Minnesota's Shame: Recount Cheats Coleman of Victory, Names Comedian Franken Senator

Minnesota is currently displaying a sickening drama involving Democratic Senate candidate Al Franken stealing the election with the help of the state's certification board and Democratic Secretary of State.

Originally, Republican incumbent Norm Coleman had won the election by some 200 votes. A recount, of course, was required.

With a Democratic party-controlled process, is it any surprise that, weeks later, the Democratic candidate, Al Franken, ended up 200 votes ahead, and certified yesterday by the state's board?

Among the irregularities catalogued by the Wall Street Journal were these:

-counties in which Franken 'won' having more total ballots than registered voters.
-varying use of either election-night totals, or revisited totals, all of which magically handed Franken more votes in each case
-situations in which, when recounted, Franken added many more votes than were added for Obama among the same ballots.
-inconsistent rulings on whether to use damaged ballots
-lost custody records on suspect ballots

It seems incredible that Coleman could wake up on election day having won, and then lose by a like amount two months later.

It seems to me that the sensible approach for any state to take in elections of a statewide nature is to hold a second election for any race in which the margin of victory is smaller than the least number of contested ballots by any candidate in the race.

Recounts, beginning with the Florida situation in the 2000 Presidential election, always leave one party feeling cheated. There's no way these things are seen as fair. The presiding officer is of one party, so the other feels it was cheated.

That's what has happened with Coleman/Franken. But not in Georgia, where they held a runoff.

It's a fair bet that, with a new election, Coleman would win.

But the reality is that the Minnesota Supreme Court probably won't want to be seen as picking a winner, so they'll likely hear, then deny Coleman's bid to be named the winner.

So the Democrats rack up another national embarrassment. First the circus for Senator from Illinois. Then New York. Now this cheating and theft of the Senate election by Franken in Minnesota.

Should help 2010 be easy pickings for the GOP.