i know what i know
Here is your single's love horoscope
for Sunday, October 4:
Laundry, schmaundry -- don't waste the super stuff the stars are sending your way on routine. Errands will wait; the fun you could be having doing new things and impressing new people won't.
leave it to me to neglect an entire month of the year with respect to this journal and only find inspiration to write when spending almost an hour with the exsomeone strolling down memory lane. what has changed since my last post? i've gotten a new job to start at the end of this month, i've had some great nights out with friends and family, and i've started going to school again. politically? while i admire the politics of this administration in some respects -- finally, a hate crimes law; finally, bills moving on workplace discrimination; finally, serious talk about repealing 'don't ask, don't tell'; and maybe, just maybe, movement on doma either from the courts or the congress -- i still must say that their missteps -- the cabinet picks (although, getting judd gregg out early would make sense in retrospect), the idiocy of not stepping in the georgia special election, and not moving forward on a number of issues that could resolved pretty easily with the hefty majorities in both houses -- have put the entire agenda at risk. just think if the democrats had a sixty two seat majority in the senate or even a sixty one seat majority with one more new england republican to play ball. watching the house debate over the healthcare bill with that resonating and dramatic final vote -- where they captured one republican vote after all with joseph cao -- represented everything that makes this country great. does anyone remember how the house passed bills under tom delay? it involved trickery, bribery on the floor, and all of the shenanigans that we have too quickly forgotten. the republicans did not lose because of their ideas only, they lost because of their tactics. further, now that there's a republican in the house willing to stand up for healthcare -- and one in louisiana to provide cover to the senator from that selfsame state -- obama can continue to stand on the idea that he represents a new kind of politics. also, although i felt i lived in a time warp because of the two republican victories on last tuesday -- one in virginia where the silly primary voters voted against the OBVIOUS fighter terry mccaulliffe who could've beaten any republican with the right packaging and the other in new jersey where, no one seems to say, THERE WAS A THIRD PARTY CANDIDATE UPSETTING THE RANKS! -- would not have happened except for special circumstances. in new york, we saw the truth of the matter -- people with good sense choosing democrats. and then, the disappointment in maine. but how can you fight church money and church trucks? seriously, they can donate millions of dollars to make sure two men don't marry when twenty five thousand children die each day of hunger and preventable disease. i won't even go there. closer to home, my candidate, steve kornell, won his city council race and that really bouyed me although i haven't had the time to reflect on the importance of it.
what else? my car has come close to repossession, my apartment eviction, and every other utility and bill delinquent. in this time, i've decided to take on classes at eckerd college. i went out more during the month of october than i have since i lost my job -- a random night to the only bar in town one night where i saw the stock broker and died over how hot the stock broker has become which, of course, lead me to a full-on mistake online later feeling jilted; a night at hiro's and push with my sister early on, where i taught her how to get into bars with a fake, and hobnob with this community's african american professionals; a halloween party with my high school friend where i once again resolved to never go out with him again and looked like a fool in my costume wildly off theme -- and i've somehow acquired more STUFF -- dvd sets, books, magazines, shirts, pants, etc -- than i can afford. honestly, i don't know what's wrong with me. it's like i've gotten so unhappy that i just can't resist the quick rush of spending money even if its on late night delivery. which, i've started atkins again, so i've lost some weight.
also, with the prospect of a new job comes the prospect of good benefits the ability to continue my addiction with exclusive eyewear. i plan to make my glasses balance out the skinniness of my ties -- of which i'm ardently stalking two band of outsiders ties to add to my collection: one in black and one in green although i still have not a single shirt to wear with any -- i want the tom ford glasses featured in the ads except in brown and the oliver peoples like the ones i have in clear, just black. and what else? of course, there's been fashion week which stood as one of the best in years -- the whiffs of desperation crippled many houses -- but had stand outs like the chanel collection which did the let's-dress-up-and-play-poor thing better than almost anyone.
but of all the cultural influences currently running wild in this little mind of mine, the season finale of mad men -- and the episodes leading up to it -- have truly stirred more emotions in me than even my old favorite of brothers and sisters. it all started with "wee small hours" with the departure of sal, but it just kept building with these half steps, non-events, and off-screen action that made me hope just hope that sal comes back. it's the "far from heaven" principle. it's not just that his character needs to be there, but what he represents needs to be there, too, because of all of the progress made in the sixties.
Here is your single's love horoscope
for Thursday, November 5:
Your busy work schedule is getting in the way of your social life, and that's never a good thing. Reassess your daily and weekly to-do lists. Cross out any tasks that don't need to be tackled anytime soon. Be realistic in your deadlines. Reward yourself regularly.
http://www.elnuevodia.com/columna/650336/
Health care vote puts Rep. Anh 'Joseph' Cao in spotlight again
By Jonathan Tilove
November 10, 2009, 7:15AM
Though soft-spoken and diminutive, Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao, R-New Orleans, has a way of making waves.
anh_cao.JPGAlex Brandon/The Associated Press archiveRep. Anh 'Joseph' Cao of New Orleans was the only House Republican to vote for health insurance reform.
Coming out of nowhere to defeat nine-term incumbent Rep. William Jefferson last December, and becoming the first Vietnamese-American in Congress, Cao's success was hailed by national Republicans as a good omen. "The future is Cao,'" declared Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, the Republican Minority Leader in Congress.
With his Saturday night vote for health insurance reform, the only Republican to do so, Cao, less than a year into his first term, has etched his name once again into the history books.
Forget the future. Since late Saturday night, now is Cao, with a steady diet of national media appearances. Tuesday's interview schedule includes The Associated Press, USA Today, Greta Van Sustern, Rachel Maddow, CBS, Tavis Smiley, and maybe National Public Radio.
The vote was not entirely unexpected. Cao had indicated he wanted to support the landmark legislation - which he considers important for the many poor and uninsured in his district - if it was amended to guarantee that public funds would not be used to pay for abortions, which, shortly before final passage Saturday night, was just what happened.
But, Cao's singular vote in the waning minutes of the roll-call, caught the nation's attention, and, at least for the moment, has bollixed politics-as-usual in New Orleans and in Louisiana.
On Monday afternoon, the Louisiana Republican Party issued a statement reiterating its disdain for the health care bill and expressing disappointment with Cao for supporting it.
"From the very beginning the Republican Party of Louisiana has made clear that we do not support a massive government-run plan for nationalized insurance that will increase taxes, ration care and put a bureaucrat in charge of decisions being made by patients and their doctors," said state party spokesman Aaron Baer. "Rep. Cao is a man of integrity who always does what he perceives to be in the best interests of his district, but clearly we disagree with his decision and we're disappointed.''
But for Bryan Wagner, Cao's godfather in New Orleans' Republican politics who guided his long-shot candidacy, any disappointment with the vote on the part of Cao's GOP partisans in the city, is offset by continued "awe" for his conscientious and conscience-guided representation.
"When Joseph went up to Washington right after he was elected, he went to the Capitol Hill Club and all the people were cheering for him and he said, `I hope you are still cheering when I can't vote for you sometimes,' " said Wagner, who said no one from Cao's inner circle is second-guessing their support for him.
Wagner said that while Cao stuck with his party in opposition to Obama's stimulus plan and Democratic cap-and-trade legislation, this time he decided the bill on the whole was in the best interests of his constituents.
"Joseph said he couldn't vote for it unless the lives of the unborn were protected, and an amendment was drafted and passed and the person who was the biggest proponent of it was Joseph, and so a freshman Republican congressman has had more input into an important bill than any freshman congressman I've ever heard of,'' Wagner said.
Indeed, Archbishop Gregory M. Aymond of New Orleans, e-mailed Cao afterward to thank him for his efforts.
In the meantime, the Louisiana Democratic Party and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which never tire of finding reasons to bash Cao, were silent on his vote Monday, especially since their party's likely Senate candidate, Rep. Charlie Melancon, D-Napoleonville, voted "no'' along with the five other Republican members of the Louisiana congressional delegation.
Even as the House was voting Saturday night, state Rep. Cedric Richmond, who is seeking the Democratic nomination to challenge Cao, issued a statement condemning Cao for first voting for the Republican alternative health-care plan, and then voting to recommit the Democratic plan, before ultimately voting for the bill after "it had already received the two hundred and eighteen votes to secure a majority.''
But Americans United for Change, a leading pro-health reform advocacy organization, is taking a very different tack, and will be launching a new television ad today to thank Cao for his vote. They said they will spend about $35,000 on cable and broadcast ads in New Orleans.
Ultimately, the question is whether those who were pleased by Cao's apostasy, were sufficiently pleased to vote for him over a Democratic candidate whose consistently Democratic votes would make them even happier, and if those who were disappointed by his vote will forgive him next November.
To Norman Ornstein, a congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, who has been following Cao's progress, the vote made perfect sense, and required the gumption to stand up to his party's leadership, including Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., who slipped into a seat beside Cao on the House floor as the moment of truth approached.
"I really think they wanted to make it unanimous,'' said Ornstein of the Republican leadership. On the stimulus vote, he said, "they were wiling to have Cao fall on his grenade for the greater good of the party and they were wiling to do it again, but I think he decided he'd taken enough collateral damage for the stimulus vote and that was enough.'' Will this vote shorten the odds on his re-election? "Let's face it,'' said Ornstein, "whatever his vote in this case, and whatever his previous votes, it's a steep uphill climb to hold that seat."
Jonathan Tilove can be reached at jtilove@timespicayune.com or 202.383.7827 .
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City elects first openly gay council member
By Stephanie Hayes, Times Staff Writer
Published Tuesday, November 3, 2009
ST. PETERSBURG - The City Council will welcome one fresh face: Steve Kornell.
He earned more than enough votes to beat Angela Rouson in the race for the seat in District 5 Tuesday. Incumbents swept the city's other four council races.
When he takes office Jan. 2, Kornell will become the first openly gay person to hold office on the St. Petersburg City Council.
Kornell, a Pinellas County schools social worker, received 59.5 percent. Rouson, a mother of five, former marketing professional and wife of state Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg, received 40.5 percent.
Kornell has an extensive background working with city recreation centers, running Childs Park and Shore Acres. He wrote a grant that still brings in millions for teen programs. He hopes to help prevent crime and increase youth activities and jobs. He advocates using Penny for Pinellas money to put solar panels on city buildings.
Here's how others played out:
In District 2, the closest match, Jim Kennedy, 52, earned 55.7 percent, beating newcomer Stephen J. "Steve" Corsetti, 65, who earned 44.3 percent. In District 4, Leslie Curran, 53, captured 71.9 percent to beat Pamella Settlegoode, 60, who earned 28 percent. In District 6, Karl Nurse, 55, earned 73.8 percent to retain his council seat, beating Vel Thompson, 51, who earned 26.2 percent. In District 8, incumbent Jeff Danner, 49, received 72.2 percent, beating Leonard Schmiege, 40, who received 27.8 percent.
Stephanie Hayes can be reached at shayes@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8857.
© 2009 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 \
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November 4, 2009
Conservative Loses Upstate House Race in Blow to Right
By JEREMY W. PETERS
SARANAC LAKE, N.Y. - Democrats won a special election in New York State’s northernmost Congressional district Tuesday, a setback for national conservatives who heavily promoted a third candidate in what became an intense debate over the direction of the Republican Party.
With 89 percent of precincts reporting, the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, led with 49 percent of the vote, while the Conservative Party candidate, Douglas L. Hoffman, had 46 percent, a margin of about 4,300 votes.
Mr. Hoffman spoke to a deflated crowd of about 50 in a hotel ballroom here soon after midnight on Wednesday and said he had called Mr. Owens to concede.
“Thank you to every single person out there that joined my team and fought back for America,” Mr. Hoffman said. “This one was worth the fight. And it’s only one fight in the battle, and we have to keep fighting.”
The district has been a Republican stronghold for generations, and the party has represented parts of it since the 19th century.
The battle became one of the most closely followed races in the nation, drawing in some of the biggest forces in politics in both parties. Republicans who viewed the race as a test of the party’s most deeply held conservative principles - including Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska; Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, a presidential hopeful; and grass-roots groups that have forcefully opposed Democratic economic and health care policies - rallied behind Mr. Hoffman.
