Is Norm Coleman stealing the election?

[creeksneakers2]

I hope I have this wrong and I'm not sure this is right but......

The Minnesota Supreme Court ruled that for absentee ballots to be counted both candidates must agree that the vote be counted.

Because of the requirement that all parties concur on which rejected absentee ballots should be counted, disagreements could prevent hundreds of ballots that may have been improperly rejected from being sent to the Secretary of State's office to meet Friday's deadline.

Al Franken wants all the ballots counted because Al is an upstanding guy who believes in democracy. Norm Coleman is a snake who doesn't care about anything but winning. Coleman only wants the votes for Coleman to be counted. Since Al agrees to all the votes, and Norm wants the votes for himself to be counted, then there is no disagreement on the votes for Norm and all of Norm's go on to be counted. When it comes to the votes for Al, Coleman objects and preempts their counting. So in the end, Coleman votes get counted, Franken votes don't and Coleman can win this way.

I thought I must be wrong but I looked today and saw on MSNBC:

In St. Louis County, 161 absentee ballots were examined. Out of those 101 will make their way to the State Canvassing Board.... Out of the 161 absentee ballots reviewed in St. Louis County, Coleman's campaign objected to 59 of them. Franken objected to one. County said those ballots will be stored in the courthouse attic until further notification

What's up?

[gratuitous]

1. The court made a stupid ruling

It's up to the Secretary of State to decide whether a ballot conveys the clear intent of the voter, not the campaigns involved. The court’s ruling that all three parties had to agree to count any particular ballot was just dumb, dumb, and double dumb. Franken’s campaign made an announcement that they want to see all the ballots counted, and the Secretary of State has (I think) already ruled that some 1,300 ballots were wrongly excluded from the count. I don’t know if Franken’s general statement in favor of democracy – that is, counting the ballots cast – is a formal declaration that the Franken campaign has decided to count all the ballots.

I hope it’s not, because that means it’s up to the Coleman campaign to decide just which ballots to count, since both the Secretary of State and Franken want to count all of the wrongly excluded ballots. Because the decision whether to count a particular ballot (but not exclude it) must be unanimous according to the dumb ruling by the Minnesota Supreme Court, then the Coleman campaign is in a position to pick and choose the ballots it will allow.

What Franken should do, if he was a real cutthroat politician uninterested in the process but only the results*, is to formally state that he doesn’t want to count any of the excluded ballots. He has the lead right now, and his refusal to count any more ballots means he wins, and he can declare himself the winner. Following the fucked-up logic of Bush v. Gore, I’m sure the U.S. Supreme Court would have no choice but to affirm Franken’s declaration of victory.

*You know, a typical Republican.

[MineralMan]

2. It is very important to remember

that the ballots themselves have not been seen yet. These are absentee ballots, still sealed in their envelopes. What is in question is whether the ballots are valid, based on the laws governing absentee ballots. Signatures and stuff like that on the ballot envelope are being considered. Until those issues are decided for each ballot, nobody will know what the vote inside the envelope actually is.

It is to Franken's benefit to see as many of these as possible opened and counted. The majority will be from Ramsey and Hennepin counties, and will benefit Franken, overall. That is why Coleman is refusing way more of them than Franken.

OTOH, absentee ballots from places around Lake Minnetonka, some parts of Washington County, and a few other places will work to Coleman's benefit, so he wants to get those counted.

Telling is the fact that Franken wanted to let all the disputed ballots be counted. Coleman wants to pick and choose.