Posts Tagged ‘recounts’
The Recount Fairy?
Is New Jersey about to get a visit from the recount fairy? Apparently both parties are bracing for this, with the National Review‘s @jimgeraghty tweeting early exits nobody should take seriously: Corzine 47, Christie 47, Daggett barely registering. Polls close at 8 PM.
Norm Coleman, Man of Honor
Norm Coleman, man of honor, will sue to keep his Senate seat despite saying two days after Election Day that he wouldn’t.
LOLColeman
Why not him? Al Franken has officially won the recount in Minnesota. (Image shamelessly stolen from Donkeylicious.)
UPDATE: Coleman’s lawyer is threatening to take this to the courts, but I know he won’t do that—Norm Coleman is a man of honor who would never put his personal aggrandizement ahead of the “healing process.”
A Few
A few.
* Franken officially takes the lead.
* The music industry is abandoning their strategy of dickish law suits.
* There are now more slaves on the planet than at any time in human history.
* Gao Xiqing, who oversees 10% of China’s $200 trillion, tells it to us straight.
The current conditions can’t go on. It is time for the new government, under Obama or even McCain, to really tell people: “Look, this is wartime, this is about the survival of our nation. It’s not about our supremacy in the world. Let’s not even talk about that any more. Let’s get down to the very basics of our livelihood.”
I have great admiration of American people. Creative, hard-working, trusting, and freedom-loving. But you have to have someone to tell you the truth. And then, start realizing it. And if you do it, just like what you did in the Second World War, then you’ll be great again!
If that happens, then of course—American power would still be there for at least as long as I am living. But many people are betting on the other side.
Random
Random.
* The Cleveland Plain Dealer doesn’t like it when big-shot New Yorkers take shits on our beloved city.
* I thought I was raised in a country where we were all free to vote for the Lizard Person of our choice. I was wrong.
* By the way, it looks like Franken may actually win.
* Labor leaders like Obama’s labor pick.
* “Area Woman Becomes Republican Vice Presidential Candidate.” The Onion continues its Year-in-Review.
* James Howard Kunstler’s “10 Ways to Prepare for a Post-Oil Society.”
Late Night
Late night links.
* Wikipedia’s list of common misconceptions.
* It’s good to live in a country without nobility or hereditary office.
* Are you a film addict? I am 55.2% yes.
* Matt, Josh, and Ezra consider the fillibuster and the extent to which we should just dump the damn thing.
* Coleman has gone to the Minnesota Supreme Court (a majority of whom have apparently been appointed by Tim Pawlenty) to ask that improperly rejected absentee ballots not be counted in the recount. I’ve looked, but I haven’t actually found any sort of legitimate reason why he thinks ballots that were improperly rejected should stay improperly rejected, other than “I might win that way.” Some commentary at TPM.
* Scientists have found the first unequivocal evidence that the Arctic region is warming at a faster rate than the rest of the world at least a decade before it was predicted to happen. We’re so very screwed.
Links!
Links!
* The podcast of my appearance last night on Poli-Sci-Fi Radio is already up.
* Lots of anxiety today over Google’s commitment to Net Neutrality after a report in the Wall Street Journal that they were looking to sell a “fast lane” to their services. Google denounces the report, but questions remain.
* Franken +200? So says the AP. More at First Read and TPM, which reports that optimism in the Franken camp is at very high.
* Does Harry Potter poison young minds? Richard Dawkins hates puppies and sunshine, too.
* The IEA says we’re screwed starting in 2020. That’s actually sort of good news; there’s good reason to think we may already be screwed right now.
* Whose poetry will be read at the inauguration?
There’s buzz about all sorts of names. Among them: Philip Levine, a Midwesterner whose writings are attuned to the working class; Robert Pinsky, former poet laureate who created the Favorite Poem Project; Yusef Komunyakaa, whose work is heavily influenced by jazz; U.S. Poet Laureate Kay Ryan.
Franken by 4?
The first stage of the recount has ended in Minnesota, and the Franken camp’s methodology puts them ahead by an unbelievable 4 votes. Due to differing methodologies, the official tally has it +687 for Coleman, and the Star-Tribune‘s has it at +192 Coleman. Kos does his best to explain the differences in methodologies:
With the recount over, the Star Tribune gives Norm Coleman a 238-vote lead, but that doesn’t include challenged ballots, which number about 5,400, pending negotiations between the campaigns to reduce the number of challenged ballots. While the official state results site hasn’t been updated yet, Minnesota Public Radio is reporting that the official margin will be down to a 192-vote Coleman lead, which would be down slightly from the 215-vote Coleman victory after the first count. Why the discrepancies? Beats me.
The state canvassing board will meet on December 16 to review those challenged ballots. If they were to affirm the decision of local election judges on every one of those challenges, then the Franken campaign claims it would win by four votes. That number does not include the 133 missing ballots from a Minneapolis precinct that have likely cost Franken about 36 votes. A state election official has said that if the ballots aren’t found, they would probably stick with the election night numbers, giving Franken a bit more of a cushion. One can’t assume that every single one of those ballot challenges will fail.
Looks like it’s just about time for a coin flip.
Franken!
For the first time, Al Franken is claiming a lead in Minnesota. But I think that was before this Minneapolis thing.
Potpourri
Potpourri!
* MetaFilter has a post on gay-rights activist Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to hold elective office in the U.S. and subject of a new Sean Penn biopic, assassinated twenty-seven years ago this week.
* Also via MeFi: the Star-Tribune has an online database of 600 challenged ballots in the Franken-Coleman race. The vote totals on the main page don’t look especially good for Franken’s chances, nor does the early word from elections guru Nate Silver:
The vast majority of challenges on both sides are frivolous, often utterly so. Perhaps 1 in 10 challenges — maybe slightly more than that — actually required a judgment call of some kind.
For what it’s worth, Silver’s projections now slightly favor Coleman, though “projecting” anything at all strikes me as a significant overreach on Silver’s part on garbage-in-garbage-out grounds. Until we know something real about the character of challenged ballots vis-a-vis nonchallenged ballots, there’s just no way of projecting what the final vote total will look like.
* In twelve-country poll, 43% see climate crisis as bigger problem than economy. Technological civilization is the chain-smoker who has also broken his leg: they’re both big problems, one’s just slightly more immediate at the moment.
* Bush is still president, but local leaders are getting the message: the mayor of Los Angeles has proposed a major solar initiative. Good on Villaraigosa, but the depth of our civilization’s chain-smoking becomes evident when you read the fine print:
This massive solar proposal is nested in a larger commitment to reduce Los Angeles’ greenhouse gas emissions by 35% below 1990 levels by 2030.
35% below 1990 is a fairly decent number for a single initiative, but 2030’s a long way off—the bad stuff is already starting to happen right now.
* The Dr. Horrible DVD is available for pre-order and coming out before Christmas. I’d also be remiss if I didn’t link to Buffy! Movie! News!, but come one, there’s absolutely no way.
Are We Living in the Frankenocene?
Franken’s people say the race is Minnesota is within less than one hundred votes, closer than the Star Tribune‘s estimate. Around 49% of the ballots still need to be recounted, mostly in Democratic districts. Meanwhile, Minnesota Public Radio is still putting up ballots for you to be the judge of—thankfully the Lizard People appear to have hit their ceiling of support.
Franken Forever
…if this rate holds (no guarantee, of course), then Franken will narrowly win the race.
Gerry Canavan 
