Sunday, November 30, 2008

11/08: One for the history books

November 2008 goes down in history at midnight tonight. And what a month it was. Last-minute surge to elect Barack Obama as president. Lots of Dems elected to U.S. House and a few newbies to the U.S. Senate. It took awhile for Alaska to count its votes, as they were transported to the capital by Todd Palin's sled dogs. Georgia has a run-off on Tuesday, with Democrat and Vietnam veteran Jim Martin and Republican chickenhawk Saxby Chambliss duking it out for the U.S. Senate. I've lost track of proceedings in Minnesota. Is Al Franken our first comedian/script-writer/author/radio host to be elected to the U.S. Senate? We've had actors, of course, and jocks, but never someone who wrote for Saturday Night Live. Guess I'll have to go check out the Minnesotans on leftyblogs.

The month wrapped up with the horrible attacks on Mumbai. Terrorism is still with us, an ongoing problem that will be Obama's to handle. He will announce his National Security team tomorrow (Dec. 1) and let's hope they work fast to undo torture policies, close Gitmo and get us out of Iraq. Meanwhile, they can focus on the real terrorist threats in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Here in Wyoming, Republicans still rule the roost, although we get two more years of Democratic Governor Dave Freudenthal (Gov Dave) before the 2010 gubernatorial elections. No names are surfacing on the Dem side (thus far) but it's inevitabvle that there will be a slew of Repubs interested in the job. Wonder if some of the WyoGoppers returning from D.C. will be interested in running for office. This is always the hidden danger of a Dem in the White House.

The state legislature comes to town in January and there is talk about the budget surplus being less surplustic due to a drop in oil and gas prices as well as a downturn in tourism which leads to a drop in taxes. Press reports during the past week say that the economic downturn has yet to hit Cheyenne and the rest of Wyoming. How long will that last?

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