Thanks to a quirk in New York’s election laws, whoever gets appointed to Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat will have to spend their first three years in office campaigning: Paterson will appoint a Senator in January of 2009 who will hold that position until Jan. 3 of 2011. At that point, the winner of a special [...]

Prorogue transitive verb: 1 : defer , postpone 2 : to terminate a session of (as a British parliament) by royal prerogative intransitive verb: to suspend or end a legislative session Canada has been in the international headlines recently as Stephen Harper’s minority conservative government faces dissolution from a coalition of opposition parties. The best [...]

It hasn’t reached the mainstream media yet, but in the days since Hillary Clinton’s nomination to be Barack Obama’s Secretary of State became official, there’s been some discussion of a little-known provision in the Constitution that could bar Hillary Clinton from serving at Foggy Bottom: [S]pecifically, Article One, Section Six, also known as the emoluments [...]

For all the rhetoric from John McCain, Sarah Palin, and the right-wing scream machine that Barack Obama was a socialist who would drag America further to the left, his first few weeks as President-Elect reveal something entirely different: WASHINGTON — President-elect Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination with the enthusiastic support of the left wing [...]

I believe there is an old story about a prominent liberal Democrat who upon hearing that President Nixon won re-election, expressed shock. How could that be, she thought, she didn’t know anyone who voted for the Republican. The story has been used to show how Democrats can end up living in a little bubble where [...]

Kathleen Parker that it’s time for the Republican Party to divorce itself from the religious wing of the party: As Republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat, they likely will overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit. Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D. (…) To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy [...]

John McCain is back in the Senate and apparently getting ready to run for his seat again in 2010: WASHINGTON – The red-and-blue Senate trolley rolled up to the Capitol basement Tuesday, a lone senator in the front seat checking a piece of paper before slipping it back into his jacket pocket. “Welcome back,” Sen. [...]

Three weeks after Election Day, Minnesota is finally getting around to figuring out who their next Senator will be: ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) – The largest-ever recount in Minnesota history has more than just voters in the state biting their nails. An army of election workers was to begin a statewide recount Wednesday of more [...]

Before the election, there was some speculation that former South Dakota Senator Tom Daschle might become Barack Obama’s Chief of Staff, instead he appears to be headed to the Department of Health and Human Services: CHICAGO (CNN) — Three sources close to the transition and in a position to know tell CNN that former Sen. [...]

Let’s face it: people don’t like the American auto industry. Scratch that: people hate the American auto industry. There are a lot of reasons to hate it: unionized workers who make crazy money that is out of sync with reality, execs who seem to have a tin ear to what Americans really want, cars that [...]

Joe Tauke at The Melting Pot Project thinks he knows why third party candidates, regardless of their ideological stripe, don’t succeed in American politics: Did you know that other democracies in the world choose their legislatures and executives in many, many different ways? If you’ve heard of other countries having six, or nine, or eleven [...]

It’s the political equivalent of a steel cage match. The prize ? The Republican National Committee: A behind-the-scenes battle to take the reins of the Republican National Committee is taking off between former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and former Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele. Neither man will acknowledge his interest in the post, but [...]

Just in case you didn’t catch it this morning, one of Obama’s closest associates, Valerie Jarrett, was on. You’ll be hearing her name a lot more in the coming years. One really important thing she said that Michelle Obama will be a mom first, and won’t be involved in policy decisions. In other words, she’s [...]

He apparently referenced this post about his confrontation with Joe the Plumber. But that’s not the cool part. Don’t get me wrong, it’s incredibly exciting to be mentioned by such a high profile media outlet, but I’m more excited about how I found out about it. See, I use this microblogging service called Twitter and [...]

Here’s what hardcore partisans on both sides often fail to understand: winning an election doesn’t mean most of the country agrees with their ideology. In fact, both the hardcore right and the hardcore left are minority positions whose influence is inflated not by numbers but by passion. They might be the “bases” of our two [...]

The final results aren’t in yet, but Georgia Republicans are apparently expecting a runoff in the Senate race there: Georgia GOP Chairwoman Sue Everhart said Wednesday morning that she anticipated a runoff between Republican Saxby Chambliss and Democrat Jim Martin for the U.S. Senate seat in Georgia. Neither candidate had 50 percent of the vote. [...]

This helpful map was created by the folks at Swing State Project A few things that might be worth watching for as Election Night passes (all times Eastern, of course) 6:00 PM (Kentucky and Indiana): There’s little doubt that Kentucky will go for John McCain this year but there’s a serious question about Mitch McConnell’s [...]

An interesting bit of historical trivia drawn from a much-longer post about final poll numbers at my personal blog: No Democrat has gotten more than 51% of the popular vote in a Presidential Election since Lyndon Johnson’s landslide in 1964. Jimmy Carter got 50.1% in 1976, and Bill Clinton got 43% in 1992 and 49.24% [...]

Marshall Manson offers some timely advice to the supporters of whoever happens to lose the election today: Challenging the legitimacy of an election is a serious thing to do. And with occasional exceptions, charges of fraud are almost always overblown and based on unreliable, anecdotal data. Over the last few years, too many on both [...]

Philadelphia is shaping up to be a key city in a key battleground state in this election, but machine problems and long lines may plague the polling stations and voter disenfranchisement will be a serious risk. Unfortunately for voters, the people charged with running a smooth election in Philly seem surprisingly unconcerned. Philly’s veritable election czar, Marge Tartaglione (D), in particular, shocked ANP with her comments at a recent hearing. See more videos at http://americannewsproject.com