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I'm so absurdly hopeful.
And also a little drunk.
I live in a neighborhood that's mostly empty vacation rentals. You couldn't tell that from the last ten minutes. There are fireworks and firecrackers being set off down the block. People are screaming up in the hills, there are cars driving around leaning on their horns.
It's like New Years. I didn't realize this many people lived here, and all I can hear are their voices, but that's enough.
I can't believe it's happened.
McCain has called Obama and conceded.
Yeah, Patrick, I'm gobsmacked too.
"Mother Rosa sat down so Martin could march. Martin marched, and that meant Barack could run. Barack ran so our children will be able to fly."
I just saw Jesse Jackson standing in Grant Park with tears streaming down his face. My dad was a Jackson delegate to the National Convention in '88. I never thought I'd see this day, or be this happy.
Yes, we can!
Pardon me if, after the past two elections, I believe it only when Obama takes the oath of office.
Patrick, I'm alternately crying and laughing.
I live in what is a 'border state'. where Confederate and Northern ties are still recognized in horrible ways. (mostly Confederates are the ones that pick at the wounds.)
I'm so proud. And I'm so happy. And it sounds like McCain is being a gentleman (I'm listing to his concession speech). And such a kind comment about Obama's grandmother.
AND, I never thought I'd vote for a Nixon, but Jay Nixon as been voted in as the Missouri Governor. He's a way better choice.
I'm pretty much verklempt.
I know no single human being could walk on water, much less single-handedly cure all the many ills in this country and government, so I know better than to put all that hope solely on Obama's presidency.
However, tonight I'm just going to celebrate, and resign myself to keeping up the good fight tomorrow, with a little more hope that said fight will go more on the side of justice and decency, in this country and abroad.
Watching McCain's concession speech now: he's a great deal more gracious than his supporters.
This is a wonderful result.
And takes the oath of office...
Deep breath: now the real work begins.
--jm
It feels like a personal victory, like most people in the country really think and feel like I do, contrary to all evidence piling up these last several years. It feels like this country really IS my country.
It's like the nation is Frosty the Snowman and the nation is saying, "Happy Birthday!"
No better way to end these eight years.
B
I think McCain deserves some credit for conceding this early. He certainly didn't have to. I feel like I'm watching 2000 McCain rather than the one of the last three months.
Spent the evening baking. I bake when I'm nervous. Six cakes. I'm not sure how I'm going to transport them to work.
Well, the dog chewed off the top of one layer. Shit. I guess I'm keeping that one.
Ran out for a burger and fries. By the time I got back, it was OVER. Fifteen minutes from "looking good for Obama" to "hmmm, landslide."
I rushed outside to light off a big firework when I heard that McCain called Obama to concede.
I wasn't the only one. Bangs from the neighborhood next door.
McCain's concession speech was underway when I got back in. So far it seems classy.
Beyond yay!
Singing with happiness!
I don't know what to say. I'm so overjoyed. I think I just heard fireworks somewhere down the street.
My birthday is on Saturday. I choose to believe this is a gift from the nation. Thank you, America.
Here, about 2.5-3 miles north of Grant Park, I'd swear that we can almost hear the cheering, although my beloved says otherwise.
That was a heck of a concession speech. McCain, not doing more like that is what lost you this election.
McCain is a lot more decent than his supporters.
I'm listening to Congressman John Lewis on MSNBC right now. He seems overwhelmed by the outcome tonight. Almost as overwhelmed as Jesse Jackson.
Finally.
It's been eight long, hard years since that faithful day in november 2000 that gave Bush the chance to steal the election for the first time. Remember how angry and disappointed we were back then, and how much more anger, grief and disappointment have followed since then?
Finally there will now be somebody who, if not a leftist, is at least competent and not driven by spite.
Somebody spiked my Obama Kool-Aid. I'll have some more thanks!
I wrote a quick reaction to this on my livejournal, tried to write something more professional for my own website, can't. I start crying every time I try. I'll have to tackle it in the morning.
