Looking Good in Virginia

From Raising Kaine:

Senator-Elect Jim Webb currently leads by 7046 votes with 99.84% precincts reporting.

The SBE website has the following outstanding precincts:

1. James City County Absentee (C003)
2. One of two precincts in James City County called "Roberts B (0502)"
3. Raynor in Isle of Wight County.
4. Fairfax City Central Absentee Precinct (C011)

Now, I just spoke with the James City County registrars office. I was told there are no voters left to count in their county. Long story short, all of the voters in James City County live in Virginia's first district. The uncounted "precincts" of that county that are in VA-03 are part of the James River. There are no more votes for anybody outstanding here.

The last two districts will - at best for Allen- add only a few dozen votes for him. Based on '04 turnout numbers, Raynor only had 170 total voters (+17 for the GOP) and Fairfax City absentees went heavily for the Dems. Most likely, Webb's lead will grow slightly.

Expect Sen.-Elect Webb's current lead to remain largely unchanged - he will be certified the winner of this Senate seat. After that, Allen will be allowed to call for a recount.

I'd rather be Webb than Allen for many reasons. The fact that Webb won the election is only one of them.

George Allen Jim Webb 2006 Election Recount

Make Them Take it Away

Daily Kos has a DSCC press release:

Both Jon Tester and Jim Webb have won their races in Montana and Virginia but want to make sure that every vote is counted. We expect to have official results soon but can happily declare today that Democrats have taken the majority in the U.S. Senate.

Montana Vote Situation: Jon Tester leads Conrad Burns by approximately 1,700 votes (as of 11am EDT) and counting. In Silver Bow County (Butte), a Democratic stronghold, votes are still being counted but Tester is winning there with 66% of the vote. We expect to gain the majority of these uncounted votes and to add to Tester's margin.

Montana Process: When the counting phase is completed, a canvass will verify the vote tallies. That process could take as long as 48 hours, and must begin within three days and end within seven. Unless the canvass shows the margin to be within ¼ of 1%, there is no recount. As the loser, Burns would have to request the recount. When the votes are all counted, we expect to be outside that recount margin.

Virginia Vote Situation: Jim Webb is up by approximately 8,000 votes and once the provisional ballots are counted, we expect Webb's margin to increase. (Please note that VA absentees were included in the tallies from last night.)

Virginia Process: A canvass is underway to verify the results and we expect that process to finish within a day or so. To be in recount, the margin needs to be less than 1% and Allen (as the loser) would have to request it. Because of Virginia voting laws, the margin would have to be much tighter than it currently is to see any change in the outcome. Given the current margins, that is highly, highly unlikely.

Credit to the DSCC for handling this correctly. When the votes show that you're winning, declare victory and make the opposition try to take it away from the less powerful position of having fewer votes.

It would be better to put the candidates on TV and have them say something along the lines of "there are still votes coming in but I'm confident that the people of Virginia/Montana have chosen a new direction for America," but this will do.

In another time when Democrats were less confident (4 or 5 months ago) this sort of press release wouldn't have come out. Dems would have been concerned about 'looking dumb/over-confindent/elitist/liberal/pro-terrorist or whatever. Democrats were scared for so long that they became scared to do anything because it might backfire.

It's nice to see they've move (a little bit) past this.

It may take a month for their claims to be validated, but it's good that Tester and Webb have claimed victory.

2006 Election Jim Webb Jon Tester Recounts

New American Tradition

Though it was a pleasant experience to wake up knowing that every candidate I voted for won (for me it was the first time any candidate I voted for won) and that the Democrats had taken the House and made gains in the Senate, one part of my morning-after-election-day experience was very familiar: I woke up not knowing what the full results were. The New York Times says I might not know for a while:

Virginia's election laws allow an apparent loser to request a recount if a contest's margin is less than 1 percent - and the margin in the preliminary results of the state's Senate election stood this morning at about one-third of 1 percent.

While a recount seems likely, though, if it comes it will not come quickly.

