Stephen: Gingrich is a baby-eating werewolf (via Crooks and Liars).

Roy Zimmerman: Iowa Edition of Vote Republican.

Mark Fiore: Dark Matters.

Sam Seder and Glenn Greenwald: The normalization of extremism.

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, Colorado edition:

SlateTV: Missouri “Right to Pray” amendment lets kids opt out of evolution .

Attack!!!!!

• SlateTV: The gloves are off!
• Young Turks: Romney attacks Obama with welfare ad.
• Bill Press: DNC says Romney Campaign is ‘hitting below the belt’
• Maddow: Welfare ad “dog-whistle” racism from Mitt Romney.
• Young Turks: ‘Son Of Boss’ Ad
• Newsy: Rep. Allen West fights ad.
• Sam Seder: Tasteless fear-mongering anti-Obama ad asks America “Are we safer?”
• Jon on Mitt’s flailing ‘Romneycare’ defense (via TalkingPointsMemo).
• Newsy: Obama ad questions whether Obama has paid income tax.
• Buzz60: New Romney ad aims at Catholic swing state voters.
• Maddow: The SuperPAC political week
• Jon: mocks conservative freakout over ‘Priorities USA Action’ ad.
• Young Turks: Alan West punches woman in face in new ad.

Sam Seder: Mississippi church refuses a Black couple’s wedding.

Pap: Welcome to the era of Super PACs.

Roy Zimmerman: Montana Edition of Vote Republican.

NPR: Special Disaster Edition of It’s All Politics

Ann Telnaes: SuperPACs and their handlers put on a silly show.

Willard:

• Newsy: Rep. Ryan will be named Romney Running mate on Saturday Morning.
• SlateTV: Obama’s new nickname for his opponent.
• Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, New York edition.
• Bill Press: Mitt’s tax problem.
• Ed and Pap: Harry Reid is right about Mitt’s taxes
• The Spin Room: Romney’s running mate.
• Jenn with UW Prof. Matt Barreto: Can Romney make a dent in the Latino vote?
• Stephanie and Markos: Was Jon Huntsman Sr. Sen. Reid’s source?
• Young Turks: How you can stop paying so much in taxes—just like Mitt Romney
• Newsy: Can Romney recover from a very bad month?
• SlateTV: Some high profile endorsements for Romeny.
• Sam Seder: Mitt Romney doesn’t know anything about dressage? YEAH, RIGHT!
• Jenn with Democratic strategist Kiki McLean: Mitt’s running mate.

ONN: Onion Week in Review.

SlateTV: Will Ted Cruz’s prime time GOP convention speaking spot appease the Tea Party?

Stephen looks back on Obama’s war on pizza.

White House: West Wing Week.

This Week in GOP Voter Suppression:

• Pap: The Pennsylvania effort to suppress the vote.
• Maddow: New ID laws.
• Jon on GOP exaggerated voter fraud claims (via Crooks and Liars).
• Sam Seder: PA is the new FL in voter suppression.
• Sharpton: Republicans ramp up voter suppression effort.
• Sen. Scott Brown is disturbed by push to register welfare recipients to vote (via Crooks and Liars).
• Rep. Allen West defends disenfranchising Ohio voters (via Crooks and Liars).

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

For months now, there has been low-level speculation about Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA-5) being selected to be Mitt Romey’s VP (e.g. here).

It makes sense in that it doesn’t defy the laws of physics or anything (well…not that the laws of physics would hold back Republicans from attempting something). Rep. McMorris Rogers is over 35. She is the highest ranking Republican woman in the House. It’s not like she only served 1/2 a term as Governor in some low-population state, or anything. And, McMorris Rodgers did have one of the earliest Republican VP Nominee Intrade pages.

Alas, these days, she’s a Republican VP Nominee penny stock.

Still…even if it’s a long shot, I predict Mittens will pick Cathy for VP. What do I have to lose? If he picks her, I’ll look like a genius. And if not, my prediction will be lost in a sea of unsuccessful VP predictions from the chattering classes.

These days political pundit seem all hyped-up over Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI-1). I guess it makes sense….

For Republicans, having an actor in the White House is political comfort food.

As if we couldn’t tell. After Obama was elected, what was the Senate G.O.P. plan for governance? Make a public showing of wanting to work with Obama, but then oppose everything.

Gov. Chris Christie (R-NJ) came to Bellevue yesterday to tell Republicans he’ll blame them when McKenna loses.

The Borowitz Report interviews Mitt Romney.

