So the Congress has re-selected George Bush. But it was at least somewhat interesting. A handful of Democrats:
forced a challenge to the quadrennial count of electoral votes for just the second time since 1877
Bush's Election Day triumph over Sen. John Kerry (news - web sites), D-Mass., was never in doubt. After a near four-hour delay to consider and reject a dispute over voting in Ohio, lawmakers in joint session affirmed Bush's 286-251 electoral vote victory — plus a single vote that a "faithless" Kerry elector cast for his running mate, former Sen. John Edwards (news - web sites), D-N.C. A total of 270 votes are needed for victory.
"This announcement shall be a sufficient declaration of the persons elected president and vice president of the United States for the term beginning Jan. 20, 2005," Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites), who presided over the session, read without emotion when the final votes were tabulated.
In a drama that was historic if not suspenseful, Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (news, bio, voting record), D-Ohio, and Sen. Barbara Boxer (news, bio, voting record), D-Calif., formally protested that the Ohio votes "were not, under all known circumstances, regularly given." That, by law, required the House and Senate to convene separately and debate the Ohio irregularities.
Boxer, Tubbs Jones and several other Democrats, including many black lawmakers, hoped the showdown would underscore the problems such as missing voting machines and unusually long lines that plagued some Ohio districts, many in minority neighborhoods, on Nov. 2.
"If they were willing to stand in polls for countless hours in the rain, as many did in Ohio, than I can surely stand up for them here in the halls of Congress," Tubbs Jones said.
The Democratic leadership, however, distanced itself from all this filthy and boring stuff about voting rights. They don't want to look like sore losers, after all. Who cares how black voters were treated in Ohio? What's important is how the Democratic leadership looks.
And what did the Republicans do? Well, they cast aspersions on the Democrats as sore losers. They definitely were not interested in how many hours old black pensioners had to stand in the rain to have their vote then rejected.
I'm not disappointed as I didn't expect anything better from this lot. My sincere thanks to those brave souls who made an effort to talk about something that is very important in a democracy: voting rights, and my heartfelt contempt to the rest of these so-called representatives of the people. The Republicans love money and a vengeful god who looks a whole lot like Pat Robertson. The Democrats love money and munching on Republican dingleberries.