So much for all the effort

All that fearmongering and sliming from the Repugs about ACORN is really paying off, evidently:

On Saturday, when a three-judge panel of the appeals court ruled against the Ohio Republicans, state GOP Chairman Bob Bennett accused Brunner of concealing fraudulent voter registrations in hopes of swinging the state to Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee.

"Jennifer Brunner continues to do everything she can to help her candidate," Bennett had said. "Her efforts to fight transparency and accountability in the voting process are shameful, and her actions to conceal fraudulent activity only serve to cast doubt on the integrity of this election. "

So, you see, if when Obama wins, it'll be fraudulent! Supreme Court challenges, court cases, recounts etc. etc. 'cause we can't POSSIBLY let the election be stolen by fradulent voter registrations!

Of course, there's the teeny little issue that voter registrations aren't votes, and that there absolutely no evidence that voter fraud is any big problem:

"There's a lot more rhetoric than reality when it comes to actual voter fraud," said Dan Tokaji, an elections law expert at Ohio State University. "There's this public perception that voter fraud is common when the reality is that it's quite rare."

A 2005 report by the League of Women Voters of Ohio and the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing in Ohio found that of about 9 million votes cast in the state from 2002-2004, there were four fraudulent ballots. The data was collected from interviews with all 88 county boards of elections.

But hey, why spoil a good excuse with the truth?