MovieChat Forums > Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election (2002) Discussion > Ignore DoobieKeebler's review

Ignore DoobieKeebler's review

posted 20 years ago by VanBurenPhilips
15 replies | jump to latest

I've just watched the film, and came on IMDB to post my rating. At this time, DoobieKeebler's comment is on the front page for this movie. IMDB is supposed to be a place for people to find out about movies, but said comment is IMO less informative about this particular film than it is about DoobieKeebler's own political leanings, and is misleading to other movie-goers. Regardless of one's political stance, it is undeniable that the comment contained plain untruths about the film. I am not posting this message to make a political argument; I am trying to do what we (as registered IMDB users and contributors) are here for: to provide information and opinions *about films.*

DoobieKeebler: "Coming away from this "documentary", you "learn" that all Republicans are evil and that democrats actually aren't interested in winning presidential elections, they only want a fair voting system."

That's not true. The film openly criticises the Gore campaign for only concentrating on the Florida states in which it felt it could gain the biggest advantage from recounts.

DK: "Katharine Harris, Jeb Bush, and company are portrayed in an unfairly negative light..."

The film states their actions in a matter-of-fact way, namely, they ordered deliberately vague search criteria for the purging of voters, and when notified of the errors this would cause, they insisted it be done anyway. Like it or not, that they did this is a matter of record. To present this information to the viewer cannot make a film "unfairly negative."

DK: "Rather than put the blame on ignorant old people who wasted their votes on Pat Buchanan, they want you to believe that steps taken to prevent felons from voting were actually designed to keep black people from voting for Gore. Uh-huh."

DoobieKeebler misses the point - whatever the reasons for the creation of these laws in the first place, the fact remains (as illustrated by the documented actions of Harris et al) that the voter purge laws were used in an indescriminate way. You may dispute whether this was due to an intention to rig the election, or human error or negligence, or whatever, but you cannot dispute that it occurred and that it affected the outcome of the election.

DK: "The more convincing point is that an overwhelming majority of felons (and suspected felons) vote democrat."

I don't see what you are driving at here, DoobieKeebler. You live in a democracy, and somebody who is legally entitled to a vote can use it however they please. The fact that their decision may be unpleasant to you is part of free choice. Are you suggesting that a felon's vote is to be taken lightly?

DK: "Two seconds are spent on the Gore's team decision to pursue JUST a recount of the four overwhelmingly Democratic counties rather than all of the counties in the state."

Obviously, any intelligible sentence that conveys the facts you describe here would take longer than two seconds. So, in your opening sentence, DK, you imply that the film attempts to portray Democrats as being more interested in fair voting than in winning the election, yet here you acknowledge the part of the film that proves the exact opposite. In case anybody wants to know, in Unprecedented we are presented with three or four interviewees in succession who clearly criticise Gore's decision not to demand a state-wide recount (which, in fact, is stipulated as necessary in these circumstances by Florida law, and is deemed the most appropriate course of action by those interviewed). The matter is neither skimmed over nor dwelt upon (although the film does return to this point once, briefly, towards the end). Quote: "they (the Democrats) got so concerned with finding the 500 votes that they needed, that they forgot about their broader responsibility."

DK: "Pretty odd that all the people interviewed are democrats bitching because Gore lost and all are presented as good citizens who just want a fair election...that will put a Democrat in office."

All the poeple interviewed were not Democrats, this statement is nothing but a fabrication, and misleading to other film fans. Most of the interviewees stated nothing that could be construed as politically motivated - the interviews cover nothing but the alleged fraud of the 2000 election and the questionable tactics employed by *both* parties; several illegally purged Democrat would-be voters are interviewed, which is absolutely necessary when making a documentary that covers the voter purge; footage of Democrats and Republicans arguing the pros and cons of the recount process is split 50/50; Katherine Harris and (I forget - it was either Jeb Bush or Bucky Mitchell) both refused to be interviewed for the film. How can the film be criticised for *attempting* to interview the two most pivotal Republicans in the whole affair, only to be denied? And as a final deflection of your accusations of the film's bias, DK, did you miss the part that declared that (after recounts of undervotes) the total came out in Bush's favour?

