November 2000 - cypherpunks-legacy

CDR: RE: A successful lawsuit means Gore wins!
by Ernest Hua 09 Nov '00

09 Nov '00

Well, Tim, maybe I'm just part of a huge conspiracy to piss you off. Or maybe you utter lots of theoretical purity of process without being the least bit accomodating to the fact that often times, in a large distributed process, things don't go as smoothly and as perfectly as you would prefer. You really should try managing a large organization or process and try to be able to claim that you can make it perfect. And, of course, to get to YOUR point ... What is different this time? Will their evil twins to be doing the voting? What? What is the problem? It's the same damn vote. One for one. If someone does not feel like "fixing" his/her vote, he shouldn't have to. If the second pass is a clean slate, then he/she can vote the same damn way again. I really don't get it. Do they get TWO votes this time? Are they now FORCED to vote even if they did not the first time? Let's face it, if there are "forces", then they'll be there this time around as well. These people weren't objective one day, and the next day, they were suddenly sheeples toppled over by political ads. So what's the difference? Just spit it out, Tim. You just aren't talking substance, but you love insulting me ... What a way to communicate ... but maybe that's not your goal. Ern -----Original Message----- From: Tim May [mailto:tcmay@got.net] Sent: Wednesday, November 08, 2000 9:28 PM To: cypherpunks(a)cyberpass.net Subject: RE: A successful lawsuit means Gore wins! At 8:57 PM -0800 11/8/00, Ernest Hua wrote: > > There cannot be a re-vote of the County, or even of the entire State, >> as this would distort the forces acting on the electorate in a way >> never seen before. The Palm County voters would know _they_ would be >> electing the next president. Billions of dollars would be spent >> trying to buy each and every voter. > >"distort the forces ..." Lord! No! Don't let them do that! > >Geez, Tim. What happened to personal responsibility? Who gives two >bits what "forces" will be upon them. They will ultimately still >have to cast a vote which they were casting just days earlier. Who >cares if idiots spend billions to sway a few thousand votes. That's >THEIR problem. It's free speech, as you have claimed in the past. You're a complete idiot if you don't understand this point. I made my points, briefly, above. This would not be a matter of the same voters simply recasting their same ballots. Think about it. (I'm not convinced you can, Ernest. In reading hundreds of your posts I have concluded that you're just part of Vinge's "Slow Zone.") --Tim May -- ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, ComSec 3DES: 831-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, "Cyphernomicon" | black markets, collapse of governments.

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CDR: [Correction] More blather from the DEMS on FL
by William H. Geiger III 09 Nov '00

09 Nov '00

>While the recount of the FL ballots is going on the Democrats are now >complaining about the format of the ballot and threating legal action. It >seems that the ballot is "confusing". The complaint is that the double >sided ballot contained 2 columns on each side rather than one. >I personally used the FL ballot. It was large, well printed, and quite >legible. Anyone who was "confused" by it's format is just too dam stupid >to vote. >I am starting to get the feeling that the SC is going to decide this >election before it is all over. :( My mistake, seems that one county in FL used a different ballot than the rest of the state. They used a punch style ballot with one column of punch holes and candidates on both sides: Bush --> 0 0 <-- Buchanan Gore --> 0 0 <-- Nader 0 0 Still seems simple enough to me. IMHO if the courts order a new election in this county then they need to do it for the entire state as the electorial college is winner take all and it would be unjust to allow this one county to determine how these delegates vote. -- --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.openpgp.net Geiger Consulting Data Security & Cryptology Consulting Programming, Networking, Analysis PGP for OS/2: http://www.openpgp.net/pgp.html E-Secure: http://www.openpgp.net/esecure.html ---------------------------------------------------------------

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CDR: Re: A successful lawsuit means Gore wins!
by George＠Orwellian.Org 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

At 7:02 PM -0800 11/8/00, Evan wrote: >what the hell is the electoral college still doing in existance? it >should have gone out w/ unlimited presidential terms.... voting with >their conscience my ass.... voting in a partisan fashion is more like it Spooky Cypherpunk Niggar Tim May Moroned: # If you are an American citizen, you have failed to understand that # this nation is a federal republic, not a direct democracy. # # Perhaps there are night school classes in your area to help you to # fill in the gaps in your education. I hear it used to be clearer: they didn't even list presidential candidates on the ballot, just the electorial college members. ---- George(a)Orwellian.Org wrote: >Wow, NBC reports 19,000 Palm Beach County ballots >were discarded because _two_ holes were punched, >presumably by people confused by the illegally >formatted ballot. Buchanun received three times >the votes expected. Spooky Cypherpunk Niggar Tim May Moroned: # Earth to George: that the ballots were discarded does not mean # anything for the vote total already reported. Those 19,000 ballots, # if this is true, will simply vanish into the great black hole of # defective ballots (more than one vote per category, torn, etc.). # # So? So: added fuel for a Palm Beach County revote. That's on top of an illegally formatted ballot that can demonstratably (statistically) be shown to be the cause of impossibly high Buchanan votes. Both are indicators the badly formatted ballot robbed people of their right to vote.

