Boy howdy, as Rachel Maddow says — are people ever desperate to get gas. I saw long lines to gas pumps on the teevee, but there are lines here, too. A lot of the gas stations are still closed, and the ones that are open have lines stretching easily a quarter mile, some maybe close to half a mile. Glad I filled the tank last week.

On to politics: Nate Silver has Mitt’s chance to win down to 16.3 percent. Whoa. Although individual polls are all over the place, averages at both the national and state level seems to show a clear increase in support for the President. The Sandy effect, perhaps?

Karl Rove already is blaming Hurricane Sandy for shutting down Romney’s momentum. You know argument’s going to be made that the President’s re-election is illegitimate because Sandy impacted the campaigns. How dare the real world interfere with politics!

But I also want to mention something Professor Krugman said a couple of days ago —

Well, what if we’ve been misunderstanding Rove? We’ve been seeing him as a man dedicated to helping angry right-wing billionaires take over America. But maybe he’s best thought of instead as an entrepreneur in the business of selling his services to angry right-wing billionaires, who believe that he can help them take over America. It’s not the same thing.

And while Rove the crusader is looking — provisionally, of course, until the votes are in — like a failure, Rove the businessman has just had an amazing, banner year.

Earlier this month’s Rove’s Crossroads GPS Super PAC was said to be propping up Mitt’s campaign. All a scam to part rich fools from their money? Of course, I’m sure Karl would prefer that Mittens win, especially since the rubes won’t be so likely to part with millions of dollars next election season.

And then there are the other rubes —

I love this —

If you missed the benefit concert on NBC last night, I thought this was the best part (even with microphone malfunction at the start):

And now, the crazy: Fox News accused NBC of holding an “Obama” concert in the guise of a benefit concert.

Update: The Breitbrats also are outraged. “Watch for the network to turn this into an ode to Obama’s grand and glorious leadership during Hurricane Sandy.” Worse, they called Bruce Springsteen an “old hack.” If they’d had any credibility to lose, that would have killed it.

For the record, I don’t recall that anyone mentioned President Obama or any other politician. I might have missed it, though.

The jobs report is out, and it’s decent. Greg Sargent summarizes.

The news will be taken as a relief by the Obama campaign. It will allow Obama to continue making the case that the economy is healing — and it will undercut Mitt Romney’s closing argument that only putting him in charge will bring about a “real recovery.” However, today’s numbers are unlikely to impact the presidential race in a dramatic way. It solidifies the fundamentals that have persisted for many months now — this is a weak recovery, but it is a recovery, which means a very close presidential race, with a narrow advantage to the incumbent.

What these numbers really mean is that the last remaining catastrophe that could have derailed Obama’s reelection effort didn’t happen.

Meanwhile, there are signs Mittens is in panic mode. Alex Seitz-Wald says that Romney campaign ads are getting more desperate. As I wrote yesterday, he’s trying to tie President Obama to Fidel Castro. He’s doubling down on the lies about the auto bailout and has brought back the ads claiming that Obama “gutted” the welfare work requirement. In other words, he’s trying to stampede as many low-information voters as he can to the polls.

Also, Jonathan Capehart comments on a Romney super-PAC ad that reminds black voters Lincoln (a Republican!) freed the slaves! Yeah, that’s gonna work.

Mitt also has been “expanding the map” at the last minute, going into states in which he doesn’t have a prayer. Seitz-Wald:

Now take a look at where Romney is campaigning in the waning days of the campaign. There’s no bigger weapon in the campaign’s arsenal than the candidate himself, so where it sends him is a good sign of where its priorities are. The Romney campaign has been insisting that it’s in such a strong position that it’s expanding the map by making a play for mostly safe blue states like Minnesota, Pennsylvania, Michigan and even New Mexico (where Obama won by 15 points in 2008). And indeed, both campaigns or the super PACs supporting them are now up with ads in these states.

But Romney isn’t going anywhere near those states. He’s doing three events in Virginia today, which he should have put away weeks ago so he could concentrate on other states. Tomorrow he heads to Wisconsin, where’s he’s still the deep underdog, and after that Ohio, which he absolutely needs to win, but is still down. Then it’s to Colorado, where he may win but Obama has been making a mini comeback. Then he’s off to Iowa and New Hampshire, where he’s down, but could really stand to win.

