> RoMunn wrote: > Coleman just sued *today* to contest the recount results. >
::sigh:: For, like, the 4th time. And the entire analysis of why he's suing is contained above but, because I like you, I'll summarize it here: -- Coleman's problem, however, is not so much that his argument is legally unsound but that it's not especially likely to benefit him even if the Court rules in his favor. The Court had previously asked the counties to double-check their absentee ballots and identify any that might have been rejected in error; the counties did that, and came up with a collective 1,300 or so. The process the Court set up required both campaigns to agree on a ballot before it was counted, and about 400 ballots were vetoed by one or the other campaign. The other 900 were forwarded to the Canvassing Board and were counted on Saturday. Coleman's claim is that there are some 650 additional erroneously rejected ballots that the counties missed during their sweep of absentees. What Coleman wants the Court to do, in other words, is to order that the counties re-re-examine their absentee ballots. What might happen if that takes place? First of all, I doubt that very many of the ballots on Coleman's list of 650 are going to be found to have been rejected improperly. Remember, the counties have already sorted through their absentees at least twice -- once on Election Night, and then a second time in accordance with the court order. Some counties, in fact, have even gone through their absentees a third time in accordance with the wishes of the Coleman campaign, and where they have, such as in Ramsey and Pipestone counties, the counties found that all the ballots on the Coleman list had been rejected properly. So this is problem #1 for Coleman. His list of 650 ballots is going to be significantly pared down, and will probably wind up closer to 65 than 650. Secondly, those absentee ballots are sealed, so we don't know how many of them will turn out to be votes for Coleman. Presumably, the Coleman campaign thinks that the ballots are more likely than not to favor him, or he would not have included them on his list. But "more likely than not" might mean 50% Coleman ballots, 35% Franken ballots, and 15% other. If all 650 ballots were counted with those percentages, Coleman wouldn't get more than a 98-ballot net gain, less than half of his present deficit with Franken. And thirdly, precisely because the ballots on Coleman's list are likely to favor Coleman, that also means there is some undetermined number of ballots that were also rejected in error but which are likely to favor Franken. Coleman, then, seems to be adopting something of an underwear gnomes strategy: 1. Force Franken to go to court to get the absentee ballots counted; 2. ??? 3. Profit! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnomes_(South_Park_episode) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;207172674;29440083;f Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:284033 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
