Shhhh....very gently now.....(Whispered:) Good morning, especially to all of you in a, um, "delicate" condition (the one where the Alka-Seltzer fizzing in the glass sounds like a 16 foot roller coming over the "Pipeline" in Hawaii). Remember its only 19 days until freeedom comes in DC and even less than that until the infamous MN senate race gets called and certified. Any swearing IN will be preceded by a lot of swearing AT in the next few days.
Tips and recommends are always appreciated but for the sake of many here, PLEASE, no coins in the jar. Folding recommends ONLY in the glass tip jar. Here's a light wrap (cloth; no paper crinkling) of yesterday in the Orange ballots if you will tiptoe below the fold in (recount) infinity....and beyond...softly now.....
UPDATE: Now at work and I'm the boss today, so i can check in from time to time. (Yes we're open on New Year's Day, the wine industry's branch of CSI: Miami (WineRev whips off Horatio Caine sunglasses and bites off line: "We NEVER close."))
1) Shoot the Messenger? Hell, The Messenger shoots Back!
Remember yesterday when Brodkorb of MN Democrats Exposed shot his mouth off like this?
Michael Brodkorb of Minnesota Democrats Exposed (his blog title says it all-WR) writes: "‘Non-partisan’ Secretary of State Mark Ritchie’s office has joined forces with the partisan liberal video-blog The UpTake to provide a live video feed of today’s State Canvassing Board meeting."
And then Ron Carey, MN State Republican Chair played Little Mr. Echo with this tripe:
"It’s amazing that a partisan, liberal blog has been made the official provider of the video for the Canvassing Board," Carey said. "To make a group with an agenda and a record of attacking one of the candidates before the Canvassing Board the purveyor of information is beyond improper, it calls into question the judgment of those who made the decision for this partisan website to be the sanctioned broadcaster of these important proceedings."
Well, the UpTake has answered, with a restraint bordering on Obama-esque, but which in my "ethnic prose, Eubonics division via Tallinn, Estonia" reads, "Meie ei votta sitta kedagist!"
(For you poor souls who still don't speak Estonian this comes off in certain neighborhoods as "We don't take NO SH*T OFF NOBODY!"):
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
STATEMENT BY THE UPTAKE
Video news site clarifies MN GOP Chair's statements
ST PAUL [12/30/08] - Earlier today Ron Carey, Chair of the Minnesota GOP, called The UpTake, an online video news gathering organization, the "Official Communicator" for the office of the Minnesota Secretary of State.
Mr. Carey's statement warrants a small clarification.
The UpTake is not the "Official Communicator" for the Minnesota Secretary of State. The UpTake is currently providing an unedited switched video feed of Minnesota State Canvassing Board proceedings. The UpTake is also webcasting the feed live at its website, http://www.theuptake.org. The feed and webcast are free, public and available to any organization interested in obtaining it. Many press organizations have already taken advantage of our pool feed. Outlets from the Pioneer Press to Fox News have requested the code for our live webcast.
The UpTake is providing this service because the Capitol staff who normally provide both the video feed and webcast were not available. The UpTake volunteered to contribute equipment and technical personnel to continue to provide both. The office of the Secretary of State accepted our offer. This conversation was transparent and also streamed live online.
Jason Barnett, Executive Director of The UpTake, commented, "We are extremely pleased that the Chair of the Minnesota GOP watches The UpTake and was able to enjoy today's State Canvassing Board hearing through our live coverage."
That, my friends, is MISTER Jason Barnett from 3/4 of the court away DOWN-TOWN.....and NUTHIN BUT NET!!!!!
2) Rejected Absentee Ballots
They are slogging through them across the state and sending them in steadily to the Secretary of State's Office.
Must See TV: Mark Ritchie and the Secretary of State's Office will open and count received ballots beginning 9:00am, Saturday, January 3.
TheUpTake will provide a live, (lefty, liberal, partisan) streaming feed of the count....probably something like this:
McIntee (breathlessly): "And now the wise, left-handed, in-the-tank, joined-at-the-hip-with-us, deputy SoS Gelbmann reaches into the Wadena County envelope with his RIGHT hand...."
Nate Silver (interrupting, soft golfing commentary voice) "That's his 14th right hand reach-in, which so far has favored Franken 59.27% of the time..."
McIntee (rising excitement) "...and its....its..a Barkley vote!"
Pat Buchanan: "This is good news for John McCain!"
Michele Bachmann: "That vote was anti-American and should be investigated, and I never said what I just said even though I was tricked into it."
