defendandprotect]

49. True . . . true . . .

[Touchdown]

18. I find it hard to believe that any DUer would vote no.

... at least without an explaination. I guess The freeptrolls are allowed to vote.:shrug:

[iamthebandfanman]

37. i know

which was why i was shocked that the person who posted the video on DU would say 2000 was fair!

[L. Coyote]

19. Impeaching Clinton was fraud. A series of crimes enabled that event.

Bush vs. Gore, the 'Arkansas Project,' the USA firings, and the Swiftboat Admiral
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1029113

No to mention the various fixes in Florida that were stil required to pull it off!.

[apocalypsehow]

20. I voted yes. I think it is irrefutable that the 2000 election was stolen, GOP fraud widespread.

[Truth2Tell]

21. No, it was Nader.

:rofl:

Kidding! I just thought I'd throw it out there before the anti-Nader trolls showed up. :P

[IndieLeft]

27. I was gonna say...

WTF are you talking about.

[iamthebandfanman]

38. lol thanks

made me laugh!
i was about to go... oh god, here we go... lol

i hate it when anyone on DU blames the loss on anything but fraud. call me crazy.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

22. Bush himself was a fraud

In addition to the other factors mentioned earlier in this thread, George Bush himself had to be one of the biggest frauds I've ever seen in an American election. Compassionate conservatism, moderation, reaching across the aisle to compromise with the other party and get things done, no nation building which were major points in his campaign platform were followed by his governance as President in the most extremist manner in the modern American history of the Presidency.

[Harry Monroe]

45. what do you mean "WAS a fraud"

The fraud is still with us!!

[defendandprotect]

50. Whenever I see Bush speaking, I wonder . . . . "Is he wearing a wire again...?"

[blm]

23. Dan Rather's report on voting machines showed agenda to rig started in 1999

and we can only note that the DNC saw evidence of this all along and CHOSE to let the election process go UNSECURED in 2002 and 2004 even as they told Dem candidates and Dem voters otherwise, promising to be a counter to the RNCs tactics of stealing elections.

DNC sat on their hands the entire time with NO interest in the security of the 2002 and 2004 ELECTION PROCESS.

[defendandprotect]

51. No -- THE COMPUTERS CAME IN DURING THE MID-1960's . . . !!!!

P L E A S E .... understand that ---

Two journalists --- one of whom ran for office --- came upon the tricks of the computer fraud
very early on --- this was Jim & Ken Collier ---

One of them had run for office in the late 1960's or early 1970's . . . and when they were
trying to check out why their numbers had suddenly just stopped rising and stood still --
after suggestions of a higher count for them --- they came upon the fraud of computer voting.

They investigated computer voting for 26 years . . . and their book . . . VOTESCAM/see Amazon.com
... was suppressed.

YOU CAN READ THE BOOK FREE AT THE VOTECAM WEBSITE WHICH IS RUN BY THEIR FAMILY --
BOTH OF THESE JOURNALISTS ARE NOW DEAD ---
http://www.constitution.org/vote/votescam__.htm

[blm]

60. Thanks. Rather's report must've tracked back to latest incarnation of machine fraud

.

[defendandprotect]

63. I think most of us can identify things changing drastically after the

coup on JFK --- they began changing almost immediately ---
They've been at this a long, long time --- as you can see from the history of the Bush family
which is on one of these threads going back to at least pre-WWI --- !!

[Uncle Joe]

24. In large part because Al Gore empowered the people when he championed the Internet which ultimately

led to the coup. There was definitely fraud but I believe the underlying motivation for the corporate media keeping scandal front and center from the very beginning of the Clinton Administration until they were able to enable Bush to power via judicial coup was because of the Internet's growing threat to their monopoly on information, simply put, they didn't want the primary political champion for opening up the Internet to the people in the White House. Information = money, power and influence and the corporate media heads saw all this as slowly slipping away.