According to a statement issued this month by the state's Board of Elections, no request for a recount may be filed until the vote is certified, which is scheduled to happen this year on Nov. 27th.

After certification, a losing candidate has 10 days to file a recount request in the state courts. The petition will be considered by a panel made up of the Chief Judge of the Circuit Court in Richmond and two judges appointed by the Chief Justice of the state Supreme Court. Those judges then set out guidelines for conducting the recount.

November 27th! That's a long time! I don't know if I can wait that long to find out if Democrats take the Senate.

The article notes that Virginia's last recount didn't see much 'wiggle room' created. In a race for state Attorney General, the margin was 323 votes out of more than 1.9 million cast. If a recount doesn't close that gap, the likelihood that it will make a difference in a race with a margin of just under 8,000 seems small.

That said, we may be waiting a while for the official results. For the next few weeks, Virginia is for Lawyers.

Don't forget that it would be perfectly legal for the sitting Republican Senate to declare Allen the winner and technically the whole problem would go away...

Virginia Senate Recount George Allen Jim Webb 2006 Election

The 'Real Virginia'

From AP:

Members of the Manassas [Virginia] City Council are hearing plenty of opinions on whether a gay man should be allowed to open a massage therapy business in his home.

Howard Daniel is a former Marine Corps reservist who is also a certified massage therapist. He wants to open the business in his home, but nearly two dozen Manassas residents have spoken out against his application.

Daniel already offers his massage therapy services at the local hospital and in the homes of clients.

Two other applications for a home based massage business have been approved by the Manassas City Counsel in the past 3 years, yet half of the council's members have said they'd vote against Daniel's application.

I guess this is the 'Real Virginia' George Felix Allen talks about...

Howard Daniel Manassas Virginia Bigotry Discrimination

Shhh! Dubya in Virgina but Allen Doesn't Want You to Know

From the Washington Post:

As he [Va. Sen. George Felix Allen] and his wife, Susan, stood next to Bush in front of a huge U.S. flag, the president excoriated Democrats on national security and taxes. "They would have our country quit in Iraq before the job is done," Bush said. "That's why they are the party of cut and run. We will fight. We will stay. We will win in Iraq."

After the speech, the senator's aides brought Allen out to meet with reporters, where he softened the tone, saying that "America needs to adjust. Our battlefield commanders need to adjust and adapt to this evolving threat."

That's pretty sad. The Allen Campaign is so desperate to eek out a win in this thing that they've called in Dubya to raise money (about $500,000 last night) but within hours of standing next to him on the stage, the candidate all but tells the media he doesn't support the President's Iraq strategy. Why would Allen do that?

A Washington Post poll last week found that Bush's job approval among likely voters in the November election is at 43 percent in Virginia, about the same as nationally. In addition, 54 percent believe that the war in Iraq was not worth fighting, and 46 percent believe that "strongly."

Nearly a third of Virginia voters live in Northern Virginia, where political leanings are much more like Maryland's than Virginia's. Turnout numbers, especially the relative turnout of NoVa to the rest of Virginia could be the determining factor in the election.

Or George Felix Allen could say something dumb. Again. You never know.

George Allen George W. Bush Virginia Politics 2006 Election

Sen. Jim Webb, D-VA

Well, not yet. But the Washington Post has given him quite an endorsement:

THE U.S. SENATE race in Virginia pits a novice politician, Democrat James Webb , against a much more experienced one, incumbent Republican George Allen, who spent much of the early fall obliterating his reputation for amiable charm and political deftness. As Mr. Allen has partially admitted, his wounds in the close race have been mostly self-inflicted and have left a sour taste in the mouths of many Virginians. Still, there is an even better reason to vote against Mr. Allen: Quite simply, he is a mediocre senator whose six years of undistinguished service do not justify rehiring.

