So Close! — But Still No Fraud

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As you may have noticed, a very large number of people -- including the GOP's nominee for President of these United States -- seem to be convinced that there's some massive voter fraud being perpetrated. There's not much new about this; it gets brayed about fairly regularly, and every time it gets looked into, there's no there there. Simply put, there has never been any evidence of organized voter fraud in modern American politics resulting in ineligible people voting, or eligible people voting multiple times.

But now the New Mexico GOP claims to have found 28 voters in a state-rep Democratic primary earlier this year that they think are fraudulent -- based mostly on information missing from their registration forms. (That's right, a Democratic primary; a progressive Latina beat the incumbent Dem, and is now the rep-elect because there is no Republican running.)

One of those 28 "voters" has the entertaining name Duran Duran. Aha! National Review Online's Jim Geraghty triumphantly declares vindication! Because, you know, people trying to commit organized voter fraud aren't smart enough to think up plausible fake names:

The person who is "Duran Duran" almost certainly voted under their real name, and thus got two votes in the primary. God knows how many of those 27 others exist; for all we know one person might have cast all of them. Anybody who voted once had their vote diluted by the guy who cheated to vote 27 times.

Amanda Carpenter, Townhall.com's "National Political Reporter" and one of the rising stars of the know-nothing wing of the conservative movement, also trumpets this "bombshell."

Turns out Duran Duran is a real dude. Which you can find out by, say, searching in an online directory.

So close! But hey, keep looking!

Oh, and by the way, why was the GOP looking through voter-registration forms for voters in a Democratic primary, for a small district seat where there is no Republican candidate running? Are they really concerned about the integrity of which Democrat represents the NM House 13th District? I mean, I'm sure they aren't just targeting Hispanic voters in a battleground state. Right?

Courtesy Boston Phoenix