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[–] 22158760? 1 point -1 points (+0|-1) ago  (edited ago)

He's a supersmart and ultrapersuasive bastard all right.

He had me completely fucking amazed in Bush vs Gore.

What Gore was demanding was so patently outrageous -- lose according to the established tabulating rules, get recount and lose, demand changes to how votes are counted and lose again, and still demand yet more recounts and selective ones at that, engineered to guaranteed increase his votes but not his opponent's* -- that I couldn't imagine anyone could seriously argue the merits of it. What, keep counting and change how you do it till you win via essentially selective stuffing of the ballot box, then the counts end? That's the only criterion for when the process stops?

But Dershowitz wrote astounding briefs, and wrote them fast. Amazingly persuasive. In truth completely wrong, but amazingly persuasive.

  • Why guaranteed increase for him but not his opponent? Because on repeated running of punched ballots through the machines, "chads" come out of partially punched cards and so become readable. Historically the numbers always go up at least some. Gore didn't want any counties where Bush was leading to be recounted. He demanded only counties where he was leading to be recounted. This patently did not give voters in different counties equal rights to have their votes counted. He also fought against uncounted but received military absentee votes being counted, which votes favored Bush.