You think I'm kidding? It could have happened to me.

A few winters ago I let my new neighbor--a woman who had just escaped from an abusive relationship--borrow my car. She knocked on my door in the middle of the night, crying. Her newborn baby had a 105 degree fever, and she had to get to the emergency room.

Everything went fine until she was pulled over because one of the brake lights had burned out. As it turns out, her license had been suspended due to an unpaid ticket, and she didn't even know it. It was no big deal--the police called me, I put on my moon boots, and trudged half a mile to drive her and her baby home from the spot where she was pulled over. The police were nice, considering the circumstances: no tickets for her or for me.

If I-300 had been law, the police would have been required to impound my car, and I would have been forced to pay the $2,700 in bonds and fees to retrieve my car from the impound lot. And that doesn't even include the cost of towing.

That's why I'm asking you to vote No on Denver's Initiative 300 before 7:00 p.m. tomorrow.

It's deceptive. It's scary. It's expensive. And it's unnecessary.

Police officers already have the ability to impound vehicles if they are concerned about public safety. The Denver Post, Mayor Hickenlooper, ten members of the Denver City Council, House Speaker Terrance Carroll, and a long list of Denver community organizations and individuals oppose Initiative 300. And the proponents of this nightmare are counting on low turnout in an off-year election to sneak this one past us.

You can get more details on Initiative 300 by visiting http://www.VoteNoOnImpound.com.

1. Vote. Turn in your ballot by 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday. You can drop it off at the Webb Building downtown (201 W Colfax) or do a drive-through dropoff at the Denver Elections Division office. (3888 E. Mexico Ave. at Colorado Blvd.). It's too late to mail it--you need to hand deliver it.
2. Forward this e-mail to 5 friends in Denver.
3. Share this information on Facebook status, Twitter, and other social networks to remind people to vote and vote no on I-300.

If you haven't received your ballot yet, or if you lost it or spoiled it, go to either the Webb Building or the Denver Elections Division before 6:00 p.m. today, or between 7:00 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. tomorrow. If you have any questions about the process, dial 311 to contact the Denver Elections Division.

There's an election on Tuesday! 

If you vote by mail and haven't turned your ballot in yet, hand-deliver your ballot to your County Clerk's office Monday or Tuesday to ensure that it's received in time for your vote to count. Your county may have more than one possible drop-off location for your convenience. If you haven't received your ballot yet, contact your county clerk to find out how to obtain a replacement ballot. Below, we've included some other information that may help.

Whether you're liberal, conservative, progressive, libertarian, or a completely unaffiliated free spirit, vote.

The elections in odd years involve local issues from school boards to city council to county commissioner. There may also be bond issues, initiatives, and referenda--all very local to your city or county. Although elections call to mind voting for President, Governor, and legislature, the fact is that most of what affects our daily lives happens locally. Our schools, our city streets, our zoning boards, even our trash collection are all local issues.

If you don't exercise your right to vote in these local elections, you will miss the best opportunity you will have this year to affect change for yourself and your family.

• According to the Secretary of State, there is an election in every Colorado county except Archuleta, Hinsdale, and Phillips.
• Most Colorado counties have an all-mail election this year. If you have not received a ballot or information on where to vote, contact your county clerk right away.
• Your ballot must be received by your county clerk no later than 7:00 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 3rd for your vote to be counted. Postmarks don't count.
• If you already voted by mail, you can make sure your ballot was received on the Secretary of State's secure voter lookup website:
  https://www.sos.state.co.us/Voter/secuVoterHome.do
• If your county has a polling place election, your polling place may not be in the same location as last year. Contact your County Clerk if you are not sure where you should vote.
• If you need to contact your county clerk for any of the above reasons, you can find your county clerk's contact information here:
  http://www.elections.colorado.gov/Default.aspx?PageMenuID=1397

If Initiative 300 in Denver passes, and you forget your wallet and get pulled over, police officers will be forced to impound your car leaving you stranded.

Which is why we're asking for your help. We need you to vote No on Initiative 300 if you live in Denver County.

It's deceptive. It's scary. It's expensive. And it's unnecessary.

Police officers already have the ability to impound vehicles if they are concerned about public safety. The Denver Post, Mayor Hickenlooper, ten members of the Denver City Council, House Speaker Terrence Carroll, and a long list of Denver community organizations and individuals oppose Initiative 300. And the proponents of this nightmare are counting on low turnout in an off-year election to sneak this one past us.

• Send an e-mail to 5 friends in Denver and ask them to vote no.
• Talk to your friends, neighbors, and co-workers in person about how important it is for them to return their ballots, and ask them to vote no on Initiative 300.
• Sign up to volunteer.

As for voting, the 2009 Election will be Mail-In Ballot only. Voting couldn't be easier-- it just takes 2 stamps to return, or you can drop it off to the Denver Election Commission in person. So please Vote NO on Initiative 300 and help spread the word.

If you live in Denver, you should have received your ballot in the mail. To check on your voter registration and on the status of your ballot, click here to look it up at the Secretary of State:

http://www.sos.state.co.us/Voter

If you believe you are registered to vote and you have not received your ballot, call 311 today.

