Sore losers

In the weeks and months leading up to the midterm elections, liberal activists were busy sowing the media field with warnings about Diebold’s sinister voting machines. Watch out, they said. If Democrats didn’t take at least one chamber of Congress, it would be because Republicans rigged the machines. HBO even aired a documentary on the Diebold machines that basically made the United States look like Saddam Hussein’s Iraq when it came to voting integrity.

Guess what? The Democrats swept, and nary a word about the heretofore demonic machines. Suddenly, the United States was the envy of the democratic world — except in Florida’s 13th Congressional District, where Republican Vern Buchanan edged out Democrat Christine Jennings by a mere 369 votes. The Jennings camp has sued, asking a state judge to order a new election, because in Sarasota County some 18,000 voters didn’t cast a ballot in the congressional race. There are many possible explanations for the higher-than-average “undervotes,” but in conspiracy land, it’s all Diebold’s fault, no doubt helped by some wicked Republican election supervisor.

Only Diebold didn’t make the machines. Electronic Systems and Software Inc. did. This has forced the “netroots” over at DailyKos.com and other left-wing blogs to alter their theory a bit into a case where the machines malfunctioned on their own without the manufacturer doing any tampering. No explanation yet on why malfunctioning voting machines only ever help Republicans. They do have their wicked election supervisor, however — Kathy Dent of Sarasota County — and the smear campaign against her has only just begun.

No one would begrudge a candidate a recount request in a campaign decided by less than 400 votes. That recount has taken place, and Mrs. Jennings has come up short. Moreover, the state is conducting its own independent audit on the voting machines, as it should. But unfortunately Mrs. Jennings has given in to interest groups like People for the American Way and the ACLU and their blogging peers, who, it appears, cry foul when a Democrat loses by a small margin.

This leaves the question of why the same folks see nothing wrong with the many other elections that were decided by fewer than the 18,000 or so votes. Oh, right, because a Democrat won most of those.