In NC the race is neck and neck; Obama leads 51-49 right now with about 60% of the precincts reporting in.

I'd really like to see NC go for Obama.

I'll get in touch about seeing what we need to do to get y'all on MT 4.2 Pro.

There's nothing in the Minnesota papers about the Senate and House races that's worth paying attention to yet.

McCain: 49.7%
Obama: 49.2%

- arrow keys on the remote to pick which of the 8 channels' audio you get
- hit Select to tune to that channel directly (leave Election Mix)

Waiting until everyone agrees.

However, it seems increasingly likely that the Texas State House of Representatives may regain a Democratic Majority.

"So.. it's like Obama, 10 nothing in the 3rd... like... How's McCain even keep on playing, y'know?"

I'm entirely too amused by "US politics as hockey night in Canada"

The D.Kos map says Markey's looking strong (61-33) with 32% of precincts reporting. Good job!

Give it another hour and I think Simon Schama is just going to smack him on the chin.

(sob)

It is interesting seeing the differences between networks, though. Of the two I've been flicking between, CNN seems to be much more conservative (I mean, in the sense of not taking risks) than MSNBC. (Even CNN is projecting an Obama win in NM, though, with only 6% reporting. Odd.)

Ohio Congressional District 1 (Cincinnati, most of Hamilton County(west), a little of Butler County (north)): Looks like it's going from Red to Blue, and I'm glad*. The incumbent (Steve Chabot) has a handshake like a dead fish, and when I lived in that district, I regularly voted against him. If I still lived in that district, I'd have voted for his opponent, Steve Driehaus.

Ohio Congressional District 2 (eastern Hamilton County, southern Warren County, Clermont, Brown, Adams, Pike Conties, western Scioto County): The district where I currently live, and site of a 3-way battle. Historically, extremely red. Latest results from cincinnati.com show the Republican incumbent with 46%, the Democratic challenger with 36%, and the independent challenger with 17%. Uncertified results in Clermont County have the independent getting 22% in the county. So the incumbent may go back, but she may not have a majority.

*Also biased. In the interest of full disclosure, the Democratic (Driehaus) candidate is my 3rd cousin once removed. A reasonably close relative in that part of town.

The few times that I went to a hockey game with my dad, my favorite part of the game was when they'd take a break. A machine would come around and, where scratched-up ice had been, it'd leave a trail a smooth ice. That fascinated me.

During our 8:30 break, the word went up that Obama got Pennsylvania and about 60% (or more!) of the choir applauded.

Florida sounds interesting. It would be great if Obama got both Ohio AND Florida!!!!!!

That machine rejoices in the name "zamboni."

Steve Forbes is on TDS; "you were an advisor to Senator McCain on economic issues; he seemed to be a real quick study on that."

That will probably tighten as the night goes on (380,000 of the margin is from Philadelphia, where over 80% of the precincts are in, and Obama is up 82.2% to 17.2%). But it's pretty much an unsurmountable lead, and so far that's a bigger margin than most of the polls were predicting.

I haven't felt a need to turn the TV on earlier, but Grant Park (which some of the nets are showing now) is quite inspiring. Anyone know when Obama is likely to speak there?

What are your criteria? I'm trying to figure out when to pop the cork.

Bolton and Schama have signed off and taken it outside to the car park. Shame, could easily have enjoyed a few more hours of that particular commentariat.

Will this election have the highest voter turnout in modern history (expressed as a percentage of either total US population or eligible voters)?

Will Obama beat LBJ's record of 61.1% of the popular vote?

I think I can cautiously have hope.

I think we can, I think we can...

Why does PBS insist on putting David Brooks on the television?

AZ remains too close to call according to Brian Williams. Back to Colbert. Oops, Chuck Todd indicates the truth--that they're just pretending not to call FL.

This is an odd feeling.

It's a very hard system to do that with.

And I've never seen anything quite so 50/50 as Virginia, North Carolina and Florida are looking right now.

I want a T-shirt or at least a button saying "YES WE DID".

People caught with an ounce or less of marijuana won’t be considered criminals in Massachusetts.

Voters have approved a measure to ease marijuana laws. Under the new law, which takes effect in 30 days, those caught will be forced to give up the pot and pay a $100 fine, instead of facing criminal penalties.

What's up down-ballot?

