In an upstate New York county, hundreds of voters have been sent absentee ballots in which they could vote for “Barack Osama.”

The absentee ballots sent to voters in Rensselaer County identified the two presidential candidates as “Barack Osama” and “John McCain.”

Commissioners for the Rensselaer County Board of Elections say they regret the error but do not acknowledge in a statement exactly what the error is.

From where I grew up, you could see Troy. In fact, we looked down on Troy. In fact, we called Troy “The Armpit of the Universe.” Other than the fact that this was true, I’m not sure why we did that.

I quickly add that Rensselear County is quite beautiful. Home of the Headless Horseman and other tales by Washington Irving, and so on, this former Patroonship is probably now mostly suburban sprawl but I’m sure the little towns like Kinderhook are still terribly quaint.

And I suspect this was an honest typo. Troy is not Lake Woebegone.

Yesterday in Minnesota shows that the hottest senate race in the country is getting hotter, with Al Franken pulling a statistically non-significant but still interesting four points ahead of incumbent Norm Coleman. The Independence Candidate is not increasing his percentage of the vote, apparently, so he has stopped being a factor.

Today, also in Minnesota, an even newer poll puts Franken at 8% out, and I believe that is statistically significant.

An interesting glitch here is that of the 17% or so who claim Barkely as their guy, a very small percentage seem to have strong support for the Independence Party candidate. This means that this remains a volatile race.

Today’s Gallop Tracking Poll shows a continuation of the increase in Obama’s lead, despite McCain’s continued shenanigans in the campaign. The fact that the global markets are literally crashing like they’ve never been seen to crash before may be a factor here.

… say no more.

for so many reasons.

H/T PZ

It turns out that McCain voted FOR that bill funding the bear research he constantly bear-rates….