60? Still a very long shot. But 59 could totally happen. In today’s episode of TPMtv, we bring you up to speed on the very latest on the still-to-be-decided Senate races …
Full-size video at TPMtv.com.
From TPM Reader KT …
If one were so inclined, couldn’t one take the combination of (a) Palin’s statement about the relationship between G-d and her possible Senate career and (b) Stevens’ almost immediate (miraculous?) drop into a position where he now trails Begich, as proof that of divine intervention?
Some Senate Dem staffers considering making health care reform a part of the pending economic stimulus package.
Secretaries of State don’t usually last more than a single presidential term. And sometimes they don’t make it that long. So, for the life of me, I do not understand why Hillary Clinton would want to give up what is in all likelihood a senate seat for life to run the State Department for Barack Obama.
Late Update: This post, not surprisingly, has generated a big response. And a few of you have suggested that this is a way for Hillary to angle for another shot at the presidency in 2012 or 2016. But that strikes me as deeply, deeply improbable. Never an easy thing to challenge a sitting president of your own party, next to impossible to do it from his own cabinet. I don’t have an answer on why either party would want this appointment. But that ain’t the reason.
Perhaps like others of you out there, I was checking this afternoon at the Alaska election return website to see if there was any other movement on the Stevens-Begich numbers. After I saw that wasn’t happening I checked in to see what the deal was and when the rest of the counting was going to take place.
This is what I found from an article in the Anchorage Daily News …
The state still needs to count at least 15,000 questioned ballots and an estimated 25,000 absentees. With all the absentee votes coming in, this will be one of the biggest turnouts, if not the biggest in terms of ballots cast, the state has ever seen. That’s despite questions in the media and on blogs about why turnout appeared low on Election Day.
Most regional elections headquarters will count their remaining ballots on Friday. But the most populous region, based in Anchorage, won’t count its ballots until either Monday or Wednesday, state elections chief Gail Fenumiai said.
To get some perspective, it was roughly 60,000 votes counted on Wednesday that accounted for the roughly 4,000 vote swing from Stevens to Begich.
As I mentioned a few days ago, one of the biggest background stories of the coming months is the rewiring of Washington, speficially the rewiring of the para-government (which includes the lobby shops, the think tanks and much more) for a period of Democratic dominance. Here’s another piece in the Post on what’s happening in the lobbying sector.
The gist: it’s a good time to be a Democratic staffer with a decent resume looking for work on K Street.
Set a course for adventure and your mind on a new romance — with Mitt Romney — on the National Review‘s post-election Caribbean cruise. That and the day’s other political news in the TPM Election Central Morning Roundup.
The Democratic cadre that came up during the Clinton Administration is back, with congressional majorities and a mandate they never had in the ’90s.