To those movie-goers who want a view of the film not tarnished by politically-motivated defensiveness, it is *not* about who should have won the 2000 election, it's about the fact that, in many ways, the freedom that *should* be afforded to every citizen of the US (or any democracy) was wilfully overlooked or taken away by people you *should* be able to rely on (not least the US Supreme Court).

By the way, I don't live in the US, and I have no affinity for either your Republican or Democrat parties. I don't even have a problem with people who can't assess a film properly because of the various opinions and prejudices that cloud their objectivity - as long as they have the good sense not to inflict their misinformation on the rest of the world. If you're at all interested in this film, ignore DoobieKeebler's review (as it is merely a statement of his political standpoint) and see it for yourself.

[–] oedipus_wrecks2003-1 20 years ago

You live in a democracy

The United States is a republic governed by republican laws.

Join the Classic Films community at http://www.communities.com

[–] VanBurenPhilips 20 years ago

It's also a representative democracy (at least, it's *supposed* to be), and I'm sure you're aware of that. I'm not interested in splitting hairs over terminology. Got anything to say about Unprecedented?

[–] jtpaladin 20 years ago

Where did you learn your history and civics? You are so wrong. The word "Democracy" is never used in either the Declaration of Independence or the U.S. Constitution. We are a REPUBLIC not a Democracy. The formal name of this country is "The Republic of the United States of America".

As for this idiotic "documentary", it is so one sided that it's ridiculous that anyone could take it seriously. They didn't even bother to interview people with different views on the matter. This issue had been settled a long time ago and each time, it was found that Bush won fairly. Just because Florida has problems in their election process does not mean that Bush did anything wrong.

[–] rlarose 20 years ago

It was not found that Bush didn't do anything wrong. The democrats gave up.

And as for the term Democracy.. then if the USA is not a democracy then how can they affectively SPREAD "Democracy" as Bush likes to coins it?

[–] VanBurenPhilips 20 years ago

jtpaladin, you're confused. The statuses of Republic and Democracy are not mutually exclusive. If you think your own country is not a representative democracy, then you seriously haven't been paying attention. Look it up.

And the issue was never "settled." The only independent effort that came close was this one:

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2001/florida.ballots/stories/main.html

...and it was totally inconclusive (despite the rather unbalanced wording of CNN's report) because it was missing a couple of thousand ballots (that's about four times the margin, so obviously the results don't tell us much).

Aside from the vote count, there's absolutely no doubt that the "felon" purge was illegal (Katherine Harris and Florida were later sued by the NAACP on this issue; the NAACP won) and deliberate (emails on record prove that Bush's campaign wanted to go ahead with their search criteria even *after* DBT pointed out how they would give false results). Then came the US Supreme Court decision, which was an utter a joke - it defied logic in the eyes of the law and rational thought; the decision contradicted itself. The problem in Florida was identified (by the Supreme Court) as the counting of votes without a uniform standard, yet the only logical solution to this problem (to order a final recount *with* a uniform standard) was not taken - the conservative majority (some of whom had conflicts of interest and should have recused themselves according to the Supreme Court's own rules) decided to hand the election to Bush instead (based on incomplete counts which they themselves had just identified as undemocratic). Lawyers all over America, even conservative ones, condemned the decision. It made no sense.

More info here: http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20010205&c=1&s=bugliosi
Again, equal and opposite to the CNN report, this author's standpoint is abundantly clear, but both documents give you the facts you need if you really want to draw your own conclusions.

The 2000 US election was not a democratic one, and it was ridden with criminal activity. It amazes me that American republicans continue to bury their heads in the sand rather than admit this crime happened (amazes me that anyone could decide that their guy winning is more important than their democratic right to choose the winner), but thankfully the rest of the world can assess the plain evidence objectively.

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] VanBurenPhilips 20 years ago

OK, judging by those quaint little nicknames, I'm guessing you're not exactly the most objective observer. Thankfully, coming from the UK and regarding both your Democrat and Republican parties as hilariously right-wing (and having sympathy for neither), my analytical abilities are not skewed by such bias. And by all means if someone makes a decent documentary about how your Democrats are crooks too, fine, I'll watch that one as well. Are you really arguing that because the Democrats (allegedly) tried and failed to fix the election that we should ignore the fact that the Republicans tried and succeeded? Just call it quits, you say? I don't think so.

