Agreed - Rossi should think in the long term and position himself as the gracious "conceder" who would have done a better job than Gregoire when she fails. . . SS

Tim,

I can't agree with you on this at all. I live in Washington state, and this election is the biggest mess you can imagine. In King County alone, there are over 2000 more votes than voters! Many instances of dead people and felons voting have been documented. King County (just about the only county Gregoire won by any substantial margin) "found" several hundred ballots *after* the machine recounts were completed. The King County canvassing board awarded votes to Gregoire that should have been thrown out (e.g. the write-in vote for "Christine Rossi" that was awarded to Gregoire). It goes on and on and on. Today, Gregoire will be sworn in as our governor, after the Democrat-controlled state house and senate certified her votes. My state representative, Dawn Morrell, a Democrat, voted for certification, even though in our district, Rossi won over 53% of the vote. How is that for representing the district?

I'm don't see how the "If its not close they can't cheat" thing applies. It was close, they did cheat, and it's been like that here in Washington for a long time (c.f. the U.S. Senate race between Slade Gorton and Maria Cantwell). The liberals from Seattle dominate state politics, because they have the population base, but a lot of the state doesn't like it. If we don't take a stand, the Democrats will continue to cheat whenever there's a close election.

Take a look at soundpolitics.com for a lot of excellent reporting by Stefan Sharkansky on this topic.