Official Election Thread

In my small town of about 2000 people, there are about 900 registered voters. The line that my wife and I waited in at 7:00 am was about 50 people long, and when we left, the line was about 75 people long.

We usually get about a 30% voter turnout in my little town, but today... probably about 90% of registered voters will do their duty.

BTW, if you are registered to vote, and you don't... or if you are of legal ability to vote and did not register... I'm better than you are

My prediction is that the man who wins will win by a more significant margin than any polls were showing... I say 5%, but it could be a multiple of 5, like 10 or 15...

I'm gettin a case on the way home from work for the Election Day Party tonite... I guess the real fun is gonna start at 7pm eastern..

Happy Election Day!

The Number In Nations
The God In Their Hearts
The Justice In Swine
The Devil In God...

..Corrosion of Conformity, Blind, Track #7 (skip to the chorus...)

Just need a quick trip to WalMart...

...but hey, relax, I am only kidding. I only own sharp pointy things

--DDTM

Here in the Heartland, there isn't much of a contest between Bush & Kerry; Bush has it hands down, and we've got only 3 electoral votes, so we just sit in our sod houses on the prairie waitin' for the Pony Express to bring word of how it's going elsewheres.

The big race here this year is between incumbent Senator Tom Dashcle (Senate Minority Leader) and Republican John Thune. Most prognosticators have put their money on Thune because Daschle has proven himself to be more interested in the good of the DNC than the good of SD. He acts like a centrist when here during campaigns, but votes like a liberal when in DC. That and he's all but denounced his SD residency.

Last night Daschle's crew started in early by bringing suit against Thune in Federal Court to keep Republican poll watchers from taking down license plate numbers of voters on one of the Reservations in the Western part of the state. They claimed it was a bullying and intimidation tactict to keep Native Americans from voting. Actually, it's standard practice to try & keep a lid on people returning to the polls multiple times to vote multiple times. It's happened before, and now it'll likely happen again. Daschle made sure that the case was put before Judge Larry Piersol, a man who is, in Daschle's own words, "a close friend and supporter", and actually played an instrumental role in getting Daschle elected in his first race. Piersol ruled partly in favor of Daschle; Daschle wanted the RNC poll watchers thrown out entirely, but now they are just barred from taking down license numbers and following voters when they leave the polls. The whole thing smells fishy to me.

I went and voted at about 11:45, and was number 570; it's a fairly small district, but in past elections I don't remember getting a number over 700, and that was when I voted just before the polls closed. So predictions of record turnout are coming true.

If you haven't voted yet, get your tail out there. And remember... Because of the expected high turnout, officials are asking that Republicans vote on Tuesday, November 2, and Democrats vote on Wednesday, November 3.

And remember… Because of the expected high turnout, officials are asking that Republicans vote on Tuesday, November 2, and Democrats vote on Wednesday, November 3. ;)

I think I saw somewhere that people voting for Nader are supposed to mail their wish to

S. Claus
1 Candy Cane Lane
North Pole

They need to make sure that it's postmarked by Dec. 24.

Seems like the only way he could ever win the Presidency

Nah; Nader really does have a chance of winning... In a parallel universe, or an alternate reality, or something like that.

A friend of mine has an old Corvair that he's restored — beautiful car. It's now sporting a Nader for President bumper sticker! Too funny!

Stood in line over three hours.

And CNN is wrong - voting is not over in Pennsylvania. There was still over an hour's worth of people in line when I left a bit after 9:00.

I managed to go just before the lunch hour and there was no line. I discovered that (at our polling place at least) if you want to write in a candidate in one race you have to fill out a paper ballot by hand for the whole thing. Everything went pretty normal for me, but my wife, who is from Costa Rica and just got her citizenship in May, was pretty appalled by the sloppiness. I'm pretty sure she could have gone back later in the day voted again if she really wanted to. She said they didn't check her ID, and they didn't have her sign the black binder book until she went back and pointed it out. The guy also took out paper ballots to fold (a no-no, no one but us should be touching those until it goes in the box), and the place where we filled out the paper ballots was a table with no privacy. She said that they are much more strict about procedures and privacy in Costa Rica. I never really thought about it, but they do seem more like the volunteers out orchestra uses to usher our concerts; not exactly hard nosed professionals, they seem more like they are there to be nice and make life pleasant than to ensure a fraud-free poll.
As far as we could tell, there was no reason a non-citizen couldn't vote. She said that from registering through checking in at the voting booth, she was never asked to prove citizenship. The only thing I can think of is that maybe they check some computer database at registration. Go figure.

Whatever happens, don't blame me- I voted for Badnarik.

Time to sit back and watch. I really hope Dan Rather loses his mind like he did last time. At least that provided some entertainment.

"Under democracy, one party always devotes its chief energies to trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule—and both commonly succeed, and are right."

According to the AP, Kerry will concede at 1 pm Eastern.

So... thoughts?

Oh, and if you are not a voting US citizen (Canadian, UK, OK minor, TN non-voter, etc.), please say so in your post so that I can wrap my tiny lil brain around everything here....

I'm, like, a non-voter in the election from Canada, eh?;)

A bit of a nail-biter last night. Working in a production area producing three newspapers last night, it was an interesting contrast from 2000 to see how rightly cautious the papers were in calling a winner. In fact, none of them did. One of the three decided early there would be no decision and released their final pages. The other two hung on for nearly two hours and finally released their last pages with only slight changes to the results.

Glad to see Kerry conceding. I've got little respect for either candidate, but I'll at least give credit to Kerry's camp for throwing in the towel instead of playing the "we'll keep recounting until we get the numbers we like" that Gore did. It'll be better for everyone - including other countries - to get back to business.

What America needs is a viable third - or fourth - party.

I went to vote at lunch. The place was very empty, though I heard that after work the pools were pretty busy. Voter apathy is a big problem here in the bay area, which is OK with me as most of the people here are liberal whiners.

I went to vote at lunch. The place was very empty, though I heard that after work the pools were pretty busy. Voter apathy is a big problem here in the bay area, which is OK with me as most of the people here are liberal whiners.

I dunno why but I would have never pegged you to be a republican. It was probably the whole association with Apple and my thinking that every single person who works for Apple must be a tofu-eating hippy liberal (i know its a bad stereotype, but its what i thought). LOL

Most people can't peg me in either political party because I tend to think for myself.

Most people can't peg me in either political party because I tend to think for myself.

I think it's impossible without complicated quantum physics to actually label a Buddhist who packs heat.

Republicans will admire the hardware, and awkwardly ask if you do kung fu. They may also ask you about "The Buddy". Democrats will spontaneously combust with a cry of "Help me, Llandru!" trying to reconcile their PC terror of offending Buddhists with their loathing of big, mean guns.

"The Democrats seem to be basically nicer people, but they have demonstrated time and time again that they have the management skills of celery. They're the kind of people who'd stop to help you change a flat, but would somehow manage to set your car on fire. I would be reluctant to entrust them with a Cuisinart, let alone the economy. The Republicans, on the other hand, would know how to fix your tire, but they wouldn't bother to stop because they'd want to be on time for Ugly Pants Night at the country club. "

I think it's impossible without complicated quantum physics to actually label a Buddhist who packs heat.

I'm Taoist actually.

I'm Taoist actually.