In the wake of the ensuing election debacle, many taxpayers and Porter County officials alike have been quick to blame Clerk Martin. She deserves a lion's share of the blame.

Martin, who incidentally lost her bid to become county auditor in the election, was the chief official in charge of Tuesday's election.

The election was a failure on so many obvious levels.

Rather than becoming a pair of willing hands trying to fix the problem, Martin was largely missing in action in the days following the election fiasco.

Porter County commissioners and others have called on Martin to step down in the wake of the disaster, and she should even though she has only a couple of months left in her term.

But this disaster in Porter County's electoral process goes beyond Martin.

Unprofessional vitriol from Kozuszek, an inept motion by Stankiewicz that appeared to fly in the face of state election law and a pattern of dysfunctional infighting among election and voter registration officials shows a system seriously broken.