Here’s a real quick take on the results tonight in North Carolina and Indiana:–Pretty good night for Obama. Did well in NC by beating Hillary by more than 10 points. Did well enough in Indiana by keeping it close. Expanded his delegate lead by at leas…

Continue reading " Quick Take on NC and Indiana "

The recent post about Paul, Hastings’s idiocy (made worse by rumors that two of the anonymized partners, and not the nice one, are fellow Boaltholes), got me to thinking about the other group of a-holes who pop up in the context of layoffs: headhunters. Don’t get me wrong; not all headhunters are a-holes. [...]

Continue reading " Headhunters Are Scum "

12:30 AM Update:  The only additional precincts to report in in the past 1/2 hour have been in Bloomington, which went for Obama, but not as heavily as expected, pulling his margin there down from 66%-34% to 64%-36%.  It’s still up to Gary.

12:00 AM Update:  LaPorte and Porter Counties (east of Gary, leaning to Hillary) are now complete; they came in about as expected.  If the rest of Gary comes in this way, Obama will definitely win.  He is now trailing by 20,000 votes; if we extrapolate, he would win Indiana by 26,000 votes.

11:45 PM Update:  Lake County (Gary) is reporting in; 28% of that vote is now in, and Obama leads 75%-25%.  If that margin holds for the rest of the city, Obama will win Indiana.

11:40 PM Update:  Checking the precincts that have come in in the last 1/2 hour, we are now down to partial returns in 6 counties, plus the two that have not reported anything.  Obama picked up a few more votes than my predictions below in the latest precincts.

Update:  I checked the detail on cnn.com, and it looks like there are precincts outstanding in 7 other counties as well.  Of those, the biggest blocks are in Monroe County, where Bloomington is, and Marion County, which is where Indianapolis is.  Those are all strong Obama areas.  If we extrapolate out from current returns in those counties (perilous, I know, but it’s the best we can do), Obama should pick up another 2,590 votes when all are counted in those 7 counties.

That could actually give the vote to Obama.

First post at 11:00 PM or so…

For the last hour, there have been two counties outstanding in Indiana according to cnn.com:

1.  Union County, on the Ohio border, is a small county that will probably vote about 1,500 people.  If it goes as heavily for Clinton as the neighboring counties, that would mean a 500 vote swing for Clinton.  

2.  Lake County, which includes Gary, is the second-largest county in the state.  If it has the same turnout as the rest of the state, it should have about 100,000 votes cast.  If it goes for Barack Obama in the same way that Indianapolis did (2-1), that’s a 34,000 vote swing toward Obama.

Right now, the margin is 39,000 votes.

So we’re down to the most likely outcome being that Hillary ekes out a razor-thin victory.

It appears that Barack Obama has run about 6% to 7% ahead of the last polls in both Indiana and North Carolina.

Continue reading " Waiting for Gary, Indiana "

12:30 AM Update:  The only additional precincts to report in in the past 1/2 hour have been in Bloomington, which went for Obama, but not as heavily as expected, pulling his margin there down from 66%-34% to 64%-36%.  It’s still up to Gary.

12:00 AM Update:  LaPorte and Porter Counties (east of Gary, leaning to Hillary) are now complete; they came in about as expected.  If the rest of Gary comes in this way, Obama will definitely win.  He is now trailing by 20,000 votes; if we extrapolate, he would win Indiana by 26,000 votes.

11:45 PM Update:  Lake County (Gary) is reporting in; 28% of that vote is now in, and Obama leads 75%-25%.  If that margin holds for the rest of the city, Obama will win Indiana.

11:40 PM Update:  Checking the precincts that have come in in the last 1/2 hour, we are now down to partial returns in 6 counties, plus the two that have not reported anything.  Obama picked up a few more votes than my predictions below in the latest precincts.

Update:  I checked the detail on cnn.com, and it looks like there are precincts outstanding in 7 other counties as well.  Of those, the biggest blocks are in Monroe County, where Bloomington is, and Marion County, which is where Indianapolis is.  Those are all strong Obama areas.  If we extrapolate out from current returns in those counties (perilous, I know, but it’s the best we can do), Obama should pick up another 2,590 votes when all are counted in those 7 counties.

That could actually give the vote to Obama.

First post at 11:00 PM or so…

For the last hour, there have been two counties outstanding in Indiana according to cnn.com:

1.  Union County, on the Ohio border, is a small county that will probably vote about 1,500 people.  If it goes as heavily for Clinton as the neighboring counties, that would mean a 500 vote swing for Clinton.  

2.  Lake County, which includes Gary, is the second-largest county in the state.  If it has the same turnout as the rest of the state, it should have about 100,000 votes cast.  If it goes for Barack Obama in the same way that Indianapolis did (2-1), that’s a 34,000 vote swing toward Obama.

