Posted on 11/19/2008 10:48:55 AM PST by ButThreeLeftsDo
Senate candidate Al Franken has met with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to brief him on the recount in Minnesota.
Republican Sen. Norm Coleman leads by 215 votes heading into the recount — or 0.008 percent.
Franken, a Democrat, told reporters after the meeting he is "cautiously optimistic" about his prospects.
He said he's eager to "roll up his sleeves" and get to work.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
Minnesota is notoriously accurate in applying taxes.
The DFL in Minnesota is almost a religion.
I have attended two Minnesota State Fairs. Minnesota Public Radio (MPR) was broadcasting their regular standard shows from the DFL booth - a beautiful booth with glass windows to see the broadcast day in progress. The Republican booth was a shack and was never visited by MPR. The moral of this story is that the DLF is loved. and the GOP is despised in the state.
If Franken is elected we all shall be wenting to the government to ask the government to: ‘...borrow me a dollar.’ If you understand that last sentence you understand Minnesota.
I must be wenting now.
Incorrect on MN’s application of taxes. The state applies tank inspection fees and spill fees on N6 fuel based on gross gallons. The oil is sold at net gallons.
You could be right, but my understanding was that the ballots that make it through the scanner are ones that have proper votes for president and improper ones for senate.
I could be wrong on this.
A reference to the Dartmouth study (not that I trust Time magazine):
http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1859543,00.html
The simple fact is that the current margin of 216 votes is well within the margin of error for the machines used in the initial count, so there really is no knowing who will win the recount when all the ballots are examined by hand.
And there isn’t much room to fix the recount itself, since representatives from both parties will be examining every vote by hand to determine the intent of the vote (if its unclear). Only those that remain unclear will be referred to the election board — some of which, no doubt, will be argued over by both sides.
The bad news for Coleman is that historically the Democrats have a slightly greater chance of gaining from a recount because more of their voters were first-time voters (i.e. inexperienced) and less educated, so there is a slightly greater chance of someone marking a vote for Franken but in way that was not readable by the machines. But whether that margin is 20, 200, or 2000 votes is unknowable at this point, and the machine reading error rate could still swing the vote decisively in either direction.
At the moment, I see little reason to be paranoid about the process. Republicans are plenty involved in the recount. If it remains very close (within 100 or maybe 200) then I have no doubt that the losing side (whether it is Coleman or Franken) will find reasons to sue. If the margin of victory reaches 500 or more, I suspect it will be over as soon as the recount is done.
BTW: If it’s a tie, then a coin toss will decide who wins (for real!). If there is a tie after the recount, expect the litigation to go on for weeks first before any coin toss. It would get very nasty.
There is already a court order to look at all ballots and on irregular ones to “try to determine the intent of the voter”.
Does that help answer your question?
At least there are no hanging chads to worry about. On the other hand, I suspect the magnifying glass will get plenty of use to examine all the dots, marks, and squiggles in and around the names of the two candidates.
Thanks — but the court order is simply to allow Franken access to the information about the ballots and why they were rejected. Unless the Coleman team agrees that some of those ballots were unfairly rejected (unlikely) then Franken will have to sue again to get them un-rejected (so to speak).
So, at the moment, nothing has really changed. No new ballots are being introduced into the recount. And, as I mentioned, there will be rejected votes for Coleman in there too, so if he’s on the ball, he will be examining the same list of rejected ballots to make sure that he can (a) defend against invalid ballots being counted and (b) ensure there are no valid Republican votes incorrectly rejected.
Well, we’ll see. I’m not ready to claim conspiracy yet. As for Soros, it’s no surprise to me that he’s helping to bankroll Franken’s team during the recount. Still doesn’t make it a conspiracy — it just makes it easier for Franken to keep bringing issues to the courts. You’re right that the courts will decide, but I don’t think it’s a done deal that Franken will win the court battle.
Not just bankrolling Al, but bankrolling Sec. Of State candidates (D) to attempt to jigger the elections in more states than just MN.....
True, but there’s no point in crying about it. That’s the way the system works in the U.S. — the elections are in the control of elected partisan officials, so it makes sense to fund you’re own party’s nominees to the best of your ability. If Soros’s donations are legal then, I’m sorry, I just don’t see the problem. The Republican Party needs to step up to counter Soros’s cash.
I used to live in the UK. There the elections are in the control of non-partisan officials. There is a lot to be said for that since I don’t recall anywhere near the same hysteria and suspicion over close elections as we get in America. They just get on with the recounts - more than one if the election is very close - until its obvious one side has lost and they concede. They don’t have to handle a count anywhere near as big as a senate race, so it isn’t quite as difficult a task, I’ll admit.
It’s also strange to Brits and other non-Americans that each state has such a wide variety of election procedures. I know the idea of standardizing it all under federal control wouldn’t fly, but it could take some of the heat out of close elections if they took the best examples from around the country, and required all states to meet those standards — the type of equipment, the number of voters per polling station, the layout of the ballots, and so on. It might actually reduce much of the bureaucracy and overhead into the bargain.
A pipe dream, I know.
Ballots previously rejected by automatic counting methods are usually rejected because of the stupid voter, not the machine.
Because the stupid voters usualy are DIMS, the recount will sway in the direction of the RATS. BTW, it must make the RATS swell with pride that they represent so many idiots.
That said, I fail to see why this recount has found nearly 100% of the new votes for Franken. It seems to be statistically impossible and fraudulent to me. Any batches of votes discovered in cars should be rejected because they were not properly handled and can be (probably are) fraudulent.
Is past Minnesota recounts, how many votes have changed on average?
No idea, sorry.
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