Because of a quirk in state law, Spokane’s 4th Legislative District will have one senator for the first day of the upcoming special session, and a different senator for the rest of it.
Republican Mike Padden is the apparent winner of the race to fill a seat that came open earlier this year when veteran Sen. Bob McCaslin resigned for health reasons. Padden has a mathematically insurmountable lead over Jeff Baxter, a fellow Republican appointed to the seat earlier this year.
Padden, a former state representative and district judge, leads Baxter by 3,628 votes. The Spokane County elections office estimates there are fewer than 3,000 votes left to count in the 4th District.
  

Say what you will about Texas Gov. Rick Perry's “oops” moment — OK, so it was more than a full minute — but he at least parlayed it into an appearance on David Letterman.

He mocks himself by reading the Top 10 list.

Tim Egan of the New York Times profiles Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington in today's edition.

It's an overall flattering piece, characterizing her as a populist warrior against Wall Street villains.

OK, it has one unflattering jab:

“Through two terms, she has been almost an invisible senator. In person, she underwhelms, a charm deficiency that has given rise to a nickname of “Senator Cant-smile.”

It also concludes with a look at the 2012 election to which some Republicans might object: “She faces no significant opposition in her run for a third term next year.”

This might cause state Sen. Mike Baumgartner, a Spokane Republican who has announced a campaign, to remark something like: “So, what am I? Chopped liver?”

Apparently in Egan's assessment, the answer would be yes.

It is eleventy-eleven day, and late this morning everything will come up ones, when it is 11:11:11 a.m. on 11-11-11.

It is also Washington statehood day. On this day in 1889, Washington became a state.

It is also Armistice Day. On this day in 1918 at 11 a.m., a cease fire took hold to end the Great War. (We know it as World War I, but in those days, they apparently didn't have the sense to number their world wars.)

Most of all, it's Veterans Day, to which Armistice Day was cha nged, to honor veterans of the wars before and after World War I. If you're a veteran, you deserve the day off; if you're not a veteran and have the day off, thank the first person in military uniform you meet.