The finger pointing among Republicans started on Wednesday morning. Some conservatives were blaming the Republican Party for the loss, saying that if they had supported a more conservative candidate all along, the seat could have been won.
“I think Doug Hoffman likely would have won if he had been the Republican candidate from the get-go,” said Mike Huckabee, the former Republican presidential contender. “It wasn’t a spike in the end zone for the Democrats. They got that seat not because Democrats were brilliant, but because Republicans were stupid.”
Many conservatives attempted to frame Mr. Hoffman’s defeat as a victory, saying that despite Mr. Hoffman’s loss, conservatives prevailed because the moderate Republican candidate, Dede Scozzafava, was forced out of the race.
“Our number one goal was to make clear that the Republican Party cannot take someone as liberal as Dede Scozzafava and thrust her out on the voters and expect the voters just to accept it,” said Brian Brown, executive director of the National Organization for Marriage, which worked to defeat Ms. Scozzafava, the Republican candidate who faced a challenge from Mr. Hoffman.
Democrats had thrown muscle behind the race as well, eager to avoid a potentially embarrassing defeat as President Obama’s approval ratings have softened and efforts to portray them as the party of big government and deficit spending appear to be sticking. A win in the Republican-leaning 23rd Congressional District would provide Democrats with a welcome boost, while a loss would reinforce the notion that the party is struggling.
The seat became vacant after President Obama appointed its long-serving Republican congressman, John M. McHugh, as secretary of the Army.
Leading conservative voices - including The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page and The Weekly Standard and the talk show personalities Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck - took on the Republican nominee, Assemblywoman Scozzafava, who supports gay rights and abortion rights and had embraced some Democratic economic policies like the federal stimulus package. They labeled her as too liberal.
The attacks on Ms. Scozzafava eventually took their toll, and she stunned her party over the weekend first by withdrawing from the race and then by urging her supporters to vote for Mr. Owens, a 60-year-old lawyer from Plattsburgh.
But the ballots had already been printed, and early results showed her picking up 6 percent of the vote. It was unclear how many of those were protest votes, and how many simply did not know she had left the race.
The White House became closely involved in the efforts to boost Mr. Owens’s candidacy in the final days of the campaign. They orchestrated an effort that persuaded Ms. Scozzafava to endorse Mr. Owens. Vice President Joseph R. Biden rolled through the district on Monday to support Mr. Owens.
But the race was perhaps most notable for the fissures it opened in the Republican Party. Ms. Scozzafava, who was selected as the Republican nominee by the 11 leaders of the county committees that comprise this vast district along the Canadian border, was excoriated by Washington’s conservative establishment almost as soon as she was nominated.
Ms. Scozzafava united social and fiscal conservatives from across the country firmly behind Mr. Hoffman, a previously unknown 59-year-old accountant from Lake Placid - which is not in the district.
The Club for Growth, a group that promotes limited government and lower taxes, spent about $1 million promoting Mr. Hoffman. Social conservative organizations like the Susan B. Anthony List, which opposes abortion, and the National Organization for Marriage, which fights same-sex marriage laws, joined forces in support of Mr. Hoffman. They printed literature, made phone calls and flooded the district with volunteers from across the country.
“This is probably the most amazing coalition-building I’ve seen in a long time - probably decades,” said Marilyn Musgrave, a former Republican congresswoman from Colorado who now works with the Susan B. Anthony List and came to New York to campaign for Mr. Hoffman.
On Tuesday morning, Ms. Musgrave stood in frigid weather for several hours outside a state office building in downtown Watertown with a group of home-schooled students passing out blue fliers that read, “Doug Hoffman shares our values!”
Ms. Musgrave said the overwhelming conservative embrace of Mr. Hoffman would show leaders in Washington that political bases should not be taken for granted. “Don’t just assume we’re yours.”
Joe Lo Templio reported from Plattsburgh.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
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11/4/09 | 881 comments
video and Poll
Gay marriage repealed in Maine
Yes on 1 claims victory, repeal opponents 'will regroup'
By Kevin Miller and Judy Harrison
BDN Staff
PORTLAND, Maine - Voters on Tuesday repealed the state’s same sex marriage law after an emotionally charged campaign that drew large numbers to the polls and focused national attention on Maine.
With 87 percent of precincts reporting, the campaign to overturn Maine’s same-sex marriage law won with 53 percent of the vote vs. 47 percent opposed to Question 1, according to unofficial results compiled by the Bangor Daily News.
Gay-marriage opponents claimed victory shortly after 12:30 a.m. Wednesday.
“Question 1 has passed,” Frank Schubert, campaign manager of Stand for Marriage Maine, announced in Portland. “It has all come together tonight and the institution of marriage has been preserved.”
About 40 people who worked on the Yes on 1 campaign cheered as they heard the announcement by computer hookup at Jeff’s Catering in Brewer.
“We went up against tremendous odds,” Marc Mutty, public affairs director for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland who has been on loan to the campaign, said from Portland. “We all know we were the little guy going up against the big guy, but we prevailed. We prevailed because the people of Maine - the silent majority - the folks back home spoke with their votes.
“What they had to say,” Mutty continued, “is marriage matters because it’s between a man and a woman. [This campaign] has never been about hating gays, but about preserving marriage and only about preserving marriage, and that’s what we did tonight.”
The defenders of Maine’s gay marriage law - which passed the Legislature in the spring but was never allowed to take effect - acknowledged being behind, but held out hope for a bump as the final votes and absentee ballots were counted.
In a defiant speech to several hundred lingering supporters, No on 1 campaign manager Jesse Connolly pledged that his side “will not quit until we know where every single one of these votes lives.”
“We’re not short-timers; we are here for the long haul,” Connolly told the crowd, some of whom wiped away tears as he spoke. “Whether it’s just all night and into the morning, or next week or next month or next year, we will be here. We’ll be fighting, we’ll be working. We will regroup.”
The Yes on 1 campaign, led by the group Stand for Marriage Maine, built its lead by winning votes in rural Maine as well as in some larger towns such as the Roman Catholic and Franco-American stronghold of Lewiston.
In contrast, the effort to defend Maine’s gay marriage law won strong support in places such as Portland, where 73 percent voted against Question 1, and majority support in Bangor.
Throughout the campaign leading up to Tuesday’s closely watched election, both sides had said that turnout would be key. State election officials estimated earlier Tuesday that turnout likely would top 50 percent.
But while gay marriage supporters hoped the high voter interest would provide a boost, it was not enough to make Maine the first state in the nation where gay marriage won at the polls rather than in the legislature or courts.
Despite the outcome, Mary Bonauto, a No on 1 executive board member and attorney with Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, said she was never more proud to live in Maine and raise a family with her long-term partner. She was especially proud of the attention the No on 1 campaign brought to the values shared by all families, regardless of sexual orientation.
“I look around at the 8,000 volunteers, and the vast majority are not gay people,” Bonauto said. “So that gives me hope that, regardless of the outcome, that this discussion has changed the state.”
At the No on 1 election-watch party, what began as an exuberant crowd of more than 1,000 began to steadily dwindle as the Yes campaign’s lead held steady. By 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, a few hundred die-hard gay marriage supporters still remained in the ballroom as Connolly spoke, but the disappointment was palpable.
With relatively few high-profile elections around the country, the national media spotlight is on Maine. Had Question 1 been defeated, Maine would have become the first state in the nation where same-sex marriage was legalized at the ballot box.
Secretary of State Matt Dunlap, after witnessing activity at several polling stations and hearing from clerks around the state, said he believed at least 50 percent of voters may have cast ballots in the off-year election dominated by the gay marriage issue.
“What I have seen around the state has been steady to very busy turnout all day,” Dunlap said.
The lead-up to Tuesday’s historic election began back in April when more than 3,000 people crammed into the Augusta Civic Center for a public hearing on the bill.
Lawmakers sat through more than 10 hours of impassioned, sometimes tearful testimony from longtime gay and lesbian partners as well as children of same-sex couples. The bill’s opponents were equally passionate, often citing religious objections to redefining marriage from the traditional one-man, one-woman union.
Several weeks later, both chambers of the Legislature signed off on the bill, LD 1020, and sent it with some trepidation to Gov. John Baldacci, who had been on record previously as favoring civil unions and domestic partnerships over same-sex marriages.
But Baldacci immediately signed the bill, making Maine the fifth state in the nation to grant gay and lesbian couples marriage rights.
“When history shines a spotlight on you, you have an opportunity to advance the cause or to let the cause slip backwards. I chose to move things forward,” Baldacci said recently.
Even before Baldacci had put his pen to the bill, however, opponents announced the petition drive to gather enough signatures to trigger a “people’s veto” referendum. They easily surpassed the 55,000-plus required signatures.
In the months since, the two campaigns have spent more than $6.5 million on the campaigns, with money flowing into their coffers from organizations and individuals from outside of Maine.
Although the campaign is over, the Rev. Bob Emrich of Palmyra said that the work of traditional marriage supporters was not.
“This doesn’t mean it’s the end of our work,” he said. “We must begin building bridges and we may have to mend fences. People on the other side were doing what they believed in, too.
“God has given us this victory,” Emrich continued, “and it is very important for us to recognize that he is the one who put the energy into this campaign. So let’s not be so arrogant to forget this. It’s very appropriate to pause for a moment of prayer.”
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GOP reclaims Virginia
McDONNELL CRUISES IN GOVERNOR'S RACE
Messages on taxes, jobs resonate with voters
By Rosalind S. Helderman and Anita Kumar
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Virginians elected Republican Robert F. McDonnell the commonwealth's 71st governor Tuesday, sweeping the GOP to power and emphatically halting a decade of Democratic advances in the critical swing state.
The exclamation point on the former state attorney general's trouncing of Democratic state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds was a victory in Fairfax County, the state's most populous jurisdiction, which had delivered powerful Democratic majorities to President Obama and Govs. Timothy M. Kaine and Mark Warner. McDonnell also reversed the political order in the Washington region's outer suburbs, winning Loudoun and Prince William counties, which went for Kaine four years ago.
Boosted by a political mood shift that has left many voters cool to Democrats, McDonnell, 55, prevailed with a promise to create jobs in the down economy and fix the state's clogged roads without a tax increase. His campaign avoided the hot-button social issues that in recent elections had alienated voters in Northern Virginia and other urban centers. And he benefited from a lackluster Democratic opponent whom voters came to know in good part from a video clip in which he waffled and stammered when asked if he would raise taxes.
As Republicans swept all statewide offices for the first time in 12 years, joyful activists tossed beach balls at a Richmond hotel as party leaders pronounced a new era of low taxes. "We're back," said former Fairfax County congressman Tom Davis. "The state has moved back toward the center."
Republicans expanded their majority in the House of Delegates by at least four seats. Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling easily won reelection, and Fairfax Sen. Ken Cuccinelli II, one of the most socially conservative members of the Richmond legislature, will be the next attorney general.
McDonnell dominated among independent voters, while Deeds, 51, failed to re-create the coalition that last year helped Barack Obama become the first Democratic presidential candidate to capture Virginia in more than four decades. With turnout in a governor's race slumping below 40 percent for the first time in at least 40 years, Deeds fell well short of the margins Obama, Kaine and Warner amassed among black voters, young people and Northern Virginians. McDonnell won by a particularly wide margin in rural areas, which the Democrat had labeled "Deeds Country," hoping to outperform his Democratic predecessors from his base in the Shenandoah Valley's Bath County.
In the campaign's final days, Deeds made an explicit appeal to Obama voters that a vote for him was a vote in support of the president. But earlier, he had distanced himself from Obama's agenda, especially on health and energy policy.
Inheriting many problems
The three Republicans inherit a government burdened by a severe budget crisis and a transportation network so underfunded that Virginia will soon lack the matching funds necessary to secure U.S. dollars for road construction. For Republicans to build beyond Tuesday's improved showing in Northern Virginia, McDonnell will have to prove that unlike past GOP administrations, he will deliver more resources to Virginia's most populous and affluent region.
