Mississippi
updated
7:29 p.m.
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From the Clarion Ledger opinion section, Another dynamic: a possible record Democratic turnout Nov. 4 if Barack Obama is the first black party nominee. Will Mississippi remain Republican in presidential voting, as it has every cycle since Jimmy Carter in 1976? Will a Davis-Childers rematch for the full term change in outcome? Former Democratic Gov. Ronnie Musgrove will also face Wicker on Nov...
Cotton Mouth - 7:29 p.m.
I haven't found the video online, yet, of Edwards endorsing Obama, however, I did find a video (released in April) on why Edwards cannot endorse Clinton- in his own words. Also, Obama's home page has a great image of Obama and Edwards- very presidential/vice-presidential....
Cotton Mouth - 10:59 a.m. - 5 clicks 
Every State. Every race. Right here. This is number nine in a planned series of 50 entries between now and November, looking at each of the 50 states in terms of every race on that state's ticket--Presidential, Gubernatorial, Senate, House, State legislatures--the whole ball of cotton. Special attention paid to identifying and promoting the most important contests per state. With our ...
DailyKos (Mississippi) - 10:58 a.m. - 4 clicks
Fellow members of the DailyKos community, I wish I were writing to you under happier circumstances. Unfortunately, however, there is a dark and heavy cloud hanging over us and I feel that it must be addressed. I am certain by now that you have heard the disturbing and saddening news that last night, a Democrat won a Congressional seat in Mississippi in a special election. Like me, ...
DailyKos (Mississippi) - 10:58 a.m. - 4 clicks
I am not one to gloat but, in this case I can't help it. The gold standard of journalism, The New York Times , described the level of panic in the GOP. It is every man for himself... But Mr. McCain’s advisers said the Mississippi race underlined his intention to distance himself as much as possible from Congressional Republicans. Mr. McCain has already been openly critical of some of President B...
Cotton Mouth - 1:01 a.m. - 10 clicks
While everyone is still feeling good from the big win last night, let's turn our attention to November where we can shock the country again by electing a Democrat Senator. Ronnie Musgrove helped bring us the MAEP as governor, the single most important piece of legislation since William Winter was in office. Roger Wicker is a an empty suit who wants to bring his king of pork politics to the Senat...
Cotton Mouth - 1:01 a.m. - 13 clicks
Leading up to Tuesday's special election runoff in Mississippi's First Congressional District, former Gov. William Winter expressed horror at Greg Davis' race-baiting campaign style -- and rightly so. The trend was obvious enough for me to note less than a week after Davis' first match-up against Travis Childers. The strategy was simple and far from original -- play off racial division i...
Will Bardwell - Wed 11:10 a.m. - 11 clicks
I'll allow that this is a tad gratuitous, but as I'm still basking in the reflected glow of the North Mississippi 'Stash, I'd like to point out that Big Trav's victory landed lil' ole 'Sip on the front page of today's Washington Post . Not much in the way of new information, but a couple of fun quotes: At least he didn't say "hurricane": "No one could have imagined the tsunami that just cras...
Cotton Mouth - Wed 11:10 a.m. - 12 clicks
The Republicans lost another crucial election last night. It was their third special election loss in a row . All three were deeply Republican districts in the past. This one was in the heart of Mississippi and was in a district that George Bush won with 62% of the vote in 2004 . The Republicans are in deep, deep trouble. If they lose in these districts (the other two were a Louisiana seat t...
DailyKos (Mississippi) - Wed 11:10 a.m. - 15 clicks
Democrat Travis Childers blasted past Republican Greg Davis by nearly 8,000 votes in his special election bid for the congressional seat vacated by Roger Wicker. Wicker of course is set to try the doomed Republican strategy against former Governor Ronnie Musgrove. Wicker has a slight edge here only due to fundraising, really a draw. With the good news from MS-01 look for Musgrove's fundraising ef...
Cotton Mouth - Wed 1:50 a.m. - 16 clicks
The Hill , a favorite political website of mine posted their post-results piece on last night's election in north Mississippi. The meat of the article has some great quotes by the soon to be fired, in this blogger's opinion, NRCC chairman Tom Cole. Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), issued a somber and self-reflective statement f...
Cotton Mouth - Wed 1:50 a.m. - 17 clicks
Lifted from the DCCC website. DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen released the following statement on Travis Childers' victory in the special election runoff in Mississippi's 1st Congressional District. With tonight's win, the Democratic majority in Congress has expanded to 236-199. "Congratulations to Travis Childers on his stunning victory. His victory has sent a political thunderbolt across Am...
