Reply #48: This is not a rebutttal of Toobins arguments.

[AP]

These false attacks range from accusing Al Gore of not fighting hard enough to win in Florida to blaming Al Gore for the pro Bush media's unprecedented campaign against him.

Toobin doesn't blame Al Gore for, vaguely, not doing enough. He lays out the things that Gore did that were counter-producitve. He lists a series of Gore's actions which created problems for Gore.

They include allegations that Gore abandoned African American voters who were illegally purged off of the Florida voting rolls, that he vetoed public demonstrations, that he did nothing to promote voting reform and counting all of the votes.

This doesn't rebut the fact that Gore told Jesse and Al to go home and not to protest.

The truth is that there was nothing short of starting a civil war that Al Gore could have done to have gotten the uncounted, legal votes in Florida counted.

So is she saying it's OK that he made so many mistakes because he wouldn't have won anyway, or his she saying that he did everything he could?

To me, it's seems Nancy is just upset that people were blaming Gore and is giving him a blanket "you're forgiven" without really giving any arguments to rebut the things that Toobin talks about.

There was no mechanism for a statewide count.

IIUC, there's not mechanism at the protest stage, but there definitely was at the contest stage, and the point is, Gore held things up at the protest stage when Gore should have been trying to get to the contest stage as soon as possible. For someone who states that her aim is to rebut Toobin at the start of her article, she doesn't really seem to care much about addressing the precise issues Toobin raises in his book.

Nancy's article seems to have much narrower ambitions than Toobin's book. I'd give Toobin's book a read at this point if I hadn't read it.