One of the gus on the Powerline blog wrote (a few weeks back) that he didn’t think that this race was stolen. The guys from Powerline are level-headed and conservative.
Powerline says that Coleman was poorly served by his attorneys, Fritz Knaak (former state senator) and Tony Trimble (former state GOP chair). The post-election legal effort was sub-par.
But all that aside, Coleman’s re-election campaign was terribly run and very unfocused. I’m not even gonna get into the “Coleman lost because he wasn’t a conservative” issue.
Coleman lost because he was an invisible Seantor for the last six years.
Coleman lost because he was perceived as an elbow-rubbing, back-slapping, behind the scenes Senator.
Coleman lost because he had nothing to run on other than the general theme of “Hey, vote for me! I’m not Al Franken”.
Coleman lost because he appeared vascillating and watery on most issues.
I really hope that Coleman will not run for Governor next year - that is, if Pawlenty doesn’t run again. Coleman has embarrassed himself and the state GOP.
I might add that Coleman was elected at a time when the GOP brand and Bush’s approval ratings were high. Then Coleman had to run for re-election when ratings for Bush and the GOP were in the dumpster.