John McCain has returned some $3 million in general election donations. He's done this because he is now actively going to pursue getting public financing, even though he tried to withdraw from it and started breaking election law and raising money beyond the cap in spite of the FEC's opinion that once you apply for public financing, you can't get out of it unless the FEC says so, and as such all the limits on raising and spending apply. It is no wonder that now McCain is asking for legal defense contributions instead of campaign dollars.

Now DNC chair Howard Dean says that along with making sure Florida's delegates get seated, the DNC is also committed to seating the Michigan delegates. He mentions that whatever plan ends up being the plan must be approved by both campaigns, but here's your official DNC position on the stripped delegations, in case you were wondering.

Things in the United States are not going well. People are starting to figure that out.

We're going to talk more about this, because it is the kind of thing that puts me into a severe temper: the Bush administration is engaged in a full and heavy PR battle against the federal media shield bill, so much so that they have even launched a website against it.

In more bad news on employment figures, the Labor Department today revealed that employers terminated 80,000 jobs in March.

Campaigns and Elections projects that if Democrats win in Texas, some big changes might be in store here during the next redistricting. It is also interesting to see what they think about how other states will shake out under what circumstances.

Obama: $40 million. Clinton: $20 million.

In the chain of bad economic news that never seems to end, today we have another link: 407,000 people applied for unemployment benefits last week, which was the most applicants in one week in over two years.

The Chronicle's Lee Nichols and Richard Whittaker give their impressions from the Travis County Democratic Convention. It actually sounds like it was a pretty good time.

As if the Republican Party didn't have enough problems: now the Ron Paul supporters are using their organization to gain control of regional delegations. That must be like a slow-motion car wreck for the GOP old guard.