What about stolen gubernatorial elections?

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That's of some concern. When the hand-picked, ultra conservative, right
wing judge from the most pro-Republican county in Washington state
threw Dino Rossi and the Republicans out the courthouse door and into
the street yesterday, he was careful to note that he based his ruling
on applicable state laws. (Don't you hate that? Shouldn't he have taken
an "activist" stance and handed the decision to his cronies?) While the
judge concluded that statewide there were about 1800 illegal votes,
(out of almost three million), the only evidence presented in court
showing any candidate benefitted from any of those votes indicated that
four of the 1800 had voted for Dino Rossi, and there was no other
evidence presented by either side to indicate how the remaining
0.00000005% (or whatever) actually voted. The judge had no legal choice
except to recognize that the probability that all those illegal voters
had voted for Gregoire was no higher than the probability that they had
all voted for Rossi. Any other conclusion would be based on a guess,
not evidence.

There was no evidence submitted that showed how many of the illegal
voters, if any, even cast a vote in the governor's race on the general
election ballot. A certain percentage of voters in WA voted for
candidates runing for POTUS and little or nothing else last November.

However, the Republicans carried the day in an important sense. Having
narrowly lost the election by a riculously tiny margin, the only thing
the GOP could hope to do would be taint the Democrats with rumors and
claims of criminal conspiracies. They have had an additional seven
months after the election to keep their scandalous headlines, absurd
accusations, etc, in the public eye. Rossi shrewdly threw in the towel
after yesterday's ruling and rebuke by Judge Bridges; the State Supreme
Court is more liberal than Judge Bridges, and by law neither party can
introduce any new evidence (in other words, correct the errors of their
first case) during an appeal. Carrying the fight forward from here
would taint Rossi as a "sore loser" and damage his future political
prospects. Among the die-hard Republicans, Rossi still enjoys a lot of
support and he will have a leg-up in early contributions and
organization should he decide to run for public office in the future.
(Watch out, Senator Cantwell)

You probably aren't aware of this, down in FLA, but earlier this year
the Repubs trotted out a long list of very specific charges of fraud
and criminal activity they claimed swung the election to Gregoire.
Funny thing- not one of those truly outrageous charges actually came up
in the courtroom. They didn't come up in court because when the
Republicans were deposed in pre-trail precedings they declined to
repeat *under oath* the same charges they were planting in the
newspapers and on talk radio. Why do you suppose that would be? (hint,
becuase they weren't based on fact) While the charges were never
presented in court, they continue to circulate on right wing radio
shows, etc.

Politics as usual. And too bad. That's the main reason I'm an
independent, rather than a straight ticket voter.