His opponent -- former Navy secretary, former assistant defense secretary, former Marine Corps officer and former Republican -- is admirably independent-minded. He was prescient in warning, back in 2002, that the war in Iraq risked stranding the United States in a long-term occupation without an exit strategy. An intelligent man with a record of integrity, he has resisted the packaging of political consultants, which can only be a good thing. Those assets, as well as his deep familiarity with military and national security affairs, offer the promise that he would make an able, if unorthodox, U.S. senator. And the fact that his youngest son is deployed as a marine in Iraq gives him a perspective that is rare in today's Congress.

[...]

Virginians deserve better and more enlightened representation. Mr. Webb offers that hope.

Allen still leads in the latest poll (October 16th) but only by three points, 47%-44%. That poll is the fourth consecutive poll in which Webb gained on Allen.

This election will come down to who's voters are more energized. It's all about get-out-the-vote.

George Allen Jim Webb Virginia Politics 2006 Election

More on George Allen - UPDATE

George Allen: The Man Who Couldn't Stop Screwing Up.

First, we learn that his use of certain racial slurs wasn't just a 'once in a while' occurence:

"I heard to my left the N-word and I heard it again and I looked around and I heard it again and there was this fellow sitting on the ground....I said to the boy beside me, a man, who is that kid? And he said, oh, that's George Allen." --Patricia Waring

"He just threw it around so casually, it's like he didn't know any better....[W]henever he'd get a black card that he didn't like, he would refer to it as a 'nig--- card' he needed to get rid of." --Leah Deason

"It was part of his everyday speech. It just rolled off his tongue. He'd get a black card he didn't like and he'd toss it back and say, 'I don't need that nig--- ten.'" --a former UVa classmate

What's that, George? You've never used that word? Sure. And you always make sure you've disclosed all your financial concerns per Senate Rules too. Oops, you didn't do that, did you?

For the past five years, Senator George Allen, Republican of Virginia, has failed to tell Congress about stock options he got for his work as a director of a high-tech company.

Congressional rules require senators to disclose to the Senate all deferred compensation, like stock options. The rules also urge senators to avoid taking any official action that could benefit them financially or appear to do so.

Mr. Allen’s stock options date to the period from January 1998 to January 2001, after his term as governor of Virginia and before he took office as senator.

Who's looking forward to new polling for the Senate race in Virginia?

UPDATE: 10:39 am 10.10.2006 - Via Bloomberg:

Stock options that Senator George Allen described as worthless were worth as much as $1.1 million at one point, according to a review of Senate disclosure forms and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filings.

The records appear to contradict remarks he made to the Associated Press. "I got paid in stock options which were worthless," AP quoted him as saying.

Allen served as a board member of Chantilly, Virginia-based Xybernaut Corp. from 1998 until December 2000 and was awarded options on 110,000 shares during that period. His Senate financial disclosure form for 1999, required for candidates as well as officeholders, doesn't report that he owned the options.

Most Virginians might not agree that $1.1 Million is 'worthless.' I'm guessing, however, that there are a growing number of Virginians that think George Allen is worhtless...

George Allen Racist Xybernaut 2006 Election Senate Virginia

More Racism in Allen's Past.

I'm just as un-shocked as you are. From the New York Times:

WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 — Two acquaintances of Senator George Allen of Virginia said today that he had used racially inflammatory language in the 1970's and 1980's, compounding allegations of racial insensitivity that have dogged his re-election campaign since he referred to a young Indian-American as "macaca" a few weeks ago. Mr. Allen said he had never used the language attributed to him by the acquaintances.

Christopher Taylor, an anthropology professor at Alabama University in Birmingham, Ala., said that in the early 1980's he heard Mr. Allen use an inflammatory epithet for African Americans. Mr. Taylor, who is white and was then a graduate student at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, said the term came up in a conversation about the turtles in a pond near Mr. Allen’s property. According to Mr. Taylor, Mr. Allen said that "around here" only the African Americans — whom he referred to by the epithet — "eat 'em."