Let's stick to the point. The accusation is that the Republican "win" in 2000 was undemocratic. If that's not so, _all_ of the actions of the Bush campaign, and the US Supreme Court in finally deciding the winner, must be beyond reproach and have totally fair, logical and acceptable reasoning behind them. For starters, I'll pick my two favourites ;) Give me _logical_ explanations for the following problems:

1. DBT informed Bush's people of the danger of their felon-search criteria (namely, that many false positives would be generated) _before_ the search was conducted, yet they went ahead with the search anyway with those same flawed criteria. This means that human error or incompetence are not viable excuses - they were made aware of the error before they committed it. It is impossible to dispute that the elimination of non-felons as well as felons was intentional. You give me an acceptable reason for this, or you _must_ admit that this was a deliberate attempt to obstruct or pervert a democratic vote.

2. As you say, the US Supreme Court's stated reason for overruling the vote counts in Florida was that there was no uniform standard for counting votes accross all the counties. OK, that sounds fair enough, they're doing it in the interests of democracy - so what's the solution? Surely, the only logical next step from there is to order a final recount after agreeing a uniform standard, right? So why didn't they do that? Instead they GAVE the election to one party. Either they did so arbitrarily (went for "their man"? Flipped a coin?), or they went by one of the prior vote counts WHICH THEY JUST IDENTIFIED AS UNDEMOCRATIC! Come on, you don't need to be Einstein to grasp this. If you can explain to me how their solution addressed the problem as they identified it, I'd love to hear it. Otherwise, you _must_ admit that their decision was flawed (the result: undemocratic selection of your president).

The fact that you don't like it - that every oh-so-patriotic fibre (sic) of your being rebels against it - has absolutely no bearing whatsoever on whether or not it is true. If you can give me objective, factual reasons why the above two points do not indicate undemocratic and fraudulent actions, my hat is off to you.

Your turn...

[–] 20 years ago

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[–] 20 years ago

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[–] alistla 19 years ago

Every documentary must face the gauntlet of the editing suite. By its very nature, editing is a selective process whereby one decides what to show --and what not to show. "Unprecedented" is just as selective as the next documentary, showcasing interviews and other evidence supporting its point of view, which is that the 2000 election was "stolen" by the Republicans, and underplaying evidence to the contrary.

Additionally, it's important to note that no election, especially in a nation of nearly 300 million people, is perfect. For instance, U.S. elections in 1992 and 1996 had an average of 2 to 3 percent ballot spoilage. In Florida in 2000, 3 percent of the ballots were considered spoiled, on the upper end of the average, but hardly unusual.

As a necessary corrective to the largely one-sided contentions in "Unprecedented," please note the following facts:

A consortium of major newspapers conducted an exhaustive recount of the Florida ballots. There were many different ways to do such a recount. The consortium tested 10 different scenarios. By their measure, Bush would have won nine of them.

As the New York Times reported on November 21, 2001, "A comprehensive review of the uncounted Florida ballots from last year's presidential election reveals that George W. Bush would have won even if the United States Supreme Court had allowed the statewide manual recount of the votes that the Florida Supreme Court had ordered to go forward." The USA Today recount team concluded: "Who would have won if Al Gore had gotten the manual counts he requested in four counties? Answer: George W. Bush."

The Miami Herald, no Republican rag, dug deeply into the felon purge controversy and concluded that "the biggest problem with the felon list was not that it prevented eligible voters from casting ballots, but that it ended up allowing ineligible voters to cast a ballot." And in most of those cases, it allowed blacks to vote who shouldn't have.

As for the ballots, it should be noted that according to Florida statute the responsibility for the conduct of elections lies in the hands of county supervisors, not the governor or secretary of state. County supervisors are independent officers answerable to county commissioners, not the governor or secretary of state. And in 24 of the 25 counties that had the highest ballot-spoilage rates, the county supervisor was a Democrat. (In the remaining county the supervisor was not a Republican, but an independent.)

