Either Al Franken or Garrison Keillor -- all Minnesotans look alike
-Headline of the day-
"Popular polling site predicts Franken win; Minnesota lawyer sees Franken gains."
Despite an initial strong showing by incumbent Sen. Norm Coleman and stiff competition from the Lizard People, it's starting to look like Al Franken will be the next senator from Minnesota. Nate Silver, the number-crunching savant of FiveThirtyEight.com, dug his mind into the problem and predicted the exact number of votes Franken would win by -- 27.
"[T]he fewer the number of challenged ballots, the better Franken is doing, and the higher the number of challenged ballots, the worse he is doing; the relationship is in fact quite strong," Silver writes. And there are fewer challenged ballots every day.
Politico's Daniel Libit quotes a Minnesota lawyer as saying that Minnesota Democrats are "sloppy voters."
"Democrats are [thought to be] more creative, free-spirited, so the idea is they’re more likely to make a mistake that the optical scan won’t pick up," election law attorney Robert Hentges told Libit. "But when they recount the hard copy, those votes will be counted for Franken. If you talk to Republicans, they say it will be Franken’s advantage, because Democrats are stupid and will screw up ballots more often."
The lesson learned here? Don't get freakin' creative and give your ballot a personal touch. If you need to make a statement in the polling booth, wear goofy clothes or something. (Raw Story)
-Better than what?-
The right wing group "Our Country Deserves Better PAC" is taking donations to pay for an ad to thank Sarah Palin for all the great work she did on the campaign trail.
No, really.
The pitch, which I assume is meant to be read with a straight face, tells us your donation will be used for an "upcoming ad campaign honoring and thanking Gov. Palin for being an articulate, straight-forward and uplifting champion of common sense conservative ideals." Oddly, no mention is made of putting the McCain campaign in the toilet.
Bonus fun; the ad is a Thanksgiving-themed ad. Which means turkey. Who was it who recently starred in a viral video involving a turkey?
I think the phrase you're looking for is "unfortunate timing." (OurCountryPAC.org)
-Bonus HotD-
"A Colbert Christmas: Thank you, Santa!"
How many of you watched Stephen Colbert's Christmas special last night and realized that you might've made the mistake of going through life never seeing George Wendt in a Santa outfit knife a bear for eating Elvis Costello?
What, just me?
Oh well, someone has to wonder about those sort of things and it looks like I've got the job. That you got to see Costello, Colbert, Feist, Willy Nelson, John Legend, and Toby Keith do a version of Nick Lowe's (What's so Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love, and Understanding is just gravy. For me, the holidays will forever be about Santa stabbing a bear.
That's the magic of Christmas. (Entertainment Weekly, with sample videos -- sadly, neither the ursine puncturing nor the Nick Lowe choral are among the samples)
