Smoker Backlash

In an excellent post at Redheaded Blackbelt, Kym compiled a slew of profound dissatisfaction with Humboldt County over Prop 19′s demise.

Martin on his Cannabis Warrior blog calls for a boycott of all these “traitors.”  He says, “They duped thousands of people into voting against not just their own best interest, but the interests of people across the globe who are counting on California to take this historic step. When Humboldt County votes no to legalizing pot there is a big fucking problem.”

I do have to say that I was surprised by the numbers when they came in Tuesday night.  It didn’t just fail in Sohum.  It went down huge.

I believe it’s what Rondel Snodgrass once referred to as the “mill town” effect.  Did we really just reject it because it was “badly written,” or are we really afraid of change?

Olbermann Out

For making campaign donations without permission from the management, against NBC policy.  Ostensibly  is “neutrality” was jeopardized.

Lots of talk on KGOE today about how many Fox News figures not only donate but actively participated in Republican campaigns, but Fox has no similar policy.  More important is the point noted through the link that many NBC figures have donated to campaigns, including the man who was assigned to replace Olbermann tonight.  So while it seems that Olbermann may have violated policy, there is some evidence of selective enforcement and a question of whether there is a clear understanding of the policy’s workings.

Indefinite suspension without pay also seems like an extreme reaction.  NBC’s refusal to answer questions about it is also weird.  It plays into the claims of KGOE programming hosts who speculate that it’s about the pending Comcast takeover of NBC with fear about the new political order thrown in.  I guess this would suggest that the Maddow, O’Donnell, and Shultz are up for the chopping block as well?

Fox does have a different policy re neutrality and the impression thereof.  What other network will organize and even orchestrate a demonstration then cover it as a spontaneous event?

MSNBC conservative commentator Scarborough donated to a Republican back in 2006 and again this year.  Will he be suspended as well?  His show Monday morning will probably be the most watched in a long time.

Josh Marshal asks some pertinent questions about the incident, and one of his readers comments:

“The strangest thing about MSNBC policy is the asking for permission part. Either you can give or you can’t. Requiring permission implies that certain candidates or parties are acceptable and certain candidates or parties are unacceptable to management. Isn’t it illegal for employers to go down that road?”

Addendum: Rachel Maddow comments.

Rachel Maddow on Keith Olbermann suspension, posted with vodpod

Key quotes for those of you on dial-up:

Let this incident lay to rest forever the facile never true anyway bullpuckey lazy conflation of Fox News and what the rest of us do for a living.  I know everybody likes to say Oh, that’s cable news it’s all the same.  Fox News and MSNBC mirror images of each other.  Let this lay that to rest forever.  Hosts on Fox raise money on the air for Republican candidates.  They endorse them explicitely; they use their Fox News profile to headline fundraisers.

Yes Keith’s a liberal and so am I… We are not a political operation; Fox is.

Oh, and the netroots aren’t taking it lightly. You can sign a petition.  Or you can call MSNBC.

Will Kamala Harris’ lead hold?

Here’s the Secretary of State results map. You can move the cursor over each county for the count in each.

The counties Harris won represent about 2/3 of the state’s population even though they represent maybe 1/5 of the acreage.  The biggest “red” counties are Orange and San Diego, while the blue counties are Los Angeles (where Harris won despite the fact that it’s Cooley’s hometown).

There are 2 million ballots to be counted, which means that Harris’ 9000 vote lead means next to nothing.  But there are reasons to be optimistic.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-attorney-general-20101105,0,4476074.story

Los Angeles topped all counties in the number of unread ballots: an estimated 411,960. Mail-in ballots were 233,374 of those. The other counties with the most uncounted ballots were San Diego with 240,000; Orange, with 233,196; Alameda, with 122,000; Sacramento, 120,000; Santa Clara, 108,000; and Contra Costa, 107,000.

Ventura County reported 40,279 uncounted and Riverside County 78,100. San Bernardino’s estimate had not been submitted to the secretary of state. Nine other counties, including San Francisco, Kern and Sonoma, also had not submitted estimates.

In tiny El Dorado County, between Sacramento and Lake Tahoe, 17,400 ballots remained uncounted Thursday. Potentially, that could equal 25% of the vote in the county.

Orange County is scary because the votes went to Cooley 60 to 30 percent.  San Diego went 53 to 39 percent for Cooley, which is just about the reverse of Los Angeles.  Alameda went to Harris 66 to 37 percent for Harris.  Sacramento was about even.  Santa Clara went 55 to 37 for Harris.  San Francisco, which has informally reported “tens of thousands” uncounted votes went 70-20 for Harris.

Of the reported numbers above, the blue county votes total about 750,000 and the red just over 600,000.  And as stated, that does not include San Francisco, San Mateo, nor Sonoma which I think outweigh Kern and San Bernadino.  Again, Sacramento and Santa Barbara were pretty close as to be considered almost a wash.  That pretty much accounts for the larger counties.

So I am cautiously optimistic.