Blogs - The Takeaway

David Wall Rice: The complex joy of poll-watching with Mrs. Maple

Tuesday, November 04, 2008

By David Wall Rice : Takeaway Contributor

So here we go - Election Day. I've rolled out of bed much, much, much earlier than normal in an effort to get to the polls before they open. I am a poll-watcher today. Exciting!

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The importance of winning central Florida, “the battleground region of the biggest battleground state”

Monday, November 03, 2008

By Jennifer Hsu : Video Producer, WNYC Interactive

ORLANDO, FLORIDA — I met up with Aubrey Jewett, a University of Central Florida political science professor, to find out why the “I-4 corridor,” a stretch running from Daytona on the Atlantic coast all the way over to the Tampa on Florida’s west coast, is critical to winning the presidential election. Jewett explains why this once Republican region is slowly turning Democratic.

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David Wall Rice: Sipping the Kool-Aid and voting early

Monday, November 03, 2008

By David Wall Rice : Takeaway Contributor

I've sipped the Kool-Aid. Not the Obama brand, or the McCain for that matter. It was labeled true democracy — flavored red, white and blue. I didn't drink it all mind you, just a sip. The first time I was able to vote was as an undergraduate in school in Atlanta — Clinton vs. Bush 41 in 1992. It was simple enough. I rolled out of bed, probably went to a class or two and strolled to the poll set up in Archer Hall, our auditorium at Morehouse College. No big deal, but a big deal — people died for me to vote, so it was my responsibility to show up. It was the same with Clinton vs. Dole in 1996. This time I was in graduate school in Washington, D.C. Clinton won, again. Whatever. And it was downhill from there.

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Unemployed in central Florida: Voices behind the vote

Saturday, November 01, 2008

By Jennifer Hsu : Video Producer, WNYC Interactive

Trouble viewing this video? Check out the YouTube version (click “watch in high quality” for best quality).

BUENAVENTURA LAKES, FLORIDA — While visiting an early voting location in Buenaventura Lakes, less than 10 miles from Disney World, I was intrigued by one voter, David Fernandez Rido. He’s an unemployed small-business owner who is struggling to make his mortgage payments and find a job in this depressed economy. Like nearly one in two residents of this community, he’s Hispanic. He’ll soon be in the majority.

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Yes, We Van! Early voting made easy for university students in central Florida (Republicans accepted)

Friday, October 31, 2008

By Jennifer Hsu : Video Producer, WNYC Interactive

Trouble viewing this video? Check out the YouTube version (click “watch in high quality” for best quality).

ORLANDO, FLORIDA — Early voting in Central Florida’s Orange County has already dwarfed 2004. Four years ago, a total of 79,000 people voted. Today, with two more days left in early voting, some 114,000 people have already turned out here.

Part of that total comes from the “Yes, We Van!” shuttles at the University of Central Florida. These students have been running vans from campus to early voting sites. They’re supporting Obama for the presidency, but they’ll take any student who wants to vote. Takeaway producer Jennifer Hsu rode along.

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Video: Xtreme polls 2008: Getting creative with political prognostication

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Trouble viewing this video? Check out the YouTube version (click "watch in high quality" for best quality).

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Mary Elizabeth Williams: Screw the polls, voters are putting candidates where their mouths are

Thursday, October 30, 2008

By Mary Elizabeth Williams : Culture Critic

In these last few days before the election, many of us are furiously surfing the Web looking for the clues to the outcome. We electoral-vote.com. We 538. We Gallup. Maybe we check out some goat entrails. But we're American. We vote with our wallets — especially when there's a delectable sweet or a meat lover's pie thrown in the deal.

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A new, strikingly accurate polling method: Shortbread cookie sales

Thursday, October 30, 2008

By Adam Hirsch : Web Producer

I spoke with Gregg Forrest, who owns and runs Layers Bakery with his wife Jeanne in Henderson, Nevada. Early voting started on October 18, but Forrest has been running an unofficial poll for several weeks from his bakery counter with some startlingly accurate results.

UPDATE:
The Layers cookie poll finished up with 467 “O-Biden” cookies to 352 for “McPalin.” (That’s 57% to 42%.) The bakery’s polling accuracy continued to be uncannily dead-on: the official voting results for Nevada showed 55% for Obama, 42% for McCain. (This is only a guess, but perhaps if Layers had offered (and sold) a handful of third-party cookies, they’d have been even closer to the final results.)

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North Dakota Oil Diary: Photos from the Bakken oil fields

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

By Caitlin McNally

A sign identifies Peak Energy's Dunn County, North Dakota drilling site. (Caitlin McNally)

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Jeff Beresford-Howe: Bad umpiring and bad play makes for the Worst. World Series. Ever.