Cotton Mouth - Tue 11:03 p.m. - 19 clicks
Lifted from the DCCC website, UPDATE: Speaker Pelosi's statement: "On behalf of the Democratic Caucus, I welcome Congressman-elect Travis Childers to the House of Representatives and congratulate him on his spectacular victory." As I tell every new Member of Congress, 'your title Representative is your job description.' Travis Childers earned the votes of the people of Mississippi's Firs...
Cotton Mouth - Tue 11:03 p.m. - 15 clicks
Whether Travis Childers' win in MS-01, perhaps the friendliest of all Republican House district in the country, is the biggest upset in recent Mississippi political history is a debate for another day with cooler heads. But even if it was, this upset was no accident. A glance through the results shows a lucid, coordinated shoring-up of both strengths and weaknesses from Childers' April 22 sho...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 20 clicks
From poster "chrisman" on conservative Mississippi message board Y'all Politics : Greg Davis is a fine, conservative candidate. I believe we can start looking up at W as to why Davis won’t pull this one out. W betrayed a lot of NE MS Democrats and MS Republicans. McCain never misses an opportunity to partner up with the other team. It’s an absolute shame. From Josh Kraushaar of The Polit...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 19 clicks
For all its massive turnout, DeSoto County -- the crown jewel of the northeast Mississippi GOP juggernaut -- actually waned slightly in importance on Tuesday night. Travis Childers' 8-point win over South Memphis' Greg Davis is impressive enough on its own, but take away DeSoto County, and Childers's advantage goes from 8 points to 20 points (60.3-39.7). Compare that to the April 22 special elect...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 19 clicks
With more than 90 percent of precincts reporting, Travis Childers leads Greg Davis by six points in Mississippi's First Congressional District. Assuming that margin holds, it will represent a 38-point turnaround from November 2006, when then-Rep. Roger Wicker coasted to re-election by 32 points . And that was Wicker's closest race since he won the seat in 1994. In 2004, for example, Wicker crui...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 17 clicks
A WillBardwell.com regular, "Fangmouth," points out that Travis Childers won interim Sen. Roger Wicker's old House seat with both Wicker's birthplace (Pontotoc County, 53-47) and the senator's home (Lee County, 58-42). Ouch....
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 16 clicks
Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but another WillBardwell.com regular and I believe that Childers' win marks the first time since Sonny Montgomery's retirement in 1996 that Mississippi has boasted three Democratic congressmen. UPDATE (10:07 p.m.) -- Anderson points out that Ronnie Shows' brief tenure in Congress gave Mississippi three Democratic reps. So let me rephrase -- this is the first tim...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 16 clicks
Our friends at Right of Missisippi were poking a little fun at us recently. Here is what they had to say, Question: Does Travis Childers Have a Chance? Answer: No Someone over at DailyKos and our friends at Cottonmouth are really trying to sell a bill of goods that says Travis Childers has a chance in NE MS. They forget one important fact; Haley Barbour is the Governor of Mississippi, he ...
Cotton Mouth - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 15 clicks
We will break down all the implications and hash through all results tomorrow. I am going to the local watering hole for a few adult beverages. For now meet your new Representative of Mississippi's First Congressional District, Travis Childers. ...
Cotton Mouth - Tue 10:02 p.m. - 15 clicks
Itawamba's in, and with but one precinct in Childers' home county left to report, the Democratic Congressman from North Mississippi (man, it feels good to type that) won this race by an eight point margin . Booya. So much credit is due to the folks on the ground who gave of themselves to help make this happen. It was awesome to see a ground game in action - people powered piece by piece acros...
Thorn Papers - Tue 10:01 p.m. - 15 clicks
No joke this time. WillBardwell.com projects that Prentiss County's Travis Childers has defeated Southaven's Greg Davis in Mississippi's First Congressional District....
Will Bardwell - Tue 7:34 p.m. - 20 clicks
Results for the Mississippi First District special election, filling the seat of Senator Roger Wicker. 79% of Precincts Reporting Travis W. Childers (D): 51% (42029) Greg Davis (R): 49% (40275) We're near 60% in now. DeSoto (aka DavisLand) keeps trickling in, 21 of 38 precincts now, ...
DailyKos (Mississippi) - Tue 7:34 p.m. - 15 clicks
Results for the Mississippi First District special election, filling the seat of Senator Roger Wicker. 93% of Precincts Reporting Travis W. Childers (D): 53% (54029) Greg Davis (R): 47% (47361) Update : The AP has called the race for Travis Childers. Mississippi now has three Democr...
