Today’s the day, folks. Come by here tonight for the live blog of the returns.
I predict we won’t know returns from Ohio and Florida for many hours or even days, but I’m hoping it won’t matter.
I also predict that Chris Christie will become the scapegoat for a Romney loss. The Romney people already are painting Christie as an ingrate and a fair-weather friend (literally) to the campaign. IMO Christie has pretty much cemented his re-election as governor of New Jersey, but other Republicans will stop inviting him to their birthday parties.
Update: Nate Silver on Colbert. I get a kick out of the way the audience treats a quintessential nerd like a rock star.
“other Republicans will stop inviting him to their birthday parties”
No more Pin the Tail on the Donkey? Monopoly? (pay for your own) Operation? Break the (arctic) Ice?
My $0.02:
For what little it’s worth, I predict that President Obama will win, with north of 300 Electoral College votes – maybe even north of 320.
The Democrats will hold the Senate, with probably 54 seats, maybe even north of 55.
The Democrats will make some gains in the House, but fall short of the majority. My thinking is that D’s gain about 10 seats.
I think what will put President Obama back in the White House, keep the Democrats is a Senate majority, and gains in the House, is women.
Women.
Republicans have some very misogynistic candidates running, and they’ve let their freak fly in the open.
“Legitimate rape?” REALLY?!?!?!?! WTF is ”illegitimate rape,’ then?
I have done polling for the Republicans, and I don’t think the polls reflect what’s really out there.
In my experience, if a Republican woman answers the phone for a poll, she almost universally hands the phone to her husband. I got HIS opinion – not hers.
Now, I have no evidence to support this, but I think a lot of Republicans wives, sisters, mothers, aunts, will go in the voting booth, and vote for the Democrats. And when they leave, they will dutifully tell their significant others, that, ‘Of course, I voted for Mitt, and ____________ for the Senate, and _______________ for the House!’ And since older couples tend to vote together, even the Exit Polls may not reflect their votes – since they’ll want to carry on the facade of voting for the Republicans.
Of course, this may be wishful thinking on my part. But I don’t think so.
And so, if the voter suppression doesn’t work the way the Conservatives intended, and intimidating the voters in certain locations doesn’t work, and the Electronic Voting Machines in certain districts don’t flip faster than Mitt Romney, then Barack Hussein Obama will be reelected as POTUS.
What we need in this country, is a Voter’s Rights Amendment, so that ALL 50 states have the SAME requirements to vote!
And if that involves photo ID, then fine – give people the next two years to make sure that they can get it. Right now, some Secretary of State in OH, or Governor of PA, can set up some BS arbitrary voting requirements right before a national election, and make minority voters jump through hoops.
As bad as today’s Whoreporatist Democrats are, at least they’re inclusive – they want as many people to vote as possible. The Republicans only want older white voters to count – and preferably, males.
That, and we need shorter election cycles.
Right now, even before their hands are off the Bible when they’re sworn in, politicians are running for reelection.
Saner countries have shorter election cycles.
But then, no one has ever confused America with a sane country.
After breakfast, I’ll be taking my Obama-lovin’ Mama to vote.
And then, I’ve volunteered to drive people to the polls.
I’ll be home to make us dinner, and then, make myself a large drink, and settle in to watch the results on MSNBC.
And if VA goes for Obama when the polls close at 7pm, then maybe we’ll have an early night.
Of course, the voting machines won’t flip until late at night, so I may wake up to
find that Romney stole the election. But that’s SOOOOOO 2000/2004!
Don’t give the Conservatives a close election that they can play havoc with.
The best revenge, is voting. In large numbers. SO, GO VOTE!!!
Sounds good to me. At the very least, IMO the federal government ought to be able to make some rules about how the states manage presidential elections.
Drove past a high school en route to work, saw a line of young adults shivering in the chill morning air as they held up signs for the Democratic candidates and reminders to GO VOTE.
In my city’s public school district, Obama and Bob Kerrey won the student poll for President and U.S. Senator. Obama also won the straw poll in my niece’s school district. Our states are both deep, deep red on Nate Silver’s map.
My poor niece turns 18 next February. She is really upset that she’s missing this election. O could use every single vote today, and I know he’d have hers. For her sake as much as anyone’s, I sure hope we pull this off.
“What we need in this country, is a Voter’s Rights Amendment”
I’m glad we at least still have the Voting Rights Act. Sadly, it is clearly still needed.
Voted this am, cussed out a Mourdoch poll-barker and reported him to the commissioner for electioneering, all before 6:15am!
So, now we will find out if the Republican Disenfranchisement Machine is enough to overcome the methodology of Nate Silver, or whether that effect is blunted by the Obama GOTV campaign. The other day I expected we’d know about Florida by 10:30 EST, but given the news of the early days, I’m wondering if there will still be people standing in line then.
What will happen when they try to close the voting when there are people still standing in line, I wonder? Will THAT be enough to get people to really confront the GOP attempts to rig the game?
The Bag News gave me some “fired up, ready to go!” inspiration this morning. Maybe now we can all focus in one direction. E pluribus unum.
10:40 a.m. EST, Nate has Mittens’s chances back up to 9.1%. I imagine at Romney HQ, they’re ecstatic.
Distributed hand-warmer packages to cold Democratic campaign workers who were valiantly distributing materials outside local voting locations.
Me and my Obama-lovin’ Mama just voted.
There were no lines in my Upstate NY polling place. We were in and out in less than 10 minutes.
I’ll be picking up a few people to take them to the polls this afternoon. Then, I’ll make dinner, and we’ll settle in to watch the results on MSNBC.
And, if Obama’s declared the winner, I may turn to FUX Noise for a heaping helping of schadenfreude.
Hmm… I now get the audio for MSNBC on satellite radio in my car. Tonight I could sit out in the cold and listen… or stay in where it’s warm and watch PBS on teevee. Oh, crap, what to do…?
My daughter got disenfranchised here in Florida..She was caught driving without insurance, so the police confiscated her drivers license. She managed to get a temporary license with proof of future insurance for 6 months, but the temporary license is not a photo ID. She has no photo ID aside from her license..One less Obama vote!
Swami,
Can’t she cast a provisional ballot?
I want to weigh in on something important that C U N D GULAG has commented on twice in the last few days and Barbara echoed. A voters right act.
As the demographics shift against the GOP – and it is inevitable – we will see even more sophisticated voter suppression at the state level to affect national races. There is NO chance that any republicans will vote FOR national rules that will end local attempts to skew the vote. But it can be done in the second half of Obama’s second term.
Universal rules for voting in federal elections is the first of five reforms we are proposing – We being a group I am part of called ‘The Civilist Papers’. We are incorporated in Florida as a non-profit and have applied for federal 501(C) tax exempt status. There are five proposed reforms – the first is election reform along the lines C U N D GULAG is thinking. Any fool can write a list of reforms, but we think we have a method of electing a bipartisan majority of Civilists to the House in 2014. This bipartisan group will make passing a specific set of reforms their top priority – and a coordinated populist movement will put the heat on the old guard who will try to block the freshmen in Congress.
Gulag – Go to – http://thecivilistpapers.org/
On the left sidebar, your pet reform is the first – ‘One Person – One Vote’. To learn how such an ambitious law might be passed (along with four others in succession) read the articles under strategy.