[Denver, December 8. Image via Getty]

DENVER - DECEMBER 08: Job seekers wait in line to enter a career fair December 8, 2009 in Denver, Colorado. Some 500 applicants turned out for the event, despite the bitter temperatures and snow. In an effort to boost jobs nationally, President Barack Obama on Tuesday proposed small business tax cuts, new infrastructure spending and energy efficiency. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

[Aurora, Colorado; December 1. Image via Getty]

AURORA, CO - DECEMBER 01: An immigrant from Mexico holds her four day-old son during a newborn care class at a community health center for low-income patients on December 1, 2009 in Aurora, Colorado. The Metro Community Provider Network (MCPN), which has 11 health centers in the Denver area, has seen a 138 percent increase in patients during the last year of recession. Non-profit community health centers such as MCPN could play a major role nationally if health care reform is passed, with increased subsidies from the federal government as well as millions of newly-insured low-income citizens seeking care. Health coverage for immigrants remains a contentious issue in the reform debate. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

[Aspen, November 29. Image via Getty]

ASPEN, CO - NOVEMBER 29: Erin Mielzynski of Canada skis her second run enroute to a 30th place finish in the Women's FIS Alpine World Cup Slalom on November 29, 2009 in Aspen, Colorado. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)

[Copper Mountain, Colorado; November 19. Image via Getty]

COPPER MOUNTAIN, CO - NOVEMBER 19: Laurenne Ross of the Women's US Alpine Ski Team poses for a portrait during media day on November 19, 2009 in Copper Mountain, Colorado. (Photo by Doug Pensinger/Getty Images)

Andrade's defense attorneys claimed that Andrade reacted without premeditation, in a rage at finding out that Zapata was born male (which Guanabee suggests may have happened after the two had sex). One lawyer said, "Justin Zapata lived like a female, looked like a female, sounded like a female. That's what Mr. Andrade believed. And when he found it wasn't Angie, it was actually Justin, he lost control." But prosecutors countered that Andrade knew that Zapata was born male for 36 hours before he killed her, and that he did so "out of his dislike for homosexuals." The jury agreed, deliberating for only two hours before finding him guilty of both murder and hate crime — one of the first times hate crime law has been applied to a transgender victim. Andrade will serve a life sentence without parole.

A really telling — and disturbing — aspect of this case is the language used on both sides. Andrade's defense lawyers insisted on referring to Zapata as Justin, perhaps implying that Andrade's actions somehow made more sense because Zapata wasn't "really" a woman. Andrade himself referred to Zapata as "it" when he was first arrested. There's also an interesting contrast between the AP's description of Zapata as "biologically male" and the Times's "born male." Does the Times's version do a better job of acknowledging the complexities of biological gender?

Blogger Drew Wilson reminds us that Zapata's death was, sadly, not a first for Colorado. A Navajo teen, Fred Martinez, was killed in 2001 because he identified as a two-spirit, a Native American who occupies both male and female gender roles. Notably, his murderer, Shaun Murphy, was not convicted of a hate crime. The conviction of Angela Zapata's killer on this charge is the saddest kind of progress.

Murder And Hate Verdict In Transgender Case [NYT]
Jury reaches verdict in Colo. Transgender Slaying [Breitbart]
As We Remember Angie, Let's Not Forget Fred [Drew Wilson, Denver Gay Examiner]
Breaking: Allen Andrade Convicted Of First Degree Murder [Feministe]
Defense Says ‘No Hate Crime' In Angie Zapata Trial, Prosecution Proves Otherwise [Guanabee]

According to Dorothy Wickenden's story in this week's New Yorker, Rosamond Underwood and Dorothy Woodruff were both twenty-nine, both well-to-do Smith graduates, and both "uninspired" by their suitors in Auburn, New York, when they responded to a search for schoolteachers in remote Elkhead, Colorado. The mastermind behind this search, cattle rancher Farrington Carpenter, had a secret agenda — luring educated East Coast women to Elkhead to marry local men. It worked — Rosamond married local mine supervisor Bob Perry and, forty years later, Carpenter himself — but this marriage scheme doesn't negate the impact that the women had on Elkhead, or that the town had on them.

Elkhead was a mountain town seventeen miles from the nearest train station, and its school was a single room serving the families of homesteaders in the outlying areas. Dorothy taught the younger children, ten boys and a single girl, while Rosamond instructed the older kids. One former student of Rosamond's wrote, "I don't believe there was ever a community that was affected more by two people than we were by those two girls." Another, who went on to become Missouri's chief forester, wrote, "their impact was immediate, but above all lasting." And although graduation rates in the late teens and early twenties were extremely poor, all six of the ninth-graders Rosamond taught went on to either college or professional school.