DailyKos (Mississippi) - Tue 7:34 p.m. - 15 clicks
Half an hour after polls closed, and still no results at all (by way of the Clarion-Ledger's county-by-county breakdown page ). Odd. I'll pop in now and again, but for your Mississippi flavored live-blogging coverage, Will Bardwell and Cotton Mouth are on point. And the good fellas of Swing State Project are on as always. Update (7:57 PM): Childers 59%, Davis 41%. No reports in yet from S...
Thorn Papers - Tue 7:34 p.m. - 19 clicks
Chris Bowers, who does a great job over at Open Left , will also be liveblogging tonight's election results in Mississippi's First Congressional District. As mentioned last night, WillBardwell.com also will be liveblogging, starting around 7 p.m. So that's something to live for. UPDATE (5:53 p.m.) -- Swing State Project , too. UPDATE (5:58 p.m.) -- And, of course, those crazy kids at Cott...
Will Bardwell - Tue 4:50 p.m. - 26 clicks
Evenin', y'all. Polls close in Mississippi's First Congressional District at 7 p.m., and the first results probably will start to trickle out about a half-hour later. Check back here throughout the evening for the Mississippi blogosphere's very best in raw conjecture. Most of the big national blogs are following the evening's developments, of course, but for Mississippi-based analysis, keep ...
Will Bardwell - Tue 4:50 p.m. - 26 clicks
I don't know if it means anything for the rest of the district -- or even the rest of the city -- but turnout was up at my precinct. At 4:15 p.m., I was the 484th voter at Oxford 4 (Chamber of Commerce), which cast just 427 votes on April 22 . At about the same time that day, only a little more than 300 had voted at Oxford 4. Just for the record, Greg Davis edged Travis Childers with 51 percen...
Will Bardwell - Tue 4:50 p.m. - 19 clicks
The storm that soaked Oxford earlier today has come and gone, but the system is moving across the southern portion of the First District as we speak. Just looking at the map , my guess is no better than yours, but the 5 p.m. commute in Columbus looks like it could be a wet one. For what it's worth, that might help Travis Childers more than Greg Davis. Davis won Lowndes County with 53 percent o...
Will Bardwell - Tue 1:38 p.m. - 15 clicks
We will be posting results as they come in tonight, as are several other blogs. I am going to post links to a lot of cool stuff for MS-01 so that you can be prepared when the results start coming in. Phonebank for Childers MS-01 Resources: Mississippi Secratary of State's website has the official SOS returns for the April 22 election 2008 Race Tracker has district information Swing S...
Cotton Mouth - Tue 1:38 p.m. - 16 clicks
First off, I think it was a risky, boneheaded move on the part of the DCCC, particularly in Mississippi. A classic example of a national crew failing to really understand a local dynamic. But, that said... The beef behind the DCCC's mailer is that Greg Davis never actually said he'd take the Forrest statue, just the Davis statue. This was due to some less than clear writing in the Commercial Appe...
Thorn Papers - Tue 1:38 p.m. - 17 clicks
A handful of Election Day thoughts... The weather is looking mighty ominous here in Lafayette County. The Weather Channel says it might clear up before polls close at 7 p.m., but the big question is whether it'll be storming in DeSoto County during the evening commute. Stay tuned. I don't know why I didn't think of this yesterday, but for those First District voters out there, report in how ...
Will Bardwell - Tue 10:39 a.m. - 14 clicks
Offered from the NE MS Daily Journal without comment: Cheney said Davis , who faces Democrat Travis Childers in today's voting, would support President Bush on his policies in Iraq and would vote to maintain Republican tax cuts .... ...Politics is a team sport, "and we need a congressman in the 1st District who will vote like Thad and Roger, not against them," Barbour noted. He was referring...
Thorn Papers - Tue 6:06 a.m. - 13 clicks
Just released by the New York Times is another article surveying the effect of recent Davis campaign attempts to bring down Travis Childers by linking him to presumptive Democrat presidential nominee Barack Obama. Many Mississippians see this as what it is, race baiting at is finest. Former Governor and hero of Mississippi politics, who gave us the monumental Education Reform Act of 1982, had t...
Cotton Mouth - Mon 9:45 p.m. - 21 clicks
The Hill a website devoted to the politics of DC, just released an an analysis of the MS-01 congressional race tomorrow. The article features quotes from Marvin King, an assistant political science professor at Ole Miss, who also has a really cool blog, Black Political Analysis . There were several interesting parts, highlighted below starting with the pull out all the stops approach for the GOP....
