(What was Secretary of State Ritchie's latest approval rating? 61%? Wonder where all the Republican attacks against the integrity of his tenure have gone... - promoted by Joe Bodell)
The title quotes Mike McIntee from The Uptake's coverage this morning of oral argument for Coleman's appeal to the state supreme court. McIntee was referring to Coleman lawyer Joe Friedberg's admission to the court that there was no voter or election fraud committed during the election or recount (whether there was fraud in doctoring copies of ballot envelopes is another issue). Rep. Laura Brod has been one of the Republicans pushing for photo IDs for voting. He could as well have said "Mary Kiffmeyer, are you listening?", since Rep. Kiffmeyer has also been pushing for photo IDs. She is the former secretary of state, defeated by Mark Ritchie in 2006, and part of Minnesota Majority, which has been pushing for photo IDs and fighting against IRV.
Election lawyer Christian Sande was helping McIntee with post-hearing coverage and reiterated that this election had been gone over incredibly thoroughly, yet no fraud was found. Let me add that is isn't just in this election that no fraud was found. Kiffmeyer had her two terms in office to go after voter fraud. So where is it?
Let's scale it up a bit.
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The Bush DOJ focused intensely on voter fraud. They had eight years in office. In 2002, every US Attorney had to designate a district election officer. What did they find? According to Harold Meyerson,
And yet between October 2002 and September 2005, just 38 cases were brought nationally, and of those, 14 ended in dismissals or acquittals, 11 in guilty pleas, and 13 in convictions. Though a Justice Department manual on election crime states that these cases "may present an easier means of obtaining convictions than do other forms of public corruption," federal attorneys have failed to rack up those convictions, for the simple reason that incidents of fraud have been few and far between.
Impressive. Tens of instances. Let's be generous and assume if the count covered the entire Bush administration, they might have managed a hundred convictions. That wouldn't even change the Franken/Coleman election.
And if anyone doubts how serious the DOJ was about finding voter fraud, remember that the reason for firing several of the USA's fired in Gonzogate was their refusal to pursue groundless charges of voter fraud.
As to the argument that Republicans would have supported the DFL's election reform bills if only they had included photo ID, it's nonsense. The proposed reforms didn't depend on each other. Photo ID wasn't necessary to move the date of the primary, any more than establishing early voting was a prerequisite to centralizing absentee ballot counting making registration at the time of applying for a driver's license opt-out instead of opt-in. Certainly makes it look like Republicans are more interested in an issue to use against the DFL than in fixing elections.
Well, OK, there was one instance of voter fraud, one felon who voted illegally. He was still on probation, and Minnesota requires felons to be finished with parole and probation before voting. He voted for Coleman, which is humorous under the circumstances, but he's also the exception that proves the rule. Voter fraud is really, really hard to get a away with, carries a serious penalty, and a small reward, which is not the normal formula for crime.
So unless your tin foil hat is screwed on really tight, to believe there's massive voter fraud, you have to believe hordes of people are risking stiff penalties and a high risk of being caught to cast one more ballot, and are able to escape detection despite intense efforts of the federal and state governments.
If you believe that, perhaps you can fill us in on how the moon landings were faked too. |
