#elections

#elections

As I started writing this, folks were heading to the polls for the first time in a long, terrible year. Hyperbole somehow failed us when the White House was (is still being) destroyed. Plus, everyone's Social Security numbers were stolen, the world's biggest anti-vaxxer wants to ban Tylenol, and SNAP benefits were frozen for the first time. Yeah, it's been that kinda year. Pandora's box has been opened and all the maladies therein have been unleashed.

Ifirst heard the expression "strategic incompetence" in El Salvador in December 1993. Along with my partner and two friends, I'd been recruited to do some electoral training there. We were working with the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, or FMLN, a coalition of leftist parties that had led a long-running guerrilla war against a series of US-backed autocratic governments. I'd visited El Salvador once before, during the 1989 elections, when armed troops were overseeing the voting.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban led what he called a "peace march," stressing his opposition to military support for Ukraine, while his main challenger, Peter Magyar of the Tisza Party, led a competing protest. In an address to the crowd in front of parliament, Orban reiterated his opposition to EU military aid for Ukraine as well as potential EU and NATO membership for the country.

In other words, the date on a machine-applied postmark may reflect the date on which the mailpiece was first accepted by the Postal Service, but that is not definitively the case,

They had managed to have three leaders in a little over a year: Nicola Sturgeon, Humza Yousaf and then John Swinney. It was a rate of attrition that would make even the Conservative Party of recent years blush. There had also been a high-profile and long-running police investigation into the SNP's finances, involving Sturgeon, who was told earlier this year she would face no action.

CNN's Dana Bash played video of Trump saying Friday, When somebody is given, 97% of the stories are bad about a person that's no longer free speech, that's no longer anything, that's just cheating. Senator, he really seems to be redefining free speech as speech that is only favorable to him, Bash said. I can't imagine that you're comfortable with that.

Samoa's first female leader, Fiame Naomi Mata'afa, has failed to win a majority in the Pacific nation's elections this week, capping months of political infighting. Official results published by the electoral commission on Friday showed the opposition Fast party won 30 out of the 50 contested seats in parliament. That means Fast's leader, La'aulialemalietoa Leuatea Polataivao Schmidt, is most likely to be sworn in as prime minister.

The Republican president is proudly promoting the work of roughly 2,000 National Guard troops in the city, loaned by allied governors from at least six Republican-led states. They're in place to confront what Trump describes as an out-of-control crime wave in the Democratic-run city, though violent crime in Washington, like dozens of cities led by Democrats, has been down significantly since a pandemic high.

* This Eric Adams ally corruption story has everything: snacks, questionable lawyering, and a wad of cash. [ The CITY] * A Trump U.S. Attorney in Virginia abruptly resigns. Hmmmm... wonder what's going on there. [ Bloomberg Law] * Ninth Circuit clears way for Trump to end Temporary Protected Status for immigrants from Nicaragua, Honduras and Nepal. [ Reuters] * Is revenge a good justification for a federal case? We'll see! [ Law and Crime]

"We have to prove to people we are competent," Cooper told BBC Radio Stoke. He said many people told the party after they came into power that they "did not know how to run things" and had no history in local government.

The recent parliamentary elections in Poland marked a significant turning point, as the national populists of the Law and Justice party were ousted from power with a record 75% voter turnout.

Sir Keir Starmer's decision to recognize Palestinian statehood will lead to significant challenges for top cabinet ministers, as pro-Gaza candidates threaten their positions in upcoming elections.