How They Settle Elections in Nevada

Matt Welch | November 5, 2004

Robert Swetich and Raymond Urrizaga each received 1,847 votes in Tuesday's general election. Under the law in this gambling state, tied elections can be settled by lot.

After the election was certified by the commission Thursday morning, the two settled over a shuffled and fanned deck of cards.

Urrizaga drew first. Queen of clubs. Swetich pulled a seven of diamonds, then offered his congratulations to the winner.

Story here; link via Ken Layne.

Comments

|11.5.04 @ 12:16PM|#

They tried the same thing Flordia in 2000.

Gore drew a nine.

Bush pulled out a six, and shouted a triumphant "Yes!"

Ba dum dum. Is this a blog or an oil painting?

|11.5.04 @ 12:21PM|#

Four more years of GWB is ALMOST worth the seeing the left choke on their shrillness.

|11.5.04 @ 12:24PM|#

You know, that shrill, jokey thing. Uh, yeah.

|11.5.04 @ 12:25PM|#

I agree, anything that causes so much bitterness and resentment in our lefty brethren that they can't let it go even after four years and another election has to have at least some redeeming value.

|11.5.04 @ 12:28PM|#

Lighten up, kids! Clinton's pants, Gore's woodenness, Bush's intelligence and speech, Kerry & the French thing - it's all good.

|11.5.04 @ 12:34PM|#

Well, I guess I no longer need to evaluate candidates on their experience and stances. I can just find out what would make leftists really unhappy and vote accordingly. The morning after, when I discover that I've helped elect a theocrat who spends like a drunken sailor, I can take solace in how many leftists are pissed off right now.

Yeah, that's the ticket!

coyote|11.5.04 @ 12:36PM|#

Look guys, this is shrill. I thought Joe was pretty funny. Lighten up.

|11.5.04 @ 12:41PM|#

You're right. That was shrill. Michael Moore's current article is actually both shrill and funny. He at least recognizes the value of the Bush daughters...

|11.5.04 @ 12:45PM|#

"Urrizaga drew first. Queen of clubs. Swetich pulled a seven of diamonds, then offered his congratulations to the winner."

God bless America.

|11.5.04 @ 12:51PM|#

"Urrizaga drew first. Queen of clubs. Swetich pulled a seven of diamonds, then offered his congratulations to the winner."

Now that's respectable.

|11.5.04 @ 1:03PM|#

Hey about doing away with all the bother of elections, and selecting a President through a seven-card, no-limit, Texas hold'em tourney? Think of how it could work in '08; Hillary, Gore, Edwards, Kerry, McCain, Jeb, and one and a half dozen others could arrive in Vegas, each with suitcase packed with 10,000 Ben Franklins. They sit down at the green felt, and play non-stop until somebody has twenty four million (no salary for the job) and the keys to the White House!

coyote|11.5.04 @ 1:03PM|#

Penn Gillette for office in Nevada! Not only is he funny, intelligent, and a libertarian, but with some ability at sleight of hand, he probably could win any ties...

coyote|11.5.04 @ 1:04PM|#

Penn Gillette for office in Nevada! Not only is he funny, intelligent, and a libertarian, but with some ability at sleight of hand, he probably could win any ties...

oops, posted too often. It must be a Friday.

|11.5.04 @ 1:11PM|#

Hey thoreau,
Good news in LibertarianLand. Your buddy Tom Campbell was appointed as Arnold's new finance director.

http://www.sacbee.com/static/weblogs/insider/

Warren|11.5.04 @ 1:12PM|#

joe will go to his grave refusing to accept the truth about Fla. in 2k.

Congratulations to Commissioner Urrizaga, and hat tip to Mr. Swetich.

|11.5.04 @ 1:29PM|#

Which truth is that, Warren? That a lot of retired Jewish people like Pat Buchanan?

James Anderson Merritt|11.5.04 @ 1:48PM|#

Steve declares, "Good news in LibertarianLand" concerning the appointment of Tom Campbell as a highly-placed financial adviser to Arnold the Governator's administration.

Campbell is often hauled out as the "model" of a moderate Libertarian, or a Libertarian Republican (the latter of which his supporters claimed him to be when he served in the House and was running for Senator against Feinstein). For the most part, I like listening to the guy, and I was thrilled that he became Dean of Business at Berkeley, but I doubt that the Libertarian Party could win with candidates like him; he's not radical enough to inspire the true believers, and he doesn't seem to have the mudfighting spirit that it takes to go up against today's Demos and GOP. In fact, he's Mr. Bland. As far as working within the GOP to get "Libertarian Republican" candidates nominated, I recall that Feinstein gave Campbell a pasting on the order of the one Boxer just gave Bill Jones last Tuesday.

