I'm Pete du Pont with the National Center for Policy Analysis. If I'd heard Al Gore's every-vote-counts pontificating one more time, I'd have screamed. So, for the last time:
Overseas military ballots were attacked, following Gore campaign instructions. Successive recounts, then recounts of recounts were demanded — and the counting rules changed — when they didn't produce enough Gore ballots.
Bush votes with punched chads taped back in were found in Broward county. Democratic election commissioners decided 105 such ballots represented voter attempts to correct a mistake by taping the chad back in. Gore gets 88 votes, Bush seven. Meanwhile, Dade officials unsuccessfully tried to shut out media observers.
After Gore lost the initial count he promptly adopted the Clinton scorched earth policy. His staff smeared Florida's secretary of state Katherine Harris as a "commissar" and a "hack."
Gore operatives began compiling dossiers on republican electors in other states to find blackmail material to get them to switch their vote.
The only count worth waiting for was Gore — finally — being counted out.
Those are my ideas, and at the NCPA we know ideas can change the world. I'm Pete du Pont, next time, New Thoughts on Health Care.