Everyone trying to say "it might be tougher" for McCain to win. 22 more minutes of this nonsense. (Or will they not call CA and WA on the close?)

Me too! I don't want to be burned again. But I'm ready for the bubbly!

Jack Markell won the governor's race by 72% (very exciting, Jack is a great guy). Matt Denn will be his Lt. Gov. with a healthy margin, despite some really nasty local ads.

Mike Castle was re-elected to the House with 61% of the vote, which is actually encouraging--the Democratic challenger doesn't normally get that close to him.

Joe Biden won his Senate seat, of course. His opponent, Christine O'Donnell, had an opponent at my polling place who was hysterically assuming everyone was voting Obama (not unreasonable, I live in a heavy Democratic & minority district) and was handing out these bizarre leaflets that had anti-UN stuff on them and no indication of party affiliatiion. Also scare stuff about who the governor will appoint to his seat--it will likely be John Carney, who is not an unknown and was actually the Democratic party's choice for governor this year who was upset by Markell in the primary.

Insurance Commissioner is a big deal here, and Karen Weldin Stewart won handily, which I am sure feels like vindication for her--she ran in the Democratic primary 4 years ago and the party opted to back Denn instead of her, so it was good to see her get back up and take another crack at it.

My friend Rebecca Young lost her bid for a seat in the state house, but John Kowalko and Terry Schooley won their re-election bids.

I am sad to report that the Blue Enigma party only got 1773 votes statewide. Their mascot is a turtle. That is all I know about them.

Delaware is such a strange little state, but elections are fun here because you do get to know the candidates, especially if you get involved in the different party clubs.

On preview: Vicki@#53, which governor appoints the successor to Joe Biden is going to depend on when Biden resigns the seat. If he waits until inaguration day, it will be Markell. If it's before then, it will be Ruth Ann Minner, the outgoing governor. Either way, I'm pretty sure it'll be John Carney--the other name floating around is Beau Biden, but he's frankly not experienced enough to jump from Attorney General to Senator whereas Carney has 8 years of Lt. Gov. under his belt. If Biden waits until inauguration day, it will likely have negative implications for the seniority of the seat in the Senate, so I expect he won't wait that long and Ruth Ann will make the decision.

When nearly half of the other guy's homeboys are voting for you, that says something.

Senate: Mark Udall (D) 57% vs Bob Schaeffer (R) 42% - Called.
Key House: Betsy Markey (D) 60 % vs Marilyn Musgrave (R) 39%

Amendment 47 (Right to "work" -- anti-union bill) appears to be failing with 55%. Called.

The fetal rights bill (Amendment 48) is failing by 3 to 1. (Yay!)

All numbers from Rocky Mountain News or Boulder Daily Camera.

Will I then have your personal guarantee that we've won? :-)

Yes, in order to win now McCain would need to peel off Oregon and Washington. But you can wait another fifteen minutes -- there are some really important local issues out here.

I've heard of articles saying that a Republican in office would be better for Taiwan, but so far everyone I've talked to plus the American DJs on the English-language radio station (guys with conservative backgrounds, one from Waco and one from northern MN) seems to be pro-Obama.

Besides, the last (prior to today) candidate I voted for who won was dead at the time.

Patrick (#73) - He's doing the circuit.

ABC boldly predicts that the Dems will retain control of the House of Representatives.

Obama remains at 207; anyone else starting to think they're testing new vote suppression and just figuring no one will notice?

PBS appears to have called VA. For Obama? (now at 220; CA ends it.)

Robinson did a lot better than Rajesh Mirchandani who gave the smug John Bolton a chance to take the moral high ground and make the BBC look stupid. Bolton totally recovered from his bullying of Katty Kay a little earlier. Politicians ae allowed to use spurious gobboids to push people around on TV. Interviewers ought not to - or if they do they ought to be sure of their facts.

but my husband's coming home with takeout, & i'm gonna stop watching here so i don't see any spoilers for the daily show/colbert, waiting for us on our dvr.

Gosh, I'm starting to feel good...

MKK

(They also have a live stream of the McCain event in Arizona.)

I get to watch the speech! (My fingers remain crossed until then.)

!!!!!! I'm just speechless.

We go insane.

Oh my god.

I assume everyone else is, too.

Wow, that sounds difficult to take back!

Sing it with me now: "Nah nah nah nah, nah nah nah nah, Hey hey hey, goodbye!"