Maybe Campbell's counsel and assistance can help the Governator steer Caul-i-FOUR-nyah in a libertarian direction. I agree that there is cause for some optimism (especially after I saw a media clip on the news last night, where Schwarzenegger berated the legislature, telling them flatly, "the people don't want to be taxed" -- now THAT'S good news!). I'd be more excited if Schwarzenegger would bring in folks like Jim Gray or better yet, Richard Rider.

James Anderson Merritt|11.5.04 @ 1:51PM|#

Recarding the cutting of the cards: perhaps we should have settled our Indian Gaming propositions 68 and 70 that way here in California, too.

Hey, if we extended this method to all offices, we'd have Libertarians in the statehouse in no time!

|11.5.04 @ 1:57PM|#

James,

OK, so Campbell got waxed by Feinstein. But I'm sure he still got 40-some percent of the vote. That's a hell of a lot more than the Libertarian candidate has ever gotten in a California Senate race.

Anyway, the finance director's job is to try to reverse the fucked-up-ness of the state budget, so all that matters is that the position is occupied by a fiscal conservative. The fact that it will give Campbell a higher profile, and expose people to a drug-legalizing, Libertarian-leaning Republican, is gravy.

|11.5.04 @ 2:22PM|#

Before we assume that Campbell is a weak campaigner, keep in mind that he was elected several times to US Congress and CA State Senate. Now, I don't know the demographics of his district, it may very well have been so gerrymandered that even a weak campaigner with a letter "R" behind his name could win it. Then again, statewide elections in CA have usually been such that any idiot with "D" behind his or her name can win (with a few exceptions).

What I do know is that Campbell has a lot of good ideas and good intellect, and so a job in Arnold's administration is a good place for him to be. He will hopefully make a positive impact there.

|11.5.04 @ 2:38PM|#

I've long been of the opinion that any politician who wants the job should not be allowed to have it. Only the reluctant should rule.

To that end, I propose that all offices (or at least all candidates) be selected by lot. Winners to be notified by Ed McMahon:

"J. RANDOM LUSER: You may already be the SECRETARY OF STATE of RHODE ISLAND'

|11.5.04 @ 3:44PM|#

"Urrizaga drew first. Queen of clubs. Swetich pulled a seven of diamonds, then offered his congratulations to the winner."

If they'd been bridge players, diamonds would have been the higher suit.

Bill Bennet's dominatrix|11.5.04 @ 8:46PM|#

I'd like to see Bush and Kerry rochambeau for it.

|11.8.04 @ 7:37AM|#

I can just find out what would make leftists really unhappy and vote accordingly.

As a rule of thumb, this is hard to beat. Essentially mirrors my own rule: cast your vote for the least bad candidate.

|11.8.04 @ 5:40PM|#

So, RC, what consoles you if you find out that you voted for a theocrat who spends like a drunken sailor?

James Anderson Merritt|11.9.04 @ 12:53PM|#

Steve says, "OK, so Campbell got waxed by Feinstein. But I'm sure he still got 40-some percent of the vote. That's a hell of a lot more than the Libertarian candidate has ever gotten in a California Senate race."

Check out http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/sov/2000_general/us_sen.pdf.

Campbell got 36.6% of the vote in 2000. I'll grant you, it is still a "hell of a lot more" than any Libertarian ever got in a Senate race, but it is in line with the total we would expect from a marginal major-party challenger, facing an entrenched incumbent, so I don't know that this says a lot about Campbell's campaigning prowess. It seems to say more about the lock on the process that the Demos and GOP have. The GOP probably could have run a dog against the sitting Senator and done as well as Campbell did. In fact, that's what happened this year -- and Bill Jones got 37.9% of the vote -- better than Campbell did against Feinstein.

Just FYI, in the 2000 election, the Libertarian candidate for senator (the same person whom Judge Gray beat in the Libertarian primary this year!) got 187,718 votes, or 1.8%. The current vote count for Gray in the 2004 General is given (at http://vote2004.ss.ca.gov/Returns/ussen/00.htm) as 181,604, or 1.7% of the total. His count will probably be adjusted upward, once all the votes have been tallied, but Gray basically did no better and no worse than other Libertarians in a polarized election climate, despite having every possible qualification for office and running an active (though apparently deliberately ignored) campaign. He might have done as well to simply sit out the campaign season and wait for returns to come in on election night. That is the part that I find most vexing and baffling about this whole episode. This time, the Senate race was run almost completely out of the pragmatist-LPer's playbook: excellent, serious candidate; active campaign; emphasis on important issues of security, privacy, and liberty. But the result was ESSENTIALLY NO DIFFERENT than we had experienced, when running far lower profile candidacies for the same or similar high offices.

What the hell?