Election Day Thread
 

My prediction: A few days from now, we will still not know who our new president is.

It warmed my heart to hear some talking heads on CNN speculating on Paul Ryan's next career move.

I'm just ready for it to be over.

I think we may know before the polls close on the West Coast/Hawaii and Alaska. If Romney loses Ohio, which seems pretty likely at this point, and if he loses Virginia and Florida, both of which seem more likely than not at this point (though I think Florida is a much closer call), it's over. (That's assuming that both candidates are winning in the states that have been considered "safe" for them or leaning strongly to them.) Even if Romney wins Florida, if he doesn't carry Ohio or Virginia, he pretty much has to win every other swing state, which at this point seems highly unlikely.


Well, it certainly doesn't look like he helped the ticket in Wisconsin. But I assume he's a shoe-in for his congressional seat.

For all of the spotlight on my native Ohio, I think Virginia may be an early "tell." If Obama wins it, game over. If Romney wins it, it'll go a while longer.

As was said upthread, taking what I've seen as pretty reliable lock/and leaning states for each candidate as a base, the president has a lot more ways to get to 270.

Right, but when was the last time a VP candidate lost and went back to a congressional seat? I mean, I know that's what he'll do in the short term, but what else?

There's a chance that all four states voting on marriage equality will get it right today. Honestly, that is more important to me than any candidate for office.

I think it's a possibility for Romney to win the popular vote, but not the electoral vote.

I would love to see that happen, because I think it would make the NPVIC pick up steam in a big way. Most of the states that have approved it are left-leaning, but a Romney loss in the EC might motivate some right-leaning states to pass bills.

I voted 2 weeks ago. I'm ready for all the madness to be over.

Funny, I seem to think it the other way around... :confused:

Possible, though at this point that seems unlikely. Nate Silver, who has a very good track record (we'll see how his track record is after today :D) places the chances of that at 5.3%. (He places the chances of Obama winning the popular election but not the electoral college at 0.6%.)

FWIW, since the popular vote became the norm for how states selected presidential electors (1832 for all states except South Carolina), there have only been three instances where the winner of the electoral college did not also win the popular vote -- 1876, 1888 and 2000.

I voted at 7 a.m. About 50 people were lined up to vote that early. The poll place directors (sorry, I don't know their official name) said it was the most people they had ever seen at that time in the morning for an election.

I love Nate Silver. If he's right, we'll know tonight who won.

I have voted. There was nobody in line when I got there. When I left, there were probably 15 people waiting. The ballot in my county was two pages, both sides and took a long time to complete even though I had brought a list with me of who I was voting for and how I was voting on each proposal. For people who were not as prepared, they could take quite a while reading all the proposals, especially our county proposals which had a lot of legalese.

Nothing to do now but run errands and wait for election coverage tonight! Presidential election days are exciting days to be Americans :)

For those not familiar with Nate Silver, he has been doing statistical analysis of polling for the last two elections (at least). The NY Times has picked up his blog now. http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/

My wife voted a little after 7:00 and about 250 people had voted before her. (The polls opened at 6:30.)

I voted a few weeks ago. I guess it was the fact that she hadn't voted that kept the ads coming to our TV.

I would love to second this point!!

Our ballot was two pages, two sides on one and one side on the one that had all the proposals. One nice thing about Illinois is that they send you any state constitutional amendments in advance by mail with arguments for and against. So with a little additional research on our own, Live-in and I both agreed on how to vote. But I still read the instructions just to double check.

Also, there was a provision on there for the City of Chicago to be able to negotiate lower electricity rates, and they sent that out in the mail in advance, too, so we knew how to vote on that as well.

There was one I hadn't seen before (even when I looked up our ballot in advance) but it wasn't too complicated to understand.

Live-in left to vote just after 6, I left to vote just after 7. He was just getting his ballot whenever I got in line. But it moved faster for me, I didn't wait as long.

We have leftover wine/Champagne from my sis-in-laws wedding last week...so, we plan on either celebrating or drowning ourselves in sorrow tonight!

Team ROMNEY/RYAN!

The ballot language is a hot mess on this one. Hopefully, it will fail, but if it doesn't, I really hope the courts throw it out.

Ballot language from our county proposals: (and yes, they were in all CAPS):

"SHALL THE WAYNE COUNTY HOME RULE CHARTER BE AMENDED TO ADD A NEW SECTION 5.120 AND TO AMEND EXISTING SECTION 5.134 TO AUTHORIZE THE WAYNE COUNTY COMMISSION RATHER THAN THE WAYNE COUNTY EXECUTIVE TO ESTABLISH THE FORM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO LUMP-SUM AND LINE-ITEM) OF THE COUNTY BUDGET AND APPROPRIATION ORDINANCE; AND TO REQUIRE THE COUNTY COMMISSION TO ESTABLISH THE FORM OF THE BUDGET AND APPROPRIATION ORDINANCE BY DECEMBER 7, 2012 AND TO ADOPT CHANGES TO THE FORM AT LEAST TEN MONTHS BEFORE THE BEGINNING OF A FISCAL YEAR TO BE EFFECTIVE FOR THAT FISCAL YEAR; AND TO ALSO AMEND SECTION 5.121 TO REQUIRE THE COUNTY EXECUTIVE TO PREPARE AND SUBMIT THE BUDGET AND APPROPRIATION ORDINANCE IN THE FORM ESTABLISHED BY THE COUNTY COMMISSION?"



