It’s election night. Please be sure to VOTE, and then join us for some electoral punditry and political prognostication over a pint at tonight’s Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally.
We meet tonight and every Tuesday evening at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Our normal starting time is 8:00pm.
Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings over the next week. Tonight the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. The Lakewood chapter meets this Wednesday. For Thursday, the Spokane and Tacoma chapters meet. And on Friday, the Centralia chapter meets.
With 211 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and three more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting near you.
Can’t say that I’m much of a Terry McAuliffe fan, but I like seeing that win over the Republican nutter in VA.
I’m really digging De Blasio’s big win in NY. Looks like he swept the thing.
The VA AG race has been fun to watch. With 1% of precincts remaining, Mark Herring (D) is down by 1,600 votes. When 2% were remaining, he was down by over 10,000 as I recall.
N in Seattle points out that VA has lousy recount laws, so let’s hope Herring comes out ahead after that last 1%.
Looks like SeaTac’s $15 minimum-wage proposition has enough lead to hang on.
This is interesting … Seattle Times reports “Whatcom County voters appeared to be sending a message against coal trains in the initial election returns released Tuesday night. All four county-council candidates who are thought to oppose a controversial proposal coal-export facility there were leading.”
Houston has re-elected Mayor Annisse Parker, a Democrat, to her third and final 2 year term. She is also a Lesbian.
http://app1.kuhf.org/articles/.....Ahead.html
In Minnesota, both of the Twin Cities held municipal elections, using Ranked Choice Voting, St. Paul saw Mayor Coleman re-elected, but in a crowded field, a progressive Democratic Farmer Labor candidate is leading with 36% of First Choice Votes, the second and third choices of lower candidates have not been redistributed, and their were 35 candidates, probably should not have had the filing fee be $20.
http://www.theuptake.org/2013/.....sy-hodges/
If a level of government in St Paul needs RCV, it’s that other one, the State government. The Independence Party has played spoiler ever since Jesse Ventura left office.
Illinois just approved marriage equality legislation.
http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/.....-equality/
We may have a new public transportation service in Washington State. Okanagon County voters appear to have approved the Okanagon County Transportation Authority, and a .4% Sales Tax to fund it.
http://www.omakchronicle.com/n.....portation/
75% of the vote had been counted in the Okanagon County, and it is only 600 vote difference. Still too early to call. I have noticed a trend in recent years, Eastern Washington counties joining the Public Transit movement. Asotin County did it a few years ago, Grant County about a decade ago. Perhaps it’s the high gas prices.
Darryl @ 2
As for Virginia AG, Mark Herring (D) has a 541 vote lead over Mark Obenshain (R), with 2,555 out of 2,558 precincts counted. This is from unofficial results on a VA state government website.
http://electionresults.virgini.....38;map=CTY
Normally, the GOP strongholds in VA count their votes before the DEM strongholds — explaining why Cuccinelli (R) had about a 12 point lead over McAuliffe (D) after the first 20% of precincts, but Big Mac beat Coo-coo by almost three points after all the votes were counted.
However, the last three precincts are in GOP strongholds. 2 out of 24 outstanding in Mecklenburg County, where Obenshain is at 59.61%, and 1 out of 30 in Rockingham County, where Obenshain has a whopping 75.26%.
If these precincts mirrored the rest of the respective counties, the election will be hella closer than even now.
Obenshain won Mecklenburg by an average of 56.05 votes per precinct, so narrow the gap by 112 votes down to 429 votes.
Obenshain won Rockingham by an average of 367.45 votes (bigger precincts, much stronger GOP territory than Mecklenburg). So that guesstimates an edge of only 72 votes for Herring, out of 2.2 million cast.
Now I go to the Richmond Times-Dispatch, where they have AP results, which show only two precincts outstanding — but amazingly find only 2,541 precincts in all of VA (versus 2,555 from the state elections website).
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/f.....N=POLITICS
With just two precincts left, the AP has Obenshain with a 53 vote lead. So I assume the missing precincts are both from Mecklenburg County, since only Rockingham has big enough precincts to produce a 594 vote shift in the lead in favor of the Republican.
