What a long weekend...

The first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament is over. March Madness has seen the tournament go from 64 teams to 16 teams remaining.

Since I only posted score reports over the weekend, let's get back to business. Sound good, okay?

It's unfortunate that name recognition and money is everything when it comes to the presidential race.

What was there before there was Jon Stewart?

Ed Rendell wants an earlier primary for the presidential elections in Pennsylvania.

The state house has agreed to the changes made by the Senate with regards to the minimum wage bill.

Democratic candidates for governor discussed what they would do with cigarette taxes.

They somehow found a way to tie in the NCAA Tournament with Congress.

Of the 64 teams that will compete in the basketball tournament, Georgetown has more graduates (19) in Congress than any other school. And George Washington University (GW) ranks third, with 13 members of the 535-member Congress who took a degree from that institution.

This is evidence that many members of Congress were influenced by their education in the shadow of the Capitol — and may have gotten the political bug to run for Congress while in attendance there.

The Georgetown graduates in Congress include Michigan Democrat John D. Dingell, the House’s longest-serving member, who took a Georgetown undergraduate degree in 1949 and a law degree in 1952 — at a time when his namesake father was serving in the House.

Among the GW graduates in Congress is Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, who took a law degree there in 1964 and who worked in Washington during that time as a Capitol police officer. Reid entered politics in Nevada but returned to Washington in 1982 after his election to the House. Reid delivered the 2005 commencement address to the GW law school.

The University of Virginia, which is about 100 miles from Washington in Charlottesville, has 14 graduates in Congress — most of them having taken a juris doctor degree from the law school. Many members of Congress have law degrees.

Indiana Democratic Sen. Evan Bayh lived in Washington for much of his youth because his father, Birch Bayh, was elected to the first of three terms in the Senate in 1962, when the younger Bayh was seven years old. Evan Bayh took a law degree from the University of Virginia in 1981, the year after his father was defeated for re-election to the Senate.

After those D.C.-area schools, Stanford University in Palo Alto, Calif., from which 12 members of Congress took a degree, has the next-highest amount of congressional representation among teams in the basketball tournament. This grouping includes Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus.

Two large schools that are expected to seriously contend for the championship each have nine graduates in the current 110th Congress — the University of Florida and Ohio State University. The University of Texas in Austin and the University of Wisconsin in Madison each have eight graduates in Congress.

The Hillbilly Report has this up dealing with the Ireland Army Hospital. There's a follow-up here.

Dr. Dick Robinson's campaign has released this press release.

The Cincy Post has this up dealing with the governor's race.

Jonathan Miller will bring fresh ideas to the governor's mansion.

Richard Blumenthal is finally ready to run for Governor in Connecticut in the next 3 years.