Phoenix,

I’ve been stopping by to catch your updates nearly every day, because the race is important and the crackpottery endlessly entertaining. Just feeling a little boobish for failing to drop a note of thanks for the great reporting and insightful analysis—

Thanks…………..s

What is this costing Franken and who is paying for it?

You’d think the people of Minnesota would be pushing for some sort of class action suit, considering they have only 50% representation at a crucial time. I’m thinking something along the lines of malicious interference with an election, or government neglect of duty. Whatever, I’m no lawyer. But there should be something.

there have been various times in the recent past, either thinking of cheney/bush and their determination to go into iraq or now with the coleman/franken fiasco, the phrase “come hell or high water” would come to mind. well, at least in the case of the failed, costly, unconstitutional gwb admin. it was literally = the hell of the quagmire of iraq and the high water of katrina.

Thanks again for your updates on all the ballot slogging and legal high(and low)jinks in MN. It’s been like an old-fashioned serialized novel, but I think we can guess the denouement by now (even though it apparently will be a surprise to the man with the big teeth).

As to who is paying for Franken’s lawyers, I hope we all are — I just dropped a few bucks here. Even if you maxed out in contributions during the campaign you can still donate up to $2300 for the recount.

But in the end, all the Republicans are doing is delaying the inevitable — and their ability to do so just suffered several major blows.

And making bigger baffoons of themselves every day.

Yes, but will the Politico story or any of this backstory make it into Minnesota’s “mainstream” media? I’m not seeing it.

Former Senator Blown&Gone is the king of frivolous lawsuits. He’s famous for meaningless lawsuits during his campaigns that never go anywhere, but serve as attempts to steal headlines and narratives for a few days. All he’s doing here too. BigMedia of course never calls Repubs on their hypocrisy with this “frivolous lawsuits” nonsense, and we know it’s simply a projection technique, which is one of their favorites.

By the way PW, many thanks for your comment over at Giordano’s place quoting the Alinsky interview from 1972. Damn, the exact same stuff we’re fighting today. I agree with your point that we may be able to finally stop the madness this time by having a President actually encourage and train people on making systemic change in “the system.” We can do it if we’re smarter on tactics this time around, and learn from mistakes of the last 30 years.

Franken in the Senate will certainly help as well!

Hopefully this will end Colman’s career in electoral politics, at least in Minnesota. I wish someone influential would step forward to tell people that Coleman is doing all this just to delay the seating of the second Minnesota Senator.

Ah, but today, backed by some political science experts (Stephen Schier and a couple others), the venerable (?) Pioneer Press had an editorial pressing for a runoff election, inasmuch as the vote separation is statistically negligible. (sigh)

Anybody doing some analysis of the odds of Coleman pulling this thing out?

Here’s the link to op ed noted above.

May not actually be pressing for runoff in this election, though that’s not totally clear (to me, but then that’s me). The point is that since it’s a statistical tie, there needs to be a do-over. If not for this one, then for another.

Most of the scuttlebutt I’m hearing is a definite “no” to that.

Others saying, “The answer is maybe, and that’s final.”

Coleman is the same douchebag (no affront meant to actual douchebag’s) who said in November that Franken ought to save the taxpayer’s money by ackowledging that Coleman had won and not have a recount.
Hypocrite!
I don’t know. Maybe I’m wierd, or wired differently. But I coulnd’t do what he’s doing. Outside of the lust for power, what else is he arguing?
I can hardly wait for the ethic’s investigation’s into this asshat and his wife.
Hey, Norm, your name and JAIL both have 4 letters. Let’s see how much his friends are will to pay the lawers to keep his corrupt ass out of jail.

In terms of percentage of population, the Franken/Coleman vote spread is much greater than Bush/Gore in FL in 2000. Wonder if the wingnuts and Pioneer Press were pressing for a special election then.

Just a reminder of exactly what Coleman said…

It’s useful to know that the PiPress endorsed Coleman and (get this), did not endorse either Obama or McCain. Can you say “pandering to the miniscule and dwindling readership”? Sure you can.