But what Elkhead offered Rosamond and Dorothy was perhaps greater than what they offered it. Before they left for Colorado, the women's lives were circumscribed by the expectations of their class and time. "No young lady in our town had ever been hired by anybody," Dorothy wrote. And both women, says Wickenden, "were considered by friends and family to be hopeless spinsters." In Elkhead, they learned that, far from hopeless, they were capable of freeing a horse from a snowbank (wearing snowshoes all the while), cracking the ice in a bucket to give it a drink, and then taking a swig of whiskey each to restore their own strength. Though both later married and had children (Dorothy Woodruff was Wickenden's grandmother), they seem like the kind of spinsters Sadie would approve of. And though their tenure in Elkhead only lasted a year, their story remains inspiring: two women whom no one could imagine even having jobs traveled across the country, made their mark on a group of students (without ever having taught before), and learned to "rough it" along with men.

Dorothy Woodruff's husband died in 1930, leaving her to face the Great Depression with four children. Rather than despairing, she took typing classes and pitched in to help flood victims. "She took life by the throat and dealt with it," says her daughter. Her time in Elkhead may well have prepared her for the hardships of her later life. Now that hardship is upon all of us in one way or another, it's comforting to read about women who learned to do without some of what Dorothy called "the frills, which fill up so much of our lives at home" and were strengthened rather than demoralized by it.

Roughing It [New Yorker]

Earlier: Old Maids And Spinsters: The Best Female Role Models A Teen Girl Can Have

Colorado
After reports surfaced that Republican Secretary of State Mike Coffman had purged tens of thousands of voters from the rolls in Colorado within the sacrosanct 90-day time period in which purges are illegal, he was sued to add the voters back in. This week, a federal court forced Coffman to not only add those voters back onto the rolls, but to grant their provisional ballots special status. When one of the purged voters files a ballot, the state has to actively prove that they don't qualify to vote or else count the ballot.

Florida
The grandmother of voter suppression efforts by the GOP, early voters are turning out in record numbers here, too, hoping to avoid a repeat of the 2000 election. Most of them say they're hoping that if their votes get screwed up, voting early will give them time to fix things. Of course, machine breakdowns and ID-verification ended up slowing the process down, which means that early voters have hurried up to stand in line anyway. Despite GOP concerns that early voting could cost them the election, Republican Governor Charlie Crist ordered early voting locations to stay open longer to accommodate the unexpected surge.

Georgia
In a state seeing unprecedented voter turnout, particularly in African-American communities, and with scores of people voting early (as much as 40 percent of the total 2004 turnout), it's worth nothing that the Republican Secretary of State, Karen Handel, "flagged" as many as 55,000 Georgia voters for additional review prior to the election. While the courts told her to notify the 4,500 flagged for citizenship review that they were eligible to vote, there's no word on the other 50,000 people she's trying to kick off.

Michigan
Michigan has a system that sends newly registered voters cards to confirm their registration. Since 2006, about 5,000 of those cards were returned as undeliverable, and the state threw those voters off the rolls with no other evidence. This week, a federal appeals court ordered the state to re-enroll those voters, insisting that the state law does not require the receipt of the notification card, so the state can't declare them not registered. Those (and other voters) can still face a request for proof of residency at the polls.

Ohio
Ohio, the biggest, swingiest state of them all, has also been a hotbed of voter purges, new registration and Republican activity this year. As mentioned before, Ohio Republicans attempted to force Democratic Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner to throw people off the rolls and stop allowing voters who registered after the early voting period had started to vote; Brunner declined and the Supreme Court sided with her. Bush even tried to get the Department of Justice to weigh in on it, but AG Michael Mukasey decided he didn't want to end up a Gonzales-style legal outcast and declined. Nonetheless,most observers expect that Ohio will be the biggest clusterfuck of this election season (possibly even surpassing Florida in 2000), full of legal challenges, fraud allegations, suppression allegations and general stupid political shit that has nothing to do with anything. Should be fun.

Pennsylvania
The state of Pennsylvania went to court to argue that it didn't need to provide voters with paper ballots — despite all this talk of record turn-out — unless all of the machines in a polling place fail. Judge Harvey Bartle ruled that if half of the machines in a polling place break, the state has to provide paper ballots to voters. The state decided against appealing the decision, apparently realizing that forcing voters to stand in long lines to all use one functioning machine is probably not the best plan.

