It seems some people are quite pleased with Frank Rich's column in the New York Times today, including our own SocioSam, in a top-rec-ed post and FP-er KagroX. And I don't disagree with the main points either of them make. I think they're both right in praising Rich for the reasons they did.

I, however, come not to praise Rich, but to edit him. For, you see, he has made, and allowed into print, several severe and deeply offensive, what I'll charitably call, "typos". More after the jump...

Today, however, Democrat Ellen Simon is poised to take this district from Rick Renzi (R-Corruption). She is positioned to win, in my view, because she's an excellent candidate and also because of Howard Dean's 50-State Strategy, which BiPM diaried about today. This, my friends, is one of the places where it all comes together for that final Red Zone drive  to score the game-winning touchdown. Follow me on the flip and I'll tell you how she scores the TD.

Last Thursday night I had the opportunity to meet Ned Lamont and talk with him face-to-face and in-depth about his race to unseat Joementum Lieberman. We got down to it, to put it bluntly, no holds barred, and I'm telling you right here and right now Ned  should win this race. He deserves our attention and as much support as the netroots can muster. This guy gets it, folks. He can take Joementum out, ridding us of a major embarrassment in the Democratic Party and an unapologetic shill for right-wing extremism. I'll tell you how and why I came to this conclusion below.

The flag pin itself validates them subliminally to viewers as 'true' patriots. It's a subtle and effective political tactic, a small detail to be sure, but also showing how far behind we are in communications and positioning strategy. They 'own' the flag as their symbol and the very best we can do is 'equal' them on it by wearing the flag pin ourselves.

Kyl (R) 44 (46)
Pederson (D) 29 (17) -- kos)

A new poll in Arizona tracking the US Senate race between Republican incumbent Jon Kyl and expected Democratic opponent Jim Pederson shows voters in the state are beginning to surge toward the challenger even before he has formally declared his candidacy. The poll was conducted by Wright Consulting Services from July 21, 2005 to August 10, 2005 among a representative sample of 600 likely general election voters in the state and it has a margin of error of +/- 4.1 percentage points at a 95% level of confidence. (Cross-posted at MyDD.com)

(Disclosure: the writer, the principal of Wright Consulting Services, has met and discussed this race with Pederson but has not, and will not, be involved, work for nor advise his campaign at any point prior to next year's general election.)

Pederson has gained 12 points since April in his quest to unseat the highly conservative Republican Kyl and the table below shows two very important trends are occurring: