Frankenfraud

The Wallstreet Journal has a great summation of the Frankenfraud situation in Minnesota. It seems, per WSJ, that some voters are having their ballots counted twice. Yep, twice.

Under Minnesota law, election officials are required to make a duplicate
ballot if the original is damaged during Election Night counting. Officials are
supposed to mark these as "duplicate" and segregate the original ballots. But it
appears some officials may have failed to mark ballots as duplicates, which are
now being counted in addition to the originals. This helps explain why more than
25 precincts now have more ballots than voters who signed in to vote. By some
estimates this double counting has yielded Mr. Franken an additional 80 to 100
votes.

Throughout the recount we have heard about one impropriety after another. Now it seems that since Frankenfraud is ahead, he suddenly wants to stop the recount. He wants to take his marbles and go home since he's in the lead.

As I've written before, the outcome of this so-called election was a foregone conclusion once Coleman didn't get a large enough margin to avoid a recount.

I find it interesting that Obama's move into the White House is surrounded by all these Democrat debacles. We have the on-going sitcom in Illinois with the governor, Richardson stepping aside due to legal problems and the Franken issue. Did I miss any? I know there are a lot of side issues in play: the very unfair "Fairness Doctrine", the Employee Free Choice Act which takes away the employees right to free choice and the ongoing bailouts.

While all this goes on Obama quietly makes controversial appointments (to my way of thinking) like Leon Panetta, Bill Clinton's former White House Chief of Staff, to head up the CIA. It's recycle city, no real change I can believe in...

Funny Business in Minnesota
In which every dubious ruling seems to help Al Franken.
Strange things keep happening in Minnesota, where the disputed recount in the Senate race between Norm Coleman and Al Franken may be nearing a dubious outcome. Thanks to the machinations of Democratic Secretary of State Mark Ritchie and a meek state Canvassing Board, Mr. Franken may emerge as an illegitimate victor.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123111967642552909.html

GetLiberty.org has a good recap of the Wall Street Journal article and the shenanigans that have occurred with some interesting insights you might want to read: http://alg31blog.timberlakepublishing.com/default.asp?Display=854

Mel Martinez (FL) to retire; Brownback to run for Gov. (KS)

The 2010 election is already starting to get interesting and this one isn't quite over! I understand Norm Coleman is ahead at the moment and probably will "win" by a slim margin. However, the lawsuits have started already so who knows when it will officially be over. I read that Al Franken is asking the Democrat controlled Congress to intervene on his behalf, but didn't bother reading the details.

Mel Martinez, (R-Florida) has announced he won't run in 2010 which is going to lead to a very hot race for his seat. Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas) is looking at running for Governor.

Here's a link to one of the stories that includes both tidbits and details (others I found don't mention both):

Mel Martinez To Retire
Florida Sen. Mel Martinez (R) has decided against seeking a second term, a decision he will formalize shortly in the Sunshine State, according to an informed party source.
Martinez's decision was based on a desire for more free time and a less scheduled life, said the source. The first term senator also was an almost certain Democratic target in two years time although those familiar with Martinez's political prospects insisted his strengths in South Florida, coupled with his political base along the I-4 corridor, made his path to reelection possible.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2008/12/mel_martinez_to_retire.html?hpid=topnews?hpid=topnews

Saxby headed to a run-off?

When I went to bed late last night both Fox News and CNN had declared Saxby Chambliss a winner. I woke up this morning to discover he may be headed to the run-off of all run-offs. As I type he has 49.8% of the vote with the Secretary of State's office still opening early or absentee (?) ballots from "heavily populated counties". Those heavily populated counties are probably not going to favor Saxby as clearly as some other rural counties.

We'll see what happens. If he goes into a run-off you're going to see so many ads from both sides it will have you turning off your television and your phone recorder. Both sides will view this as a death-match and throw everything they have at it.

Why Georgia is one of the only (or maybe one of the very, very few) to require a 50 plus 1 victory is beyond me. It always seems to favor the candidate who took the least votes and had the least support of the two.

Look at our local election here with Peter Pfeifer. He had two tough opponents yet he came within a hair of winning the election outright. If he had taken just a tiny fraction of his Peachtree City opponents numbers he'd have won outright. Instead he ended up in a run-off and as always, the number of people who came out was laughable. The "underdog" won as usual, thus the guy who got a fraction of Pfeifer's votes now takes the seat in January.

Whether it's a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian or "other" in that situation, it doesn't seem logical to force a run-off.

On a good note, I just got the work that Al Franken lost by a slim margin. Due to state rules there will be an automatic run-off the race was so close.

I was kinda hoping Louisiana would ditch Landrau just because of Katrina, but that didn't happen although if I remember the numbers it was also fairly close.

Elizabeth Dole lost in North Carolina.

I'm still half asleep. I stayed up until McCain gave his concession speech last night, very diplomatic and gracious by the way. Then I woke up at the crack of dawn and couldn't get back to sleep. That after rising yesterday before 5 a.m. to be a poll watcher, running back and forth to cover the suspicious package threat at Republican headquarters in Fayetteville and trying to keep up with the Fayette Front Page, the Christian City Chair-ity event (mark your calendars for Dec. 1st for a really cool event), the Read My Lipstick Network, and on and on it goes... Yours truly was one busy and tired puppy and it'll take me a day or two to recover!

Keep the faith, we have a tough road ahead of us but we're strong!