Virginia
The Virginia NAACP filed a lawsuit against Democratic Governor Tim Kaine this week, alleging that the state was failing to provide enough voting machines at minority voting places and asking the judge to force them to try to keep wait times to 45 minutes. They withdrew their request for a temporary injunction yesterday after negotiations with Kaine's administration, but the lawsuit remains active. People trying to take advantage of in-person absentee voting in Northern Virginia locations like Arlington have had to wait as long as 90 minutes this week. Worse yet, an anonymous group has been distributing flyers in Democratic precincts intended to convince voters that the day for Democrats to vote in November 5th.

West Virginia
After numerous complaints from voters that touch screens were flipping their votes for McCain, Jeff Waybright, the Jackson County clerk, attempted to explain away the errors and improperly calibrated machines. He demonstrated how it might look that way when a machine was improperly calibrated, and then calibrated the machine. It promptly failed to do what it was supposed to. So, if you live in West Virginia, review your votes carefully and take your paper record.

Voter Registration Smashes Records [MSNBC]
Concern Mounts Over Expected Voting Surge [CBS]
Some Voters Still Waiting On Absentee Ballots [CNN]
Colorado Agrees to Restore Voters to Rolls [NY Times]
How Early Voting Could Cost McCain Florida [Time]
Gov. Crist Extends Early Voting Hours statewide [Miami Herald]
Black Voters May Lead Democratic Wave [Salon]
Thousands Of Flagged Voters Can Vote, Court Rules [CNN]
Michigan Loses Appeal Over Voters Rolls [MSNBC]
Ain't Like the Old Days [Talking Points Memo]
In Tight Race, Victor May Be Ohio Lawyers [NY Times]
Judge: PA Must Have Paper Ballots Ready If Half Of Machines Fail [CNN]
Va. NAACP Sues Virginia Governor Over Election Readiness [AP]
NAACP Drops Voting Lawsuit [Richmond Times-Dispatch]
Delays Abound in Early-Voting Surge; Predictions of High Turnout, Confusion [Wall Street Journal]
Phony Board Of Elections Flier Tells Virginia Democrats To Tote On November 5 [Think Progress]
West Virginia Vote Flipping Allegedly Caught On Tape [Huffington Post]

Earlier: There's Nothing Some Fear More Than Citizens Exercising Their Constitutional Rights
Voter Suppression And You: A Guide For Unreal Americans

• Were you — like Glamour editor Cindi Leive wondering how Sarah Palin managed to spend so much money on her wardrobe? By the way, the suit she wore at the debate was Tahari, one of my favorite affordable suit makers. [New York Times]
• Well, it turns out that she might not have really ended up with all $150,000 of it, as some of the purchases included ripped T-shirts and clothing for a 2-year-old. [New York Times]
• She might have to claim the clothes as income for tax purposes, though, and a formal complaint has been filed with the FEC about the clothes. [Andrew Sullivan, Politico]
• Oh, and she got pissy with the SNL costume people because the matching suits they had her and Tina Fey in weren't in keeping with her "new" image. [Huffington Post]

• In actual news, the chairwoman of a New Mexico women's GOP group, Marcia Stirman, wrote an OpEd in which she called Obama a "Muslim Socialist" and declared all Muslims "our enemies." That's what the McCain camp needs right now, definitely. [Salon]
• Someone (or a group of someones) has been vandalizing the Minnesota homes of the entire Congressional delegation. [Pioneer Press]
• Air America's Mark Maron went to a Palin rally in Colorado springs, didn't find hate but did get a shiny copper penny from an old guy. [The Guardian]
• The Washington Post's Dana Milbank went in search of the Real Virginia and found that it's voting for Barack Obama. [Washington Post]
• The FDIC may start to insure your mortgages as well as your bank deposits in the hopes that lenders will stop foreclosing, but they probably won't because they're dicks and they all live in Delaware. [Washington Post]
• Like most Americans, Alan Greenspan is really sorry that he thought The Market was self-regulating. [New York Times]
• The McCains and the Obamas would save money under either candidate's tax plan, but the McCains would save $732,000 under his plan. Yowza. [Think Progress]
• And in awful news, a 20-year-old woman was mugged and then, when the mugger noticed her McCain bumper sticker, maimed. He carved a "B" in her face. Barack Obama's campaign (and everyone else in this country) wants the sick fuck brought to justice. Not in our names, dude. [WTAE, Politico]

MEGAN: I am sitting here watching CNBC and drinking coffee, which I don't normally do. By the way, the economy: still fucked.

