Here are a few Virginia (and national) news headlines, political and otherwise, for Saturday, November 24.

*Opponents of Egypt’s Mursi call Cairo protest for Tuesday

*Chambliss latest US Republican to break with anti-tax lobbyist (Good to see, although I still despise Chambliss for his despicable smearing of triple-amputee, Vietnam War hero Max Cleland as some sort of bin Laden sympathizer.)

*Can Democrats Retake the House in 2014? (“…we actually won the overall votes in House races by the same 2% plus margin that Obama did, so re-districting dominated by Republican gerrymandering clearly played a big role in them holding on to the House. Democrats, though, are making a big mistake in attributing our failure solely to gerrymandering and essentially giving up on retaking the House the rest of this decade as many pundits are suggesting.”)

*How Democrats can keep winning (“The party has to rely on ideas, not demographics.”)

*Promises on Gun Control (“President Obama now has the freedom to take on the issue that politicians shun.”)

*House District #28 (“The 28th district would be a very competitive open seat at this point.  Can it be competitive with the Speaker still in it- and his unlimited warchest?  It would take the perfect candidate to unseat him, but the numbers alone say it could be done just with Obama/Kaine voters if Democrats could get them out and hold them in a general election.”)

*Virginia lawmaker wants to stiffen new voter-ID law (Why? What on earth possible reason for this would there be? No way in hell!)

*Legislative battle heating up over Va. uranium mining

*Mr. McDonnell’s chance for a transportation legacy (“…does the governor have the spine to twist the arms of his fellow Republicans?”)

*Thousands of remains from Civil War battle surface in Virginia basement

*Doubts plague plans for new 460

*Va. Tech and Virginia today at noon

*D.C. area forecast: Winterlike conditions return; midweek storm?

UPDATE: Also see It’s time to accept Obamacare, Virginia by my Delegate, Patrick Hope.

Sadly, as Paul Krugman correctly points out, it’s not just on climate science that the Teapublican’ts follow the mantra, “If evidence seems to contradict faith, suppress the evidence.” It’s on everything: Marco Rubio’s inability to admit that science has, indeed, figured out how old our planet is (and no, the answer is NOT 6,000 years!); “unskewing” the polls because they didn’t believe it was possible President Obama could win reelection; adhering to “the dogma that cutting taxes on the wealthy leads to higher economic growth,” etc, etc.

As always, I can’t even imagine how 47%, or even 4.7% for that matter, of Americans could vote for a party that is so deeply hostile to rationality, to empirical reasoning, to science, to reality itself. I’m sure in part this is a failure of our education system, but what else is going on here? Are these people dumbed down from watching the idiot box (particularly channels like Faux “News”) hours a day from an early age? I mean, that could certainly rot people’s brains out of their heads. Are certain personality types simply immune to things like facts, logic, and math? All of the above? Any other theories?

On October 3, I wrote about how, as crucial 2012 and 2013 Virginia elections approached, the Washington Post’s Virginia Politics blog coverage was collapsing. As I noted at the time, what we’ve seen the past few months has been a sharp decline in the Post’s Virginia politics coverage, certainly in terms of quantity (e.g., a drop of about 70% since February 2012 in the number of Virginia politics articles the Post’s been publishing every month) if not in quality (very hard to measure, also subjective, so you’ll have to judge this one for yourself).

Thus, in July 2012 — not coincidentally, Virginia politics reporter Anita Kumar’s last month at the Post — the number of articles (94) on the Post’s Virginia Politics blog was actually UP 3% year-over-year. In sharp contrast, in August 2012, the number of articles (43) was down 51% compared to August 2011, and also sharply down (-54%) from July 2012. Things perked up slightly in October 2012, with 64 articles, but this was still down 40% year-over-year, despite the fact that there were two marquee races – Obama vs. Romney; Kaine vs. Allen – going on in the key “swing state” of Virginia. Given everything going on leading up to this year’s elections, you’d think that Post Virginia politics coverage would have been UP sharply from a year earlier, but instead it was DOWN sharply. Yikes.

Hey, you know things are bad when the Post Ombudsman (Patrick Pexton) writes a column entitled, “The Post forgets to be local.” In that piece, published on November 9, 2012, Pexton called the Post’s local coverage “inadequate,” especially considering that the competition – Patch and other “suburban weeklies” – were, in Pexton’s view (and mine) “inadequate to the task.” No argument here (although I’d add that, increasingly, the Moonie Times and even the bat****-crazy Washington Examiner are kicking the Post’s butt on Virginia politics coverage).

So, what’s happened over the past few weeks since Pexton’s column? Has the Post picked up its coverage of Virginia politics and other local news? Nope. Instead, as you can see from the graph, the collapse in the Post’s Virginia politics coverage has actually accelerated, if anything. Incredibly, given everything going on in Virginia politics – both related to 2012 and 2013 – there have been just 34 stories posted on the Virginia Politics blog through November 22, 2012, down 69% from November 2011 (note: with 1 week to go, assuming the blog keeps up this pace, the number of posts will be down about 60% year-over-year).

