Comments on: Florida Reforms its Voting Rights http://joshuacolwell.com/blog/index.php/2007/florida-reforms-its-voting-rights/ Science, astronomy, politics, movies, and various minutiae. Fri, 10 Feb 2012 09:56:48 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.7.1 hourly 1 By: Bruce Moomaw http://joshuacolwell.com/blog/index.php/2007/florida-reforms-its-voting-rights/comment-page-1/#comment-15357 Bruce Moomaw Wed, 30 May 2007 03:40:00 +0000 http://joshuacolwell.com/blog/?p=169#comment-15357 Actually, it's more important than that. You'll recall that it was the (apparently) accidental mislisting of several tens of thousands of black non-felons as felons that kept them from voting and put Bush in the White House. The mistake may have been accidental -- as I understand it, the list was first compiled 6 months before Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles left office -- but the fact remains that Jeb Bush didn't correct it for 2 years. And if it hadn't been for a determined effort by the Miami Herald to break down Jeb's legal opposition -- plus the fact that they were lucky enough to draw a sympathetic judge -- the same damn thing wold have happened in 2004: that time, the list disqualified black felons but left all the state's Hispanic felons (who, being Cuban, tend to vote Republican) eligible to vote. Actually, Crist seems bent on cleaning up a lot of Jeb's messes -- including getting rid of those damned paper-trail-less electronic voting machines, and improving the state's downright Draconian welfare rules. In a just world this would make him one of the GOP's rising stars, but in our world I wouldn't count on it. Actually, it’s more important than that. You’ll recall that it was the (apparently) accidental mislisting of several tens of thousands of black non-felons as felons that kept them from voting and put Bush in the White House. The mistake may have been accidental — as I understand it, the list was first compiled 6 months before Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles left office — but the fact remains that Jeb Bush didn’t correct it for 2 years. And if it hadn’t been for a determined effort by the Miami Herald to break down Jeb’s legal opposition — plus the fact that they were lucky enough to draw a sympathetic judge — the same damn thing wold have happened in 2004: that time, the list disqualified black felons but left all the state’s Hispanic felons (who, being Cuban, tend to vote Republican) eligible to vote.

Actually, Crist seems bent on cleaning up a lot of Jeb’s messes — including getting rid of those damned paper-trail-less electronic voting machines, and improving the state’s downright Draconian welfare rules. In a just world this would make him one of the GOP’s rising stars, but in our world I wouldn’t count on it.

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