LATOYA: Lucky you — I'm already in the office. I know the economy is still fucked — why do you think I'm here? I think we need to chill for the long haul on this one. It's gonna be a while, new stimulus package or no.

MEGAN: I love, by the way, that John McCain is all like, "Obama just wants to throw money at problems like education and special needs kids!" and in the meantime, he's all Mr. New Spending. And Republicans are shoveling money at the market faster than they shovel bullshit at the American people.

LATOYA: Yeah, some free market this is. I didn't know some people got a string to pull if you fucked up. Looks like Bernake's ProBama.

MEGAN: This is what happens when you tell reporters that the economy isn't your strong suit and the economy goes to shit. Also, insulting your opponent by calling him a Socialist while the government is busy nationalizing entire industries and you're calling for the government to, in effect, buy the mortgage rights to have the country is not good either. Bob Schieffer knows that most Republicans are privately Pro-bama these days, they're just too scared to say. It's just the mouth-breathers who don't actually have to, like, work in the government that are all like JOHN AND SARAH OH MY GOD I LOVE THEM SO.

LATOYA: Details, Megan, Details Is it just me that's hoping for a reverse Bradley effect?

MEGAN: If I prayed, I'd pray for one.

LATOYA: Don't waste your prayer on that. The specter of election '00 still haunts us.

MEGAN: Well, I mean, She's supposedly omnipotent, right?

LATOYA: If this comes down to the Supreme Court, I want everyone on this: protest, prayers, fertility dances. I don't give a damn what you do, do it in the Obama direction.

MEGAN: I'm up for a fertility dance, even if it means I have to be celibate for a month.

LATOYA: Nah, you have to stick with the prayers. We have to counteract the scared evangelicals.

MEGAN: Awww, poor babies, once they've denounced him, called him godless, passed around rumors that he's a Muslim and campaigned against him, they're worried he won't talk to them about their conservative, intolerant social agenda? Color me sad.

LATOYA: It's only unfair when you're losing. I'm just concerned they'll call up the ghost of Jerry Falwell.

MEGAN: Oh, right. I mean, it's his duty to represent all the people in the United States, sort of like it was George Bush's duty.

LATOYA: Define "people". Obviously, some of us who aren't here yet count more than those of us who are here, so maybe they just are counting most of us heathens.

MEGAN: Well, I think that by "people" they mean "those of them that are saved" and so that's anything that's in our uteri, and (white) evangelicals. Other than that, um, oh, wait, I think Bush had Chalabi's back for a while when he went to invade Iraq.

LATOYA: Then again, maybe it isn't the extreme set that we should be worried about. Someone shot a bear cub in the head and dropped some Obama campaign tags over its dead body. Now, there are multiple layers of fucked up in that mix and the story doesn't have many details yet. But that is just sick and disgusting.

MEGAN: Also, I think we need an alibi for Sarah Palin. She was just in North Carolina.

LATOYA: Ha — you can handle that. I'm watching how Obama is leaving the campaign trail to visit his sick grandma. It's the little things that get to me in this election, it really is.

MEGAN: I mean, if they sent her home from the hospital last week, and she's that ill, she's probably in hospice care.

LATOYA: Perhaps. I hope she gets well.

MEGAN: I hope for his sake that he gets there in time, and that he's taking Sasha and Malia.

LATOYA: See, I can't even read a sweet story like that without getting pissed. On one hand you have a family man, someone in a partnership with his wife, a thinking politician, someone who has seen the best and worst of America and wants to serve us anyway...

MEGAN: I mean, his spokesman all but said she's not going to get better. It sucks that she won't get to vote for her grandson. And it probably sucks more that if she votes absentee, some Republican will probably object.

LATOYA: Sigh. Moving on. Oh, did you hear? We apparently hate real Americans. Because obviously, we are fake Americans. This isn't news to me — we talk about how PoC are marginalized in America all day every day at my spot — but I thought you would want to know.

MEGAN: Well, that's good to know, at least. If I'm disenfranchised at the polls in two weeks, at least I'll know why. So, am I to assume there's a new God test for citizenship? Do I have to swear fealty to a particular brand of God to vote? Are they going to make me submit to a lie detector to make sure I really believe in God?

LATOYA: Oh, it gets better:

Warming up a crowd in North Carolina Saturday, Republican Rep. Robin Hayes offered the diagnosis that “liberals hate real Americans that work and achieve and believe in God.”

His remarks came shortly after he had said he would “make sure we don’t say something stupid, make sure we don’t say something we don’t mean.”

Hayes had followed Rep. Patrick McHenry, also a North Carolina Republican, who laid out the choice between McCain and Obama.