Complaint filed with PDC alleging that McKenna campaign broke disclosure laws.

Guess who else Romney murdered!

Puget Sound area traffic this weekend…is going to SUCK.

MoJo: Tea Party shoots itself in to foot again.

Connelly: The state Republican Party predicted, early this year, that it would “flip” enough Democratic-held seats to gain a majority in the 49-member Washington State Senate. The issue is now very much in doubt.

Tax experts assess how likely it is that Romney paid no taxes for a decade.

Eli Sanders attempts to interview Bruce Danielson.

Charges brought in an actual case of election fraud. Wanna guess which party?

Markos: We are winning! (Of course, HA readers have known this all along.)

Mini-essay. Which of our local papers actually wield some influence among the electorate? The Stranger endorses a third-party candidate against Frank Chopp…as a write-in, and she likely comes in second place. How did the Seattle Times do? Not so well.

The Stranger’s Eli Sanders has been on top of the Danielson-Gonzalez Supreme Court race for a long time now. In fact, I think he deserves some of the credit for raising awareness that led to an election result in which a highly qualified candidate with the Hispanic surname defeated the highly unqualified candidate with the lilly-White surname.

But even in victory, Eli has an important point to make about failure:

The results are now clear: rural voters, for the most part, pick the white guy over the Latino guy.

If Gonzalez hadn’t spent over $260,000 to combat this dynamic—and if urban Washingtonians hadn’t sounded the alarm—then we’d now have a Justice Bruce Danielson.

This is a disgracefully ignorant and dangerous way to pick our supreme court justices.

There is another point to make here as well.

The deal is this. Every single county East of the Cascades went for the white guy. Most of them did so by 60% or more, including Adams and Douglas counties that went for Danielson by over 70%.

The counties with the highest proportion of Hispanic population (from 2010 census data) are Franklin (63.8%), Adams (57.9%), Yakima (45.6%), Grant (39.5%), Chelan (27.5%), Douglas (26.7%), Walla Walla (21.4%), Okanogan (19.2%), and Benton (18.0%).

All of these counties but Benton voted for Danielson in excess of 60%. That’s right…Franklin county, with a 63.8% Hispanic population went for Danielson by 64.3%. And Adams county, with a 57.9% Hispanic population went for Danielson by 70.6%.

Now, there may be several reasons why counties with a high proportion of Hispanic individuals have voters that overwhelmingly vote Republican and vote against a highly qualified individual with a Hispanic surname running for Supreme Court.

The Hispanic population may be younger, so that many are not old enough to vote. A certain proportion may be non-citizens. A lower rate of English literacy among Hispanic voters may suppress voter turn-out. Hey, there may even be some fraction of Hispanic voters who really believe it’s in their best interest to vote Republican (yeah…right!).

What we can say is that the interests of the considerable Hispanic population in Washington state for whatever reasons are not being served by our electoral system.

I find that disgraceful!

I don’t know what the story is behind this failure. Frankly, this looks like a failure on the part of Democrats to conduct effective registration drives, voter education efforts, and put GOTV operations into the field in these counties.

Whatever the reason, it needs to change!

Election results:

• Whew! Gonzalez ahead in Supreme Court race
• First CD: DelBene and Koster
• Gov: “Inslee earned 46.8 percent of the vote and McKenna earned 42.9”
• Seattle libraries, county juvenile-justice levies are up
• Re: last night—Publicola election miscellanea
• WA SOS elections page
• Nationally, a rough night for incumbents

A brief history of that Badass Harry Reid

Washington fights to keep tourism alive.

The MittVeePstakes are heating up.

“Mitt Romney is laboring under the lowest personal popularity ratings for a presumptive presidential nominee in midsummer election-year polls back to 1984.”

Caught on video: Hillary Clinton dancing in South Africa!

It is election day in Washington state. So fill out that ballot, drop it in the mail or a drop box and then join us for an evening of politics, conversation, and election watching over a pint at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally.

We meet every Tuesday at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00pm. Some people show up earlier for Dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings over the next week. Tonight the Tri-Cities and Vancouver, WA chapters meet, and Thursday night Drinking Liberally Bremerton meets.

With 231 chapters of Living Liberally, including twelve in Washington state four in Oregon and three more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter near you.

Curiosity didn’t kill the Rover. But controversy erupts.

Tomorrow is election day. Having difficulties completing your ballot? Here is the Progressive Voter’s Guide from Fuse.

Actual Headline: “Northwest ties to Hiroshima remembered on A-bomb anniversary”. Ummm…are we supposed to celebrate or something????

