Ice Cream Shop Done!

Views of the Ice Cream Shop (bird's eye and lego person's eye), and two shots up and down the block.

Pride Birthdays and Memorials for the Week ~ November 18th to November 24th

Future President?

The year is 2036 and one of these 11 year olds could become president of the United States.

Freshmen Class of Senators

Post Election Redux: North Carolina

While North Carolina went to Romney by 2.2%, the Democrats still won women, youth, African Americans, Hispanics, and urban areas like Raleigh, Durham, Charlotte, Greensboro, Winston-Salem and Asheville. And perhaps the most interesting Obama margin was in Cumberland County, home of Fayetteville and the largest military installation in the state: Fort Bragg. Another blow to the myth that the military is in the pocket of the Republican party. North Carolina, like Florida, Virginia and Ohio, IS a true swing state.

Post Election Redux: Wisconsin

Wisconsin went for Obama by 6.7% which is SO FAR outside of the margin of error and any definition of a "swing state". Only the extremely rural areas and wealthy suburbs of Milwaukee went for Romney. Everywhere else, all over the state, went for Obama. Paul Ryan's hometown went for Obama. Wisconsin was the foam on the Obama Swing State Tsunami.

Post Election Redux: Iowa

Iowa is a story of East versus West, and more people live in the eastern part of the state. Other strongholds were the university towns. Another surprise component to Democrat's victory was the Hispanic community in the state. And with 5.6% margin, another NOT swing state treated like a swing state.

Post Election Redux: Colorado

Colorado went from predictions of a razor thin margin at best to a victory by 4.7% in favor of Obama. Women, Hispanics, youth all turned out for Obama. Denver, Bolder, Fort Collins, and interestingly Aspen and Telluride all when for Obama. Colorado Springs a national haven of Evangelical Christianity went for Romney.

Post Election Redux: New Hampshire

New Hampshire went 5.8% for Obama to suggest that it wasn't actually a swing state at all in this election. The only thing that sets New Hampshire apart is that Romney succeeded in the largest urban areas of Portsmouth when most urban areas in states went to Obama. In other elections, Democrats took back both House seats and the governorship and now those three offices are held along with both of the Senate seats by women. New Hampshire becomes the first state with a complete Federal congressional delegation to be 100% female. Awesome!

Pollster Report Card Time!

I took this information from the Nate Silver blog on the New York Times website and constructed this graphic out of it giving my own grades to the major polling organizations. Ranked from most accurate results to least accurate the data reveals some stunning facts--if you ask me. 1) The majority of the bias favored the Republicans and was thus reflected in the media---Liberal media bias? NOT so much. 2) You know how most polls give the caveat + or - 3 percentage points, or somethings that's called the "margin of error," well what do you call it when you are consistently 4 to 7.2 points off? Incompetence? 3) What names fall off the scale as being terrible at this? Rasmussen Reports (which Fox bought a few years back and turned into a tool of their own Conservative Agenda News machine), ARG, Mason-Dixon, and....dare I say it, GALLUP! These are among the most well established and oft quoted polling companies in the nation. If they were publicly owned and traded today, Gallup and Mason-Dixon would be at the penny stock level. What statistician worth their salt would even want to work there--or is that already the problem?

Post Election Redux: PENNSYLVANIA

I have Reduxed the three big swing states of Ohio, Florida and Virginia. And you may recall that throughout the election there were 9 of these attention getters out there. The other five were New Hampshire, Iowa, Wisconsin, Colorado, Nevada and North Carolina. And so you would expect that the nine closest races would be in these 9 states. But the reality is a bit different and tips the hat to the Romney team, and begs perhaps a rethinking come the next presidential election. Top ten closest states in descending order: 0.9% FLORIDA 1.9% OHIO 2.2% NORTH CAROLINA 3.0% VIRGINIA 4.7% COLORADO 5.2% PENNSYLVANIA 5.6% IOWA 5.8% NEW HAMPSHIRE 6.6% NEVADA 6.7% WISCONSIN Did you catch that? PENNSYLVANIA was closer that nearly half of the swing states. So IF Pennsylvania wasn't a swing state, why was Wisconsin or Nevada? I would suggest that Nevada never was (in spite of a certain casino magnate’s hundreds of millions of dollars in free speech), and that the only thing that made Wisconsin one was Paul Ryan's name on the ticket.

Looking more closely at the map of Pennsylvania you see a story very much like that of other states. Most notably the vote of urban areas going to Obama: Pittsburgh, Erie, Allentown, Harrisburg, Scranton, Wilkes-Barre and the mother of all--Philadelphia! If you were to take the vote in Philadelphia and subtract from those who voted for Obama the voters who voted for Romney and others so that you are only talking about the net winning votes for Obama, MORE people voted for Obama in Philadelphia that voted for BOTH of the candidates in all of the highlighted and most successful counties for Romney. I hope that what I just described makes sense, but in the abstract what it means is that Philadelphia is the 900 lb gorilla in the room called Pennsylvania.

