Hamline University

Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak romped to a third term while openly flirting with a 2010 gubernatorial bid. Today a state agency rebuked him for mingling funds while pursuing the dual political contests. Will the ruling hurt Rybak’s political viability?

The personal is apparently political for Minneapolis City Council president Barb Johnson. City Pages reports that the four-term council member, who is locked in a tough, four-way re-election fight, makes some rather dubious campaign expenditures.
Johnson charged her campaign $1,154 for hairdresser appointments and $986 for dry-cleaning during the current four-year election cycle. No other city [...]

The end is near in the U.S. Senate contest. That might seem difficult to believe given that the fight has now dragged on for nearly seven months, but the bottom line is that Norm Coleman is running out of legal options.

Vandals spray-painted a swath of anti-gay messages on several buildings, on sidewalks and even trees and bushes Wednesday morning, amid Hamline University’s Rainbow Week, a series of events designed to raise the visibility of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students.

Norm Coleman is not going down without a fight. But by continuing to drag out the contest, his political prospects could suffer “serious damage,” according to one-time rival Dean Barkley. Meanwhile, former Sen. Dave Durenberger, a Republican and Coleman supporter, believes that the most serious damage to Coleman’s political future has already occurred.

As the U.S. Senate contest lurches forward, with nearly 80 percent of the ballots recounted and Norm Coleman clinging to a roughly 200-vote lead over Al Franken, a resolution finally looks to be on the horizon. But as events have repeatedly proven over the last three weeks, nothing is as simple as it seems when a senate seat that potentially could give Democrats a fillibuster-proof 60-seat majority is on the line. All eyes will now turn to the five-member statewide canvassing board as it meets tomorrow to deal with the thorny question of whether to consider absentee ballots that were rejected by local election officials.