More FL ballot bungling - 268 absentee votes never opened

[ringmastery]

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/local/states/florida/counties/broward_county/6627385.htm

Memo to 268: Your vote didn't count
Absentee ballots were untallied
BY ERIKA BOLSTAD AND NOAH BIERMAN
[e-mail]

SHOCKED: Candidate Margaret Hostetter's vote didn't count.

Diane Whatley mailed her absentee ballot a week early for last year's primary election.

Eleven months later, her ballot sits -- still unopened and uncounted -- in a file with 267 others in the Broward State Attorney's office. The ballots, postmarked as much as a week before the primary, went unnoticed in a pile of thousands of pieces of elections mail dumped in the Broward elections office in the frenzied days leading up to the primary.

Until Tuesday, when they were contacted by Herald reporters, none of the 268 disenfranchised voters had any idea their votes didn't count.

''It's amazing,'' said Whatley, a 50-year-old former poll worker from Coral Springs. ``It counted for squat.''

Among the disenfranchised was a school-board candidate whose vote for herself was never tallied. Margaret Hostetter lost, but by more than one vote.

''I guess I'm a little flabbergasted,'' Hostetter said. ``There has to be something that gives people the assurance that their vote will be counted.''

[ronnykmarshall]

1. Could this change any results?

[TlalocW]

3. No

The "official" results had Bush over Gore with 500+ votes. Even if all 268 went for Gore, it would only halve Bush's lead. Of course, even if 1000 Gore votes were found, Bush and his cronies would do whatever possible to shut it up or down.

TlalocW

[ronnykmarshall]

4. The ballots were from 2002.

I wonder if they count these ballots if any results could be changed.

[GBD4]

6. thankfully, no

...because if these votes threw the election to Margaret Hostetter, well, we'd be in bad shape in FL. She is extremely opposed to the GLBT community and calls herself a "Christian conservative."

[cherryperry]

2. Perhaps we could

cut off Florida and push the state into Cuba ... apologies to any liberal Floridians but really, enough is enough!!

:puke: :bounce: :argh:


:kick: :hi:

[zbdent]

10. Naw, Bugs Bunny already tried it

after seeing that rabbit skins were worth 1 cent per twenty.

He managed to bump up the reward for his hide to about 20 million.

I was really disappointed when he filled in the Grand Canyon . . .

[hang a left]

5. You know I think that any

state that displays their complete incompetence in the security of our voting rights, should have their electorates suspended from any Federal election. What do you think?

[spooky3]

7. oh, I don't know...

I did appreciate the fashion and makeup tips I got from watching Kathleen Harris. :-)

[Freddie Stubbs]

8. It's not the state's fault

It's the county's fault. It is their responsibility to count the votes. But is seems that some of the counties in Florida are not up to the job.

[hang a left]

9. that is not the only

county that has problems

Remember who the Gov is.

[Freddie Stubbs]

11. It would be nice to blame Jeb for this, but

This is something that is hard to blame the Republicans for. The Elections Supervisor is appointed by the County Commission. Democrats hold a majority on that Commission.

The big problem that this article highlights is patronage. The clerk who screwed up was hired becasue she was a friend of the Elections Supervisors sister. Too often in local governemnt people are hired becasue of who they are related to and who they are frinds with, insead of who is best for the job.

[Eloriel]

13. You're talking about an increasing number of states,

I hope you know. As more and more states adopt computerized voting systems, you'll see fraud on a massive scale. Or worse, you might not see it. A lot of computerized vote fraud has already gotten under the radar, even with amazing, stunning election results.

Eloriel

[jiacinto]

12. Well

I just registered to vote in Florida after waiting seven hours to get my license.

[sunscreened]

14. Not appointed, elected

Miriam Oliphant is elected and a Dem. The county commissioners asked Jeb to remove her prior to the 2002 elections and he refused. The commissioners only administer the budget and just last week they refused to fund her $290,000 (excessive phone bills, legal fees and 13,394 for MAINTENANCE on the new touch-screen machines). The elections office hopes they can make payroll til Oct 1 and may have to cut back some of the services.

I just don’t understand what is going on here. It has been chaos since Nov. 2000. This is just one in a long list of screw-ups – too many to list but outrageous. It suits Jeb just fine and if I wear my tinfoil, I might have to think that maybe Oliphant is another Madam Butterfly LaPore.

I am tearing my hair out down here. The SOS is now an appointed official and only has the Gov as oversite. I spoke with the asst. dir. of elections and they don’t give a rip. I asked if my state senator or house rep could help and she implied that they were busy and probably wouldn’t give a rip. I spoke with the Broward County elections office and they don’t know or give a rip. I spoke with a guy with the Broward County Dems and he didn’t have a clue if there was a committee addressing this or know much about the whole issue at all.

This is the one issue that will bring me out of lurker status and I will use this opportunity to thank each and every BBV warrior. It's not an easy battle and you are my heros!

Hope you enjoy Florida, jiacinto.