Pride Birthdays and Memorials for the Week ~ November 11th to November 17th

Post Election Redux: FLORIDA

Let's look at Florida, I didn't call it for Obama, Nate Silver said it was too close to call. In the End Obama took it by 0.6% of the vote or 51,938 votes. Again, like Virginia, voters in heavily Democrat areas waited in some precincts for up to 8 hours AFTER the polls closed to cast a ballot. 1) Obama faired far better in most of the Urban areas: Miami, Tampa, St. Petersburg, Orlando, Gainesville and Tallahassee. (Romney took Jacksonville and Pensacola) 2) The Panhandle continued it's reputation as being one of the most Republican areas in the nation. 3) Hispanic, Black, Jewish, Youth (18-29), and Female voters in Florida proved a stronger coalition in the end. 4) Florida also gave the House three new Democrat congresspeople and returned a Democrat Senator to office. With a growing shift in demographics that favor Democrats on ALL the metrics, Florida, like Virginia will continue to be a swing state into the near future.

Post Election Redux: OHIO

Ohio is an interesting critter this time out. The Erie shore remained faithful from Toledo to Ashtabula with Cleveland smack dab at its heart. Both Akron and Youngstown, too. And then four other satellites of blue stand out and our home to Athens and Ohio State, Columbus, Dayton and notoriously "red" Cincinnati. So what do we know about the vote in Ohio? 1) Running a commercial that was 100% falsehood during the final week of the election bashing the leading source of Ohio's economic comeback might not be such a brilliant idea--thank you, Rob Portman! 2) Younger Ohioans went for Obama: 18-29 by 63% (Athens, por ejemplo) and 30 to 44 by 51%. 3) Women favored Obama by 55%, which mirrored the national average of this demographic. 4) 96% of African America and 54% of Hispanic citizens of the buck-eye state chose Obama. 5) 62% of unmarried Ohioans chose Obama. Was it that squeaky clean married Mormon shine that scared them off? It's a curious statistic. Nationwide, 62% of unmarried Americans who voted, voted for Obama also, while only 44% of married Americans did.

Post Election Redux: VIRGINIA

Let's look at Virginia: A state that Obama took by over 110,000 votes thousands of which were cast by people willing to wait up to and over 6 hours AFTER the polls closed. Some key points to consider: 1) Romney did best is far western Tazwell County with 78.2% of the approximately 17,500 votes counted. 2) Even in many counties that went for Romney, the Independent cities went for Obama. 3) Northern Virginia and Richmond proved the Democrat strongholds that they have always been. 4) The military bastion of Norfolk/Newport News/Portsmouth also went very decisively for Obama. 5) The military in Virginia supported Obama by large margins over Romney, ending the myth that Republican's hold sway over the military vote. 6) Charlottesville was another power locale for Obama owing to a strong showing of young voters (ages 18 to 29). 7) Obama's strongest showing was in Petersburg with 90.4% of the approximately 13,000 votes cast. 8) Northern Virginia support was buffered by both huge percentages of Hispanic and Asian support.

Bacon Saturday!

When it comes to Bacon, I can be a little bit like that dog on the commercial for the bacon flavored dog biscuits, right? But I limit myself to only eating once or twice a month. Today was Bacon day!

Breakfast was Huevos Primavera with Hickory-smoked Bacon!

Dinner Bacon-wrapped Shrimp-Kabobs! In my best Lt. Sulu impersonation, let me just say, "Oh my..."!

What To Expect Tonight

In case you haven't figured it out by now, I'm kinda politically wonkish... And so tonight I will be awaiting the outcome with great anticipation. I also love graphic design. I anticipate a long night, and one in which the numbers will favor Governor Romney for the majority of the evening. Obama will be declared the winner after the poles close in California, Oregon and Washington at 11:00 pm. And the critical state in the mix will be Virginia. Ohio and possibly Florida will simply be icing on the cake.

When The Polls Close

Election Day!

My advice? Eat a hearty breakfast and then GO VOTE!!! Yeah!

Lego Construction Boom Continues

With a new Bicycle Shop in the lot next to the rising Ice Cream Parlor with the Italian Restorante on the other side.

I often use real buildings as inspiration. The one in the photo from Amsterdam, I think inspired the ground floor here.

The interior ground floor is complete with merchandize.

And a helpful sails clerk to assist you with your purchase.

I context you can see that it sits in the formerly vacant lot between the Italian Restorante and the new brownstone with the ice cream parlor on the ground floor.

A bird's eye view of the block.

New Lego Construction In Progress

Pride Birthdays and Memorials for the Week ~ November 4th to November 10th

Presidential Race Map #17: The Finale