The Recount Is Over

That, and other news, in today's Political Panorama.

The recount of the U.S. Senate race in Minnesota is completed, Norm Coleman leads Al Franken by 192 votes, but the disputed election could go on for weeks. Still remaining is a resolution of thousands of  ballots being challenged by each campaign, as well as the whereabouts of some 133 missing ballots from Minneapolis.

The Franken campaign claims that it has a four-vote lead when the thousands of challenged ballots are counted, while the Coleman campaign contends that it will be ahead when those ballots are resolved. Such positioning is ever important politically at this point, especially if Franken has to make a case to the Senate to keep his efforts to win the seat going.

Flashback '77: A few items upon today's release of "Frost/Nixon": Ron Howard says he voted for Nixon in 1972 and had a draft number of just 41 ... You can't ask for better promotion: Nixon Library and Museum releases the latest Nixon tapes here and here...Howard does his imitation of Nixon for Jon Stewart ... and David Frost pitches the release of the actual Frost-Nixon interviews.