Franken wines by +312 votes.
Number of days Norm Coleman seemed to lead: 43.
Number of days Al Franken has certifiably led: 135
(After yesterday's hi-octane grammatical discussion, also know as "number of days Norm Coleman has been un-leaded= 135")
Number of days since election day (Nov. 4): 178
Some thoughts from a lunatic with a laptop just past the fold....
Hoooooo--wweeeeee.
Sleep is SUCH a good thing I'm recommending it to all my friends. I needed that.
Thank you SO much for all your support (h/t to Bartels & James) in yesterday's diary. My tip jar overflowed with good Karma and strength enough to keep me upright and functional during the day..... and I could feel it. Really. It was a quasi-religious-cum-mystical experience for someone like my self who is a complete rationalist, total empiricist and the very epitome of "the facts, the whole facts, just the facts, and nothing but the facts" Joe Friday kind of guy. (Which is why all of you read these diaries-- for just the facts.)
The sensation of being supported wasn't quite that seminar/guru-leader in a commercial for I don't remember what (great concept, lousy product placement) with a massive picture of some galactic nebula projected behind him, an auditorium full of fervent and wannabe fervent attendees in front of him, and he declaims, "The universe wants you to be rich!", but it was close: "The Kossacks want you to be...... conscious!"
But you people are great and I am grateful.
Norm Coleman's House of Mirrors
Kossack TerribleTom did a terribly good dismantlement of the Coleman brief in yesterday's comments, with a great moment here:
Throughout the entire argument, Coleman conveniently conflates two processes: The first is the election-day system of poll watchers, election judges and county auditors and so forth. The second is a court of law, bound by rules of evidence and procedure.
In effect, Coleman argues that the two processes should be identical. If a court requires evidence of a particular element, then the election day process should have required the same evidence and, thus, always produce an identical result. Otherwise, there are two standards, and we can't have that.
It's nonsense, of course, and it makes my head hurt.
And the proposed remedies have all the properties of patent medicines before the Food & Drug Admin. was established about 1908. (One of the best sellers about 1905 was "Radiathor": a great little tonic based on the latest scientific discoveries. It contained grains of pure radium in the alcohol and not only cured everything from lumbago to baldness to toenail fungus it also provided a soft night-light glow in your medicine cabinet. Really.)
Norm argues that because some counties used different standards than others, a statistical method of altering the count should be used which is based upon how how well each candidate did in the county in question. This is pretty bizarre and would be an unprecedented solution.
Another way is to allow properly rejected absentee ballots to be counted to make up for the absentee ballots that Norm now claims shouldn't have been counted in the first place. In other words, illegal votes should now be counted. This is also unprecedented and very unusual.
Considering how weak Norm's arguments are, I can't really see the MN Supreme Court ever getting to a point where they will be analyzing Norm's remedies.
More from the BigE at MN Progressive here:
http://www.mnprogressiveproject.com/...
You go to the MN State Fair or the carnival comes to town and often one of the trailers is the "House of Mirrors." Step right up. Pay your money. Try to make your way through the maze while meeting yourself coming and going, in double profile, and while seeming to be 2 foot 3 or wider than tall. Of course if you just keep glancing down you'll see where the gray/grey (spelling war!) paint has worn off much more to show you where goes the path through the maze.
The Coleman Appeal (the legal one, not the personal angle; also no truth to the rumor that Norm (unlike Ben Ginsberg) is reptilian by genetics and periodically sheds his skin, which poetically is described by Chaucer as "Coleman a- peal- in".) makes a big deal out of "equal protection." The phrase is from the 14 Amendment to the US Constitution, ratified in 1868, just after the guns had cooled from the Civil War. The newly-freed were usually being treated as the still-oughta-be slaves. The Republican Party (!) put through the legal, yea bedrock Constitutional, basis for laws to be enforced equally for all persons "regardless of previous condition of servitude" and apart from considerations like race, sex, etc. (like state laws in Lincoln's state of Illinois that limited the number of persons of color who could settle in the state to an annual quota.) In other words, its an amendment that the elite, the aristocratic wanna-bes, the biased and the hierarchical are always going to despise because it demands EQUAL treatment under the law.
