Poli Sci profs say election plagued by media craziness

There's no doubt that this year's presidential election has become one of the most bizarre political spectacles in decades. But lest newspaper headlines get too carried away with the melodrama of the situation, there are at least a few Penn professors who want to remind Americans that the election, though unbelievably drawn out, has not violated a single aspect of the Constitution. "I called it a 'Constitutional Crisis' to bring you folks here, but I put a question mark after it," Political Science Professor Marie Gottschalk said. A roundtable discussion held yesterday afternoon in Stiteler Hall joined together Political Science Professors Will Harris, Ellen Kennedy, Jerome Maddox, Anne Norton and Gottschalk -- each of whom agreed that the election and its ensuing controversy hardly constitutes a Constitutional crisis. The election now looks to be perhaps the most disputed in American history. A full week after the election, the winner is still unknown, as Florida's 25 electoral votes -- which will likely decide the election -- are still being counted and recounted. Florida's secretary of state said yesterday that today would be the deadline for certifying election results. Four largely Democratic counties are still in the process of having their votes recounted by hand as George W. Bush's campaign fights against a manual recount. The state's absentee ballots are expected to be counted by Saturday. Yesterday afternoon, Harris, Penn's foremost expert on the Constitution, said the situation should be branded a "Constitutional coup" -- and not a crisis. "Our Constitution was not made for a stupid people," Harris said. "On the other hand, the media was made for very simplistic people." Calling the present state of politics "media-crazy," Harris and the other panelists blamed the media for essentially taking over the election process. He cited CNN's quick recall of the winner of Florida's electoral vote on Election Night, and criticized the media for trying to provide up-to-the-minute election news instead of accurate coverage. "The media is running its own election," Kennedy said. "There was very stupid reporting on the election [last] Tuesday." Objections to the use of the Electoral College as being an indirect means of voting that does not mirror the will of the people were also addressed. "The problem that we have here is the 12th Amendment is in fact a limitation on popular democracy," Kennedy said. Gottschalk briefly described the four previous presidential elections in which the Electoral College winner failed to win the popular vote. According to Gottschalk, both Bush and Al Gore are similar to John Quincy Adams, who won the election in 1824 despite losing the popular vote to Andrew Jackson. "[Adams] came in very much associated with his predecessors... and he had a terrible four years," Gottschalk said. "Now, we could say that Gore is so identified with Clinton. And Bush Jr., the shrub, hides himself in the big trees of the earlier administration of Bush Sr. " Several of the 60 or so students and faculty members in attendance said they appreciated the academic viewpoint that was presented. "I don't really think there's a 'crisis' or that there's going to be a collapse in the government, but a rare event like this might never happen again in my lifetime," College junior Adam Michaels said. Still, though the five professors all predicted an eventual win for Bush, they agreed that the outcome can never really be satisfactory. "I actually wish we had a bigger controversy," Norton said. "But this election matters most to the candidates. None of us really care who wins as much as they do... and that should trouble all of us."

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