Franken camp claims four-vote lead (Oh no Franken might win :()

Politico ^

[unkus]

“I would like to find a concise and fairly brief analysis of what makes hard-core liberals tick.”

*Secular explanation: It is generally an utter emptiness of the soul leading to rage, self-loathing, and delusion. Thist makes the susceptible to liberal ideology, either as a way to try to feel good about themselves or to share their pain with the world. Or both.

Religious one: The above makes one susceptible to dire influences (if you believe in that sort of thing). In other words, Satan’s influence as you stated (again, if you believe in that sort of thing).*

Thank you. It makes sense. They love socialism and all socialism does is spread the misery.

[oldfart]

Okay. I’ve asked this before but no one seems willing (or able) to give an answer.

I go to the Minnesota Secretary of State site and this is what they tell me:

Statewide Recount Results for US Senate

Totals
Nov. 4 Ballots Cast for Norm Coleman 1210995
Nov. 4 Ballots Cast for Al Franken 1210285

Recounted Data Totals Percent
RECOUNT Number of Ballots for Coleman (as recounted) 1208344 41.41
RECOUNT Number of Ballots for Franken (as recounted) 1207657 41.38
RECOUNT Number of All Other Ballots (as recounted) 495475 16.98

RECOUNT COLEMAN and Other Ballots Challenged By FRANKEN 3280 0.11
RECOUNT FRANKEN and Other Ballots Challenged By COLEMAN 3375 0.12

Percentage of Ballots Recounted = 99.93 %

Ssorry about the formatting but you get the idea. Anyhow, according to the numbers shown there, with all but one precinct recounted, Coleman has a lead of 687 votes over Franken. How the Sam Hill can anyone say that either man has a 42 vote lead? Is there something I’m missing (aside from my mind, that is?) The only place they’re closer than the 687 is with the challenged ballots where Franken is “ahead” by 95.

Please, someone explain this mathmatical puzzle to me.

[justiceseeker93]

I too was initially confused, but I'll try to explain this as best I can.

First of all, there is one precinct in the entire state that is not included in the SOS totals for the recount. That happens to be the precinct where the supposed "lost ballots" incident took place - it's geographically located in the Dinkytown section of Minneapolis. We know, however, from other sources, how the original vote went in that precinct: it was +495 for Franken in that precinct alone, including the "lost ballots." Therefore, expect the hand recount net in that precinct to be just about the same when it formally gets included in the SOS count, give or take a handful of changes. So expect Coleman's lead to be about +192 statewide when that precinct recount comes into the SOS recount tabulation. And that Coleman lead of about +192 assumes that the "lost ballots" are found and counted by hand as well. If the "lost ballots" (it is questionable if they were actually lost or counted twice by the optical scanner by mistake originally) are rejected as illegitimate, Coleman's statewide lead goes up by about 37 votes to about + 229. But all that is before the challenged ballots - challenged by each camp, respectively - are ruled on and counted on Dec. 16. Judging from past history re challenged ballots, it would seem highly unlikely that Franken can make up the net number he needs with the challenged ballots to overcome Coleman's lead. So the official recount will declare Coleman the winner, in all likelihood.

At that stage, Franken could only try to overturn the result by litigation and/or appealing to the 'Rat controlled US Senate to seat him despite the official Minnesota results.

[oldfart]

Thank you!! Im a little less confused now... not much, but a little.