I’ll be honest – I find it galling that prosecutorial misconduct was the likely deciding factor in the 2008 Alaska Senate race. I even called upon Ted Stevens to resign so that there could be a replacement candidate in the race. But even now that the dirty tricks of certain prosecutors have come to light, I find this idea unacceptable.

Alaska GOP Chairman Randy Ruedrich said a special election should be held "so Alaskans may have the chance to vote for a senator without the improper influence of the corrupt Department of Justice."

"The only reason Mark Begich won the election in November is because a few thousand Alaskans thought that Senator Ted Stevens was guilty of seven felonies. Senator Stevens has maintained his innocence and now, even the Department of Justice acknowledges its wrongdoing," Ruedrich said in a statement.

Sorry, friends, that isnÂ’t how it works, even in a race as close as this one was. The reality is that we could point to some injustice or untruth that was the deciding factor in a great many races. Do we really believe that there should be do-overs for that reason? Of course not. So while conduct that ought to lead to criminal charges against and/or the disbarment of the Stevens prosecution team (or at least of some members of that team) has been conclusively demonstrated and implicitly acknowledged by the Attorney General, that is not a sufficient reason for overturning the results of an election.

Posted by: Greg at 11:45 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 254 words, total size 2 kb.