No Winner: What Happens If the Election is Close

It was 1:30 a.m. and CBS still wasn't ready to call Ohio's 20 electoral votes, or the presidential election, for George W. Bush. In Washington, Karl Rove was already declaring victory. But unlike 2000, when Al Gore almost conceded before it was clear that Florida deserved a recount, the Democrats were not rolling over this time.

For a while in November 2004, it looked like the counting could go on for weeks. As expected, Bush had swept the southern and mountain states, while John Kerry carried most of the two coasts. The President was leading in the popular vote, but neither candidate could claim the required electoral college majority.

As it emerged that Ohio might be the new Florida, ABC's Cokie Roberts complained, "This could be the worst of all possible worlds." She meant the prospect of extended litigation. Bush was ahead, but the Democrat were challenging Republican tactics and holding out for the counting of provisional ballots, a process that could take at least a week. Republican operatives called the tactic "bizarre, absurd, and ludicrous." This year they may copy it.

Commenting on the high 2004 turnout, George Will offered a disquieting Vietnam analogy. "When we have high turnout we tend to be an unhappy country," he argued, then adding that 1968 "was one of the worst years in US history. It ran up turnout, but I don't think we want to do that constantly."

State ballot initiatives were also influential, mainly bringing out social conservatives who tended to back Bush. Items calling for the rejection of same-sex marriage passed convincingly in 11 states; of these, nine went for Bush. In this sense, 2016 will be very different. The marriage debate is basically over, but five states will vote on recreational marijuana; another four will choose whether to permit its medical use. Four states are also voting to raise the minimum wage, and three will decide on background checks for gun buyers.

Still, one dynamic has stayed very much the same. It remains a closely divided electorate. As Chris Matthews put it in 2004, "It's an election between north and south that will be decided by the Midwest."

Using CNN's new high-tech wall of graphics, Jeff Greenfield posed various scenarios, including the possibility of a 269-269 tie. That prospect, an irresistible storyline that has emerged again this year, lingered into the night. Would the House of Representatives end up choosing the President? And if something like that happened now, who would the GOP-dominated House choose?

As the night wore on, speculation began to pass for fact. Shortly after 1 a.m., MSNBC announced that Bush was only one electoral vote shy of victory, while Kerry would have to win every remaining state to reach a tie. Actually, Bush had substantially fewer electors tied up at that point. The desire for an exciting story had eclipsed pre-election promises of caution.

By dawn the next morning, Bush actually had 254 electoral votes to Kerry's 252. That left Iowa and New Mexico, two states where Bush was clinging to a slim lead, and Ohio, where the likelihood of a Kerry victory looked slim. Kerry conceded by early afternoon. If something similar happens this time, no one expects either candidate to say uncle.

Whatever the outcome, there will be deep suspicions and lingering claims of fraud and manipulation. That certainly happened in 2004, when claims of cyber-warfare surfaced after the vote. The difference now is Trump, who will use any opening or legal option to win, or else challenge the legitimacy of the election.

Jeb's Dark Alliances: Bush, Batista & the Contras

Over the years various researchers and investigations have suggested, even asserted at times, that as Vice President George Bush, along with some of his national security advisers, maintained close ties with a secret air-re-supply operation in El Salvador during the Reagan years. In October 1986, a week after the Nicaraguan government shot down a plane carrying supplies for the Contras, front page press reports actually announced that the operation led to both the CIA and Bush.

When it was revealed that Contra resupply project Chief Felix Rodriguez met several times with Bush and a key aide, the VP claimed they didn't discuss Nicaragua. That actually worked! But here's where it gets really interesting: the trail also led to the vice president’s son, Jeb. According to the Manchester Guardian, Jeb Bush “long acted as a liaison man with the fiercely pro-Contra, anti-Cuban and Nicaraguan settlers in Miami.”

Yes, this is the Republican "establishment choice" for 2016.

When the Iran-contra scandal began to break in October 1986, mainstream sources like CBS Evening News and the Miami Herald quoted unnamed officials as saying that Jeb Bush had served as his father’s chief point of contact with the contra rebels. Jeb’s denials were narrow. He didn't deny being his father’s liaison to the contras, only the idea that he had participated "directly" in the illegal contra resupply effort directed from the White House.

And yet, like Keyser Soze, such stories just vanished. George Bush, by then heir apparent to Reagan, was insulated from probing questions as he campaigned for president for the next two years. The one person who connected the CIA, NSA and the mercenary forces on the ground. Instead of being investigated he became president.

Robert Parry, an Associated Press reporter who investigated the Reagan-Bush administration’s secret support for the Contras, confirms Jeb Bush’s association with Contra supporters operating out of Miami. More recently, he recalled that one Nicaraguan businessman with close ties to both Jeb and the Contras told Parry that Jeb Bush was involved with a pro-Contra mercenary named Tom Posey, who was organizing groups of military advisers and weapons shipments. In 1988, Posey was indicted along with several other individuals on charges of violating the Neutrality Act and firearms laws. The charges were dismissed in 1989 when a federal judge ruled that the US was not "at peace" with Nicaragua.

Jeb was also integral in securing a number of “pardons” of Cubans involved in terrorist acts. A prominent example was his intervention to help release Cuban terrorist Orlando Bosch from prison and grant him US residency. A notorious figure, Bosch was convicted of firing a rocket at a Polish ship en route to Cuba and was implicated in many other acts of terrorism, including the 1976 mid-air bombing of a Cubana Airlines plane, which killed 73 civilians.

The Cubana Airlines bombing and several other major acts of terrorism by Cuban right-wingers occurred while George H.W. Bush was CIA director and was working closely with anti-communist Cuban exiles employed by the CIA, including Rodriguez, a close associate of Bosch’s alleged co-conspirator in the Cubana bombing Luis Posada Carriles.

Bosch’s release, often called a pardon by media, was the result of pressure by hardline Cubans in Miami -- with Jeb Bush as their point man. In July 2002, while he was Florida’s governor, Bush nominated Raoul Cantero, grandson of Cuba's deposed dictator Batista, as a Florida supreme court judge despite his lack of experience. Cantero had previously represented Bosch and acted as his spokesman, once describing Bosch on Miami radio as a "great Cuban patriot.”

Cuba Confidential: Love and Vengeance in Miami and Havana recounts that in 1984 Jeb “began a close association with Camilo Padreda, a former intelligence agent under the Batista dictatorship, overthrown by Fidel Castro. Jeb was then the chairman of the Dade county Republican party and Padreda its finance chairman.” Later, Padreda was convicted of defrauding the housing and urban development department of millions of dollars.

With baggage like this, it's hard to imagine Bush making it through the race -- or just the primaries -- without opening up his shady past. And as for improving relations with Cuba, at least Trump would just want his name on a casino.