"SHALL SECTION 6.112 OF THE WAYNE COUNTY HOME RULE CHARTER BE AMENDED TO EXPAND THE WAYNE COUNTY RETIREMENT COMMISSION'S MEMBERSHIP FROM 8 TO 9, ADDING AS A MEMBER THE WAYNE COUNTY TREASURER OR HIS OR HER DESIGNEE; AND ALSO TO AUTHORIZE THE CHAIRPERSON OF THE WAYNE COUNTY COMMISSION, WHO IS ALSO A MEMBER OF THE WAYNE COUNTY RETIREMENT COMMISSION, TO APPOINT A PERSON TO SERVE AS HIS OR HER DESIGNEE ON THE RETIREMENT COMMISSION; AND TO FURTHER ALLOW EMPLOYEES AND RETIREES OF THE WAYNE COUNTY AIRPORT AUTHORITY TO VOTE FOR AND SERVE AS MEMBERS OF THE WAYNE COUNTY RETIREMENT COMMISSION (WITH NO MORE THAN ONE MEMBER BEING AN AIRPORT EMPLOYEE OR RETIREE) UNTIL SUCH TIME AS THE AIRPORT AUTHORITY ESTABLISHES ITS OWN RETIREMENT SYSTEM OR PENSION PLAN?"

Typically, I don't spend a lot of time trying to parse them on my own, and instead check out what the LWV has to say. They are non-partisan, and spend a lot of time studying these issues.

I was in and out in less than 5 minutes. There was only three proposals this year and I knew walking in how I wanted to vote on them. I live in a heavily democratic area so other then the presidential, congressional, and state senate candidates everything else was just one democrat running unopposed. I don't vote when there is only one candidate on the ballot.

I wasn't able to vote this morning because I live in a boarder town and work in GA, but my polling place is open 7am-7pm central. I'll be going after work. I'm really excited about the above proposed amendment. Please, Alabama, get it right.

I wish these amendments, though, would be written in plain English. The one above was the shortest, and easiest to understand. I'm likely to not vote yes OR no on the rest of them because the wording is such that I can't figure out what I would actually be voting for or against.

I think this is a REALLY GOOD non-partisan breakdown of what each one means:

http://www.lwval.org/election2012/st...ts.11.6.12.pdf

I agree. Sadly, they didn't do our county proposals, only our state proposals.

I find that Alabama proposal interesting:

The proposed amendment represents a state’s rights stand relative to the mandates in the federal health care legislation that were upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court. It would apply to all Alabama residents and has the following provisions:
1. No person, employer, or health care provider could be compelled to participate in any health care system.
2. A person or employer would be able to pay directly for health care services and not be required to pay penalties or fines for paying directly for lawful health care services.
3. Health care provider could accept direct payment for lawful health care services and not be required to pay penalties or fines for accepting such direct payments.
4. The purchase or sale of health insurance in private health care systems shall not be prohibited by law or rule.

That's interesting because ACA does include any of those things. Under ACA, nobody is compelled to use any health care system. You cannot be forced to go to a doctor or hospital. Under ACA, employers can still be self insured and anybody can still pay for their care out of pocket if they choose. Under ACA, health care providers can still accept money out of pocket without penalties or fines. And under ACA, the purchase or sale of health insurance in private health care systems is not prohobited by law or rule.

I don't see how this proposal would do anything at all.

As best I can tell, it's a purely symbolic "we don't like Obamacare" measure.

Thanks for this!

My dad heard this last week.

NPVIC? Is this something to change the Electoral College? I'm all about getting rid of the EC and going to popular vote. It seems like every election since I could vote there has been an EC fiasco. I'm so over it!

So with you there! I'm so glad that I no longer have to hear or see political ad's anymore.

I voted early on the Saturday pre-Sandy just to be on the safe side and waited 2.5 hours. People today across the DC/Baltimore area have been waiting everywhere from 15 minutes to 2+ hours...we also have a very 'question' heavy ballot this year. Casino table games, DREAM act, and gay marriage

Really? Exaggerate much? I've only been alive for one election in which it was an issue, much less eligible to vote in an election in which it was a problem.

It will retain the EC, but it would require the states that are members of the agreement to have their electors vote for the national popular winner. I think the EC needs to go, but I don't think that the NPVIC is the solution.

Once the NPVIC is in force, the popular vote winner would automatically win the electoral vote. Yes, it would be dumb to still have the electoral college at that point, but it would have the same effect.

so nice to be out of the US today...no political commercials, and very little coverage just now (it's midnight here).

Downside: no concept of how things are going.

I'm going to make a bold prediction:
Obama wins Vermont and Romney wins Alabama.

I love it when they call states with 0% counted. Also, CNN doesn't even list Pennsylvania as a battleground. Hahaha, good strategy, Romney.

I find it funny that they are calling states in the South for Romney even though they only have 1% of the votes in and Obama is way ahead.

They're basing it on exit polls.

Eh, he can have 'em. I want Obama to take FL, and then I can go to bed early.

ETA: The networks have called Illinois, too.

It's on BBC1. Every major European outlet is broadcasting nothing but US elections.