Posted on 12/24/2004 4:08:32 PM PST by sionnsar
All Washington state wants for Christmas is a new governor.
Just when it seems as if Indecision 2004 could not get more serpentine, surreal or saddled with conspiracy theories, some monstrosity, like a fanged beast from an old black-and-white movie, jumps out.
The latest twist involves bloodsuckers with briefcases: lawyers.
Attorneys and political consultants are now scrambling after the results of a second recount yesterday gave Democrat Christine Gregoire a 130-vote edge. That margin appears to give her a decisive victory over Republican Dino Rossi in the closest and most bizarre governor's race in American history.
Legal shrieks and cries of electoral foul still threaten to make this marathon donnybrook the horror story that won't end.
After all, the election hasn't been certified, and the entire imbroglio could in a long shot reach the U.S. Supreme Court, a la Florida in the 2000 presidential election.
Meanwhile, state Republicans appear headed to court to try to validate ballots from other counties -- a last-ditch push to eke out votes. Never mind that those counties already certified their ballot results, effectively slamming the door.
The GOP's Hail Mary takes a page from the playbook of Democrats who successfully made the case that hundreds of mistakenly rejected ballots from King County should be counted. King County had not certified its ballot results, leaving a canyon of opportunity open.
Gregoire was down after the general election. She was down after the first recount. Now, she's on top, fortified by votes from King County, which happens to be the bluest county in the state.
Hmmm ...
This isn't really a case of the third time being the charm. Rather, in the cobra pit of politics an election is not over until your side spits venom every which way and slithers and slides to victory.
Little wonder Gregoire was in a slyly smug mood, suggesting that after this recent round of recounting she and Rossi should agree to live with the results.
Well, one is giddy to live with results when one is pretty much sizing the drapes in the governor's mansion. And it's easy to map out a moral high road -- as Gregoire was trying to do -- when you are all but ready to put both feet up on the big desk in Olympia.
Nothing but an infernal twist could cause Gregoire to lose this contest now.
But her all-but-assured win is no cause for whooping or hollering.
Rossi, who should swallow his pride and concede, has not had the stake driven in his heart. Regardless of whether the Supreme Court hears this election case, at this moment Rossi is morphing into something that will bestride Washington like a towering colossus:
Dino-zilla.
Rossi stands to become a mythic, elephantine figure in the GOP. Former Washington Gov. Dan Evans, a measured Republican, is among those hearing the potentially earth-shaking footsteps. A Gregoire victory, on the heels of so much nastiness, Evans predicts, will "create a rallying point for a lot of Republicans, independents and some Democrats."
It will fire up Republicans ticked off about being losers after having swished victory like a fine Walla Walla cabernet.
It will radicalize independents to see redder than red because they either believe Gregoire stole the election or they're fed up with decades of Democratic governors ruling the roost.
It will sway a fraction of Democrats to the political right who cannot stomach how Gregoire conducted herself in a fumbling campaign that was hers to lose.
The politico who stands to feel the wrath of Dino-zilla?
Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell, who is gearing up for re-election in 2006.
Consultants could convince Rossi a race against Cantwell is one he can win.
If not, Rossi could loom over Gov. Gregoire like that infamous giant fire-breathing lizard.
Rossi smiled at his 261-vote margin of victory over Gregoire following the general election. He held his breath after a machine recount shrunk the lead to 42.
Now he's behind. The guy who trumpeted himself as being an Olympia outsider is on the outs for real -- so much so he is stumbling over himself.
Earlier, Rossi blasted Gregoire, saying that recounting over and over "until you finally win" leads to an illegitimate governorship.
Yesterday, Rossi's spokeswoman said his camp will "be going across the state demanding they make every vote count."
If such a stunning reversal of fortune does not drive a person to madness or turn a candidate or political party into a rampaging monster of revenge, nothing will.
Washington got what it wanted in this season of giving and receiving.
The gift of a new governor has been unwrapped after we all got the chance to see what democracy looks like -- not pretty, it turns out.
But mark my words. This will be one gift that keeps giving, for better, for worse.
And our state store, as far as I can tell, has a strict policy of no returns.
Ha. I left him one of my "welcomes" an hour or two earlier, on some other thread. (I think I noted it on the Undead Thread...)
I hadn't heard that. Good point!
I agree -- bring back "Cedar County"!
Count every ballot. They finished counting them in King County, now count the rest of the state. Especially the Republican counties.
This is insane. Rossi won the general, and Rossi won the recount. That's it. Game over. You can't keep counting until your guy wins. Completely nuts.
I've been hearing about that. I would honestly like to work toward it...and I've been hearing that there will be a push for it once the election is settled.
People over here are getting fed up.
Good screen name. Sounds like the conservatives of Washington should load their own muskets and not let this stand. If there was ever a time for people take up arms it is now...in Washington.
The rule of law should prevail over the rule of black-robed judges.
The screwiest thing about this whole "decisive victory" is that when Rossi won the original count with 261, Gregoire and company, as well as the MSM referred to it as a "TIE".
I'm trying to do the math here, but logic, reason, and basic arithmetic tell me that 261 is more than twice as many as 130.
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OH, I get it!
A pubbie vote is worth 1 centiquadrillionth of a vote if the pubbie is winning.
A demoNrat vote is a "legitimate" vote, even if the marking is in the machine portion of the ballot and no mark is made anywhere else in that ballot section.
<< If Rossi keeps it up for too long, the Dems will be thinking about him the way we do about Gore. >>
"Dems" don't think.
Even being one is but the symptom of a psychosis.
And "DemocRATS" already feel about every Republican the way we think about the world's one-time most dangerous dullard, Al-fredo Gore-leone.
It's called psychopathological projection.
And is yet another symptom of their collective psychosis.
We Republicans will allow this overt election FRaud to stand only at the peril of the body of Law upon which our nation is founded and must forever stand!
Please. Rossi won twice. Gore never even won once.
I'm not talking about whether or not he won. I'm talking about how he will be perceived. You think the dems and moderates will think he "won" or will think of him as a loser prattling on about how an election was stolen from him?
Most will see what we see - - Rossi won twice but then a bunch of mysterious "votes" for Gregoire turned up in the major Democrat parasite nest of King County. That is, they will see that the election was stolen from Rossi by crooked rats who have a long, storied reputation for vote fraud.
You would think...because of the huge number of media types and attention of King county...that it would have certified their vote within hours of the rest of the counties in the state. And to have simply stalled...leaves one to wonder why the media never asked them about this...and why the general public simply accepts the idea that a county can stall. I don't have a problem if the state gives the county 72 hours to officially count and recount their vote...but this stall took weeks...and there is no legal reason to stall like that.
I saw her on the tube late Wed evening, and she had this sly smirk about her that was completely shameless.
Acting like she had won in a landslide, and there was never any doubt.
This is the same problem that many states have, being overwhelmed by the votes of the metropolitan districts.
It was disgusting. The even more disgusting thought is that she had her democratic minions tweaking the recount.
If I was a person who altered the recount, I honestly couldn't sleep at night.
I hope you're correct. Again, I'm not talking about reality, but the perception of reality. And I just don't see Rossi being perceived in a true light. I see it being a case of people like Keith Olberman passing over facts in order to tilt the coverage. Granted, he's only tilting it to the five people who have his show on, and one of them is probably poking around the refridgerator looking for something to eat at the time...
Excellent
He went bye-bye, Jim!
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