After an extensive six-month investigation, the U.S. Civil Rights Commission, headed by Mary Frances Berry, by all accounts a fiercely partisan black Democrat, was unable to unearth any solid evidence that a single person was intimidated, harassed, or prevented from voting by Florida law enforcement. (Of course, this didn't prevent Berry and her Democrat-dominated commission from leveling unsubstantiated charges of "widespread voter disenfranchisement.")

Despite such sweeping claims of police intimidation and harassment, the only potential evidence of law-enforcement "misconduct" consisted of a mere two witnesses who described their perceptions regarding the Florida Highway Patrol. One of these witnesses testified that he thought it was "unusual" to see an empty patrol car parked outside a polling place. There was no evidence that sight of the vehicle somehow intimidated the witness or any other voters from casting ballots. There was no evidence that the occupant of the vehicle harassed voters. There was no evidence that the empty vehicle was there for the purpose of somehow disenfranchising anyone assigned to vote at that location.

The second witness had filed a highly publicized complaint with the NAACP regarding a police motor-vehicle checkpoint. In the highly charged months following the election the complaint took on a life of its own and apparently became part of the basis for the unsubstantiated myth that legions of cops were harassing thousands of black voters throughout Florida.

The evidence, however, shows that the checkpoint in question was two miles from the polling place. Moreover, it was not even on the same road as the polling facility. During the checkpoint's approximately ninety minutes of operation, citations were issued to 16 individuals, 12 of whom were white. The uncontroverted evidence shows that no one was delayed or prohibited from voting due to the lone checkpoint.

In addition, John Lott of Yale Law School conducted a comprehensive study and found that the group most likely to have its votes undercounted in the 200 Florida election were black Republicans: His study concluded: "Using extremely detailed cross-sectional data collected by USA Today and less detailed panel data, I find that to the extent that these types of regressions measure discrimination, it is African-American Republicans who were harmed. Indeed, the nonvoted ballot rate for white Republicans is higher than for white or African-American Democrats. The data also indicate that nonvoted ballot rates are highest in those counties where Democrats are the election supervisors.

And finally, Bob Butterworth, the Florida attorney general and a Democrat, testified that of the 2,600 complaints he received on Election Day, only three involved racial discrimination.

I'm not suggesting that the 2000 election is an open-and-shut case. I just want to demonstrate that there is another side to the story as portrayed in the partisan "Unprecedented." It is especially important that foreigners understand this as I suspect their media, which are so unrelentingly hostile to Bush, don't give him a fair shake. Please keep an open mind. This documentary isn't the full story.

[–] 19 years ago

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[–] dackerma2000 18 years ago

If you look hard enough you can always find someone to support your point of view.
Don't want to believe in Global Warming, go to BunkScience.com and you will see any number of "facts" that show that global warming does not exist and most if not all of Gore's information is off the mark.

Here we go again. Someone puts a huge amount of research into the documentary Unprecidentd yet somehow all their research is flawed. In other words, if 500 people say the world is round yet one person says it is flat and presents evidence to show that the world is flat then that one person must be right and the 500 others are wrong. More and more this seems to be the Republican way of viewing information.

Case in point....Bush was told any number of times that there were no Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq yet one person (with questionalbe credentials) claims that there are Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq so we go to war based upon the statement of one while denying the statements of hundreds of other qualified people.

The people in Unprecidented are going on the record in making their statements....they are putting themselves out there for scrutiny. You give a list of 10 comments to combat a documentary that lists hundreds of examples of unfair election tactics and suddenly this documentary should be viewed as one sided and biased propaganda created by Democrates.

It is reasoning like this that has put us in a hopeless war which soon will have killed more Americans than the 9/11 attack. I can't wait to see how the Republicans deal with those numbers when they arrive!

[–] rayrnames 18 years ago

Well said firu, well said.

[–] 18 years ago

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[–] kelsosemail 11 years ago

Excellent! Well done. Thorough. And on-point.

"What else do you like? Lazy? Ugly? Horny? I got 'em all."
"You don't look lazy."