Why Pawlenty Won

From “Let’s review the roadkill from Tuesday’s election
Nick Coleman, Star Tribune

Spoiling to be Spoilers: The Independence Party has begun to give “good government” a bad name. The party called itself “Team Minnesota” but forgot there is no “I” in “team.” Peter Hutchinson got an embarrassing 6 percent of the votes in the governor’s race, and his statewide total of 141,800 was close to the total received by the LOSING candidate for Hennepin County sheriff, despite the fact many Minnesotans embraced his party’s platform. Ol’ Hutch can chisel “Finished a Distant Third” on his tombstone, but had no effect on the 2006 election. Except for the spoiler part. The Independence Party is supposed to care about what’s best for Minnesota. If so, Hutchinson might have said, “Only one person can win, and it’s not me. Please vote for the viable candidate who most favors my platform, Mike Hatch.” If just 22,523 Hutchinson voters (16 percent of his total) had voted for Hatch, Hutchinson would be in line for a post in the Hatch administration. Some folks are just too smart for their own good.

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