Gay Marriage Approved by Voters, First Time in US History

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Americans for the first time approved gay marriage at the ballot box on Tuesday, pointing to changing attitudes on the divisive issue.

In Maine and Maryland, voters approved ballot initiatives to begin allowing same-sex unions. Those wins mark a first for a cause that had previously been rejected by voters in more than 30 states, including as recently as 2009 in Maine.

And in Minnesota, where gay marriage is already not allowed, voters declined to back an initiative that would enshrine in the state’s constitution a definition of marriage permitting only a union between a man and woman.

In Washington state, where voters also weighed an initiative to legalize gay marriage, the vote count was expected to stretch on for days. With half of the vote counted as of 3 a.m. Eastern time, nearly 52% supported the idea.

In Maine, campaigners for same-sex marriage said the win marked a turning point for their cause. “We made history here tonight and showed that voters can change their minds,” said Matt McTighe, the campaign director of Mainers United for Marriage. “That will serve as something of a signal to other states who have lost marriage fights before at ballot boxes. You can change those minds.”

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Huckabee and O’Reilly: “GOP Has a Problem Reaching Voters Who Are Not White Men and Want Stuff”

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Republicans have not done a good job reaching minorities as the country has started to shift from a majority white society, which may have cost them the presidential election.

Mike Huckabee and Bill O’Reilly in separate interviews on Fox News said the GOP has a problem reaching voters who are not white men and want stuff – which is why, they said, President Barack Obama won reelection.

“The white establishment is now the minority,” O’Reilly said before the election was called for Obama. “And the voters, many of them, feel that the economic system is stacked against them and they want stuff. You are going to see a tremendous Hispanic vote for President Obama.

Overwhelming black vote for President Obama. And women will probably break President Obama’s way. People feel that they are entitled to things and which candidate, between the two, is going to give them things?”

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GOP Wins Big in Governor Races, The Most Since the 1920’s

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North Carolina voters elected their first Republican governor in two decades Tuesday, fanning the GOP’s hope of broadening their party’s hold on governor’s mansions across the country.

The victory by former Charlotte Mayor Pat McCrory came two years after Republicans snatched six governors’ offices in the midterm elections, giving the party 29 governorships to 20 for Democrats and one independent entering Tuesday’s elections, in which 11 gubernatorial races were to be decided.

When all the ballots are counted, Republicans could have as many as 33 governorships — the most since the 1920s and one more than they had in the 1990s.

Mr. McCrory defeated Democratic Lt. Gov. Walter Dalton to become the state’s first GOP chief executive since Jim Martin left office in early 1993. Mr. McCrory had lost his gubernatorial bid in 2008 to Democrat Beverly Perdue, who opted not to run for re-election this year.

Democratic governors are leaving office in North Carolina, Montana, New Hampshire and Washington, raising Republican hopes that at least some of those offices can be flipped to the GOP. But New Hampshire’s governor’s mansion remained in Democratic hands Tuesday, as did those in Vermont and Delaware.

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Ron Paul Republicans Win Closely Contested House Races

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Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul will retire from Congress next year after serving for 12 terms, but several Republicans influenced by the iconic libertarian-leaning lawmaker will be arriving to take his place.

Thomas Massie won the race to replace retiring Kentucky Republican Rep. Geoff Davis, beating Democrat Bill Adkins by 20 percentage points. Massie, an ally of Paul’s son, Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul, raised nearly 10 times as much money as Adkins, according to the Lexington-Herald Leader.

Michigan Republican Rep. Justin Amash, who was already vying to be the House’s next “Dr. No” in his first term, was re-elected with 58 percent of the vote. Democrat Steve Pestka had hoped to win the votes of independents and moderate Republicans who might regard Amash as too extreme, but failed to gain traction against the 31-year-old congressman.

In a neighboring Michigan district, Ron Paul Republican Kerry Bentivolio was elected to the House seat formerly held by GOP Rep. Thaddeus McCotter. McCotter, who had failed to gather enough valid signatures to appear on the ballot, resigned from the House amid a petition scandal. Bentivolio beat Democrat Syed Taj.

Bentivolio spent four decades in the U.S. Army, but was painted by opponents as an eccentric. He raised reindeer and was an occasional Santa Claus. He was elected to Congress by a 7-point margin.

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Laura Ingraham: No Surprise if Chris Christie Becomes a Democrat

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Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who came out long ago in favor of his party’s nominee Mitt Romney’s candidacy for president, apparently upset a lot of people on the conservative side for his embrace of Romney’s opponent, President Barack Obama in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. And according to conservative talker Laura Ingraham, it was taken to the point of “embarrassing himself.”

On her Tuesday radio program, Ingraham, the author of “Of Thee I Zing: America’s Cultural Decline,” criticized the New Jersey governor for his latest comment expressing his excitement in hearing from Obama supporter and rock star Bruce Springsteen.

“Speaking of embarrassing himself, Chris Christie … was out there and he was very excited, not because he’s voting for Romney,” Ingraham said. “He’s excited because he got a phone call: not just from the president of these United States, but he got a phone call from Bruce Springsteen.”

Ingraham went on to point out that Christie shares a character trait with Obama in that he often talks about things in context of himself.

