This small soapbox rant is in no way an attack on the majority. Its sole purpose is to portray the situation as it exists in our state.
A lot of people like to talk about diversity. They like to assume that because they are intelligent; they can adequately account [...]
After a spirited contest which saw the Democrats pick up seats in the House, Senate and the White House (and after the corresponding 1 month break for recovery), it's finally time for this blog to get back to doing what it does best - arduously long pieces designed to inform.
Interestingly, the 111th Congress has yet to even begin and members of the GOP that are thought to be vulnerable are already reaching across party lines in hopes of solidfying their support in 2010. A good example of this is Ohio Senator George Voinovich who have seen his State [...]
First, for the good news -
As you know, Ben Nesselhuf easily defeated Jerad Higman in his re-election campaign, proving that District 17 is one of the finest and most progressive districts in all of South Dakota. Aside from that, we also picked up 4 house seats overall in the [...]
Well they haven't even started building it yet, but the Hyperion Group is protesting environmental regulations and wants to skirt the law. They do not want to put a device that would capture and eliminate hazardous vapors from the proposed refinery. Back when they wanted all the permits and it [...]
Congratulations to the Democratic party for one of the biggest and most well-organized political campaigns in memory.
That said, here are some things that have become obvious:
1) There was no wave
As far as down ticket races go, few Democrats drastically outperformed their expectations. Neither [...]
While every other nominee won their home state with a minimum of high 50% of the vote, McCain failed to get a majority of votes in the primary. He won the Arizona primary with 49% of the vote. At this point, it is a very realistic possibility that should he [...]
9:00 PM Central Time
Home Stretch – Iowa, Idaho, Utah, Nevada and Montana
G.W. Bush swept these states on his way to the presidency in 2004, but Barack Obama and Howard Dean’s 50 states strategy has paid heavy dividends in three of the 5 states. These [...]
Alabama (Bush by 26%) – McCain +22.2
Mississippi’s slightly more sensible sister state, Alabama is still expected to go heavily Republican this election cycle. One thing to keep an eye on, though, is the Democrat-controlled state house and senate. Alabama’s district maps may be completely different come [...]
7:30 PM Central Time
Snack Break
Arkansas (Bush by 9%) – McCain +11.1
For some god awful reason, Arkansas closes its polls at 7:30 while the nation is taking a break between the polls closing in the Mississippi River Valley region and the Midwest region.
7:00 PM Central Time The first big wave of poll closings will happen here as states as diverse as Texas, Maine and Eastern South Dakota will close their polls. A lot of interesting races to cover here and a lot of interesting trends
Pennsylvania (Kerry by 2%) [...]
6:30 PM Central Time
THE Ohio Poll Closes – Ohio, North Carolina, West Virginia
North Carolina (Bush by 12%) – Obama +1
North Carolina will be crucial this time around. Obama currently leads by a thin margin against McCain, but the very fact that he’s competitive speaks [...]
Introduction
For all of those who have no had a chance (READ: Is not nearly as nerdy) to keep up with the election, here is a quick and dirty guide to the election. First a few ground rules and general things to keep in mind.
Not all polls [...]
I am sure I am not the only one who did a double take when they first heard that taxes were apparently an agent of socialism and wealth distribution. Firstly, I guess it makes sense in a roundabout way, but I really wonder if anyone who uses "tax raises for [...]
The Economist - one of premier genuinely non-partisan news sources in Europe and one of the most well-respected publications in the Western world - has endorsed Barack Obama for President of the United States.
It's time
America should take a chance and make Barack [...]
This won't be long:
I really thought both sides did well. My thanks to Matt Hittle, who I haven't always been kind or respectful of, both Tims and Morgan for a well-reasoned defense of Republican policy. My thanks to all people who posed questions, even if yours weren't always [...]
With 11 days left until the election, most people are getting rather sick of the bombardment of information about the swing states. Factors not being mentioned are developments in non-swing states that still have important elections. For the next 11 days I will provide information about one state [...]
There are two things that stood out to me at the Nesselhuff-Higman debate tonight. The first, is that for all the talk of economic development, neither candidate could name a specific way in which they would help economic development, at least directly. The only one, in fact, that offered anything [...]
This current financial crisis has destroyed public confidence in the market, stratified sectors considered "main street" and "wall street" and set the American financial system on a path of nationalization and government involvement at levels previously thought impossible. Frequently undercovered in this time of great crisis, though, is the impacts [...]
According to this Argus Leader poll.
In this case, I'll let the circumstances speak for themselves.
[...]While I was far from the first to make such a claim, I would like to point out that this blog pointed out the possibility of a 60 seat supermajority in the US Senate (and also correctly identified 2 of the 3 unlikely states of Republican weakness - Georgia [...]
In case anyone missed it, the New Yorker magazine this week featured a fascinating article detailing the inner-workings of the McCain campaign and how they came to the selection of Sarah Palin.
The thoroughness of the campaign’s vetting process, overseen by the Washington lawyer and former White House counsel [...]
Previously, we discussed why ACORN and their unfortunate hiring practices and equally as unfortunate coincidence of circumstances did not constitute election fraud.
This, ladies and gentlemen, does constitute as voter fraud.
