Elections

The patience of the Minnesotan people is starting to wane as the battle over the empty Senate seat continues.  As of now, the two candidates Al Franken(Dem) and Norm Coleman(Rep) are willing to take the race to the Senate to the bitter end.  With Just a few hundred votes in contention for the final decision, the two candidates are enbroiled in a legal battle for the win.

But the Minnesotans are starting to worry about the lack of representation and growing increasingly weary as the two continue to duke it out.  The legal hair-splitting is growing old as one candidate claims victory over the other, and one candidate calls BS on the results.

Now it is up to the lawyers to decide how this election will turn out.  Many are calling for Coleman to step aside, lest he damage his reputation and future prospects in politics.  Even his supporters are ready to throw in towel for the sake of ending this merry-go-round of ballot rejection and approval.

Not that Franken is in any better posititon in the public eye.  But according to the recount so far, Franken is ahead, even if by a small number of votes, giving him the motivation to take this thing as far as could go.

And rightly so.  Since Read more

The five member state Canvassing Board denied a request by Al Franken's campaign to reconsider absentee ballots it claims were excluded from the initial vote count because of technicalities or administrative errors.  Republican Sen. Norm Coleman's campaign said the board lacked power to revisit those votes.  Statewide, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie estimated 12,000 absentee ballots were rejected for various reasons.  Franken entered the recount trailing Coleman by 215 votes out of 2.9 million ballots.  About 80 percent have been counted with Coleman still in the lead.  However, there are still about 3,600 ballots that both campaigns have challenged that could determine the outcaome of this long, drawn-out race.  Read more here. Read more

The counting continues in Minnesota as the race for the Senate tightens.  Read the whole story here.

About 73 percent of precincts have reported complete results to the secretary of state, with only a few dozen counties remaining. As of Saturday night, about 66 percent of the estimated 2.9 million ballots had gotten a second look.

Coleman entered the recount with a 215-vote edge over Franken. That lead has dropped to 167 votes when comparing totals in precincts where the new count is complete. But the figure doesn't include ballot challenges, which have caused vote tallies for both men to drop.

There have been 1,893 challenges between the campaigns, some could be withdrawn before the Canvassing Board's Dec. 16 meeting.

For alittle comic relief from all this counting, check out this poll from the folks at 23/6.