Does This Count?

In a barely-related-to-track news story, former SNL writer Alan Zweibel won the Thurber Award (outstanding humor writing) for his novel The Other Shulman, a book about midlife crisis, suburban hell, and the New York City Marathon. He beat better-known nominees Kinky Friedman and Bill Scheft.

In a more-related-to-track story, Jim Ryun today faces the first serious threat to his congressional seat (KS-02). All three major players in the prediction game (Cook Political Report, CQ Politics, and the Rothenberg Political Report) rate the race as a toss-up. For a conservative Republican to be in danger of losing in one of the reddest states, he had to have shot himself in the foot; a good summary can be found here.