Reuters/Jim Young
–As Jay notes, Obama political arm Organizing for America is trying to take some credit for Bennet’s solid victory last night in Colorado. The message: Just because we couldn’t save Specter or clear the field for Lincoln and Bennet, the White House political operation is not ineffectual.
–Establishment Republicans have got to be tearing their hair out over the Centennial State. Dan “Tyranny on Two Wheels” Maes and Ken “High Heels” Buck are not the statewide candidates they envisioned just a few months ago. National Republicans will probably call in the cavalry for Buck (a la Sharron Angle), but Maes might just get forced out. The state party is reportedly wooing ReMax founder Dave Liniger to replace Maes atop the ticket. Oh and Tom Tancredo could still play spoiler.
–Georgia’s GOP gubernatorial runoff looks like it’s headed for a recount, which is a viable option if the margin of victory is 1 percent of the total vote or less. the Atlanta Journal-Constitution explains what’s next:
On Wednesday, the counties will count their provisional ballots and work toward certifying their results. Fulton County will not certify until Saturday, for example. Once all the counties certify their results, they will turn their certified results in to the state. The state will then certify the election. Candidates have 48 hours after certification to ask for a recount. The entire process will extend into next week.
—Linda McMahon won the Republican Senate nod in Connecticut, dispatching a thousand gleeful Democratic operatives to YouTube. It’d be a mistake for them to underestimate her though.
–David Leonhardt describes a new unemployed landscape: The recession is increasingly being defined by long-term joblessness, and it has hit the uneducated hardest. Felix Salmon teases out a few more datapoints.
–Majority Leader Reid is reopening the Senate for a vote on the $600 million border security bill.
—Foreign Policy reports Palestinian Authority president Mahmoud Abbas is close to signing onto direct talks with Israel. Mideast envoy George Mitchell is meeting with Netanyahu today.
–New York governor-in-waiting Andrew Cuomo is already butting heads with the state assembly.
–Marc Ambinder boils down Charlie Rangel’s epic apologia into four lines:
1. He’s Charlie Rangel, damn it. Been in public service all his life.
2. He’s not going to let the ethics committee take away his dignity.
3. He’s ready to bargain if they’re ready to be transparent about what they want.
4. Dignity, damn it. Dignity.
–At least one person is attending his birthday party.
–And your Sunshine State absurdity of the day: Gubernatorial candidate Rick Scott calls rival Bill McCollum “the Tonya Harding of Florida politics.”
What did I miss?
UPDATE: I haven’t read it in its entirety yet, but the Atlantic just posted its new cover piece by Jeffrey Goldberg on the possibility of an Israeli strike against a nuclear Iran and what that could mean for the U.S. A chilling excerpt:
In most of these interviews, I have asked a simple question: What is the percentage chance that Israel will attack the Iranian nuclear program in the near future? Not everyone would answer this question, but a consensus emerged that there is a better than 50 percent chance that Israel will launch a strike by next July.
(h/t Ben Smith)