So it really depends on what two precincts remain in Mecklenburg County. It seems like a somewhat rural small town place, with 32,727 people in the 2010 census. The county population is 59.24% White and 39.08% Black. Only 1.21% is Latino (most of whom seem to have picked White, instead of Other), and only small fractions of a percent for Asian and Native American.
If these two precincts are stronger for the GOP, then Obenshain has it (for now). If they are Democratic strongholds, then Herring will pull ahead. Keep in mind that the demographics and politics may vary wildly, depending on which part of the county one is looking at.
So I go look at precinct totals on the Virginia State Board of Elections unofficial results. While they say Mecklenburg has 24 precincts, I only count 23, and only find one that has not reported — 501 South Hill. This precinct is larger than average, since it has all of the 5th county supervisor district (while most districts are divided into several precincts).
In 2012, Romney carried South Hill by 842 to 612 over Obama. Obenshain is relatively stronger than Romney by a couple of points, looking at the statewide results. Turnout this year is roughly half of last year. So when South Hill reports, it should add 100 or more votes to Obenshain’s “margin”.
So we likely have Obenshain ahead by about 150 votes statewide when all precincts report.
Provisional votes haven’t been counted. Not many are accepted in Virginia, compared to other states, but that can make the difference. And I don’t know whether Virginia allows late absentees — such as overseas or military votes — that arrive after election day.
If the GOP didn’t have two coocoos at the top of their ticket, Obenshain would have likely won by a comfortable margin of several points. He is a halfway decent fellow, and would be far better in any office than Cuccinelli or the firebrand radical the GOP put up for Lt Gov.
Where’s all those ‘helpful’ teabagging trolls to show us what a great victory they had on Tues. That’s right they are all busy learning to steal other people’s work at the R.Paul School of Creative Writing.
TED Talk: Nick Hanauer “Rich people don’t create jobs”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKCvf8E7V1g
The true job creators are the middle class consumers.
He had an amazing metaphor.
For centuries, astronomers thought that the earth was the center of the earth. And yet the facts do not show that to be true. An astronomer today would be terrible, if he still thought that.
Today politicians and economists say that that the rich are the job creators. And yet the facts do not show that to be true. What does that say about our politicians and economists?
What do you think of it?
Cereal seems to have permanently disappeared so it’s been a while since we’ve heard the ha-ha-ha the Chevy Volt from government motors is a failure.
YTD, the Volt has sold over 16,000 units and is outselling the leaf by a few hundred.
For perspective, that’s a little more than double as many Corvettes as GM has sold but no one is clamoring for the death of the Corvette. It’s also more than the Escalade. (Caveat, the all new redesigned 2014 ‘Vette is piling up orders and will do really well.)
Tesla sold 5,500 units in Q3 pretty much besting every SUV on the market.
Yep, there’s no demand for electric cars.
Yep, looks like they have a Gregoire-Rossi situation in Virginia, with the Republican 306 votes ahead (out of more than 2 million votes cast).
@15 Tesla’s overheated stock dropped 14% today.
(Full Disclosure: Roger Rabbit doesn’t own any Tesla stock. I invest only in companies that make money.)
@ 17
Overheated stock, or overheated batteries?
@18 The stock overheated before the batteries did. I would love to have their car if someone gave me one, but I won’t pay the asking price for either their car (can’t afford it) or their stock (not worth it). I don’t get people who pay several hundred times earnings for stocks. What are they thinking? Amazon’s stock is over $350 and the company earns less than $1 a share. (I ordered four books from them today, and they’ll make nothing.) Needless to say, I don’t throw money away on “fad” stocks. I do fine with companies that sell toothpaste, gasoline, and Frosted Flakes. I’ve made over $65,000 this year sitting on my fat rabbit ass in front of a computer screen flipping stocks.
Soon to be the new right wing mantra. Abortion causes climate change
@20
Oh. My. God. Just read your link.
I knew David Barton was a total hack and liar extraordinaire, but that really takes the cake.
Plagues as a wrath of God for abortion?!
The sad thing is that there are fools who believe that shit; the depressing thing is that charlatans like Barton and Copeland see the world as a sea of marks to grift, like our own puddibigot.
