Category Archives: Florida

Take a look at this picture in which it looks as though Tropical Storm Jeanne, which was going to miss Florida may instead take a sharp left and attack the state from the one direction we haven't been hit yet.


It does seem consistent with the idea that Someone is either warning or punishing Florida, doesn't it?

I used to do a lot of retail politics. One of my very unscientific tests for how a campaign is doing is how they handle phone calls: Campaigns that don’t answer before the third ring will lose. Campaigns that don’t give great phone will lose. Alas, the reverse is not inevitably true—quick pickup and great phone alone are not enough to ensure a win, especially if no one ever calls.

But let me tell you, I’ve never seen or heard such great phone as I just got from calling Betty Castor’s HQ. (Castor is the Democratic nominee for Senate, running against the unscrupulous hate-peddling Mel Martinez.) Earlier today I tried to make a donation on the web page, and got an ‘internal server error’ so I called up the campaign HQ (I got the number from Google's cache of the front page) to tell them about it. The phone was answered just as the second ring began. I told the perky lady on the phone why I was calling, and she gave me her name (Rebecca), thanked me for reporting it, said she’d look into it, and then added that meanwhile she could take credit cards over the phone. So I made my not particularly munificent donation (we are rebuilding our house, there are many good causes, cash flow isn’t all it could be), only to be thanked as if I just pledged several thousand dollars. Another couple of minutes of pleasant chit-chat, and I was dispatched.

Impressive.

PS. My email to tech support also got a quick emailed reply saying that they were investigating.

[UPDATE @ 9pm: Abstract Appeal reports that the Florida Supreme Court reversed the trial court's reinstatement of its stay, thus reinstating the automatic stay supplanted by Judge Davey….but added its own order stopping everything — no mailing of ballots until it rules. And it set oral argument for Friday 8am, “cognizant of the September 18, 2004, deadline for mailing overseas ballots.” Which seems fair enough.]

My head is spinning.

The Florida trial court reinstated its stay. Shortly afterwards, the Florida Court of Appeals had its hearing. The Florida Secretary of State asked the Supreme Court to reinstitute the say.

Meanwhile — hold on to your hat — the “Reform Party” (ie the GOP) counterclaimed in the trial court, arguing the Democrats should be thrown off the ballot because their slate (filed in a timely manner unlike the Republican one) was not, they say, notarized like it should have been.

I hope the Democrats who didn't want to challenge the GOP's late filing are feeling suitably chasened. (Imagine a world in which neither party was on the ballot…that would be even weirder.)

Go to Abstract Appeal for more….I have to go collect my kids from school.

Abstract Appeal remains the best place to go to get your Nader Florida ballot case information. The latest updates as of this second report on the abortive attempt by the so-called Reform Party to remove the case to federal court. That attempt died faster than you can say “nofederalquestionandwaiver.”

Today is the hearing in the Flordia state court of appeal. The Florida Supreme Court seems to have put up a web page with a full set of .pdf's of Briefs & Other Documents in Case No. 04-1755. I wish I had time to read them.

Jeb Bush and his minions just announced they will act preemptively to put Nader on the Florida ballot because hurricane Ivan might make it impossible for an appellate court to hear their appeal against a lower court order forbidding it. Note that currently the odds of the hurricane actually striking where the relevant courts sit is actually very low.

How am I supposed to teach a class about the Rule of Law in the face of this? Bush v. Gore already made me decide it would be a long time before I taught Constitutional law again, but am I to be reduced to teaching Law and Film, where at least everyone agrees the representations are fictions?

[Revised Update: This account at Jurist suggests the ruling may only apply to overseas absentee ballots, not all ballots. Since those have to be mailed by this weekend, and presumably cannot be printed instantaneously, the state may have at least an arguable case for its actions since the injunction against it was stayed by the appeal.

Although Reuters's account of the decision buries this fact, having now re-read it, I think that's all that is going on. The questions, then, are (1) how long it actually takes to print the ballots, (2) whether the state informed the courts of the practical deadline, (3) how quickly the Florida courts can act and (4) whether the State's case has a leg to stand on — for if it doesn't then this action is still pretty rank. My sense of the trial court action was that the challengers had a very strong case under Florida law that Nader did not meet the legal requirement to be on the ballot because his party nomination was a sham.]

Politics News Article | Reuters.com

Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader's name can appear on Florida ballots for the election, despite a court order to the contrary, Florida's elections chief told officials on Monday in a move that could help President Bush in the key swing state.

The Florida Democratic Party reacted with outrage, calling the move “blatant partisan maneuvering” by Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's younger brother, and vowed to fight it.

In a memo to Florida's 67 county supervisors of elections, Division of Elections director Dawn Roberts said the uncertainty of Hurricane Ivan, which could hit parts of the state by week's end, forced her to act.

The action came in an ongoing legal battle over whether Nader should be allowed on the Florida ballot as the Reform Party candidate.

Nader, an independent nominated by the Reform Party, was a presidential candidate in 2000 when Bush won Florida, and the White House, by 537 votes over then-Vice President Al Gore. Analysts said most of the nearly 98,000 votes Nader got in Florida would have gone to Gore had Nader not been on the ballot.

Florida Circuit Court Judge Kevin Davey issued a temporary injunction last week preventing the state from putting Nader on the 2004 ballot, siding with a Democratic challenge that the Reform Party did not qualify as a national party under state law.

A hearing on a permanent injunction is scheduled for Wednesday. But Roberts said Hurricane Ivan, which is headed for Florida's Gulf coast, had raised “a substantial question as to when such a hearing” will be held.

'PARTISAN MANEUVERING'

As a result, she said, Florida's Department of State had filed an appeal against the temporary injunction. The appeal application automatically lifts the injunction, allowing the counties to put Nader's name on overseas absentee ballots, which must be mailed by Saturday.

“I'm in disbelief,” said Scott Maddox, chairman of the Florida Democratic Party. “This is blatant partisan maneuvering on the part of Jeb Bush to give his brother a leg up on election day.”