Otherwise, I believe Al Gore was more than capable of winning by a landslide too immense in proportion to allow the neocons to steal. The corporate media gave him the Prometheus Treatment with endless slander and libel because he worked to empower the people. Bill Clinton gave them an assist with the utter political stupidity of the Lewinsky Scandal, and then subsequently lying to the nation knowing they had him under a microscope. I believe much of the witch hunt against Clinton was in fact a back door attempt by the corporate media to keep Al Gore from coming to power, they transferred the integrity frame from Clinton to Gore weeks after Clinton's impeachment because they knew it was the only way Bush stood a chance to make the race close enough to steal.

As someone mentioned up thread, there was a perfect storm of events, but I believe fear and envy of the Internet's growing power fed that storm more than anything else. I also believe that's why Bush and his minions are working their asses off to neutralize it's growing influence in one form or another. It's too much people power for them to handle.

[Uncle Joe]

30. Here is an example of what I'm talking about.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=2871759&mesg_id=2871759

[defendandprotect]

52. The computer began to come in during the mid-1960's . . .

Remember, we supposedly went to the moon with NASA using computers ---
they were around a long time before the public's general use of them for communication ---


From the thread above . . .

P L E A S E .... understand that ---

Two journalists --- one of whom ran for office --- came upon the tricks of the computer fraud
very early on --- this was Jim & Ken Collier ---

One of them had run for office in the late 1960's or early 1970's . . . and when they were
trying to check out why their numbers had suddenly just stopped rising and stood still --
after suggestions of a higher count for them --- they came upon the fraud of computer voting.

They investigated computer voting for 26 years . . . and their book . . . VOTESCAM/see Amazon.com
... was suppressed.

YOU CAN READ THE BOOK FREE AT THE VOTECAM WEBSITE WHICH IS RUN BY THEIR FAMILY --
BOTH OF THESE JOURNALISTS ARE NOW DEAD ---
http://www.constitution.org/vote/votescam__.htm

[Uncle Joe]

54. I'm not speaking of the computer, I'm speaking of the Internet, and the

two way very public open exchange of information that creation fostered between the people, thereby breaking open to some degree the manipulative dominant one way flow of information or Matrix previously enjoyed by traditional media, particularly television and to a lesser extent radio and printed publications such as newspapers, books, magazines etc. The vast majority of people can't afford to own a televison network, radio station or chain of newspapers, but they put their voices out for the world to see because of the Internet and collectively that can be very powerful.

The corporate media was losing it's monopolized gatekeeper status regarding the flow of information to the people and they knew it. It's far more difficult to rule by the maxim of divide and conquer when the people can converse instantaneously among them selves without having to go through a media filter for the editor's approval. It's far more difficult for television or radio to paint a false perception among the people when they can't just cut off the people off or ignore them entirely if they don't like the message or approve of the messenger. The Internet gives the American People a voice and it's the equivalent of fire in the Information Age, Al Gore was the primary political champion of opening that technology to the people and that's why the corporate media resented him to the point of slandering and libeling him relentlessly for the better part of two years prior to the selection of 2000 while simultaneously giving an obviously inferior candidate a free pass to the most powerful job in the land. As a nation and as a planet, we've paying a heavy price for that betrayal of the American People's best interest ever since.

[defendandprotect]

62. True, the internet does somewhat break the corporate-press's total control . . .

but the steals couldn't happen without the computers ---
They provide a way to move a large number of votes --
And change total counts ---

And, I would guess, that they will also respond with a corporate-internet shortly ---

The 2000 steal was quickly followed by 2001 -- and that quickly followed by shutting down
Congress for more than 3 months with the Anthrax attacks ---
in fact, much of Congress' mail is still being radiated and drived out for three weeks before
delivery!!!

And, here, in 2008, we still do not have DIRECT e-mail communication with most members of
Congress ---
some do have it --- most don't --
it's in and out of the websites if you want to comment.

And --- in my area C-span II which is the Senate has been taken out of the genral line up
and put in a higher tier of service which provides HD TV ... because you need HD if you want
to know what the Senate is doing, right . . . !!!

[w13rd0]

25. Lol...

...DU was FOUNDED under that presumption, backed up by the investigations and the events that occurred.