@21
Ha! Just when you think it can’t possibly get any crazier, a Teavangelical comes along and ups the bar.
Frank Gaffney on why allowing people to vote is communism.
@19
The get rich quicker are bailing out of Tesla. I have some but its a long term hold. I also had Amazon in the late nineties in the $75 range and held it through 2010 and did well with it. Shifted it to life settlements, also a long term hold.
Anyway, some investors aren’t seeing big picture. Teslas earings per share is bad as they pour a ton into the recharging network and the Model X. I see Tesla as something to park unneeded cash in for 10-20 years.
The latest iteration of climate change denial holds that worrying about the environment is nothing more than a fill-in for discredited Marxism among the atheist crowd. The implication, of course, is there’s no problem the godly have to worry about, and the rest of you are pagans and communists.
http://www.economist.com/blogs.....d-religion
@24 I’m not a big fan of stuffing money in mattresses and hoping bedbugs don’t eat it.
@23 Well, at least Gaffney is honest about what the right’s agenda is — not letting “the others” vote! Say, wasn’t that why the civil rights workers were murdered in Meridian, Mississippi? Because they were registering poor blacks to vote? It seems not much has changed in how reactionaries think.
In other voting news Remember Wendy Davis dahhhling of HA DUMMOCRETINS…Well she’s not so much a dahhhling of Texans now!
Tooooooooooooooooooooooo
Dammmmmmmmmmmmmmmn
Fuuuuuuuuunnnnnnnnnnnnny
Obummer been very clear on this Obummercare matter…
You havta buy Obummercare insurance that you definitely don’t want from an approved Obummercare web site that doesn’t work at all otherwise Obummer’s Tea Party Hatin IRS will find you and will fine you!
DUMMOCRETIN Senators at the OutHouse meeting with Obummer becuz it could be a slaughter in 2014.
Puddy remembers how all the HA DUMMOCRETINS were giddy over the Tea Party taking a shellacking over the shutdown due to Obummercare… Well looks like the Tea Party was right in the higher costs, lower coverages and the overall screw job healthy peeps are taking due to it.
DUMMOCRETINS will take a shellacking in the 2014 erections. Why? Republicans can say this was a DUMMOCRETIN debacle and Obummer lied to get it passed! CNN and ABC published the meeting notes when the Obummer speeches were being crafted with you can keep your insurance. .period. .guaranteed.
Here’s a load of horseshit from Rahmbo Deadfish…
PuddyCommentary… DUMMOCRETINS will lie and lie and lie… to rewrite history… If it was blocked DUMMOCRETINS did it! Hey Emanuel, Obummer had a DUMMOCRETIN House and Senate. He chose to deliver Obummercare and we see how well that is going!
Wendy Davis…
I LOVE that she’s stealing the Teahaddist’s grip on the happy-happy term ‘pro-Life’. The right wing is anything but that, and she’s taking the argument to them – go Wendy!
Thanks for that link, puddibigot – I didn’t know she had said that!
It’s really too bad that the ACA is as terrible as it is, though what do you expect? It’s a re-tread Heritage Foundation idea first put into practice by Mitt Romney.
Republicans LOVED it in the 1990’s…only hating/sabotaging it when it was presented by a black guy in the 2000’s.
We should have just expanded Medicare, or crafted a simple, non-profit, low-overhead single payer plan for everybody. We couldn’t do that, of course, because SOSHULISMMMMS!!11!
Context is important. The puddibigot is too stupid to remember that.
schmucko-moron… It’s not even close to RomneyCare.
schmucko-moron, you are the moron here. Back in 2010 these problems were predicted on the senate floor by a Republican. .EVERY. .ONE. .OF. .HIS. .PREDICTIONS. .HAVE. .COME. .TRUE. schmucko-moron. Obummer and you DUMMOCRETINS have lost context. Sebelius was WARNED this was a fiasco before they turned the website on. Can’t blame this on Puddy! Look into the mirror and admit you are the problem schmucko-moron!
Some kind of old moist dog shit seems to have clogged up this page.Good thing it’s the same old dog shit that has polluted the comments before because it can be easily stepped over or carefully plopped into the psycho doo-doo bag.