Coleman Lead Attorney Mark Trimble (enters picture from right, arms flailing, shouting): "This was a non-Franken vote, which was therefore clearly intended for and should be counted for Coleman. And since the Deputy Secretary used his RIGHT hand for the reach-in and since Franken is a well-known elitist, lefty, liberal, UpTake watching latte-sipper, this ballot should be counted double for Coleman. However this does not set a precedent for any future court actions the Coleman campaign may undertake at a later date..."
Should be a great show!
3) Close to the action:
Well yeah, but, uh....there are limits, right?
Michael McIntee: Yes. All of these meetings are to be public. We've had no problem with that. Dakota County asked that we move our cameras back so you can't see Social Security numbers and passport numbers on the ballot envelopes. We indicated we need to be close enough to hear. They are working out a way for us to do that today.
..."so you can't see Social Security numbers and passport numbers...." A nice, respectful move by Dakota County officials saying to McIntee this is a bit TOO close but MAN, the nostril hair shots TheUptake edited out must have been FANTASTIC!
True MN praise for McIntee of UpTake from a blogger at their site: Mike said they would do their best to cover every regional meeting they could and the response came:
neither snow nor sleet nor bad lutefisk shall stay your correspondents from the prompt coverage of recount news! Excelsior!
4) How to Win Friends, Influence People and Satisfy Voters
Remember the Great Anoka County Showdown on Tuesday? (Coleman Lawyer: We're not going to talk about any of the 1346 "5th pile" ballots unless we also talk about the Coleman 654 around the state (and here in Anoka County as well.)
Franken Lawyer: We're not going to talk about ANY of the 654.
Anoka County election director Rachel: "We're not going to waste everyone's time. Meeting adjourned.")
Word on Wednesday is that the whole Tuesday meeting/trainwreck took 10 minutes! (Whew! Like a 42 sec. into the first round: "Down goes Frazier.")
One Anoka county voter and blogger was very impressed by the exchange:
I was hoping to see more action in Anoka county. After seeing what has happened during this recount and Senator Coleman's positions. I am hoping that I hear my absentee ballot be rejected by Senator Coleman's people -- I never should have voted for him!
Wednesday was Round 2 in the Anoka Regional meeting. One of the other county reps present at Anoka was Isanti County (next county north of Anoka). He/she was rather miffed at Round 1 and didn't show for Wednesday....but sent word if the 2 campaigns agree on some sort of rules for admitting absentee ballots that they can drive up to Isanti County and talk it over with him or her!
(I LIKE that kind of spunk! Coleman and Franken lawyers in $500 suits debating inter-planetary war, DNA sequencing strands ("On this chromosome its CCGAT!" "No, that spells Lizard! Its CCAGT!") AND what process to devise for counting rejected absentee ballots. Some, I don't know, retired auto mechanic from Cambridge, MN AND chair of the Isanti County elections board tells them "You come to MY place, and MAYBE I'll talk to you...but only after you hand me that can of 5W-20, lick your fingers and put one each on each pole of this battery to see if there's any juice in it....")
Reports from Anoka and Dakota County Wednesday is the Coleman push for their pile of 654 ballots be looked at first (and NOT AT ALL per the Franken camp) appears to have collapsed. Both counties were looking at their share of the 1346 "5th pile" ballots.....
Process at work: Dakota county-- a few absentees came in on time but near to election day and were sent to precincts BUT the new voter registration cards were sent to the county election board. Precincts rejected said ballots (pile 3) and returned them to county. Now county matched new registration cards (for new, first time voters) with these absentee ballots. BOTH campaigns AND Counties agreed these ballots are IN and have sent such to Ritchie's office.... another outbreak of common sense and fair play; no wonder proto-fascists are getting antsy......
....Ramsey County (St. Paul) 133 ballots examined over 4 hours: 71 sent on to Ritchie's office, 33 rejected by Franken camp, 21 by Coleman camp......
.....Wright County (1/2 way between Mpls & St. Cloud; MN-6 Bachmann district) 17 of 29 ballots sent in; Franken objected to 11 and Coleman to 1.....
.....Crow Wing County (North Central, Brainerd) sent in 20 of 26; Franken objected to 5 and county officials withdrew 1...
.....Polk County (Waaayy NW MN, along the NDak line, Crookston) sent in 5 of 7 with Franken putting the kibosh on the other 2......
.....Hennepin County sends 182 out of 231 (82 more to review on Friday), with 48 turned down by the campaigns, (24 by Franken and 24 by Coleman).......