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CDR: Re: A strange election scenario.
by James B Windle 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

-- On Wed, 8 Nov 2000 20:36:04 Tim May wrote: > >Actually, MacBride _was_ the elector, in the 1972 election. He ran as >the LP candidate in 1976, presumably on account of his 1972 action. > >(The 1972 was my first election, and I voted for John Hospers, >candidate of the very new Libertarian Party.) > Interesting. That may be right I remember it happening as I grew up in Virginia but I was pretty sure it must have been 1976 as I didn't think I remembered much about 1972 except Nixon won as I wasn't even a teenager. A little research didn't help regarding that vote, but there are several other instances of electors voting for other candidates as the elector are not apparently legally bond to vote as they are elected to vote. 1956 An Alabama elector voted for a circuit court judge instead of Adlai Stevenson 1960 An Oklahoma elector voted for Harry F. Byrd instead of Richard Nixon 1968 A North Carolina elector voted for George Wallace instead of Richard Nixon 1988 A West Virginia elector voted for Lloyd Bentsen instead of Michael Dukakis Jim Windle > > > Get FREE Email/Voicemail with 15MB at Lycos Communications at http://comm.lycos.com

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CDR: Re: A successful lawsuit means Gore wins!
by George＠Orwellian.Org 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

Wow, NBC reports 19,000 Palm Beach County ballots were discarded because _two_ holes were punched, presumably by people confused by the illegally formatted ballot. Buchanun received three times the votes expected. >This _NY Times_ article has a little more detail: >http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/politics/AP-ELN-Florida-Ballot-Confusion.ht… > >: Florida law specifies that voters mark an X in the blank space >: to the right of the name of the candidate they want to vote for. >: >: Jeff Liggio, a lawyer for county Democrats, called the ballot >: illegal. "Right means right, doesn't it? The state law says right. >: It doesn't mean left," he said.

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CDR: Weather [was: RE: Well, that's over. Heads up, America!]
by Templeton, Stuart 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

i think the weather thing has more to do with the agricultural background of the country, and how this influenced the development of American Society at an early stage. Most Americans i've spoken with don't actually "MEAN IT"... perhaps there's some selfish concern about being comfortable in the weather at hand while doing some inane activity. Tennis (or whatever) in the snow? does this really seem so bizarre? -----Original Message----- X-Loop: openpgp.net From: owner-cypherpunks(a)Algebra.COM [mailto:owner-cypherpunks@Algebra.COM]On Behalf Of Trei, Peter Sent: Wednesday, November 08, 2000 10:29 AM To: cypherpunks Mailing List; 'Ken Brown' Subject: Weather [was: RE: Well, that's over. Heads up, America!] > Ken Brown[SMTP:k.brown@ccs.bbk.ac.uk] wrote: > > OK you folks on the downwind side of the Atlantic, now your election is > over (even if you won't know the result for 3 weeks yet), can you take > your weather back? We've had a month of egregious rain and floods over > here and I'm sure it has to be your fault somehow. 5 tornadoes in Sussex > (my home county) one of them even killed people. These things just don't > happen in England. It must be the Americans fault. Somehow. It wasn't > like this in my day... [...] > Ken Brown [...] I once heard a European pundit observe that Americans seem normal most of the time, but every now and then something surfaces to make it clear just how alien they actually are. The example he gave was the American obsession with weather. In Europe, talk about the weather is just conversational padding; noise of no serious consequence to fill an otherwise awkward silences. Americans, on the other hand, MEAN IT when they talk about the weather. They sit up and pay attention when forecasts appear. All US cable systems carry a channel which broadcasts nothing except weather reports, 24x7 - a notion which seems as bizarre to Europeans as would a channel for watching the grass grow. He surmised that this is due to the fact that in the US, unlike Europe, bad weather can kill you. [And even if it doesn't kill you, it can sure as hell play havoc with your day. I've had over 2 feet of snow overnight at my house, while 10 miles away there was just rain. Mark Twain once gave a speech about the New England weather: http://marktwain.about.com/arts/marktwain/library/speeches/bl_weather.htm It's worth a look. ] Peter Trei

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CDR: Calif Mandatory Youth Education Camp competition loses in CA
by David Honig 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

Seems the Calif proposition to fund private schools has failed. You must register Jr. with the government next September. Mandatory anthrax shots in January.

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CDR: Re: A very brief politcal rant
by Anonymous 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

brflgnk(a)cotse.com wrote: > If the citizens of Missouri chose to elect a deceased person as Senator, > I think that's exactly what they should get. Leave the seat empty for > two years. I think the good Senator Elect's corpse should be carted to Washington where it should be erected in its designated seat and left to putrefy. Better, his corpse and several hundred of those on Tim's list should be doused with a plague variant and catapulted over the walls of the Capitol Building.

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CDR: Re: A strange election scenario.
by James B Windle 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

-- On Wed, 8 Nov 2000 11:28:25 Trei, Peter wrote: >In most states, electoral college >electors are bound by law to cast their >votes in favor of the candidate who won >their state. But not all - in some states >(which ones? I don't know) electors can >legally vote their conscience. A Libertarian >presidential candidate got an electoral vote >a while back in this manner. > The electoral college vote you are thinking of was in the 1976 election, a Republican elector from Virginia cast his vote in the electoral college for McBride who was the Libertarian candidate that election. The elector was not a very popular guy with the Republican party but he broke no law. Jim Windle > > > > Get FREE Email/Voicemail with 15MB at Lycos Communications at http://comm.lycos.com

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CDR: More blather from the DEMS on FL
by William H. Geiger III 08 Nov '00

08 Nov '00

While the recount of the FL ballots is going on the Democrats are now complaining about the format of the ballot and threating legal action. It seems that the ballot is "confusing". The complaint is that the double sided ballot contained 2 columns on each side rather than one. I personally used the FL ballot. It was large, well printed, and quite legible. Anyone who was "confused" by it's format is just too dam stupid to vote. I am starting to get the feeling that the SC is going to decide this election before it is all over. :( -- --------------------------------------------------------------- William H. Geiger III http://www.openpgp.net Geiger Consulting Data Security & Cryptology Consulting Programming, Networking, Analysis PGP for OS/2: http://www.openpgp.net/pgp.html E-Secure: http://www.openpgp.net/esecure.html ---------------------------------------------------------------

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