franken-colemanEven though Al Franken and Norm Coleman have taken in more than $12 million during their contest’s extra innings, their campaigns likely won’t have anything leftover when (or if?) a winner is decided, says Politico. But others are also trying to cash in on the drawn-out conflict.

The latest attempt to try to snag a ride on what Politico terms the “Franken-Coleman gravy train” involve the contending forces in New York State’s special congressional election.

Republican Jim Tedisco and Democrat Scott Murphy, locked in an electoral tie even tighter than Minnesota’s, are both lawyering up quickly, according to The Hill, and the GOP has vowed to put up a more aggressive fight than it has done so far in the Gopher State.

Politico has former Clinton administration aide Paul Begala (now with CNN) saying the Democratic Party “is awfully close to giving this president the filibuster-proof majority he needs. And I think that’s why the Republicans are fighting this beyond the bounds of reason. They have very little respect for democracy. They didn’t care that Bush got fewer votes than Gore.”

Begala, who was caught on video strolling the snowy streets of Minneapolis with Al Franken and U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy (D-R.I.) this weekend, has joined fundraising efforts by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Both committees expressly tie the New York struggle to the Minnesota mess.

In their e-mail fundraising campaigns, Democratic and Republican groups trade accusations that Coleman and Franken, respectively, are trying to steal the election in Minnesota.

The story reviews the Republican National Lawyers Association’s fundraising effort (on its own behalf, Politico says), highlighting Coleman’s post-election campaign. Not mentioned: The suspicions that the group was illegally funding Coleman, prompting a DFL Party compaint to the FEC.

And it adds a coda to an appeal on Coleman’s behalf to more than 10,000 e-mail addresses by the New Jersey-based, pro-Israel group NORPAC (the group that called the former senator’s opponent “Al Franklin“):

Karen Pichkhadze, an official with the PAC, said the response was “actually pretty quiet.”

The group raised less than $2,000, which it forwarded to Coleman, she said.

“I think it’s kind of fading,” Pichkhadze said of the fervor over the race.