The Disgrace that Was the 2000 Election: A Refresher Course in What Went Wrong
... Not the broadcast networks, which on election night first announced at 7:49 pm EST that Al Gore had won Florida, then announced at 10:13 pm that the race was too close to call, then announced (following the lead of Fox News) at 2:26 am that Bush had won Florida. Within hours the networks pulled back yet again, concluding that it was impossible to decide who had won the state.
...Not Leon County Circuit Court Judge N. Sanders Sauls, who ruled, without looking at a single ballot, that manually counting the undervotes in Palm Beach and Miami-Dade Counties was unnecessary since it couldn't possibly lead to a different result.
... Not Katherine Harris, who refused to accept the results of a recount in Palm Beach County because the results were dropped off at her office two hours past her deadline.
... Not Palm Beach County's Theresa LePore, who in a well-intended attempt to provide a more readable ballot using larger type approved a design so convoluted that thousands of voters mistakenly cast a vote for Patrick Buchanan when they thought they were voting for Al Gore.
... Not Al Gore's legal team, which adopted a loose standard for counting the ballots in Democratic counties while simultaneously arguing that absentee ballots from soldiers overseas should be disallowed on the grounds that they did not carry a postmark, as required by law.
...Not George Bush's legal team, which adopted a strict standard for counting the votes from Democratic counties while simultaneously arguing that absentee ballots from soldiers overseas be allowed regardless of whether they carried a required postmark.
... Not Al Gore, who first conceded the election and then flip flopped, telling Bush in a phone call he was rescinding his concession. "My little brother says it's all over," Bush told Gore, referring to Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida. To which Gore replied, "I don't think this is something your little brother gets to decide."
... Not George W. Bush, who announced he had won the election weeks before the legal process had played out. (He made his announcment following Katherine Harris's initial decision to certify his slender victory.)
... Not the Florida Supreme Court, which first intervened in the election without even being asked.
... Not the United States Supreme Court, which (1) intervened in the Florida election even though it traditionally left the control of elections up to the states, and (2) stopped the recount of the votes and then argued days later that the recounting of the votes could not resume because there wasn't time to finish.