Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

By Paula Reed Ward / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A jury found suspended Supreme Court Justice Joan Orie Melvin guilty on all but one count today. Her sister, Janine Orie, was found guilty on all but one count.

The sisters were charged with misapplication of government funds, theft of services and conspiracy for using the justice's former Superior Court staff and the legislative staff of a third sister, former state Sen. Jane Orie, to run campaigns for the Supreme Court in 2003 and 2009.

Among the allegations are that staffers wrote speeches, drove her to campaign events and worked the polls.

The jury was hung on one count of official oppression against Justice Orie Melvin.

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/news/politics-state/jury-deliberating-orie-melvin-public-corruption-case-close-to-verdict-676334/

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The PA Supreme Court is currently short one (Republican) judge. As I understand it, now that she's been convicted, Governor Corbett will be able to appoint a new justice.

Until now, she couldn't serve on the court, but couldn't be replaced, so the court was balanced with 3 Republicans and 3 Democrats. Assuming Corbett appoints a Republican and the legislature approves (a likely assumption) it will go back to 4 Repubs and 3 Dems.

Source: NBC News

New Jersey's emergency experiment with email voting hasn't fared well. One election official described it as a "catastrophe" and voters are complaining that computer glitches are blocking their last-minute efforts to obtain electronic ballots. An avalanche of requests for e-mail ballots that overwhelmed county clerks' offices forced the state to extend its e-mail voting deadline to Friday afternoon at 8 p.m., though e-mail ballot requests must still be filed by 5 p.m. Tuesday.

"It has become apparent that County Clerks are receiving applications at a rate that outpages their capacity to process them without an extension," said Lt. Gov. Kim Guadango in her order extending the deadline.

Several election officials say misunderstanding is at the root of the problem: Email ballots are only permitted for residents displaced by Hurricane Sandy, but many who are not displaced are nevertheless deluging the system.

"The numbers are overwhelming. The county clerks are inundated with requests," said Michael Harper, clerk of the Board of Elections for Hudson County, N.J. which includes Hoboken, one of the hardest-hit regions recovering from Sandy. Asked to describe the situation, he said, "I would lean more towards catastrophe."

Read more: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/11/06/14974588-new-jerseys-email-voting-suffers-major-glitches-deadline-extended-to-friday?lite

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This could be very bad. If there are a lot of ineligible people trying to vote this way, those people may miss the chance to vote altogether.

I could have predicted that this would run into problems. Who thought that they could possibly throw something like this together so quickly?

http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/2012072815/did-romney-really-create-jobs-staples
More

This is for Neil:

""

I'm not sure if this link will work or not. Hopefully it will. It's a screen capture of a message a popular liberal FB page received offering thousands of dollars for the page.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=488286641183230&set=a.216446661700564.61571.216446038367293&type=3&theater

http://gothamist.com/2012/07/22/penn_state_removes_joe_paterno_stat.php

Just to remind everybody of what our country is capable of.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo11.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11

Video at link: http://onion.com/JZCKx0
(In case anyone doesn't realize. It's the Onion and it's a joke.)