Those who spent Thanksgiving Week away from the world of electoral politics missed a hearty laugh, brought to you by none other than former Senator Norm Coleman:
Former Minnesota Sen. Norm Coleman had some unsolicited advice for fellow Republican Joe Miller: It’s time to quit.
"I think that race is over. I think the counting’s been done. I’m not sure there’s anything that would change that,” Coleman told C-SPAN in an interview.
The snarky tweets practically wrote themselves. After all, if Norm Coleman tells you to hang it up...
And, of course, Coleman is right on this one. Even if every one of Miller's ballot challenges were upheld (and some of them were downright comical), he'd still lose. At some point, Miller has to finally draw the doubtlessly bitter conclusion that he has no shot at becoming Senator.
But buried deep within the Politico piece is an absolutely extraordinary attempt by Coleman to do some judicious rewriting of history.
Check this out:
“I made a decision in my race with Franken at a certain point in time to say, ‘Let’s not go any further,’” said Coleman. “I think at a certain point in time, you have to have some finality to these things. It should be time to move on. There's not much that you can gain by extending the process."
Norm Coleman said that. Norm. Coleman. Said. That.
For those scoring at home, Norm Coleman conceded his race to Democrat Al Franken on...June 30th of 2009. That would be just shy of eight months after Election Day. It would also be after the Canvassing Board for the state of Minnesota had spoken, as had two separate courts in the state of Minnesota. The final death blow came when the Supreme Court for the state of Minnesota, the majority of which had been appointed by Republican governors, unanimously rejected his appeal.
But this little nugget is only the latest example of Minnesota Republicans trying to generate the myth of a stolen election in 2008. Let's stroll down memory lane to look at some other examples:
- FRANKEN ONLY WON BECAUSE OF THOSE DAMNED FELONS: This is a fairly recent claim (having caught fire last summer), but a report by a right-leaning group in Minnesota claimed that "hundreds" of illegal votes cast by felons might have turned the tide of the Senate race between Franken and Coleman. In a predictable move, Republican Governor (and presidential wannabe) Tim Pawlenty called for an investigation at the time, and even implied on Fox News that the bulk of those votes would have presumably been Franken votes. Five months later, the head of the state's association of county attorneys is furious, holding a press conference last week to blast the report for wasting the county attorney's time investigating cases that almost uniformly have been false reports. To date, barely two dozen cases have actually been brought for illegal voting by felons.
- COLEMAN'S PHANTOM LEAD: If the "felon voting" meme was the latest wrinkle in the Minnesota Mythology, the earliest one came in the hours after the polls closed in Minnesota. Norm Coleman's initial "lead" of just over 700 votes had winnowed down to just 215 votes, a margin that would eventually flip during the recount. Coleman acolytes screamed "foul" in unison, with the Coleman campaign casting great suspicion on such swings. Of course, the actual answer, as a DK diarist noted at the time was far simpler. In the Two Harbors precinct, for example, Franken's vote total was amended from 27 votes to 273 votes. Given that Barack Obama had carried the district with over 300 votes, that would seem to be...well...inherently logical. Tabulation errors happen in every election (as close followers of this year's election in Colorado can attest). The GOP cynically tried to color perceptions of the recount by working hard to cast aspersions.
- THE COURTS "STOLE THE ELECTION" FROM COLEMAN: This one is an absurdity on a number of levels. First off, it was Coleman that sought relief in the courts, after the recount came back with a 200+ vote lead for his Democratic challenger. Furthermore, both courts that heard his challenge were unanimous in their rejection of Coleman's challenge. This is particularly significant when you consider that the initial court to hear his contest was a three-judge panel, with one Democrat, one Republican, and one Independent. The majority of the state Supreme Court, meanwhile, were Republicans. And, once again, their dismissal of Coleman's challenge was unanimous in both cases. The courts didn't "steal" the election from Coleman, they acted (beyond party label) to prevent him from stealing it from Franken.
And...now...this latest bit of mythology: the uproarious concept that Coleman did not stretch his challenge out one minute longer than needed. Even as late as mid-June of 2009, Coleman was intimating that stifling Democratic initiatives by leaving a seat vacant was enough of a reason to keep his challenge alive. The NRSC also saw the advantage, funding his challenge as late as May of 2009, when a unanimous three-judge panel had already denied his contest and the majority of Minnesota voters wanted him to stand down.
Speaking of Minnesota voters: if Coleman wants to do a good deed a bit closer to home, maybe he ought to dispense the same advice to the sore loser Republican in his home state (Tom Emmer) that he did to Alaska's Joe Miller.