Send the Franken and Coleman camps in their entirety to bed without any media privileges until Wednesday morning. Both sides have acted like spoilt children in the last couple of days and I am sick of it. From both sides.

God, yes, this is pure crap.

Can this get any worse? Wait, we have a few days left - it will.

John Olson at comment #1 is doing the classic "pox on both houses" which many people like to do because it makes them feel above the fray, bi-partisan, post-partisan or whatever.

It also relieves people of having to analyze the actions and come to any kind of conclusion about what happened and whether or not it's important.

In this case, the difference between the two lawsuits is huge. The legal action Norm filed first against the Franken campaign is the same thing Norm's done in previous campaigns. He files a complaint about an ad and then drops it as soon as the campaign is over.

The second case was not filed by the Franken campaign at all. It's a bunch of Republicans in Texas suing each other over the control of a company. The case was filed in late October because it came 90 days after the founding CEO had been ordered to step down in late July. He had 90 days to contest the action. Just do the math and voila....we're suddenly looking at a court action filed in late October.

The part about Norm makes up three pages of a 30-page brief and it's only one allegation among others, none of which have anything to do with Norm.

But the allegation that one of Norm's wealthy benefactors ordered underlings at the Texas company to funnel $100,000 to Norm's wife for services unrendered because, as Norm's pal said, "U.S. Senators don't make (expletive deleted)" is a serious one. If proven, we're talking felony charges against a few people. And the allegation comes up in a sworn affidavit with names, dates, times and copies of receipts.

The two cases aren't the same at all and to pretend that they are with a "pox on both houses" approach is lazy citizenship.

Tell you what Lynnell, perhaps people like me are more interested in selecting a candidate on the basis of what they stand for on the issues and whether or not I believe they can represent us in Washington responsibly and adequately. Not on the basis of who has the better legal team or fastest spinmeisters.

From my vantage point, I agree with you on two key points:

- Norm (or more accurately, Norm's handlers with his consent--I presume) has once again filed one of those stupid lawsuits against his challenger at the 11th hour.

- A bunch of Republicans in Texas are fighting amongst themselves and Norm allegedly gets caught in the backwash.

If you are going to make your candidate selection on the basis of who has better lawyers and whether or not a particular set of allegations are true or false, that is your choice.

What I am tired of are the endless ads from both camps and--especially--their respective partisan lemmings (think national committees and the 527s) that think people like me are too stupid to understand the difference between filet mignon and Spam. They are wrong.

Your "lazy citizenship" retort isn't needed. It simply diminished what I would agree are some otherwise astute observations on your part. We can agree to disagree on some things without having to resort to the personal attacks.

I agree with Lynell that John's "pox" was a lazy equality. Distorting things out of proportion is an old problem and has been a very effective ploy. It is rather interesting how when one brings up a Coleman allegation, they invariably have to slap at Franken as well. Just because Coleman construes the Franken campaign as the conduit, doesn't mean we should have to acknowledge it.

My first impression of the ad was a likening to Bonnie and Clyde, but that was then and this is now.

It was distrubing that the Star and Tribune would endorse Coleman on the anniversary of the Wellstone tragedy, but not objectively reporting Donorgate should really wake people up to the false right wing bias that the paper is accused of.