The nightmare of the past eight years is nearly over. Unless, of course, you count the economic hangover being left behind for all of us to deal with.
Bush gave his final press conference, no one came. He gave his farewell speech, no one cared. He leaves office with a final approval rating of 34%, up from an even more dismal 25% a mere two months ago. The increase, of course, comes courtesy of spineless farewell ass-kissing by fellow Republicans, 3/4 of whom suddenly believe he knocked it out of the park during his terms in office. How does he rank among all presidents since WWII? Third lowest approval ratings and second highest disapproval ratings according to Gallup. Given that Nixon holds the trophy in both categories, Bush is definitely in good company.
While I’m sure there will be much more to discuss about the Bush Administration as the veil of presidential secrecy is lifted by more and more of his insiders, it’s time to move on for now. There are only four more days until the change becomes official and I can’t wait. (Ok, so I could also really use a Steelers win on Sunday to start the week out right, but that’s a topic for another time and blog.)
Have to work on Inauguration Day? No problem. You can watch the historic events live right here:
Holy crap, an election process that seemed to last almost as long as my extended family holiday activities felt (I love you guys, you know I do!), is finally over. At least the first phase, that is.
The Minnesota State Canvassing Board certified results today showing Franken came out of the recount 225 votes ahead of Republican incumbent, Norm Coleman.
Coleman, of course, has vowed to sue in order to stretch this thing out indefinitely, ensuring that Minnesota will be the center of attention for months to come.
Bill O’Reilly makes me laugh. The guy is a goof. When he’s not out looking for new and fun things to do with falafels, he’s browbeating his guests…even when they work for the same network. Now, he’s latched on to, what I’m going to call, the most ridiculous state-related holiday “controversy” EVER.
You know about the all the commotion regarding the holiday signs/displays in the Washington state Capitol building, right?. If you don’t, here’s a quick rundown:
Atheists were allowed to put up a sign in the state Capitol building near the traditional Christian nativity scene and a “holiday” tree.
There are requests for other displays as well. Someone applied to put up a “Festivus” pole in honor of the invented holiday featured in the 1990s sitcom “Seinfeld.” Another person wants to create a religious-themed “balloon display.”
So back to O’Reilly:
O’Reilly, on his FOX News show earlier this week, urged viewers to call Gov. Christine Gregoire’s office to protest the sign. Gregoire’s office received more than 9,000 calls Thursday alone, said spokesman Pearse Edwards.
My absolute favorite quote from the segment he did on the displays:
“Washington is ground-zero for just about every nutty, secular cause on Earth, but this time, the State has embarrassed itself and the Nation.”
So Governor Gregoire had enough and has settled the controversy, cracking down on what can and cannot be displayed based on current laws. Bill, of course, disagreed with her decisions and decided to debate Fox News reporter and attorney, Megyn Kelly, on his show while making broad and completely incorrect statements about legal issues and First Amendment rights. He was completely wrong, as usual, and watching Megyn, who agreed with and defended Governor Gregoire, drill him for it was rather satisfying:
My take on the whole thing? People (I’m looking at you here, Bill) need to get a grip. Shit a lot worse than a sign stating the opposite of your beliefs being displayed at the state Capitol is going down all over the world. If that’s the kind of thing that ruins your day, you lack any sense of perspective and are wasting perfectly good air the rest of us could be using.
Happy Ramhankwamastice. If you celebrate that sort of thing.
Today was already not going so well and then this came across my desk. Holy roasted chestnuts, this is awful! The wars are still going, the economy is in the tank and getting worse by the minute, but Bush and Barney decide to make a 4-minute long Christmas video for us all to enjoy. How many tax payer dollars were spent on this garbage? I guarantee the cost was not commensurate with the production quality. Hell, there was probably $15,000 sunk into the poinsettias alone that appear behind Laura in her closing statement at the end of the video…a statement which, by the way, will make you ill.
And not to leave our Jewish friends out of the mix, were you lucky enough to receive an invite to the White House Hanukkah celebration, complete with a Christmas tree on the front of the card? No? Well, here you go:
The message reads that the couple “requests the pleasure of your company at a Hanukkah reception,” written beneath an image of a Clydesdale horse hauling a Christmas fir along the snow-dappled drive to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
And, no, it is not a Hanukkah bush. A close look at the wagon reveals the message “White House Christmas Tree 2008.”
In the background, the White House windows are festooned with Christmas wreaths.
Did you really expect any less of this administration? Just in case you can’t go another minute without knowing what the Bush family is up to for the holidays, you can visit the official White House Holiday website.
I’m wondering how many of you are now feeling like me right now, wishing someone had thrown a shoe at your head instead.
