Gore Vidal on Maher spoke of the appearance of Kerry coming in 5th in OH?

[sabra]

Vidal was great on Maher this pass weekend, and the show started with a discussion about "what went wrong in OH". Vidal was speaking of a scenario where it appeared that Kerry came in 5th in OH, where three no names were ahead of him. Anybody know what exactly he was referring to?

[pennylane100]

1. I heard him say that.

He had a book in front of him but I do not know the title. I would also like to know what he meant.

[FreedomAngel82]

12. The book

was the Conyers report. He wrote the forward I believe.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

2. He talked about

three unknown candidates aggregately getting more votes than Kerry and someone else. It's a very compelling theory.

His new book isn't out yet - I scoured bookstores and online sellers this weekend, and couldn't find it. Title doesn't even appear in "Books In Print" yet, so searching for it is futile - right now.

[NYCGirl]

6. There is no new Gore Vidal book coming out — he was referring to

the Conyers report, in which he wrote the foreward.

[OldLeftieLawyer]

7. Is that it?

"What Happened In Ohio"?

That's what they called the Conyers report? And it was published in a trade paperback?

I didn't realize that. Thanks very much.

Edited to add: http://tinyurl.com/eyl7t

There it is, in all its amazon.com glory.

Thanks again for the clarification. I drove myself nuts looking for it, but also picked up four of Vidal's recent collections, so it wasn't a waste at all.

[emcguffie]

3. I think what he was talking about was --

-- in the precincts where some candidate for a different office -- I do not remember if it was state senator or attorney general or governor, maybe judge? -- but some local office -- that had not put any money into their campaign, got a lot more votes in one county or precinct. It just made no sense, you know, how the bottom part of the Democratic ticket lead by a wide margin, and all of a sudden, up at the top, Bush won. So it looked like some votes had obviously been switched. If I went back and looked I could find it, I think, but I cannot right now.
E

[emlev]

9. It was state supreme court chief justice, but I don't think

that's what he was talking about. I noticed that after he made that comment (which I believe was just plain wrong) he started leafing through the published version of the Conyers report. I was wondering if he was looking for the part that he'd been talking about, realizing he was confused.

He also may have been talking about the startlingly large counts that some third party candidates recieved in particular precindts. But it wasn't more than Kerry, as far as I know (and I believe I'd know).

If you want to know more about the Ohio State Supreme Court race, see:

ONE MORE LOOK AT SOUTHWESTERN OHIO
Richard Hayes Phillips, Ph.D.
at: http://web.northnet.org/minstrel/connally.htm

[FogerRox]

16. Ellen Connelly got 235k more votes than Kerry in Ohio

A little known candidate except in 5-6 southern Ohio County's.
after spending IIRC $40k for a state wide campaign

It may be Vidal was confused-or-he may have referenced the Primary in Ohio

Though IIRC it was in Iowa, that Kerry & Edwards jumped ahead of Dean.
Considering that Iowa is thought to be one of 6 or so PRime candidates for the scene of the crimes---reason stands that Iowa would/could be the scene of the crime during the Primaries.

[FreedomAngel82]

13. Yes

That happened here. There was this woman who was running for something dealing with Nashville and I've never heard of her before personally and she won that race. With Congress the republican won because he's way more popular and well-known here so it made sense. The challenger, democratic John Wolfe, did do pretty well. In the past election I remember he only had about 20% or so and this time it was Wolfe 30% and Wamp 50%. So that was pretty good and I was very surprised (I'm in Tennessee by the way).

[emcguffie]

15. I grew up in Memphis.

Where in Tennessee are you?

[jrthin]

4. Keep in mind.

the jackass Frankin tried to suggest that there was nothing to the claim of a *fixed* election.

[Coexist]

5. but he shut up quick when Vidal countered him

out of respect or to avoid an argument over it - I don't know, but he mentioned some expert he consulted with. Ugh.

[FreedomAngel82]

14. That pissed me off

I wonder why he did that. :shrug: He said he didn't want to be involved in "consperiacy theories" but there is hard evidence.

[garybeck]

8. I think

he was saying that in some areas, if you add up all the third party candidates votes they total more than Kerry.

[gauguin57]

10. Sorry, Mr. Vidal ... but you wouldn't support your cousin in 2000! Now...

... you bitch and bitch about how Bush is ruining the country. Well, Mr. Vidal, you very publicly refused to support your distant cousin, Al Gore, in 2000 (supporting Nader instead). And now you're bitching about Bush? Forgive me if that pisses me off!

[Peace Patriot]

11. Hey, stop with the divisiveness, okay! Nader voters gave Kerry huge...

...support in this election. Why not praise them and thank them for that--instead of picking over the past? No one could have predicted at that time 9/11 or the Iraq war or anything else. There were many legitimate reasons to object to Clinton-Gore policies and to be fed up with them, at the time--in the context of democracy and a fair vote. (Their lies to labor and to environmentalists about NAFTA being a good case in point.) (Who do you think precipitated the jobs losses in the U.S.?) In 2004, Nader voters saw that we had a much bigger problem--the 9/11 coup resulting in unchecked presidential power--and joined with the rest of us to oust this "Little Dictator." The coalition and bridge-building that we did created the Kerry victory that was stolen from us all. Do we want to try to put that coalition back together--or re-open wounds, to no purpose at all?

It is Democratic Party arrogance and myopia that says, "Unless you choose us, you will have fascism." That's not democracy. We might all agree to choose the Democrats for a critically important strategic purpose, such as ousting the Bush Cartel. That does not mean that they should have all votes all the time. We'll likely have to make that compromise again in the near future, to pull this country back from the fascist cliff we are about to fall off of--if we can retrieve our right to vote. But let me remind you which politicians promised that every vote would be counted, and utterly failed to deliver on that promise--failed long BEFORE the election, on election day, and now.

Wally O'Dell and buds counting all our votes in secret, with no paper trail, was a no-brainer. Why didn't the Democrats cry foul then? The exit polls are also a no-brainer, if the truth were known. And Ohio was a no-brainer--massive, bold, legally actionable violations of the Voting Rights Act. We have hardly had a peep of objection from Democratic leaders.

And now? Where are they now? With our democracy hanging over a cliff? Where are their massive programs of election reform in every state and county? Where is their support to solve this critical problem? Where is their activism? Where is their jawboning of local Dem election officials who made the mistake of choosing Diebold, or their action to remove them if they are corrupt? Where was their support for our good Secretary of State in California, Kevin Shelley? (They helped do him in!) Where is their help in counting all the precincts? Where is their help in obtaining Edison-Mitofsky's data?

Nowhere, is where. Or colluding with the enemy. With one or two notable exceptions.

So, this picking on Nader voters from 2000, or Gore Vidal, seems very disruptive to me, and very, very ill thought out.

[nightfire]

17. Amen.