Voter Fraud?

 

This is an issue I have not been very smart on, but I am getting up to speed as fast as I can. I still have quite a bit to understand. My learning started during the Bush v Gore Supreme Court decision in 2000. From this decision I learned two very important lessons - first, EVERY vote count as the margin of victory was razor thin and second, every vote has to be cast in a legal and proper way.

 

In fact, during the very lengthy recount leading up to the Supreme Court decision, many on the Left had a new mantra - "Make every vote count". I stood arm in arm with them on that issue - with one small exception. I added the word "legal" between every and vote. In fact, I am still saying it today. It pains me after the exercise this country went through in 2000 to define what is a real vote, a valid vote, we seemed to have had problems in every election since. 

 

Although many of us in Minnesota are still smarting from the recount of the 2008 Senate race, this first big voter issue since 2000 happened in Washington state in 2004. The election for governor of Washington in November, 2004 gained national attention for its legal twists and extremely close finish. Notable for being among the closest political races in United States election history, the Republican was declared the winner in the initial automated count and again in the subsequent automated recount. It wasn't until after the third count, a second recount done by hand, that the Democrat took the lead by a margin of 129 votes. The Republican Party filed a lawsuit contesting the election, but the trial judge ruled against it, citing lack of evidence of deliberate electoral sabotage.

Think about this. With 2.7 million voters in Washington state, the margin of victory was 129 votes. The first two counts going to the Republicans and the manual recount going to the Democrats. As important as it is to count every vote, it is more important to count (the right way) every LEGAL vote. The debate will continue on this one and chances are we will never know the truth.

As close as the Washington 2004 election was, it was just a warm up to what happened in Minnesota Senate election in 2008.  After a legal battle lasting over eight months, Al Franken defeated Republican incumbent Norm Coleman in one of the  closest elections in the history of the Senate.
 
When the initial count was completed on November 18,  2004,Franken was trailing Coleman by 215 votes. This close margin triggered a mandatory recount.  After reviewing ballots that had been challenged during the recount and counting 953 wrongly rejected absentee ballots, the official certified the recount results with Franken holding a 225-vote lead. On January 6, 2009, Coleman's campaign filed an election contest and on April 13, a three-judge panel dismissed Coleman's Notice of Contest and ruled that Franken had won the election by 312 votes.

Again with over 2.8 million people voting in 2008, the margin of victory was only 312 votes. As in Washington governor race in 2004, the Republican led up until the recounts and then lost. Since the election, much post event vetting has been done. For example, it has been PROVEN that 1,100 felons voted. Whether you agree or disagree that felons have the right to vote, current law in Minnesota dictates they do not. Unscientific sampling on felons have been done asking voter preferences - over 90% said they would vote Democratic. In addition, other aspects of voter irregularities are still being investigated by private concerns. The election is over, the results will not be overturned, but lessons can still be learned.

Finally, the most recent was the 2010 Minnesota Governor race. Again, another very close race with a recount. Many were still smarting from the 2008 senate election as suspicions of fraud had already surfaced.  An automatic ballot recount occurred, as Mark Dayton's lead over Tom Emmer was less than one half of one percent. Even though the margin of victory was not as close as the 2000, 2004, and 2008 elections, it was still close as it was just a few thousand votes.

However, consider the following as it relates to the Minnesota 2008 and 2010 elections.
In late 2006 George Soros backed the Secretary of State project (SOS). SOS was founded to make sure that liberals and progressives, instead of conservatives, oversee key elections (which includes recounts). In 2009, Matthew Vadum of The American Spectator said  “A group backed by Soros is gearing up to steal the 2012 election for President Obama and congressional Democrats by installing left-wing Democrats as secretaries of state across the nation - from such posts, secretaries of state can help tilt the electoral playing field.”

The SOS project gave Minnesota Mark Ritchie. Once elected, Ritchie later oversaw the recount between Democrat comedian Al Franken and Republican Norm Coleman, which eventually led to Franken being elected despite voter irregularities. Investors Business Daily reports, “Under Ritchie’s supervision, it was decided which ballots would be counted, which would be discarded, and how and when recounts would occur. That helps when we now know that more felons voted illegally in that race than the margin of Franken’s victory, and felons, it has been determined, tend to support Democrats.” In addition, Mark Ritchie was in charge of the recount between Mark Dayton and Tom Emmer.

Between ACORN, SOS, and other lax voter standards, the chances for voter fraud is high in many states, including Minnesota. VOTER ID IS THE BEST WAY TO HELP STOP ANY CHANCE OF VOTER FRAUD. With the 2012 elections right around the corner, we need to ensure that every LEGAL vote counts. We also need to closely monitor any Secretary of State which was part of the SOS project to ensure close elections are adjudicated fairly. Lax standards already gave us ObamaCare - lets make sure that was the end of the line.