FOX News election night coverage

Sunday Funnies

Kaufman's apprentice gets boost for Clerk

I speculated previously about two people working for Beverly Kaufman who might be line up to run for her position in 2010 but Miya Shay found the true teacher's pet:

When (Kaufman) announced her retirement, I assumed there would be a jockeying of candidates from both Democrats and Republicans. On the Dem side, several names have been bantered about, including Sue Schechter. On the Republican side, while there have been talk of several semi-notables, the main guy is shaping up to be Kevin Mauzy. Who is he? Mauzy has been Kaufman's chief deputy for years, and Kaufman quickly endorsed him as HER choice.

As previously blogged, I spent many late election evenings in the Harris County Clerk's ballot cave over the past couple of years, and not only did I never meet Mauzy, I never even heard of him before this. But let's allow Miya to continue ...

Yesterday, while covering Prof. Barton Smith's bi-annual chat about the Houston economy, I ran into Kaufman and Mauzy at the luncheon.

"Are you trying to get Mauzy in front of the TV cameras so he'll have an advantage?" I asked.

"Isn't it obvious what I'm trying to do?" Kaufman answered with a big grin. "It's called earned media, it's very important."

We chatted a bit more about Kaufman's plan. Basically, during the run-up to the November election, she tried to hand over every on camera media request to Mauzy. she (sic) plans to continue doing that as we get closer to the December run-off. The idea is to give Mauzy free TV exposure, and valuable name ID. In addition, since most of the questions asked by the media are mundane, uncontroversial clerk stuff, it's easy to sound like you know what's going on.

Basically, Kaufman's trying to give Mauzy the "air of incumbency" without being an incumbent or an elected official. This is not illegal, and it just might work. Think about every media outlet that will need an interview or a quote about voter turnout or polling hours between now and next March. If Mauzy's the one giving the information, then that's an advantage his opponents can't buy. It will help stave off Republican contenders, and force Democratic challengers into an even more uphill battle.

Let's pause for a moment here.

The Harris County Clerk, the person responsible for administering elections in the nation's third most populous county, is -- once again -- using her office to influence voter opinion to her choice, this time for the person who would succeed her. And Shay, a hard-working member of the ABC affiliate in Houston covering the political beat, is favorably impressed by this?

If you wanted an example of political corruption enabled by a compliant corporate media, you would be hard-pressed to find a better one.

Read the comments and you'll note that a GOP precinct chair isn't too fond of the idea, either. Then again Mr. Large has been in the news over his, ah, issues with other Republican candidates also.

Bachmann Teabagger Overdrive

Brad Friedman (he coined the header used here) and Richard Blair link to the photo at yesterday's latest protest against health care, where this poster appeared ...



The red lettering in the photo reads: "National Socialist Health Care: Dachau, Germany – 1945". Pasted over a stack of concentration camp corpses.

House Republican leadership in attendance at the rally where this poster was displayed, near the front and center of the stage, included John Boehner -- who mistook the Declaration of Independence for the Constitution -- and Eric Cantor, who also happens to be Jewish.

How much is too much?

That wacky Texas Tribune poll

The one with Rick Perry ahead of Kay Bailey 42-30? Not just obviously flawed, not simply bogus, but a whiff of deception on the part of the Texas political sphere's shiny new model.

First of all, Polling Point simply doesn't have the chops to to perform this research. They are a sign-up-and-vote-online outfit. Even Zogby has more credibility. If the Tribbers were going to spend tens of thousands of their dollars on a poll, they should have picked one with a better methodology, or at least a more visible reputation.

Secondly, while PP had Ronnie Earle and Farouk Shami as Democratic choices for governor -- officially neither one is in the race, until Tuesday that is for Shami -- Hank Gilbert was not, at least for most of the "polling period". That's just incompetent. Gilbert has had ten times the online and offline visibility of both Earle and Shami combined. Gilbert has been on a statewide ballot before, in fact was the state's second-highest Democratic vote collector in 2006.

Someone at the Tribune must have known all this, and just flat-out blew it. Or God forbid, something worse.

Third, Wayne Slater and Glenn Smith and even Paul Burka have all questioned the poll's veracity. Burka's slow, but when even he gets it...

Fourth, Evan Smith is purportedly aggressively defensive about the poll. Protests and methinking and all that.

So with that many black marks against it, why run with it (besides the obvious, which is that they spent thousands of dollars on it)?

