Franken-Coleman Race Is Going to the Blogs

By MONICA DAVEY
New York Times

EAGAN, Minn. — On a laptop at a kitchen table in this cheery Twin Cities suburb, headlines ripping into Al Franken, the satirist whose campaign for the United States Senate is seen as one of the most competitive in the nation, are written up day after day for “Minnesota Democrats Exposed,” a political blog created by a former Republican Party researcher.

Michael B. Brodkorb, the blog’s creator, is a former Republican Party researcher who has worked on campaigns of some of this state’s top Republicans. His critics say the Web site’s claims, screamed in red uppercase letters, are often breathless, far-fetched, painfully partisan.

But Minnesota Democrats Exposed has dealt several blows to Mr. Franken’s campaign lately: revelations that he owed $25,000 to the State of New York for failing to pay workers’ compensation insurance and that his corporation was in forfeiture in California. Mr. Franken has since paid the debt.

With only weeks until the state Democratic Party’s convention, where Mr. Franken is expected to win the party’s endorsement to run against Senator Norm Coleman, the Republican incumbent, people here disagree about how much these financial questions will matter to voters in the fall.

(Continued here.)