Daily Digest: 11-05-08

Posted at 9:37 AM on November 5, 2008 by Molly Bloom (2 Comments)
Filed under: Daily Digest

Minnesotans turned out in large numbers yesterday, but didn't quite reach the goal of 80 percent that the Secretary of State's office was hoping for.

After a long night, (most of) the results are in:

President

Sen. Barack Obama has been elected in an electoral landslide, 349-147. Here's AP's story.

Minnesota goes for Obama.

And this margin could still grow; we're still waiting for results from North Carolina and Missouri.

McCain concedes gracefully in Arizona. And Obama gives his victory speech to a crowd of 65,000 in Chicago's Grant Park.

U.S. Senate

The Democrats have gained at least five seats in the Senate, with the results from four more races uncertain.

One of these races is right here in Minnesota. Incumbent Republican Sen. Norm Coleman has won, but by less than 1,000 votes. But a mandatory recount will occur since the margin is less than one half of one percent.

Sen. Coleman and DFL challenger Al Franken each won 42 percent of the vote, with Independence Party candidate Dean Barkley winning 15 percent.

U.S. House

Democrats have gained about 20 seats in the U.S. House.

But none of those seats are in Minnesota. All of our incumbents are re-elected, including Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann in the 6th Congressional District.

Retiring Republican Rep. Jim Ramstad's seat will stay within in the party. Erik Paulsen defeats DFL challenger Ashwin Madia, 48 to 41 percent. IP candidate David Dillon won 10 percent of the vote.

Constitutional Amendement

Voters pass the proposed constitutional amendment, which will provide funding for outdoors and the arts and the raise the sales tax by three-eights of a percent beginning next July. It passed 56 to 39 percent.

MN Legislature

The DFL appears to have gained two seats in the MN House, but failed to gain the five needed for a veto-proof supermajority.

Schools

So far, school referenda have had split results. 35 questions have passed and 38 have failed. Reporter Tom Weber has put together a nifty map where you can see how districts voted across the state.

Voters in Minneapolis pass a measure that expands the School Board from seven to nine members and changes the way they are elected.

Judicial races

Two Minnesota Supreme Court justices successfully defend their seats. Justices Lorie Skjerven Gildea and Paul Anderson are re-elected.

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Comments (2)

How did Al blow it?
Let me count the ways:

Al did not bring up his business tax screw ups himself,
that cost a lot of votes when he got “outed”
for his business mess ups. First thing if
you make a mistake: announce it before the
other guys, you look honest, Al looked like
an idiot trying to hide stuff.

Kazeminy did not get the coverage, the media ignored this guy, how many companies is he involved in and how many do Coleman’s wives (and girlfriends) work for? Partly Al’s fault, they did not do the research to feed the media. The lawsuit was dumb luck for Franken,
but the lack of better
coverage of the “buying the suit” and “vacation flights” and the Petter’s type story of Kazeminy
not being known means it was ignored. Too bad
the media was not primed with tasty bits about
Kazeminy beforehand.

You make your own luck Al,
if there had been better media prep on Nasser K.
the lawsuit would have been the story instead of
the headline “Franken, stop attacking my wife”
which was the only message that got out.

But what really hurt was the inept business screw up and the
failure to get it out first.

Posted by Als reflection | November 5, 2008 1:20 PM

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Molly,

I'm off for a walk - it's been an unusually fatiguing day, a chapter of accidents - back before the re-count's done.

Poldy

Posted by Leopold Bloom | November 5, 2008 11:23 PM

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