I think it will soon be time to open the Tusker.

And it looks like you guys put Obama in the White House

Whatever they did in VA, IN, NC

The world says thanks!

TDS calls it, per CNN.

I'm pretty sure my Dad's vote broke Wayne County.

"Signed, Sealed, Delivered."

Eucatastrophe.

Icing on the cake.

Meiguo jiayou!

(Never thought I'd vote for a Nixon, but I don't think he's related.)

And then the nice young man that lives next door came out, and we solemnly shook hands, agreed it was a great night, and expressed hope that Franken would win.

Anybody heard yet how he's doing now? Are we close enough to say?

Oh, and once more: Woo-HOOOO!!!!!

I am drinking blue plum brandy with lemonade, and I raise my glass in the general direction of the USA.

Oh Beautiful for spacious skies....

Joy.

But why is MT so close? Or MO, IN, SC, or FL?

I expect we'll win some of these.

I think he means it positively, though.

There should be more churchbells and fireworks going off, I would have thought. Even here in the heart of TN. Though I did hear sporadic repeated applause above a TV's drone from another apartment's window.

(This goes a long way towards finally completing the healing from having to go home sick from work in 2004...)

--Dave

How many EVs do we need before it is officially a landslide?

MKK

McCain is conceding. His followers are booing Obama. McCain is trying to squelch them.

(listening to the concession speech gnashing my teeth.)

Our local radio is now broadcasting McCain's concession speech.

I think McCain is giving a good concession speech.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that our long national nightmare isn't over until January 20.

I feel like I can breathe again for the first time in 8 years.

(I still want to see all those white spaces turn blue so it's the biggest landslide possible. NC is neck-and-neck, and MT looks like it could go for Obama too.)

Free Republic is going ape on the racial epithets. Apparently, either the President-elect or the Vice-President elect was good at track and field, specifically the javelin.

Amusing... in a who removed the clutch from your brain sort of way...

Also worried that the hateful Prop8 is leading in California. Meh.

"President-elect Obama" sounds good, though. Very good.

North Carolina and Indiana are still ever so close.

> way to go retards, you elected a socialist president of these united states

Aww.... What a shame you don't feel as happy as I do.

Ten years ago, someone could have taken a hell of a lot of my money betting with me about whether we'd elect a black president in 2008.

Wow.

My Tusker is wonderful. (Its Kenyan beer. I used to live in Kenya. It is good beer. It is not Luo beer though. Did you know that Luo women smoke cigarettes with the lit and in their mouths? I didn't believe that when I was told it but I saw it with my own eyes.) I expect that a few hundred thousand bottles of it are being knocked back in Kenya right now. It is actually very good beer. Buy some if you can.

I emotionally prepared for this by reading "Beloved" today. (and yes, I cried) Those people described in the book could hardly have imagined a "coloredman" (as they would have said) being elected President. Hell, Toni and her black friends in 1983 could hardly have imagined it.

Its not that Obama makes America a better place. It is that his election shows that America already is a better place.

A change is gonna come.

Now for coffee and the start of the working day.

OMG.

But at least he's not another dry drunk imperialist pig.

Jubilation if and when Obama wins the Presidency, culminating in a rally in Chicago's Grant Park that may draw one million souls. It's not a Cubs' World Championship, but most Illinoisans will take it; what kind of odds could you have gotten in 1908 that a black dude would get elected president before the Cubs won the Series again?

I'm well aware that Obama is human and faces many challenges. We all have tough times ahead. But I am so very proud of my country tonight. Flawed and divided as we are, at least most of us stood up and said it's time to turn this mess around. Thank you all for that.

To me that was the first salvo in a future campaign to reach out to that old Republican fiction, the "Silent Majority." It also laid out the groundwork for assigning blame for his own loss, and trying to save face.

But he does this by trying to drive a racial wedge. To me that is more than a little contemptible.

Here's to the early days of a better nation.

I like that. It would be unfair to say that he's a man eminently suited to defeat, but I think he's got a good career in history as Too Noble a Roman for This Age.

ZOMG!

But there was the Berlin Wall (well actually the resolution of the Magya worers and peasants party but the Wall rubbed it in)

I'm old enough to remember where I was when I heard that Kennedy was shot.

And there was me watching Nelson Mandela walk out of prison on TV. Holding my little baby. That was good. Just as me watching the bombardment of Iraq on TV, holding the same baby, was scary. I cried a lot. All those other little babies getting bombed.

