Alex Altman

Picture by Larry Downing/Reuters. For more, check out our White House Photo Blog.

Ted Sorensen, a speechwriter, strategist and adviser to President John F. Kennedy, died yesterday at 82. His nephew, Swampland’s own Adam Sorensen, penned a moving remembrance that is well worth a read.

How it looked from my spot on the ground. For what it’s worth, CBS News estimates the event drew 215,000 people. I have no idea if that’s accurate, but it was a huge, happy crowd.

In addition to the bevy of Congressional battles and state-legislature clashes with consequences for redistricting, voters hitting the polls next week will be confronted with an array of state-ballot initiatives. One of the most interesting is in Washington state, where residents will consider a measure that would impose a new income tax …

Less than a week before Election Day, Republican Senate candidates hold leads in four key battleground states, according to a new CNN/Time/Opinion Research Corp. poll. You can read more here.

A week before Election Day, both parties are spinning early-voting tallies as a positive omen for their midterm prospects. “Despite national momentum being on the Republican side for months, we are not seeing anything resembling a Republican surge,” New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee Chairman,

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Despite all the hullaballoo about the potential for voter intimidation on Nov. 2, there is a greater danger to the integrity of the midterms–one that has received far less attention. As I write in a Time.com piece up today:

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For the first time, TIME has assembled a roster of this year’s rising political stars–40 candidates, strategists, leaders and office-holders under 40 years of age. You can check out the list, which includes micro-profiles and honoree interviews, here. Best choice? Worst choice? Who’d we miss?

(Bonus: Time.com has also put together a …

Norwalk, Conn.

In politics as in business, Linda McMahon grasps the art of the sale. During Thursday morning’s debate between Connecticut’s Senate candidates, the Republican cast herself as the antidote to the bankrupt politics of Washington, a product few voters are pleased with in this turbulent cycle. “The choice in this …

The Wall Street Journal fronted a good story today about how Tea Party groups in several states have worked to build closer ties among themselves and with lawmakers as they try to exert greater influence on public policy. The fruits of their efforts, as writer Neil King points out, will be on display at a conference beginning Friday in …

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGGAgljengs&feature=player_embedded]

She’s you. Although I suspect you believe in evolution.

“That is clearly up to the states.”

-Joe Miller, Republican Senate nominee in Alaska, arguing the federal minimum wage should be abolished. During an interview with ABC News and Politico published on Monday, Miller also invoked the 10th Amendment to explain his opposition to federal unemployment insurance. “If you like big …

TIME’s Elizabeth Dias files this report:

A Senate Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions Committee investigation into federal investment in for-profit colleges devolved into a political squabble this morning, with Republican Sen. Richard Burr calling Sen. Tom Harkin’s investigation a “witch hunt.”

The proceedings were charged

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