This is all highly amusing. Not only the debate about the 1996 championship, but the split championship in 1997 betw. Michigan and Nebraska was supposed to be remedied by the BCS championship. Politics were supposed to be eliminated by the addition of computer rankings and strength of schedule, yadda, yadda....
But now, becuase of the BCS, we have coaches and writers purposefully voting for a #4 team to leapfrog two others into the #2 spot for what purpose? To eliminate controversy, but causing more in the process.
Ironic, isn't it, that by trying to eliminate politics in college football, the solution is more of the same but under a guise of legitimacy. It just goes to show you that no matter how many people vote for something, a majority cannot create the truth, no matter how many people want to think they believe Florida is really the #2 team in the country.
Hell, take a vote to disallow Michigan in the title game, I really don't care, but don't purposefully vote a team into #2 if they don't deserve it and you really only do it to solve a problem of logistics.
That being said, I really don't think Michigan should be in the title game. They blew their chance, USC lost their chance, and Florida earned the chance. It will be interesting, though, if OSU manhandles Florida 42-3 and Michigan beats USC, to see which team ends up #2 in the final poll of the season.
The only way to solve this is to split the country into 2 leagues and have the west #1 play the east #1 at the end of the year. Eliminating writers and coaches from the polls and going by records and strength of schedules is the only true way to guage rankings, not this bullshit voting.