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October 25, 2006 - Over 100 U.S.

October 23, 2006 - Congressional Quarterly is featuring their list of Congressional races that are up for grabs in the upcoming election. CQ's list shows that a good number of Southern seats, especially those currently held by Republicans, will be hotly contested to the finish.Here's how the House races are breaking down according to CQ:SEATS CURRENTLY HELD BY DEMOCRATSOf the House seats currently held by Democrats, CQ rates the Democratic candidate to be "safe" or "favored" in all of them, except in eight races where the race "leans" Democrat, including three in the South (bold):

October 17, 2006 - A couple weeks ago, Wal-Mart announced that -- in addition to expanding its Blue Light Special empire into China (where, unlike U.S. employees, Wal-Mart workers will have unions) -- it is launching a drive to register 1.3 million of its "associates" to vote.As Daniel Gross points out at Slate, it wouldn't be a stretch to doubt the motives of the Bentonville, Ark. retail goliath's experiment in civic engagement:

October 16, 2006 - Last week, the Institute released the findings of a major project we've been working on for over six months -- a national public opinion poll, one of the first surveys to take an in-depth look at Southern attitudes towards the Iraq war.

October 11, 2006 - When the U.S. public began turning against the Iraq war, especially in late 2004/early 2005, the Bush Administration began talking less about "freedom" and more about "democracy," the new rhetoric focused on turning over the reins of power to the Iraqi people.The corollary of the self-rule frame was that, as the citizens of Iraq took greater power -- including assuming control of police and military functions -- the U.S. presence would decline. As recently as last month, officials were touting cuts in Iraq troop levels by spring 2007.No more, reports the Associate Press today:

October 3, 2006 - The long-awaited Kentucky River decision has come down, and blogger David Goldstein sums up what happened at Huffington Post: The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued its much anticipated "Kentucky River Decision" today, and it pretty much went exactly as expected. Voting along party lines, the Republican dominated NLRB gutted long-time federal labor laws by allowing employers to reclassify up to 8 million workers as "supervisors," thus prohibiting them from forming unions.

September 27, 2006 - For over two decades, the religious right -- the "hard base" of the Republican Party -- has grown to be a driving force for GOP political success. The "values voters" base will be especially important to Republicans this November. Lower mid-term turnout and general public dissatisfaction with the country's political direction make a solid showing among the conservative faithful critical to GOP success. Double that in the South.