At the Richmond Marriott, Republicans who have spent years watching Democrats win election after election roared with excitement as media outlets called the race for McDonnell about 8 p.m. "My promise to you as governor," McDonnell said, "is to strengthen the free-enterprise system, to create more jobs and opportunity so that every Virginian can use their God-given talents to pursue the American dream and liberty here in this great commonwealth."
The magnitude of the GOP sweep had many party leaders recalling the 1993 vote, which also followed the election of a Democratic president. That year, George Allen was elected governor, the leading edge of the Republican revolution that culminated in the party regaining control of Congress a year later. Republicans said Tuesday's wins restored Virginia to its natural political condition, arguing that recent Democratic victories reflectedwidespread anger at former President George W. Bush and the personal popularity of Obama and Warner.
"It's a Republican state. It has been, is now and will be," said Pat Mullins, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia.
Democrats blamed their loss on the natural swing of the political pendulum and said demographic changes will help the party's fortunes over time. "I've been around a long time, and I know that there are cycles in politics like there are in anything in life," said Democratic Party Chairman Richard Cranwell.
Deeds called McDonnell to concede shortly before 9 p.m. "Just because we didn't get the right result tonight doesn't mean we get to go home and whine," Deeds told supporters. "We still have fight, we still have spirit."
Thesis attack fails
From the start, McDonnell had history on his side: Since 1977, no party that has won the White House has gone on to capture Virginia's governorship the next year.
McDonnell's campaign -- supported, like Deeds's, with millions of dollars from his national party -- was on the defensive for only a few weeks, starting with the publication in August of a Washington Post report detailing a master's degree thesis the candidate wrote in 1989 at what is now Regent University in Virginia Beach. In the thesis, written at the Christian-oriented school founded by televangelist Pat Robertson, McDonnell, then 34, outlined an action plan for strengthening the traditional family and wrote that working women were detrimental to the family.
Deeds seized on the thesis, making it the centerpiece of an advertising campaign designed to convince voters that McDonnell was a right-wing extremist who had undergone a disingenuous campaign-year makeover.
The strategy appeared to work for a time, as polls tightened. But McDonnell fought back with a series of TV spots featuring supportive testimonials from his daughter, an Army veteran who served in Iraq, and a gallery of professional women who had worked for him in the attorney general's office. Increasingly, voters said they saw Deeds's campaign as a largely negative one that failed to define his own vision for the state.
McDonnell campaigned on his opposition to federal policies. He criticized the Democratic-led effort to change the nation's health care system and sided with southwest Virginians who believe that proposed federal legislation designed to curb greenhouse gases would cost jobs in the coalfields of that region.
The Republican also relentlessly attacked Deeds over the Democrat's willingness to raise taxes for transportation improvements. A key turning point in the campaign came in September, when Deeds was caught on camera flailing when swarmed by reporters asking whether he would raise taxes to pay for road improvements.
The moment, immediately cut into TV ads aired repeatedly by McDonnell and the Republican Governors Association, highlighted Deeds's stammering speaking style, caught him snapping at a reporter and made him appear indecisive on the critical issues of taxes and transportation.
"I think taxes are high enough," said James Thomas, a 39-year-old accountant who cast his ballot for McDonnell at Clarendon United Methodist Church in Arlington County.
Born in Philadelphia, McDonnell grew up in Fairfax County and played football for Bishop Ireton High School before attending Notre Dame and marrying a Washington Redskins cheerleader. He pointed to his Northern Virginia childhood frequently in a disciplined effort to convince suburbanites he understood their concerns better than Deeds.
"I think McDonnell is better qualified, and he has ideas," said Debbie Zolp, 51, of Dumfries, who cast her ballot for the Republican after voting for Obama last November and Kaine four years ago. "It doesn't seem like Deeds has a plan."
McDonnell carefully avoided alienating independents or angering Democrats, taking care at nearly every appearance to praise Obama, especially for championing charter schools and promoting fatherhood.
Avoiding divisive issues
Although known for a social conservatism deeply informed by his religious faith during his 14 years as a Virginia Beach delegate, during the campaign McDonnell studiously avoided controversial such social issues as abortion, immigration and gun rights, largely neutralizing Democrats' effort to portray him as an extremist with a stealth agenda.
"He's a breed of Republican candidate I've been hoping and looking for that translates Republican values into everyday reality,'' said Michael Steele, Republican National Committee chair. "Bob talks about what people want to know."
Deeds struggled to connect with the Democratic base, at times distancing himself from Obama. Former governor L. Douglas Wilder, a fellow Democrat and the nation's first elected black governor, declined to endorse him, and prominent black businesswoman Sheila Johnson, a Democrat, supported his opponent, even making a TV ad for McDonnell.
Deeds battled McDonnell to within 360 votes in a race for attorney general in 2005.
McDonnell outspent Deeds considerably, receiving unprecedented support from outside groups -- $9 million from the Republican National Committee as well as significant direct TV buys on his behalf from the Republican Governors Association, the National Rifle Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
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Newark Live, Politics, Statehouse »
Republican Chris Christie ousts Jon Corzine in N.J. governor's race
By Star-Ledger Staff
November 04, 2009, 12:14AM
chris-christie-nj-governor-final-win.JPGAndrew Mills/THE STAR-LEDGERChris Christie pumps his fist with the state's first Lt. Governor, Kim Guadagno, together on stage as he celebrates his win over Jon Corzine to become the 55th Governor of New Jersey.Republican Chris Christie, a corporate lawyer turned crusading federal prosecutor, was elected New Jersey’s 55th governor last night, ousting Jon Corzine, an unpopular but well-funded incumbent, in a race viewed as an early referendum on President Obama.
It was the first time a Republican won a statewide election in New Jersey since Gov. Christie Whitman was re-elected by a narrow margin in 1997. Corzine became the first incumbent to lose an election since Jim Florio in 1993.
With 99 percent of the state’s voting precincts reporting, Christie took 49 percent compared with Corzine’s 44.5 percent, even though late public opinion polls showed the race too close to call. Independent Chris Daggett, who reached 20 percent from voters in one recent poll, came in with only 5.7 percent.
Vote totals show voter turnout was a record low for a New Jersey governor’s race. The race also marked the introduction of the post of lieutenant governor and Christie’s running mate, Monmouth County Sheriff Kim Guadagno, will become the first person to hold that title.
COMPLETE ELECTION COVERAGE
Democrats, meanwhile, will continue to control both houses of the Legislature following Assembly elections last night.
Christie received Corzine’s concession call at about 10:45 as he waited with friends and family in his suite at the Parsippany Hilton. Downstairs in the ballroom, the crowd was already rejoicing.
Christie arrived on stage about 11:20 as his Bruce Springsteen’s "Born to Run" played on the speakers.
"Tomorrow begins the task of fixing our broken state," Christie told the crowd. "The campaign we just went through will seem easy compared to the tasks that lie ahead of us to fix our state. We know the challenges we face, and over the next four years we’re going to have our work cut out for us. There are no easy answers to these difficult problems."
At Corzine’s party in East Brunswick, supporters left early, talking in whispers.
"A few minutes ago I called Mr. Christie and congratulated him on becoming New Jersey’s next governor," Corzine announced. "I want you to know that Chris was gracious in his response, and we will work hard together to make sure the transition is smooth, that we are able to do everything that serves the people of this great state."
Corzine, 62, became governor in 2006 after less than one term in the U.S. Senate and a long career at Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs, where he rose through the ranks to become chief executive.
For his part, Daggett told supporters they need to rally behind Christie "with all the energy that we had in this campaign." He said the winner deserves "the support of every one of us in New Jersey because the problems that face this state are significant."
Christie, 47, once had a near-prohibitive lead in polls, only to watch the race tighten in recent weeks as Corzine barraged him with TV ads, criticizing him for everything from ethical lapses to his health insurance plans.
The race became a dead heat and Corzine even took the lead in some polls. But Christie, thanks to a strong voter-turnout program in key GOP counties, carried the momentum into an Election Day victory in one of the most solidly Democratic states in the country. The Republican even won highly Democratic Middlesex County.
Exit polls, meanwhile, said Christie won independent voters two-to-one.
After complaining that Corzine was a "failure" who never could get costs under control or rein in state government, Christie now takes over amid estimates that next year’s financial shortfall is hovering around $8 billion, more than a quarter of the total state budget.
"Starting tomorrow, we’re going to pick Trenton up and we’re going to turn it upside down," the governor-elect said.
He also called for bipartisanship.
"No matter whose idea it is, if it’s a good one, if it’s a good one, Kim and I will figure out how to get it done," Christie said. "So now to all of those pundits out there, to all of those experts on politics: I beg you, let’s turn the page, let’s put the petty politics of the past behind us and let’s start a new era of hope and optimism in New Jersey."
Christie also called last night’s resounding victory a repudiation of attack politics.
"Through their overwhelming support tonight, the people of New Jersey said, ‘No more negative personal campaigns,’" he said. "In the face of a $30 million onslaught that consisted of almost exclusively negative personal campaign against me my family and my friends the people of New Jersey decided enough is enough."
Christie has said his governing philosophy would be simple: Only essential programs would be funded and he would take a hard line with unions in order to keep government costs in check.
Perceived to be the GOP’s best - maybe only - chance of taking back the governor’s mansion after eight years, Christie faced a surprisingly strong primary challenge from conservative activist Steve Lonegan.
In the run-up to Election Day, Corzine made a last-minute appeal to voters for support him - not so much because of his work but because of their belief in Obama and the Democratic Party that controls Washington.
Obama headlined four rallies in New Jersey in the last two weeks, including Sunday events in Newark and Camden. Corzine was also joined by Vice President Joe Biden, former president Bill Clinton, Caroline and Patrick Kennedy and their cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and former New York governor Mario Cuomo.
The rallies were high-energy events but did not mobilize enough voters to offset strong turnout in critical GOP counties like Ocean, Morris and Monmouth.
The Democratic emphasis on New Jersey grew even more heightened in recent weeks after it became clear Virginia - the only other state with a gubernatorial race this year - would see its governorship shift from Democrat to Republican.
For weeks, the White House has been minimizing the potential impact of the Garden State election even as Obama seemed to take up residence somewhere along the Turnpike.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said he did not want to analyze the New Jersey election but reiterated Obama’s support for the embattled governor.
"I’ll let people look into their crystal balls and figure out what all this stuff means for the future," Gibbs said during his daily briefing.
Christie’s first task will be to name a transition team, to be headed by GOP lawyer Bill Palatucci and former state Attorney General David Samson, who served under Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey. Their job will include everything from planning a January inauguration to hiring key staff and Cabinet members to budget-making in preparation for the introduction of the next budget, likely to be in March.
By Claire Heininger and Josh Margolin/Statehouse Bureau
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Bryan Batt talks about Sal Romano's firing from Sterling Cooper on 'Mad Men'
By Dave Walker
October 12, 2009, 12:00PM
Thanks to the 1963 calendar it’s been retracing this season, the AMC drama “Mad Men” has been dense with impending peril.
bryanbattsalromano.jpgCarin Baer/AMCBryan Batt as Sal Romano. For the characters, who face cultural shifts that will upend their professional lives, and for the country, which is headed for Dallas on November 22.
Sunday’s (October 11) episode, titled “Wee Small Hours,” was another gem - and a heart-stopping, heart-breaking hour for fans of New Orleans native Bryan Batt, who plays Cooper Sterling art director Sal Romano, a closeted gay man.
While editing film for an important client, Romano spurns the man’s romantic advances.
“I’m married,” says Romano.
“So am I,” says the client.
“There’s been a misunderstanding,” says Sal.
“I know what I know,” says the client.
The scene ends, but the client later demands that Sal be fired.
His cigarette-company account is big enough that Roger Sterling (John Slattery) does so without hesitation.
Sal’s appeal to Dan Draper (Jon Hamm) fails.
Sal is out, though still not “out” with his wife.
Reached by phone in New York City on Monday (October 12) morning, Batt said he was home in New Orleans when “Mad Men” creator Matthew Weiner called to tell him his character’s storyline for the episode.
