Did Karl Rove help steal an election in 2002? Probably not

The original Turd Blossom, Karl Rove, actually talked some sense when discussing GOP responsibility for Jan. 6. OTOH, since his actions way back in 2002, or actions of those connected to him, may have led to an actual #StartTheSteal, he's a fucking hypocrite. 

But, did he actually help challenger Bob Riley steal the 2002 Alabama gubernatorial race from incumbent Don Siegelman?

First, contra the end of the piece at the second link, I've seen no evidence that Ohio 2004 was hacked, and have written about this and more here, and above all here, where I linked to Mark Hertsgaard CRUSHING "Chemtrails Bob" Fitrakis' BS claims on Ohio 2004. This includes arguing with Brains, and behind him, his co-conspirator Brad Friedman, or I should say, conspiracy theorist Brad Friedman, over this. And, contra the middle of the piece, per Wiki, there's controversy over whether a #StartTheSteal even happened in Alabama 2002. Per one claim, the explanation of how the original reported vote total in Baldwin County became the final number is convoluted at scale fully matching conspiratorial thought. Supposably, whoever was genyus enough to hack into Baldwin County's system was at the same time initially stupid enough to give votes to both Riley AND Siegelman, and then had to rehack to fix that!

The AP story, linked off Wiki, notes that, if it were a glitch, it was a big one, BUT, that Siegelman's original vote total was way overblown vs Alabama state average. Occam's Razor, per which had historic background, and is simpler, per the end of the paragraph above.

Beyond that, the author of the second link, Jennifer Cohn, seems somewhat given to conspiracy theorizing. Take Georgia's 2002 Senate race. Max Cleland got hardballed and smeared, but no hacking of anything happened.

The real issue that Cohn gets right is Rove and BushCo later prosecuting Siegelman for allegedly taking a bribe. The biggest subissue on that is that "look forward" Dear Leader Obama and his AG Eric Holder refused to look at the case again and Obama refused to give clemency, let alone a pardon.