A couple flew home to New York all the way from Bangalore in order to vote after their absentee ballots failed to arrive in time. They are both naturalized citizens. Some people really value their right to vote – and based on what I know of the fares from India to New York via Chicago, they probably paid full-coach, no discount. I hope they at least got a mileage upgrade, that Delhi-Chicago flight on American is pretty brutal according to some of my clients. Just changing planes as in-transit travelers is an ordeal. I admire this couple for their tenacity,…
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Lincoln Mitchell: Rethinking the American Electorate after an Obama Victory After properly invoking a great American philosopher, Lawrence Berra by noting “it ain’t over ’til it’s over,” HuffPost’s Lincoln Mitchell points out that an Obama victory will force all of us, right and left, to rethink our positions. I’ve been thinking about this for a few days now, ever since running across this thoughtful rumination comparing political divides to religious ones. There will be no place for polarized politics in the future; it’s a failed model that merely perpetuates itself with constant discord and conflict. We don’t have time for…
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Editor & Publisher is keeping track of newspaper endorsements of Obama and McCain; they’re also noting which papers were for Kerry and which were for Bush last time around. TUESDAY: Updated Endorsement Tally — Obama Leads 121-42
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There’s a third “major paper” in the Chicago area, the Daily Herald. They’re not quite as famous as the Chicago Tribune or the Sun-Times, being known more as a suburban paper with a raft of very small community papers (some of the “shopper paper and local high school sports” variety). It’s more conservative than the Trib and makes no bones about it; having dealt with them trying to get publicity inserted for my Episcopal parish, I can tell you they’re really into faith news. They probably are more interested in items of interest to Catholics and maybe conservative Protestants, though.…
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I have a TERRIBLE memory, but sometimes I get a flash of insight. Does the name Nathan Sproul mean anything to you? I got one of those flashes, and found this Daily Kos: State of the Nation post that I actually remembered reading in 2004.
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The hysterico-pundit wing of the GOP has been accusing ACORN (via its contractors) of fraudulently registering football teams and cartoon characters to vote. They see it as a vast left-wing conspiracy, but really it’s low-income contractors trying to defraud ACORN, because they get paid by the number of registrations they turn in. As has been pointed out repeatedly, Mickey Mouse isn’t going to show up to vote. It might throw off the statistics for total number of registered Democrats there are in each locality, but there’s little likelihood of any serious electoral fraud being committed. Now, here’s a twist: a…
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For the first time in its 161-year history, the Chicago Tribune endorses a Democrat for President, Barack Obama. As it happens, I prefer reading the Trib to the agressively blue-collar Sun-Times; never liked the latter papers rah-rah attitude toward Daley and other local pols. Also, their comics section sucks. Via Daily Kos: State of the Nation
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This just in via my sturdy Google Reader feed: Who do you want to vote for? Who do you want to represent our country on the world stage? Who is less scary? Who is more trustworthy? Who is more statesmanlike and leaderly? Who do you want taking that 3:00AM phone call? Who do you want the Football to follow around? Please. Vote for That One. Because a vote is a terrible thing to waste. CAPSHUNZ PLZZZ!!! “Give me all your hamsters, I’m staaaaaaarviiiiiingggggg!!!” Via » What’s Up with “Senator McTongueâ€? » The Adventures of Accordion Guy in the 21st Century…
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Worth a listen for a chuckle: what if Joe the Plumber could unclog the economic mess? Imagining ‘Joe The Plumber: The Epic’ : NPR Sometimes that 15 minutes of fame turns into an hour. Satirists Bruce Kluger and David Slavin present the promo for a fictional epic called Joe the Plumber — it’s the story about the one man equipped to fix the nation’s plugged up economy.
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I was just telling my sister in an email about listening to this story about Obama’s political beginnings. He’s disappointed not a few progressives and reformers in Chicago for not taking on “Chicago Machine politics,” or from “getting along” just enough to get elected. But he’s inspired a whole lot of people, too. Sometimes surprisingly so. How Chicago Politics Shaped Obama : NPR He was a young politician who couldn’t win a congressional seat in his own neighborhood, and yet he was asking the state’s political kingmaker to back him for a statewide race. Furthermore, Obama wanted Jones to help…