Right now, the margin is 39,000 votes.

So we’re down to the most likely outcome being that Hillary ekes out a razor-thin victory.

It appears that Barack Obama has run about 6% to 7% ahead of the last polls in both Indiana and North Carolina.

Continue reading " Waiting for Gary, Indiana "

…came to Charlottesville today.  Unfortunately, work intruded, and I could only be there for a little while.  The rally started at 2:15 PM.  Mark arrived early, for him — 2:40.  (His advance people routinely tell the Party faithful to get there a half an hour before THE MAN HIMSELF bothers to show up.  The worst situation I remember was the 2005 Convention in Williamsburg, where we were all told to be there at 2:00 PM and Mark didn’t show up until 3:00 PM — and his official schedule said 3:00 PM.  Maybe today was a change, or maybe it was just dumb luck.)  I don’t know that anyone counted the house, but I would guess 400 were there.  It was a beautiful day on the Charlottesville Mall.

The emcee was former Charlottesville Mayor David Brown; he introduced, among others, Delegate David Toscano, George Beller (husband of the late Emily Couric and a cardiologist who talked about the need for health care solutions), and Bill Crutchfield, CEO of Crutchfield Electronics.  Bill is basically a Republican who says that he has publicly supported only two Democrats in his life — Don Beyer in 1993 (against former Albemarle Delegate and Congressman George Allen — he must have known something) and Mark Warner, both in 2001 and now.  We let him speak anyway.

He then introduced Mark, who gave his usual stump speech about bipartisan solutions, a competitive economy (”India and China aren’t playing for second place”), fiscal prudence, etc.  You can read it — or at least the version that he gave yesterday, when two of his daughters were with him, at http://www.markwarner2008.com/…

Then he was done, and it was off to Harrisonburg, where he was supposed to be by 5:00 PM.  He left the Downtown Mall by 3:30, so he should in theory have been on time to Harrisonburg.  

Continue reading " Warner’s kick-off tour… "

…came to Charlottesville today.  Unfortunately, work intruded, and I could only be there for a little while.  The rally started at 2:15 PM.  Mark arrived early, for him — 2:40.  (His advance people routinely tell the Party faithful to get there a half an hour before THE MAN HIMSELF bothers to show up.  The worst situation I remember was the 2005 Convention in Williamsburg, where we were all told to be there at 2:00 PM and Mark didn’t show up until 3:00 PM — and his official schedule said 3:00 PM.  Maybe today was a change, or maybe it was just dumb luck.)  I don’t know that anyone counted the house, but I would guess 400 were there.  It was a beautiful day on the Charlottesville Mall.

The emcee was former Charlottesville Mayor David Brown; he introduced, among others, Delegate David Toscano, George Beller (husband of the late Emily Couric and a cardiologist who talked about the need for health care solutions), and Bill Crutchfield, CEO of Crutchfield Electronics.  Bill is basically a Republican who says that he has publicly supported only two Democrats in his life — Don Beyer in 1993 (against former Albemarle Delegate and Congressman George Allen — he must have known something) and Mark Warner, both in 2001 and now.  We let him speak anyway.

He then introduced Mark, who gave his usual stump speech about bipartisan solutions, a competitive economy (”India and China aren’t playing for second place”), fiscal prudence, etc.  You can read it — or at least the version that he gave yesterday, when two of his daughters were with him, at http://www.markwarner2008.com/…

Then he was done, and it was off to Harrisonburg, where he was supposed to be by 5:00 PM.  He left the Downtown Mall by 3:30, so he should in theory have been on time to Harrisonburg.  

Continue reading " Warner’s kick-off tour… "

Falls Church City voters have elected Lawrence Webb as the first openly gay African-American elected official in the state’s history. More from Victory Fund. Lawrence was elected Tuesday to the Falls Church City Council as the third highest vote getter…

Continue reading " Falls Church Elects Lawrence Webb As The State’s First Openly Gay African American Elected Official "

Uncly-Wuncly asks “It’s true. In the event I actually run into him, anything you want me to ask? Should I ask about baseball or McCain-Feingold?” Since I’m going to the convention, too, I echo the question. In the highly unlikely event that I get a chance to ask him anything, what should the [...]

Continue reading " McCain to Speak at NRA Convention "

It’s hard to tell from exit polling, but CNN’s take on the exit polls was that Rush Limbaugh’s call for Republicans to muck up the Democratic Party by voting for Hillary Clinton in the Indiana primary today didn’t materialize.

