Three of Texas Gov. George W. Bush’s primary campaign slogans were: “I trust people, while my opponent trusts government,” “Government should not get involved in local matters” and “Honesty and integrity are on the ballot and my opponent doesn’t have either.”

Well, I guess he trusts individuals, except for those individuals in southeast Florida. By his statements and those of his campaign, this slogan is a lie. I guess going to the federal courts to intervene on a state and local matter might say the second slogan is a lie. We have seen from hundreds of sources, including the manufacturers of those ballot machines used in Palm Beach County, national election consortiums and even Bush himself when he signed his now famous 1997 hand-count law, that hand counting is the only way to accurately count punch-hole ballots. If this is true and the Republicans know it, then they are flat-out lying every time they say this hand counting is illegal, inaccurate and subjective.

Furthermore, the Republicans know the hand counting processes underway have been closely watched by their campaign and that of the Democrats, not to mention all the media. Also, the Republicans know hanging chads will fall off when being handled and they know they only fall off when they have been incompletely punched.

They also know other states even remove those chads before machine processing them. They know that there is no funny business going on, but continue to cry foul anyway. Their spin campaigns as far as I can see, have been riddled with lies and have been polluting the minds of Americans. So Bush’s honesty and integrity is a lie as well. Does Bush have any legitimate campaign promises? Bush equals hypocrisy.

Joseph Doe
College of Human
Medicine sophomore