In Opinion/4
Wednesday
November 15,2000
Volume 100
Issue 60
dailyneb.com
Since 1901
Daily Nebraskan
i werem nspirea uy enner
canddate? No. Columnist Jake
has been playing with a
hurt shoulder
In SportsWednesday/10
Through triumphs and
tragedies: 100 years of
UNL theater
lnArts/5
Election still too close to call after 5p.m. deadline
f,W
After a recount deadline
expired in Florida Tuesday,
this is how the results stood.
Legal challenges from Al Gore
and George W. Bush were expected.
VI Bush
P| Gore
Source: The Miami Herald
—
Melanie Falk/DN
International students
ponder election chaos
BY GEORGE GREEN
America’s recount-ridden and
lawsuit-happy election has bewil
dered the international commu
nity, some UNL international stu
dents said.
A few countries are even
laughing out loud at what they
call American foolishness.
'Rrnya Lloyd, a math graduate
student from the Bahamas, said
the past week of election action
has been cluttered with confusing
information.
Lloyd said she didn’t even
know the president was chosen
by an Electoral College before the
controversy arose.
But Lloyd said watching the
political battle twist and turn has
been interesting.
"I am excited to see the
Democratic system work,” she
said.
In the Bahamas, people are
definitely watching to see who
will emerge from the political tan
gles with a victory, she said.
Zoe Ward, a junior marketing
major from England, echoed
Lloyd’s feelings of confusion.
In her country, Ward said, the
election system is much more
concrete and easier to follow.
A system that sometimes
doesn't produce conclusive
Please see FOREIGN on 3
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
BYTHE ASSOCIATED PRESS
One week into America’s election limbo,
Florida counties officially reported their
presidential votes after a state judge upheld
Tuesday’s deadline, even as thousands of
disputed ballots were counted into the
night at A1 Gore’s behest
“When is it going to end?” asked Bush
aide James A. Baker III.
There was no answer in sight
Baker floated a proposal to cease the
ballot-by-ballot fight for the White House,
but Democrats said he offered nothing new
- and dismissed it outright. With lawyers
and judges front and center in the presiden
tial election, nerves began to fray and adjec
tives Med to serve.
"It’s like the seventh day of being held
hostage,” stammered Jeb Bush, governor of
Florida and the harried brother of the GOP
presidential hopeful.
The latest margin for Bush was 286
votes, according to an unofficial AP tally.
Judge Terry Lewis ruled that counties
could file new vote totals after the state’s 5
p.m. Hiesday deadline to certify ballots. He
gave Secretary of State Katherine Harris, a
Bush supporter, authority to reject or
approve them using “the proper exercise
and discretion.”
It was a setback for the vice president,
who wanted a clear order lifting the Hiesday
deadline, but his lawyers found solace in
ruling language urging Harris to consider
“all appropriate facts and circumstances”
Gore decided to hold off an appeal and
press forward with recounts in four
Democratic-leaning counties. He hopes
Harris will approve the hand-counted bal
lots and is prepared to appeal if not
Officials in Volusia County pledged an
appeal, saying they needed more time to
complete their hand recount.
“If the secretary of state arbitrarily refus
es to accept the amended returns based on
the recount and violates what this court has
ruled... which is to accept those results
unless she has good reason not to, then we
will be back in court,” said a new member of
Gore’s massive legal team, David Boies.
A lawyer for Harris said if updated totals
“If the secretary of state
arbitrarily refuses to accept
the amended returns based
on the recount and violates
what this court has ruled...
which Its to accept those
results unless she has good
reason not to, then we will
be back in court.”
David Boies
A1 Gore legal-team member
are submitted after Tuesday's deadline, “it is
then in her discretion to consider all the
facts and circumstances and she will cer
tainly do that” The spokeswoman, Donna
Blanton, said the outcome of the statewide
election should be known on Saturday,
when all overseas absentee ballots have
been counted.
But she left open the issue that could
determine who becomes the nation’s 43rd
president - offering no definitive guidance
on the fate of hand recounts in progress in
scattered counties at Gore’s request
The race tumbled to the courts after a
statewide machine recount trimmed Bush’s
lead from 1,784 votes to a few hundred,
prompting Gore to push for painstaking
manual recounts and Bush to fight them in
courts of law and public opinion.
Officials in two counties tabulated bal
lots by hand Tuesday, with action in two
other jurisdictions pending.
With the razor-thin lead in ballots
counted so far, Baker said presidential can
didate Bush would accept the results of
manual recounts collected by close of busi
ness Tuesday and the overseas absentee
ballots due in Friday. Both sides would also
drop their dueling lawsuits, Baker said.