I wonder if a class-action suit (The People vs. Norm Coleman) would bestir him to get his sorry butt out of the way. I know, I know. No precedent, too long to get in place, not legally possible, name the reasons. Delicious thought, though.

Why would either Coleman or the republican party want a do-over? Republicans think they’re more popular in Minnesota now than on Nov. 4th? It actually might be kinda fun. (if it weren’t so expensive)

I’m not sure they do, but one assumes (perhaps incorrectly) that the PiPress speaks Gooper.

Norm,Norm, Norm. When are you going to learn that the guys who are shoveling money to you to draw out the agony are not your friends. You won’t get a cent from them for your defence against your upcoming bribery indictment.

That’s like saying they should redo the Men’s 100m Butterfly at the Olympics. Milorad Cavic led up until the very end, and he lost by a mere .01 seconds. The video of the touch sure looked as if Cavic should have won.

But for the arguably brilliant way the Republicans climbed all over the highly emotional Paul Wellstone memorial service, making it their signature indictment of All Things Democrat (sic), we’d never have had Normie in the first place. Timing is everything.

of course, this won’t hurt the repuglitard party until there is another election in Minnesota

so the repuglitards get a pass until November of 2010

then the repuglican’t party HAS A REAL FUCKING PROBLEM

I’m thinking the repuglitards thrown away their chances for statewide office in Minnesota FOR EVER

With apologies to Phoenix Woman, the pugs have an uncanny way of rising out of the ashes — even when they’ve started the fire.

One more thing, if I may. My brother is an adult with mental retardation. One of the things advocates for him and his peers stress is attempting to lay to rest words like “retard,” “retarded,” “xxxxtard” because that can be hurtful to folks with disabilities and to those of us who love them. Generally, people are unaware that this is so. Language really does have the power to do that. Please help me help reduce/eliminate this language. Thanks!!!

The whole point of the GOP attempt at keeping Franken away from the Senate was to stop Obama from having an early victory and, in particular, derail the economic stimulus bill. Since that has passed anyway the hoped-for GOP political victory is gone. And the money for Coleman is likely to dry up rather quickly. Kind of hard to muster the troops to support the rear action once the major battle is over and lost.

I actually think we might see this end within the next week or two, probably without an appeal to the MN Supreme Court. Coleman has to pay all the legal fees when he loses, so the expenses include Franken’s legal team as well as the 100-lawyer army he’s got. Keep your eye out for a ratcheting up of a public relations war against Franken, as the GOP shifts their strategy from the court room to the cable TV studios. Franken’s still going to be the GOP bogeyman, but the legal delay is all but done.

I just sent them $50 the other day.

I also have a good friend who’s son was working with the Franken campaign during the summer and fall, and since the election, on he’s been donating his time (he just graduated law school) to the legal team.

It’s costing a lot. And they need contributions.

Just sayin…

It is time for Reid to bite the bullet and attempt to seat Franken. If the assholes want to filibuster, let them.

One clarification that I think is important which should contribute to shorten Norm’s election contest suit, the burden of proof became tougher with this ruling. Norm has to prove that the rejected absentee ballot was legally cast not that it was improperly rejected.

This burden of proof is what is probably the wrench in the works for Norm. Since Ben Ginsburg and Joe Friedberg took over, they’ve been angling for showing that thousands upon thousands of ballots may have been improperly rejected. They just wanted to cast doubt and impugn MN’s election system … not actually prove that votes were legally cast.

Consequently, I believe the first laughing will be by the 3 judge panel as they laugh Team Coleman’s attempts to prove ballots were legally cast right out of the courtroom. Then next laughs will be, as you point out, at the MN Supreme Court.

RNLA Issues Fact-Free Fund-Raising Letter Claiming ‘Desperate’ Franken is ‘Stealing U.S. Senate Seat’
Republican National Lawyers Association Says Goodbye to Any Credibility They May Have Once Had…

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6918

- Tom