Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Mother Jones has the skinny on eleven of the worst places to try and vote in America, courtesy of Sasha Abramsky:

Just Try Voting Here: 11 of America's worst places to cast a ballot (or try)

I won't spoil the top ten for you. But here's what Sasha says about number eleven:

Please read the whole article.

CONFESSION: This piece was originally blogged with an incorrect heading which claimed "Ohio didn't even make the top ten" ... in fact Ohio claimed two of the top four spots. So that was a big FUMBLE! by your nearly frozen host, spotted by Lorraine Bieber. My apologies.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

I'm working on a few things but none of them will be ready to be posted soon.

So go ahead. Be the blog.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

According to usually reliable sources, Congressman Tom Feeney (R-FL) flexed enough muscle on Monday night to have his potential November opponent, Clint Curtis, evicted from what was supposed to be a public meeting.

The meeting, at the Republican Club of North Brevard, in Titusville, FL, featured Feeney as a speaker. Curtis was sitting quietly in the audience when Feeney noticed him there. At that point, according to our sources, Feeney immediately turned bright red and started whispering to some of the people near him.

One of those people raised a point of order and pointed out that there was a Democrat in the room. She said she wanted him to leave because this was a Republican meeting and she did not feel it was appropriate to have a Democrat in the audience.

The chair said that perhaps Democratic members of the audience would be converted to Republicans. When others objected to Curtis' presence at the meeting, the chair informed them that it was an open meeting and the rules required that Curtis be allowed to stay.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

The time has come for Mexican President Vincente Fox to deliver his State of the Nation speech, but he may not be able to reach the Congress!

The American media seem to have noticed this story all of a sudden --- because of the threat of large-scale violence?

Here's AP reporter Julie Watson at SFGate.com:
Protesters Threaten to Stop Fox Speech

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Word just in! Francine Busby will be on the radio with Peter B. Collins beginning at 8:15pm Eastern time. That's 7:15 Central, 6:15 Mountain and 5:15 Pacific, of course.

If you're in (or near) Monterey, Sacramento, Eureka or Phoenix, you can listen via broadcast radio.Otherwise your only option is a streaming webcast.

Either way, click here for more details.

UPDATE: A recording of Francine Busby's interview with Peter B. Collins is now available. Click here to download it (MP3).

We now have a transcript, courtesy of Emily Levy. That's below the fold.

We're also trying to get the audio for Busby's appearance on The Stacy Taylor Show on KLSD this morning, too. Will post it when/if we get it.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Today's New York Times has a front-page article called Ohio to Delay Destruction of Presidential Ballots, which starts like this:

The article gets around to mentioning the secretary of state in Columbus by name, but it never quite manages to point out that in addition to supervising the electoral process, Kenneth Blackwell co-chaired the Bush/Cheney '04 Ohio campaign.

Can the NYT spell "conflict of interest"?

More widespread irregularities than previously known? Yikes! We already knew so much!

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Monday's New York Times included a long article about the alleged "liquid bombing plot", which --- as you may recall --- was reportedly broken up by British authorities three weeks ago.

The article "claims to reveal new information", and would certainly have been of great interest to NYT readers in Great Britain.

But they couldn't read it!

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

According to Mike Malloy's website:

And now you know as much about this as I do.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Well, OK ... I'm not really a King ... but I would like to see another open thread!

{So... poof! He made it so. --99}

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Judge Yuri Hofmann of the California Superior Court is expected to rule this afternoon on the arguments presented Friday.

The plaintiffs in the CA50 Election Contest are asking for a manual count of ballots from the June 6th House special election, which was held to replace former Republican Congressman Randy "Duke" Cunningham, who resigned after being unable to contain the fallout from a major bribery scandal.

The defendants are arguing that California no longer has any jurisdiction over the election since the Republican U.S. House went ahead and swore in Brian Bilbray just 7 days after the election, with thousands of votes still uncounted, and certification still several weeks away...

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

I have three Katrina-related items for you, from the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Greg Palast, respectively.

NYT: Bush Cites Progress in Gulf Coast Visit

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

We have two news articles and some analysis from Mexico:

BBC: Mexico court rejects fraud claim

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Sewell Chan, writing in today's New York Times, explains that a "full-face" voting system is one which shows all the races --- and all the candidates for each race --- on a single page.

Chan quotes Lawrence D. Norden, an associate counsel at the NYU's Brennan Center for Justice, as saying that adopting the DREs with a full-face requirement...

His conclusion is based on research conducted by Dr. David C. Kimball, a political scientist and a co-author, along with Norden and two others, of a report which was to be released today by the Brennan Center.

The NYT has more details, for subscribers only. But according to the NYT website, subscribing is free and easy. So click here if you're interested in the details.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot

Today's Washington Post has an excellent piece by Dick Thornburgh (former Republican governor of Pennsylvania) and Richard Celeste (former Democratic governor of Ohio). I'll give you a short excerpt but I urge you to read the whole thing.

As I've been saying, there's more.

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot.
Research assistance by Agent99.

British authorities investigating the alleged "liquid bombing plot" released two more (suddenly former) suspects last Thursday, charged one person, bringing the total now charged to 12, and extended the custody limit for the remaining suspects who are still being held without charges.

One of the two people released Thursday (August 24) had previously been described as "a potentially important figure" in the alleged plot, since his brother is (or was) supposedly the ringleader.

Allo, London? We're getting mixed messages here!

But then again ... what else is new?