Sour note: Sikh Temple shooter was “a ‘frustrated neo-Nazi’ who led a racist white supremacist band.”

The good news for Mitt is that he “probably earned more than $50 million, and possibly as much as $60 million from the Italian directory sale of Seat Pagine Gialle SpA…. The deal turned into one of the biggest windfalls of his tenure.” The bad news: Mitt can’t really go to Italy anymore.

More science for the nutbaggers to deny: The impact of ocean acidification on shellfish.

Saving Town Hall: Stanwood edition

Saving Town Hall: Darrington edition

Romney outraises Obama for third month in a row.

WA-10 Republican candidate Stan Flemming’s “atypical loan pushed the boundaries of federal law.”

Folks interested in examining Electoral College scenarios may find Michael Tomasky’s Daily Beast article of interest:

So if Pennsylvania is off the boards, let’s look around. Imagine it’s election night, say 10:45 east coast time. Four eastern states haven’t been called yet: Ohio (18), Virginia (13), North Carolina (15), and Florida (29). Also, in some Western states, the polls haven’t closed, or the races are too tight to project just yet—Colorado and Nevada, say. Arizona has just been called for Romney. At this point, Romney actually leads, 188 to 182. In this scenario I’m assuming Obama has won Iowa (6), which is admittedly close but where his lead has been stable at three or four points, and New Hampshire (4), where Obama has a similar fairly small but stable lead, and Michigan (16), where the gap appears to be opening up a little.

So it’s a six-vote Romney edge. They’re feeling great up in Boston. Especially with the big Eastern four still up in the air. Right?

Not really. Let’s look at these West Coast states….

Read the rest here.

Mark Fiore: Bishops versus Nuns!

Pap: The psychology of Republican voters.

SlateTV: Contraception mandate is “like 9/11, Pearl Harbor.

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, Illinois edition:

Willard:

• Jon on Mitt’s trip to London (via Crooks and Liars).
• Mitt Romney’s tax return hunt.
• Obama on Mitt Romney’s tax hike on the middle class.
• Young Turks: Mitt Romney, blaming job losses on President is “poppycock”.
• Behind the dressage: Rafalca.
• Sam Seder: Universal Healthcare is great…for everyone but america!
• Stephanie Cutter: Mitt’s tax hike!
• Ann Telnaes: Romney’s trip continues.
• Mitt Romney: Jobs creator!
• Young Turks: Why aren’t Birfers demanding to seem Romney’s tax returns?
• Pap: Mushroom Cloud Mitt should frighten us all.
• SlateTV: Mitt’s bad trip to Poland.
• Mitt won’t answer for his middle class tax hike
• Sam Seder: Romney spokesperson to reporters, “Kiss my ass.”
• Young Turks: Harry Reid hits Romney hard over (possibly) not paying tax.
• Maddow: Romney demanded past opponents release tax returns.
• Romney Spokesperson to Press: “Kiss my ass. This is a Holy site for the Polish people. Show some respect.”
• Zina Saunders: Romney, Job Creator.
• One more “unwelcomed moment” ends Mitt’s trip
• Romney: Russia is our number one adversary?!?
• Sam Seder: Harry is right to question Mitt’s tax returns
• Maddow: Romney caught in a lie on tax return demands.
• SlateTV: Mitt v. Harry.
• Jon: The gaffes continue in Israel and Poland (via Crooks and Liars).

Stephen ‘salutes’ Sen. McConnell for attempting to stop Obamacare’s contraceptive mandate (via Crooks and Liars).

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, California edition.

Analysis: How do Obama and Romney stack up on foreign policy? (via TalkingPointsMemo).

Music video: David LaMotte sings “Hope”.

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, Minnesota edition.

Food Politics:

• Chick-Fil-A sets the record straight.
• Jon: Chicken sandwich activism (via TalkingPointsMemo).
• The official Chick-fil-A appreciation day video:
• Susie Sampson’s Tea Party Report: Chick fil-A vs. the Gays
• Rahm Emanuel welcomes you to Chicago.
• Sam Seder: hate a gay, eat a processed chicken.
• KFC loves gays!
• Stephen: Who Will Protect The Vegetables? (via TalkingPointsMemo).

Pap: Republican hate peddlers divide America.

Sam Seder and Sarah Silverman catch up on movies and politics.

Jon: Old Man Fight—Cheney vs McCain (via Crooks and Liars).

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, Delaware edition.

Ann Telnaes: Justice Scalia on money in politics.

