Good morning. Our roundup of political news today starts with the heated Alaska Senate race.
The count goes on and spelling is key. Most of the write-in ballots
opened on Wednesday went to incumbent Sen. Lisa Murkowski, but
supporters of GOP nominee Joe Miller are on hand to challenge misspelled
names and illegible ballots.
Lt. Gov. Craig Campbell, the
Republican who oversees the Division of Elections, says the count will
take longer than expected and go on for days.
Miller's request
that a federal judge immediately stop the count was denied, but the Tea
Party favorite will get his day in court sometime next week. He filed a
lawsuit seeking that only ballots that spell Murkowski's name correctly
be added to her vote total.
In other headlines:
Jean Quan
became the first woman and first Asian American elected mayor of
Oakland, Calif. The city of 400,000 is a majority-minority city, with
blacks making up 36% of the population, Hispanics 21% and Asians 15%.
Quan succeedes former House member Ron Dellums, a founder of the
Congressional Black Caucus.
A Connecticut official is considering a challenge to Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele. Chris Healey, chairman of the Connecticut GOP, says "someone has to step up and say the emperor has no clothes."
Democratic losses in the Rust Belt could spell trouble for President Obama in the 2012 election.
We'll
have more about Democrats grappling with their new minority status in
the House. A special thank you to the men and women who serve the USA in
the armed forces and those who have been in the military on this
Veterans' Day.