Bush and Gore were lying low. Gore
called for calm on Monday but declined to
field reporters’ questions. Bush monitored
the legal fight from his ranch in Texas for a
third straight day and is expected to talk to
journalists today.
Omaha Tribe
language
classes offered
BY VERONICA DAEHN _
To make amends with American Indians and to
reach out to native communities in the state, UNLIs
anthropology department is offering a class in the
Omaha language.
Not only is this the first Omaha-language class
taught at the University of Nebraska-Iincoln, it’s also
the first class in the language taught at a land-grant
university.
Robert Hitchcock, chairman of the anthropology
department when the class was scheduled last year,
said there had been concern the university wasn’t
doing enough for native people.
In the spring of 1998, American-Indian remains
were found in 109 Bessey Hall. They were supposed to
have been cleared from the room, but a year later,
more remains were found.
Kail Reinhard, then associate professor of anthro
pology, was accused of illegally storing and studying
J the remains. Ttoo separate investigations, carried out
by the Nebraska State Patrol and university-hired
attorney Robert Grimit, exonerated Reinhard.
Reinhard has since moved to UNL's School of
Natural Resource sciences.
Hitchcock said the class offering was only partly
to help make amends with American Indians over the
bones issue.
It's important for the class to be taught in the
anthropology department instead of in modem lan
guages because anthropologists work a lot with
native people, Hitchcock said.
The modern languages department offered a
class in the Lakota Sioux language a couple of years
ago. But when the professor retired, a replacement
couldn't be found, and the program folded.
Since, there has been pressure to do more with in
state, native languages, Hitchcock said.
There is a heavy population of Lakota people in
Please see OMAHA on 7
More than 75
people line the
Capitol steps at
noon Tuesday to
support the
right for
Palestinians to
return to
Palestine. The
president of the
UNL Muslim
Student
Association,
Ahmad Ismail,
and other sup
porters spoke
during the rally,
giving accounts
of the violence
in their home
land.
NateWagner/DN
Rally calls for increased involvement in Mideast
BY CHARLIE KAUFFMAN
To raise public awareness of the plight of
Palestinians, more than 50 members of Lincoln's
Arab community held a demonstration outside the
Capitol on Tuesday.
“The main purpose is to show the public our
side of it, to get them involved," said Ahmad Ismail,
President of UNL’s Muslim Student Association.
“It's our duty to inform the people."
Ismail said the situation in the Middle East has
been an open war for some time, and Palestinians
are not equipped to fight against the military might
of Israel.
His views were echoed in the signs the demon
strators carried, whose messages included:
“Defenseless Palestinians Under Bombardment,”
“Zionism = Racism” and “Stop Killing our
Children.”
Ismail said the Israeli government has not
i
taken the necessary steps for peace, and it s up to
the rest of the world to re-initiate the peace
process.
“The best thing that can be done is some pres
sure from the international community,” Ismail
said. “The Palestinians are willing to defend their
rights, but they cannot stand up for themselves.”
Ismail said only after the public has been made
aware of the situation can they lend their support
to the cause.
Some tiring
of media's
race coverage
BYJILLZEMAN
It’s hard to ignore this year’s presidential elec
tion with updates’ overtaking the front pages of
newspapers and breaking news bulletins’ inter
rupting television shows.
Many University of Nebraska-Lincoln students
join the rest of the world in their new-found addic
tion to election news, but others are ready for
things to get back to normal.
Junior biochemistry major Erick Kinyungu
said although he supported Democrat A1 Gore, he
thought Gore should concede to Republican
George W. Bush.
“I feel it’s time for Gore to show his character,”
Kinyungu said. “It’s not like he’s admitting defeat.”
Gore can still focus on the 2004 presidential
race if he steps down, he said.
With the nation's focusing so heavily on who
the next president will be, none of the candidates
is speaking about issues anymore, Kinyungu said.
“It's all about the presidency now,” he said.
Jill Skradski, a junior art major, said because
the vote recounts in Florida have consistently
gone toward Bush, he should be the winner.
“We know who’s going to win,” she said.
Tedious, manual recounts will bring more
merit to whoever the winner is, she said.
Freshman art major Danielle Brady said she
originally supported Green Party candidate Ralph
Nader but has now swayed her support toward
Bush.
“(Gore) lost, and that’s all there is to it,” she
said.
The controversy has painted the candidates in
a negative light, said freshman art major Joe
Anderson.
Bush’s lawsuits and Gore’s calls for recounts
make both look bad, he said.
But a manual recount may not be the most
accurate way to check the votes, he said.
Please see REACTION on 3