Franken leads +225.
MN Sec. of State's Office under supervision of the Election Contest Court is collecting 400 absentee ballots statewide from counties and cities. Due in St. Paul, noon, April 6. Court will determine which ones and how many will be opened and COUNTED, starting 9:30am Tuesday, April 7. These will be the LAST ballots counted in the MN Senate race between Coleman and Franken, 154 days after election day, Nov. 4.
Today's ravings have the excuse of mentioning Michele Bachmann as reason for their..... "meandering" quality as you'll see past the Orange fold....
The End is Near
No no not the MN Senate Recount, although that may be included. But rather THE END. You know, 4 horsemen of the Apocalypse, "earthquakes, floods, famine! Chaos! Dogs and cats LIVING together.......!" kind of END.
Because.......Michele Bachmann, execrable Congresswoman from (sigh; sorry) MN; wingnut-ETTE, self-righteous, airheaded, mock-moral, plastic patriot,....
because Michele Bachmann, like fellow linemate Sarah Palin, both of whom probably first tasted fame and adulation as one of the leggy backdrop girls with eye makeup applied with a trowel swaying suggestively behind Robert Palmer in his smash MTV video "Addicted to Love"....
THAT Michele Bachmann, who never found a Reichving position or Brownshirt male politician she didn't love and go kissy face on,
THAT Michele Bachmann...... has publicly AGREED on a political issue..... with President Barack Obama.
"President Obama’s rhetorical spanking of the American auto industry yesterday hit the right chord," Bachmann wrote in her blog.
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Whew! Well after that kind of reverse spinning of the current solar system, I'm just getting my balance back here, so what follows may be a bit woozy. And looking around it seems the after effects are still echoing:
Opening Shift
While county and city election officials across the state are skiing hard toward Monday's killer climb up "Final Count" Mountain, we can only cheer them on. Those of us who are patriots can. The political types .... not so much. They have politicking to do, but there is a distinct smell of sweat rising from inside the hockey gloves of the games being played in DC.
Take (please take) a PRIME example of a politician, Norm Coleman. He hasn't had an interview with his "hometown" newspaper (the St. Paul Pioneer Press) or even taken questions from them in weeks. But Norm was in DC yesterday and managed to be on 3 radio outlets there...... after appearing at the National Republican Senatorial Committee for a session, accompanied by everyone's favorite greaser, Ben Ginsberg. Norm's still skating without a mouthguard (in a couple of ways), dropped his stick and is fighting for his balance while fast approaching either the side glass or a court decision:
Roll Call:
Coleman, who is trying to overcome a 225-vote deficit, believes that Minnesota’s expansive election law is on his side and that he will eventually prevail........
"He believes that he won the race and won’t concede until there is a fair and accurate accounting of all properly registered voters or a new election is held, whichever is cleaner," said one GOP source. "If he wanted to protect his political future he would drop it, but this is about justice to him, not a political seat."
Coleman will hold today’s briefing partly because he wants to counter the public perception that Tuesday’s ruling by a state judicial panel puts his legal case on shaky ground and is unlikely to net positive results. The Coleman camp is circulating talking points to that effect.
As Norm sailed by windmilling and clutching for help, the Senior Senator from Illinois reached out to give him..... a firmer push toward the boards:
"No one should have to go through what [Franken] is going through and what the state of Minnesota is going through. But it looks like it’s nearing the end of the Minnesota chapter when their courts will have the last word," Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Wednesday. "I hope that at that point that fair-minded people will prevail, that the governor and secretary of state will step forward and give the state of Minnesota the two Senators that they need."
Thank you, Senator Durbin.
Some of the homestate Democrats, sporting the popular "DFL" logo (Minnesotan for "Democratic") also skated over to shove Norm along :
"We had a very good meeting," Coleman continued. "We went over where the case is at and the position of the courts and we talked about the next steps."
The Minnesota DFL Party responded later to the closed-door session.
"Rather than being transparent regarding his intentions, former Senator Coleman is hiding behind closed doors in a secret strategy session with national Republicans," DFL Party Chairman Brian Melendez said in a statement.
Thanks to Minn Post's Cynthia Dizikes of the DC Bureau for leaning down close enough to the ice there to hear the exchange.
First Line Change
Now Southerners have some excellent traits but I must say hockey is probably not one of them, especially in the growing up days of Republican Senator Jefferson Beauregard Braxton Stonewall Lee Hill Longstreet Stuart Sessions. Does he sound a little wobbly on the ice yesterday in his first 8 words? You know, like his laces aren't quite tight enough above his double runners? (Hockey fans know I am slapping the man bald with impunity here!)
