E!!

Nevermind that this gives the Dems a 13 – 7 edge over R’s on the committee; that ratio is to be expected after the 2008 elections.  But Franken is a junior senator with NO qualifications for that seat.  It’s beyond ridiculous.

An astute reader wonders why no one (not Obama, not the poet) flipped a few words around and used “seven score and four years ago” in today’s rhetoric – especially as Obama did other things that mimicked Lincoln’s inauguration. 

It’s been 144 years since Lincoln was assassinated and the south surrendered.

(If you didn’t know it, a score is 20 years.)

I’m trying not to be grouchy and just let ObamaNation have their fun today, but that’s one hell of a price tag for today’s Festivities. Seems to me we could have had a very nice Inauguration for a lot less.

Strange that a British writer - Peter Hitchens - is the one to re-break my heart re: election night with this piece in the Daily Mail. 

Hat Tip:  Derb, who provides the column’s four paragraph close

King George of the Let Them Eat Cake blog has noted that Obama’s change.gov site invites his beloved citizens to contact him and “share their vision” with his administration. George snarkily suggests how O might process and manage the millions of bright ideas coming in.  You can click thru for his thoughts (which are very amusing) and my cake-inspired sample letter just below his post.

Nicky Cheese clicked around and noted that change.gov also invites people to fill out an O admin job application online.  Nic is super excited about working for the new Obamastration and has already applied and begun apartment hunting in D.C.  This afternoon he forwarded me the touchingly personal note he received from Obama:

“Thank you for your interest in joining the Obama-Biden Administration. Within a few days, you will receive an email with a link to the more complete on-line application. Please be patient, as we are trying to respond promptly to the large number of people who are interested in working in the Administration.”

I am so inspired that I am also going to apply.  Suggest you do the same before all the good jobs are gone.

(Nic ~ can you convince the powers that be to throw up a Blogivists discussion board on this so we can all compare notes?  I suspect we can have some fun with this.)

Obama visits the White House while the echoes of McCain’s can’t-say-that (or That either) (and definitely not THAT!) protestulations and admonishments still ring in our heads. 

This makes it hard to understand why The Maverick has been so quiet on the snarkfest re: Palin.

Says a new blog pal:  Your silence, sir, is deafening!

This morning Megyn Kelly on Fox News reported that Norm Coleman was protesting the counting of absentee ballots in the recount for his senate race with Al Franken.  I couldn’t imagine how Coleman could object if the ballots were valid so assumed they had already been rejected for one reason or another

I now have a more detailed report in my Inbox saying the Hennepin County Canvassing Board unanimously rejected Franken’s demands that absentee ballots which had been previously invalidated/rejected now be validated and counted. 

Cullen Sheehan, a staffer in Norm Coleman’s MN campaign, also sent out this brief release:

“The Al Franken campaign today tried to stuff new ballots into the ballot box in a brazen, last minute act of desperation.  We have raised concerns repeatedly about these types of tactics by the Franken campaign.  Today is further evidence of their intent to use whatever means necessary to counter the decision of the people of Minnesota.  We applaud the actions of the Hennepin County Canvassing Board in rejecting this blatant, desperate act.”

I’ve said it before, though not on this blog: 

It is amazing to me that the MN senate race was/is so close considering what a snarky, dishonest tax-evading louse Al has proven himself to be.  Even worse, he was a terrible talk radio host during his brief stint with the short-stinted Air America.  (Memo from E!! to Franken and Friends:  Nasty is never funny.) 

The dialogue has begun.  Mahmoud informs Obama that the world expects a major “overhaul.”

CEI’s Iain Murry corrects (UK) Times‘ writer Danny Finklestein on our recent election and American politics.  Worth reading no matter which side of the Pond you reside on.

Read about it here on Boston.com.

Like many Americans last week, I tuned in for the 30-minute Barack-o-mercial. 

In between the anecdotal close-ups of struggling American families – a widow working two jobs and raising two kids; a husband and father worried about his job at the Ford plant – I noted that Obama’s megacommercial failed to present hard data on the cost of his proposed programs and said nothing about our huge federal deficit and the corresponding budget pressures he will face once in office. 

Obam’s description of his health care plan – which “includes improving information technology, requires coverage for preventive care and pre-existing conditions, and lowers health care costs for the typical family by $2,500 a year” – sounds very nice, but there has been no independent economic analysis confirming that costs will really be reduced by that (or any) amount.

