JohnDubYa said:
Bob, I just think you are overlooking the psychology of a delay. During the time before the results are announced both sides develop paranoia that the other side is pulling strings to swing the counts their way. I think the votes need to be counted and announced as soon as possible.
Yes, but the three choices are:
1) Delays in the election with either a) no definite end in sight or b) the possibility of conducting the election under the same conditions as if you held them at their originally scheduled date.
2) Hold the elections as scheduled, but dilute the impact of the terrorists threat by delaying the release of the results.
3) Hold the elections using standard procedure. Rely on voters to ignore the impact their vote may have on the hostages' lives and vote solely based on their opinions of the candidates.
Diluting the threat is going to be the most you get out option 2. People notoriously have trouble making decisions based on unknown variables - "Do I vote for Kerry just in case they don't resolve the crisis by the deadline? Then my vote was a waste if they do resolve the crisis. Do I vote for Bush and hope they do resolve the crisis? What if they don't?" There's too many variables and uncertainties to make a choice based solely on the hostages - it's easier to vote the way you originally intended and put the responsibility for rescuing the hostages on someone else. It doesn't entirely eliminate the effect of the crisis, but it makes the effect very, very low.
And, of course, the votes are counted immediately. All the elections, local, state, and federal, are conducted on the same ballot. It's harder not to count them than to count them.
State election officials know the result, can make recount decisions based on them, but can't release the results. Florida officials know the results in Florida, Oregon officials know the results in Oregon, Oklahoma officials know the results in Oklahoma. No one knows the overall totals.
Will the results leak out? If you want to preserve the ability to conduct elections in similar situations in the future, you have to consider leaking the results the equivalent of leaking the plans for D-Day - it's tantamount to treason.
Will they leak out anyway? Personally, I think people take their duties seriously enough that there's less than a 50% chance. That's not exactly great, but you don't need a 100% success rate to maintain credibility. Leaked results have to be kept to 2 or 3 states at a maximum in order to maintain the credibility of re-using this option in the future. Individuals who leak results need to be discovered quickly and the punishment has to be similar to that for treason (the death penalty would be overly extreme, but at least conceivable if it results in the immediate death of the hostages). Media that publish the leaks are fined into bankruptcy (the fine depends upon the size of the market the newspaper or television station/network serves). Television/radio stations publishing the leaks immediately have their FCC license revoked - newspapers have their equipment impounded. Obviously, not all judges will refrain from granting a restraining order, but it doesn't take that high of a percentage of denied restraining orders to raise the risk for a television network or newspaper publisher to unacceptable levels (considering the circumstances, I think judges would be more likely to see this as the equivalent of publishing the D-Day plans than as a First Amendment issue).
Are you so stuck in the past that you've never heard of the Internet? Who first blew CBS's Bush story out of the water? If you were transmitting a radio signal, and someone else were transmitting on the same frequency, neither of you would have much success in getting your message through. The Internet is already a noisy place. Extra noise intentionally injected into the system would make actual leaks indistinguishable from the overall noise level. To be honest, making 'noise' available to major newspapers and television networks would also make actual leaks worthless, but that would be entrapment (how could the media possibly resist?)