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Appeals Court to Reconsider Recall Postponement "Nearly half a million people have voted in this election and they are naturally concerned about what will happen to their votes," Shelley said today. "In addition, state and county election officials have spent nearly $50 million, and there are at least 2 million absentee ballots in the mail on their way to voters." In their brief, lawyers for the ACLU argued that the ruling lined up with the 2000 Supreme Court decision in Bush vs. Gore, and that the delay would be in the best interest of not only the voters in the counties in question, but also those serving overseas who have not filled out absentee ballots. Earlier this week, Los Angeles County Registrar-Recorder Conny McCormack warned the federal court that putting off the vote could cause widespread confusion and ballot errors -- precisely the problems the judges said they were trying to avoid when they ordered the election postponed. "I have every confidence" that the election "can and will be administered fairly and effectively in the county of Los Angeles using the punch card voting system," McCormack wrote in a letter to the 9th Circuit. In Californian, election officials and candidates continued their preparations and campaigns this week as if the election was to be on Oct. 7. Gov. Gray Davis appeared today in Los Angeles with former Vice President Al Gore, wrapping up a week of campaigning with prominent Democrats. The morning event, billed as a voter registration drive, was the first of two stops for the duo: both were also scheduled to host a similar forum in San Francisco this afternoon. At the morning event, Gore urged voters not to let the recall become another Florida, saying that no one should be able to "overturn the say of the people." Davis echoed those comments, and added that the former vice president was the perfect person to be campaigning on his behalf because "what's happening in California really began when they tried to impeach Bill Clinton." "Al Gore should have been president of the United States and nobody can speak with more clarity as to what the Republicans are doing around the country to overturn legitimate elections they lost the first time around," the governor said. He added, though, that the recall should be resolved as soon as possible -- a change from earlier comments that suggested he would prefer it be postponed until March. "My attitude is, let's just get it over with, let's just have this election on Oct. 7, put this recall behind us so we can get on with governing the state of California," he said. Republican State Sen. Tom McClintock was in the Inland Empire today, hoping to gain support at a rally in San Bernardino against the recent tripling of car taxes. Later in the day, he was scheduled to visit a manufacturing facility in Ontario, and this evening, the senator was to speak at an Inland Valley Republican Assembly Dinner in Etiwanda. And independent candidate Arianna Huffington attended what her campaign called an "environmental breakfast" at the Coalition for Clean Air in Santa Monica this morning, then was to go on "CNN en Espanol" in the afternoon. Republican front runner Arnold Schwarzenegger had no events scheduled for today, but did release a statement praising the court's decision.
"This election doesn't begin on October 7th -it's occurring right now," he said. "Hundreds of thousands of Californians have
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