Mix #1: So today I managed to vote for Harold Ford at the same time that I cancelled out his declared vote in favor of the anti-gay-marriage amendment.  Bittersweet.

Mix #2: So I'm in line this afternoon at the courthouse in this redder-than-red county in East TN--of course it's at the last minute, knowing me, but at least I've got a chance to volunteer on election day now--and it's a HUGE line.  Huge.  It was huge at the primary, too.  

So, passing the time while waiting, conversation strikes up.  The guy behind me is asking one of the poll workers if any women had been in today who were born before the 19th amendment.  He says no, not that he saw.  And it'd be unlikely: She'd have to be at least 87.  But what I'm wondering is a little more realistic: How many people voted today who had to pay a poll tax fifty years ago?  And here we are with the chance to elect the first African American senator since Reconstruction.

I read this at a friend's blog, and liked it so well that, with her permission, I thought some others here might be interested in it:

From writingjen:
OK, the weekend is almost over. I didn't join the crowds at the mall, Wal-Mart and Target. I didn't rush out at dawn with my daughter's school-supplies list, or check out the latest back-to-school fashions. I didn't buy one single thing for school, not one single thing that qualified under our state's "tax holiday" exemption list (clothes, school supplies/stationery, computers under $1,500). These "holidays" are apparently a big trend nationwide; this was our first.

Our local sales tax is really high: A total of 9.75%, so I could have saved basically a tenth on whatever I'd bought. If I'd bought anything. I could use a break, money-wise.

So why didn't I partake of this "holiday" so graciously bestowed on us by the governor and General Assembly of Tennessee?

Ann Coulter is, in fact, a plagiarist. I'm sorry to disagree with kos, but "stealing someone else's arguments" is, in fact, plagiarism. Furthermore, it is not the be-all and end-all of plagiarism. There's also the matter of using someone else's work without giving them credit. There is ample evidence at Rude Pundit, the linked-to TPM Muckraker article, and other places to indicate this.

This is a diary and not a comment because in reading the thread on kos's story, I found myself wanting to reply to thirty different people and say the same thing to each one. So I'll say it here and see if it sticks. Read past the fold for more definitions and discussion.

To plagiarize is, to quote the Oxford English Dictionary:

Originally of writers, later also of composers, artists, etc.: to take and use as one's own (the thoughts, writings, or inventions of another person); to copy (literary work or ideas) improperly or without acknowledgement; (occas.) to pass off as one's own the thoughts or work of (another).

Via the Rude Pundit:

John McCain: Torture Worked on Me

Basically, the geniuses at NewsMax claim that McCain has no leg to stand on in opposing torture because he gave in to it. I can only begin to articulate how angry this makes me. I should be laughing, though, for reasons I'll note after the flip.