I would suggest sending this to anyone who thinks Rudy is competent. Many of you may know this stuff... but this video is short and would be great to send your friends and family who may not quite understand this...

http://therealrudy.org/

 The fact that he laughs when asked about the location of the command center... and that people died because of him is really quite disturbing... 

This morning, ten major U.S. businesses and four national environmental organizations issued a joint report, A Call to Action (pdf file), calling on the federal government to quickly pass strong national legislation to cut global warming pollution.

You can watch the press conference live this morning on CSPAN at 11:30am Eastern. You will also be able to watch it online at CSPAN.org.

The companies involved in today's announcement are well-known Fortune 500 corporations: Alcoa, BP America, Caterpillar, Duke Energy, DuPont, Florida Power and Light, General Electric, Lehman Brothers, Pacific Gas & Electric, and PNM Resources.

They have joined Environmental Defense, the World Resources Institute, Pew Center on Global Climate Change, and Natural Resources Defense Council to form an unprecedented alliance -- the United States Climate Action Partnership (US-CAP).

In today's announcement, the partners pledged to work together to support six recommendations for national action:

Tom Vilsack is running for president.

The Iowa governor plans to formally launch his bid for the 2008 Democratic nomination today, one of his top political aides said Wednesday.

Vilsack, who leaves office in January, will file papers today to establish his presidential campaign committee, aides said. The step marks the first official move by any politician among the large field of Democrats and Republicans weighing campaigns for president.

RICHMOND -- An estimated 200 votes, all of them in Isle of Wight County, remained uncounted early today at mid-day as election workers began reviewing the results of Virginia's cliffhanger Senate race, state leaders said.

Jean Jensen, secretary of the state board of elections, said the remaining 2,442 precincts have reported their vote counts. The number of untallied ballots is well below the 7,312-vote lead that Democrat Jim Webb holds over incumbent Republican Sen. George Allen.

The Senate race is expected to be Virginia's third statewide election recount in the Commonwealth's history. Attorney General Bob McDonnell was elected last year by a 360-vote margin after a recount. In 1989, former Gov. Douglas Wilder was declared the victor after a recount.

Jensen said a computer malfunction in Isle of Wight has delayed a final vote count for that county.

"The votes are fine," she said. "It's just the machines are locked up. The votes are in there."

The precinct in limbo has 383 registered voters, said William Bell, secretary of the county's electoral board. He said turnout for the county was about 57 percent, meaning the number of uncounted votes should be around 200.

Because the results show Webb winning by less than 1 percent -- 0.31 percent to be exact -- Allen will have the opportunity to request a recount.

The Republican may file a request with Richmond courts after the State Board of Elections certifies the final vote on Nov. 27. That means the final result of the race could remain unresolved until December.

Still uncounted are an estimated 2,000 "provisional votes," ballots filled out by people who could not be confirmed on Tuesday as legally registered voters. Jensen said about 4,000 provisional votes were reviewed in last year's recount for the attorney general race, and only 700 of them were determined to be legal votes.

Also, some bad robo-calls went out from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in places like New London and Old Saybrook. DCCC spokesman Bill Burton confirms the problem, which directed people to their primary polling place, which is different from the general election polling place. He says the calls were stopped as soon as the problem was brought to their attention, corrected, and then resumed with the correct information. He believes "a small number" of the thousands of robo-calls being made in Connecticut were incorrect. - MSNBC

Well, I fin'ly started thinkin' straight
When I run outa things to investigate.
Couldn't imagine doin' anything else,
So now I'm sittin' home investigatin' myself!
Hope I don't find out anything . . . hmm, great God!" - Dylan

From NBC's Doug Adams and the "Make Your Vote Count" team
There were long lines this morning in Denver outside some polling places, where hundreds lined up to wait. Among them was Democratic gubernatorial candidate Bill Ritter, who spent several hours waiting in a line outside a voting center in Washington Park in Denver.

We talked with Alton Dillard, the spokesman for the Denver City Election Commission, and it appears that the problem has to do with the electronic "pollbook" and not the voting machines themselves. Pollbooks are the electronic connections that link precincts to the city's master list of registered voters.

Similar problems with this type of "electronic pollbook" caused massive problems in Maryland's Montgomery County during the September primary.

Voters were slowed up when they checked into the voting center because the pollbooks experienced system slowness. The poll workers apparently called into the county elections office to check on individual voters, which created larger lines. However, the precincts were all equipped with Adobe PDF versions of the entire city's poll listing. When asked why those were not used, the spokesman admitted: "Good question."

Voting experts are watching Denver closely this year, in part because the city is implementing a new system of "vote centers" this year. They have eliminated more than 400 neighborhood precincts and folded them into 55 "vote centers." These larger vote centers are designed to allow people to vote anywhere within the city - instead of having to go their local neighborhood precinct. They generally are located in high-traffic areas such as shopping malls.

As Kim Brace, our election expert, puts it: Using these vote centers for more than 350,000 registered voters in Denver is "like putting a full stream of water through a small funnel."