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There’s only three days left for the Members Project. If you have an American Express card, go vote for Kiva, Loans That Change Lives, at the Members Project. Right now they’re in third place, just 1500 votes short of second place. 1500 is nothing!

By now it seems like the primaries happened ages ago, but a recent post at FiveThirtyEight.com made me remember one of the reasons I supported Obama over Clinton.

On the Road: New Albany, Indiana

…we zipped up to the Obama Columbus office and found it both open and busy. Jonathan Swain, Barack Obama’s Communications Director, noted that it was one of 43 field offices open around the state, with the potential for a couple more to be added in the final weeks. In all 92 Indiana counties, Swain said, “Barack Obama always intended to compete and compete hard.”

When Bill Clinton won the Presidency in 1992, the Democratic Party was overtaken by the Democratic Leadership Council idea that you only had to compete in the “battleground” states, completely ceding several states to the Republicans. They completely glossed over the fact that Ross Perot took 20% of the vote and allowed Clinton to win with a plurality.

It was people from this DLC school of thought who ran Hillary Clinton’s primary campaign, and allowed Obama to pick up race after race to catch up and surpass Clinton in delegates. It’s these same people who would have run her general campaign in much the same way.

The fact that so many of these states are now in play has a lot to do with the economy, but with Obama as the candidate, the Democrats are ready with offices and feet on the ground in all these states to help Democrats up and down the ticket.

If you’ve never been, check out Open Secrets from the Center for Responsive Politics. They’ve got a donor lookup that lets you find out who’s made political contributions to which candidate or party. Pretty interesting stuff.

For instance, people who have MySpace or Fox Interactive Media listed as their company have given $12,450 in this election cycle to the Democratic Party and their candidates. The Republicans have received $10,051.

NewsCorp’s President and COO Peter Chernin gave over $31,000 to different Democratic candidates and committees.

NewsCorp’s Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch gave over $33,000 to Republican candidates and committees, but also handed Hillary Clinton a $2300 check.

They put the balance into “Fair and Balanced.”

There’s some sort of reporting threshold (I think it’s $250), so it’s not comprehensive, but I guess that would allow those of you who value your privacy to slip under the radar by making a bunch of $200 contributions on a monthly basis.

Good weekend for space: the Chinese conducted their first space walk, and now a private company has sent a rocket into space.

Wired: SpaceX Did It — Falcon 1 Made it to Space

SpaceX has made history. Its privately developed rocket has made it into space.

After three failed launches, the company founded by Elon Musk worked all of the bugs out of their Falcon 1 launch vehicles.

The entire spectacle was broadcast live from Kwajalein Atoll in the South Pacific. Cameras mounted on the spacecraft showed our planet shrinking in the distance and the empty first stage engine falling back to Earth.

As the rocket ascended, cheers rang out during every crucial step of the launch sequence, and at the final stage their headquarters in Hawthorne, California erupted in excitement. (Wired.com viewed the launch over the Internet on SpaceX’s live webcast.)

The tensest moment came just before stage separation. At that critical juncture, the third launch attempt had failed. This time, it worked out perfectly.

Eight minutes after leaving the ground, Falcon 1 reached a speed of 5200 meters per second and passed above the International Space Station.

Here’s the video of the flight:

Granted, the price was only $13, but I’d almost be willing to pay the extra $7 for some better writing and editing. On top of the poor writing, organization, and redundancy, they’ve decided to embed a bunch of trivia in their paragraphs. Some kind of crude copy-protection scheme?

Washington Mutual died on its 119th birthday.

Reuters: WaMu is largest U.S. bank failure

Washington Mutual Inc was closed by the U.S. government in by far the largest failure of a U.S. bank, and its banking assets were sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co for $1.9 billion.

Thursday’s seizure and sale is the latest historic step in U.S. government attempts to clean up a banking industry littered with toxic mortgage debt. Negotiations over a $700 billion bailout of the entire financial system stalled in Washington on Thursday.

…

119-YEAR HISTORY

The transaction ends exactly 119 years of independence for Washington Mutual, whose predecessor was incorporated on September 25, 1889, “to offer its stockholders a safe and profitable vehicle for investing and lending,” according to the thrift’s website. This helped Seattle residents rebuild after a fire torched the city’s downtown.

Maybe I should have deposited that check this morning.

I had nothing to do with this, but MySpace just re-launched their music site in the US with lots more music from major label artists.

It’s actually pretty cool to be able to listen to all this stuff for free and compile playlists. The product itself is definitely rough around the edges, but overall it’s not bad.

It’s been a while since I’ve come across any new music I liked. If you’ve got any recommendations, feel free to throw in their MySpace URLs in the comments.

A while back I wrote about Kiva, the non-profit that facilitates the practice of micro-lending by matching up lenders with entrepreneurs in developing nations who need small loans to raise ducks or sell gin.

It turns out they’re one of 25 finalists in the Members Project from American Express. If Kiva is selected as the winner, they’ll get a million or two from American Express. Kiva makes no money off the micro-loans, so a windfall like this would go a long way toward paying the rent, doing the legwork with micro-lending institutions in developing countries, and helping a bunch of do-gooders get their paychecks. $1.5 million translates into 60,000 $25 micro-loans!

If you have an American Express card, go vote for Kiva’s entry, Loans That Change Lives, at the Members Project.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, both Dorcas and Lan Thi are repaying their loans.

Heard this on NPR today:

Day to Day, September 23, 2008: TransUnion Deal Includes Free Credit Monitoring

TransUnion Corp. is offering free credit-monitoring services as part of a settlement over allegations that it improperly sold consumers’ personal data.

Here’s where to register:

https://www.listclassaction.com/

1. Sign up for auto-pay whenever possible
2. Set up Google/Yahoo Calendar reminders around the statement issue and due dates