About 10% of the state’s Democratic primary voters were Republican - and that group did vote for Hillary Clinton, 53 to 47 percent over Barack Obama.  But so did registered Democrats, who made up two-thirds of Tuesday’s primary voters, gave roughly the same edge to Clinton, 53 to 45 percent.  Only Independents - who made up about a quarter of the electorate - voted for Obama, 53 to 47 percent.

For whatever reason, self-identified conservative voters did overwhelmingly support Clinton - two out of three cast their votes for her.

Continue reading " “Operation Chaos” apparently didn’t do much… "

It’s hard to tell from exit polling, but CNN’s take on the exit polls was that Rush Limbaugh’s call for Republicans to muck up the Democratic Party by voting for Hillary Clinton in the Indiana primary today didn’t materialize.

About 10% of the state’s Democratic primary voters were Republican - and that group did vote for Hillary Clinton, 53 to 47 percent over Barack Obama.  But so did registered Democrats, who made up two-thirds of Tuesday’s primary voters, gave roughly the same edge to Clinton, 53 to 45 percent.  Only Independents - who made up about a quarter of the electorate - voted for Obama, 53 to 47 percent.

For whatever reason, self-identified conservative voters did overwhelmingly support Clinton - two out of three cast their votes for her.

Continue reading " “Operation Chaos” apparently didn’t do much… "

Roanoke City voters signaled a new direction today by turning to a old hand, former Mayor David Bowers.  Bowers won back the seat he lost to now-Senator Ralph Smith back in 2000 by defeating incumbent Nelson Harris.  While Bowers was officially a Democrat the last time he held the office, this time he won by [...]

Continue reading " Everything Old is New Again "

Roanoke City voters signaled a new direction today by turning to a old hand, former Mayor David Bowers.  Bowers won back the seat he lost to now-Senator Ralph Smith back in 2000 by defeating incumbent Nelson Harris.  While Bowers was officially a Democrat the last time he held the office, this time he won by [...]

Continue reading " Everything Old is New Again "

Falls Church City has elected Lawrence Webb as the first openly gay African American elected official in the Commonwealth’s history. Webb On Vote Falls Church. More here. Lawrence was elected Tuesday to the Falls Church City Council, as the third…

Continue reading " Falls Church Elects Lawrence Webb As State’s First Openly Gay African American Elected Official "

*Roanoke has a new mayor, David Bowers (I), who defeated the incumbent, Nelson Harris (D).

*In Herndon, incumbent Steve DeBenedittis (I) defeated J. Harlon Reece  (I) 52.43%-37.53% for Mayor.

*In Fairfax City, Robert F. Lederer (I) was elected Mayor with 69.96% of the vote.

What other races are you watching in Virginia?

Continue reading " Virginia Results Open Thread "

At least one high profile war critic sounds alarmed by a recent revelation that Mr. Bush signed a “secret finding” against “the Iranian regime” six weeks ago. I’m frankly less than agog about it. In a May 2 CounterPunch article, Andrew Cockb…

Continue reading " CounterProductive CounterPunch Story on Iran "

Our 2nd district congressional candidate, Glenn Nye, will join us for a live-blog on Sunday, May 11th at 8:00pm.
It’s been awhile, so let’s review… Please leave your questions for Glenn in the comment section and join us live on Sunday if you can. Should be fun!

Continue reading " Glenn Nye to Live-Blog Sunday "

Without getting too personal about it, I’ll say that I try (and prefer) to live my life in a way that presumes the decency of others.  I’m always thrilled to see this approach benefiting another.

Continue reading " Decency Succeeds "

Defying most expectations, Republican Alan Krasnoff defeated “Independent but really a Democrat” Rebecca Adams, handing Adams her second straight loss in a mayoral contest. 54% of the vote, with a typical 18% turnout, Krasnoff.
The entire Republican slate for Council won: Patricia Willis, Debbie Ritter, Rick West and Suzi Kelly. Cliff Hayes won, [...]

Continue reading " Republicans keep Mayor’s office in Chesapeake "

Defying most expectations, Republican Alan Krasnoff defeated “Independent but really a Democrat” Rebecca Adams, handing Adams her second straight loss in a mayoral contest. 54% of the vote, with a typical 18% turnout, Krasnoff.
The entire Republican slate for Council won: Patricia Willis, Debbie Ritter, Rick West and Suzi Kelly. Cliff Hayes won, [...]

Continue reading " Republicans keep Mayor’s office in Chesapeake "

David Bowers completed a dramatic political comeback tonight. After losing 5 or so elections in a row, Bowers was able to knock off incumbent Mayor Nelson Harris by a wide margin. As a young professional in Roanoke City, I cannot tell you how disappoi…

Continue reading " Roanoke City Elects Bowers - Takes a Step Back "