Well Coleman argues at length (as his side has done at width, at sprawl, in the hall, bouncing a ball; could you, would you, Ben, at the Mall?) since local election officials made decisions on the spot on absentee ballots, based on statewide legal standards, and that those decisions came out differently between, say, Baudette County and Wadena County, there was something wrong. He looks in this mirror, sees that quadruple reflection over there and says, "Hey! Must be bias. Must be discrimination."
Then he holds up 1300 ballots from his back pocket, and if you look toward this mirror they look like 4000, and in that mirror they look like 4800 AND if you look at them in this TINTED mirror 3 reflections over there they don't look like they came out of his pocket. And he bleats, "Disenfranchised. Gotta count them. Equal protection for the rejected."
OTOH his brief turns a couple corners and stands where 2 mirror face each other square on. If you lean your head in and look either way the image of your head is repeated into infinity.
The 2 mirrors here are the 133/2 votes from Minneapolis where the paper ballots have been lost for the recount (but we have fine evidence the voters voted IN PERSON).
These votes Coleman want UN-counted. Why? Well there's no real good way to say, even using Latin in a legal brief, "I'm losing so I want some of the other guy's votes thrown out." Ego non victoriatum, ergo desirio votati Frankenisti heave-ho-rium doesn't cut it somehow. (Subject to the Latin grammar police, but I think I'm as close as Brian putting up his "Romans go home!" graffiti in his first "terrorist" strike.)
BUT look! Norm! (Slaps Tony Trimble/Ben Ginsberg upside the head, partly to get their attention, partly because they deserve it in general.) If every vote should be counted regardless of legalities you CAN'T have the 133/2 thrown out! Those voters would have screaming loud grounds to beat you to a bloody pulp with "equal protection." "May it please the court, these voters exercized their RIGHT to vote in person, not by privilege of absentee. They were registered. They voted. To take away their vote denies them the franchise, discriminates against them as a group/class of identifiable voters." If there's any justice the Court should not only agree, they should stick a rolled up copy of the 14th Amendment up Ginsberg's nose.
For a much more elegant demolishment of Coleman's "equal protection" claim, Kossack and actual MN attorney "underwhelm" put up a diary back on January 29 (3 days after the ECC trial opened). S/he (and I think he's a he, but not positive) takes the Mirror Maze Coleman is trying to lead the court into and lays down those airplane floor lights that "will activate to lead you to the nearest exit," the little glow-in-the-floor string that blink "walk this way." I think the Court will do just that, Arrowsmith style, "Walk this way, talk this way! Walk this way, talk this way, and gimme a kiss!"-- a kiss off, that is, to Norm's whole argument.
http://www.dailykos.com/...
Personal Note
Yesterday was the first day for pre-ordering a book of these diaries and there were 24 of you unhinged enough to actually pony up $16.95. And you call ME a lunatic with a laptop.
Attention Kossack Nation! Among you are 24 twisted souls (starting in VA) that have a severe case of MN Senate Swine Flu. Symptoms include use of Visa & MasterCard via PayPal, an uncontrollable desire for snark, and they break into tears of joy when the Muzak at their mall plays "Swedish Rhapsody" (...or "Bohemian Rhapsody"; other shoppers give wide berth to someone softly singing with a sing-song accent, "I'm yust a poor boy froma pooren family...Ve vill not let yew go!") I would too.
But if you want to join the ranks of the raving, Word Alchemy will help you out, as will Another Massachusetts Liberal (See? Two lines! No waiting.):
http://www.wordalchemy.net/...
http://www.dailykos.com/...
OK gotta face the desperate horde today. Its the LAST day of the wine sale so they will be out in force. Then comes the "re-order & re-stock the shelves" of next Monday & Tuesday, followed by a long weekend in Florida visiting Mama WineRev for Mother's Day.
Hope this will hold you for the next day or 2 with all the latest from yust southeast of Lake Wobegon.
Shalom.