More likely, the “expand the map” strategy is about his campaign and their allies having more money than they need in the real swing states and a desire to “keep the ‘momentum’ storyline going,” as Amy Walter notes, even if it’s no longer true.

Romney must believe he has Florida already, or else he’d be spending half of his time there. If he loses Florida it’s probably all over for him. But the most recent Reuters/Ipsos poll has Romney and the President dead even in Florida. Nate Silver gives Romney a slight edge in Florida, but calls it a tossup.

Steve Kornacki thinks the “expand the map” strategy is a sign of both desperation and incompetence. At the last minute, Romney is pushing his campaign into states he has been ignoring for months and which are all but sewed up for Obama. He might be competitive in those states now, Kornacki says, if he had been campaigning in them all along. But he didn’t, and he’s not.

This is surreal. A man at a Romney rally interrupts Mitts speech and holds up a sign that says “End Climate Silence,” and the crowd snatches away the sign and begins chanting USA! USA!

Righties: Do learn to make sense someday. Thanks much.

Seriously, how miswired do you have to be to assume the USA! chant is a normal response to this situation? Even if you disagree that climate change caused Frankenstorm, what does USA! have to do with anything? And yeah, I kind of know that they associate their twisted opinions with Real Americanism and patriotism, and that’s the problem.

Elsewhere — Jamelle Bouie writes about Mitt’s efforts in FLorida, which really is a must-win state for him. I was playing with the Electoral College numbers this morning, and it became obvious that if Mitt loses Florida, it’s pretty much all over for him unless he pulls big upsets in at least a couple of big states that are probably going to go for Obama, like Pennsylvania and Ohio.

And Florida’s a real toss-up, leaning Romney by only a hair in the polls. I’m wondering if the stories about Mitt wanting to dismantle FEMA might pull it toward Obama. Mittens is trying to tie Obama to Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, which seems absurd to me, but maybe that sells in Miami.

See also Greg Sargent, “Mitt Romney’s Kamikaze strategy.”

First, this morning Nate Silver has the President’s chances of winning the election up to 79 percent, which is 8 points higher than a week ago. It would appear the late deciders are going in his direction. See also “Oct. 31: Obama’s Electoral College ‘Firewall’ Holding in Polls.”

(And I just noticed the lights are on in the hallway, which I hope means all the power is restored to the building. Maybe I’ll have heat and hot water pretty soon.)

George Will spins a column entirely out of straw men to argue that the Obama campaign has become “empty” and “strident.”

Seems to me the Romney campaign is, like, stoned. They think they’ve got Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Minnesota — all solid blue, Nate says. They think they have a shot at Iowa, Wisconsin, and Ohio. Nate says, not likely. Paler blue, but still blue.

I gather that the Romney camp thinks Obama voters in these states won’t be enthusiastic enough to vote (or will be prevented from voting). Only Romney supporters are enthusiastic enough to vote. That’s how they are figuring it. Also Karl “I have THE math” Rove has some theory about why the polls are wrong, which Sam Wang shoots down.

Update: I’ve been playing with this interactive map. Going by Nate Silver’s numbers, if President Obama only wins states that are solid blue, meaning that he has at least a 90 percent chance of winning, then Romney wins. But if Obama wins just the states in which he has at least a 75 percent chance of winning, then he’s got 281 electoral votes, and Obama wins.

Obama can lose all of the tossup states — Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, and Colorado — and still win the electoral college vote. Romney has to win all of the tossup states plus Ohio, or if not Ohio at least two other states Obama is likely to win. If Romney loses either Florida or Virginia, the odds that he will pick off enough upsets to make up the difference grow very long.

For example, if Romney loses Virginia, he’s got to pick off all three of the states in which Obama’s chances of winning are above 75 but less than 80 percent — Ohio, Iowa, and New Hampshire — to get to 272.

So, while a Romney win is possible, he’s got to pull off some upsets to do it.

Found this video while looking for something else — very timely.