How to Steal an Election: The Inside Story of How George Bush's Brother and FOX Network Miscalled the 2000 Election and Changed the Course of History

This is a brisk but comprehensive overview of the 2000 election. Despite the inherently democratic bias of the what the book is asserting, the book never comes off as whining and references are plenty. One of the author's main points is that the Fox News channel prematurely called Florida for Bush, and all of the other networks blindly followed suit to avoid being the only network to not have this information. Hours later it was clear the state was too close to call for either candidate, but because all of the networks had called Florida and thus the entire election for Bush, Gore's later contentions were perceived as those of a "loser" trying to overturn a result in his favor, when in fact the reality of the situation was that Bush had never "won" the state to begin with. Had the state never been called, the perception would have been that Florida would simply require some extra time to be tallied and there wouldn't have been the same sort of "Sore Loserman" public backlash to Gore's recount efforts. It's pretty convincing stuff. Where the author failed to convince me of though was that the "Bushies" made a concious effort to "steal" the election. The author describes what happened as George Bush's cousin John Ellis being encouraged by Florida governor Jeb Bush to call the state. This, of course, turned out to be foolish, but ultimately FOX was sticking their neck out in the call. The author's tone suggests that this was some grand scheme planned out from the beginning, that the Bushies somehow knew exactly how the scenario would play out and that their move would turn public opinion against Gore. Ultimately though, this was a compelling book and at less than 150 pages, worth anyone's time.