"I think if there is a realistic prospect for a complete count that’s fair that would give Sen. Coleman the victory, we should not give up until the last avenue of appeal is over," said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). "Everybody on our side believes that."
Hmmm.... that sounds like a loophole to me.
Next Line Change: Hometown Heroes
And while Minnesotans are a people who honor the Law and respect this process our patience is taxed(!) by those who do neither. (Those idiots who have forgotten so much will also have forgotten the adage "Beware the fury of a patient Northern state.")
Indeed our rather overworked Senior Senator is showing a bit of "Beware" herself.
(MSNBC)Host David Shuster said to (MN-Sen. Amy) Klobuchar: "Your colleague, Republican Senator John Cornyn, said that if Democrats try to seat Al Franken before this goes all the way to the (US) Supreme Court, he threatened World War III. What's your reaction?"
"Well, one of the other things he said, David, he said that we could go in Minnesota with one senator for years. And I would love to know how Texas would like that. I think that Minnesota would prefer to make its own decisions."
I know, I know. We would all prefer Amy flame throwing to a level of "Mesquite Crisp" on Cronyn, but around here this counts for getting edgy.
Cornyn has skated into the corner of the rink throwing elbows pretending to scrap for the puck. But Klobuchar knows the corners are a place AWAY from the referees for throwing back: does the skate blade kicking at the puck come up just a little higher than needed to slice through somebody's boot lace? (Wait for the next rush up ice to start, you hoser on one blade.) Butt end of your stick slide inside your own elbow and snap up into somebody's solar plexus.....leaving them, a little breathless? And just how did that Lone Star Stick get the first 6 inches cracked off the blade so abruptly that you have to drop it on the spot or else?
And the overworked Senior Senator is not alone on the Congressional ice either. Teammate (D) James Oberstar is working the boards too and giving "Klobs" some help against those Washington Senators (trying to make them look like the Washington Generals):
Politico:
"The Republican Party nationally and in Minnesota is playing not just with fire, but with dynamite," said Rep. James L. Oberstar, a Democrat and the dean of Minnesota’s congressional delegation.
Oberstar - like a lot of Democrats - says November’s election should finally be over as soon as the Minnesota Supreme Court rules.
If Pawlenty and the Republicans push it further, he says, "this thing is going to blow up in their face."
In my time in MN this sort of statement is NOT Oberstar (although I haven't paid a lot of attention; he's in another district) so for the Transportation Committee heavy to start throwing around "dynamite" and issuing warnings... folks, for Minnesota, "Klobs" and "Obie" both going on record like this on the same day is skating past the other team's bench for a whistlestop line change.... and dragging your stick along the top rail. (The football fan equivalent is from "Remember the Titans", when in the semi-final Julius flattens the quarterback and Gary runs to the opposing sideline to point a snarling finger in the face of the racist coach.)
Even the Senate coach had something to yell at the other bench when the ref was fixing a bad spot on the ice during a stop in play:
Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), whose spokesperson Jim Manley said:
"It’s not fair to the people of Minnesota to be represented by only one Senator. And, it’s about time a Senator from Texas stop telling the people of Minnesota what’s best for them. Enough is enough."
Grinder/ Checking Line
AND Paul Begala of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee has also skated over, flexing, with a bit more reputation than Klobuchar for throwing hard body checks:
"How many more recounts does Norm Coleman want? How many more delays? How much longer will the Republican Party hold Minnesota's Senate seat hostage?" Begala asks in an e-mail and invitation to sign a petition called "Give it up Norm."
Place on there for comments. Anyone can sign on line, but signers from MN will swing greater weight. Best of all have been those lone patriots I've lifted up now and again from the Star Trib & Pioneer Press blogs who have written something like, "I don't like what Norm's doing and I voted for him!"
http://www.dscc.org/...
And AGAIN in DC, Aaron Blake at Briefing Room Blog of The Hill is loudly asking "How is Coleman LEGALLY paying for his Recount effort?". The first quarter just ended and reports are due OUT (published and public) later in the month. Well Norm?
http://briefingroom.thehill.com/...
And still MORE from DC, Chris Cillizza of the Wash Post asks the doom question of should Norm concede? Leaving aside any considerations of "premature", "legal appeal" Cillizza goes for the throat (by DC standards) and asks the Beltway angle: what is Norm's political future and on THAT basis thinks Norm should do whats best for NORM. That has seldom been a problem for the former mayor, former Democrat, former New Yorker, former loser to a pro wrestler for governor.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/...
