Why I donated money to expose Bush's educational record, supported Gore,  and funded various legal battles in Florida

My reasons for supporting Gore are available here. If you voted for Bush, you will discount each point. If you voted for Gore, you'll likely agree with each point.

Suffice it to say that 50% of the American public came to the same conclusion I did in choosing to vote for Gore. Each of us had different reasons for our preference. That doesn't mean that Bush is a bad choice. It simply means that half us thought Gore was a better choice.

As far as why I spent $1M+ to expose Bush's educational record, that is really simple. I believe in exposing fraud. When a candidate says his #1 accomplishment in Texas was the educational improvement, and all the accomplishments that were listed on the candidates website (except 1 which was insignificant) turn out to be bogus, we should expose that information publicly.

You may not agree that there was fraud. But there is an extremely compelling case to be made that each of the points that were made by Bush on his website were misleading and that the truth is closer to "nothing happened." The RAND report was just a single instance of that. See this page for details on each of Bush's educational claims that were on his site and what I found when I looked at the details.

The point is not whether my analysis is "right." I'm sure we could do a separate thread on each claim that was made. The point is that when I researched it, that's what I found. I was appalled.

So I spent money to expose what I had found so that people can weigh the evidence, do their own research, and make up their own mind.

For example, have you seen anywhere else where there is an analysis of each of Bush's educational claims that were on his site? I haven't. That's why I created the analysis and that's why I spent the money.

You then get to decide whether you believe what I found (you can do the same research I did and I'd bet you'd find the same thing I did), or you can just believe what you are told by the Bush campaign or from some other source.

So I was someone who found something that looked like political deception, did some research that the press didn't do (such as talking to authors of both RAND reports), and put out the facts for people to decide for themselves which "facts" they want to believe.

I don't have anything personal against Bush. Even though I thought Gore was a better choice than Bush, I would have investigated Gore if I had read something that would have led me to suspect that the #1 issue of the Gore's campaign was untrue. If someone had evidence that Gore's #1 campaign issue (and what Gore said was the #1 issue in America today) was untrue AND if that information was NOT publicly known at the time I received that information, then I would have investigated Gore. That never happened, and to this day, hasn't happened.

It appears my conclusions have merit. For example,

• I've pointed out that the attack on Klein's paper from the most credible source is full of holes and raises more questions than it answers. So my expenditure to educate people on why the second RAND report was an accurate picture of what was going on in Texas was justified.
• I've pointed out that the reasons I believed that Gore won Florida is supported both by statistical analyses which have not been discredited, as well as through polls of the American public which revealed that more people believe Gore won Florida than Bush. Hence, my expenditures on behalf of Gore to fund his legal bills was justified.
• I've pointed out the reasons I believed certain Florida voters were not entitled to receive absentee ballots, yet did so in violation of the law as written. I supported those legal efforts as well. I was surprised by the court's decision on the interpretation of the law because the implications are quite interesting. They essentially ruled that all the provisions of Florida election law are merely advisory (because the statutes never use the word "essential"), and interpreted the words "MUST HAVE" as if it were written "SHOULD HAVE." I stand by the statues as written. To me, "must" is not a word that means the same as "optional." Unfortunately, the Florida courts interpret the English language differently that me (and to everyone else in Florida as well INCLUDING the perpetrators thought it meant MUST since they went to great lengths to fill in the information that the courts said were optional)

As far as why I put money into this effort instead of funding education in my local community or other causes, that's pretty easy to answer. I fund a wide variety of causes. This was one of them. I didn't fund this to the exclusion of other things. However, this was an important expenditure because I think the highest leverage decision we can all make as people is who we pick as President.

While you may not agree with my conclusions or my reasoning, many people did and found my research valuable. This page was not written to try to persuade you to my point of view, but only to explain things like why I picked on Bush and not Gore, why I donated to money to fund legal battles to determine who prevailed under the legal process, etc.

Steve Kirsch Political Home Page