And the early voters seem to favor Obama. Knox County numbers are pretty astounding, too, not to mention Roane and Anderson. 1.5 million across the state.
October 2008 Archives
No, just kidding. It's actually terrible news! Terrible enough to warrant the use of the word "downright." From UT's Center for Business and Economic Research 2008 Economic Report.
Via WBIR:
The fall 2008 Economic Report to the Governor was released today, and it said the path forward is nothing other than "downright ugly."
It cites housing starts at their lowest since 1945, job losses every month, and a shrinking Gross Domestic Product as indicators.
The report's authors expect the GDP to keep shrinking through the middle of 2009.
Thanks to Archon Fung over at myfairelection.com, you can now track voting problems at districts throughout the country.
From Brainiac:
Fung and ABC are asking voters from every state to register at myfairelection.com. After they've -- that is, you've -- cast your ballot next Tuesday (or sooner), you can then log on again and report how your experience was: one to five stars, plus a few comments about specifics. If you've registered in advance, you can also submit your ratings via email (perhaps live from the scene, from your Blackberry or Palm).
As of this writing, only three people have signed up in Tennessee--just one in Knox County.
Via Wonkette:
Joe Killian is an elitist media journalist de politico for a North Carolina newspaper, the Greensboro News-Record. Ooh well isn't he neat. He was covering a Sarah Palin rally at Elon University yesterday, a radical liberal college, and when he laughed at the college kids fighting with the Palin supporters outside the event, some fat slob kicked him to the ground from behind, haw haw haw.
From a blog post yesterday titled "Former Fetus Barack Obama":
Barack Obama may actually believe, as he stated yesterday, that Roe v. Wade "was rightly decided." But it may be very lucky for him, as the son born of that woman, that it hadn't been decided a dozen or so years earlier.
And, today, in explanation:
I aimed to use a concrete circumstance and a hypothetical to get people to (as I put it) "think more carefully about the valuable role that protective abortion laws play." I don't see what is remotely objectionable about that, especially as I clearly refrained from opining that Obama's mother would have chosen one path over another.
Hey, remember when they fired Christopher Buckley for this post?
Oliver Stone's new George W. Bush biopic comes out today, and former Fla. Gov. Jeb Bush calls it all a bunch of "hooey," specifically the "Oedipal rivalry" bit. Oedipal rivalry? I am now officially excited.
Conservative-leaning News Corp. rag the New York Post, gives it pretty good accuracy (read: they have to call it "truthiness." Ugh.) points. So does MTV. And Slate's Timothy Noah gives a pretty good case for Bush being Stone's perfect subject.
The film features, among other things, a drunken 26-year-old Bush crashing his car into some trash cans at his family's home, then threatening to go "mano a mano" with his father. This one, of course, seems to be true. Again, I can't wait to see this movie.
Local home prices are falling in Knoxville, writes KNS blogger Josh Flory in Property Scope:
If you want to know your home's estimated value, go here, and click on Home Price Calculator.Data from the Knoxville Area Association of Realtors show the median sale price of a three-bedroom home fell 4.4 percent in September, to $142,500.
...
Total residential sales fell 27.8 percent, to 931, while the average market time was 105 days.
From Bloomberg:
The U.S. Supreme Court, siding with Democrats, freed Ohio officials from a lower court order that might have limited participation by new voters in next month's presidential election.
Today's ruling means Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, doesn't have to provide county election boards with lists of new registrants whose information doesn't match up with government databases. A federal trial judge had ordered Brunner to supply the lists by today.
Well, our Congressional representatives' scorecard, at least. This was taken from the League of Conservation Voters Environmental scorecard. Released this morning, the scorecard is an annual analysis of "key environmental votes" in the House and Senate.
Here's some more samples:
From io9:
Bad news, Cormac McCarthy fans -- The Road's movie adaptation, featuring scraggily Viggo Mortensen, has now been pushed back from its original soft release dates of Nov. 14 and Nov. 26 to "at least December." The Hollywood Reporter is stating that the apocalyptic movie may even be pushed into the new year.