It's a shame the Texas Tribune opened with such a stinkbomb. They need to hold themselves to a higher standard than this going forward. If it's accurate that some of those folks writing over there are pulling down 90K, they suddenly have a lot farther distance to go to earn it.

RG Ratcliffe excerpts Kay Bailey's response. This is probably the last time I will ever agree with her.

Ed. note: The Texas Tribune poll did not include Shami as a candidate. I regret the error.

Two outta three ain't bad for the Right

But they still lost a seat in Congress they had held for over a hundred years:

President Barack Obama's decision in June to appoint a Republican congressman to a Pentagon post has paid dividends in November now that Democrats have gained the House seat by capitalizing on a split between moderates and conservatives in the GOP.

Lawyer and retired Air Force Capt. Bill Owens won the special election Tuesday in northern New York in which the Republican candidate withdrew over the weekend under pressure from the party's right wing and GOP heavyweights endorsed the Conservative Party nominee.

The teabaggers stepped up to the pump and promptly spilled gasoline all over the shoes.

With 92 percent of the precincts reporting early Wednesday, Owens defeated businessman Doug Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate, 49 percent to 45 percent, after a boost from unified labor efforts in the last days of the campaign.

The GOP had represented the region for more than a century. Republican John McHugh vacated the seat to become Army secretary.

Owens thanked one-time opponent Dierdre Scozzafava, a moderate Republican who exited the race Saturday after Republicans criticized her support of abortion rights and same-sex marriage and Hoffman surged past her in the polls. Scozzafava, an assemblywoman in the state legislature, picked up 6 percent of the vote herself.

The race received national attention, with some calling it a referendum on Obama and others saying it could help Republicans focus their message to attract more people to the party.

Owens defeated Hoffman despite a voter registration edge of 45,000 for Republicans and big-name endorsements for Hoffman from former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, former Republican Sen. Fred Thompson and others.

Creigh Deeds and Jon Corzine were damaged goods. Deeds was woefully incompetent, losing to McDonnell a second time (the VA attorney general race in 2005 was the first) and Corzine, who was also in the US Senate before the governor's office, had worn out his welcome with New Jerseyites. He had job approval ratings in the 30s. Both men should have lost.

But NY-23 was where the GOP Palintologists wanted to stake their claim, and they choked. That won't be what you hear on teevee today, though. You'll hear a whole lot of "referendum on Obama" bullshit.

Damned liberal media.

Three point two million down the drain

All that money and he barely outdrew Roy Morales.

The unpredictable and unorthodox race for Houston mayor narrowed Tuesday to a choice between a veteran City Hall insider trying to become Houston's first openly gay leader and a former civil rights activist hoping to become only the second African-American to run the nation's fourth-largest city.

City Controller Annise Parker and former City Attorney Gene Locke, the two candidates originally predicted by many to prevail at the race's outset, face each other in a Dec. 12 runoff.

Roy. Freaking. Morales.

(T)he big surprise of the night was the strong showing by Roy Morales, the race's only conservative. The retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, who ran with virtually no money and no endorsements compared to his opponents, placed only a few percentage points behind City Councilman Peter Brown, who poured more than $3.2 million of his family fortune into his candidacy.

All of the teevee ads, all of the forests of dead trees who sacrificed their lives for his direct mail pieces, and all of Marc Campos' bleating about it came to naught.

The old axiom about choosing between a real Republican and a pretend one is only partly true in this case -- more people still chose Brown, but barely. Both his and Morales' endorsement will be sought (read: pandered to) over the next five weeks. Let's watch how hard Gene Locke runs to the right in the run-off. Will Beverly Kaufman endorse him a second time?

Meanwhile in the city council races, a pretend Democrat -- Stephen Costello -- did get into a run-off with a real one -- Karen Derr. A couple of incumbents, Sue Lovell and Jo Jones, will have to fight to keep their jobs next month. CO Bradford resurrects his political career after losing the very close Harris County DA race in 2008 with an outright win in Peter Brown's vacated council seat. And the controller's contest heads to a runoff with Ronald Green and MJ Khan barely eliminating Pam Holm.

Two Progressive Coalition candidates, Deb Shafto and Don Cook, managed double-digit vote percentages but missed the run-off.

More fun still to come, and if you want more excruciating detail, Kuffner and Muse and Wythe are where you want to be.