Minor League Exhibition Line Change
Finally, in MN (you know, where this period of hockey started on this diary) Manu Raju of Politico thinks the hockey player really facing some rough ice ahead is a guy who actually does skate and play a nice club version of the game, Governor Tim Pawlenty. I still think T-Paw will sign off on a certificate of election but he's going to try to skate off with as much limelight as long as he can without having to actually do something until he absolutely has to.
http://www.cbsnews.com/...
Old Timer's Line Change
Why did your WineRev read through all these (and more) to bring you these clips and links? Well aside from my sense of duty to all of you (really), sheer curiosity, love of politics and the affection I genuinely feel for you who continue to tip, rec and comment, its also the hope of coming across something that will distill this all down. Mark Bannick over at the UpTake blog is looking for it too, the words he yearns to hear from just ONE Lamestream Media talking head/anchor/pundit/Sunday talk host that just would sweep everything before it. If somebody (Bill Moyers? Keith Olbermann?) wants it here's the nut of it (edited for spellings, grammar):
[Comment From Mark Bannick]
@ElZed: The hope is one, just one anchor will say something to the effect: "The recount in MN was automatic, transparent, and fair. There is no "stealing" involved. It was the right of either losing party to challenge the results via an "election contest" as provided in MN law. Former Senator Norm Coleman chose to force an election contest to try to overturn the recount. The cause of the delay and the person trying to overturn, or, as you said, "steal" the election, is former Senator Norm Coleman, not Al Franken. To steal the election, the person doing the stealing must be behind in the count. That definition fits no one other than former Senator Norm Coleman.
Eastern League Wire Report: Out of Town Game: NY-20: The Bloggers build!
Its like giving birth I suppose, watching the last couple days in the comments as the Empire State Upstaters around Albany mobilize for their own election drama. Blogger NYlawstudent put up a comment on NY election law vs. MN, was answered, even debated, asked to put up his/her own diary on the matter and got comments and recommends to a fair thee well:
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Donna over at the UpTake came up with a PDF on ALL the absentees in NY-20 hanging fire, which is begging for the emergence of a spreadsheet wizard like TomTech to take it down and bring it up (Venn Diagrams optional):http://tinyurl.com/...
OK, OK so NY-20's Word Alchemy begged off "winerev-ing" the whole thing (I'm still not sure I know what to do with being a verb; and should the "v" be doubled when adding "ing"? Orthographers to the fore). She has some little excuse about editing a winerev book that is taking up her time while running a business and having a life. I'll give her a pass, but thats just me.
But, Albany Project, javelina and other bloggers, you are on the way, revving up. Just add the wine (or other chemical assistance) fill us in on the players, timelines, and guesses and lay it out for us to read!
(BTW, Marc Elias' wife blogs regularly on the UpTake so she can keep up with Marc's life while he's in MN. (They live near DC.) Yesterday was her birthday so many good wishes posted.... AND many folks wanting to know if Marc was going to Upstate NY for Murphy's side as some kind of, you know, lawyer on election law who has any, kind of recent, you know, recount experience?
Mrs.E laughed, but DIDN'T say no, but she also said she's usually the last to know where he goes next.)
Now see? There's a GREAT rumor to start in Tedisco's backyard! And a bug to e-mail to Murphy's ear. "Fresh off a bracing 5-month election win in MN, Marc Elias today announced in Albany......"
Friday Morning Minnesota Media
Over at MNPublius Jeff Rothenberg had his Wheaties this morning and is in a pugnacious mood. Perhaps inspired by all the news out of DC yesterday he thinks when Franken comes with a certificate of election the Democrats should seat Franken and tell Cornyn/McConnell..or else!
http://mnpublius.com/
Otherwise the local folks stayed quiet with the DC media providing so much coverage. Rachel Stassen Berger DID blog something that shows why the Reichving HATES Norm Coleman. Being attacked by friends is part of the politician's territory but still..... When Norm was in DC on those radio shows, one was Michael Medved. Medved gave him opportunity to pull the full Goebbels and Norm wouldn't do it (so, weird as it is to say it, good for Norm.)
Coleman went out of his way not to play the partisan judge card:
"I’m not saying, by the way, that this court was a partisan court. You had three trial court judges. They looked at the ballots in front of them. They made determinations about what they felt were legally cast ballots."
http://blogs.twincities.com/...
The Star Tribune upgraded its coverage for the day by NOT using reporters OR the wire services, but by only running LTEs (2). A Mpls letter writer says we have been patient long enough with Norm and that Norm should prove he cares about MN by conceding. A Bloomington writer sings Norm the same song, using Kenny Rogers' words: Norm? "Know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, and know when to walk away."
Got the early shift down at the shop after a fine day of "guy time" with son WineRev-ER. Not much of this happened in state but it was plenty to read about here yust southeast of Lake Wobegon.
Shalom.