PLEASE USE YOUR REFRESH BUTTON TO BE SURE YOU'RE GETTING THE LATEST

Click below for:

An American Hero: WHO WAS THE "COLE" OF THE TERRORIST-BOMBED USS COLE?

RIGHT NOW: THE FINANCIAL MARKETS

SPORTS

WEATHER

The Latest . Net

A cooperative of working Independent broadcast journalists; not Democrats, not Republicans. We're tired of our editors telling us what the news is; If our editors knew we were doing this, we'd probably be fired.

Michael Shiloh, Editor & Webmaster.

John O'Roarke, Publisher.

E-mail: ORoarke@Juno.com

The Latest News Brief

WILL IT NEVER END?

The wrangling and manipulation of law to straighten out the presidential race voting in Florida will end, but those looking for a definitive naming of whom the next president will be will likely have to wait until well into next month.

If Florida doesn't certify all its votes and solve all legal problems in time, the Electoral College will still meet as scheduled December 18th, but it would ignore Florida and the state's delegates would be disqualified from participating, according to experts.

And 26 states don't require Electoral College delegates to exclusively commit to a single candidate, so some delegates could switch votes; so the real outcome of this extremely close, contested election really won't be known until December 18th.

Gore and the Democratic National Commitee (DNC) have adopted what they call "disenfranchised voters" in Florida who were unhappy with the method used in casting their votes on Election Day, a punch-hole system they say caused confusion; a number of voters, especially those in Palm Beach County, say it was confusion that caused them to vote twice in the presidential vote, which caused their ballots to be disqualified.

Tuesday evening, the Bush campaign filed an appeal to a state judge's ruling Monday, in which a judge refused to stop manual recounting of Florida votes. No date has been set for the court of appeals to hear arguments.

Also Tuesday evening, Harris notified the Florida counties that haven't turned in their vote recount tallies that they must notify Harris' office by 2:30 Eastern Wednesday afternoon, providing compelling reasons why the "amended" tallies aren't in.

Generally, procedural or tabulation errors are considered compelling, not "voter error" or "unfair ballots." Otherwise, Harris said, she will consider the tallies that are already in to be final and the votes will be certified.

A defeat for the Democrats Tuesday: a Leon County, Florida, circuit court has let stand the five PM Tuesday deadline for all state county canvassers to turn in vote recount numbers to Florida's Secretary of State Katherine Harris. But Harris was ordered to "consider" late tabulations.

And Harris said Tuesday afternoon that she expects a certifed final tally of Florida votes sometime Saturday, after all absentee ballots are received by the midnight Friday deadline, pending "unusual circumstances."

Harris was recently Florida state co-chair of the Bush for president campaign.

The five PM Eastern deadline has come and gone for Florida precincts to turn in recounted votes for certification, and Palm Beach County hasn't turned in its hand recount results from last Tuesday's election.

Florida's Attorney General, a Democrat, predictably contradicts the Republican Secretary of State's adherence to the 5 pm deadline.

Currently, Republican George W. Bush officially leads Democrat Al Gore by 300 votes in Florida, Gore having gained 90 votes in recounts during the past couple of days. Unofficially, the Associated Press says Bush leads by 286 votes.

Vice President-elect Dick Cheney's lawyers have filed a notice of appeal to Monday's ruling against Cheney and the Republicans; the ruling denied an injunction to stop the hand recounting of votes in four Florida counties.

One of those four counties, Broward County, has refused to take part in the recount, but Gore and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) has gone to court to force a recount there. Broward County officials have called a meeting for Friday to decide how and when to recount.

With hope of making an end-run around Harris' office, Gore, the DNC and one of the counties doing a recount will now go to the Florida Supreme Court in an attempt to overturn the judge's ruling, giving county vote-counters till the end of the week to finish their recount.

And Miami-Dade County has begun a recount of votes cast there.

Former Secretary of State James Baker said Tuesday the Republicans have offered to drop all court action about the Florida vote if Democrats will adhere to the five PM Tuesday Florida deadline for a recount; the Democrats turned them down.

Republicans' objection to the hand count: it's a subjective process requiring vote-counters to probe each ballot to see if they're slightly punched, thoroughly punched or if there are tiny pieces of paper "chads" hanging onto the punchcard. The process requires, as Bush spokeswoman Karen Hughes points out, a "subjective and selective" assessment of each ballot; and those chosen to do the assessment could be biased since they will likely be Democrats.