“My first reaction was, ‘Oh my God,’” said Batt, who will appear on HLN’s “The Joy Behar Show” tonight at 8. “When I first read the script, I was amazed. It was a humdinger.”
Batt shot the emotionally wrenching spurned-seduction scene on the day of “Mad Men’s” Los Angeles season-premiere screening, which he attended with his mother.
“I finished that scene, and put on the suit in the car on the way to the premiere,” he said.
Sal’s fate beyond Sunday night wasn’t open for discussion during our call - shooting on the current “Mad Men” season has wrapped; four episodes remain to air -- but fans of the show are packing blog comments sections with speculation about both that character’s future as well as Draper’s ugly handling of the situation.
“The one thing I did think … it’s a real slap at Don Draper, the character,” Batt said. “It really doesn’t paint him so well. A lot of people are not so happy with Don.
“They were OK with the philandering, but firing the innocent Sal? No.
“Sal did everything by the book. He played the game as well as he possibly could. He’s completely innocent in this. He did the right thing and he was thrown under the bus.”
Here is a longer Q&A with Batt on the “Mad Men” fan site Basket of Kisses, and, speaking of blogs, here’s what three critics who deconstruct “Mad Men” episodes had to say about Sal’s time in “Wee Small Hours:”
“And my god... Bryan Batt... what can you say about the guy after an episode like this?” wrote Alan Sepinwall, the TV critic for the New Jersey Star-Ledger newspaper in his What’s Alan Watching? blog. “Salvatore episodes tend to be rare, and therefore a treat when they come up. Here's a character who started out as obvious (some would say too obvious) comic relief and has become one of the show's great tragic figures. Everyone on ‘Mad Men’ suffers in some way (except maybe Ken Cosgrove), but Sal's burden is especially great, and Batt rises to the occasion every time he's called to show that burden with almost no dialogue. Sal dare not speak his problem's name, so Batt has to internalize most of it, play it with the eyes and body language, and the look on his face when Don turns out to be another villain, not a savior, is just devastating.”
Of Batt, Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune wrote on her blog The Watcher: “Wow. Another moving, top-notch performance.”
Wrote Tim Goodman, critic for the San Francisco Chronicle, on his blog The Bastard Machine:
“Poor Sal. It's not like he wants the moon...”
© 2009 NOLA.com. All rights reserved.
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La. judge done after flap over interracial wedding
By MELINDA DESLATTE, Associated Press Writer Melinda Deslatte, Associated Press Writer Wed Nov 4, 7:44 am ET
BATON ROUGE, La. - At least four times in the last 2 1/2 years, Keith Bardwell says he refused to marry interracial couples while serving as a Louisiana justice of the peace.
He said from his experience and discussions, he had concluded that blacks and whites do not readily accept offspring of such relationships, so the children end up suffering.
His latest rebuff to a bride and groom of different races turned out to be his last. After weeks of calls for his ouster, Bardwell resigned after 34 years in office Tuesday, leaving his reasons a secret.
His one-sentence statement to Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne said: "I do hereby resign the office of Justice of the Peace for the Eighth Ward of Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana, effective November 3, 2009."
Beth Humphrey, who is white, has said she and her now-husband, Terence McKay, who is black, received their marriage license from the parish clerk of court, where they also got a list of people qualified to perform the ceremony. When she called Bardwell's office on Oct. 6 to ask, Humphrey said the justice's wife told her that Bardwell wouldn't sign the license because they were a "mixed couple."
In interviews, Bardwell, who is white, said he refers interracial couples to other justices of the peace, who then perform the ceremony, which happened in this case.
"There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage," Bardwell said in an October interview with The Associated Press. "I think those children suffer, and I won't help put them through it."
Bardwell didn't return repeated calls to comment about his resignation. Civil rights leaders and officials, including Gov. Bobby Jindal and U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, wanted him out.
Jindal said Bardwell made the right decision.
"What he did was clearly wrong and this resignation was long overdue," the governor said in a statement.
Humphrey and McKay have filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Bardwell and his wife.
Their attorney, Laura Catlett, said the resignation won't stop the lawsuit.
"We're saddened that it took national attention to this issue, which was decided back in 1967 by the Supreme Court, and also that it took public admonishment from other elected leaders in order for him to resign," Catlett said.
His quitting "does not in any way change the fact that he, with his wife's help, discriminated against an interracial couple while he was a public official," Catlett said.
Bardwell was elected in 1975 in Ponchatoula, La., a town 55 miles north of New Orleans. His term was set to run through 2014, and he had said that even before the flap, he hadn't intended to run for re-election.
Landrieu said Bardwell's refusal to marry the couple reflected terribly on the state.
"By resigning ... and ending his embarrassing tenure in office, Justice Bardwell has finally consented to the will of the vast majority of Louisiana citizens and nearly every governmental official in Louisiana ... We are better off without him in public service."
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
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MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact:
Cindi Creager/GLAAD
(646) 871-8019
creager@glaad.org
STATEMENT BY THE NATIONAL BLACK JUSTICE COALITION
ON THE DENIAL OF MARRIAGE
TO AN INTERRACIAL LOUISIANA COUPLE
WASHINGTON, D.C., FRIDAY, OCT. 16, 2009 -- The following statement may be attributed to Sharon J. Lettman, Executive Director, National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC):
“It is hard to believe that a Louisiana state official could simply refuse to follow the law of the land as set forth in Loving v. Virginia. The status of this person as a justice of the peace is something that needs to be revoked.
“Time and again we have seen public officials discriminate against loving, committed couples and claim that their discrimination is really motivated by concern for children. That justification is wrong when it’s used to deny marriage to a couple on the basis of their race. It’s wrong when it’s used to prevent committed gay and lesbian couples from being able to marry. And it’s our responsibility to speak out against it, whenever it happens.
“Every child who is a minority faces discrimination, exclusion and oppression at some point in their lives. It is actions like those of this state official - refusing to marry a loving couple because of personal prejudice - that perpetuate the discrimination and racism that continue to pervade our culture.
“There is also the fact that this state official is just plain wrong. There are countless children of interracial parents who grew up to embody the strength of our families: President Barack Obama, Tiger Woods, Soledad O’Brien. And parents themselves -- like Seal and Heidi Klum, former Defense Secretary William Cohen and journalist Janet Langhart. And the lists go on and on, with millions of successful families who have thrived in the face of prejudice directed at their parents and their children.
“The story of Connecticut state Rep. Jason Bartlett, also deputy director of the National Black Justice Coalition, illustrates this truth. When he grew up, his mother told him that he might not be accepted by some who are white, and might not be accepted by some who are black, because of his mixed heritage. But he learned through understanding who you are in the knowledge of your family’s love, that he could overcome those obstacles.
“It is that very love of a family that helps overcome the oppressions that so many Americans continue to face. And knowing who we are - as people, and as a family -- is at the heart of survival in a culture that is too-often still hostile to our lives.”
Lettman resides in the Washington, DC area and recently married a Master Sergeant of the United States Air Force, who returned this past July from a tour of duty in Balad, Iraq.
The National Black Justice Coalition (www.NBJC.org) is America's only nationwide Black gay civil rights organization and is dedicated to empowering Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. Our mission is to end racism and homophobia. NBJC envisions a world where all people are fully empowered to participate safely, openly and honestly in family, faith and community, regardless of race, gender-identity, or sexual orientation. Founded in 2003, NBJC is the authoritative source on LGBT issues as they affect Black communities.
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Chanel Spring 2010 Ready-to-Wear
PARIS, October 6, 2009
By Sarah Mower
Chanel was up at cockcrow for a gigantic fashion romp in the hay. A huge barn had been conjured up in the center of the Grand Palais, and the models emerged from it, wheat ears clinging to their tousled blond Bardot beehives, straw stuck to their clothes, and a little smirk and stagger in their step as if just caught out at you-know-what. Naughty, naughty! Between them, the Chanel country coquettes managed to flirt their way around every rustic reference in Karl Lagerfeld's extensive repertoire of craft-y couture skills, from hopsack to basket weave and cane work to aprons, dirndls, peasant-y poppy prints, and fantastic wooden double-C clogs. It was a bumper harvest of everything that is chicly tattered, beribboned, and gloriously made about Chanel, as well as the season's sole experience to make the anxiety and earnestness around fashion evaporate, to make it seem like fantastic fun again.
Never mind the hay, Lagerfeld was on a roll. Digging into a theme can sometimes throw up some embarrassing puns, and the effort to be youthful has occasionally had off-beam results at Chanel. But with this collection, Lagerfeld's summing up of the season's tendencies-beige, ivory, and black; rough textures; transparency and lace-was spun into a collection so masterfully balanced between classicism and current fashion affairs that the whole thing felt delightfully sure-footed. The knack was that he didn't rush it-just let the thing keep bouncing out in a sustained variation of caramels, taupes, and ecrus, all logically adapted to the house's nubby tweed suits, frothy blouses, and fluttery chiffons. The editing of everything to short lengths looked sweet without being chichi-the test being that every teenage girl looked naturally at home in the little thigh-split skirts (that's what has happened to the bottom half of the Chanel suit), as well as in the mini-crinis and ruffled dance dresses.
Prince and Rihanna were competing for attention in the front row; there was a surprise turn from Lily Allen, who rose out of the floor on a hoedown platform to belt out a saltily worded country number; and at the end, Freja Beha Erichsen, Lara Stone, and Lagerfeld's constant companion, Baptiste Giabiconi, were literally rolling around in the hay together. And yet, remarkably, the clothes never became a sideshow. In a season when celebrities, concepts, and a lot of forgettable mediocrity have got in the way of seeing why luxury fashion should merit the price, this was a Chanel triumph.
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Posted on Advocate.com December 21, 2009 10:40:13 AM
Ricky Martin Condemns Antigay Hate Crimes
Pop superstar Ricky Martin denounced antigay hate crimes in a statement urging people to "accept diversity."
By Julie Bolcer
RICKY MARTIN THUMB | Advocate.com
Pop superstar Ricky Martin released a statement, published in the Puerto Rican newspaper El Nuevo Dia on Saturday, that denounces recent antigay murders and asks people to “accept diversity” as the first step toward eliminating hate.
“In the past few weeks, I've read many articles that have made me shudder and unfortunately the articles relate to things that are happening every day around the world,” wrote Martin, who also posted the statement on his website in English earlier this month.
“I find it almost impossible to believe that in the year 2009, we're struggling with such hateful situations.”
Martin, whose sexuality is the subject of frequent speculation, was born in Puerto Rico, where gay teenager Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado was found brutally murdered in November.
“Well, when we believe in peace, there is simply no room for complacency,” wrote Martin, a father of young children who describes himself as a “human rights defender.”
”The murders of James Byrd, Matthew Shepard, Jorge Steven Lopez, Marcelo Lucero, Luis Ramirez and countless others who were victims of violent ‘hate crimes’ should be completely unacceptable to every human being; because we're all human beings. It's up to us to change the paradigm. I hear the world ‘tolerance’ thrown around in the media when it comes to cases like the ones I mentioned above. One of the meanings of tolerance is ‘the capacity to endure pain or hardship.’ Another is ‘the act of allowing something.’ To me, those don't seem to encompass acceptance, by any definition. So how about this? Instead of saying ‘we need to tolerate diversity’ why not say, ‘we need to accept diversity.’”
Advocate.com © 2009 Here Media Inc. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Entertainment_News/Ricky_Martin_No_Shirt_and_a_Baby/
Ricky Martin, No Shirt and a Baby By Advocate.com Editor
Since joining Twitter about three months ago, Ricky Martin has made it a routine to regularly post photos of himself hanging out with his kids - usually at the beach, almost always wearing nothing more than a swimsuit.
The oft rumored gay singer - he’s never denied it… he simply says that part of his life is not up for discussion - became a father in August, 2008 with the help of a surrogate mother.