Ten things to watch tonight in the returns

My poll duty completed, I'll excerpt and link this from Richard Dunham in the Chron's DC bureau regarding election results this evening. (It leans a little too much to the right, but -- as we always do in Houston, a blue city inside a purple county in the middle of a red state -- we'll roll with it.) Let's start with #5, #6, and #7, since they are locally relevant ...

5. Breakthroughs for gays and lesbians?
Gay and lesbian groups are looking closely at elections in Houston and Maine. In Houston, City Controller Annise Parker is trying to win a spot in a mayoral runoff. If elected, she would become the first out-of-the-closet lesbian to run a major American city. In Maine, voters will decide whether to overturn the legislature's endorsement of same-sex marriage. Note: Gay marriage has been defeated in every single statewide election thus far. Will today be any different?

I predict 'yes, today will'.

6. Will Houston elect a City Council member as its mayor?

It's been 41 years since a former councilman was elected mayor. Remember Jim McConn? So while Peter Brown leads in the polls and has deep pockets, history is not on his side.

7. What will happen to the supporters of Houston's third- and fourth-place finishers?

Only two candidates in Houston's race to replace outgoing Mayor Bill White can make a runoff, and the losers' supporters could play a pivotal role in the runoff. Roy Morales is the only conservative Republican in the race and, if he loses today, his supporters could be decisive in a close race. Likewise, Gene Locke or Peter Brown's African- American backers or Annise Parker's community activists could tip the balance.

My prediction, like Muse's, is Parker and Brown in a run-off, with the Locke and Morales endorsements as high up in the air as tonight's finish.

1. Can the GOP “sweep” the Big Three races of the day?

Those are the Virginia and New Jersey governor's races and the special U.S. House election in upstate New York. Virginia's a gimme. State Attorney General Bob McDonnell is headed toward a landslide win — despite Obama's fairly high approval ratings in the Old Dominion. New Jersey is a toss-up. And the Republican has actually dropped out of New York's 23rd District race (and endorsed the Democrat). GOP hopes are pinned to the candidacy of Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman. If conservatives are charged up and beat the Dems in all three of these races, you can't help but call it a very bad day for Obama.

Two out of three -- Virginia and New York, but not New Jersey -- will still be interpreted as 'not bad' for the Repubes.

Rest here.

Election Day Wrangle

The day before, anyway. The Texas Progressive Alliance reminds you to -- wherever in Texas (or elsewhere) you happen to be -- get out and vote tomorrow. Here are this week's highlights.

Aruba Petroleum is drilling a Barnett Shale gas well in the backyard of Tim and Christine. Their property was taken, its value diminished, they were threatened and now Aruba Petroleum spilled toxic drilling waste a few feet from where their daughter plays. Another tale (with video) about the victims of the Shale on Bluedaze: DRILLING REFORM FOR TEXAS.

Justin at Asian-American Action Fund Blog has a roundup of the Houston city elections and proposed Texas constitutional amendments.

The Texas Cloverleaf looks at the high cost of low turnout elections by examining Denton County. $25 a vote, anyone?

This week at McBlogger, we took a look at Hank Gilbert's plan to Get Texas Moving Again.

Big news from San Antonio, where with just days before City Council was to vote to move forward with the South Texas Nuclear Project expansion, officials suddenly announced that the cost estimate for the project had ballooned by up to $4 billion! Find out more from Citizen Sarah over at Texas Vox.

WCNews at Eye On Williamson posts on the Texas' GOP leadership that thinks our state's economy is just fine: Dunnam hammers Perry, Dewhurst -- GOP needs to face rality on economy in Texas. They'll be singing a different tune when they're out of work in 2011.

TEXPAC, the Texas Medical Association's political action committee, hosted a forum where all six declared US Senate candidates -- John Sharp, Bill White, Elizabeth Ames Jones, Florence Shapiro, Michael Williams, and Roger Williams -- made an appearance. See the videos posted by PDiddie at Brains and Eggs.

John Coby at Bay Area Houston wonders: What does it take for a Republican to resign?

Off the Kuff takes a look at how Houston's mayoral candidates are spending their money.

At WhosPlayin, Trace makes his case for why we need to talk to Iran.

Mean Rachel wonders why Texas Democratic statewide candidates have electile dysfunction.

At TexasKaos, liberaltexan brings us up to date on Republican efforts to "fight liberalism" on the A&M campus, and it ain't pretty. Check it out : Young, Conservative, and Intolerant.