Martin Luther King said forty years ago, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
I'm so happy I got a chance to judge Obama by the content of his character ... to find that he was the best man for the job ... and cast a vote for him for president. And that the majority of America also voted for him.
I am so happy. I can't quite take it in. A righteous wind...
Now comes the hard work.
I've got a half a bottle of champagne in me and I feel like a great weight has been lifted from my back.
BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA, 44th PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES!
Mr. Leuchtag: Come sit down. Have a brandy with us.
Mrs. Leuchtag: To celebrate our leaving for America tomorrow.
Carl: Oh, thank you very much. I thought you would ask me, so I brought the good brandy. And - a third glass!
Mrs. Leuchtag: At last the day is came!
Mr. Leuchtag: Mareichtag and I are speaking nothing but English now.
Mrs. Leuchtag: So we should feel at home when we get to America.
Carl: Very nice idea, mm-hmm.
Mr. Leuchtag: [toasting] To America!
Mrs. Leuchtag: To America!
Carl: To America!
Mr. Leuchtag: Liebchen - sweetnessheart, what watch?
Mrs. Leuchtag: Ten watch.
Mr. Leuchtag: Such much?
Carl: Hm. You will get along beautiful in America, mm-hmm.
(from Casablanca)
well done America, in Australia we managed to get rid of our tyranical leader in our last election as well (i was ready to move to New Zealand if we didn't) so i can imagine how many of you must be feeling... congratulations
Yes! Tonight we rejoin the world! And-best of all-he won VIRGINIA! WOOHOO!
Woman singing the national anthem at the Obama rally sure has a great voice!
I am so happy. Obama is about to speak. This is a great day.
I suppose I should be more sober. I couldn't help it; I kept dancing in circles, chanting "Down in flames! DOWN IN FLAMES!" as the returns came in for the Democrats.
Now time to eat a bit and listen to the new President-Elect.
I am so happy.
We were just out on our front stoop trading jubilations with the kids four houses down who play loud music. One of them suddenly let out a whoop, jumped down laughing into their bitty front yard, and yelled "Holy shit, we have a black president!"
Unbelievably good news! Maybe I'll put off signing these Divorce America papers for a bit.
Wooo!!
So far, so good...
Now comes the calm unifying work to put to rest the fears of those worrying about riots and other foolishness.
Dear citizens, dear voters: thank you, thank you, thank you.
WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!! President Obama! :)
It's not done until Wayne Ever-Lovin' County in the Hoosier State counts the votes! I am not leaving this spot.
No, wait. I still have a piece of baked chicken in the fridge. I'll be right back.
#36: Black America deserves a really thorough-going thanks from the rest of us for saving us from the carpenter ants of the GOP. McCain was ahead in the polls in White America.
Carrie @#16, I agree--- this is the McCain I knew, liked, and voted for in the 2004 primaries.
I'm quite proud of the students I work with-- shirt and TIE to go cast their votes today.
I can't think of a damned thing to say. I just keep checking to make sure it's true.
*hugs everyone*
*whoops*
Now I don't have to move to Canada!
I'm 54 years old. I spent much of my youth in a racist Arkansas. I am sitting here with tears streaming down my face. I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would see a black man elected president. I am so grateful that God has permitted me to see this day.
I feel a little bad about this, but I am going into work knowing that if a black man can become the president then certainly I can succeed at the challenges laid out before me at work.
Once Ohio was called I thought it was pretty much set. McCain's concession speech was probably the most decent I've seen him for the whole thing.
I admit I did take a perverse pleasure at seeing Palins pained looks when they cut to her.
I sat here and said "Keith, America has a black president. A black man is president of the United States. Oh my God." And I cried. (Keith is my boyfriend.)
For years, my most-stated phrase has been "I love living in the future."
"I want my country back" has been right behind it. Today, tonight, I feel like I not only got my country back, I got a better America than I had reason or cause to hope for in my lifetime.
There's still plenty to be concerned about, plenty that might well lead me to say again, "I want my country back." But right now, right now I am so very, very proud of my country, so very, very proud of my fellow Americans.
For the first time in my life, I also have the pleasure of having voted for the president-elect.