For September, up, 0.6 percent from August and 2.3 percent from Sept. 2007, says an announcement today from the Tennessee Department of Labor. The national rate for September was 6.1 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
From the press release:
From September 2007 to September 2008, educational and health services added 6,100 jobs. Local government educational services employment increased by 1,900. From 2007 manufacturing was down by 10,000. Professional and business services lost 6,800 jobs; leisure and hospitality lost 5,700.
Congratulations, Joe.
Joe Wurzelbacher, the unlicensed Ohio plumber who was transformed last night into a symbol for getting around substantive dialogue, has been on TV and in the newspapers, a lot, today. Here's what we know so far about Joe the Fodder:
sooooo...
aaaaannnnd...
This season of change, excitement, and looking forward to a bold, new, non-intergalactic but still sort of exciting adventure, is also a season of reflection, of looking back at the past eight years. Here's the morning's sampler of some tearful reminiscing from the Washington Post:
The Bush administration issued a pair of secret memos to the CIA in 2003 and 2004 that explicitly endorsed the agency's use of interrogation techniques such as waterboarding against al-Qaeda suspects -- documents prompted by worries among intelligence officials about a possible backlash if details of the program became public.
And Harper's Magazine's Scott Horton already has an idea for the Bush legacy name, a la "The Great Communicator" or "the New Deal President."
So, think back, America, on the way we were.
It's officially the beginning of the end of this thing as already-committed voters across the state head to early voting polling locations. Early voting lasts from today until Oct. 30. Here are the locations and hours, courtesy of the Knox County Election Commission.
Oh, and in case you were wondering, that controversial "re-wording" of the proposed charter amendment to change four elected positions to mayoral appointments, has not been re-re-worded. "To take away from the people the ability to vote for..." still appears twice in County Charter Amendment Question Four.
Knoxville was at the top of national media headlines three times yesterday. The first story, as we've already noted here, was the indictment and subsequent not guilty plea of UT student and accused Palin email "hacker" David Kernell. Then, there were custody battle updates in the ongoing McLean "love triangle" murder saga.
The day, of course, ended on a distinctly more tragic note with the shooting at Knoxville Center yesterday afternoon, which left one man dead and another injured.
Minutes after suspect William Johnson allegedly shot and killed Reno Mens Wear employee Ahmed Nahl, the story hit the wire services and cable news. Since then, it's been making the rounds internationally.
The News-Sentinel, of course, has had the most extensive coverage thus far of this sensitive story (note all of the deleted comments), including this interview with shooting witness County Commissioner Greg "Lumpy" Lambert.
The McCain campaign debuted this new ad yesterday, called "Folks," which highlights Barack Obama's National Journal ranking as "the most liberal Senator." From johnmccain.com:
Despite Barack Obama's protests, the truth is very clear that Barack Obama is the most liberal member of the United States Senate. The ad will be televised nationally.
But, how clear is it, and just where did that "folks are lying" quote, used throughout the ad seemingly as Obama's lame response to the ranking, actually come from? From Oliver Burkeman's campaign blog at guardian.co.uk:
the "folks are lying" quote isn't taken from Obama's response to the National Journal ranking at all. (It actually comes from his response to the National Right To Life Committee over "born-alive infant" laws in Illinois.)
And here's what Charles Green of the National Journal had to say about the magazine's rankings.
Finally, here's what The New York Times wrote about the campaigns this morning.
The greatest cover-up conspiracy of the past six decades has finally been blown wide open by the editor of this credible looking magazine. The world may have had cause to rejoice, had the British discoverer Philip Mantle not gone all nationalistic on us. From The Telegraph:
"Us Brits really have beaten the Americans at their own game and it is really great that we have done that. It really is revolutionary for the UFO world."I, for one, am 100 percent convinced.
David Kernell, 20, a UT student and son of state Rep. Mike Kernell, has been indicted by a grand jury for accessing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's email without authorization. Kernell could face up to five years in prison if convicted. Here's the Department of Justice's press release.
Whatever.
Here's how Tennessee voted:
David Davis, R, Dist 1: Nay
John "Jimmy" Duncan, Jr ., R, Dist. 2: Nay
Zach Wamp, R, Dist. 3: Yea
Lincoln Davis, D, Dist. 4: Nay
Jim Cooper, D, Dist. 5: Yea
Bart Gordon, D, Dist. 6: Yea
Marsha Blackburn, R, Dist. 7: Nay
John Tanner, D, Dist. 8: Yea
Stephen Cohen, D, Dist. 9: Yea
Wamp's the only one who changed his vote from Monday.