Monday, October 27, 2008

By Jeff Beresford-Howe

Tampa Bay Rays third baseman Evan Longoria walks back to the dugout after striking out during Game Four of the 2008 World Series. The star infielder has gone 0-16 in four games. (Jim McIsaac/Getty Images)

With Sunday night's Game Four 10-2 rout of the Tampa Bay Rays by the Philadelphia Phillies, this year's World Series nears a probable end Monday night as the Phillies throw their ace, the always good and recently unhittable Cole Hamels, at the Rays. If Hamels pulls it off for the Phils, it'll be the fifth straight lopsided and forgettable World Series.

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An interactive glossary of the economic crisis

Monday, October 27, 2008

Subprime Mortgages? Mortgage-Backed Securities? Credit Default Swaps? What!? Explore a cloud of the concepts, people, government institutions and companies behind this economic crisis.

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Slideshow: Your photos of ballots, envelopes, machines and polling locations from across the country

Friday, October 24, 2008

We're asking for your photos of ballots, envelopes, machines and polling locations to get a sense of all the different methods by which Americans are voting. Email the photo to mytake@thetakeaway.org or post it to Flickr.com. Be sure to tell us your name, where you're from, and the story of the photo. We'll share the best of them with our readers on Wednesday.

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Q&A with Yale's Heather Gerken on the voting process and election reform

Friday, October 24, 2008

By Christina M. Russo

Yale Law School professor Heather Gerken took your questions on the voting process and how to fix it, Friday, October 24, 2008, at 10 a.m. (Eastern).

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Takeaway listeners talk politics

Thursday, October 16, 2008

By Jennifer Hsu : Video Producer, WNYC Interactive

Trouble viewing this video? Check out the YouTube version (click “watch in high quality” for best quality).

Femi Oke meets up with some Takeaway Listeners in New York after the last of the presidential debates. Fresh from watching John McCain and Barack Obama debate, they make television political pundits look like pussycats.

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Iceland's economy becomes a casuality in the global financial downturn as allies look away

Thursday, October 16, 2008

By Sherry Mazzocchi

While the United States is focused its own economic problems, Iceland is experiencing an even more severe crisis. The Icelandic government has seized control of the three largest banks, its stock market was closed for several days, trading in the Icelandic krona is suspended, and Iceland is in negotiations ...

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North Dakota Oil Diary: "It's always scary, until you get used to it"

Thursday, October 09, 2008

In my previous post about North Dakota's Bakken oil fields, I included a conversation with two young waitresses about their journey from opposite sides of the country to almost the dead northern middle. The girls had left their homes on the coasts with their boyfriends, searching for work in what they had heard was the beginning of an all-out oil boom.

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Q-and-A with Jon Barrett, editor-in-chief of The Advocate

Monday, October 06, 2008

10 years after Matthew Shepard's death in Wyoming, we talk with Advocate editor-in-chief Jon Barrett.

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So how many times did Sarah Palin wink?

Friday, October 03, 2008

By Jennifer Hsu : Video Producer, WNYC Interactive

It felt like Sarah Palin was winking at me constantly during last night’s vice-presidential debate. But in fact she only winked four times. I know, because I went through the entire broadcast and counted….

Wink #1: “And the American workforce is the greatest in this world, with the ingenuity and the work ethic that is just entrenched in our workforce. That’s a positive. That’s encouragement. [Wink.] And that’s what John McCain meant.”

Wink #2: “And how long have I been [wink] at this, like five weeks? So there hasn’t been a whole lot that I’ve promised, except to do what is right for the American people.”

Wink #3: “As for disagreeing with John McCain and how our administration would work, what do you expect? A team of mavericks, of course we’re not going to agree on 100 percent of everything. As we discuss ANWR there, at least we can agree to disagree on that one. [Wink.] I will keep pushing him on ANWR.”

Wink #4: “I come from a house full of school teachers. My grandma was, my dad [wink] who is in the audience today, he’s a schoolteacher, had been for many years.”

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Asking for $700 billion with a straight face

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Trouble viewing this video? Check out the YouTube version (click "watch in high quality" for best quality).

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Your questions on the Wall Street rescue plans

Monday, September 22, 2008

Rep. Barney Frank answered your questions.

UPDATE (9/24): We expect Rep. Barney Frank to join us Wednesday morning at about 7 a.m. Eastern. Listen live at thetakeaway.org.

UPDATE (9/23): Rep. Barney Frank will not be able to join us Tuesday. We hope to have him back soon. We'll do our best to address your questions this week...

Tomorrow morning on our show, we're going to be talking with Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the chair of the House finance committee about the Wall Street rescue plan. What questions do you have for him?

Leave a question in the mix, and tune in Sept. 23 24, 2008, at around 7 a.m. and 9 a.m. on your station or online.

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