Wednesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Finally, we're officially going to have a 60th Democratic Senator. Congrats to Al Franken. He'll be a strong progressive voice in the Senate and we sure need more strong progressive voices in the Senate. And, while there are 60 Democrats, there are rarely 60 Democrats in the chamber (and I don't mean Joe Lieberman and Specter.) Senator Kennedy is receiving treatment for his brain cancer and rarely appears on the Senate floor. Senator Byrd has been hospitalized and hasn't been around for weeks. The Senate really is an odd institution.

I'm in Maine for a couple days. Carlos and I drove up yesterday (we drove so we could bring Petey.) We're going to celebrate my dad's 73 birthday and the Fourth of July. I'm also going to meet up with the campaign staff from Maine Freedom to Marry to get a full briefing on the strategy to win in November.

Apparently, people in Maine haven't seen much of the sun for the past month or so. We're hoping that changes very soon.

Let's get things started...