Just for comparison purposes, I’ve personally posted 105 diaries so far in November. That’s more than twice as many articles as the entire Washington Post Virginia Politics blog staff has posted during that same time period! Obviously, other Blue Virginia “front pagers” have posted many more (I haven’t counted them all, but let’s be conservative and say 150-200 total front-page diaries on Blue Virginia so far in November). So, the fact is that the “amateurs” at Blue Virginia have managed to outproduce the Washington Post Virginia Politics blog, with several paid reporters at its service, by a factor of 3:1, 4:1 or more. What are these people doing over there? Hard to say, but it’s certainly not doing much reporting on Virginia politics. #FAIL

UPDATE: I just checked the Virginian Pilot’s “Pilot on Politics” blog, which is written by one (1) reporter, Julian Walker. I counted 58 articles in November, or 14 more than the entire Washington Post Virginia Politics blog produced. Wow.

UPDATE #2: I just checked the Roanoke Times “Blue Ridge Caucus” blog, and I counted 91 blog posts in November so far. Much better material, too – more analysis, more photos, more local coverage in general, not so much cookie-cutter/press release stuff as the Post.

UPDATE #3: Believe it or not, there’s a major Virginia newspaper with even less Virginia politics coverage than the Post — the Richmond Times-Dispatch, which has just 15 stories on its “Virginia Politics” blog through today. #evenworsefailthanthekaplanpost

Here are a few Virginia (and national) news headlines, political and otherwise, for Friday, November 23.

*The GOP’s wild attack on Susan Rice (“Republicans show a blatant disregard for the facts.” Shocker, huh?)

*Egyptian Protesters Rally in Cairo After Mursi Expands Powers (This situation does not bode well…)

*Tea party vows to stay for long haul, takes no blame for GOP losses (Excellent, go Tea Party – may you never change! LOL)

*Polls offer little guidance for politicians tackling ‘fiscal cliff’ (Looks like politicians are going to have to show – wait for it – leadership. GASP!)

*Grand Old Planet (“So don’t shrug off Mr. Rubio’s awkward moment. His inability to deal with geological evidence was symptomatic of a much broader problem – one that may, in the end, set America on a path of inexorable decline.”)

*Snyder leaving FOX News as he considers LG run (This should be good for a lot of laughs in 2013!)

*Report: Dominion Virginia Power customer’s bills have gone up since deregulation ended

*Innocence finally leads to freedom

*Neighbor is credited with saving family in Fairfax fire

*Dulles Airport marks 50th anniversary

*Hampton Roads shoppers get early start to Black Friday (This is just sad.)

*U.Va., Va. Tech left wondering what went wrong

*Griffin right at home in Redskins win (RGIII is definitely one of the best athletes I’ve ever seen. Wow.)

*D.C. area forecast: Unlike shopping, weather pretty peaceful today; Arctic chill on tap tomorrow

From the United Farm Workers Facebook page:

Please remember where your food comes from and how it it got there as we look to [the] Thanksgiving Holiday. Thank you to all the individuals who harvest our food.

So, so true. For more facts on the farmworkers, many of whom are migrants from Latin America, who bring us our food every day of the years, see here, here, and here. More broadly, we should always be aware of where our food comes from, how it’s raised and harvested, how the workers who do all that are treated, etc. Once we have that information, we can make informed choices about what to purchase, where, etc.

Here are a few Virginia (and national) news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thanksgiving Day, November 22. Have a great holiday! (also, check out President Obama’s weekly address, in which he “gives thanks in his weekly address for all of the blessings we share as Americans, and expressed his gratitude to the brave men and women who are defending our freedom around the world.”)

*Gaza crisis: will Egypt come to regret its role as peacemaker? (Fascinating analysis.)

*Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. resigns amid mental health issues, federal probe

*Why rich guys want to raise the retirement age (This is a no brainer, as Klein points out: lift the cap on payroll taxes past the first $110,000 in income, so people like the clueless Lloyd Blankfein pay their fair share.)

*Joe Scarborough Is Part Of The Problem (“Instead of copping to his slander and his foolishness, he now writes a Politico column that is so brimming with, well Politico-style Village media horse-shit you need a medical mask to keep breathing to the end.”)

*BP pays out (“But the big settlement for the Deepwater Horizon spill is yet to come.”)

*After their best election in decades, will momentum last for liberals?

*Mammograms said to barely cut death rate, lead to many wrong diagnoses

*McDonnell one of many Republicans in 2016 mix

*‘Turkeys of the Year’ for 2012 in D.C. region (Helen Dragas deservedly makes the list, with a “[d]ishonorable mention to Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) for reappointing Dragas after the fiasco.” Also, congratulations to Virginia Republicans for making the list “for pushing a bill that would require invasive ultrasounds of any woman seeking an abortion.”)

*GOP Senators Attack Obama, Praise Egyptian President In Statement On Gaza Ceasefire (Wow, these people  – McInsane and his sidekick Lindsey Graham – truly suffer from Obama Derangement Syndrome. Totally nuts, especially given Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s lavish praise for President Obama and Secretary Clinton.)

*Governor accepts game from Va. Indian tribes in rite that dates to 1677 treaty

*Black Friday creeping into Thanksgiving night

*Fairfax supervisors worry change in funding could derail VRE

*With much at stake, Redskins hope for Thanksgiving win over Cowboys (“The Redskins have a losing record, but in the forgiving NFC East, a victory could threaten first-place N.Y.”)

*D.C. area forecast: Mild sunshine to be thankful for next two days, cold blast on Saturday

These people are pitiful – whining, constantly posing as victims, ranting and raving LOSERS. My god, why does anyone watch this garbage?!?