Alaska: And the winner is... "Write In"

With 99% of the vote now in "write in" has a seven percent lead (41%-34%) over the next closest candidate, Republican-Tea Party candidate Joe Miller in the US Senate race. The Democrat garnered only about 24% of the vote. This would seem to suggest that incumbent Senator Lisa Murkowski may have just made history as only the second person ever to win a US Senate election as a "write in" candidate. The only other one being Strom Thurmond of South Carolina in 1954. Joe Miller and some of the more die hard Tea Party types are declining to concede the election, pointing out correctly that the process of tallying the write in ballots has not begun. Mr. Miller's campaign chief noted that some of those write in might be for "spiderman." Maybe. But I will give really good odds that "Spidey" didn't get seven percent of the vote. And while (sadly) there are reports of lawyers waiting in the wings to challenge "write in" votes, again I don't see any reasonable chance of success. Alaskan law does not require perfect spelling of a candidate's name, only that "voter intent" is clear. What's more is any effort to disqualify such a large number of votes would surely be seen as an attempt to steal an election fairly won under very difficult circumstances.

This is the time for Mr. Miller to show some class and give a polite nod to the lady who just made political history, by giving a least a qualified concession.