We're down to the final days before the North Carolina and Indiana primaries.  We have a complete primer on the North Carolina primary process posted at BlueNC.  Blue Indiana has this first in a series posted at this link.
In North Carolina the excitement has spilled over to the down ballot races.  It's the biggest year I can remember in my voting life.  I was 14 the last time North Carolina had a say in who would be the Democratic nominee.  I'm almost 46.  At this rate it may never happen again in my life, so I'm enjoying every minute of it.  I can even get past the negative ads so that I can celebrate the unprecedented voter registration numbers and so that I'm prepared to help the other North Carolina races take advantage of the organization efforts once all eyes are on to the next state.
On to the roundup:

Iowa
   demoinesdem has taken to providing a "McCain Shameful Behavior Roundup" to help us keep track of the myriad reasons not to vote for him

Wisconsin
   Uppity Wisconsin traces the history and legacy of Earth Day and its founder, Sen. Gaylord Nelson

There's more...

Rick Renzi's under indictment, Sue Myrick gets caught with her fingers in the cookie jar - possibly legally, Patrick McHenry has questions surrounding just about everything he does, John Shadegg can't make up his mind. How many more Republicans will get caught up in legal or ethical controversies prior to November?

One way to stay on top of this is to follow along with the state blogs. We're discussing our congress critters and their shenanigans long before it hits the national scene. Stop by. Check us out. You too can be the first to know.

Here's your roundup for the week:

New Mexico
   Republican Senate  candidate Steve Pearce says legalizing same sex marriage will lead to legalized pedophilia.  Classy.

California
   The California Yachting association wants you to call the California Republican Party and thank them for not taxing your yachts!

There's more...

There are some interesting stories coming out of the 50 State community blogs.  If you don't see your favorite state on the list check out the state blogrolls at Open Left and MyDD.

I'm sorry we didn't post at Open Left last week.  There was a coding issue and I'm not talented enough to fix it.  

Enjoy!

Texas
   Phillip Martin of Burnt Orange Report lays out the strategy of how Barack Obama can win Texas.  

Oregon
   First recorded version of Ginsberg's HOWL was in Berkley, right? Nope--a new discovery puts it at Portland's Reed College, 52 years ago this Valentine's Day. 

There's more...

This week we bring you double the pleasure in our 50 State Blog Roundup.  Real life threw me a curve ball last week and I wasn't able to follow through with the roundup.  My apologies.  You will find last week's roundup tagging along at the end.

Without further delay, here's what's going on locally at our state community blogs:

Minnesota
   Tim Walz -- first-term congressman and Democratic National Convention superdelegate -- endorsed Barack Obama's presidential bid this week.

Iowa
   desmoinesdem discusses the dispute between Iowa's governor and secretary of state (both Democrats) over the best fix for paperless voting machines.

There's more...

On the eve of the South Carolina primary, those of us near the state are busy canvassing, calling and doing everything we can to stay on top of the local news.  Earlier today I pulled up every online newspaper I could find listed for the state and found that the local news was doing a better job than the national media at portraying the race for the Democratic presidential nomination as a three person race.

John Edwards had plenty of press in the local news with at least one or two of the larger papers touting his rise in the polls and a couple of the smaller ones still reporting last week's news.  It was interesting to see that some papers showed only pictures of Clinton and Edwards and at least one paper showed only Barack Obama. Since online "front pages" change frequently, I obviously only had a snapshot of what was being shown at that particular time.  However, if it was indicative of the mood of voters in South Carolina, might the national press and the pundits that bloviate therein be out of touch with what's really going on in South Carolina?  I guess we'll find out tomorrow.  

In the meantime, your bloggers at the 50 State Blog Network have been busy.  Here's your roundup for this week:

North Carolina
   While the Democratic candidates for governor plan for their live-blog debate at BlueNC, the four candidates for Lt. Governor have participated in live debates in Asheville and Fayetteville (Part 1, Part 2).  Three of the four have agreed to a live-blog debate at BlueNC.

There's more...