And now that baby is grown up and just went to bed, after she put on "Change is gonna come" and hugged me to celebrate the day.

Like, er, gosh

Virginia!!!!!!!!!!!

Right decision for all the wrong reasons. I'll take it.

Only bit of disappointment tonight.

woot!

MSNBC has footage of people madly celebrating in Kenya. Well, fuck, yeah!

I assume we'll win OR and AK.

But no 60 in any case.

Montana has a popular Dem governor - and Baucus won again, tonight - so it's actually possible. It's my home state, and they're increasingly interested in environmental and green issues.

He's on.

And I gotta ask, Michael Roberts, what IS up with Wayne County? What does it contain? How is is likely to break?

When Obama mentioned McCain, congratulated him on a race well run, everyone cheered.

That seemed emblematic of the difference between the two campaigns.

Once again, a Democrat going to the White House has to Buy a Dog.

here

The NYT county maps are fascinating in seeing how that is happening.

Those of us who grew up a couple counties away always considered them relatively liberal. Since we went 52-46 for Caribou Barbie, it's perfectly reasonable to figure Wayne will break 50-49 the other way, with Barr picking up the "we only vote for Republicans" vote.

It's a farming county, some industry that's looking pretty rusty -- typical Indiana. It's the home of Earlham College and the Earlham School of Religion, Quaker schools of long standing and the core of a massive liberal base of ... oh, hundreds. It has rolling hills of precisely the right slope to my eye, and I'll inherit about 80 acres of it in a few decades.

All he really needs is five SCOTUS votes for history to repeat itself.

Is that landslide territory?

But mostly, the lead is now nearly 15,000 with 3% to go.

How much difference do you think Sarah Palin made to this race? Because while I'm very very happy that Obama won, I'm also desperately relieved that there's no (immediate) risk of America having a President Palin. For no very clear reason, just thinking about that gives me flashbacks to Charlie Stross's _A Colder War_. Maybe it's the tentacles.

Anyway - congratulations and thanks to all the Americans who voted Obama in. The rest of the world is cheering.

If all goes well, on 20 January 2009, for the first time since that date in 1985, all the States in which I lived will have voted for the current President.

Hoping the similarities end there.

I'm sure that they deserve it.

Hell, make it a pony.

Gregoire is winning, by a comfortable margin.

And he worked in the gettysburg address and the declaration of independence.

I fibrofogged on Berlin Wall, yeah, that's the third big one in my (admittedly not all that functional) memory.

I am doing everything I can to sear this moment into my memory, forever.

#248: I noticed that too. I've also seen the crowds at the victory - it's restrained jubilance and gentle tears. It's the difference between calm consideration and rabid populism. It speaks well of the U.S. that the former has won out.

#272: I'd wondered what happened to him. Oh well, maybe next time.

I still didn't really believe it would happen until it did, though. We realized that the race was over when Obama won Ohio, but we didn't open the champagne until the networks called the race and McCain conceded. (Well, part of that is also that we didn't open the champagne until our 2 year old daughter fell asleep.)

NWCN for some mysterious reason has no congressional listings; NYT and the WA Secretary of State both have Darcy Burner in the lead, though.

Also: Indiana is blue, BLUE, BLUE!!!!!111!

Damn Straight.

36% of Alaska precincts reporting

Stevens 49.32% R
Begich 45.19% D

Young 51.47% R
Berkowitz 44.06% D

Cooking is always a good idea!

Last year I joined the township party organization, started learning the ropes, and got elected precinct committeeman. This is a county utterly dominated by Republicans. But Democratic voters are proliferating. Cracks are beginning to show.

After the polls closed, I brought my precinct numbers to the storefront campaign office, mingled in the party, and ate stuff. In one corner, a laptop was showing the MSNBC coverage of the national election. In another, somebody was constantly refreshing the Dupage County and Will County results pages. In the back office, the campaign staff worried over the numbers.

Eventually, McCain made a concession speech. We watched that. Somewhat later, Obama made a victory speech. We watched that with greater interest.

Our race was a nail-biter; Dianne's opponent won by 693 votes, I think. She gave a heartfelt bittersweet talk to her volunteers.

Would have liked to join in the fun here, but I was distracted (and couldn't get a connection on my own laptop).