Obama simply Hopes that spending $50 billion on his proposed Changes over the next five years will save the system money.  But even if his optimistic estimates prove out, Obama’s plan does not stipulate that the net savings by insurance and health care providers will result in lower premiums for consumers.

And then we have Obama’s promises to “cut taxes for every working family making less than $200,000 a year…  Give businesses a tax credit for every new employee they hire…  Eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas…  Help homeowners by freezing foreclosures for 90 days… Provide low-cost loans to help small businesses pay their workers and keep their doors open…”

Independent analysts have estimated that combined with our current budget shortfalls, these and other of Obama’s proposals will likely result in a $1 trillion deficit next year.  That being unthinkable, some purging will be necessary.  But which of his programs will Obama cut, and why has he been promising all of them if he knows at least some must go?

Though much of his infomercial focused on the “hard realities” of life for select American families, Obama seems unwilling or unable to face reality himself.  It seems he could stand to learn something from that widowed mother of two who has to settle for half instead of whole gallons of milk when the money runs short – and doesn’t promise her family otherwise on the way to the store.

This post is very well done.

Hat Tip:  Conor Friedersdorf @ Culture11

Don’t miss Joe Carter’s post on Culture11. And (most of) the comments are worth reading, too. It is interesting how people see these things – and to note the corresponding assumptions they make about what “everyone” else thinks or believes.

I’m grateful to blog for an online magazine that encourages these kinds of discussions. Thanks, Joe!

It should be acknowledged that The Pew Research and Rasmussen Reports polls had the presidential race right at 52 to 46 percent, a 6 point spread.

The polls at Gallup and Reuters/Zogby had the race at an 11 point spread which is outside the margin of error so problematic.  ABC/Washington Post and CBS had Obama up by 9 which is just at the +/- 3 point margin of error. 

NBC/WSJ and IBD had a spread of 8 which isn’t bad, and CNN and FOX had the spread at 7 points which is/was close enough for me.

Source:  Newsmax

Forgot to mention that Rove’s electoral map prediction was the closest of any I found in my internet and blogosphere travels.  He called it perfectly with the exception of giving Indiana to McCain (so had called it 338 – 200).  Impressive.

(If you know of a site, blog or map that had it 100% right, please let me know.)

I assume most have checked the state election results by now, so here are some random thoughts:

– With 28 seats in the Assembly, a majority in the Senate, and just a couple of Republican votes the Dems can override a veto by Governor Jim Gibbons.  He is now officially a lame duck.  Or, in light of the constant trouble and controversy surrounding him, maybe just plain lame.

– In light of the above, expect a tax hike in Nevada as legislators contemplate a budget shortfall of (at least) $250 million.

– My condolences to Senator Heck (R) who lost to Breeden by 801 votes.  But, as Chuck Muth pointed out during this morning’s panel discussion on KNPR, Heck’s campaign ignored his advice to court the Libertarian active voting block (which by all counts was larger by far than Heck’s loss margin).  A few calls and mailers to Libertarian types and who knows what could have been?

– Incumbent Senator Bob Beers (R) was outspent and outslimed by a Democratic machine that did not hesitate to twist, lie and libel.  And somehow it didn’t seem to matter to voters that his opponent, Allison Copening, ducked most debate and interview opportunities throughout the campaign. 

– I was dissatisfied with both Beers’ and Copening’s pre-election responses to my “what will you cut, or what taxes will you raise, specifically” question in re: to Nevada’s budget shortfall.  Beers said we’d have to do one or the other (duh!) and Copening said she’d figure it out when she got to Carson City.  These answers are not good enough.  Voters have the right to know what their candidates plan to do before they cast their ballots.

– Congrats to Chad Christensen who is “my” Assemblyman.  A lot of people thought he was done, including Jon Ralston.

– Memo to Senator Raggio:  Please do what you can to convince your fellow senators to cut the budget and raise taxes as little as possible.

Lisa Schiffren has a great post on The Corner.  She posits that McCain deliberately held back in the campaign.  Here’s part of it:

…some McCain aides had felt for a while that their candidate had had a deep reluctance to impede the election of the nation’s first African American president. That he had, perhaps, pulled punches and failed to strike as hard as necessary to win this thing, for that greater good. [This] was infuriating, since more depended on the election than changing the race dynamic — which, it must be said, has been changed for some time, and did not require this particular symbol to validate it. To be sure, McCain must have known that his campaign was losing — and did not want to swing blindly. And maybe he didn’t like being called “erratic,” “desperate”, and a “racist” every time the inconvenient facts of Barack Obama’s short past came up for discussion.

