Mitt’s ticking Maine time bomb?

[morningfog]

Thursday, Feb 16, 2012

Mitt’s ticking Maine time bomb?
One tiny Down East county could cause some serious trouble this weekend

By Steve Kornack

The timing couldn’t have been worse for Mitt Romney when the Iowa Republican Party retracted its declaration that he’d won the state’s caucuses and instead awarded the win to Rick Santorum on Jan. 19. The reversal came just two days before the South Carolina primary, as Romney’s once commanding lead in the state was melting away and Newt Gingrich was overtaking him in the polls. The news, which nullified Romney’s impressive-sounding distinction as the only modern GOP candidate to win both Iowa and New Hampshire, meshed perfectly with the idea that he was melting down (even if it did nothing immediate to boost Santorum).

And now there’s a possibility that something similar could play out in the near future, this time thanks to the ineptitude of the Maine Republican Party.

The state GOP had given local communities a one-week window from Feb. 4-11 to hold caucuses, with the statewide tally announced last Saturday night. At that point, Romney was declared the winner by 194 votes (or a 3 percent margin) over Ron Paul. But there was a catch. Several communities had flouted the state party’s edict and held or scheduled caucuses outside of the designated window, while one county — Washington — had been forced by threats of inclement weather to postpone caucuses that were originally scheduled for Feb. 11 by a week.

At first, this didn’t seem like too big of a problem. Not counting votes from places that willfully ignored the window seemed reasonable enough; if they’d wanted to be part of the statewide tally, they could have followed the rules. And while Washington County did attempt to follow the rules, it seemed unlikely that the results from caucuses there would, when they were finally announced, alter the statewide outcome, given how low turnout in the county was for the ’08 caucuses and how poorly Paul did back then (eight votes).

But since last Saturday, some major errors in the state GOP’s official tally have come to light. As the Bangor Daily News reported this week:

The rest: http://www.salon.com/2012/02/16/mitt%E2%80%99s_ticking_maine_time_bomb/



http://www.salon.com/2012/02/16/mitt%E2%80%99s_ticking_maine_time_bomb/

[Old and In the Way]

1. Wouldn't surprise me to see Paul supporters turn out in droves.

If the Maine Republican Party had waited a week for the Washington results, they might have still have gotten their desired results. But by dumping on the citizens of Washington Country, they may get the results they don't want as the Downeaster's show those Augusta boys that they aren't buying into this Romney victory. I wonder if Waterville, the 3rd or 4th largest town in Maine will get their votes counted as well as Waldo County? This is exposing how incompetent and undemocratic this Party is in Maine.

[stockholmer]

2. I hope Rmoney takes one right in his ballot box...............

The scum GOP establishment as well.