My first campaign.

But it started at 57-43 with 8%, so I'm hopeful that all the conservative precincts get counted first.

And pinning my *real* hopes on the CA Supreme Court being ready to announce, "no, you can't take away basic civil rights with a simple majority; you need a constitutional revision to cut a person's potential spouse pool in half."

"1) When in Nairobi I was trying to sleep when I overhead the music from the place next door keeping me up and the lyrics to this catchy rasta song were 'barack obama'
I now own the cd

2) When I was in the supermarket I had the guy look at me and say 'you're going to vote for Obama, right?'
I said yes"

(For context, we're white South Africans.)

Oh, and:

"the locals here are pretty crazy about it
I will head off to a good victory party tonight"

Plus, with Obama as president, we can hope to see the U.S. Supreme Court move back to the center (or even a bit left), which might make dealing with these issues at the federal level possible.

I'm still hoping that 8 won't pass. Unfortunately, a number of people (including our "Director of Institution Diversity") at the college I work at came out as pro-8, and I'm not looking forward to trying to pretend I don't despise them.

"In front of the White House, thousands are singing 'na na na na, na na na na, hey HEY goodbye'"

I don't want to sound like I'm trying to take anything away from the historic Obama victory tonight, but let me put it this way: if Proposition 8 were going down in flames right now, then I would be drinking that Champagne I put on ice earlier in the evening. Instead, I cracked open the Jameson's.

Now, I'm kicking myself for not investing more in the effort to stop Proposition 8. I should have donated more money. I should have played hookie from work and used the time to volunteer. I should have been committed, not just involved. In short, I let all of you down. Again.

All of us Californians have let you down. We suck. We deserve your wrath for what we've done tonight. I'm deeply sorry for it, but let's be honest: that's cold comfort if you're one of those people whose marriage we just voted to nullify.

I wish I could join the rest of in you in celebrations, but I'm not feeling it. Proposition 8 is a disaster, and I'm just not finding a way to ignore that so I can revel in the Obama victory with everyone else. Sorry.

Oh well. I guess I need to try harder to remember that politics isn't everything.

Looks like my fellow Alaskans have bought into his "you're screwed without me" campaigning and have re-elected the felon Senator Ted Stevens.

And the probably soon to be indicted (please!) Rep Don Young.

America, I apologize and beg your understanding.

Or would, if it were not for the fact that I keep bursting into tears because I am so damn happy that Sen. Obama won the presidency.

As it fell out, I was eating dinner at a nice Italian place downtown. One of the women eating near my dinner companion and I wandered back from the bar, where the tv was on, and informed my dinner companion and I that Sarah Palin was crying on national television. My dinner companion expressed schadenfreude. I expressed delight that the wingnuttiness that I had detected during her gubernatorial run had come to the fore. I really think her effectiveness as governor is hosed. Hah!

Ulmer/Berkowitz ticket for governor in 2010? A gal can dream.

The District of Columbia voted 94% for Obama. It will be wonderful having him and his family (and the puppy!) in the White House. National politics is local politics to us.

The world is made better.

There's a lot of speculation up here about what Palin will do (or perhaps, try to do) next. It hardly seems likely that she would be content with Alaskan politics after her stint on the big stage. I bet she will try to get Stevens seat once the Senate expels him.

I agree that Ulmer/Berkowitz would be a great ticket for AK gov. I miss Fran.

I guess the phrase "every vote counts" does mean something. Also, Bob Barr got 15,000 votes; I guess Obama should send him a thank you card or something.

Thank God Almighty

free at last

Even assuming you're correct, that still gives us two years to get some real progress made while the wingnuts mope around the mirror to watch their collective penis shrivel...

Best start stockpiling the Viagra now, Cori darlin'...

... or even singing...

You're probably right but we'd be nuts to attempt the finale of Beethoven's 9th without a lot of rehearsal. 2 years should be enough.

Do you mean "In two years, you'll all be devastated by the midterm results" or "In two years, you'll all be sorry about the damage you've done"?

In the first case- possible. In the second case- well, why not come back then and check how right or wrong you were?

But what kept me from settling down to sleep was the scene on live TV from Pike and Broadway on Capitol Hill, Seattle hipster central, where there were thousands of happy people in the street smiling and singing and waving the American flag.

And I await with mingled hope and trepidation the results of the Franken/Coleman race.