President-elect George W. Bush is at his ranch near Crawford, Texas, putting together what could be his cabinet, should he take the presidency.

The man who led the government's Microsoft antitrust effort, David Broies, has been called in by Democrats to lead the Florida recount campaign.

The conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch has notified some Florida counties that it will independently inspect disputed ballots.

In Delaware, poll watchers say several people were allowed in booths at the same time, voters complained of loud music being played at polls, and voters were questioned about their voting history.

In New Mexico, Gore leads by 274 votes. In Dona Ana County, an election official misread a tally that said 600; the official thought the six was a one, and counted 100 votes. That was corrected Tuesday, when 500 more votes were given to Gore, giving Gore the lead again.

Gore leads in Oregon too; that won't be decided until probably Saturday when

In Iowa, a recount is still possible: Gore leads by a slim margin of 4,285 after some absentee ballots have been counted. The vote is so close in Iowa, one precinct declared Gore the winner by just two votes.

In Wisconsin, Friday is also the deadline for certified totals of all votes, including absentee. A state spokesman says 174 students at Markett University have bragged that they voted for Gore more than once, some say they voted five and six times for Gore, because polling judges weren't checking identification.

The Dow has rebounded from a downturn that began Election Day: the Dow Industrials were up Tuesday 163, to close at 10,681. The Nasdaq stopped a steep slide, closing above three-thousand, up 171. . Markets are regaining strength based on the belief that the Federal Reserve Markets Commmittee will not raise interest rates when it meets tomorrow.

President Clinton is in Brunei Tuesday night, to attend his final Asian summit, saing goodbye to leaders of China, Japan and other nations. Clinton goes to Vietnam Wednesday, the first president to go there since the end of the Vietnam War.

Last Tuesday, there was no spontaneous uprising of "disenfranchised voters," and the production of some voters' dissatisfaction into a national call by the Democratic National Committee (DNC) for "vote fairness" is in actuality a public relations campaign.

On Election Day, when Democrats heard about some disgruntled voters in Florida, the Democratic Party organization contacted a Texas telemarketing company on election day to canvass Florida voters in now-famous Palm Beach County about whether they had problems with their voting.

The company then made more than five-thousand phone calls in less than an hour, providing the DNC with more than two-thousand names of voters who felt the voting method was unsatisfactory, according to the Associated Press.

Voters were read a prepared script that read: "If you have already voted and think you may have punched the wrong hole for the incorrect candidate, you should return to the polls and request that the election officials write down your name so that the problem can be fixed." Then telemarketers took names and numbers of people who felt they may have incorrectly marked a Florida ballot. The DNC was provided about 24-hundred names.

If voters hadn't voted yet, they were instructed to be "sure to punch number five for Gore-Lieberman. Do not punch any other number as you might end up voting for someone else by mistake," AP reports.

While the current focus on recounts in Florida counties is, based on the AP report, not a result of Democrats' worries that they may lose Florida and therefore the election, the AP story does explain the public relations mechanism behind a week's worth of political and media frenzy about Sunshine State balloting, allied with Gore's former campaign slogan, "I'll fight for you."

Yet, a new bipartisan Portrait of America poll indicates that Gore isn't winning the public relations battle over Florida: When asked, Who do you believe won the election, 53-percent said Bush, 40-percent said Gore. And when asked how well the American election process is conducted, a full 59-percent rated it "fair" or "poor." Should there be a new election in Florida? Fifty-four percent said no.

Polls indicates Americans are divided on the Electoral College system: a-third said it should be abolished, about a-third said it should be "reformed," and about a-third said it should be left alone.

The Washington Post reports supporters of Green Party candidate Ralph Nader are "downright gleeful" about the dent they made in Gore's vote, especially in Florida, where they may have siphoned off enough of the Gore vote to greatly influence the national election.

The new word many are talking about: "chads." Those are the little pieces of paper a voter punches out of a voting card; after the punch, the tiny circular paper "chad" can stick to the punch-hole.

The "lame duck" session of Congress has been postponed, according to The Los Angeles Times, because congresspeople assume the eyes of the nation are focused on the Florida vote-counting drama. They'll meet in December to forge a budget bill in disagreements with President Clinton.

Jacob Eilon, Israeli news anchor, says Israelis are "shocked" at the elongated election process here in America. "Israelis don't understand how the greatest democracy can do this...The more things seem in disarray back in the United States, the more Israelis fear there is no one to turn to for help (for an Israel in violent turmoil)."