Check out photos of Martin, who is in the studio recording his first album of new material in five years, with his twin boys, Matteo and Valentino… and another sexy pic of just Ricky thrown in for good measure.
for Sunday, October 4:
Laundry, schmaundry -- don't waste the super stuff the stars are sending your way on routine. Errands will wait; the fun you could be having doing new things and impressing new people won't.
leave it to me to neglect an entire month of the year with respect to this journal and only find inspiration to write when spending almost an hour with the exsomeone strolling down memory lane. what has changed since my last post? i've gotten a new job to start at the end of this month, i've had some great nights out with friends and family, and i've started going to school again. politically? while i admire the politics of this administration in some respects -- finally, a hate crimes law; finally, bills moving on workplace discrimination; finally, serious talk about repealing 'don't ask, don't tell'; and maybe, just maybe, movement on doma either from the courts or the congress -- i still must say that their missteps -- the cabinet picks (although, getting judd gregg out early would make sense in retrospect), the idiocy of not stepping in the georgia special election, and not moving forward on a number of issues that could resolved pretty easily with the hefty majorities in both houses -- have put the entire agenda at risk. just think if the democrats had a sixty two seat majority in the senate or even a sixty one seat majority with one more new england republican to play ball. watching the house debate over the healthcare bill with that resonating and dramatic final vote -- where they captured one republican vote after all with joseph cao -- represented everything that makes this country great. does anyone remember how the house passed bills under tom delay? it involved trickery, bribery on the floor, and all of the shenanigans that we have too quickly forgotten. the republicans did not lose because of their ideas only, they lost because of their tactics. further, now that there's a republican in the house willing to stand up for healthcare -- and one in louisiana to provide cover to the senator from that selfsame state -- obama can continue to stand on the idea that he represents a new kind of politics. also, although i felt i lived in a time warp because of the two republican victories on last tuesday -- one in virginia where the silly primary voters voted against the OBVIOUS fighter terry mccaulliffe who could've beaten any republican with the right packaging and the other in new jersey where, no one seems to say, THERE WAS A THIRD PARTY CANDIDATE UPSETTING THE RANKS! -- would not have happened except for special circumstances. in new york, we saw the truth of the matter -- people with good sense choosing democrats. and then, the disappointment in maine. but how can you fight church money and church trucks? seriously, they can donate millions of dollars to make sure two men don't marry when twenty five thousand children die each day of hunger and preventable disease. i won't even go there. closer to home, my candidate, steve kornell, won his city council race and that really bouyed me although i haven't had the time to reflect on the importance of it.
what else? my car has come close to repossession, my apartment eviction, and every other utility and bill delinquent. in this time, i've decided to take on classes at eckerd college. i went out more during the month of october than i have since i lost my job -- a random night to the only bar in town one night where i saw the stock broker and died over how hot the stock broker has become which, of course, lead me to a full-on mistake online later feeling jilted; a night at hiro's and push with my sister early on, where i taught her how to get into bars with a fake, and hobnob with this community's african american professionals; a halloween party with my high school friend where i once again resolved to never go out with him again and looked like a fool in my costume wildly off theme -- and i've somehow acquired more STUFF -- dvd sets, books, magazines, shirts, pants, etc -- than i can afford. honestly, i don't know what's wrong with me. it's like i've gotten so unhappy that i just can't resist the quick rush of spending money even if its on late night delivery. which, i've started atkins again, so i've lost some weight.
also, with the prospect of a new job comes the prospect of good benefits the ability to continue my addiction with exclusive eyewear. i plan to make my glasses balance out the skinniness of my ties -- of which i'm ardently stalking two band of outsiders ties to add to my collection: one in black and one in green although i still have not a single shirt to wear with any -- i want the tom ford glasses featured in the ads except in brown and the oliver peoples like the ones i have in clear, just black. and what else? of course, there's been fashion week which stood as one of the best in years -- the whiffs of desperation crippled many houses -- but had stand outs like the chanel collection which did the let's-dress-up-and-play-poor thing better than almost anyone.
but of all the cultural influences currently running wild in this little mind of mine, the season finale of mad men -- and the episodes leading up to it -- have truly stirred more emotions in me than even my old favorite of brothers and sisters. it all started with "wee small hours" with the departure of sal, but it just kept building with these half steps, non-events, and off-screen action that made me hope just hope that sal comes back. it's the "far from heaven" principle. it's not just that his character needs to be there, but what he represents needs to be there, too, because of all of the progress made in the sixties.
Here is your single's love horoscope
for Thursday, November 5:
Your busy work schedule is getting in the way of your social life, and that's never a good thing. Reassess your daily and weekly to-do lists. Cross out any tasks that don't need to be tackled anytime soon. Be realistic in your deadlines. Reward yourself regularly.
http://www.elnuevodia.com/columna/650336/
Health care vote puts Rep. Anh 'Joseph' Cao in spotlight again
By Jonathan Tilove
November 10, 2009, 7:15AM
Though soft-spoken and diminutive, Rep. Anh "Joseph" Cao, R-New Orleans, has a way of making waves.
anh_cao.JPGAlex Brandon/The Associated Press archiveRep. Anh 'Joseph' Cao of New Orleans was the only House Republican to vote for health insurance reform.
Coming out of nowhere to defeat nine-term incumbent Rep. William Jefferson last December, and becoming the first Vietnamese-American in Congress, Cao's success was hailed by national Republicans as a good omen. "The future is Cao,'" declared Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, the Republican Minority Leader in Congress.
With his Saturday night vote for health insurance reform, the only Republican to do so, Cao, less than a year into his first term, has etched his name once again into the history books.
Forget the future. Since late Saturday night, now is Cao, with a steady diet of national media appearances. Tuesday's interview schedule includes The Associated Press, USA Today, Greta Van Sustern, Rachel Maddow, CBS, Tavis Smiley, and maybe National Public Radio.
The vote was not entirely unexpected. Cao had indicated he wanted to support the landmark legislation - which he considers important for the many poor and uninsured in his district - if it was amended to guarantee that public funds would not be used to pay for abortions, which, shortly before final passage Saturday night, was just what happened.
But, Cao's singular vote in the waning minutes of the roll-call, caught the nation's attention, and, at least for the moment, has bollixed politics-as-usual in New Orleans and in Louisiana.
On Monday afternoon, the Louisiana Republican Party issued a statement reiterating its disdain for the health care bill and expressing disappointment with Cao for supporting it.
"From the very beginning the Republican Party of Louisiana has made clear that we do not support a massive government-run plan for nationalized insurance that will increase taxes, ration care and put a bureaucrat in charge of decisions being made by patients and their doctors," said state party spokesman Aaron Baer. "Rep. Cao is a man of integrity who always does what he perceives to be in the best interests of his district, but clearly we disagree with his decision and we're disappointed.''
But for Bryan Wagner, Cao's godfather in New Orleans' Republican politics who guided his long-shot candidacy, any disappointment with the vote on the part of Cao's GOP partisans in the city, is offset by continued "awe" for his conscientious and conscience-guided representation.
"When Joseph went up to Washington right after he was elected, he went to the Capitol Hill Club and all the people were cheering for him and he said, `I hope you are still cheering when I can't vote for you sometimes,' " said Wagner, who said no one from Cao's inner circle is second-guessing their support for him.
Wagner said that while Cao stuck with his party in opposition to Obama's stimulus plan and Democratic cap-and-trade legislation, this time he decided the bill on the whole was in the best interests of his constituents.
"Joseph said he couldn't vote for it unless the lives of the unborn were protected, and an amendment was drafted and passed and the person who was the biggest proponent of it was Joseph, and so a freshman Republican congressman has had more input into an important bill than any freshman congressman I've ever heard of,'' Wagner said.
Indeed, Archbishop Gregory M. Aymond of New Orleans, e-mailed Cao afterward to thank him for his efforts.
In the meantime, the Louisiana Democratic Party and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, which never tire of finding reasons to bash Cao, were silent on his vote Monday, especially since their party's likely Senate candidate, Rep. Charlie Melancon, D-Napoleonville, voted "no'' along with the five other Republican members of the Louisiana congressional delegation.
Even as the House was voting Saturday night, state Rep. Cedric Richmond, who is seeking the Democratic nomination to challenge Cao, issued a statement condemning Cao for first voting for the Republican alternative health-care plan, and then voting to recommit the Democratic plan, before ultimately voting for the bill after "it had already received the two hundred and eighteen votes to secure a majority.''
But Americans United for Change, a leading pro-health reform advocacy organization, is taking a very different tack, and will be launching a new television ad today to thank Cao for his vote. They said they will spend about $35,000 on cable and broadcast ads in New Orleans.
Ultimately, the question is whether those who were pleased by Cao's apostasy, were sufficiently pleased to vote for him over a Democratic candidate whose consistently Democratic votes would make them even happier, and if those who were disappointed by his vote will forgive him next November.
To Norman Ornstein, a congressional scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, who has been following Cao's progress, the vote made perfect sense, and required the gumption to stand up to his party's leadership, including Minority Whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., who slipped into a seat beside Cao on the House floor as the moment of truth approached.
"I really think they wanted to make it unanimous,'' said Ornstein of the Republican leadership. On the stimulus vote, he said, "they were wiling to have Cao fall on his grenade for the greater good of the party and they were wiling to do it again, but I think he decided he'd taken enough collateral damage for the stimulus vote and that was enough.'' Will this vote shorten the odds on his re-election? "Let's face it,'' said Ornstein, "whatever his vote in this case, and whatever his previous votes, it's a steep uphill climb to hold that seat."
Jonathan Tilove can be reached at jtilove@timespicayune.com or 202.383.7827 .
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City elects first openly gay council member
By Stephanie Hayes, Times Staff Writer
Published Tuesday, November 3, 2009
ST. PETERSBURG - The City Council will welcome one fresh face: Steve Kornell.
He earned more than enough votes to beat Angela Rouson in the race for the seat in District 5 Tuesday. Incumbents swept the city's other four council races.
When he takes office Jan. 2, Kornell will become the first openly gay person to hold office on the St. Petersburg City Council.
Kornell, a Pinellas County schools social worker, received 59.5 percent. Rouson, a mother of five, former marketing professional and wife of state Rep. Darryl Rouson, D-St. Petersburg, received 40.5 percent.
Kornell has an extensive background working with city recreation centers, running Childs Park and Shore Acres. He wrote a grant that still brings in millions for teen programs. He hopes to help prevent crime and increase youth activities and jobs. He advocates using Penny for Pinellas money to put solar panels on city buildings.
Here's how others played out:
In District 2, the closest match, Jim Kennedy, 52, earned 55.7 percent, beating newcomer Stephen J. "Steve" Corsetti, 65, who earned 44.3 percent. In District 4, Leslie Curran, 53, captured 71.9 percent to beat Pamella Settlegoode, 60, who earned 28 percent. In District 6, Karl Nurse, 55, earned 73.8 percent to retain his council seat, beating Vel Thompson, 51, who earned 26.2 percent. In District 8, incumbent Jeff Danner, 49, received 72.2 percent, beating Leonard Schmiege, 40, who received 27.8 percent.
Stephanie Hayes can be reached at shayes@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8857.
© 2009 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 \
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November 4, 2009
Conservative Loses Upstate House Race in Blow to Right
By JEREMY W. PETERS
SARANAC LAKE, N.Y. - Democrats won a special election in New York State’s northernmost Congressional district Tuesday, a setback for national conservatives who heavily promoted a third candidate in what became an intense debate over the direction of the Republican Party.
With 89 percent of precincts reporting, the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, led with 49 percent of the vote, while the Conservative Party candidate, Douglas L. Hoffman, had 46 percent, a margin of about 4,300 votes.
Mr. Hoffman spoke to a deflated crowd of about 50 in a hotel ballroom here soon after midnight on Wednesday and said he had called Mr. Owens to concede.
“Thank you to every single person out there that joined my team and fought back for America,” Mr. Hoffman said. “This one was worth the fight. And it’s only one fight in the battle, and we have to keep fighting.”
The district has been a Republican stronghold for generations, and the party has represented parts of it since the 19th century.
The battle became one of the most closely followed races in the nation, drawing in some of the biggest forces in politics in both parties. Republicans who viewed the race as a test of the party’s most deeply held conservative principles - including Sarah Palin, the former governor of Alaska; Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, a presidential hopeful; and grass-roots groups that have forcefully opposed Democratic economic and health care policies - rallied behind Mr. Hoffman.