You know you’ve done a bang up job as POTUS when, in your final days in office, a journalist is willing to go to prison for chucking his shoes at you during a press conference. I’m still looking into this, but I’m pretty sure this is the first time someone has removed their shoes and thrown them at a U.S. President. Rock stars have women throwing their panties on stage. Bush? He has people throwing their shoes at his head.
In the middle of the news conference with Mr Maliki, Iraqi television journalist Muntadar al-Zaidi stood up and shouted “this is a goodbye kiss from the Iraqi people, dog,” before hurling a shoe at Mr Bush which narrowly missed him.
Showing the soles of shoes to someone is a sign of contempt in Arab culture.
Did you see how fast Bush ducked that first throw? I’m guessing he gets a lot of practice at home with Laura.
It wasn’t long after the Minnesota State Canvassing Board ruled unanimously that 1,500 incorrectly rejected absentee ballots should be counted, giving the Franken campaign a boost, that the Coleman campaign sought to battle it out in the state Supreme Court in Minnesota.
While the shenanigans continue in Minnesota, the tiny country of Estonia is laughing their istmiks off at the election process in the U.S. Ok, maybe not literally, but they are kicking our istmiks when it comes to election technology and, folks, that’s just plain sad.
Starting with elections held in 2011 and beyond, Estonians will now have the option of voting via mobile phone.
The mobile-voting system, which has already been tested, requires that voters obtain free, authorized chips for their phones, said Raul Kaidro, spokesman of the SK Certification Center, which issues personal ID cards in Estonia.
The chip will verify the voter’s identity and authorize participation in the electronic voting system, he said.
The system and software have proven effective and reliable in an independent security audit, Kaidro said. He dismissed security concerns, claiming the system “is the most secure way to authenticate digital signatures.”
This isn’t a voting technology first for Estonia, either. They’ve been using an Internet voting system since 2005 for local elections and even rolled it out nationally for the parliamentary vote last year.
No offense to the immense number of elected officials and volunteers that oversee the voting systems and processes (and there are many) in our country during each and every election, but you all just got owned by The Republic of Estonia. Estonia! That’s not something I’d put on my resume. Incidentally, no offense meant to Estonians, either. You guys rock. No, seriously. Can I come vote in your elections? Ours give me a headache.
It’s December 11th and we still don’t know who has won the race in Minnesota between Norm Coleman and Al Franken. Officially, according to the state of Minnesota, Coleman is up by 192. Unofficially, according to an internal Franken Campaign count, Franken leads by 4. Both sides are crying foul, citing controversies and irregularities, etc.
WTF? Exactly.
To really get a handle on the situation, let me present this excellent chart put together by the Minnesota Star Tribune:
But with a week to go before the state Canvassing Board begins ruling on challenged ballots, major questions remain about how the process will work.
It’s still not clear whether the campaigns will be allowed to argue their case to the board on each ballot, whether a simple majority of the five-person board will prevail in the case of split decisions, and how long this phase of the recount will play out.
It gets even better when you see where things stand regarding the interpretation of the rules to be followed by the state Canvassing Board when voting on the challenged ballots:
The board is made up of two state Supreme Court justices, two district court justices and Ritchie, who chairs the panel. It was unclear Tuesday whether a split board vote on a ballot would be decided by majority opinion, or whether the ballot would be rejected for lack of an unanimous vote.
Initially, Ritchie said he thought a split vote would be resolved in favor of the majority, but later said, “I think we don’t know. Because we haven’t as a group discussed any aspect of how this part will proceed. … We have to figure how we handle those. Do we put them aside and come back to them?”
Two state Supreme Court justices, two district court justices and the Secretary of State and no one knows the proper procedure here? The recount has been ongoing for a month. You think someone on the Canvassing Board might have taken the initiative to brush up on state election rules given that this is the closest election in state history.
Unbelievably, the Canvassing Board doesn’t meet to begin the review process of the challenged ballots until December 19th. Ritchie claims they’ll finish the review in four days. The Star Tribune did some math and estimated it will take them closer to 10. Not a problem, says Ritchie, stating that the Canvassing Board will break for the holidays, but will reconvene as many times as necessary to complete the task. The new Congress convenes on January 6th. The race is on.
But wait, there’s more!
You may have noticed the note in the chart above stating that there were 133 ballots missing from a precinct in Dinkytown. Yes, there really is a community in Minneapolis called Dinkytown. Apparently, in trying to hunt down those pesky ballots, someone at the county elections warehouse opened a box and discovered a plastic bag full of uncounted absentee ballots. Not only are the elections officials in the following video stumped when asked whether or not the ballots will now be counted, but they do a damn fine job of stumbling through what might have happened to the original 133 missing ballots as well:
In light of all the controversy, Al Franken’s campaign released a video on YouTube yesterday containing emotional interviews with voters whose absentee ballots had been erroneously rejected and were not counted. Not surprisingly, the Coleman camp issued a statement calling the video a “new low” in Minnesota politics.
