Franken wins by +312 votes.
April 30 Coleman Appeal Brief to Supreme Court Due: DONE
May 11 Franken Respondent's Brief Due: DONE
May 15 Coleman Reply to Respondent Due: DONE
June 1 Coleman v. Franken Oral Arguments before the MN Supreme Court: 13 days from TODAY
As all the news organizations are doing until June 1, ya gotta write about something......
The FORMER and ex-Senator
Yes that guy, a man who by entering a room can make a used car salesman's convention become as sincere as Linus' (Great) Pumpkin patch. In a final addendum to Saturday's diary I noted the former/ex/indictable Senator was going to be appearing at a Republican Jews for Gefilte & Lute Fisk fundraiser. (Gefilte fish or lutefisk, topped with either Japanese horse radish or limburger cheese, would threatened to be served unless attendees coughed up the dough.) I invited any MN Kossacks who were inclined to exercise their right to free speech to turn up.
Well...... some folks did. A representative of the "Make Norm Go Away, Give a Dollar a Day" turned up, complete with video camera. The rep was there to THANK Norm (politicians like to be thanked..... a LOT, sort of like Major Frank Burns in his fantasy episode at the MASH 4077th when he not only gets to put Hawkeye on trial for mutiny but also is the hero of the operating room. Chaos and disaster all around a glowing Frank and a nurse pauses in her weariness to gasp, "Thank you doctor." "For what?" Burns replies. "Just for being you.")
The rep was there to THANK Norm for being Norm, for being the raison d'etre for over $92000 being raised for progressive causes. Couldn't have done it without you, Norm. Thanks. Link here:
http://minnesotaindependent.com/...
Chris Steller at MN Independent also reports on some speculation as to what's coming next from the Coleman side:
One of the more interesting aspects of the reply brief that Coleman filed at the Minnesota Supreme Court Friday is what it didn’t say. As the Politico observes, the former senator had nothing to say in response to a major point that Democratic rival Al Franken made in his brief: that the high court should direct Gov. Tim Pawlenty to issue an election certificate as soon as the state’s judiciary is done with Coleman’s appeal.
That silence could mean Coleman is ready to bow out if he loses his current appeal (wrong, says a staffer). Or, Coleman could be readying a request for an injunction from the U.S. Supreme Court to prevent Pawlenty from issuing Franken the certificate he would need to take Coleman’s old seat in the Senate.
The whole story, including a quote from a member of the Republican National MoneyBag Circle (mostly the Fortune 500 boardroom types; in this case the CEO of MN-founded 3M "Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing") here:http://minnesotaindependent.com/...
The Senator-Elect Future is so close I can Taste it Senator
The Senator to Be was doing some party-building this weekend. Franken got himself elected (YAY! Happy dance!) as a delegate to the DFL (MN alphabet soup for "Democratic-Farmer-Labor" party; ie the good gals---(which also includes men/guys as a figure of speech)) citywide convention. He got to make a speech endorsing Minneapolis mayor R.T. Rybak for re-election. (A name like that sounds like a cousin of a Steven Segal action movie. Might boost the local economy.....hmmm.)
Franken was both gracious and funny.
The gracious:
"I want to thank all of you. When you win an election by 312 votes, there’s not a lot of effort that goes to waste," Al Franken told Minneapolis Democrats Saturday. "We ran a very efficient campaign."
The funny:
"A lot of people here have been asking me, "What do I call you?" And the answer to that is: Al. There is only one person in the state who will have to call me senator and that, of course, is [his wife] Franni.
The clips here:http://minnesotaindependent.com/...
And in an encouraging look at the Franken situation, Kossack jpmassar Sunday posted a nice diary on Norm's chances of prevailing in the Recount EVEN IF the MN Supreme Court breaks his way and orders more absentee ballots counted. Those chances: between slim and none, and slim is packing to leave town.
http://www.dailykos.com/...
The CURRENT Senator
Kevin Diaz of the Star Tribune had a nice backgrounder on what the current Senator from MN is up to these days. For the life of me I can't find the story on the ST website but I have the bugger here in front of me on the couch just past the 4th bag of Cheetos.
She and her staff are working insanely hard:
"After inheriting 400 constituent cases from Republican Coleman, whose office closed in early February, the first-term Democrat says she has seen a doubling of requests from ordinary Minnesotans on everything from veteran's benefits to overseas adoptions and lost Social Security checks."
The side benefit for Senator K is the focus is giving the lie to the Reichving bleatings that float around the internet tubes and sewers of the state like "well she's not doing anything" and "she always WAS lazy" and other bilgewater like that.
"An Internet search on "Minnesota's only senator" now yields more than 9 million hits." Yowser!
She has been effortlessly tap-dancing through the political stuff by holding a consistent position on the Coleman-Franken duel:
"I've said what I thought. That is that Norm has the right to his appeal to the MN Supreme Court, but that MN has a right to 2 Senators."
What helping has been her sense of humor (maybe to keep from crying or go screaming into, say, John Cornyn's and grab that worthless sun-tanned armadillo husk by the neck and shove him butt-first onto the nearest cactus).
"She misses few chances to tell audiences that she is both MN's "junior senator and senior senator", noting that the arrangement makes for a lot less friction.
She's a frequent guest on MSNBC's... Rachel Maddow show where she was introduced as: "the entire Senate delegation from Minnesota."
It is wearing on her, and the pressure gets high some times. A recent Medicare funding bill as part of the economic stimulus meant $300 million to MN, and it passed by 2 votes. The jr./sr./present Senator breathed a sigh of relief at that close call. She HAS asked for extra staff but at least one senator has objected (anonymously) so under Senate rules its a no-go. (You nominations HERE for which rancid turkey it might be.)
"For now Klobuchar says she has decided to to press the staffing issue. The recount might be resolved soon--- or not.
If all else fails, she jokes, "maybe I'll faint on the floor (of the Senate.) I really haven't figured out what I'm going to do."
Things Literary
Good freakin' Grief! Pre-orders for Recounting Minnesota (the dead-tree collection of these diaries hopefully due out by mid-August) have reached about 120 from you people. Holy cow! (said the Lutheran & Honorary Jew in a Hindu moment; Mr. Inclusivity personified). But thank you so much. The pre-orders will help fund the first print run. AND if you've been putting off adding to the winerev's personal economic stimulus package and not yet ordered, you can do so at the links here:
http://www.wordalchemy.net/...
Things Graphically Literary
You know, I want to be as progressive as the next person, but some things you really have to go with a traditional approach. Like, say, a book. While there are people who don't much mind about books that have no front cover or back cover, a LOT of people (like Border's, Barnes & Noble, Amazon; and various PAYING customers) really DO like a book with a cover.
Recounting Minnesota needs a cover. While we have a line on a possible artist, would there be a Kossack graphic artist who would like to try their hand at becoming the 21st century's Thomas Nast or Pat Oliphant? Think you could come up with something? If so, let the head Amazonic editor know here: kim@wordalchemy.net.
OK hope that will hold you as we grind toward June 1. Thats the semi-latest from yust southeast of Lake Wobegon.
Shalom.