Evening Update

V for Vendetta has been postponed. The delay is for a year, most likely due to the events of this past summer.

Here's a nice and interesting interview with Senator Bayh. I'm posting some excerpts.

When he was a kid, Bayh's parents took him to Independence, Mo. His dad, U.S. Sen. Birch Bayh, D-Ind., wanted Evan to meet Harry Truman. Evan's mom, Marvella, expressly told her son to be quiet on the visit to the former president's home. And Evan did just that. At least, until he was forced to break his silence.

"I said, 'I'm sorry, Mom, I've got to go to the bathroom,'" Bayh recalled Thursday, as he spoke to a crowd at the annual job fair in Hulman Center.

Embarrassed, Mrs. Bayh turned red.

But Truman saved the day. He said, 'It's OK, son, so do I,'" Bayh explained. "My claim to fame - I went to the bathroom with Harry Truman."

Now 49 years old, Evan Bayh indeed comes from a well-connected political family. But he also has roots in a town and a state well off the national political radar screen. On Thursday, Bayh said that when Truman became president, "he never really let it go to his head. He remembered where he came from."

In St. Louis Cardinal news, Tony LaRussa is only one win away from tying Sparky Anderson for all-time career wins with 2,194. With regards to Cardinal managers, Red Schoendienst has 1,041 and Tony has 873 wins as a Cardinal manager. Jason Marquis has lost about 7 games in a row including tonight's game in which Zack Duke was very impressive in his only two innings. Duke left with a sprained ankle.

By the time of this post, the Red Sox should have had 700 runs this season.

The Maris family has settled their lawsuit with Anheuser-Busch.

This is bad but it will make the news, Comedy Central-style.

Two National Guardsmen who are also local elected officials get sent overseas. While they're away on active duty, their Borough Council seats are declared vacant because of the meetings they've missed. The mayor swears in two replacements, touching off a local wave of controversy.

The story isn't too funny. But it's true - and this week it's scheduled to be featured on the Comedy Central show.

"We loved that it is a real, genuine conflict," said Stewart Bailey, co-executive producer, who added that the story fit an angle they were working on about the war in Iraq.

"We were looking for a way to tell about the sacrifices and the hard decisions made here at home," Bailey said. "Here's a man that had to force through a hard decision in order to do the business of the town."

But the segment, which producers hope to broadcast Wednesday night, reaches beyond one man's decision, Bailey said.

"We'll really be telling both sides of the story," said Bee. Last week, she and a production team spent hours interviewing Abigail Perez, wife of former Councilman Herb Perez, who is stationed in Germany, and Cathy Jefferson, whose husband, former Councilman Thomas Jefferson, is serving in Iraq.

Guess who led fundraising for the first half of the year? Not Hillary but Senator Evan Bayh

An Associated Press report on the fledgling, "maybe, maybe not" presidential candidacy of Sen. Evan Bayh included this interesting tidbit: Bayh’s political action committee raised nearly $1.2 million in the first half of the year, according to the nonpartisan Political Money Line campaign finance tracking system, more than any other potential Democratic nominee. New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton raised just under $716,000.

Bayh himself describes Hillary Clinton as a very strong front-runner; that much is obvious, as is her capacity to raise tens of millions of dollars in a hurry if she asks for it more urgently. And political odds-makers point out that Bayh’s fairly conservative brand of Democratic politics hasn’t endeared him to most traditional Democratic constituencies.

Regardless of whether he actually becomes the nominee, Bayh’s centrist course – strong on defense but moderate on the most divisive social issues – is one Democrats ought to pay attention to.

And the tightwad reputation Bayh built for himself when he was governor points to ground that Democrats ought to seize. Why shouldn’t Democrats aspire to be the fiscally conservative party? It’s been a generation or more since most Washington Republicans tried to balance a budget.

That's about it for now.