Complete vote here.
Here's how Tennessee voted:
David Davis, R, Dist 1: Nay
John "Jimmy" Duncan, Jr ., R, Dist. 2: Nay
Zach Wamp, R, Dist. 3: Yea
Lincoln Davis, D, Dist. 4: Nay
Jim Cooper, D, Dist. 5: Yea
Bart Gordon, D, Dist. 6: Yea
Marsha Blackburn, R, Dist. 7: Nay
John Tanner, D, Dist. 8: Yea
Stephen Cohen, D, Dist. 9: Yea
Wamp's the only one who changed his vote from Monday.
Complete vote here.
What is it that J's Mega Mart is famous for selling again? I can't remember. Well, now that it seems the Gay St. store may soon close, maybe everyone in town can remind me, over and over again.
Sen. Joe Biden
From Politico:
Criticizing John McCain's health care plan, Biden said that McCain would tax health care and "then you're going to have to replace a $12,000 -- that's the average cost of the plan you get through your employer; it costs $12,000 -- you're going to have to pay -- replace a $12,000 plan, because 20 million of you are going to be dropped. So you're going to have to place -- replace a $12,000 plan with a $5,000 check you've just given to the insurance company."
Got that?
Gov. Sarah Palin
From KnoxViews:
"I'm thankful the Constitution would allow a bit more authority given to the vice president if that vice president so chose to exert it in working with the Senate and making sure that we are supportive of the president's policies and making sure too that our president understands what our strengths are."
Oh, and as for the real substance of the debate, the good folks over at non-partisan FactCheck.org found some good whoppers. One, in particular, that kept coming up was the issue of emergency funding bills for troops in Iraq in Afghanistan. Taking the "We're the defense candidate" tack, Palin repeatedly said that Obama voted against funding for the troops. Well, he did, once. But, then again, so did McCain, when the bill contained language specifying a date for withdrawal.
The county election commission has verified that enough registered county voters--more than 36,000 or 15 percent of total registered voters in the county--have signed the white petition drafted by the Knox Charter Petition group and distributed by Knox Accountability. The White Petition deals with changes to the county's executive branch. If passed, it will create a county inspector general's office, change four elected positions to mayoral appointments, and require disclosure of administrative conflicts of interest.
The election commission is still verifying the signatures on the Orange Petition. They are, as of today, about 388 signatures short, said County Administrator of Elections Greg Mackay at a meeting this afternoon in the City County Building. The election commission is expected to make an announcement about it tomorrow afternoon. The Orange Petition deals with changes to the county commission. If it passes in the November vote, county commission will shrink from 18 to 11 members, the county will have an official anti-nepotism policy, county commissioners will be blocked from voting on legislation in which they have a conflict of interest and will not be allowed to work for other branches of county government.
In other news, unincorporated Knox County residents will get to vote on sales of liquor by the drink.
Tonight's the first vice presidential debate, and the latest opinion polls out there all seem to suggest that McCain VP pick Gov. Sarah Palin has more work to do than Sen. Joe Biden.
According to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released today, confidence in Palin--who just weeks ago was thought to be the answer to the McCain camp's prayers--has eroded. From the Washington Post:
Though she initially transformed the race with her energizing presence and a fiery convention speech, Palin is now a much less positive force: Six in 10 voters see her as lacking the experience to be an effective president, and a third are now less likely to vote for McCain because of her.
Complete poll results here. Oh, and here's a poll from Rasmussen, demonstrating just how important this debate may be.
Meanwhile, Gallup, CBS, and the Associated Press all show Obama at a significant lead over McCain.
Asked why he thinks his numbers are sliding on Fox News this morning, McCain gave a characteristic response.
Okay. Had enough of that nonsense? Me too.
Believe it or not there are things going on in local politics, too. In just a few minutes, the Knox County Elections Commission will tell us whether or not seven proposed amendments to the County Charter will appear on the November ballot. Oh, and the petition for liquor by the drink sales in unincorporated Knox County. Take a look at the very vague agenda. Check back tonight for updates.