Glad to educate you schmucko-moron. Too bad your daily reading of Daily Kooks didn’t provide facts just DUMMOCRETIN blather!!!!!
Yes schmucko-moron Wendy Davis only cares for the child once it’s born. She’s pro-life because she cares deeply about those humans who are spared in the womb by women who don’t agree in destroying life after conception! isn’t that why the word foetus was developed so DUMMOCRETINS wouldn’t need to call unborn children human babies, human foetuses?
Glad she’s a typical DUMMOCRETIN!
Jon Matheson – old moist dog shit!
The smell has arrived!
@31
If Piddles could pee on a newspaper not The Washington Examiner or website NOT freerepublic or read something other than Daily Caller then he’d know he’s full of shit.
The Senate was 60-40 once Al Franken was declared the winner and sworn in six months into Obama’s term so no, 18 months of filibuster proof majority is not true in any way. Just the fact that Franken wasn’t seated for six months takes that number to a year. Arlen Spector in April of 2009 switched in theory making it 59-40 while Franken waited in the wings but Ted Kennedy was unable to get to the Senate for most votes as he was busy dying. So the earliest Piddles can claim there was a majority Democratic Congress is July 7, 2009 when Franken is FINALLY sworn in.
That date, funny enough is AFTER the last time Kennedy was able to make a vote so it was always 59-40 even after Franken. Kennedy died in August 2009 and then Scott Brown made it 59-41 again. So in theory for five months the President had a 60 seat majority but subtract Kennedy and it’s 59, no cloture.
So no, at no time did Obama have an actual filibuster proof majority. Just because the nut-o-sphere claims it, it isn’t true.
These are actual facts but i’m sure Piddles will try to dispute them somehow.
Oh, my. The delusions of grandiosity are powerful in this one.
You really wrote that. Really.
(And what’s with the British spelling, dipshit? Are you just cutting and pasting?)
But really – you’re positing that the term “fetus” (or, if you prefer, “foetus”), was a political maneuver, and not a term of art in embryology?
You are one paranoid, deluded crackpot, puddibigot.
No, most normal people just use the term fetus. Foetus was developed by TeaTards because they have such a hard time with the English language, as well as for a variety of mental health issues.
British spelling on purpose schmucko-moron.
Damn you are so dense! When people look at a pregnant woman they say wow that baby is getting big… It’s DUMMOCRETINS who say who your fetus is getting big!
You are one idiotic, insipid inane imbecile schmucko-moron!
Maybe schmucko-moron was one of those parasitic fetuses you read about that lived!
Person who is pretending to be Puddy, I enjoyed that belly laugh. I showed your posts to my co workers and we all had the best time pointing and laughing at you. Thanks.
What’s amazing with the above string of stuttering stupidity from the puddibigot – his rejection of the simplest of scientific facts.
Mammals go through a fairly stereotyped embryogenesis and fetal development, prior to parturition. It’s a fact. The puddibigot seems to be defying that in a most childish way.
“Fetus” as a political term? Absolute nonsense, except perhaps in the context that learning and precision and knowledge are no longer valued by the Teahaddist rump of the Republican party.
Next he’ll be telling us that storks bring swaddled newborns to God-fearing heterosexual couples.
It’s one more object lesson in the Teahassists’ rejection of science and modernity. I remember my poorly-educated immigrant Evangelical grandmother bristling at the notion that humans were animals – it’s the same thing. She and puddibigot share a notion that they’re extra-special blessed by God, and their magical thinking is somehow valid in the larger world. Puddibigot’s insanity/inanity rejects basic biology in favor of some gauzy definition of ‘baby’ as a romantic ideal – used of course to shame and disempower women, particularly those who don’t fit his stereotype of proper and worthy and deserving nice ladies.
One more float in the ongoing parade of the puddibigot’s caustic marriage of hate and stupidity.
There is a sci fi story
Arvies
by Adam-Troy Castro
http://www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/arvies/
A sci fi story about intelligent fetuses living inside defined-as-dead young women, since the only life only mattering between conception and birth, and once a person is born, they are nothing more than disposable meat.
Really? Apparently you and schmucko-moron disagree!