Senator? Part 2

On Monday John Fund of the Wall Street Journal an offered this update on the contest for the soon to be open Minnesota Senate seat in the op-ed pieces "The Battle for Minnesota Is Just Getting Started"
Ope-ed at the insets....

Recount staffers in Albert Lea, Minn., sort ballots while a Coleman volunteer
(far left) and a Franken volunteer (far right) watch, Nov. 19, 2008.That may
soon change. Today, the state's five-member Canvassing Board meets to rule on
Mr. Franken's demand that it review whether absentee ballots rejected by county
officials can be added to vote totals. Those ballots are likely to determine the outcome and will be the center of challenges in the courts or before the U.S. Senate, which is the final judge of the winner. A lot rides on the result because the Minnesota race, along with a Dec. 2 runoff in Georgia, will determine if Democrats get the 60 votes they need to cut off GOP filibusters on a party-line vote.

Congress is sneaky enough without being fillibuster proof, do not forget their recent attempts at an underhanded passage of amnesty for illegal aliens. In the past year ther have been number of attempts to pass legislation that was objected to by a vast majority of legal citizens. Beware that a fillibuster proof Congress will act as if it has a mandate, evn if it is against the will of the people.

"Things are clearly moving in the wrong direction for Franken [in the recount]," Larry Jacobs, a political scientist at the University of Minnesota, told the St. Paul Pioneer Press. He says many of the challenges filed by both campaigns against individual ballots are frivolous and will be withdrawn or dismissed by the canvassing board: "The Franken campaign is going to win or lose based on what happens with the absentees."

Let us hope that the sitting judges aren't activist and treat the ballots objectively.

A review of less than half of Minnesota's 87 counties has found that at least 2,066 absentee ballots were rejected because the voter wasn't registered, didn't sign the ballot or have a witness. Late yesterday the Franken campaign claimed it had learned of hundreds of "missing ballots." Those numbers dwarf the 725-vote margin Mr. Coleman had on election night, as well as the 215-vote lead he had before the recount began, and his current lead of some 200 votes. The problem with adding absentee ballots is state law. According to an advisory opinion issued last week by the office of Democratic state Attorney General Lori Swanson, "Only the ballots cast in the election and the summary statements certified by the election judges may be considered in the recount process." A recount manual prepared this year by the office of Secretary of State Mark Ritchie, also a Democrat, makes clear that the canvassing board only supervises "an administrative recount" that is "not to determine if absentee ballots were properly accepted."
But Mr. Franken's attorneys are now arguing that Minnesota law also requires that each county's election report include "the complete voting activity within that county." They are also invoking the Equal Protection arguments cited by the Supreme Court in Bush vs. Gore, as well as rulings from Washington State's disputed 2004 governor's race -- that contest was decided for Democrat Christine Gregoire by 133 votes after an initial count and two subsequent recounts.Intent on harvesting absentee ballots, the Franken campaign has presented affidavits from four voters who claim their ballots were improperly rejected. It hopes to find more, now that a Ramsey County judge has agreed to a Franken demand that it have access to data from that county on whose absentee ballots had been rejected. After initially saying rejected absentee ballots shouldn't be part of the recount, the secretary of state's office now says the information should be made public.
If the absentee names are made public, a mad scramble will ensue to contact those voters and get them to demand their ballots be counted. That's just what happened in the 2004 governor's race in Washington State after King County Judge Dean Lum allowed local Democrats access to the list of provisional voters that hadn't been counted because either there was no signature or no match between the signature and the voter registration on file with officials.

Public disclosure of absentee ballot voters, having problem ballots, creates the opportunity for bribery and extortion. We already know the Democratic party's position on union secret ballots is an impediment to a voter's implied right to privacy.

His ruling set off a partisan hunt for votes. Ryan Bianchi, communications assistant for Ms. Gregoire, told the Seattle Times that Democratic volunteers asked voters if they had cast ballots for Ms. Gregoire. "If they say no, we just tell them to have a nice day," he said. Only if they said yes did Democrats ask if they wanted to make their ballots valid.

Like the 2000 Florida election, when Democrats endlessly called for recounts all the while fighting the inclusion of the absentee ballots of enlisted men. Now the Democrats are selectively searching for rejected absentee voters that fit their recount goals.

Margot Swanson, a voter in Redmond who forgot to sign her ballot, told me she was contacted by phone and asked whom she voted for. When she said Republican Dino Rossi, the caller quickly hung up. "I puzzled out there might be a problem with my ballot, and I found out there was," she said. "But I would never have known from the tricky call I got."

Sneaky little twitches they are. Democrats, in these situations are far from morally centered. They fight and fight dirty if the goal is worthwhile. Here in Georgia we will have the Senate runoff tomorrow between the Republican incumbent Chambliss and and upstart Democrat Martin. The local media ads that the ads that the challenger has been offering are bereft of truth. In one big hammering point describing Chambliss as an advocate for a 23% sales tax, at best showing a complete ignorance of the "Fair Tax" and more likely at worst an intentional lie. The big guns have been visiting from both sides, Bill the Adulterer, Joe the Cheater and from the other side of the aisle Rudy the Prosecutor and Sarah the Point Guard, have all visited in the last couple weeks.
I'll be voting for "My Big Daddy".
Let's hope that Minnesota is not at the brink of a real "Decade of Al Franken".