Also, I am really sorry my state sent that whackadoodledoo Bachmann back to the House of Representatives. I had hoped for better from my fellow Minnesotans, but.... *sigh*

I hope someone will point out to President Obama's daughters the hoofprint of the pony in the old White House elevator. One of Teddy Roosevelt's kids had the measles and was confined to his bed, so his sibs snuck the pony up to see him.

Sure, sure, competent and probably well-meaning president, dawn in America, yadda yadda, but I'm not a Red Stater any more! !!! (Until 2012, maybe, but still -- my whole life, and I'm turning 42 on Saturday.)

Oh friends, not these tones!
Let us sing more cheerful songs,
And more joyful.
Joy! Joy!

Schadenfreude! Götterdämmer-
-ung is going to have to wait....

but he doesn't have the experience to be president of this country. and that's what makes me say that he's going to turn us into a socialist country with handouts paid for by the working class.

Fascinating logic there. The "little experience" thing is one thing, and so is the "socialist" thing, but how does one follow from the other? How much political experience do you have? If you would become president tomorrow, would you turn the USA into a socialist state?

Link

If what you're complaining about is that the country isn't going to be no-holds-barred capitalist: we haven't been like that for a hundred years. All those regulations (and programs like Medicare and Social Security) are there because no-holds-barred capitalism is a fast route to being a third-world country with wealthy (and isolated) owners and a whole lot of poor laborers.

I'm annoyed at how blatantly the republican party wants to bring back the age of the robber-barons.

You can't conclude inexperience causes socialism -- certainly not just by looking at Palin.

Yes, she doesn't have the experience.

Yes, she's governer of a socialist state.

But Alaska's been socialist since the oil money started flowing into the citizens' pockets.

Palin just moved into the chair as governor of a socialist state, she didn't make it one.

I have met many socialists, and Obama is no socialist. Anyone in possession of an internet connection and a fairly minimal level of intelligence could determine that.

I see you are in possession of an internet connection.

he doesn't have the experience to be president of this country

Experience? I don't see that McCain's experience led him to make many good decisions in the campaign, or to appoint very good people to assist him in it. If he'd had the chance to run the country the way he ran that campaign, we'd be toast.

On the other hand, Obama's controlled, intelligent campaign, strong in both contingency planning and people skills, showed precisely the characteristics that we need from a leader. That which he does not know, he seems to be able to learn thoroughly and integrate quickly. And he's inspiring: look how many people he turned on to their civic responsibilities, to the dedication to improving our nation.

Better intelligence with too little experience than experience with too little intelligence.

I guess that's because Bush called it "economic stimulus", and because he didn't have Obama's honesty of pointing out that these sorts of things have to be paid for by taxes.

Corinthian, can you tell me if you objected to Bush's wealth-redistributing checks as socialism too, and where? Or, if not, why you think it's different?

It's possible, since the corinthian appears to be a permanent feature of this thread, that he or she could actually list some of the socialist policies he or she thinks President Obama will ram through the doubtlessly equally Marxist Congress.

But I strongly suspect that the corinthian will do no such thing, because the corinthian doesn't actually know what the word "socialism" means, and is using that Scary Epithet to avoid his real problem, which is that Obama has darker skin than the corinthian finds stylish in a world leader.

In which case, I can only tell the corinthian to Get Over It. And have another slice of this delicious Schadenfreude Pie. I've been enjoying it all day. NOW THAT I'M A BLUE STATER!

In an effort to qualify my thoughts about what Obama's policies will be like, I used the term socialism. I used it incorrectly.

(Abi was kind enough to point out that I am an idiot for not using my internet connection correctly and doing my research. Thank you for those kind words, ma'am. In all actuality, I just learned how to turn this dang gum computer on.)

So, with that mistake acknowledged, I firmly believe that Obama will be putting into effect a great deal of programs that, while designed to help lower income people, will encourage the majority of these recipients to simply collect another government handout. And for the record, I don't care if they're white, black, purple or a lovely shade of Blackwatch plaid.

Bush's economic stimulus plan was a joke. I used that money to pay off an outstanding debt. It didn't go directly into the economy.

I don't know who, and perhaps it's wishful thinking, which is why I'm mentioning it. Does the corinthian's style sound familiar to anyone else?

Their answer wasn't "handouts," the corinthian. It was "JOBS, baby, JOBS!"

