Politics

Arizona will now have a majority of Democratic Representatives in the House, as Rick Renzi is replaced by Ann Kirkpatrick in District 1 in a close race. The other close race is District 5, where Harry Mitchell has defeated David Schweikert. This means the Arizona delegation will be Senators John McCain and Jon Kyl (both Republicans), and Representatives Ann Kirkpatrick (D-District 1), Trent Franks (R-District 2), John Shadegg (R-District 3), Ed Pastor (D-District 4), Harry Mitchell (D-District 5), Jeff Flake (R-District 6), Raul Grijalva (D-District 7), Gabrielle Giffords (D-District 8). Bad news: Andrew Thomas was re-elected as Maricopa County Attorney, and Joe Arpaio was re-elected as Maricopa County Sheriff. And Arizona went for John McCain as president, though he has graciously conceded to Barack Obama. Some bad results on the propositions: Prop. 102 is passing, amending the Arizona constitution to ban same-sex marriage, Prop. 101 on medical choice is failing. But there’s also good news: the payday loan industry-backed Prop. 200 is failing (that would add barriers to entry to new payday loan companies, as well as prevent the current payday loan legislation from sunsetting), and Prop. 100’s ban on additional home transfer taxes is passing. UPDATE (November 5, 2008): Prop. 101 is still too close to call, with “no” votes leading by 2,195 votes (867,924 no, 865,729 yes). There should be a conclusive result tomorrow. UPDATE (November 6, 2008): Still counting on Prop. 101–it’s now a 2,944-vote lead for no, 887,821 to 884,877. UPDATE (November 12, 2008): Prop. 101 has been defeated, 961,567 no votes to 950,440 yes votes. ...

ApostAZ podcast #10 is out: Episode 010 Atheism and Dogma-Free Thought in Phoenix! Go to meetup.com/phoenix-atheists for group events! Quiverfull, Innocence, Over-population, Which Came First, Religion or Ignorance? (Some of David’s artwork: http://www.flickr.com/photos/davidbessent/), Fear and Dogma, Ignosticism, Priming the Gish Gallop.There’s some discussion of what the legal standards should be for government prevention of abuses by separatist religious groups like Warren Jeffs’ FLDS group. It’s a tough problem, especially when various child protective agencies themselves have a poor reputation and cause harm themselves. In the FLDS case in Texas, the state raided the FLDS compound on the basis of a hoaxed complaint, adult women were taken and held as minors, and the Texas CPS repeatedly misrepresented the facts to try to justify its actions (links are to several of numerous blog posts by economist David Friedman, who blogged the FLDS situation in detail). ...

From the Iowa State Daily: Audience members escorted out of Sen. John McCain’s, R-Ariz., campaign event in Cedar Falls questioned why they were asked to leave Sunday’s rally even though they were not protesting. David Zarifis, director of public safety for the University of Northern Iowa, said McCain staffers requested UNI police assist in escorting out “about four or five” people from the rally prior to McCain’s speech. Zarifis said while the people who were taken out weren’t protesting or causing problems, McCain’s staff were worried they would during the speech. “Apparently, they had been identified by those staffers as potential protesters within the event,” Zarifis said. … Lara Elborno, a student at the University of Iowa, said she was approached by a police officer and a McCain staffer and was told she had to leave or she would be arrested for trespassing. … Elborno said even McCain supporters were among those being asked to leave. “I saw a couple that had been escorted out and they were confused as well, and the girl was crying, so I said ‘Why are you crying? and she said ‘I already voted for McCain, I’m a Republican, and they said we had to leave because we didn’t look right,’” Elborno said. “They were handpicking these people and they had nothing to go off of, besides the way the people looked.”

Amy Silverman’s “Love the War, Neglect the Warrior: His fame’s based on his POW status, but Senator John McCain’s made a point of voting against fellow veterans," tells the story of McCain’s voting record on support for war veterans, and how various veterans’ groups and retired military personnel feel about him: Most vet special-interest groups decline to officially take sides (even VoteVets hasn’t made a presidential endorsement). But VoteVets is among many veterans groups to note the discrepancy between John McCain’s talk and his actions. ...

Here’s a nice set of graphs from the New York Times that shows various economic metrics by President and party majority in the Senate and House of Representatives. For the budget surplus vs. deficit, there seems to be a benefit to having one party in the presidency and another party in control of Congress. In general, it looks like Republicans in the presidency and the Senate produce bad results… (Via the Big Picture blog.)

There are reports that Sarah Palin is “going rogue” by continually going off message and clashing with key McCain aides. One McCain aide reports: “She is a diva. She takes no advice from anyone,” said this McCain adviser. “She does not have any relationships of trust with any of us, her family or anyone else. “Also, she is playing for her own future and sees herself as the next leader of the party. Remember: Divas trust only unto themselves, as they see themselves as the beginning and end of all wisdom."This is not the kind of person who should be in a position of political leadership in a representative democracy–perhaps in a banana republic, but not a first-world nation. (I do agree with her that “robocalls”–prerecorded political advertisements–are extremely annoying.)

Sarah Palin says that Bill Ayers counts as a domestic terrorist for setting off bombs, but declines to apply the term to those who set off bombs to blow up abortion clinics: WILLIAMS: Are we changing – it’s been said that to give it a vaguely post-9/11 hint, using that word that we don’t normally associate with domestic crimes. Are we changing the definition? Are the people who set fire to American cities during the ’60s terrorists in – under this definition? Is an abortion clinic bomber a terrorist under this definition, Governor? ...

Via the Reason blog: The 1976 U.S. Supreme Court case of U.S. v. Martinez-Fuerte established an exception to the Fourth Amendment, allowing the federal government to establish roadblock checkpoints within 100 miles of U.S. borders to stop people and search for illegal immigrants and smuggling. The ACLU notes that 190 million people live within 100 miles of U.S. borders, providing this helpful map. (Although Lake Michigan is entirely within U.S. boundaries, by treaty Canada is allowed full navigation rights to the lake–so it’s not clear if that 100-mile boundary would actually be as in the ACLU’s map around Lake Michigan.) There are currently 33 checkpoints in operation within the boundary area. Here’s some video footage of one of them in Arizona: (Via Checkpoint USA, which has numerous videos of interactions at one of these temporary checkpoints.) ...

Daniel Zubairi, one of McCain’s state leaders for Maryland, stepped forward to publicly criticize a person who was criticizing Obama and claiming that he’s tainted because of a Muslim background. CNN wanted to put Zubairi on air, but the McCain campaign said no. (Via Daily Kos.)

Former George W. Bush press secretary Scott McClellan says he’s voting for Obama: “From the very beginning I have said I am going to support the candidate that has the best chance for changing the way Washington works and getting things done and I will be voting for Barack Obama and clapping,” McClellan told new CNN Host D.L. Hughley.