Wait. Scratch that.

Al Franken won his Senate in Minnesota because every vote could be counted.

You see, Minnesotans get to vote on something called “paper ballots.” And these “paper ballots” can be recounted when there is a close election. Crazy, I know. For those of us in Tennessee who can only vote on electronic black boxes with secret vote counting (flipping?) software, the Franken victory seems mythic.

Election Integrity journalist and BradBlog.com writer/producer Brad Friedman explains:

Although the victory was sealed today, the Republican claims of “voter fraud” became impossible to support long ago, because hand-marked paper ballots – nearly three million of them – as cast by the voters in the squeaker of an election, were actually being counted, in full view of the media and any interested citizen alike. To a ballot, they were all accounted for, and any disagreement about voter intent on those ballots was adjudicated in an open process by a bipartisan state canvassing board. All but a handful of those votes were determined unanimously by the board to have been cast either for Franken, for Coleman, for a third party candidate or for nobody at all.

The only question remaining after the weeks-long, painstaking, public hand-count was whether a number of uncounted absentee ballots, rejected as per the state’s strict standards for counting, should, in fact, be counted.

Minnesotans and their damn-near perfect elections are the envy of Election Integrity activists everywhere. What with their “paper ballots,” audits, a mandated automatic hand-counted recount of the “paper ballots” if an election is close, an open counting process, citizen vigilance over the ballot chain of custody, etc. etc..

What’s a Tennessean gotta do to get some secure and verifiable elections? Learn to ice fish?

I don’t know where Oprah votes precisely, but if in Chicago, her vote was probably lost on one of Sequoia Voting System’s touch-screens. If out in the burbs, it was likely Diebold’s touch-screen. Either way, it’s a 100% unverifiable vote. Even after she succeeded in making her selection.

Watch the Video

I’d be happy to advise her on what actually happened. Even happy to do so live on her show on Monday if she’d like to inform America of the dangers of these machines before voters hit the polls in historic numbers on Tuesday.

(Readers may suggest she cover this topic on Monday before the election, by dropping her a note here. I’m happy to help her, of course!)

The best part about Oprah’s retelling of her experience is her advice to verify your choices before hitting the VOTE button! Remember, everything you need to know about verifying your vote you learned in the third grade – check your work!

Despite McCain and company’s maneuverings, Brad Friedman of BradBlog rightly calls out their actual intent as an “assault on democracy” and points out that are still completely ignoring the real problem, “Concerns of Actual Election Fraud, Voter Registration Purges in State After State…”:

The GOP’s October “Surprise” continues…Even as it’s no surprise at all that they are hoping to cause absolute bedlam at the polls. They are off to a good start, as the Democrats seem to be caught flat-footed, despite years of warnings about all of this.

The latest Republican assault on democracy began earlier this week with a ’stunt’ raid in (swing state) Nevada, then unsubstantiated allegations in (swing state) Missouri last night (raid coming soon, no doubt), and just hours ago as AP reports, it’s (swing state) Ohio…

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Law enforcement officials in southwest Ohio are seeking information on hundreds of voters who registered and voted during Ohio’s weeklong same-day voting window.

Greene County Sheriff Gene Fischer and representatives of County Prosecutor Stephen Haller have contacted the local Board of Elections asking for the voter registration cards of everyone who voted during the six-day window, which ended Monday.

Haller is the former law partner of Mike DeWine, the former Republican senator who is chairing presidential nominee John McCain’s Ohio campaign.

[Update: In an updated version of the AP report quoted above, it's noted that Sheriff Fisher is "a Republican," that Green County is "rich with Democrat-leaning college students," and that Fisher requested the voter information after "he had been inundated with phone calls from people concerned about possible fraud." In other words, no actual evidence of anything, just angry Republicans, fired up by chasing their own tails after Fox/RNC told them too. Smelling the rats here, yet?]

Whatever fear the Dems had of talking about this issue seems a tad bit silly right about now…

The chairman of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, Rep. John Conyers’, is calling on the John McCain campaign to “immediately halt Republican vote suppression efforts,” as seen recently in Michigan — where a county GOP chair announced his intention to use home foreclosure lists to challenge voter eligibility at the polls on Election Day — and elsewhere.

Conyers has announced hearings on these issues, and is calling on Attorney General Michael Mukasey to launch an immediate “full scale investigation” into these matters. He has sent letters both to McCain [PDF] and to Mukasey [PDF] (the latter signed by 23 members of Congress) to that effect, as well as issuing the following statement today…

Read the rest…

BradBlog has the full story of Missouri Election Integrity Activist, Phil Lindsey, of ShowMeTheVote.org, the victim of needless intimidation and unlawful disenfranchisement, who was arrested for having the right form of ID while attempting to vote in his state’s primary on Tuesday:

This story is unfrickin’-believable. Or maybe it isn’t. It took place in Thor Hearne country, after all. And though she didn’t get arrested and thrown in jail, a similar incident happened to the Missouri Secretary of State during the 2006 election.

A voter in Kansas City on Tuesday — one I happen to know, because he’s an Election Integrity advocate in the Show Me State — was arrested and sent to jail after he refused to show a driver’s license at the polling place before attempting to vote during the state’s Primary Election.

As user “galloglas,” Phil posted the unnerving details at DemocraticUnderground.com.

Or course, the official charge couldn’t be, “He knew what kind of ID he needed to vote legally,” so they slapped him with “disturbance/disorderly conduct…acts in a violent or tumultuous manner toward another, placing such person(s) in fear of safety by refusing to show proper I.D. when voting.”

Also over at BradBlog, links to local news coverage of the incident and similar stories experienced by the Missouri Secretary of State and Brad’s dad – two very nice people.

“Show-me” State Missouri needs a new slogan: The “Show-Me the ID I want Regardless of the Law or Get Thrown in the Hoosegow” State. Wordy, I know, but if the slogan fits…

This Tuesday’s crucial contest will be primarily run on 100% faith-based, touch-screen e-voting machines across the state. There will be no way to determine after the election whether the computers have accurately recorded, or not, the intent of those voters who voted on them. As VerifiedVoting.org summarizes the crucial contest, it “will be essentially unrecountable, unverifiable, and unauditable.”

How is this still possible? Forget flag pins and guilt by association, why aren’t the American people and both candidates screaming about this from the rooftops?!? We won’t trust machines to run our lotteries but we’ll trust them to handle our elections?