Stu Rasmussen

Found her on Megafilter today, just the random ramble looking for found, shiny objects.
Funny thing is, though, last night I saw a local production of the Pulitzer winning "I Am My Own Wife," and it was a brilliantly written and acted account of a German tranny who survived both Nazis and E. German Stazis.
Anyway, Stu has been active in Silverton, OR, business and city politics for two decades, but only recently discovered his true nature, or at least what it meant. They elected her mayor anyway.

Sen. Gordon Smith, R, Oregon

is the projected loser in his bid for re-election by the local newspaper, The Oregonian of Portland, whose political staff knows more than any outsider how the state's demographics work. Mostly, it's because the areas left to count, blue-blue Eugene and Portland suburbs, are likely to push his opponent over the top.
Merkley, Jeff Merkley, I think.

Three More Dem. Senators?

Franken and Coleman are in a recount and the odds are in Al's favor.
Chambliss in Georgia will have to go into a runoff.
Smith in Oregon may lose his seat once the only uncounted ballots from liberal Democratic areas in Eugene and suburban Portland are tallied.
Oh, wait, then there's Alaska, where Stevens' opponent believes he has a 50/50 shot at pulling it out.

And Harry Reid's having a little chat with Joe Lieberman about that Homeland Security chairmanship.
And there are now five new Democratic senators.

Hope Index Rising?

UPDATED BELOW
Travis Childers apparently isn't what you or I might call a "better" Democrat (as in "elect more and better Democrats," as in "Ah'm pro-loff and pro-gun"), but it's Mississippi for god's sake, and he just beat a Republican in a deeply red district by more than 7 points, a district that went 67 percent for George Bush last time.
This is the third deeply red seat the R's have lost in special elections this year, the second in which a 527 tried to use Rev. Wright against the Democrat and failed, and the first in which the R's can't legitimately claim they had a bad candidate.
This gives me more hope than I had yesterday.

UPDATE
Oops, it was 62 percent, not 67 percent.
Josh Marshall of TPM notes there are 25 open House seats this year, meaning no incumbent problem to factor in.
Here's his good, short video report.