That Nutjob from Iowa:

• Rep. Steve King gets in touch with his inner Birfer (via Crooks and Liars).
• Doggies against Rep. Steve King (via Crooks and Liars).

White House: West Wing Week.

SlateTV: Tea-time in Texas.

Alyona: Is defense spending really our top priority?

Thom with The Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly.

Roy Zimmerman: Vote Republican, Connecticut edition:

Sam Seder: Dems add gay marriage to their platform.

Stephen sacrifices a baby to appease Grover Norquist (via Crooks and Liars).

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Over at Slog, Paul Constant posts two new political ads, one from the Romney camp and one from Obama’s camp.

Let’s try an experiment.

Each ad has brief footage of President Obama. Can you tell which ad is attacking Obama just by looking at a screen capture of him?

Ad one:

Ad two:

Now, I realize that it is common to alter the shade and focus, and add effects to political hit ads. Color is typically washed out to display the opponent as less appealing, generic and gray. This can be seen in Obama’s ads where Romney ends up with a green-blue hue and raster lines running through the scene, giving an Orwellian feel (with, perhaps, a touch of Max Headroom).

How do the Romney people make Obama less appealing? They render him out of focus and darken his face.

Huh…why do you think they did that?

Here are the ads:

From last night’s Drinking Liberally:

Just before the June, 2010 Washington State Republican Party convention, WSRP chair Luke Esser sent a pledge letter out to the G.O.P. senatorial candidates who were challenging Sen. Patty Murray (my emphasis):

We the undersigned Republican candidates for U.S. Senate herby urge the Washington State Republican Party to not make a pre-primary endorsement or nomination of any candidate in this year’s race for U.S. Senate, and to offer equal access to party resources for all Republican candidates. A pre-primary endorsement or nomination would only serve to divide our party at a time when we all need to be united in the effort to defeat Patty Murray. [….]

As Esser explained to Politico:

I thought it would be a mistake for anybody to win an endorsement. I think the body and the state party believe at this point that we should have a competitive and vigorous primary. May the best candidate win.

That’s some pathetic spin. The back story is that the Teabaggers were highly energized with a strong presence at the 2010 convention. The Teabaggers were pushing for a Clint Diddier nomination over latecomer Dino Rossi. Diddier had just earned Sarah Palin’s endorsement. A nomination fight would have have gotten ugly!

There’s only one problem with not nominating anyone in 2010. Take it away, Goldy (emphasis in original):

In what could turn out to be massive political blunder with far-reaching consequences, a question has been raised as to whether Mitt Romney can legally qualify to appear on the Washington ballot under existing state law:

WAC 434-215-165 Presidential nominations by major political parties.

Nominations for president and vice-president by major political parties are conducted at each party’s national convention. Immediately following the convention, each party must submit a certificate of nomination and list of electors to the secretary of state in order to place the nominees on the presidential general election ballot.

That is the procedure by which presidential candidates from “major political parties” qualify for Washington’s general election ballot. But according to a public records request that was forwarded my way, the Washington State Republican Party may no longer be a major party:

RCW 29A.04.086 tells us that “”Major political party” means a political party of which at least one nominee for president, vice president, United States senator, or a statewide office received at least five percent of the total vote cast at the last preceding state general election in an even-numbered year.”

The problem for the state G.O.P. is that the Senate race was the only state-wide race in 2010. And, as far as anyone can tell, and consistent with Esser’s pledge letter and statement, there was no actual Republican nominee for statewide office in 2010.

The implication is that the WSRP is now, technically, a minor party in Washington state.

Why is this important? Well…it is embarrassing. Republicans losing major party status will be the laughing stock of Washington state…with some assistance from the Teabaggers, Sarah Palin, and Dino Rossi’s timorousness in announcing his run.

But the other, potentially more serious consequence, is that the WSRP would be required to nominate a presidential candidate according to the rules for a minor party:

(2) In order to nominate candidates for the offices of president and vice president of the United States, United States senator, United States representative, or any statewide office, a nominating convention shall obtain and submit to the filing officer the signatures of at least one thousand registered voters of the state of Washington.

and signatures must…

(7) Be submitted to the appropriate filing officer not later than one week following the adjournment of the convention at which the nominations were made.

The 2012 WSRP State Convention ended on June 2. Oopsiedoodles!

So, unless the state Republicans submitted those 1,000 signatures and complied with all the other requirements of RCW 29A.20.161, Mitt Romney is not eligible to be on the Washington state general election ballot.

Should that happen, the Washington state Republicans will be the laughing stock of the nation.