The BBC report that veteran Republican Senator, Ted Stevens has finally lost his bid for a seventh term in office after a knife-edge race against Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich. The Democratic candidate led the Senate's longest-serving Republican by 3,724 after Tuesday's count, with only 2,500 overseas votes to be tallied.It is the first time Alaska has elected a Democrat to the Senate for 30 years. Mr. Begich's election also means that a possible route for Sarah Palin to get to Washington DC has been closed down. Mr Stevens was convicted last month of lying about gifts he had received from an oil company. If he had won re-election he would almost certainly have been thrown out of the Senate by his colleagues creating a special election that Ms. Palin would have been favourite to win.It is...

Final votes are being counted in Alaska's knife-edge Senate race, as Minnesota's election looks set to go to a...

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Sarah Palin barely waited for the dust to settle on the wreckage of the Republican party before offering herself as its saviour yesterday. But while Palin's sights seem fixed on 2012 after the meteoric rise and fall of her 68 days on the national stage, it is far from clear how her fellow Republicans will welcome the return of the woman many blame for John McCain's defeat and their party's disarray.By the time McCain steeled himself to concede to Obama at his election night party in Arizona, Palin was practically persona non grata in the Republican presidential campaign. She was given no chance to speak, relegated to standing tearfully by McCain's side while he accepted the Republican defeat. But the former vice-presidential candidate soon reached out for the attention she felt she...

Oh good Lord. When I started blogging, I had no idea where I was going. But where blogging seems to have taken me is concentrating on Alaska, x thousand miles away, rather than the pavements, roads and pooper scoopers within yards of my home. And, indeed, Alaska rears its remarkable head again. Sarah Palin could become a US Senator! Pass the sick bag, Alice. But help is at hand. Ted...

Democrats have fifty-six seats, Republicans forty. With all or almost all (99% in Alaska) the votes counted, if current totals hold after recounts and whatnot, the Republicans get three more...

Only one thing to say, apart from thank you America:I wouldn't like to be a moose in Alaska this...

Sarah Wildman: Obama wins: John McCain's attempt to win over women voters didn't work. The Alaska governor was a drag on the Republican...

As the candidates go to the polls, Sarah Palin makes yet more history by voting in a hoodie. Imagine if David Cameron were to do the same in a British election? Hug a hoodie indeed. But then, Alaska is a good deal colder than Primrose Hill so you can see her...

The BBC has a correspondent at John McCain’s campaign HQ in Ashes, Arizona. No, give ’em a poke. Any luck? Nope, still ashes.Richard’s getting us ice cream and some more big chocolatey birthday cake we’ve been saving. Mmm, it’s all nice and fudgey. And the cake too. Last week we bought a lot of ice cream – including Baked Alaska and Fossil Fuel, in honour of Governor Palin. Well, that’s what I said, anyway. Richard pointed out that in half-baked Alaska, you can’t have fossil fuel, because fossils are the creation of Satan just to tempt those wacky evolutionists with their evidence and science and crazy things like that. And of course he’s right. That’s why she’s so keen on drillin’ all those fossil fuels out of the ground and burnin’ them, followed by books, gays...

A second report on the Alaska "Troopergate" scandal was released yesterday. The Anchorage Daily News...

JASON Horowitz spots author Erica Jong In the NY Observer: “My friends Ken Follett and Susan Cheever are extremely worried. Naomi Wolf calls me every day. Yesterday, Jane Fonda sent me an email to tell me that she cried all night and can’t cure her ailing back for all the stress that has reduces her to a bundle of nerves.” Fear of Obama losing - O-bomb-a! Like the Roman, I seem to see the river Tiber foaming with much blood… “My back is also suffering from spasms, so much so that I had to see an acupuncturist and get prescriptions for Valium.” “After having stolen the last two elections, the Republican Mafia…” “If Obama loses it will spark the second American Civil War. Blood will run in the streets, believe me. And it’s...

Anyone wondering why Sarah Palin is so popular in Alaska should have a look at what other politicians in the state get up to. This great clip is from Politico's ten worst campaign ads of the current election season in the United States.Hat Tip: Stephen...

Bloggers have been lining up to expose the “hypocrisy” and “stupidity” of Sarah Palin calling Barack Obama an evil socialist for calling for redistribution, while supporting it herself: “And Alaska - we’re set up, unlike other states in the union, where it’s collectively Alaskans own the resources. So we share in the wealth when the development of these resources occurs.” Hat tips all round to Stephen Glenn, Jennie Rigg and Andrew Ducker, but they all got it from Keith Olbermann on MSNBC: But I feel the need to defend Palin here because it is just possible she is making a distinction between redistributing income and redistributing wealth. Alaska’s system works by redistributing the revenue raised from Alaska’s natural...