The finger pointing among Republicans started on Wednesday morning. Some conservatives were blaming the Republican Party for the loss, saying that if they had supported a more conservative candidate all along, the seat could have been won.
“I think Doug Hoffman likely would have won if he had been the Republican candidate from the get-go,” said Mike Huckabee, the former Republican presidential contender. “It wasn’t a spike in the end zone for the Democrats. They got that seat not because Democrats were brilliant, but because Republicans were stupid.”
Many conservatives attempted to frame Mr. Hoffman’s defeat as a victory, saying that despite Mr. Hoffman’s loss, conservatives prevailed because the moderate Republican candidate, Dede Scozzafava, was forced out of the race.
“Our number one goal was to make clear that the Republican Party cannot take someone as liberal as Dede Scozzafava and thrust her out on the voters and expect the voters just to accept it,” said Brian Brown, executive director of the National Organization for Marriage, which worked to defeat Ms. Scozzafava, the Republican candidate who faced a challenge from Mr. Hoffman.
Democrats had thrown muscle behind the race as well, eager to avoid a potentially embarrassing defeat as President Obama’s approval ratings have softened and efforts to portray them as the party of big government and deficit spending appear to be sticking. A win in the Republican-leaning 23rd Congressional District would provide Democrats with a welcome boost, while a loss would reinforce the notion that the party is struggling.
The seat became vacant after President Obama appointed its long-serving Republican congressman, John M. McHugh, as secretary of the Army.
Leading conservative voices - including The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page and The Weekly Standard and the talk show personalities Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck - took on the Republican nominee, Assemblywoman Scozzafava, who supports gay rights and abortion rights and had embraced some Democratic economic policies like the federal stimulus package. They labeled her as too liberal.
The attacks on Ms. Scozzafava eventually took their toll, and she stunned her party over the weekend first by withdrawing from the race and then by urging her supporters to vote for Mr. Owens, a 60-year-old lawyer from Plattsburgh.
But the ballots had already been printed, and early results showed her picking up 6 percent of the vote. It was unclear how many of those were protest votes, and how many simply did not know she had left the race.
The White House became closely involved in the efforts to boost Mr. Owens’s candidacy in the final days of the campaign. They orchestrated an effort that persuaded Ms. Scozzafava to endorse Mr. Owens. Vice President Joseph R. Biden rolled through the district on Monday to support Mr. Owens.
But the race was perhaps most notable for the fissures it opened in the Republican Party. Ms. Scozzafava, who was selected as the Republican nominee by the 11 leaders of the county committees that comprise this vast district along the Canadian border, was excoriated by Washington’s conservative establishment almost as soon as she was nominated.
Ms. Scozzafava united social and fiscal conservatives from across the country firmly behind Mr. Hoffman, a previously unknown 59-year-old accountant from Lake Placid - which is not in the district.
The Club for Growth, a group that promotes limited government and lower taxes, spent about $1 million promoting Mr. Hoffman. Social conservative organizations like the Susan B. Anthony List, which opposes abortion, and the National Organization for Marriage, which fights same-sex marriage laws, joined forces in support of Mr. Hoffman. They printed literature, made phone calls and flooded the district with volunteers from across the country.
“This is probably the most amazing coalition-building I’ve seen in a long time - probably decades,” said Marilyn Musgrave, a former Republican congresswoman from Colorado who now works with the Susan B. Anthony List and came to New York to campaign for Mr. Hoffman.
On Tuesday morning, Ms. Musgrave stood in frigid weather for several hours outside a state office building in downtown Watertown with a group of home-schooled students passing out blue fliers that read, “Doug Hoffman shares our values!”
Ms. Musgrave said the overwhelming conservative embrace of Mr. Hoffman would show leaders in Washington that political bases should not be taken for granted. “Don’t just assume we’re yours.”
Joe Lo Templio reported from Plattsburgh.
Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
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11/4/09 | 881 comments
video and Poll
Gay marriage repealed in Maine
Yes on 1 claims victory, repeal opponents 'will regroup'
By Kevin Miller and Judy Harrison
BDN Staff
PORTLAND, Maine - Voters on Tuesday repealed the state’s same sex marriage law after an emotionally charged campaign that drew large numbers to the polls and focused national attention on Maine.
With 87 percent of precincts reporting, the campaign to overturn Maine’s same-sex marriage law won with 53 percent of the vote vs. 47 percent opposed to Question 1, according to unofficial results compiled by the Bangor Daily News.
Gay-marriage opponents claimed victory shortly after 12:30 a.m. Wednesday.
“Question 1 has passed,” Frank Schubert, campaign manager of Stand for Marriage Maine, announced in Portland. “It has all come together tonight and the institution of marriage has been preserved.”
About 40 people who worked on the Yes on 1 campaign cheered as they heard the announcement by computer hookup at Jeff’s Catering in Brewer.
“We went up against tremendous odds,” Marc Mutty, public affairs director for the Roman Catholic Diocese of Portland who has been on loan to the campaign, said from Portland. “We all know we were the little guy going up against the big guy, but we prevailed. We prevailed because the people of Maine - the silent majority - the folks back home spoke with their votes.
“What they had to say,” Mutty continued, “is marriage matters because it’s between a man and a woman. [This campaign] has never been about hating gays, but about preserving marriage and only about preserving marriage, and that’s what we did tonight.”
The defenders of Maine’s gay marriage law - which passed the Legislature in the spring but was never allowed to take effect - acknowledged being behind, but held out hope for a bump as the final votes and absentee ballots were counted.
In a defiant speech to several hundred lingering supporters, No on 1 campaign manager Jesse Connolly pledged that his side “will not quit until we know where every single one of these votes lives.”
“We’re not short-timers; we are here for the long haul,” Connolly told the crowd, some of whom wiped away tears as he spoke. “Whether it’s just all night and into the morning, or next week or next month or next year, we will be here. We’ll be fighting, we’ll be working. We will regroup.”
The Yes on 1 campaign, led by the group Stand for Marriage Maine, built its lead by winning votes in rural Maine as well as in some larger towns such as the Roman Catholic and Franco-American stronghold of Lewiston.
In contrast, the effort to defend Maine’s gay marriage law won strong support in places such as Portland, where 73 percent voted against Question 1, and majority support in Bangor.
Throughout the campaign leading up to Tuesday’s closely watched election, both sides had said that turnout would be key. State election officials estimated earlier Tuesday that turnout likely would top 50 percent.
But while gay marriage supporters hoped the high voter interest would provide a boost, it was not enough to make Maine the first state in the nation where gay marriage won at the polls rather than in the legislature or courts.
Despite the outcome, Mary Bonauto, a No on 1 executive board member and attorney with Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders, said she was never more proud to live in Maine and raise a family with her long-term partner. She was especially proud of the attention the No on 1 campaign brought to the values shared by all families, regardless of sexual orientation.
“I look around at the 8,000 volunteers, and the vast majority are not gay people,” Bonauto said. “So that gives me hope that, regardless of the outcome, that this discussion has changed the state.”
At the No on 1 election-watch party, what began as an exuberant crowd of more than 1,000 began to steadily dwindle as the Yes campaign’s lead held steady. By 12:30 a.m. Wednesday, a few hundred die-hard gay marriage supporters still remained in the ballroom as Connolly spoke, but the disappointment was palpable.
With relatively few high-profile elections around the country, the national media spotlight is on Maine. Had Question 1 been defeated, Maine would have become the first state in the nation where same-sex marriage was legalized at the ballot box.
Secretary of State Matt Dunlap, after witnessing activity at several polling stations and hearing from clerks around the state, said he believed at least 50 percent of voters may have cast ballots in the off-year election dominated by the gay marriage issue.
“What I have seen around the state has been steady to very busy turnout all day,” Dunlap said.
The lead-up to Tuesday’s historic election began back in April when more than 3,000 people crammed into the Augusta Civic Center for a public hearing on the bill.
Lawmakers sat through more than 10 hours of impassioned, sometimes tearful testimony from longtime gay and lesbian partners as well as children of same-sex couples. The bill’s opponents were equally passionate, often citing religious objections to redefining marriage from the traditional one-man, one-woman union.
Several weeks later, both chambers of the Legislature signed off on the bill, LD 1020, and sent it with some trepidation to Gov. John Baldacci, who had been on record previously as favoring civil unions and domestic partnerships over same-sex marriages.
But Baldacci immediately signed the bill, making Maine the fifth state in the nation to grant gay and lesbian couples marriage rights.
“When history shines a spotlight on you, you have an opportunity to advance the cause or to let the cause slip backwards. I chose to move things forward,” Baldacci said recently.
Even before Baldacci had put his pen to the bill, however, opponents announced the petition drive to gather enough signatures to trigger a “people’s veto” referendum. They easily surpassed the 55,000-plus required signatures.
In the months since, the two campaigns have spent more than $6.5 million on the campaigns, with money flowing into their coffers from organizations and individuals from outside of Maine.
Although the campaign is over, the Rev. Bob Emrich of Palmyra said that the work of traditional marriage supporters was not.
“This doesn’t mean it’s the end of our work,” he said. “We must begin building bridges and we may have to mend fences. People on the other side were doing what they believed in, too.
“God has given us this victory,” Emrich continued, “and it is very important for us to recognize that he is the one who put the energy into this campaign. So let’s not be so arrogant to forget this. It’s very appropriate to pause for a moment of prayer.”
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GOP reclaims Virginia
McDONNELL CRUISES IN GOVERNOR'S RACE
Messages on taxes, jobs resonate with voters
By Rosalind S. Helderman and Anita Kumar
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Virginians elected Republican Robert F. McDonnell the commonwealth's 71st governor Tuesday, sweeping the GOP to power and emphatically halting a decade of Democratic advances in the critical swing state.
The exclamation point on the former state attorney general's trouncing of Democratic state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds was a victory in Fairfax County, the state's most populous jurisdiction, which had delivered powerful Democratic majorities to President Obama and Govs. Timothy M. Kaine and Mark Warner. McDonnell also reversed the political order in the Washington region's outer suburbs, winning Loudoun and Prince William counties, which went for Kaine four years ago.
Boosted by a political mood shift that has left many voters cool to Democrats, McDonnell, 55, prevailed with a promise to create jobs in the down economy and fix the state's clogged roads without a tax increase. His campaign avoided the hot-button social issues that in recent elections had alienated voters in Northern Virginia and other urban centers. And he benefited from a lackluster Democratic opponent whom voters came to know in good part from a video clip in which he waffled and stammered when asked if he would raise taxes.
As Republicans swept all statewide offices for the first time in 12 years, joyful activists tossed beach balls at a Richmond hotel as party leaders pronounced a new era of low taxes. "We're back," said former Fairfax County congressman Tom Davis. "The state has moved back toward the center."
Republicans expanded their majority in the House of Delegates by at least four seats. Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling easily won reelection, and Fairfax Sen. Ken Cuccinelli II, one of the most socially conservative members of the Richmond legislature, will be the next attorney general.
McDonnell dominated among independent voters, while Deeds, 51, failed to re-create the coalition that last year helped Barack Obama become the first Democratic presidential candidate to capture Virginia in more than four decades. With turnout in a governor's race slumping below 40 percent for the first time in at least 40 years, Deeds fell well short of the margins Obama, Kaine and Warner amassed among black voters, young people and Northern Virginians. McDonnell won by a particularly wide margin in rural areas, which the Democrat had labeled "Deeds Country," hoping to outperform his Democratic predecessors from his base in the Shenandoah Valley's Bath County.
In the campaign's final days, Deeds made an explicit appeal to Obama voters that a vote for him was a vote in support of the president. But earlier, he had distanced himself from Obama's agenda, especially on health and energy policy.
Inheriting many problems
The three Republicans inherit a government burdened by a severe budget crisis and a transportation network so underfunded that Virginia will soon lack the matching funds necessary to secure U.S. dollars for road construction. For Republicans to build beyond Tuesday's improved showing in Northern Virginia, McDonnell will have to prove that unlike past GOP administrations, he will deliver more resources to Virginia's most populous and affluent region.
