What a crazy election there in MN. Talk about a roller coaster.

Personally, I don't have much of an opinion of Franken. My reasons for wanting him to win are to help Obama pass his agendas through the Senate and make Sean Hannity's head pop off.

MISSING SOMETHING HUGE

There are approximately 5000 ballots that were challenged but had their challenges withdrawn. Those votes have not been counted yet and are not part of the board's review of challenged ballots that will be over Friday. The withdrawn challenge votes won't be hard to count because they go revert back to the original decisions made by the local boards. The Star-Tribune could have counted them, except Coleman keeps adding challenges and withdrawing them, so it impossible to get the full account of which ballots are which. Some withdrawn challenged ballots were counted with still challenged ballots today, to make things more confusing.

Anyway, it isn't going to be over tomorrow unless they have staff counting all the withdrawn challenge ballots.

That's unbelievable...

P.S. Only one "s" in Just Deserts.

Challenging that ballot is an affront to polite society.

I think some in here may be being
unfair to Franken the candidate:

Minnesota hasn't forgotten being a
national laughingstock re. the Jesse
Ventura fiasco.

So I think there was wariness re. another
celebrity...and Franken clearly is one; his public
strengths were, I think, largely liabilities
at this time, in this place.

When I first read "Rush Limbaugh is a Big
Fat Idiot" in 1996, I was stunned at how
thoughtful and eloquent Franken was
(though, of course, with a wicked wit).

It made me read his other books, and damned,
Mr. Harvard is smart as Hell...and unapologetic
about his beliefs. I've thought for a decade that
he could be a great spokesperson for the
Dems. Those who haven't read his books, though,
(and that would be MOST Minn. voters)
probably assumed he was as empty a suit as
the actors that the Republicans routinely elect.

If they DID elect him in November, they'll soon
find out that his humor is just the tip of the iceberg...
the marketable side of his deeply held values.

For a little humor on this: We were at a pub quiz night Thursday evening at Sven & Ole's Pizza in Grand Marais, MN. One of the questions was: Name the Minnesota state fruit. From one table came the audible reply: "Al Franken." From another table came the rejoinder, from someone obviously quite up to date on the recount: "That'd be SENATOR Al Franken to you."

The Court tried to punt, knowing that the biggest criticism of the SCOTUS was they decided who the POTUS would be and not the voters or the process. As for ridiculous challenges their point was to try to get time and measure the process for later appeals---typical lawyer'g when highly paid mechanics are faced with the cliff that they are against the law or the evidence.

What appears is that Franken is down to a handful of officially counted and sanctioned votes with another 400-500 contested votes remaining. The Star-Tribune projects Franken getting a lead of 90 by the end of the day---which makes things problematic for Coleman's camp. If that is the number it is outside the range of 46 that Franken was awarded from the missing 133 vote envelope.

Therefore his only chance is to work at those absentee ballots he tried to get rejected in mass~~~but then they will try to carve out his precincts versus contest Frankens~~~problem is Franken can do the same, so they return to the Canvass Board to deal with the disputes and back in the process where the MN authority actually resides.

If indeed the various counties had various incompetency....like with my wife where they spelled her last name with an extra letter or other non voter mistakes even mistakenly putting envelopes in the wrong pile....the process emerge.

Here is the problem when Franken emerges will Coleman eventually concede? As for the respective attributes of Franken or Coleman it is immaterial as the most important thing right now is to insure the public's will be expressed and the process no matter how imperfect versus people's impatience and desired end result be allowed to finish.

Last note: If I were in MN, I would find out if my absentee ballot was in that pile of 1600 and it actually is my damage and file suit to ensure that it is counted.

Regardless of the out come this re-count has shown that our voting system here in Minnesota, we use optical scan machines. Is pretty damn accurate. Over 4 million scanned votes and there have been less than a few hundred vote difference. That ain't bad.

Not to be too grumpy-old-man, but: People, just don't write stuff on your ballot!!