Wowee, big news out of Iowa…

Republican front-runner Mitt Romney’s narrow lead in the Iowa caucuses disappeared when officials certified the vote count, a Republican involved in the process said Thursday, but former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum cannot be declared the winner because of irregularities in some precincts.

Instead of leading by eight votes, Romney ended up trailing former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum by 34 votes–29,839 to 29,805, the Republican said.

That from the Washington Post, which credits the Des Moines Register with breaking the story. (Official announcement coming this morning.) So I guess Mitt Romney isn’t sweeping the primary process after all. And who knows how it might have played out if Santorum had been named the winner on caucus night. (IMO, it wouldn’t have had much impact; Santorum is too flawed and underfunded to prevail.)

But to me, the bigger takeaway from this story is the utter ineptitude and sheer hypocrisy of the Republicans. The Iowa GOP screwed this puppy six ways from Sunday.

First, they took longer to certify the results than the two weeks required in their own rules; the official announcement comes on Day 16.

Second, the recount uncovered a massive number of bungled talles, according to The Register: “GOP officials discovered inaccuracies in 131 precincts, although not all the changes affected the two leaders.” That’s a lot of mistakes. Hell, I take more care proofreading my GMD posts than the Iowans did counting their ballots. But here’s the topper:

Results from eight precincts are missing – any of which could hold an advantage for Mitt Romney – and will never be recovered and certified, Republican Party of Iowa officials told The Des Moines Register on Wednesday.

The conclusion: The Iowa Republican Party gives up and declares a virtual tie. Sorry, folks, nobody won our “crucial” caucus. It’s a wash. Move on, nothing more to see here. Yeah, we proclaimed Mitt Romney a winner by a scant eight votes — but we can’t name a winner now, even though Santorum has a 34-vote margin in a much more accurate count.

This, from the party that is so concerned with The Integrity Of The Voting Process that they’re trying to build all sorts of barriers between us and our constitutional right to vote. It’d be funny, if the threat to voting rights wasn’t so real.

A couple more points…

Given the performance of the Iowa GOP, I wouldn’t let ’em borrow my car, let alone run my government. The nation’s eyes are on Iowa; they cling determinedly to their first-in-the-nation status; but when push comes to shove, they can’t be bothered to run a clean, efficient process and they don’t seem to care very much. That’s scary.

Finally, I’ll be interested to see whether the political media lets the Iowa GOP have the final say. The Party proclaims this a virtual tie. But clearly, if you accepted the eight-vote “Romney victory” — or Bush v. Gore, for that matter — you ought to take one look at the official results and say, “Santorum Won Iowa.” Anything less would be an abdication of journalistic responsibility.

And even worse: an abdication to the very people who completely f**ked up their caucus.