The Alaska Ballot Counting

All the news reports indicate that incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski has garnered 98 percent of the write-in ballots cast last week in that state's election. The election observers from the campaign of Tea Party favorite Joe Miller are questioning the validity of about ten percent of those ballots, but even that appears to be an insufficient number to narrow Murkowshki's margin.

It should not surprise that Mr. Miller is insisting that only those ballots that spell Ms. Murkowski's name correctly be counted. He insists that the law demands nothing less. But, the law is actually silent on the issue os proper spelling as it is silent on the issue of voter intent. Nonetheless, there is something creepy about the desire to disenfranchise voters who do not dot their "I's."

Alas, Mr. Miller, whose goons "arrested" a reporter whose questions the candidate found nettlesome, is not exactly the kind of man to be overly concerned about niceties where democratic processes are concerned. I have no great love for Sen. Murkowski, but of all the Tea Party candidates this year, Miller was the most frightening. His defeat is a good thing for democracy and a good thing for Alaska.