Anybody who still thinks this guy is anything but a racist bigot is being willfully ignorant. I want a list of Republicans that have endorsed Allen. They need to be called out on this. Now that it's known that Allen is a racist, do they still endorse him for Senate?

Virginia Politics George Allen Racism

I Never Would Have Guessed

Via Salon.com:

Three former college football teammates of Sen. George Allen say that the Virginia Republican repeatedly used an inflammatory racial epithet and demonstrated racist attitudes toward blacks during the early 1970s.

"Allen said he came to Virginia because he wanted to play football in a place where 'blacks knew their place,'" said Dr. Ken Shelton, a white radiologist in North Carolina who played tight end for the University of Virginia football team when Allen was quarterback. "He used the N-word on a regular basis back then."

A second white teammate, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared retribution from the Allen campaign, separately claimed that Allen used the word "nigger" to describe blacks. "It was so common with George when he was among his white friends. This is the terminology he used," the teammate said.

A third white teammate contacted separately, who also spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of being attacked by the Virginia senator, said he too remembers Allen using the word "nigger," though he said he could not recall a specific conversation in which Allen used the term. "My impression of him was that he was a racist," the third teammate said.

Raise your hand if you're surprised.

Nobody?

That's what I thought. And think! People actually thought this asshat would be president.

George Allen Racist Republicans Virginia Senate 2006

Tucker Carlson = Racist

Via Media Matters:

On the September 18 edition of MSNBC's Tucker, host Tucker Carlson called S.R. Sidarth, a volunteer with the campaign of Virginia Democratic Senate challenger Jim Webb, "[t]hat whiny little kid." On August 11, Sen. George F. Allen (R-VA), Webb's opponent, was caught on tape addressing Sidarth as "Macaca" and saying to him: "Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia." Macaca is a genus of monkey and is also reportedly a slur used in Europe and North Africa against people of African descent; Sidarth is of Indian descent, but he was reportedly born and raised in Virginia.

As Media Matters for America noted, Allen has engaged in behavior in the past that has resulted in accusations that he has what The New Republic has called a "race problem." Yet Carlson said that if Allen "loses because he called this kid 'Macaca,' that's got to be the worst possible reason to lose a race." Carlson asked people who were "gonna vote against George Allen" because of the "Macaca" incident to "[p]lease, have some dignity," and repeatedly stated of the issue: "Who cares?" On the August 24 edition of Tucker, Carlson also stated, "He's not calling [Sidarth] a widely recognized racist term. ... I've never even heard that word before." He then asked, "[W]ho cares?"

Media Matters has video and the transcript.

Here's the thing: The only possible reason why Tucker wouldn't care about having a racist like Allen in the Senate is if he agrees with the Senators sentiments.

Being a racist and refering to an American born citizen as a 'monkey' and a racial epithet isn't a good reason not to vote for someone? Not wanting somebody in government that thinks that people who look different couldn't possibly understand what the 'real America' is isn't a good reason? How about just not wanting to elect a bully that would grossly insult a young man who was quietly going about doing his job for having skin darker than your lily-white ideal?

And speaking of victim-blaming, if I recall, S.R. Sidarth never actually said anything. I haven't seen him on TV talking about the incident. I don't even recall Sidarth asking for an apology, though when he got a rather disingenuous one, he was skeptical.

Tucker, you're calling for voters to 'have some dignity' and vote for a racist. How about calling on Senators to NOT BE RACISTS!

And while we're dealing in personal attacks like 'whiny little kid' I'll ask you how it feels to be the first "star" kicked off "Dancing with the Stars." I guess that makes you a 'stone-footed bungling oaf.'

Tucker Carlson George Allen Racism Virginia Politics

It was just a question, George...

Virginia Senator Georgie Allen can't quite keep it together. From the Washington Post:

At a debate in Tysons Corner yesterday between Republican Allen and Democrat Webb, WUSA-TV's Peggy Fox asked Allen, the tobacco-chewing, cowboy-boot-wearing son of a pro football coach, if his Tunisian-born mother has Jewish blood.