I am here to save you a needless tube journey: Yes, that Ted Stevens. YouTube - DJ Ted Stevens Techno Remix: "A Series of Tubes" Time - Can Ted Stevens Still Win Alaska?: Stevens, 84, was found guilty Monday on seven felony counts for failing to report $250,000 in improper gifts he received from Bill Allen, the disgraced executive of an oil services company. FiveThirtyEight - Senate Projections, Baked Alaska Edition: Our projection models are designed to be fairly dynamic -- but you don't usually have the circumstance wherein a sitting senator gets convicted on seven felony counts (appeal pending!) eight days before an election. So, a little bit of creativity is going to be required... Rolling Stone - The Sarah and Ted Show: Under the old rules, Stevens' corruption scandal could well...

The Politico raises the question of whether Senator Ted Stevens, now that he is a convicted felon, can vote for his own reelection to the U.S. Senate. Under Alaska...

A jury has found Alaska Senator Ted Stevens guilty on seven felony counts of making false statements about gifts he received. The deliberations took five hours. Despite the verdict,...

Longest serving US Senator - a Republican - faces prison after being found guilty of corruption. To make matters worse for McCain, convicted Ted Stevens, 84, is from the great state of Alaska, home of 'hockey mom' and McCain's running mate Sarah Palin...Earlier today, the biggest paper in Alaska endorsed Obama, saying Palin was a novice and it was unthinkable that their own state Governor could become a heart-beat away from becoming President. It ain't over til it's over, and a week's a long time in politics. But can anything now stop Barack Obama becoming the first black President of the most powerful nation on earth...?I hope...

My favourite US election advert of the year comes from Alaska via YouTube: Amazingly, she didn’t...

SAYS Sarah Palin: See as a senator, John has confronted the corrupt ways of Washington. And the wasteful spending. And the abuses of power. As president, he’s going to end those once and for all. Last Friday, the Troopergate report said: For the reasons explained in section IV of this report, I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 2952.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act. McCain is working already…...

An Alaska judge has issued an order requiring Gov. Palin to preserve e-mails from private e-mail accounts (including the one that was hacked) which she used to conduct state...

A US impersonator's parodies of Alaska governor Sarah Palin are becoming a hot election issue, the BBC's Rajini Vaidyanathan...

The Alaska legislature's report on Gov. Palin's "Troopergate" scandal was released yesterday. According to the Anchorage Daily News, Palin "abused her power in pushing for the firing of an...

Here we are in the midst of an economic "crisis" the like of which hasn't been seen since... *insert attention grabbing date here*. But it's not all bad news. As we slowly fall into the last few months of George Bush's second term we can all breath a sigh of relief as his administration doesn't just bow out quietly but implodes in upon itself as it feels the heat over the collapse of the US economy and the mountains of debt it has amassed. Now he takes the ultimately hypocritical stance of calling for the nations of the world to avoid unilateral action in the face of the crisis. Please Mr Bush, you taught us all about unilateral action against the wishes of the world community!! It's how things are done now in the this near post-Bush world. Thanks Mr Bush.And now it's confirmed in a...

Poor old John McCain’s really got no chance now, does he? Even he’s realised it - watch him to try to reposition himself to salvage a career after his defeat in a few weeks’ time: Finally some honour, but it’s far too little, far too late. Troopergate has broken: Gov. Sarah Palin abused the powers of her office by pressuring subordinates to try to get her former brother-in-law, a state trooper, fired, an investigation by the Alaska Legislature has concluded. The inquiry found, however, that she was within her right to dismiss her public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, who was the trooper’s boss. A 263-page report released Friday by lawmakers in Alaska found that Ms. Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee, had herself exerted pressure to get Trooper...

“I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110 (a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act,” investigator Steve Branchflower concluded in the 263-page report finding US Vice-Presidential Republican nominee Sarah Palin in violation of a state ethics law prohibiting public officials from using their office for personal gain. Mrs Palin’s [...]...

Ricky's Halloween in New York is selling a Sarah Palin Halloween costume for $22.99, including glasses and a Miss Alaska sash.Via Alana...

A legislative committee investigating Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has found she unlawfully abused her authority in firing the state's public safety commissioner. The investigative report concludes that a family grudge wasn't the sole reason for firing Public Safety Commissioner Walter Monegan but says it likely was a contributing...

Several Alaska state representatives wen to the Alaska Supreme Court seeking to shut down the state legislature's investigation of the so-called Palin "troopergate" scandal. This means the legislature's investigative report...

Can I say I’m really looking forward to tomorrow? An investigation into Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s firing of her public safety commissioner can proceed, Alaska’s Supreme Court ruled Thursday, clearing the way for a Friday report to the state Legislature on the issue. Oh it’s about time too, isn’t it? The Guardian explains for you, if you don’t already know the story: she is expected to be criticised for failing to cooperate with the inquiry into the Troopergate affair, so called because Palin is alleged to have dismissed the state’s public safety commissioner, Walt Monegan, after he refused to sack her former brother-in-law, a state trooper. It is unclear whether the investigation will find that Palin, the governor of Alaska, is guilty of firing...