Polinaut: March 14, 2006 Archive

Daily Briefing - Tuesday March 14, 2006

Posted at 8:29 AM on March 14, 2006 by Bob Collins (1 Comments)

The Analyst analyzes Select A Candidate. I tried to post a comment but I've finally reached the phase of remembering too many passwords and if you get it wrong, you have to type in those random letters that keep spammers from posting. And if you get it wrong again, there's a bunch of new letters to type in. If you get it wrong again, even more. Since it's 8:30 and I have to be at work by 11, I gave up.
Good article, though.

NPR has started a newsroom blog. Some of Mixed Signals has to do with politics. Most doesn't. But if you read closely you can almost hear how stories are discussed.

Christy Mihos has joined the race for governor of Massachusetts. Rasmussen has a Bay State poll out today. Merrimack College has a poll that says about the same thing. Mass., to many people's surprise, has a habit of not electing Democrats to the corner office that often since Foster Furcolo. Of course, in that state, the big cheese is the House Speaker.

Oh, and John Kline jumped into the race yesterday officially yesterday. Given the news load yesterday, the timing wasn't that great to get many mentions. Of course, it was no surprise either.

Unrelated ponderables
Northwest Airlines to charge $15 for an aisle seat. Doesn't anyone like looking out the window anymore? And you don't have to get up every 10 minutes to let someone go to the bathroom.

Comment on this post

Lourey for Lourey

Posted at 11:53 AM on March 14, 2006 by Bob Collins

Tony Lourey is running for his mother's seat. The other candidates are Bruce Ahlgren, Bruce Chaffe, Dan Reed, Kelly Riihiluoma, Tom Skare and John Westmoreland. The DFL endorsing convention is April 8.

Endorsement

Posted at 11:57 AM on March 14, 2006 by Bob Collins

I'm not exactly sure why the blogs are abuzz today with whether Mark Dayton did or did not endorse Amy Klobuchar but the gist of the hand-wringing today seems to be that Klobuchar is somehow ashamed of Dayton's endorsement. The Hill, as I mentioned last night, reported on a Kennedy press release asking why Klobuchar won't talk it up.

For the record, everyone seems to be pointing to a Strib article. At least one blog said that the article said Klobuchar got the endorsement.

What the story said was:

"In contrast, the party's other front-runner, in the U.S. Senate race, found no need to trumpet an important endorsement on Wednesday.

Hennepin County Attorney Amy Klobuchar finally received the official blessing from U.S. Sen. Mark Dayton, whose retirement is leaving the open seat she seeks, but there was no prominent announcement. Her convincing triumph Tuesday night means the endorsement is all but hers, and her challenge now is to find mainstream positions heading toward the general election, and maybe keep just a little distance from liberals such as Dayton."

OK, let's see if I got this right. Dayton didn't have any prominent announcement; didn't appear to have any announcement at all. Dayton says he hasn't endorsed Klobuchar yet but probably will. And Dayton gave her a "blessing," the meaning of which remains unclear to me.

Time to take a walk and go talk to average voters, folks. Find out what they are interested in and then -- just a suggestion -- talk about that for awhile. See how that goes over.

By the way -- going out on a limb here -- I'm gonna guess that the senior Minnesota senator , a DFLer, will -- in fact -- endorse the DFL candidate for U.S. Senate in Minnesota.