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An interesting scenario has developed in the Oregon Senate race ...  

Until recently, it has been assumed that Jeff Merkley would win the Democratic nomination to take on Republican Gordon Smith.  

But his Democratic opponent Steve Novick -- who proudly displays a metal hook for a left hand -- has come on strong, most recently by winning the endorsement of the Service Employees International Union.

From the AP:

"Novick fills a room the minute he walks into it," said Webb Thomas, a teacher from Beaverton. "That's what you need. Merkley is so out of central casting. If you took all the white, male, Democratic candidates and blended them together, then you'd have Jeff Merkley."

... Merkley is still favored, but appears to be in real danger, as is evidenced by a new NRSC webpage, which attacks Novick as "As tax-happy as Jeff Merkley ... only funnier." 

On MSNBC this morning, Barack Obama said this:

“... It's certainly different from saying that we would have a high level of combat troops inside Iraq for a decade or two decades or as John McCain said, perhaps 100 years. I am just quoting back what he said. Unless you tell me that that's a misquote.”

... to which RNC spokeswoman Liz Mair responded: 

“Barack Obama seems happy to continue twisting John McCain’s words in a way that has been described by non-partisan Politifact.com as ‘false.’  This is despite seeming acknowledgement from Barack Obama today that he is indeed mischaracterizing John McCain’s position with regard to a continued US troop presence in Iraq.   

“It’s becoming increasingly clear that for all his protestations as to representing a ‘new brand of politics,’ when push comes to shove, Barack Obama is worryingly comfortable continually repeating known falsehoods in order to score political points.  Instead, Obama should stop engaging in such blatant distortion and misrepresentation.  He should, in addition, condemn DNC Chairman Howard Dean who has repeatedly used the same inaccurate talking point, and who recently achieved an all-new-low by slandering John McCain as a ‘blatant opportunist’ for highlighting his record of military service." 

Pure irony from Politico:

Among the debts reported this month by Hillary Rodham Clinton’s struggling presidential campaign, the $292,000 in unpaid health insurance premiums for her campaign staff stands out.

Clinton, who is being pressured to end her campaign against Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination, has made her plan for universal health care a centerpiece of her agenda.

He was devoted to the Navy, but in personal comportment, he was anything but regulation.  He was a rumpled, informal man, who wore a crushed cap with the crown removed that the wife of one of his aviators had given him; kept his shoes off when he worked in an office; tobacco leavings were always scattered about him, as he rolled his own with one hand; possessed a mischievous sense of humor, and was unusually close to sailors and junior officers who served under him, and revered him.  They called him, “Popeye;” his family called him, “Sid;” and his fellow officers, “Slew,” for reasons I never learned.