5) Lawyers swing Light Sabres IX: Back at the Supreme Court
With the last batch of ballots (most of the 1346 "5th pile") on the brink of being counted, arriving by the score at Secretary of State's Ritchie's office for a Saturday morning grand opening and tally, the Colemaniks have moved to make sure Franken pulls further ahead! Thats right, they've filed a motion with the MN Supreme Court! (Every time Norm, Fritz and Tony go to court Franken draws closer or moves farther ahead in the count/recount, so this is good news!)
What do they want? A DO OVER! "All these votes are coming in from all over the state and we can't stop the ones we want stopped, and we can't get our 654 super-duper coincidental ones (from piles 1-4) included at all. ("Waaahh!") So we are asking the MN Supreme Court to have all 1346 sent in to Ritchie's office and all of them opened under one (yet to be determined) standard, which of course will be broad enough to include, oh, say, about 654 more rejected absentee ballots."
(Star Tribune)
Fritz Knaak, Coleman briefcase swinger:
(Overhead circle swing of light sabre for head cut attempt) Coleman's aim is "bringing in ballots that were wrongly excluded," attorney Knaak said Wednesday. "I heard it a hundred times from the Franken campaign."......
Knaak (throws cluster of 87+ photon torpedoes at local election boards; a full spread!) said in a statement that the Coleman campaign's action was prompted by concerns that a county-by-county review of the wrongly rejected ballots was resulting in the emergence of "a subtle form of political guerrilla warfare."
It was inconsistent to review only those absentee ballots judged wrongly rejected by local officials, Knaak said, ("and under his mask, the words,"But the Dark Side of the Force is strong in ME") and leave out, in some but not all cases, other ballots questioned by the campaigns.
Mark Elias, Franken's main public mouthpiece/attorney
(Forward somersault with series of 2 handed parries) Elias said the Coleman petition seeks to halt the count. "If this process can be revisited every time one candidate decides at the end of it that they're not likely to prevail, then it will never end," he said.......that his campaign would fight the move and was confident it would fail.
(Wide sweeping slash at power conduit causes momentary blackout)"They are now back ... asking for a do-over" even though the process ordered by the Supreme Court is nearly finished.......
(Several 2 handed hacks; a desperate Knaak parrying for all he's worth; Elias lands a scoring cut) "Norm Coleman and I are both native New Yorkers, and this is the height of chutzpah," Franken attorney Marc Elias told reporters Wednesday evening. "They are trying to stop the count."
"We're simply not prepared to allow them to rewrite those rules," he said. (Knaak dives down an escape tube, leaving behind a maze of standing, intersecting lightning bolts until the next episode)
And then....... a sighting of..... yes, from the Franken side: David the Lillehaug (the queen piece for the Franken legal team, the Big Kahuna, Mr. Major Mojo). There was a slight tremor as the WineRev decided to press the limits of fair use by citing one more superbly written bit (Duchschere et. al.) from the Star Trib..... and also the earth rumbled slightly as Obi-Wan Lillehaug appeared showing the same move as seen the day before in Anoka county, but on the big stage (as befits Lillehaug):
In Hennepin County, a dramatic moment occurred when the session began. Franken recount attorney David Lillehaug objected to reviewing any of the 170 rejected absentee county ballots that Coleman's attorneys wanted to add to the 329 ballots already on the review list.
Bill McGinley, a Coleman attorney, offered to include the 30 ballots that Franken wanted to add. Lillehaug nixed that offer, too.
Quote of the Day
No LTE's on New Year's Day.....in fact no op-ed page at all, just a round up of best editorial cartoons from '08. I wandered over to the Star Trib online to see if some Reich-winger had left a "Tales From the Crypt" bunker comment and was delighted to find it took until page 3 (of 7) posts to find someone NOT complaining about Norm's changing the rules of the game as he runs to the Supremes again. A LOT of slams on Coleman including this gem from blogger appledumpling:
Norman, this is your appledumpling talking
Losing the senate is the price you pay for: 1. being W's lapdog; 2. fooling around on your wife and sexually harassing women while claiming to be pro-family values; 3. laundering over a hundred thousand dollars in illegal donations from rich friends through nieman marcus, hays companies, your rental and who knows what else; 4. lying about all of the above; and 5. wearing dentures that were made for somebody's horse.
Soooo, a carrot and a lump of sugar for all of you. Be gentle with the hangovers (lots of liquids, easy on the caffeine). Don't step on any absentee ballots you havae lying around the abode....Happy New Year to all of you from yust southeast of Lake Wobegon.
Shalom.