Besides being a ridiculously transparent response…you can’t tell me they wouldn’t be doing the same thing right now if the recount numbers weren’t going their way…the fact is, Coleman and his staff seem to have rather short memories. I, for one, would argue that this was the lowest point in Minnesota politics:
Approximately 192 votes now separate the two candidates in a race where nearly 2.5 million ballots were cast. I can’t imagine a better example of the phrase, “Every vote counts.” Unless, of course, you count this or this. This concludes argument #157 regarding why we need a new election system in this country.
In closing, I leave you with the Franken campaign’s new video, “My Vote”:
UPDATE (11/26/08): The MN Canvassing Board has ruled that the 12,000 or so rejected absentee ballots will not be recounted. Let the circus begin.
Remember the election that happened three weeks ago?
It’s still happening in Minnesota.
As of 8PM yesterday, Coleman held a lead of about 213 votes in the current recount. The woman in the picture above is reacting to news that her table would need to count the ballots again…the ballots they had just finished recounting. Approximately 18% of the total ballots still need to be recounted and then Minnesota elections officials get to deal with all the ballots challenged by the candidates. Right now, the number of challenged ballots stands at nearly 4,000.
Hopefully, elections officials are going to pause things for a bit following work on Wednesday and let all these people eat some turkey, because pending the outcome of today’s meeting of the Minnesota Canvassing Board, things are about to get a lot worse.
At issue are thousands of absentee ballots that were rejected for a variety of reasons, many of which are likely to be found erroneous after further legal review. If the board decides to allow the absentee ballots to be counted, expect a firestorm of controversy of epic proportions. You’ll also be able to add the 2008 Minnesota U.S. Senate race to the list of elections full of unbelievable twists, legal battles and drama.
Millions of tax-payer dollars spent on elections, a months-long recount process, the likely upcoming court battles, and the potential for a seat from Minnesota to sit vacant in the U.S. Senate for months while this is all sorted out. All to end in, what is likely to continually be, a disputed outcome. Even if the recount returns results similar to those of Election Day, the U.S. Senate could throw another wrench in the works:
If the strategy of adding previously rejected ballots to the Minnesota Senate recount is successful, a final outcome could be months away. In 1975, the U.S. Senate refused to accept New Hampshire’s certification that Republican Louis Wyman had won by two votes. The seat was vacant for seven months, with the Senate debate spanning 100 hours and six unsuccessful attempts to break a filibuster and vote on who should be seated. The impasse ended only when a special election was agreed to, which was won by Democrat John Durkin.
Democracy is alive and well in our country…unless you count the whole voting thing.
No, Alaska is still NOT done counting the ballots. The good news is, however, Begich has won.
Begich leads Stevens by more than 3,700 votes, according to the Alaska secretary of state. Gail Fenumiai, the head of the state’s election division, said about 2,500 absentee votes from overseas and Alaska’s most remote regions remain to be counted.
The Democrat’s lead thus far — 47.8 percent to 46.6 percent — puts him beyond the margin of victory that would allow Stevens to call for a state-funded recount of the ballots.
I know Alaska is a big state and there are registered voters living in very remote areas where absentee ballots need to be flown in by plane. We’re now two weeks past Election Day, however. I’ll give them 4-5 days for bad weather, but 14 days? Come on. Multnomah County here in Portland, OR counted 366,498 in just two days…over 40,000 more than were cast in the entire state of Alaska.
So, unless Stevens pulls within 0.5% once the final 2,500 ballots are counted (by Christmas?), which would trigger an automatic recount, his 40 year career in the U.S. Senate is over. I know at least one blogger and two friends in Alaska who couldn’t be happier.
That leaves only Minnesota and Georgia left undecided.
In Minnesota, Republican Norm Coleman finished 206 votes ahead of Democratic challenger, Al Franken. A recount of the 2.9 million ballots cast began yesterday and should be completed by next week.
In Georgia, racist Republican incumbent, Saxby Chambliss, was up by 110,000 votes over Democrat Jim Martin. Chambliss’ numbers, however, did not reach more than 50% as required by state law, so there will be a “do over”…err, runoff…election held on December 2nd.
John Stewart covered the three remaining Senate races most excellently on The Daily Show yesterday:
Note to John: Dude, it’s pronounced “Wampa“, not “Wampass”. Um, now I’ve probably said too much.
By the way, by stating in the title of this post that the Democrats now have 58 seats, I’m including the two Independents who caucus with the Dems: Bernie Sanders of Vermont and piece of shit, back-stabbing, traitor-of-convenience, whining, sniveling, ass-faced Joe Lieberman of Connecticut.
While the shenanigans continue in Minnesota, the tiny country of Estonia is laughing their 