But all Republicans who watched their candidate these past few months, must have been struck, as I have been, by the sense that he was holding back. I wondered, too often, how it could be that no one at the campaign could frame and muster the arguments that were clear to all conservative writers here and at the other publications and blogs that share our view. When the arguments were made, they were too little, too late, and garbled enough to drain their force. The campaign had it’s (very serious) flaws, but it seems that the reluctance to aim and shoot cleanly, was due to the candidate’s internal conflict here.

I’m not sure what I think about this.  But I also often wondered why, with so many brilliant minds and writers at his disposal, McCain did not do a better job of articulating his message in speeches, interviews, debates and ads. 

How is it possible that McCain’s campaign could not manage to patch together a persuasive narrative?  Lisa’s post may explain at least some part of it.

Obama mastered both in his campaign and this election.  Now we will see what they are worth when it comes to the office of the POTUS and the serious task of governing in perilous times.  For all our sakes, I hope there is substance where ’til now there’s been mostly sparkle. 

No matter who wins tonight, all of this needs a full audit and the full attention of the public.  It is ridiculous and shameful that our election processes should be so fraught with ineptitude and/or corruption.  America can do better.

It’s almost 7:30 back east so the polls – if running on time – are now closed in Kentucky and Indiana as well as VT, parts of NH, VA, SC, GA, and FL. 

MSN’s map (a pretty good one – interactive and clickable and fun) is showing Indiana with McCain at 50% and Obama at 49% with 10% of precincts reporting. 

Kentucky is coming in as expected; it will be red.

I’ll be blogging all night but it won’t be every 5 minutes.  I think The Corner will be blogging pretty frequently, so I suggest going there and checking back here maybe every 30 to 60 minutes.

I just love Mark Hemingway:

Anne of Idaho writes in with the following:

I am always pleased to be able to vote, and to do so in an orderly and civilized manner.  When we lived in Spain (’68 – ’70), we were warned not to discuss politics (i.e. Franco) when in the bars or talking with Spanish residents.  And they weren’t allowed to discuss politics, either.  They talked sports and lottery and (according to some of my Navy friends) had a kind of code in which they voiced their opinions to one another.  But most people were genuinely cowed and simply “stayed out of politics” altogether rather than risk a visit from La Guardia Civil.  If they held elections, I wasn’t aware of them.

It was much the same during our time in South Africa.  People simply didn’t talk about the way the country was run, especially those who were nowhere near the seats of power (white or black).

Once a country starts to slide toward despotism, the people hunker down and concentrate on their personal lives and simply endure what the leaders do.  They don’t approve but they become passive and at first unwilling, and then unable, to engage politically with any force.

So we are still very lucky to live in the USA, where dissent is, for the moment, allowed and even encouraged.  But it wouldn’t take much for this to change, and a Democratic President and Congress can make inroads that could well be permanent, barring an armed revolution.  So if Obama is elected, freedom-loving people everywhere need to speak up and take risks no matter the consequences. 

I didn’t mention Dean Heller’s congressional race in my prediction blurb because he’s going to crush Democrat Jill Derby and I assumed everyone knew that.

ARLINGTON, VA – Today at 2:00 p.m. EDT, the McCain-Palin presidential campaign will hold a press conference call with Senior Advisors Brian Jones, Ed O’Callaghan and Deputy Campaign Manager Christian Ferry to discuss Election Day voting irregularities.

Since I couldn’t make this call, I’m just waiting to hear what was said from my peeps over at Voter Fraud Squad (or anyone else who dialed in).

I surely must be dreaming…because my election predictions made NRO along with those of Kenneth Blackwell, Alex Castellanos, editor Kathryn Jean Lopez, Rob Long, John Miller, John Pitney, Lisa Schiffren, and the great Mark Steyn.  (Mine is the third blurb down.)

What an honor.

Now if only my prediction is wrong and McCain wins handily, I can go home and really enjoy that bottle of champagne that’s chilling in the fridge.

Karl Rove has called it for Obama.  He’s got the electoral vote count totals at 338-200 because (he says)Obama wins in NV, CO, NM, MI, OH, FL, VA, PA, and NH while McCain only wins in MO, IN, and NC.

Of course, evil Republican genius* that he is, Rove could just be trying to lull Obama voters into a false sense of security (i.e. staying home).

*For those not aware, this is a liberal term of endearment for Rove.

Most people who follow election day results know that poll closing times drive news coverage throughout the afternoon/evening.  Below are how the closing times fall (all times are Eastern) along with some notes.  Electoral votes are in parenthesis where indicated.