Conservatives fanboys have handouts on the brain. GET. OVER. IT.

One of the many tests Obama faces will be how he deals with similar behavior by the Republican minority... but you know, I suspect that simply growing up black will have given him some useful experience there!

My big worry is whether, when that comes up, he'll be fast enough at switching from olive branch to thunderbolt....

Alaska no more qualifies as socialist than does Obama.

corinthian:

It's possible that you're right. But Obama's tax plan (which is the thing McCain seemed to be talking about with the "redistributionist" label) doesn't seem to even remotely fit that description. It's tinkering around the edges of our (hideously complex, ugly, loophole-filled) tax system in a way that will make it very slightly more progressive. We're really talking about a tiny tweak, here.

Further, if you look at the folks Obama uses as his economic policy advisors, you get such wild-eyed reds as Warren Buffet, Austen Goldsbee[1], and Paul Volker. If he's planning to go far left on economic policy, he's sure hiding his intentions well.

And finally, in budget terms, the redistribution that matters is Social Security and Medicare. Those are in practice almost impossible to touch, but they dominate the future budget in ways that more welfare-type programs can't hope to approach. (There's also the bailout, which might turn out to cost a huge amount, but whose total cost is unknown. Let's hope we don't end up playing Iceland at the end of this whole thing.) Welfare type programs otherwise may create bad incentives or waste money, but they're not going to wreck the budget.

I expect the main thrust of any kind of "redistributionist" program will be trying to spend our way out of the impending economic crisis, or out of the next wave of the global financial meltdown, should it come. There is not much difference between Democrats and Republicans on that stuff, to be honest.

[1] From that well-known bastion of Marxism known as the University of Chicago.

On which topic I refer you to my good friend Mr. Paulson. I heartily agree with you, in fact -- we should definitely stop the no-strings-attached welfare handouts in this country, in order of percentage of budget.

That means the military-industrial complex has to start holding their bake sales first. Then we can move on to the insurance "industry". We could yank the $700 billion back that's earmarked for welfare recipients getting billion-dollar bonuses to buy their fourth yachts.

Somewhere waaaaaay down at the bottom of that, we could talk about taking food out of the mouths of babies, which is what you're obsessed about.

OR -- here's a thought -- we could acknowledge that feeding the hungry is important, then we could actually work out how that might be done without the social fallout we all hate. There aren't any South-Side-Chicago-style projects in Europe, and yet they feed their hungry. Perhaps, I dunno, maybe it's not the principle of feeding the hungry that's the problem. Maybe some governmental transparency might be the answer instead of flailing about in a panic about socialism.

But from where I sit, the corinthian, you look pretty damned stupid, coming in here and calling us retards without even knowing Thing One about the words you're using. Apparently you voted for McCain. Wow. He wouldn't have been socialist at all, now would he? Just spend another fifty billion on his friends here and there -- but who's counting? At least that money didn't go to fund deadbeats or anything.

Moron.

Whether there are inefficiencies in the system is a different question -- yes, of course there are; it's a large system, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics colloquially applies. Its a large enough system that some of those inefficiencies are pretty startling, I'm sure. But "inefficiencies" are a different thing from "no strings".

What we don't need in this sort of argument is people making absurd exaggerated-to-the-point-of-wrong claims to support points that could be made more accurately. If any reasonable person can see that you're exaggerating your support, why would they believe you if they don't already? And why will they believe anyone else, once they get themselves convinced that's all there is because its all the loudest people say?

Berkowitz talks a good line, but he is a complete Casper Milquetoast. I voted for him, but I'd vote for almost anyone running against Don Young. I found myself underwhelmed by his campaign, and he had my vote as soon as he became the candidate.

I hope Ted goes down when the absentee/question/early ballots are counted. But at this point, I'm not counting on it.

Hey Serge, I'm thinking about moving to New Mexico. Any suggestions?

Well, I contribute sarcasm. That has to count for something.

BTW, glad you seem to have come thru' this last physically OK. Keep well.

I'm okay, but I had PT yesterday and I now have a very scary balance exercise!

Do the people of Manassas not care about anything but local office? Conservative or not, they may have noticed that Virginia does have statewide elections, as well as the chance to vote for president.

I'm still astonished that Loudoun County is now considered a bedroom community for DC. When I lived in the region Loudoun was all horse country.