"It has been reported," said Fox, that "your grandfather Felix, whom you were given your middle name for, was Jewish. Could you please tell us whether your forebears include Jews and, if so, at which point Jewish identity might have ended?"

Allen recoiled as if he had been struck. His supporters in the audience booed and hissed.

[...]

Citing reports about his "possible Jewish ancestry," Fox questioned Allen's past denial that his mother is Jewish.

"I'm glad you all have that reaction," Allen said to the audience as people jeered the questioner. Allen lectured Fox about the importance of "freedom of religion and not making aspersions about people because of their religious beliefs."

[...]

Allen, surrounded by cameras and microphones after the event, hadn't cooled down. "What do you mean, 'make me so angry'?" he demanded angrily when asked why Fox's query had made him so angry.

"To make whatever sort of comment that was, you just don't judge people by their ethnicity or their religion," Allen said, fuming that Fox would "drag my mother into this." The senator said his mother was the one who taught him about tolerance.

Taught George Mo' Caucasian than you' Allen about tolerance? You watch and decide for yourself.



This guy won't be president even if he manages to win reelection to the Senate. He won't be able to hide the fact that he's a whackjob when subjected to the scrutiny of a Presidential campaign. Still, the more he spouts off, the better our chances for a Democratic pick up in Virginia.

George Allen Religion Virginia Politics 2006 Election

YouTube Politics

The New York Times has an article on the growing influence, or at least impact, YouTube is having on politics.

The story was brought on, it would seem, by Senator George Allen's recent bigoted diatribe involving a student working for the opposing campaign's Indian heritage and the slur 'macaca.' Unfortunately for Allen, the incident was caught on video and quickly found its way onto the internet.

The student, working for the opposing campaign, taped the comments, and the video quickly appeared on YouTube, where it rocketed to the top of the site's most-viewed list. It then bounced from the Web to the front page of The Washington Post to cable and network television news shows. Despite two public apologies by Senator Allen, and his aides'’ quick explanations for how the strange word tumbled out, political analysts rushed to downgrade Mr. Allen'’s stock as a leading contender for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

That's some pretty serious consequences for something that never would have made it to the evening news two years ago. (Rasmussen says 6%.)

When politicians say inappropriate things, many voters will want to know. Now they can see it for themselves on the Web.

But YouTube may be changing the political process in more profound ways, for good and perhaps not for the better, according to strategists in both parties. If campaigns resemble reality television, where any moment of a candidate's life can be captured on film and posted on the Web, will the last shreds of authenticity be stripped from our public officials? Will candidates be pushed further into a scripted bubble? In short, will YouTube democratize politics, or destroy it?

The article takes the position that YouTude will force politics deeper into the sound-byte, pre-packaged realm. Ex-Bush strategist Matthew Dowd says "that politicians now have to be perfect from Day 1. It's taken some richness out of the political discourse.‚”

We all know what Republicans mean by the 'richness of political discourse.'

Dowd thinks that YouTube will prevent politicians from crafting a message over time, refining speeches and trying out new frames, all out of fear that the oldversionss will circulate on the internet.

What Dowd misses is that it's not bad speeches and outdated frames that end up being popular on YouTube. It's the spectacular gaffes that YouTube craves. People aren't going to call their coworkers over to their cubicle to show them the video of Senator Smith using last week's talking points. People don't want to watch wonkishness, they want to watch a Senator belittle a college kid using racial epithets.

Politicians only need to worry about letting their personalities slip into speeches if that personality is going to offend the voting population! If you're a racist bastard, then you need to worry about letting something slip out. Politicians don't need to worry about censoring themselves if they aren't going to accidentally use the N-word.

YouTube has left handlers with less control over their candidate's image. For that reason, it's probably good for politics. Plus it allows essentially free forums for campaign adds to be distributed. What's not to like?

Politics YouTube George Allen
Image: Christopher Serra - New York Times