Only about 19-percent of Americans are "worried" about the election brouhaha; in a Washington Post/ABC News poll, 67-percent of those asked said the candidates should accept the outcome of the Florida recount and not turn to the courts. The vast majority are against a new vote and recounts in other states.

Some military families overseas are said to be anguished because their absentee ballots arrived late or never arrived at all, according to WorldNetDaily.com. Some in the military say their ballots came fourth-class "bulk rate" mail, which often takes a month to arrive, rather than the speedier first class mail. Bush has championed the "underpaid and low-morale" of the military

One of the great legends of broadcast news has died: Robert Trout, who covered President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and World War Two, passed away this morning at a New York hospital. He was a stylish writer and announcer, was known as a snappy dresser and a gentlemanly presence, a "consummate correspondent," unflappable and authoritative. Many Americans first heard about the D-Day invasion from Robert Trout. He was 92.

The Senate seat from Washington state still hasn't been decided; Republican Slade Gorton is leading Democrat Maria Cantwell as the vote count continues but the outcome is far from certain; the outcome will have a great effect on the balance of Congress: should Cantwell win, the Senate will be split 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats.

Mexican national police fired shots at US federal Border Patrol agents along the border with California October 28th, according to T. J. Bonner of the National Border Patrol Council. California authorities reportedly investigated and found no wrongdoing. The Mexican government denies shots were fired. No one was injured. It's not the first time Mexican police have fired on Border Patrol officers; it happened earlier this year along the border with Texas.

The sailors on guard duty aboard the USS Cole had no ammunition in their guns the morning the ship was attacked by terrorists, according to Tuesday's Washington Post. The guards were ordered not to fire a first shot; they would have had to ask permission to fire on the terrorist boat that delivered plastique explosives to the hull of the Cole, if the guards had seen the boat approaching.

The Justice Department is investigating whether one of its lawyers misled Congress when he said there was no pressure on the Justice Department to derail the department's probe of possibly-illegal Clinton and Gore campaign financing. Justice lawyer Lee Radek was allegedly overheard saying that Attorney General Janet Reno could lose her job if a campaign finance investigation went forward during the presidential campaign. -- The Washington Times.

Independent Counsel Robert Ray has promoted an associate counsel to the role of Deputy Independent Counsel, signifying a continuation of the investigation of President Clinton's actions in the Monica Lewinsky scandal; Ray has hinted he may seek an indictment of Clinton.

Internet columnist Matt Drudge has been fired from his weekly network radio show by ABC; a surprise because ABC Radio executives had recently begun arranging for Drudge's show to go from weekly to nightly, according to the Washington Post.

Three ski-train tunnels are now closed in Austria, after a huge fire aboard a train going though a similar tunnel that killed at least 129 people. Sixty-six bodies have been recovered from the rubble; at least half-a-dozen Americans are thought to have been among those killed. No cause for the fire has been announced.

After all his protests in the 1960s, President Clinton is finally going to Vietnam; he leaves Washington Tuesday for his last-hurrah final meeting with Chinese and Russian leaders Wednesday, then he's off to Vietnam, the first president to visit there since the war ended in the mid-1970s,

The Independent Postal Rates Commission has okayed a one-cent raise in the cost of a postage stamp: 34-cents starting early next year, probably January 7th. . The increased Postal Service income will likely result in a budget surplus.

A combination of election jitters and disappointing profit reports (from Hewlett Packard, for one) caused the Dow Industrials to drop more than 200 points Monday morning; it then rebounded to close down 85. The Nasdaq dropped to it's lowest close in more than a year, down 62 to close at 2966, below three-thousand for the first time in more than a year.

The Dow has dropped more than 430 points since Election Day; the Nasdaq has dropped more than 400 points since November 7th.

The Supreme Court has agreed to clarify when police officers can be held liable for using excessive force during an arrest; decision due next year.

The death toll in the Ebola virus epidemic in Uganda is now 103; those who have caught the disease and recovered -- along with those who have been treating the victims -- are finding themselves shunned by their community. At least 170 poeple are thought to have survived Ebola in the African territory. The virus is highly contageous, but is spread only through direct contact with victims. There is little treatment and no known cure.

They kept ringing at times that were irritating to Her Majesty, so the Queen of England has banned cell phones at Buckingham Palace.

-30-

Return to the top of the page.