The officially-reported margin is even less meaningful than Franken’s estimate, though, because it doesn’t include the 6,000 challenged ballots that haven’t been ruled on yet. Most of the challenges, by far, are bogus and will end up being counted. If Coleman made significantly more bogus challenges than Franken did, Franken can win. And then there are the lost 133 ballots and the rejected absentee ballot.

I call it somewhere between 5-4 in Coleman’s favor to 2-1 in Coleman’s favor. Franken’s unquestionably still in the game. Coleman can win honestly, and so can Franken. Both are going to fight for every vote, and that’s as it should be.

What we have to watch for is a Republican attempt to invalidate the election — basically it’s already started at the gutter level with Coulter and others. We have to be ready to get the word out and keep them from pressuring judges and Senators.

If it’s undecidable, the Democrats in the Senate can vote to seat Franken, and if they do, that will be perfectly legitimate. That’s what the law provides and that’s what’s been done in the past.
Everything that’s been done so far is legit, and the election is still undecided. Coleman has not won. He’s already falsely declared victory three times and might well do it again.

In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if the StarTribune’s head line is something like; “New York Times says Franken wins”

Our country has been way too complacent in accepting the degredation of our election process by the introduction of electronic voting and the impossible-to-verify systems imposed on us by “false and designing men” (the words of John Adams)

We have only to compare the recount here in Minnesota, where the citizens have the incredible luck to retain a system based on paper ballots, as opposed the poor residents of Georgia, who must accept on faith the word of fools who don’t know or don’t care that no matter how long they search, and no matter how much money they spend, they can never really know for sure how many votes were cast for Saxby Chambliss.

For those who can’t seem to grasp the crux of the issue, we have before us a ‘real-life’ example.

That’s how many votes the Franken campaign just said they’re leading Norm Coleman by, with the hand recount now officially finished. In other words, with every single precinct in Minnesota now done counting (except for the one where they’re still searching for the missing votes), the Franken campaign is claiming the lead. An extremely slim lead, but a lead nonetheless.

“We are not declaring victory — we are moving into the next stage of the process,” said Franken’s lead recount lawyer Marc Elias, in a press briefing going on now with reporters. “But we are going into that ahead by four votes.”

At the end of this hand count, it’s worth restating a few necessary caveats. The Franken camp’s methodology involves taking down the opinions of the local election officials regarding the challenged ballots, and assuming that the local referees’ calls will be upheld by the state canvassing board. As such, we are dependent on the Franken camp’s numbers and assumptions”

TPM

Star Tribune

Also, after the recount is completely over, hopefully Ritchie will be busy recommending changes to improve Minnesota’s election system.

I’d like a law saying that counties must review absentee ballot envelopes as they’re received and contact the voter within 24 hours by-phone-and-mail if there are any issues which might cause the ballot to be rejected.

In this past election, some counties notified voters about issues with their absentee ballots and let them correct the problems. Other counties didn’t even tell voters that their absentee ballots were rejected. That isn’t consistent with the Equal Protection of the Law.