“It’s like black and white,” yelled someone from the crowd.

You just can't make this shit up. You really can't.

MEGAN: I love how that shit is a) not stupid and b) not something he doesn't mean. Really, can we just pick somewhere for them all to go on November 6th?

LATOYA: Mars?

MEGAN: Perfect! And since it takes 3 years to get there, they won't be back until 2014. I think that's a good plan.

LATOYA: We should tell them real Americans set up camp on Mars.

MEGAN: No, we should tell them that God has called them to journey there, just like God called Moses to lead the Jews out of Egypt. Charlton Heston already left! Outer space is the new desert.

LATOYA: It so is. Mars is red, the Red Sea — we could totally sell this. This is shaping up to be a tough week for McCain. He's running out of cash (down to $47 million!) and he's breaking up with Colin Powell.

MEGAN: I'm actually surprised he has $47 million left when he only had $84 to start. But, then I read about Meg Whitman giving almost $100,000 despite donation "limits" that McCain's supposed campaign finance reform put into place and I'm not that surprised anymore.

LATOYA: I would say something about saving and fiscal responsibility, but it just looks like creative loopholing. I find it interesting that McCain is shocked Colin Powell didn't call.

MEGAN: I mean, why does no one but me point out that McCain wrote the loopholes?

LATOYA: Makes sense though. That's how he knows what to use. I'm still on the McCain/Powell break up. Maybe Powell didn't feel like being called Judas. That title was already flexed on Gov. Richardson. Or maybe Sarah drove a rift in their relationship. Hmmm...

MEGAN: Given how leaky McCain's organization is — as evidenced by no less than 3 staffers telling CNN they're giving up on Colorado — I'm not totally surprised. Plus, when do you think the last time was that McCain called him up? With all the whispers for weeks that Powell was thinking about breaking it off, why wouldn't John call him and be like, Colin, baby, I'm sorry, I've been really busy, let me buy you a drink when this is all over...? Especially since they weren't in an exclusive relationship.

LATOYA: Does Colin Powell have a Facebook page? Maybe John should have checked their status. Telephone is so pre-2000. Maybe Colin sent him a "TTYL" and he just stopped paying attention. I guess after 25 years, the thrill is gone. It's the end of a bromance. We should send him a CD. Or at least email Meghan McCain, have her post "How Come You Don't Call Me" in his honor

MEGAN: Powell's all about "You Don't Own Me."

LATOYA: LOL — "Don't tell me what to say!"

MEGAN: "Don't say I can't go with other boys!"

LATOYA: "Just let me be myself...that's all I ask of you!"

MEGAN: In my head, Colin Powell is, crying, singing this into his hairbrush like Bridget Jones, slightly drunk.

LATOYA: "I'm free — and I love to be free!" See, now that's going to be stuck in my head all day!

MEGAN: I'm a terrible person, I apologize.

• According to a recent mall survey in the UK, 4 out of 10 women wear Spanx-like underpants to look slim and 1 out of 10 women admitted to using "chicken filet" breast-enchancers. • A recent study found that the name-dropping of brands in rap videos causes viewers to transfer their feelings of the rappers (both positive and negative) onto the product. • Many Chinese lawyers representing clients who were effected by the milk-contamination scandal are claiming that they have been warned by the Chinese government to drop their cases due to "government sensitivity" about the scandal. • Researchers say that they are developing a urine test for breast cancer risk in women. • A Florida man is charged with beating and stabbing to death his wife, who had experienced a lifetime of physical spousal abuse from her former husband, whom she also killed. • A 99-year-old woman from Corte Madera, California plans to keep her driver's license when she turns 100. • An 18-year-old boy in Colorado hired men to attack and kill his mother (who escaped the attack) so he could use her money to buy breast implants for his girlfriend.•

Head protester Will Duffy went on Denver's local Fox morning show to speak out against anyone even remotely involved with Planned Parenthood, right down to the cleaning ladies and contractors. They all deserve to be picketed, he said, because they are helping PP "rip the arms and legs off unborn children." Uh, what? I'm pretty sure they don't do that. Fox also interviews Vic Barta, whose Denver Security Services were hired to protect the Planned Parenthood lot from security breaches. Barta has since abandoned the lucrative contract because the protesters outside his house scared his 14-year-old child. Vicky Coward of Colorado Planned Parenthood puts it pretty succinctly: the protesters "say they're pro-family, but they're really terrifying families and communities."

Albuquerque Has Renewal of Attacks on Abortion [New York Times]
Contractor Opens Up About Abortion Protesters [My Fox Colorado via feministing]