6:00 – Most of KY and IN – Indiana is a battleground state this year.

7:00 – Remaining precincts in KY and IN + VT, half of NH, VA, SC, GA, FL – This is the “first wave” of election results.  Kentucky (8), South Carolina (8), and Georgia (15) are red states.  Vermont (3) is blue.  Eyes are on Indiana (11), New Hampshire (4), Virginia (13), and Florida (27).  I’ve seen polls in these states that have the candidates virtually tied and polls that have Obama up by 3 to 5 points.  I predict FL and NC for McCain; not sure on NH and VA.

7:30 – OH, WV, NC – Ohio is huge with 20 electoral votes.  West Virginia (5) is red, but North Carolina (15) is in play.  I predict McCain will win NC, but Ohio is anybody’s guess.  Obama could win without Ohio, but I’m not sure McCain can.

8:00 – ME (4), the other half of NH, MA (12), CT (7), PA (21), NJ (15), DE (3), MD (10), D.C. (3), MI (17), TN (11), AL (9), MS (6), IL (21), MO (11), SD (3), KS (6), OK (7), TX (34) - The battleground states on this list are NH, PA, MI, and MO.  Mchigan will go blue.  I think Missouri will go red.  I would have called PA for Obama up until a week ago, but now I’m not so sure.  PA is second in importance behind Ohio, and no matter what McCain can’t lose both of them and win the way things are looking.

8:30 – AR (6) – Arkansas is red.

9:00 – RI (4), NY (31), LA (9), WI (10), MN (10), parts of ND (3) and SD (3), NE (5), WY (3), CO (9), NM (5), AZ (10) – The only real question marks here are Colorado and New Mexico.  All the polls say Colorado will go to Obama and the margin seems to make that likely.  The race in New Mexico is closer.  Strangely enough, the way these things work, McCain really needs New Mexico’s five electoral votes.  (And I noted that he spent some time there today so his campaign concurs.)  I ran quite a few scenarios earlier including one in which McCain won NH, IN, OH, VA, NC, FL, MO, and lost PA, MI, CO, NV, and NM…which resulted in a tie:  269 electoral votes each.  Moving NM’s 5 to Obama’s column resulted in a 274-264 Obama win.

10:00 – IA (7), MT (3), ID (4), UT (5), NV (5) - Iowa is blue.  The rest are red except Nevada which is in play this year.  Based on registration rolls, many people are calling Nevada for Obama, but the predicted Dem wins in the primaries (for the same reason) didn’t happen.  So, we’ll see.  

11:00 – WA (11), OR (7), CA (55) – “Yawn”:  The most boring poll closing since all are blue.

12:00 – AK (3), HI (4) – Alaska is red; Hawaii blue.

Tomorrow afternoon – when the polls have not yet closed and the exit polls are all we have to talk about - let’s not forget that the 2004 exit polls had everyone predicting an easy Kerry win. 

Exit polling is not scientific.  Someone stands outside the poll place and asks voters, “Will you tell me who you voted for?”  People can answer or take a pass.

Historically, exit polls do tend to skew Democratic.  I’ve heard various theories as to why:  some say it’s the bias of the exit pollers; some say conservatives/Republicans tend to be more private so don’t share personal information as easily.

I’m scheduled to be on KNPR’s State of Nevada with Dave Berns tomorrow to discuss the election.  Others on the panel will be political consultant (and my friend) Chuck Muth, City Life editor Steve Sebelius, and Las Vegas CBS/Channel 8 Face to Face’s Jon Ralston (who I’ll be meeting for the first time).  Listen in if you can or check the website for the archive later on.

Newsmax just sent out a press release including the following:

Fox Poll: McCain Tied in Key States

A just-released Fox News poll of 1,000 voters in each of six key states shows Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain making major last minutes strides to pull even with his Democratic rival, Sen. Barack Obama.

While Obama leads in two of the battlegrounds states, the candidates are now tied, or within 1 point of each other, in four others, according to the Rasmussen Reports survey.

In Ohio, one of the states that McCain’s supporters believe they have to win, McCain has pulled dead even. Obama and McCain are now tied in Ohio, at 49 percent apiece.

Here are the results from the Fox News poll:

Colorado

Obama 51

McCain 47

Florida

McCain 50

Obama 49

Missouri

Obama 49

McCain 49

N. Carolina

McCain 50

Obama 49

Ohio

Obama 49

McCain 49

Virginia

Obama 51

McCain 47

The poll has a plus or minus margin of error of 3 percent.