As of Tuesday, a record-breaking 628,000 Missouri voters have already cast ballots ahead of Election Day. Thousands of voters are steering clear of polls to avoid catching or spreading the coronavirus, which reached record levels of new cases and deaths in the state this month.

The state has followed a seismic shift nationally in American voting patterns. Missouri lawmakers in June expanded vote-by-mail options to make it easier for voters to cast ballots before Election Day, Nov. 3. Under the new laws, the number of voters casting absentee ballots doubled previous election records. In both the 2016 and 2012 general elections, fewer than 300,000 Missourians voted absentee.

Claims by President Trump that voting by mail would lead to widespread voter fraud have been proven baseless, but some voters still question how secure it is to vote in advance of Election Day.

So, what happens after you cast an absentee or mail in ballot? The process varies slightly from county to county in Missouri, based on the technology and staffing available at local election authorities, but all ballots follow roughly the same path. To clarify what that looks like, here’s the journey that mine is taking in St. Louis County.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/government-politics-issues/2020-10-30/one-ballots-journey-how-absentee-and-mail-in-ballots-are-counted-in-missouri

Is that resisting a rest? ..........................

But, Geography is where it’s at.............

But it is certainly UP there...............................

St. Louis County Executive Sam Page has fulfilled a promise to veto two pieces of legislation he says would have severely hurt his ability to address the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

“With growing numbers across the state, and across the county, St. Louis County cannot give up in its fight against COVID-19,” Page said Monday at his regular press briefing. “But giving up is exactly what Bills 222 and 223 are asking us to do.”

Under the legislation, Page or any future county executive would still have been able to issue states of emergency or public health orders like the mask mandate currently in place. But the council would have had to approve any extensions beyond 15 days by a two-thirds majority, or five votes.

Democrat Rita Heard Days broke with Page and her Democratic colleagues last week to approve the legislation by a 4-3 vote at the end of a meeting that lasted nearly a week as members listened to more than 2,000 public comments. But another member of the Democratic majority would have to defect in order to override the veto, which appears unlikely.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/government-politics-issues/2020-10-26/page-vetoes-limits-on-public-health-orders-states-of-emergency

If the 2020 race for Illinois' 13th congressional seat seems familiar, it’s because in many ways it is.

The contest is a rematch of 2018, when Republican incumbent Rodney Davis narrowly beat Democrat Betsy Dirksen-Londrigan. And a number of the issues are the same in a race that is drawing interest from political observers outside the central Illinois district, which contains portions of the Metro East.

“This is going to be a really close contest,” said Ken Moffett, chair of Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville’s political science department. “There’s a lot of money flowing in on both sides from nationwide sources.”

A lot of that attention is tied to the results from 2018, when Democratic congressional candidates picked up 41 seats, including two in Illinois.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/government-politics-issues/2020-10-27/illinois-13th-district-congressional-race-is-nearly-identical-to-2018

A Lidl grocery store that just opened in Dublin has the remains of an 11th century Viking home on display under its floor. When the building on Aungier Street near Dublin Castle was slated for redevelopment as a street-level retail space with student housing in the upper stories, a team from the Irish Archaeological Consultancy was enlisted to survey the site. They discovered the remains of the 1,000-year-old house, which only survived because this dwelling, very atypically for the time and place, had a cellar. It was dug out below ground level and the cellar was lined with masonry blocks. Wooden planks were then added to form the floor of the home. The planks are long gone, but the outline of the home is clearly visible thanks to the surviving stone blocks.

In order to preserve this unique dwelling of Hiberno-Norse Dubliners, the archaeological material was left in situ and covered by a thick plexiglass floor so customers can enjoy the history of the city while they shop. And not just medieval Dublin. There used to a be an 18th century theater on the site, and archaeologists also unearthed a brick “pit trap,” a hidden compartment under the stage that actors would burst out of to appear suddenly on the scene or drop into to disappear. The pit trap area, in a prime location right in front of the checkouts, was covered by plexi as well so it can be viewed while shoppers wait to make their purchases. I wonder if there will be a decline in impulse buying of candy and magazines now that customers have something cooler to fixate on in the checkout line.

The store has put up an array of information panels about the archaeological treasures under their feet. There are explanations of the finds and drawings interpreting the remains.

http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/59901

👻 They have lots of spirit..........................

Hospitals in the St. Louis region are treating more coronavirus patients from outlying counties, health officials said Friday.

That means local health systems are bearing the burden of the virus’s spread in rural areas, doctors said. The increase in patients from outstate regions is putting a strain on metro health care systems, which are regularly seeing more than 50 new admissions a day, a rate officials call “unsustainable.”

“What’s going on in those rural areas is going to affect the urban areas,” said Dr. Alex Garza, head of the St. Louis Metropolitan Pandemic Task Force. “That’s where the bulk of the health care is consumed.”

That has hospital officials concerned as case numbers begin to climb again in St. Louis and St. Louis County. The St. Louis bistate region saw a 16% increase in case numbers in the past week, and the rate of hospital admissions among people from St. Louis and St. Louis County is beginning to go up again.

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/health-science-environment/2020-10-23/hospital-capacity?

It just makes my day.......................