“You know what, I’ve just got to say this: He has a lot more in common with Obama than we thought,” she said. “It’s all about Chris Christie. ‘My Jersey Shore,’ ‘my roller coasters underwater,’ ‘my hero Bruce Springsteen,’ ‘I have to pinch myself to go on Air Force One as the son of an Italian immigrant,’ or whatever he said.”

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Ten Commandments Judge Roy Moore Wins Again as Alabama’s Chief Justice

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Judge Roy Moore, who made headlines when state officials removed him from his position as chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court in 2003, has been re-elected to that very post.

In a race that was called some hours after polls closed tonight, Moore was declared winner of the race over Bob Vance, a Jefferson County circuit judge. The victory margin was 52-48 percent.

After the race was called, Moore told WND that he’ll be concentrating on assessing the case load, the budget and other administrative tasks as soon as he takes office early in the new year.

“It was a wonderful victory,” he said.

In a recent editorial asking for votes from his state’s residents, he explained that the controversy that resulted in his removal nearly 10 years ago was not primarily about a Ten Commandments monument he had had installed in the court building.

“I will … lead the judicial system of Alabama to uphold constitutional principles and moral values contained in our law and will resist all efforts to disparage or destroy our beloved constitution,” he wrote then.

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Post-Election Flood of ‘Obamacare’ Rules Expected

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photo credit: SteveKingIAThe bottled-up rules to set up President Barack Obama’s health care reform law are going to start flowing quickly right after Election Day.

But how long will that last? That depends on who wins the presidency.

The once-steady stream of regulations and rules from the Obama administration — instructions for insurance companies, hospitals and states on how to put the law in place — has slowed to a trickle in recent months in an attempt to avoid controversies before the election. Many states, too, have done little public work to avoid making the law an election issue for state officials on the ballot.

But work has been going on behind the scenes — both in the Department of Health and Human Services and at the state level. As soon as Wednesday, the gears and levers of government bureaucracy are likely to start moving at full speed again.

HHS is expected to begin to release the backlog of regulations. And the states will quickly face a Nov. 16 deadline to tell the Obama administration whether they’ll implement a health insurance exchange — a key part of the law about where consumers will purchase health insurance after 2014.

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Romney’s Closing Statement

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photo credit: masonbuzzflickrThese last few months, I’ve watched our campaign become a nationwide movement.

It’s not just the size of the crowds — it’s the depth of our shared conviction, the readiness for new possibilities, and the belief that we can do better than we’ve done these past four years.

I am asking for your vote . . . because it matters for your family and our country’s future.

Throughout my life, I’ve led turnarounds of every kind. I pledge that Paul Ryan and I will bring real change to America from Day One. We have a plan that will deliver a real recovery.

Our children will graduate into exciting careers that are worthy of their qualifications. Our seniors will be confident that their retirement is secure. Americans will have good jobs, good pay, and good benefits. Our veterans will come home to a bright future. We will have confidence that our lives are safe and our livelihoods are secure.

If you are ready for that kind of change — if you want this to be a turning point in America’s course — join us and vote for the kind of leadership that these times demand.

This is the most important election of our lifetime — and every vote counts.

We have to win this for America — and with your vote, we will. We are hours away from the better future America deserves. Thank You.

Learn more about the candidate HERE.

Philly Activist Group Shreds GOP Voter Registrations

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The Community Voters Project is a “non-partisan” lefty organization whose mission is to register people to vote, with a particular emphasis on minorities. In the 2008 election, they had offices in 10 states and registered around 300,000 minority voters. So far, so good.

This year, however, it seems they aren’t registering everyone who wants to vote. Outside a CVP office in Philadelphia, for example, they shredded and threw away numerous registration forms. A number of these were for people trying to register as a Republican.

A citizen-journalist came across a large bag of trash outside the CVP office in Philadelphia. Glancing at it, the citizen saw what looked like shredded registration forms. The pictures in this post are from CVP’s trash. The photo above clearly shows that the voter who submitted the shredded registration form was registering as a Republican.

You’re right if you think this sounds a lot like ACORN and its litany of problems with voter fraud. CVP used to work along side ACORN, and several of its employees have worked for both organizations. CVP has also had significant problems with fraud. Several of its employees were indicted in 2008 for voter registration fraud.

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Complaint Alleges Unions Putting Illegal Immigrants on Voter Rolls in Nevada

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photo credit: Barack ObamaJust hours before voters go to the polls in the battleground state of Nevada, a national group has announced it plans to file a complaint regarding illegal immigrants purportedly being allowed to vote.

ALIPAC, Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, based in Raleigh, N.C., sent the Nevada secretary of state an email outlining its intention.

“We want to stop the felonious thefts of American elections,” says William Gheen, ALIPAC’s president.

Gheen points to a commentary published in Sunday’s Las Vegas Review Journal. In it, editorial writer Glenn Cook accuses the Culinary Union 226 of knowingly registering illegal immigrants and then pressured them to vote.

Cook quotes an unidentified illegal immigrant who is on the Clark County voter rolls. The person claims a union representative told them they were “in so much trouble” for refusing to vote.

Read more from this story HERE.