So the New Jersey supreme court has ruled that Frank Lautenberg's name can be substituted for Frank Torricelli's. Highlights of the arguments and the justices' questions to the lawyers can be found at law.com. My favorite quote is:
Genova added that, if ordered, the Democratic Party would cover the costs of redoing the ballots, but suggested public funds should be used. "The costs of democracy are the costs of democracy," he said.
Indeed. Hey Genova, here's a news flash: business is business.
Despite Genova's stirring argument on the subject, the SCONJ ruled that the Democratic party did have to pay for the costs of reprinting and remailing those ballots that have already been mailed and printed.
But it occurs to me that a much cheaper fix was available all along: aliasing. Lautenberg just changes his name to Torricelli and Torricelli changes his name away (to clear the field). After the certificate of election is presented to Lautenberg/Torricelli, the two men can change their names back. Total cost: $120 (four name changes at $29.95/per). This is certainly cheaper than the estimated $800,000 cost of reprinting and remailing the ballots already printed.
I suppose one risk is a possible GOP denial-of-service attack where they convince many other people to change their name to 'Robert Torricelli'. However, only the real Robert Torricelli will be residing at the address listed on the nomination petition; the Democrats just need to make sure that Lautenberg/Torricelli moves in and establishes that as his address before the election. So throw in the cost of a couple of U-Hauls and some free election worker labor -- it's still far cheaper than remailing.