Comments on: Krugman Apologizes for His Florida 2000 Apology http://www.kipesquire.net/2005/09/krugman-apologizes-for-his-florida-2000-apology/ A Stitch in Time Saves Nine ... But Haste Makes Waste Tue, 13 Jul 2010 16:53:45 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 By: Eh Nonymous http://www.kipesquire.net/2005/09/krugman-apologizes-for-his-florida-2000-apology/comment-page-1/#comment-768 Eh Nonymous Sun, 04 Sep 2005 14:53:35 +0000 http://www.kipesquire.net/?p=1490#comment-768 I won't go into the Florida thing. Like with the OJ issue a few years back, I was curious about people's interest but found that following the details was - how to put it diplomatically? Like watching a moron tell an idiot how to watch the grass grow, on CourtTV. <br /> <br /> But, "there is no right to be an idiot in the voting booth" - interesting. There's no duty to be literate in order to exercise the franchise; there's no duty to have graduated high school. There is no _right_ by the government or anyone else to put impediments in the way of citizens who have achieved their majority attempting to vote - you know, things like purging the voter rolls of "felons," sending out (false) notices that persons attempting to vote will be checked against outstanding-warrant lists or forced to pay all parking tickets or unpaid child support. All false, all "good ideas" in the sense of being helpful for some other policy goal... all apparently calculated to suppress the black vote in Florida, for example. <br /> <br /> There's no right to criticize people who screwed up the butterfly ballot. I challenge you to open up an actual-size copy of one of those, with its lack of color-coding, its outstandingly poor design, and its confusing circles and get it right the first time. The democrats who chose it and the republicans who went along with it should all be horsewhipped. Morons. <br /> <br /> I agree that we can't force people to, say, vote while informed, or vote while not drunk, or vote intelligently. But can't we insist that the persons they try to vote for and the persons they succeed in tallying votes for are as close as is reasonably possible? Wouldn't that, you know, minimize outrageous error like Palm Beach retirees coming out in force for Buchanan? I won't go into the Florida thing. Like with the OJ issue a few years back, I was curious about people's interest but found that following the details was – how to put it diplomatically? Like watching a moron tell an idiot how to watch the grass grow, on CourtTV.

But, "there is no right to be an idiot in the voting booth" – interesting. There's no duty to be literate in order to exercise the franchise; there's no duty to have graduated high school. There is no _right_ by the government or anyone else to put impediments in the way of citizens who have achieved their majority attempting to vote – you know, things like purging the voter rolls of "felons," sending out (false) notices that persons attempting to vote will be checked against outstanding-warrant lists or forced to pay all parking tickets or unpaid child support. All false, all "good ideas" in the sense of being helpful for some other policy goal… all apparently calculated to suppress the black vote in Florida, for example.

There's no right to criticize people who screwed up the butterfly ballot. I challenge you to open up an actual-size copy of one of those, with its lack of color-coding, its outstandingly poor design, and its confusing circles and get it right the first time. The democrats who chose it and the republicans who went along with it should all be horsewhipped. Morons.

I agree that we can't force people to, say, vote while informed, or vote while not drunk, or vote intelligently. But can't we insist that the persons they try to vote for and the persons they succeed in tallying votes for are as close as is reasonably possible? Wouldn't that, you know, minimize outrageous error like Palm Beach retirees coming out in force for Buchanan?

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