Recount Triggered for Minnesota Senate Seat

President Obama will have a robust congressional majority with which to work. The Democrats are poised to control at least 56 Senate seats, having picked up new members in North Carolina, New Hampshire, Virginia, New Mexico, and Colorado. A recount will be needed to determine whether Senator Norm Coleman or Al Franken won Minnesota's seat, while races in Oregon and Alaska (Senator Ted Stevens has a narrow lead) are still too close to call. That would be the largest Democratic majority since 1979 and 1980. Meanwhile, the Democrats have picked up 18 seats so far in the House. And the Democrats held a pair of important House seats they were afraid of losing: those of Paul Kanjorski and John Murtha in Pennsylvania.