Alliance For A Better Minnesota has produced a fun video calling attention to Norm Coleman's frequent, privately funded travel. According to the group, Coleman is ranks second in trips paid for by private organizations.

A 2006 story on Minnesota Public Radio's site lists Coleman as the most travelled member of the Minnesota delegation at the time, having made 41 trips since his election in 2002. Members of his staff accounted for another 54 trips. Then fellow Minnesota Senator Mark Dayton, by contrast, was found to have made only one such privately funded excursion in 2001. Dayton's successor, Amy Klobuchar has pushed for a ban on privately funded travel.

This is not to say that Coleman will not use public funds to satisfy his wanderlust. MNPublius.com caught this nugget at the bottom of a story in The Hill back in August.

The official recalled a trip that former Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.), former Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) and Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) took a few years ago to Pakistan.

“When the senators went to Kabul on a military plane, the three spouses of Frist, DeWine and Coleman had a separate C-120 take them to Bahrain to take a windshield tour of the city and to shop,” the official said.

Presently Coleman is the only non-former-senator in that travelling trio.