[glatt]

It's a biased opinion piece, planted by the RNC.

Republicans are already framing the Coleman/Franken fight as an example of Democrats acting improperly. The Republican National Committee late last night sent an editorial to reporters from the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial page alleging "Funny Business in Minnesota."

An actual news article would give you better information. For example, this twin cities article quotes Coleman's recount attorney as saying that Coleman would basically ruin his career in Minnesota if he challenged the Franken victory in court because voters are sick of the recount issue and want it to be over.

Among vote caches Coleman could ask the courts to consider:

# The 654 rejected absentee ballots the Coleman campaign says may be wrongly rejected. The campaign has a request before the Minnesota Supreme Court for inclusion of those ballots. That issue might be decided this morning, which could put the kibosh on the declaration of a Franken victory. Those ballots tend to come from more Republican areas than the mistakenly rejected absentee ballots identified by county officials and included in the recount totals Saturday. If Coleman gets his way on those ballots, they could net him 50 votes or more.

# The 133 missing ballots from Ward 3, Precinct 1, in Minneapolis. Those ballots disappeared after Election Day and before the recount. The state canvassing board, upon request from the city's elections director, voted to accept the election night total from that precinct. That decision netted Franken 46 votes. If that decision were reversed in an election lawsuit, Franken would lose those votes.

# The 171 found ballots in Maplewood's Fire Station No. 7, where the city's Precinct 6 voters cast their ballots. Those votes were uncounted on Election Day, but the ballots appeared during the hand recount. Franken netted 37 votes from their appearance.

# Potentially more than 100 Franken votes from various precincts in Minneapolis. The Coleman campaign believes those votes were counted twice in the recount, after damaged original ballots were separated from their duplicates created by election judges. The campaign told the state Supreme Court it believes both the original and the duplicate ballots were tallied. The court decided it could not sort through the issue but allowed that Coleman might bring it up in an election lawsuit, in which evidence and testimony could be gathered.

If all those issues moved Coleman's way, Franken would lose more votes than his current 225-vote lead.

And that's not even a complete list of the matters the Coleman campaign might bring before a court.

The election contest may go "way back to the most ancient history," Knaak [Coleman's recount attorney] said. And if the courts agree with Coleman's doubts about the count in certain precincts, hundreds of votes could swing.

"The results of entire precincts could get thrown out," he said, although he made clear he was not necessarily advocating that.

That means Coleman would not have to see victory on every legal issue but still would need many favorable decisions.

"It is not easy by any stretch of the imagination, but it is doable," Knaak said.

There are other reasons not to go forward: expense and public opinion. If Coleman goes to court, he'd bear the brunt of both.

Minnesotans, having anxiously watched the recount for more than two months, may be just sick of the whole thing.

"You'd hear a collective moan" when the lawsuit gets filed, Knaak said.

And many of the state's voters could blame the continuing fight on Coleman, who may hope for a political future beyond the Senate.

So Coleman's attorney is talking about throwing out the results of entire precincts and that a legal challenge "won't be easy."