At WhosPlayin, Trace makes his case for why we need to talk to Iran.

Mean Rachel wonders why Texas Democratic statewide candidates have Electile Dysfunction.

At TexasKaos, liberaltexan brings us up to date on Republican efforts to "fight liberalism" on the A&M campus, and it ain't pretty. Check it out : Young, Conservative, and Intolerant.

This week Teddy at Left of College Station writes about the young, conservative, and intolerant Texas A&M Chapter of the Young Conservatives of Texas and about the lies and misinformation that the Coalition for Life gives to women in front of Planned Parenthood. Check out the videos posted from President Obama's visit to Texas A&M including an interview with a Texas A&M student, a rant from a member of the Texas Minuteman, and highlights from the anti-Obama protest.

Sunday Funnies

Some good news for newspapers

Via Socratic Gadfly, there remain some optimists among industry observers.

Each time another report surfaces about the decline of newspapers, I feel like a death-row inmate counting the warden's footsteps.

The latest echo of doom arrived a few days ago: U.S. newspaper circulation dropped 10 percent from April through September, compared with the same period last year. The largest decrease recorded thus far, the decline was attributed to the usual -- advertising and readership lost to the Web. Industrywide, ad revenue, which constitutes newspapers' main source of income, is on track to drop $20 billion by 2010. Even so, most newspapers remain profitable, and circulation is astoundingly good, all things considered.

That's the delightful view of Alex Jones -- fourth-generation member of a newspaper-owning family, Pulitzer Prize-winning media critic and now author of "Losing the News." In his book, Jones, who also heads Harvard University's Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, manages to combine a dispassionate look at the news business with a page-turning story of traditional journalism's highs and lows.

A first-chapter excerpt is here and a lengthier Google Book preview is here. In my read it has a little more fear-mongering and a little less causality: corporate ownership -- specifically 30 per cent profit margins.

His nightmare scenario is that current trends eventually could produce "a yawning disparity in accurate knowledge just as there is in wealth," he writes in the book. "We could be heading for a well-informed class at the top and a broad populace awash in opinion, spin, and propaganda."

Traditional news organizations, especially newspapers, provide what Jones calls the "iron core" of information. Some new media, including Web sites and nonprofits, produce some news and investigative journalism, but traditional media outlets produce the bulk. The reason is that journalism is expensive. Thus far, only traditional media have the money and institutional wherewithal to withstand boycotts or to fight First Amendment battles. Unknown is how some of the newer journalism entities will respond when, inevitably, they are challenged.

Jones doesn't shy away from charges that the media are biased, but he insists that "the media" are not monolithic. Reporters and editors are human and make mistakes, but they also are bound by standards. Accountability matters. Jones, meanwhile, stakes great faith in Americans' ability to distinguish between entertainment centered on public issues and traditional journalism.

He predicts that newspapers will develop new business models and survive. And though every news organization will have alternate methods of delivery, including the Web, each entity should remain true to its "authentic self."

Web culture -- fast, irreverent, crude and subjective -- is one kind of creature. Traditional media are different and should stick to what they historically have done best. Crucial to survival will be a renewed commitment to community, to corporate citizenship and social responsibility, and above all, to quality.

Anyway, having subscribed to a dead-tree version of the Houston Chronicle this past week after several years away, I think I will pay to read all of Alex Jones' book. Hopefully some newspaper managers do the same.

The White (Haunted) House

Two thousand children rang the bell at 1600 Pennsylvania last night:

Dressed as superheroes, pirates, fairies and skeletons, the kids came in with their parents from Maryland, Virginia and Washington D.C., and lined up on the orange-lit White House driveway. ...

Mrs. Obama wore furry cat ears and a leopard-patterned top. Obama said the kids looked adorable, as well as his wife, "a very nice looking Catwoman."

This just cracks me up. We saw trick-or-treaters of all ages all over West U last night, on the way home from our sushi feast in the Village.

By early afternoon, a big, stuffed, black spider was dangling in a web of string from the top of the portico, and pumpkins had sprouted up around the columns. The White House will be lit orange for the occasion, and three giants pumpkins — about 1,000 pounds each — will be on the grounds.

The loot is just part of the treat for the kids, ages 6 to 14. Roaming the North Lawn were fairies, bubble makers, wandering trees, Star Wars characters, theater actors and artists and a “skeleton band.”

Here are more pictures.