Steve Perry

Idaho children chant ‘Assassinate Obama’ on school bus

The following report was filed earlier this week on CBS affiliate KIDK-TV. In the town of Rexburg, Idaho — home to a campus of Brigham Young University — one family reported to school officials that children on a school bus were chanting “Assassinate Obama” on the ride home from school last Friday.
The most chilling part [...]

Want a top-level job with Obama administration? They have a question or 63 for you

The New York Times has posted a PDF copy of the job application questions facing anyone in line for top posts in the Barack Obama administration. Stretching on for a staggering seven pages, it features 63 questions sorted into eight categories: professional background; publications, writings and speeches; relationships and affiliations; financial information; tax information; legal [...]

Franken campaign sues for lists of rejected absentee voters, shoots itself in foot

As Pat Lopez reports in the Strib, the Al Franken campaign has filed suit against Ramsey County to compel disclosure of the names and addresses of voters whose absentee ballots were rejected.

Legally and politically, it’s a perfectly legitimate move to ensure that every vote is counted, but Team Franken stepped into a PR nightmare by embellishing the news of their lawsuit with the high-pathos anecdotal case of an 84-year-old Beltrami County woman whose ballot was rejected because a stroke had altered her signature.

The Schultz Report: Is Minnesota another Florida 2000? No, and yes

In this week’s edition of the Schultz Report audiocast, David Schultz examines the looming vote recount in the Minnesota US Senate face-off between Sen. Norm Coleman and Al Franken.

Is the situation here another Florida 2000 cage match, as so many pundits are claiming? In most respects, Schultz thinks the answer is no. But when it comes to the stakes and the political gamesmanship, that’s another matter.

National housing market posts seventh straight quarter of declining prices

New numbers from the real estate website Zillow.com, via CNBC:
Home values fell 9.7 percent year-over-year in the third quarter to a Zillow Home Value Index of $202,966, according to the third quarter Zillow Real Estate Market Reports, which encompass 163 metropolitan areas.
Home values have dropped a total 12.8 percent since the market peaked in 2006.
Year-over-year [...]

Greenwald: Meet the new bosses…

The ever-acute Glenn Greenwald has that morning-after feeling:
Though it hasn’t happened yet, it is appearing increasingly likely that Senate Democrats — led by Barack Obama (who seems to be playing a much more active role in all of this than his spokesperson yesterday suggested) — are going to choose Joe Lieberman to serve as their Chairman of [...]

Best Coleman/Franken recount preview: Ragsdale’s Pioneer Press column

The Pi Press’s veteran political reporter and analyst Jim Ragsdale has a must-read column on the pending Minnesota US Senate recount.

The Coleman campaign, while promising to “work together to get things done,” has dished most of the dirt, suggesting that normal bounces in the unofficial results are evidence of vote-tampering or worse. Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty jumped in this week, saying that the question is whether “ballots from outside the process are going to be allowed in.”

I understand the freak-out factor for the Republican team when the net result of the “unofficial” changes has benefitted Franken, the Democrat. That will be sorted out in the recount. But having our top Republican officials suggest that state and local election officials are crooked is irresponsible and reminiscent of the battle in Miami-Dade, Palm Beach and Tallahassee in November and December 2000.

Ragsdale then goes on to compare Florida 2000 to Minnesota 2008.

Team Coleman jumps on Mark Ritchie MSNBC comment

UPDATED W/ VIDEO [below]: Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie (pictured) elicited the scorn of the Norm Coleman campaign today after making the following remarks in a morning appearance on MSNBC:
“Their [the Coleman campaign's] goal is to win at any price. They’ve invested millions and millions of dollars. We consider this part of the normal [...]

Michael Barone: “Liberal media attacked Sarah Palin because she did not abort her Down syndrome baby”

This is bizarre: The conservative pundit Michael Barone, a Fox News Channel habitue as well as the editor of the Almanac of American Politics, told attendees of a higher-education convention yesterday, and we quote:
“The liberal media attacked Sarah Palin because she did not abort her Down syndrome baby… They wanted her to kill that child. [...]

Survey: Half of religious McCain voters believe Obama is or was Muslim

The Beliefnet forum, one of the largest religion-related discussion sites on the web, has conducted a post-election survey to gauge the values and motivations of believers who voted for Barack Obama or John McCain.
Here’s the eye-catcher: “Half of McCain voters believe Obama is or was Muslim, with 31.7% saying ‘He used to be Muslim and [...]