You cahn’t get theyah from heeah.
You might have noticed the screwed up GOP primary in Maine, the one where a Ron Paulish district didn’t get to vote on time because of three-inches of snow. You may recall the Iowa Republican Party declared Romney its winner before it went back and named Rick Santorum the actual winner. And incidentally, eight precincts votes were lost and not counted.
The latest in a number of GOP primary irregularities has happened in Michigan, where, contrary to its own rules,
“the Michigan Republican Party voted Wednesday night to award its two at-large delegates to the statewide winner instead of dividing up proportionally, as we (and even the Michigan GOP chairman at one time) had assumed. That move gave Romney a 16-14 delegate edge in the state instead of a 15-15 tie, and it has produced a firestorm of controversy.
It’s sort of an odd coincidence, every screw up tilting in the direction of Mitt Romney. If Santorum and Romney had split the delegates in Michigan, the contest would have looked much more like a tie (or a loss) for its native son.
Maine was so screwed up that it would be hard to know who won. Washington County had yet to vote in the Republican caucus when Romney was declared the winner. For some reason (three inches of snow, I think) the GOP leadership in the county decided to hold the caucus after the stated deadline. That caucus was eventually held and Ron Paul garned 83 votes, though Romney still holds the lead 156 more votes. Voter suppression–intentional or not–wasn’t the only problem in Maine. Some communities, such as Waterville, which has voted before the deadline but were not counted at all in the results that named Romney the winner. Part of the problem was some tallies that were emailed into GOP headquarters were lost to–wait for it–the spam folder:
Maine Republican Party chairman Charlie Webster has admitted that the state party made numerous clerical errors in counting the state’s caucus results — even omitting some votes because emails reporting tallies “went to spam” in an email account.
However, Webster insisted that the errors did not change the outcome.
The GOP might not be stealing elections from its voters. Iowa could have been an honest mistake. Maine could have been the result of Bert & I failing to manage the complex details of an election. And Michigan, well, Romney won there, didn’t he? It might be hard to make a case for actual fraud, however, there’s at least a prima facie case for the GOP making sure Romney as much as he can from the primary season
Caucuses, it should be said, are a freakin’ disaster waiting to happen. They increase the feeling of direct democracy and the opportunity for shenanigans. In Nevada, Romney was declared the victor “based on results from the rest of the state and entrance polls conducted by major media organizations.” The candidates left the state, though only 70% of the vote had been tallied. Romney was the winner by far, but could the process be any more of a joke?
