Can you say, “irony?” I though you could. If you had to pick a district in Florida where voting was most under suspicion,” wouldn’t you pick U.S. House District 13, the seat most recently occupied by — wait for it — Katherine Harris?

Republican Vern Buchanan was clinging to a 368-vote edge over Democrat Christine Jennings for the 13th Congressional District early this morning…

The results were loaded with controversy as nearly 13 percent of all ballots cast in Sarasota didn’t include a choice for Congress. That difference, and scattered reports of difficulty finding the race on Sarasota’s touchscreen ballots, raised concerns about under-votes in the race.

Supervisor of Elections Kathy Dent couldn’t explain why 8,000 to 10,000 fewer people voted in the congressional race than in other high-profile races for governor, attorney general or U.S. Senate. But she said nothing mechanical went wrong with the county’s $4.7 million touchscreen voting machine system…

Throughout the day voters complained that touchscreen voting machines were not registering votes for Jennings properly.

Wait, it gets better.

Buchanan is an ultra-rich car dealer who defeated Tramm Hudson in the Republican primary. You would have thought Buchanan — despite pumping over $2.1 million of his own money into his campaign — would be at a disadvantage because of pesky fraud allegations in a sealed lawsuit. But Hudson was the guy who said blacks can’t swim. You decide.

Buchanan was also one of the few Republicans desperate enough to welcome heavy support from both Dufus Bush and his popular wife, the Lauratron 4000.

Until campaigning for Buchanan, Pres. Bush’s only other visit to Sarasota was on Sept. 11, 2001, when he read the book, “My Pet Goat,” with Sarasota school children, largely without moving his lips. They were just getting to the good part when the news came about the Twin Towers, which explains why another nine minutes went by before our hero returned to his presidential duties of being shuttled back and forth above flyover country.

But I digress.

We’ll keep you posted on how it all comes out, but something tells us Buchanan will maintain his amazing victory. After all, it’s District 13. Not that we’re superstitious, but we’d call Karl Rove in for one of those cleansing ceremonies with a priest before Buchanan unpacks in Harris’ old office.