I am a 2 term SGA senator and have been rather dismayed at the organization since the day I was elected. I've seen it all-- impeachment, apathetic senators, long amounts of time spent on pointless issues, arguing, fraud and more impeachment. Something is dysfunctional at SGA, but what is it? Is it the people in SGA? Something in the water? Or something more fundamental? Join me for an insider's perspective.

After much speculation that Hillary would drop out of the race if she had a poor showing on March 4th, it looks like she's in for the long haul-- at least until Pennsylvania, and possibly until Puerto Rico or the convention itself. But her path to the nomination is narrow and potentially destructive. Here are some thoughts on her presence in the race from a strong Obama supporter.

Tonight was a good night for the USD Dem's blog. It was good to see all of the bloggers back and in top form!  We really covered this thing well.  Nice work everybody!

According to google tracker, tonight was also the highest hit count we have had this semester. We had 375 page views which is pretty good in my opinion.  It is not a very large number but we are a small, local blog that is growing. Another great thing is that over 50% of our visitors were new.

I thought I would share these numbers. Let's keep it up! 

Here's the final game we settled on:

1. Obama wins a state, chug a beer. If he wins by double digits, do two.

2. Every time they say "3AM" or "Red Phone" take 3 drinks.

3. Every time Clinton says "experience," Obama says "yes we can" or McCain says "friends," take 5.

4. Every time you hear "change you can Xerox" or "reject and renounce" finish your drink.

5. Every time they talk about Hillary dropping out, finish your drink.

6. Take 1 drink when you hear latinos, blacks, momentum, super delegates, young, or elderly.
 

UPDATE: Thank you McCain, my friend, for getting me wasted.  

Midnight

CNN has called the Texas primaries for Hillary Clinton. This is unbelievable. I thought Obama had Texas locked up. This race just got really really interesting.

Check this out!

 From NBC's Mark Murray

An Obama source emails First Read that the campaign is expecting turnout between 3.6 to 3.8 million in the Texas Democratic primary.

Consider that John Kerry received 2.8 million votes in the Lone Star State in the 2004 general election.

"That's a lot of 'new' Democratic voters," the
Obama source says. "Will be great for Texas Dem Party that's working to
rebuild and only needs to pick up four seats to take back the state
house."

Jump on in and join the discussion if you're on right now. I'm going to try to post regularly in the comments and might pump out another 1 or 2 short diaries.

The much delayed part III of a four part series.

A personal opinion about social programs.

Need I say more? Read on for directions and discussions. If anyone gets shamefully drunk tonight, please share your stories on here tomorrow.

I was reading an opinion piece in the Argus Leader today and my eyes jumped out of my head. The bill to let 10 year old children hunt is on its way to the Senate floor. Here is a link to the story about the legislation that I found. This is absolutely ridiculous, I am skeptical about arming college students, but allowing 10 year olds to hunt...good god. That would mean that the same 10 year old that gets upset and punches or kicks a friend, would be allowed to wield a weapon in the field around numerous others. In America today the gun culture is so out of hand that young children receive toy guns and "shoot" them at each other at young ages, what happens if these children use a real gun and go "bang bang" at their father, and then blow him away. What will the legislature say to that family, "oops, we thought that 10 year old could rationalize that it was a real gun." Seriously, these children cannot understand the magnitude of what they are holding in their hands and that they can take the life of a human with these weapons. I don't care if you like to hunt, but you should be of an age where you can make rational decisions. There is a huge difference between 10 and 12 year old children's behaviors. I don't care if the father is there or not, because no matter how safe he is being there is no judging when that child will accidentally shoot him. It is simply unsafe to allow these kids to hunt. 

An excellent read and a quick explanation of Cuba post Castro.

From The Nation

 An excellent article that documents the history of hope as a driving force in American politics.
 

Why change is more than a word.

In the second part of the four part series, we examine the woman who runs on experience - Senator Hillary Clinton and how her views of Iraq and her experiences in her husband's administration will shape her policy and decision making.

I just read some news on Keloland.com that made my day. The campus gun bill, which stated that weapons could be carried without restrictions from universities or colleges, was voted DOWN in the Senate Affairs Committee. The article can be found here. The bill had recently passed the house and was being backed by Governor Rounds. This is a great day for South Dakota Democrats and students alike, I feel as if our campuses are much safer now and that permitting students to carry guns does not make us safer like the bill's sponsor said, but actually made it more dangerous. This was not an invasion on the second amendment like they want you believe, it is the Universities using their discretion to make their campuses safer, which I applaud. Let's give a round of applause to the members of this committee for protecting us as students. Kudos Senate Affairs Committee, Kudos. 

A summary of the views held by John McCain and why a McCain administration Foreign Policy won't be any different from 8 years under George W. Bush.

An excellent analysis of the impact of differing demographics on state politics.

In case you haven't heard, there is an incredibly heated Democratic primary contest. Obama and Clinton are neck-and-neck in national polls, contests won thus far, and pledged delegates (who ultimately elect the candidate at the convention). In this diary, I will weigh in on who I believe is the best candidate, where I think the primary is headed, and how to resolve the delegate dilemma.