The Takeaway

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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Chasing Huckabee, Jon Voight and youth issues with MTV Street Teamer Anthony W.

Friday, September 05, 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).

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — Last night, I met up with Anthony Wojtkowiak on the floor of the Xcel Center, right before John McCain’s acceptance speech. One of 51 state-based youth journalists who report on the presidential campaign and local politics as part of a MTV project called Street Team ‘08, Anthony came to the RNC all the way from Florida to track down some stories. As I watched him effortlessly chat with delegates from his home state, I wasn’t a bit surprised to hear that a day earlier he had scored an interview with Mike Huckabee merely by doggedly pursuing him after a press conference.

When we left the convention floor, we heard a commotion. Anthony rushed toward it, calling out “Mr. Voight, Mr. Voight.” It was actor Jon Voight; unfortunately, before Anthony even got out his first question, a publicist broke them up. Techniques that work on politicians don’t always work on celebrities, it seems.
I spoke with Anthony about getting interviews, the rising cost of education, and how technology is making street-level reporting faster and easier.
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Behind-the-scenes on the lawmaker-lobbyist party circuit

Friday, September 05, 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).

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — There were more than 300 parties thrown by lobbyists and corporations during the DNC and RNC, and to help me understand them, I turned to Nancy Watzman of the Sunlight Foundation, a watchdog group that investigates the interplay of money, lobbying and politics.

Wondering which companies sponsored events during the conventions?
AT&T
Qwest
Microsoft
Fidelity
HP
Oracle
Viacom…and many more
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Riot police surround Rage Against the Machine fans

Thursday, September 04, 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).

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — After Governor Sarah Palin’s speech at the St. Paul convention center, I headed over to Minneapolis to check out what was going on outside the Rage Against the Machine concert. I found a dismal scene: riot police standing in formation literally fencing in the fans/protestors and released concertgoers watching on in a daze.
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What keeps the media going and going? An RNC caterer tells all

Thursday, September 04, 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).


ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — What’s Newsweek, Inside Edition, The Wall Street Journal, Al Jazeera, and The Christian Science Monitor eating all week long in their media compounds at the Republican National Convention? For the inside scoop, I turned to Gary of St. Paul’s Wildside Caterers, the team that fed the newsmakers’ every meal.
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I sell both candidates

Wednesday, September 03, 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).

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — “Is this your candidate?”

Eddie Perrell, a T-shirt seller outside the convention center, has merch for everyone: delegates all dressed up and buzzing over tonight’s big Sarah Palin speech and Barack Obama fans.

An Obama hat will set you back $10. A McCain/Palin tee? $20.

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Ron Paul’s “Rally for the Republic”

Wednesday, September 03, 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).

ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA — Across the Mississippi river from St. Paul, supporters of Congressman Ron Paul, R-Texas, converged on the Target Center in Minneapolis at Tuesday night’s “Rally for the Republic.”

Paul’s bid for the Republican nomination for president ended months ago, and in a sign that there’s ire at the GOP, the agitator Paul wasn’t invited to speak at this year’s Republican National Convention.

No matter. Paul’s supporters’ enthusiasm remains strong for his anti-war, strict Constitutionalism views. Last night I spoke with many of them, young and old, to find out just what Paul had done to endear himself to so many and what he’s promised that John McCain and Barack Obama have not.
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