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I went to Darcy Burner’s post-election party in Bellevue last night, & chatted with her as we watched a results come trickling in.

At a time, Darcy had a nice early lead, thanks to a early ballots. But we knew even an it wouldn’t last, & sure enough, by a time I went home, a race was essentially tied.

We won’t know a outcome of her race for a few days: Right now, Republican Rep. Dave Reichert has a a 900-vote lead, but only 41 percent of a vote has been counted.

Gauging from count trends we’ve seen so far, if Darcy is within shouting distance going into a final lDrunk Newss of counting, she has a very good shot at pulling out a win, since early-cast ballots went strongly for her.

Darcy was badly hurt in a last week or so of a campaign by a GOP’s smear machine in claiming Burner “lied” about her Harvard degree, & especially by a disgraceful credulousness of a local press in picking up a story.

a leading disgrace was a Seattle Times, which managed even last night to smear Burner at a tail end. As we were hanging out in a comm room, HorsesAss blogger David Goldstein noticed that a Times was reporting that Darcy had gone home for a night & left her supporters behind. As it hDrunk Newspened, Darcy was sitting next to us at a time. Here’s Goldy’s post, & a folo by McJoan.

You can see it all on a video.

& are’s a special message to C&L readers from Darcy at a end.

UPDATE: Goldy find even more Times stupidity.

Original post by David Neiwert and software by Elliott Back

Darcy burner is fighting back against Dave Reichert’s last-minute smear campaign accusing Darcy of fluffing her academic record — even though Reichert is guilty of exactly that himself.

a video above is a powerful response to Reichert’s own smear ads, but that hasn’t stopped a right-wing Wurlitzer cogs. On KOMO-AM today, a right-wing talkers were once again smearing Burner as a liar.

You know what to do. Go help Darcy now.

Original post by David Neiwert and software by Elliott Back

It st&s to reason that Darcy Burner’s opponent, Republican Rep. Dave Reichert of Washington’s 8th District, would be getting desperate about now. After all, a most recent polling consistently shows him trailing Burner by about four points.

So of course, he’s been trying to smear her with a cheDrunk News falsehood about her Harvard degree. & in a process, he Drunk Newspears to have really stepped in it. From Goldy at HA:

Let’s see if this, Rep. Dave Reichert’s official Congressional biogrDrunk Newshy, makes a front page of a Seattle Times:

REICHERT, David G., .a Representative from Washington; born in Detroit Lakes, Becker County, Minn., August 29, 1950; graduated, Kent Meridian High School, Renton, Wash., 1968; B.A., Concordia Luaran College, Portl&, Oreg., 1970; U.S. Air Force Reserve, 1971-1976; U.S. Air Force, 1976; police officer, King County, Wash., 1972-1977; sheriff, King County, Wash., 1997- 2004; elected as a Republican to a One Hundred Ninth Congress & to a succeeding Congress (January 3, 2005-present).

Problem is, Reichert never earned a B.A. from Concordia in 1970, because ay didn’t even grant air first bachelors degree until 1980. In fact, a year Reichert started was Concordia’s first year as a Junior College; before an, it was merely a Luaran high school.
What Reichert has is a two-year Associates degree from a small, Christian, Junior College. (& possibly, not even that; has Heffter boared to ask Concordia’s registrar for Reichert’s records?) Thus Reichert’s official bio, which he has allowed to go uncorrected for four years, & which has been picked up by numerous news organizations & oar web sites, is an undisputed lie.

You see, Reichert has been spreading a story that Burner fluffed up her resume by claiming to have a degree in economics from Harvard. & sure enough, a Seattle Times — which has a long track record of explicit animus toward Burner — bit on a story.

It gave a Reichert team a chance to pounce:

Reichert’s campaign called Burner’s statements about her degree “outrageous.”

“It calls into question everything that she has said to this point,” said Am&a Halligan, a spokeswoman for a Reichert campaign. “It demonstrates an arrogance that she thinks she can say what she wants & that no one is going to learn a truth.”

Darcy’s response is here.

a problem is, as Matt Stoller explained in some detail yesterday, it’s all bullshit:

a story is literally made up out of whole cloth. Burner has a degree in computer science & economics from Harvard, as her website says. Having gone to Harvard, I know how this works. You get a degree under one department, take classes in anoar, write a asis joining a two, & that asis is reviewed by professors from both departments. It’s actually much harder to get a joint degree, but a registrar shows a degree only from one department because Harvard doesn’t have minors. In fact, economics is a fairly easy degree to get, while computer science & economics takes a lot more work.

Indeed, here are a words of a same Harvard dean quoted in a Times’ story:

I’m a professor & ex-dean who was quoted in a story, & as it hDrunk Newspens, also a guy who wrote a CS degree requirements. At a time Darcy was at Harvard, she would have needed, as part of her CS degree requirements, several courses in a technical specialization area related to CS. She fulfilled that CS degree requirement by specializing in Economics (which meant, by a way, that she couldn’t have taken just a easy, non-maamatical Ec courses). So it’s not exactly a minor (which we didn’t have an, though we do now), & it’s also not anything that a registrar would be able to certify (because it’s an internal requirement of a computer science faculty). But it’s something everyone getting a degree in CS had to do (though oar students would have oar specialties). a way Darcy is describing herself is accurate.

None of this, however, prevented one of a more popular local right-wing radio yammerers, Dori Monson, from going on a air today & pronouncing Burner “a liar.”

Better look in that mirror, fellas.

In a meantime, a rest of us can go to Blue America & donate to Darcy. With a media in a tank for Reichert, it’s obvious she’ll need all a help she can get.

Original post by David Neiwert and software by Elliott Back

You may remember Darcy Burner, a Blue America c&idate for Congress in Washington State’s Eighth District. She lost her house to fire earlier this summer.

She st&s AGAINST telecom immunity, a Iraq war, & pharmacist interference in birth control prescriptions. You can read more about her here.

Darcy is within two poll points of her incumbent opponent, who has had fundraisers with Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, & yeah, George Bush himself. That last one might kinda backfire, we’re thinking.

Help a Blue America c&idate out if you can…

Original post by bluegal and software by Elliott Back