Cotton Mouth - Mon 7:48 p.m. - 21 clicks
Today in Southaven Vice President Dick Cheney spoke at a rally for Greg Davis. Cheney either think Mississippians are dumb or he honestly believes the stuff he says. Some of the following is hard to believe that any politician called in to help would be saying. The last thing I would want as a candidate is to be linked with the failed policies of the current administration in Washington. We hav...
Cotton Mouth - Mon 7:48 p.m. - 17 clicks
Based on the April 22 special election , three weather vanes to keep eyes on when results start pouring in for the Travis Childers-Greg Davis matchup in Mississippi's First Congressional District on Tuesday... DeSoto County -- The most obvious of all. Davis needs his base to turn out big-time for him, as it did on April 22. The voting percentage isn't as important, though, as is sheer turnout...
Will Bardwell - Mon 10:37 a.m. - 27 clicks
Today's Morning Edition on NPR featured a more-than five minute story on the MS-01 race, including an interview with Travis Childers as he was pumping gas at Kent's Citgo in Grenada last Friday. You can listen to the story here . Listen close and you can even hear the moustache. Background: Last Friday, the Travis Childers visited 3 gas stations around the MS-01 district- 1 each in Tupelo, C...
Cotton Mouth - Mon 7:42 a.m. - 20 clicks
No scoop here, this was already posted over on both Swing State Project and Cotton Mouth , but I wanted to take a minute to chime in too. According to The Politico , the Democratic House leadership have a seat waiting for Travis Childers on the Agriculture Committee when he wins the MS-01 seat this coming Tuesday. That's great news for Mississippians - who most definitely need a voice in that...
Thorn Papers - May 8 - 22 clicks
If you havent already, be sure to stop in at the Mississippi Museum of Art to take in the Young Persons Cultural Exchange Exhibit, featuring artwork from young people across the state. Call 601-960-1515 for details.
David Gatlin takes the stage at Martins at 10 p.m.
Left ......
Jackson Free Press - May 7 - 33 clicks
Make it a point to stop in to the Mississippi Museum of Natural Science as its Bone up on Bones exhibit reaches its final days, teaching people about bone health and overall well-being. Call 601-354-7303 for details.
Take in some live music and make some new friends at the Plaza Buildings Thursdays at the Plaza at 5 p.m. at 120 N. Congress Street. Be sure to try a new dish at Tyes Resta...
Jackson Free Press - May 7 - 31 clicks
Seems as though the cash-strapped NRCC just isn't getting the love that they used to. From The Hill : Rep. Tom Cole on Tuesday told the many Republican members who haven’t given to the GOP candidate in next week’s Mississippi special election that they “ought to be ashamed of themselves,” GOP sources said. The Mississippi race is shaping up as an increasingly crucial psychological battle for a ...
Thorn Papers - May 7 - 22 clicks
As promised, here is the second of the two DCCC ads I was able to get uploaded. I think this is the more effective of the two, and while technically an anti-Davis ad as opposed to a pro-Childers ad, I think the faces and voices of regular Mississippi folks carry a lot of impact. And for what it's worth, the opinions of these people do reflect what I've been hearing on the ground. There's a reason...
Thorn Papers - May 7 - 23 clicks
Wow. That was something last night, wasn't it? Obama absolutely dominated in NC - not quite the "game changer" Clinton was hoping for. For her part, Clinton squeaked out, at best, a tainted win in Indiana, pushed over the top only by way of Republican crossover votes spurred on by Rush Limbaugh's mischief-making (to borrow Chris Matthews' term) "Operation Chaos." When 13% of the Indianans who...
Thorn Papers - May 7 - 23 clicks
UPDATE: A note to visitors coming from one or another of the sites which have linked to this page. Please do take a minute and check out the main site . Though dormant for well over a year, The Thorn Papers is back for the foreseeable future. Just thought perhaps those who are interested in the MS-01 race would like to see how some of the big money the DCCC has sunk into the game is being...
Thorn Papers - May 2 - 18 clicks
Wow. The good, salt-of-the-earth, heartland, working-class Hoosier folks sure have come a long way in 16 years - at least in the estimation of the Clintons. [YouTube pulled the video] Note, by the way, the shock, dismay and indignation from Carville and Stephanapoulos. Positively deafening. Shame Obama's such an elitist, eh? UPDATE: There seems to be much disagreement on whether or not the abo...
Thorn Papers - May 2 - 18 clicks
