brainpan writes:

Did I cry foul? I just said that it had brought up an issue related to counting ballots.

I didn't comment specifically on your post. I have to go back and see what you wrote.

and brainpan wrote:

Reading between the lines enough that it makes sense yields an accusation of Bush trying to cheat somehow.

Well, I try to express myself clearly, but unless you mistakenly typed "Bush" for "Gore", it was misunderstood. I am politically active here in Europe as (unpaid, part-time) webmaster of LYMEC where e.g. the British LibDems youth organisation is a member, to give you a frame of reference. What I *think* is that I would favour Gore before Bush politically, but that I think following procedures is more important than him (Gore) winning.

brainpan writes:

In any political system it's important to play by the rules. The only real thing that changes from system to system is how much it hurts when you're caught trying to violate them

Maybe it should be important to play by the rules, but many systems are based on not playing by the rules. This is what Milosevic did, this is what Djukanovic in Montenegro seems to do somewhat according to some statements from local liberals (I'm incidentally from Sweden, which has way too high taxes and a mindset I don't always agree with, but is very stable and uncorrupted). This is what happens in Tanzania, with the occupation of land, although their supreme court is blocking it, and that just shows how tough those court guys are, still fighting to uphold the law (the rules) despite threats from the government. What a country needs is rule of law, especially regarding property and commerce.

Look at Hong Kong for how far a place could come with just rule of law (and sadly no democracy, until the British made some kind of last-minute attempt to install it before the Chinese take-over). As soon as people realise that they will have to, or with impunity can, break the rules it's going downhill from there. Then you have lost one of the most important tools in the community toolchest, to communicate unambigously and explicitly what rules need to be followed. And these rules can then be criticized and changed in a public debate.

I'm sure there are rule changes needed in the US election system, but that should be done between elections, not during them.

If the Democrat people first design the Palm Beach voting paper, and then approve it before the election, they do not have much of a case. The individuals who have filed suit have more of a case, since they can claim that they are the victims of incompetent Democrats and/or snotty election workers. They are as citizens (or I suppose in the US case as registered voters) formally outside of the bipartisan structure. But, you can be registered as a voter with one of the parties? What's that?

DISCLAIMER: I could have at least as many opinions and criticisms and suggestions on my own country or Europe. I'm no US-basher, on the contrary.

POST SCRIPTUM: Is there a way we could separate political discussions from the rest of the perlmonks system?

Update: I just realised that it is me who is pushing it out from technical considerations into a larger question of procedures and legislation, moving it away from programming. It's just my natural instinct :-)

/jeorgen