Hired squads of provocateurs to shut down vote counting. Vote suppression. Dirty tactics. It was hideous. And the acrimony in the air was palpable. I lost several clients over the whole affair.

[EFerrari]

31. You're forgetting that Bill Clinton was on the Supreme Court!

And, that he counted the votes in Florida!

I hear he also designed the butterfly ballot!

:)

[genie_weenie]

32. Florida was definitely Fraud but

Al Gore lost because he could not distance himself from the *scandal-ridden* Bill Clinton.

So, no. Fraud was not the main factor. Nor was it Ralph Nader.

*- How I wish we had those scandals instead of Trillion dollar warmongering, torture and surveillance.

[damntexdem]

34. As was the 2004 election.

[MrCoffee]

35. 100th Yes Vote

Do I win a prize?

[Uncle Joe]

36. Bob, tell MrCoffee what he's won!

:party: :bounce: :applause: :toast:



It's a brand new car!!!

[dansolo]

40. Absolutely fraud

I believe that the biggest fraud was the purged voter lists, especially when it was determined that something like 95% of the people were incorrectly removed. There doesn't need to be any conspiracy theories about this, it is a well established fact. If even a small portion of the people who were illegally prevented from voting got to vote, Gore would have won.

[yurbud]

41. hmmm...is it really fraud if they do it in the open with thuggery and complicity of media?

[defendandprotect]

53. Crime which no one seems to care about . . . nor have the power to do anything about --- !!!

When they didn't move on the coup on JFK --- that was pretty much the end of everything . . .!!

[yurbud]

61. we say Iran isn't democratic because mullahs get to pre-approve candidates, but here corporations do

through the Chamber of Commerce, media, etc. If they don't trust someone, they either get frozen out like Kucinich and Edwards, ridiculed out like Dean, or rubbed out like JFK.

[Ani Yun Wiya]

42. No doubt in my mind

See this topic:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=49624&mesg_id=49624&pages=

I have the polling data for all counties.
I know that in 62 of 67 counties the numbers as certified by each county were not correctly reported by the office of Katherine Harris.

[dysfunctional press]

43. at this point, what difference does it really make?

:shrug:

i mean- it's not like anything will ever be done about it.

and besides, it wasn't fraud anyway- it was stolen, fair and square- everyone knows that.

[alfredo]

56. James Baker III confessed (bragged) about fixing the election in Florida

for bush.

James Baker said, “I fixed the election in Florida for George Bush."

[El Pinko]

57. That's funny, I'm the opposite of your friend

I'm not convinced that there was enough fraud in 2004 to swing the election for Bush - he had a commanding popular vote lead.


But in 2000, it is indisputable that Katherine Harris and Choicepoint disenfranchised tens of thousands of black voters. The courts even found against Harris and forced her to put those voters back on the Florida voter rolls, but it was too late for the election results.

Also, a great many votes were NEVER RECOUNTED. Unfortunately Gore only asked for a recount in counties where he thought he would be strongest. If he had taken a full statewide recount at the beginning, he would have won, according o the Miami Herald's analysis.

[Florida22ndDistrict]

59. Yes

I for one believe that the election machines were tampered with at my precinct. The same machines had worked perfectly fine in past elections, but all the sudden they all seemed to be broken. I had to manually find the numbers on the card and poke out the chads and rip them off by hand because my machine was totally jammed. Three family members that went to the polls with me had similar experiences at their booth and we voted at 7 AM.

[TexasObserver]

64. Most definitely, all the way to the Supreme Court.

Florida was stolen, in a myriad of ways, from the removal of tens of thousands of legitimate voters under the guise they may have been felons, to the placement of police near major black voting locations, on "routine" checks for outstanding warrants, to outright theft of votes.

[TheWatcher]

65. Looks like 14 People need to either educate themseves or get out of denial.

[Kitty Herder]

66. 2004 was even more obviously fraudulent.

Check it out.

[Perry Logan]

67. So America has had no President for the last eight years.