What's In a Name: The Western Center for Journalism

Ok granted the Western Center for Journalism is a goofy  right wing organization but with a name like that the least they could do is try to get their facts correct

WCJ:  Did Obama Steal The Election With Hagel’s Help?
"In 1992, Hagel was CEO of Election Systems & Software, maker of computerized voting machines.
On March 15, 1995, Hagel resigned as CEO but kept millions in stock options and declared that he was going to run for the U.S. Senate in Nebraska. Although he was a virtually unknown candidate; although he ran against a former governor, Ben Nelson, who was hugely popular; and although all the polls prior to the election indicated Ben Nelson would win the election, oddly Hagel won by a landslide with 83% of the vote."

umm no.  In 1996 Hagel beat Gov. Nelson 56-41.  In 2002 Hagel beat Charlie Matulka 83-17 (see here).  According to the NY Times Matulka was a construction worker who "did not raise enough money or have enough name recognition to pose a serious threat".  Matulka did try to make an issue of Hagel's part ownership in ESS (see here) but the story didn't go anywhere.   However in 2004 Matulka ran for the Democratic nomination for Nebraska's 1st House district and got less than 10% of the vote in that primary (see here) so maybe he was not the "strongest" candidate.  But just think about it for a second... if you were going to fix an election by rigging the voting machines would you do it in a way that makes you look like a 3rd world despot or do in a way to engineer a reasonable but decisive victory...say 60-40.

I presume the rest of this story holds up to the WCJ's rigorous journalistic standards as well.