The choice cut:
An agreement announced today by Obama for America, the Republican National Committee, [...]
"The right answer is what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a muslim in this country?"
Amen and god bless.
Hey... Everyone remember that tonight is the free concert in Sioux Falls at the KOC Hall (312 N. Summit)
We all have hooks for hands, Body Electric, Oxford Comma, and Boys of the Queen Bee Mill are playing... so come join us for a while or stay the whole [...]
M.T.: You don't think the unregulated CDS market was a major factor in the current crisis? Were you watching when AIG almost went under? Were you watching the Lehman collapse?
B.Y.: I think that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were also major factors. And I believe that [...]
Recently, alot of the debate has focused on taxes - who will cut the taxes? Who will these tax cuts target?
The question of taxes is something that is odd to me - everyone seems to agree that they want it to be lower, but at the same [...]
The best part of the campaign season, for me, is the numerous ads that come along with it. So, to celebrate the end of the final debate, we present - The Best Ads (so far) of the 2008 Election cycle.
Best Use of Social Fears - Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi, [...]
As said by the extremely intelligent and well-spoken former ambassador to the United Nations, Richard Holbrooke. Everyone with even a remote interest in Foreign affairs should read this article.
"To make progress on this daunting agenda, the president must master and control a sprawling, unwieldy federal bureaucracy that [...]
It always amuses me when someone labels an organization "a radical leftist" group. You'd think that every organization to ever challenge the Republican party are filled with nothing but communists and assorted class warfare specialists. In the case of ACORN, this label is especially misplaced.
ACORN, much like organizations like [...]
Per Business Week.
Here’s a look at what Obama will propose:
1. JOB CREATION: A New American Jobs Tax Credit. Obama is calling for a temporary tax credit for firms that create new jobs in the United States over the next two years.
Furman [...]
As we all know, road construction has been a constant theme in and around Vermillion and Sioux Falls for the last few years. Now comes news that despite the near-constant construction occurring on the State Highway Systems - another 72 million will be needed to maintain its current levels [...]
As written by Chris Buckley, son of Willaim Buckley - the founder of modern conservatism.
McCain rose to power on his personality and biography. He was authentic. He spoke truth to power. He told the media they were “jerks” (a sure sign of authenticity, to say nothing of [...]
The economy is frequently an issue of confidence. Knowing that, here is a recent Economist poll of Economists about the nature of the economic plans of both candidates
Here's a nice summary image.
For you, it's the feeling of accomplishment and the knowledge that you keep the world clean for your progeny.
For the city of Sioux Falls, who sells methane from landfills to energy companies, it's about $184,000.
Best of all is this selection:
Sioux Falls should get [...]
First, a simple question - does anyone know what Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac actually did? We recently heard so much blame placed on this company that it might as well be powered by the tears of orphans. But really, do the majority of us know these companies did?
When a person keeps repeating a lie despite truths staring them in the face - This is foolishness.
When a person keeps citing one study when that study has been largely debunked - this is laziness.
When people focus on largely meaningless facts while ignoring the omnious sword [...]
This will be short and sweet because it'll be easy to disprove and most people already know about it. To complete the chain of errors that defined John McCain's foreign policy commentary last night, McCain treated the question of Iran as a question of Ahmadinejad. This is a short-sighted view. For the [...]
For someone who claims Foreign Policy as a major strength, Senator John McCain's understanding of the situation in Russia seems to be extremely lacking.
In last night's debate, Senator McCain repeatedly referred to the Russia-Georgia war as an act of Russian aggression fueled by Russia's lust for Georgian [...]
During the second presidential debates, John McCain made the curious and unbelievably wrong claim that somehow the gaffes of Barack Obama during the primary season led to a decline of public approval for America in Pakistan.
Here's the problem - approval of America was down from the very beginning [...]
Now that we've spent up to 850 billion dollars on the bailout package, the natural question is - "When will we see the benefits of this stimulus package?"
The answer, unfortunately, is probably not any time soon.
First, let's have another update on the composition and state [...]
Including Charlie Battery, based in my home town of Yankton.
It's quite easy to talk of victory and defeat when you're not a participant in the actual conflict so I will simply say this - the fact that we're still calling on National Guardsmen to fight in Iraq [...]
8:02 PM
It begins, Gwen Ifill remains the moderator.
8:03 PM
Joe Biden goes through the talking points on the bailouts. A lot of talk of main street, oversight, taxpayers benefit and of course, middle class.
8:06 PM
Once again, S. 190 was not [...]
Recently, the people at the Dakota War College parroted this opinion piece and tried to sell it as a great example that President Bush saw this crisis coming and it is obviously the Democrats who were to blame for the current state of the market.
As with [...]
Couple of items today
1. The Washington Post offers this timeline of the Bailout, the process and John McCain and Barack Obama's contributions to the process.
The choice cuts?
McCain listened, then, with Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.), he burst into the Senate Republican policy [...]
First, allow me to say that I loved this format. This 5 minutes of interchange between the two candidates was vastly more preferable than the 90 second rapid fire soundbytathon that defined 2004 and 2000 debates. This debate was actually a conversation filled with rebuttals and counterclaims. This is the [...]