At the Richmond Marriott, Republicans who have spent years watching Democrats win election after election roared with excitement as media outlets called the race for McDonnell about 8 p.m. "My promise to you as governor," McDonnell said, "is to strengthen the free-enterprise system, to create more jobs and opportunity so that every Virginian can use their God-given talents to pursue the American dream and liberty here in this great commonwealth."
The magnitude of the GOP sweep had many party leaders recalling the 1993 vote, which also followed the election of a Democratic president. That year, George Allen was elected governor, the leading edge of the Republican revolution that culminated in the party regaining control of Congress a year later. Republicans said Tuesday's wins restored Virginia to its natural political condition, arguing that recent Democratic victories reflectedwidespread anger at former President George W. Bush and the personal popularity of Obama and Warner.
"It's a Republican state. It has been, is now and will be," said Pat Mullins, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia.
Democrats blamed their loss on the natural swing of the political pendulum and said demographic changes will help the party's fortunes over time. "I've been around a long time, and I know that there are cycles in politics like there are in anything in life," said Democratic Party Chairman Richard Cranwell.
Deeds called McDonnell to concede shortly before 9 p.m. "Just because we didn't get the right result tonight doesn't mean we get to go home and whine," Deeds told supporters. "We still have fight, we still have spirit."
Thesis attack fails
From the start, McDonnell had history on his side: Since 1977, no party that has won the White House has gone on to capture Virginia's governorship the next year.
McDonnell's campaign -- supported, like Deeds's, with millions of dollars from his national party -- was on the defensive for only a few weeks, starting with the publication in August of a Washington Post report detailing a master's degree thesis the candidate wrote in 1989 at what is now Regent University in Virginia Beach. In the thesis, written at the Christian-oriented school founded by televangelist Pat Robertson, McDonnell, then 34, outlined an action plan for strengthening the traditional family and wrote that working women were detrimental to the family.
Deeds seized on the thesis, making it the centerpiece of an advertising campaign designed to convince voters that McDonnell was a right-wing extremist who had undergone a disingenuous campaign-year makeover.
The strategy appeared to work for a time, as polls tightened. But McDonnell fought back with a series of TV spots featuring supportive testimonials from his daughter, an Army veteran who served in Iraq, and a gallery of professional women who had worked for him in the attorney general's office. Increasingly, voters said they saw Deeds's campaign as a largely negative one that failed to define his own vision for the state.
McDonnell campaigned on his opposition to federal policies. He criticized the Democratic-led effort to change the nation's health care system and sided with southwest Virginians who believe that proposed federal legislation designed to curb greenhouse gases would cost jobs in the coalfields of that region.
The Republican also relentlessly attacked Deeds over the Democrat's willingness to raise taxes for transportation improvements. A key turning point in the campaign came in September, when Deeds was caught on camera flailing when swarmed by reporters asking whether he would raise taxes to pay for road improvements.
The moment, immediately cut into TV ads aired repeatedly by McDonnell and the Republican Governors Association, highlighted Deeds's stammering speaking style, caught him snapping at a reporter and made him appear indecisive on the critical issues of taxes and transportation.
"I think taxes are high enough," said James Thomas, a 39-year-old accountant who cast his ballot for McDonnell at Clarendon United Methodist Church in Arlington County.
Born in Philadelphia, McDonnell grew up in Fairfax County and played football for Bishop Ireton High School before attending Notre Dame and marrying a Washington Redskins cheerleader. He pointed to his Northern Virginia childhood frequently in a disciplined effort to convince suburbanites he understood their concerns better than Deeds.
"I think McDonnell is better qualified, and he has ideas," said Debbie Zolp, 51, of Dumfries, who cast her ballot for the Republican after voting for Obama last November and Kaine four years ago. "It doesn't seem like Deeds has a plan."
McDonnell carefully avoided alienating independents or angering Democrats, taking care at nearly every appearance to praise Obama, especially for championing charter schools and promoting fatherhood.
Avoiding divisive issues
Although known for a social conservatism deeply informed by his religious faith during his 14 years as a Virginia Beach delegate, during the campaign McDonnell studiously avoided controversial such social issues as abortion, immigration and gun rights, largely neutralizing Democrats' effort to portray him as an extremist with a stealth agenda.
"He's a breed of Republican candidate I've been hoping and looking for that translates Republican values into everyday reality,'' said Michael Steele, Republican National Committee chair. "Bob talks about what people want to know."
Deeds struggled to connect with the Democratic base, at times distancing himself from Obama. Former governor L. Douglas Wilder, a fellow Democrat and the nation's first elected black governor, declined to endorse him, and prominent black businesswoman Sheila Johnson, a Democrat, supported his opponent, even making a TV ad for McDonnell.
Deeds battled McDonnell to within 360 votes in a race for attorney general in 2005.
McDonnell outspent Deeds considerably, receiving unprecedented support from outside groups -- $9 million from the Republican National Committee as well as significant direct TV buys on his behalf from the Republican Governors Association, the National Rifle Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
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Newark Live, Politics, Statehouse »
Republican Chris Christie ousts Jon Corzine in N.J. governor's race
By Star-Ledger Staff
November 04, 2009, 12:14AM
chris-christie-nj-governor-final-win.JPGAndrew Mills/THE STAR-LEDGERChris Christie pumps his fist with the state's first Lt. Governor, Kim Guadagno, together on stage as he celebrates his win over Jon Corzine to become the 55th Governor of New Jersey.Republican Chris Christie, a corporate lawyer turned crusading federal prosecutor, was elected New Jersey’s 55th governor last night, ousting Jon Corzine, an unpopular but well-funded incumbent, in a race viewed as an early referendum on President Obama.
It was the first time a Republican won a statewide election in New Jersey since Gov. Christie Whitman was re-elected by a narrow margin in 1997. Corzine became the first incumbent to lose an election since Jim Florio in 1993.
With 99 percent of the state’s voting precincts reporting, Christie took 49 percent compared with Corzine’s 44.5 percent, even though late public opinion polls showed the race too close to call. Independent Chris Daggett, who reached 20 percent from voters in one recent poll, came in with only 5.7 percent.
Vote totals show voter turnout was a record low for a New Jersey governor’s race. The race also marked the introduction of the post of lieutenant governor and Christie’s running mate, Monmouth County Sheriff Kim Guadagno, will become the first person to hold that title.
COMPLETE ELECTION COVERAGE
Democrats, meanwhile, will continue to control both houses of the Legislature following Assembly elections last night.
Christie received Corzine’s concession call at about 10:45 as he waited with friends and family in his suite at the Parsippany Hilton. Downstairs in the ballroom, the crowd was already rejoicing.
Christie arrived on stage about 11:20 as his Bruce Springsteen’s "Born to Run" played on the speakers.
"Tomorrow begins the task of fixing our broken state," Christie told the crowd. "The campaign we just went through will seem easy compared to the tasks that lie ahead of us to fix our state. We know the challenges we face, and over the next four years we’re going to have our work cut out for us. There are no easy answers to these difficult problems."
At Corzine’s party in East Brunswick, supporters left early, talking in whispers.
"A few minutes ago I called Mr. Christie and congratulated him on becoming New Jersey’s next governor," Corzine announced. "I want you to know that Chris was gracious in his response, and we will work hard together to make sure the transition is smooth, that we are able to do everything that serves the people of this great state."
Corzine, 62, became governor in 2006 after less than one term in the U.S. Senate and a long career at Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs, where he rose through the ranks to become chief executive.
For his part, Daggett told supporters they need to rally behind Christie "with all the energy that we had in this campaign." He said the winner deserves "the support of every one of us in New Jersey because the problems that face this state are significant."
Christie, 47, once had a near-prohibitive lead in polls, only to watch the race tighten in recent weeks as Corzine barraged him with TV ads, criticizing him for everything from ethical lapses to his health insurance plans.
The race became a dead heat and Corzine even took the lead in some polls. But Christie, thanks to a strong voter-turnout program in key GOP counties, carried the momentum into an Election Day victory in one of the most solidly Democratic states in the country. The Republican even won highly Democratic Middlesex County.
Exit polls, meanwhile, said Christie won independent voters two-to-one.
After complaining that Corzine was a "failure" who never could get costs under control or rein in state government, Christie now takes over amid estimates that next year’s financial shortfall is hovering around $8 billion, more than a quarter of the total state budget.
"Starting tomorrow, we’re going to pick Trenton up and we’re going to turn it upside down," the governor-elect said.
He also called for bipartisanship.
"No matter whose idea it is, if it’s a good one, if it’s a good one, Kim and I will figure out how to get it done," Christie said. "So now to all of those pundits out there, to all of those experts on politics: I beg you, let’s turn the page, let’s put the petty politics of the past behind us and let’s start a new era of hope and optimism in New Jersey."
Christie also called last night’s resounding victory a repudiation of attack politics.
"Through their overwhelming support tonight, the people of New Jersey said, ‘No more negative personal campaigns,’" he said. "In the face of a $30 million onslaught that consisted of almost exclusively negative personal campaign against me my family and my friends the people of New Jersey decided enough is enough."
Christie has said his governing philosophy would be simple: Only essential programs would be funded and he would take a hard line with unions in order to keep government costs in check.
Perceived to be the GOP’s best - maybe only - chance of taking back the governor’s mansion after eight years, Christie faced a surprisingly strong primary challenge from conservative activist Steve Lonegan.
In the run-up to Election Day, Corzine made a last-minute appeal to voters for support him - not so much because of his work but because of their belief in Obama and the Democratic Party that controls Washington.
Obama headlined four rallies in New Jersey in the last two weeks, including Sunday events in Newark and Camden. Corzine was also joined by Vice President Joe Biden, former president Bill Clinton, Caroline and Patrick Kennedy and their cousin, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and former New York governor Mario Cuomo.
The rallies were high-energy events but did not mobilize enough voters to offset strong turnout in critical GOP counties like Ocean, Morris and Monmouth.
The Democratic emphasis on New Jersey grew even more heightened in recent weeks after it became clear Virginia - the only other state with a gubernatorial race this year - would see its governorship shift from Democrat to Republican.
For weeks, the White House has been minimizing the potential impact of the Garden State election even as Obama seemed to take up residence somewhere along the Turnpike.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said he did not want to analyze the New Jersey election but reiterated Obama’s support for the embattled governor.
"I’ll let people look into their crystal balls and figure out what all this stuff means for the future," Gibbs said during his daily briefing.
Christie’s first task will be to name a transition team, to be headed by GOP lawyer Bill Palatucci and former state Attorney General David Samson, who served under Democratic Gov. Jim McGreevey. Their job will include everything from planning a January inauguration to hiring key staff and Cabinet members to budget-making in preparation for the introduction of the next budget, likely to be in March.
By Claire Heininger and Josh Margolin/Statehouse Bureau
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Bryan Batt talks about Sal Romano's firing from Sterling Cooper on 'Mad Men'
By Dave Walker
October 12, 2009, 12:00PM
Thanks to the 1963 calendar it’s been retracing this season, the AMC drama “Mad Men” has been dense with impending peril.
bryanbattsalromano.jpgCarin Baer/AMCBryan Batt as Sal Romano. For the characters, who face cultural shifts that will upend their professional lives, and for the country, which is headed for Dallas on November 22.
Sunday’s (October 11) episode, titled “Wee Small Hours,” was another gem - and a heart-stopping, heart-breaking hour for fans of New Orleans native Bryan Batt, who plays Cooper Sterling art director Sal Romano, a closeted gay man.
While editing film for an important client, Romano spurns the man’s romantic advances.
“I’m married,” says Romano.
“So am I,” says the client.
“There’s been a misunderstanding,” says Sal.
“I know what I know,” says the client.
The scene ends, but the client later demands that Sal be fired.
His cigarette-company account is big enough that Roger Sterling (John Slattery) does so without hesitation.
Sal’s appeal to Dan Draper (Jon Hamm) fails.
Sal is out, though still not “out” with his wife.
Reached by phone in New York City on Monday (October 12) morning, Batt said he was home in New Orleans when “Mad Men” creator Matthew Weiner called to tell him his character’s storyline for the episode.
