Ohio Recount Results In Little Change

In a story that most newspapers appear to have left on the wire, Ohio announced that their recounts have almost completed, with both presidential candidates picking up a handful of votes:

With recount results reported in 86 of 88 counties Tuesday, President Bush picked up 438 votes and Sen. John Kerry got an extra 680, narrowing Bush’s 119,000-vote lead by 242 votes, according to an Associated Press survey of the counties. …
Kerry’s concession hasn’t deterred critics who feel that alleged voting problems in Ohio called the outcome into question. The Rev. Jesse Jackson and the Massachusetts-based Alliance for Democracy have accused the Bush campaign of “high-tech vote stealing.”
An AP review of electronic voting found few reports of widespread problems. Elections officials of both parties were confident the election was fair and done properly.

Jesse Jackson and the rest of the reactionaries on the Left need to be cut loose from the mainstream Democratic party if the Democrats ever intend on seriously competing for leadership in this country again. They have done nothing but gripe about the election results in the states they lost, while remaining silent about states with narrower gaps — like Pennsylvania — where they won. Jackson and John Conyers (see below) have a problem accepting reality and grasp at every straw to undermine confidence in the electoral system. Their refusal to admit defeat does a disservice not only to their party, but to the nation and the voters as well.
Until these fools get rebuked by the Democrats, and rebuked strongly and publicly, voters will continue to mistrust the party that wants to transform every election into a lawsuit and every loss into a conspiracy. Americans don’t elect paranoid nutcases to high office, a lesson the Democrats should have learned in the past two election cycles.