Drinking Liberally Evanston Chapter Blog

Everybody,

Tonight we'll be meeting at 7:00 p.m. at the Prairie Moon as usual. This is probably our last regular meeting of 2008, since the next two Wednesdays are holidays. So, hope to see you tonight and Happy Holidays!

John & Lynn

This is from the DSCC. I don't know how to get the html version in here. So, here's the text version.

Mark

Current Status

Every precinct in the state has completed its hand recount, and according to our tally, Al Franken (D) leads Norm Coleman (R) by 4 votes.

Key Questions

1. Why do the Minnesota Secretary of State and some media organizations report that Norm Coleman is leading?

The short answer is that the totals reported by the Secretary of State don't include all the votes yet.

During the hand recount, thousands of ballots that were "challenged" by either side. This means that one or both campaigns disagree with the determination of how the ballot should be counted made by an impartial election judge during the recount process. All of these challenged ballots were set aside until the state canvassing board begins resolving challenges on Tuesday, December 16.

Because these disputes haven't yet been settled and these ballots haven't yet been recounted, they aren't included in the daily totals released by the Secretary of State. Many media outlets report these daily numbers, which do indeed show that that Coleman holds a small lead.

However, the Secretary of State's totals, as reported by the media, don't include all the votes.

Using the raw daily totals assumes that every challenged ballot will be thrown out by the state canvassing board. In fact, experience shows that very, very few of these challenges will ultimately be upheld.

Franken leads by 4 votes when we assume that the original call by the impartial election judge will stand. So, if the judge called it for Franken during the hand recount, we say it's a Franken ballot. Likewise, if the judge called it for Coleman, we treat it as a Coleman ballot - even if our side has challenged it.

We think this is the most accurate way to describe the current status of the ballot counting in Minnesota. And by this method, Al Franken has a 4 vote lead.

2. When will these challenged ballots be counted?

The state canvassing board will begin considering challenged ballots on Tuesday, December 16. They hope to have these challenges resolved and the votes counted within a few days, but it could take much longer than that - even into January.

We expect that in the vast majority of cases, the state canvassing board will agree with the determination made by the impartial election judge during the hand recount, even for those ballots that our campaign challenged.

3. I've read about 133 "missing ballots." How will those affect the count?

It's true that 133 votes from a Minneapolis precinct were counted properly on Election Day, but could not be found during the recount process. Election workers in that precinct found envelopes marked "2 of 5," "3 of 5," "4 of 5," and "5 of 5," but they were not able to find the envelope marked "1 of 5."

Just last Friday, the state canvassing board unanimously decided to certify the original, canvassed, and audited election night totals in this precinct.

This is great news. The canvassing board resoundingly rejected efforts by the Coleman campaign and its allies to disenfranchise more than 100 Minnesotans - many of them first-time student voters and all of whom did everything right to have their vote counted - because of clerical error.

Our side's position has always been that every lawful vote should be counted, and the canvassing board's decision reinforces that fundamental principle of our democracy.

4. What about the controversy over absentee ballots? How will that affect the final count?

Approximately 12,000 absentee ballots cast this year were rejected by local election officials and never counted. Under Minnesota state law, there are four legal reasons why absentee ballots can be rejected. For example, if someone submits an absentee ballot but is not actually registered to vote, their ballot won't count.

However, the Franken campaign has shown irrefutable proof that some small, but significant, portion of these absentee ballots were improperly rejected. In some cases, ballots from lawfully registered voters were improperly rejected as if that voter was not registered at all.

In other cases, absentee ballots were improperly rejected by simple human error. The reason listed for one improperly rejected ballot in Itasca County was "we [the local election authority] screwed up." This is not a legitimate reason to reject an absentee ballot.

On Friday, Deputy Secretary of State Jim Gelbmann estimated that there could be more than 1,600 Minnesota voters who have not yet had their absentee ballots counted because their ballots were improperly rejected by local election officials. Whatever the number, it is almost certain to be greater than the margin currently separating the two candidates. It could be enough to swing this election.

Last Friday, the state canvassing board determined that, while they do not have the legal authority to order the state's county election boards to count these ballots, they do believe that "every lawful vote should count." The state canvassing board has therefore strongly urged every county to identify, open, and count absentee ballots that were wrongly rejected.