“My first reaction was, ‘Oh my God,’” said Batt, who will appear on HLN’s “The Joy Behar Show” tonight at 8. “When I first read the script, I was amazed. It was a humdinger.”
Batt shot the emotionally wrenching spurned-seduction scene on the day of “Mad Men’s” Los Angeles season-premiere screening, which he attended with his mother.
“I finished that scene, and put on the suit in the car on the way to the premiere,” he said.
Sal’s fate beyond Sunday night wasn’t open for discussion during our call - shooting on the current “Mad Men” season has wrapped; four episodes remain to air -- but fans of the show are packing blog comments sections with speculation about both that character’s future as well as Draper’s ugly handling of the situation.
“The one thing I did think … it’s a real slap at Don Draper, the character,” Batt said. “It really doesn’t paint him so well. A lot of people are not so happy with Don.
“They were OK with the philandering, but firing the innocent Sal? No.
“Sal did everything by the book. He played the game as well as he possibly could. He’s completely innocent in this. He did the right thing and he was thrown under the bus.”
Here is a longer Q&A with Batt on the “Mad Men” fan site Basket of Kisses, and, speaking of blogs, here’s what three critics who deconstruct “Mad Men” episodes had to say about Sal’s time in “Wee Small Hours:”
“And my god... Bryan Batt... what can you say about the guy after an episode like this?” wrote Alan Sepinwall, the TV critic for the New Jersey Star-Ledger newspaper in his What’s Alan Watching? blog. “Salvatore episodes tend to be rare, and therefore a treat when they come up. Here's a character who started out as obvious (some would say too obvious) comic relief and has become one of the show's great tragic figures. Everyone on ‘Mad Men’ suffers in some way (except maybe Ken Cosgrove), but Sal's burden is especially great, and Batt rises to the occasion every time he's called to show that burden with almost no dialogue. Sal dare not speak his problem's name, so Batt has to internalize most of it, play it with the eyes and body language, and the look on his face when Don turns out to be another villain, not a savior, is just devastating.”
Of Batt, Maureen Ryan of the Chicago Tribune wrote on her blog The Watcher: “Wow. Another moving, top-notch performance.”
Wrote Tim Goodman, critic for the San Francisco Chronicle, on his blog The Bastard Machine:
“Poor Sal. It's not like he wants the moon...”
© 2009 NOLA.com. All rights reserved.
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La. judge done after flap over interracial wedding
By MELINDA DESLATTE, Associated Press Writer Melinda Deslatte, Associated Press Writer Wed Nov 4, 7:44 am ET
BATON ROUGE, La. - At least four times in the last 2 1/2 years, Keith Bardwell says he refused to marry interracial couples while serving as a Louisiana justice of the peace.
He said from his experience and discussions, he had concluded that blacks and whites do not readily accept offspring of such relationships, so the children end up suffering.
His latest rebuff to a bride and groom of different races turned out to be his last. After weeks of calls for his ouster, Bardwell resigned after 34 years in office Tuesday, leaving his reasons a secret.
His one-sentence statement to Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne said: "I do hereby resign the office of Justice of the Peace for the Eighth Ward of Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana, effective November 3, 2009."
Beth Humphrey, who is white, has said she and her now-husband, Terence McKay, who is black, received their marriage license from the parish clerk of court, where they also got a list of people qualified to perform the ceremony. When she called Bardwell's office on Oct. 6 to ask, Humphrey said the justice's wife told her that Bardwell wouldn't sign the license because they were a "mixed couple."
In interviews, Bardwell, who is white, said he refers interracial couples to other justices of the peace, who then perform the ceremony, which happened in this case.
"There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage," Bardwell said in an October interview with The Associated Press. "I think those children suffer, and I won't help put them through it."
Bardwell didn't return repeated calls to comment about his resignation. Civil rights leaders and officials, including Gov. Bobby Jindal and U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, wanted him out.
Jindal said Bardwell made the right decision.
"What he did was clearly wrong and this resignation was long overdue," the governor said in a statement.
Humphrey and McKay have filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against Bardwell and his wife.
Their attorney, Laura Catlett, said the resignation won't stop the lawsuit.
"We're saddened that it took national attention to this issue, which was decided back in 1967 by the Supreme Court, and also that it took public admonishment from other elected leaders in order for him to resign," Catlett said.
His quitting "does not in any way change the fact that he, with his wife's help, discriminated against an interracial couple while he was a public official," Catlett said.
Bardwell was elected in 1975 in Ponchatoula, La., a town 55 miles north of New Orleans. His term was set to run through 2014, and he had said that even before the flap, he hadn't intended to run for re-election.
Landrieu said Bardwell's refusal to marry the couple reflected terribly on the state.
"By resigning ... and ending his embarrassing tenure in office, Justice Bardwell has finally consented to the will of the vast majority of Louisiana citizens and nearly every governmental official in Louisiana ... We are better off without him in public service."
Copyright © 2009 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved.
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MEDIA RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact:
Cindi Creager/GLAAD
(646) 871-8019
creager@glaad.org
STATEMENT BY THE NATIONAL BLACK JUSTICE COALITION
ON THE DENIAL OF MARRIAGE
TO AN INTERRACIAL LOUISIANA COUPLE
WASHINGTON, D.C., FRIDAY, OCT. 16, 2009 -- The following statement may be attributed to Sharon J. Lettman, Executive Director, National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC):
“It is hard to believe that a Louisiana state official could simply refuse to follow the law of the land as set forth in Loving v. Virginia. The status of this person as a justice of the peace is something that needs to be revoked.
“Time and again we have seen public officials discriminate against loving, committed couples and claim that their discrimination is really motivated by concern for children. That justification is wrong when it’s used to deny marriage to a couple on the basis of their race. It’s wrong when it’s used to prevent committed gay and lesbian couples from being able to marry. And it’s our responsibility to speak out against it, whenever it happens.
“Every child who is a minority faces discrimination, exclusion and oppression at some point in their lives. It is actions like those of this state official - refusing to marry a loving couple because of personal prejudice - that perpetuate the discrimination and racism that continue to pervade our culture.
“There is also the fact that this state official is just plain wrong. There are countless children of interracial parents who grew up to embody the strength of our families: President Barack Obama, Tiger Woods, Soledad O’Brien. And parents themselves -- like Seal and Heidi Klum, former Defense Secretary William Cohen and journalist Janet Langhart. And the lists go on and on, with millions of successful families who have thrived in the face of prejudice directed at their parents and their children.
“The story of Connecticut state Rep. Jason Bartlett, also deputy director of the National Black Justice Coalition, illustrates this truth. When he grew up, his mother told him that he might not be accepted by some who are white, and might not be accepted by some who are black, because of his mixed heritage. But he learned through understanding who you are in the knowledge of your family’s love, that he could overcome those obstacles.
“It is that very love of a family that helps overcome the oppressions that so many Americans continue to face. And knowing who we are - as people, and as a family -- is at the heart of survival in a culture that is too-often still hostile to our lives.”
Lettman resides in the Washington, DC area and recently married a Master Sergeant of the United States Air Force, who returned this past July from a tour of duty in Balad, Iraq.
The National Black Justice Coalition (www.NBJC.org) is America's only nationwide Black gay civil rights organization and is dedicated to empowering Black lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people. Our mission is to end racism and homophobia. NBJC envisions a world where all people are fully empowered to participate safely, openly and honestly in family, faith and community, regardless of race, gender-identity, or sexual orientation. Founded in 2003, NBJC is the authoritative source on LGBT issues as they affect Black communities.
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Chanel Spring 2010 Ready-to-Wear
PARIS, October 6, 2009
By Sarah Mower
Chanel was up at cockcrow for a gigantic fashion romp in the hay. A huge barn had been conjured up in the center of the Grand Palais, and the models emerged from it, wheat ears clinging to their tousled blond Bardot beehives, straw stuck to their clothes, and a little smirk and stagger in their step as if just caught out at you-know-what. Naughty, naughty! Between them, the Chanel country coquettes managed to flirt their way around every rustic reference in Karl Lagerfeld's extensive repertoire of craft-y couture skills, from hopsack to basket weave and cane work to aprons, dirndls, peasant-y poppy prints, and fantastic wooden double-C clogs. It was a bumper harvest of everything that is chicly tattered, beribboned, and gloriously made about Chanel, as well as the season's sole experience to make the anxiety and earnestness around fashion evaporate, to make it seem like fantastic fun again.
Never mind the hay, Lagerfeld was on a roll. Digging into a theme can sometimes throw up some embarrassing puns, and the effort to be youthful has occasionally had off-beam results at Chanel. But with this collection, Lagerfeld's summing up of the season's tendencies-beige, ivory, and black; rough textures; transparency and lace-was spun into a collection so masterfully balanced between classicism and current fashion affairs that the whole thing felt delightfully sure-footed. The knack was that he didn't rush it-just let the thing keep bouncing out in a sustained variation of caramels, taupes, and ecrus, all logically adapted to the house's nubby tweed suits, frothy blouses, and fluttery chiffons. The editing of everything to short lengths looked sweet without being chichi-the test being that every teenage girl looked naturally at home in the little thigh-split skirts (that's what has happened to the bottom half of the Chanel suit), as well as in the mini-crinis and ruffled dance dresses.
Prince and Rihanna were competing for attention in the front row; there was a surprise turn from Lily Allen, who rose out of the floor on a hoedown platform to belt out a saltily worded country number; and at the end, Freja Beha Erichsen, Lara Stone, and Lagerfeld's constant companion, Baptiste Giabiconi, were literally rolling around in the hay together. And yet, remarkably, the clothes never became a sideshow. In a season when celebrities, concepts, and a lot of forgettable mediocrity have got in the way of seeing why luxury fashion should merit the price, this was a Chanel triumph.
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Posted on Advocate.com December 21, 2009 10:40:13 AM
Ricky Martin Condemns Antigay Hate Crimes
Pop superstar Ricky Martin denounced antigay hate crimes in a statement urging people to "accept diversity."
By Julie Bolcer
RICKY MARTIN THUMB | Advocate.com
Pop superstar Ricky Martin released a statement, published in the Puerto Rican newspaper El Nuevo Dia on Saturday, that denounces recent antigay murders and asks people to “accept diversity” as the first step toward eliminating hate.
“In the past few weeks, I've read many articles that have made me shudder and unfortunately the articles relate to things that are happening every day around the world,” wrote Martin, who also posted the statement on his website in English earlier this month.
“I find it almost impossible to believe that in the year 2009, we're struggling with such hateful situations.”
Martin, whose sexuality is the subject of frequent speculation, was born in Puerto Rico, where gay teenager Jorge Steven Lopez Mercado was found brutally murdered in November.
“Well, when we believe in peace, there is simply no room for complacency,” wrote Martin, a father of young children who describes himself as a “human rights defender.”
”The murders of James Byrd, Matthew Shepard, Jorge Steven Lopez, Marcelo Lucero, Luis Ramirez and countless others who were victims of violent ‘hate crimes’ should be completely unacceptable to every human being; because we're all human beings. It's up to us to change the paradigm. I hear the world ‘tolerance’ thrown around in the media when it comes to cases like the ones I mentioned above. One of the meanings of tolerance is ‘the capacity to endure pain or hardship.’ Another is ‘the act of allowing something.’ To me, those don't seem to encompass acceptance, by any definition. So how about this? Instead of saying ‘we need to tolerate diversity’ why not say, ‘we need to accept diversity.’”
Advocate.com © 2009 Here Media Inc. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.advocate.com/Arts_and_Entertainment/Entertainment_News/Ricky_Martin_No_Shirt_and_a_Baby/
Ricky Martin, No Shirt and a Baby By Advocate.com Editor
Since joining Twitter about three months ago, Ricky Martin has made it a routine to regularly post photos of himself hanging out with his kids - usually at the beach, almost always wearing nothing more than a swimsuit.
The oft rumored gay singer - he’s never denied it… he simply says that part of his life is not up for discussion - became a father in August, 2008 with the help of a surrogate mother.
Check out photos of Martin, who is in the studio recording his first album of new material in five years, with his twin boys, Matteo and Valentino… and another sexy pic of just Ricky thrown in for good measure.