There are still many steps ahead of us, but this ruling is great news for all of us who believe these votes must be counted.

5. When will we know who won the Minnesota Senate seat?

None of us can say for sure. The state canvassing board will begin resolving challenged ballots on December 16, but it could take days or even weeks before that process is finished.

Additionally, it's up to each county to count the improperly rejected absentee ballots. That process will take some time.

It's taking a little longer than we all thought, but I know that Al Franken believes that no recount should be considered complete or accurate until all the ballots are counted. That includes challenged ballots, improperly rejected absentee ballots, and any missing ballots from around the state.

It's easy to forget that every uncounted ballot represents a real person who did everything they were supposed to do to vote lawfully. Those people deserve to have their votes counted.

To emphasize that critically important idea, the Franken campaign made a video to tell the stories behind the Minnesota recount. Take a look:

Click here to watch the Franken campaign's new video.

Finally, I want to thank all of you for your patience. We think the recount process will be worth it to know that every vote was counted.

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Everybody,

We'll be meeting at 7:00 p.m. at the Prairie Moon tonight as usual. Fodder for discussion: Does the Blagoyevich scandal make Durbin's request of clemency for George Ryan completely moot?

See you tonight,

John & Lynn

Dean Baker's comments below.
Hope to see all'y'all at the Prairie Moon tonight.

Stacey 'n Mark
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The NYT Gets it Exactly Right On Obama's Economics Team

This editorial makes the points well (although the East Asian bailout belongs on the minus list -- it leads to the over-valued dollar and huge trade imbalances that are at the root of many of our problems).

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/25/opinion/25tue1.html?hp

Everybody,

I asked around the table last week and the general feeling was that most people wouldn't be showing up on Wednesday for Drinking Liberally, so we are skipping this week and will return at our regularly scheduled time and place.

By the way, only one person has expressed any interest in moving our meeting location, so I'll keep scheduling us at the Prairie Moon until/unless there is more interest in a new place.

Happy Thanksgiving!

John & Lynn

Everybody,

We'll be meeting tonight at Prairie Moon at 7 p.m. And I have a question for the group. Should we continue meeting at Prairie Moon, or move to another restaurant, e.g. the Celtic Knot? In the past we've moved every so often, so I am interested in what you are thinking.

See you tonight,

John & Lynn

Nov. 12 (Bloomberg) -- President George W. Bush said he regrets the display of the ``Mission Accomplished'' sign as backdrop for a speech he gave about a month after the March 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq.

``To some, it said, well, `Bush thinks the war in Iraq is over,' when I didn't think that,'' he said in a CNN interview today. ``It conveyed the wrong message.''
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Gosh, why would we think he thought the war in Iraq was over just because he said "Mission Accomplished". Oh, maybe he was talking about a different mission?

Hope to see you all at the Prairie Moon this evening. We'll be there around 7.

SnM Foisy

What an experience last night! For those of you who joined us at Prairie Moon you're probably as hoarse as I am from the hootin' 'n hollerin'.

This is also a reminder, as mentioned last week, that we got together last night and aren't planning on gathering tonight.

Obviously, feel free to go to Prairie Moon tonight for a beverage and discussion if you like.

This program will resume at it's normally scheduled time period next week.

Cheers, Mark n Stacey

Hey Y'all,

Chris is going down to Grant Park for the Motherload of Celebration Shindigs. If you want to join up let him know. contact info below
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From: Christopher Newman
To: evanston@drinkingliberally.org
Sent: Monday, November 3, 2008 5:51:56 AM
Subject: Grant Park Rally

Is anyone else headed to the rally tomorrow night? If so, is there any interest in heading down the Red Line ~5:30 P.M.?

Chris

Everybody,

This week and next week are a bit different due to the impending election. Tomorrow we will be meeting in the back room of the Celtic Knot by 7:00 p.m so we can watch the Obama speech while meeting.

Next week, we will meet at Prairie Moon on Tuesday instead of our usual Wednesday night so we can crash the Democratic Party of Evanston return watching party, which will be in the back room.

Hope to see you there,

John