Kenyans are celebrating. It's beautiful.
Dear Karl, Newt, Dick, George, Grover, et al:
You can't fool all of the people all of the time.
Good Night to you.
From Canuckistan: God Bless Us, Every One!
338 electoral votes?! (so far!) Thanks for the nice place to celebrate!
I'm still waiting for the final, Certified, total numbers. (And grumbling about TMM practically calling it before the polling-places in the West close, thus possibly causing the numbers I want to be smaller than they might be.) I'm hoping for a really large majority of the popular vote to be for Obama, so that he can be considered to have a genuine Mandate.
Such creebing aside, I'm thankful to have lived long enough to see this day.
The next Presidential milestone will, if all goes well, be in eight years, though I rather hope the Democratic Party will find a candidate more liberal than Hillary Clinton, and now my eyes (& hopes) are set on that.
I'm still biting my fingernails about North Carolina even while I'm excited about Senator-to-be Hagan and Governor-to-be Perdue, and ecstatic about Obama's win.
According to the results the NC Board of Elections links to, Obama and McCain are less than a percentage point apart with 95 counties out of 100 reporting. McCain is listed as being 5433 votes ahead.
ohpleaseohpleaseohplease let the last five counties go for Obama...
Posting in epic victory thread! Yay!
I was also impressed with McCain's speech, and the way CNN's analysts went into appreciation mode as soon as the race was called. I'm so optimistic that the hope this election has inspired spreads like a virus across the nation and we can really be as good as we know we can be. All of us.
CONGRETULATIONS!
(Sorry, I'd say something more original if I could think of anything)
Well, how about that.
Still waiting for the final totals, but...
How about that.
Yeah.
Obama rally now playing "your love is lifting me higher". A tribute to Massachusetts?
Obama rally now playing "your love is lifting me higher". A tribute to Massachusetts?
Obama has 2 very happy little girls!
The news is reporting that there's hundreds of people celebrating outside the White House and thousands on U street -- they've had to detour traffic.
I just finished talking with my mother in Kansas City. She says the world has changed, and it's high time it did. She also thinks Obama has more problems facing him than FDR did when he won in 1932. I expect she's right on both points.
Any word on Proposition 8?
"Block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand."
Yes.
I've had a good shot of Scotch and I'm looking for more; I think I've got so much adrenaline running that I burned through the alcohol in seconds.
Oh... ghods... this strange feeling, like a bubble in my chest. I think it's... HOPE.
Wow. Just... wow. I won't be still until inauguration day either, but still. This is an amazing moment.
Did you see that?
He just now, very quietly, with one adjectival phrase, gave his campaign's slogan back to the nation as a whole.
I love this man.
Nicole #68, that exact line was the one that got me. A black man that gives shoutouts to the working class is going to be my president. My mind is completely blown.
Do you think McCain seemed relieved in his concession?
I hope never to hear "Democrat" as an adjective ever again.
The famous last paragraph of Chekhov's "Lady with the Dog" comes to mind:
"And it seemed as though in a little while the solution would be found, and then a new and splendid life would begin; and it was clear to both of them that they had still a long, long road before them, and that the most complicated and difficult part of it was only just beginning."
It ain't over, it's just starting.
Barack - Don't. Screw. This. Up.
Listening to Obama's speech. I particularly appreciated his homage to the women who fought for the right to vote. They are too often forgotten.
Yes we can. Where we breathe, we hope. I'm going to cry now, just a little.
All this, and a puppy? It's just too much.
Stefan (17), you too? Wamt to swap? We can never eat this much apple strudel. I've never been six cakes nervous, though I once found it necessary to roast three chickens in completely different styles. Good thing we had guests.
Kathryn (63), it's a pleasure to see those kids.
Irene Gallo lives in the Flatiron District, and she reports that people are doing exactly what you'd expect: gathering in Union Square.
If this guy doesn't quit quoting Lincoln, I'm going to dissolve entirely.
Holy shit.
Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit. He won.
What is to come will be hard, so hard, like shoveling water out of a deep hole in a downpour. It will be demoralizing. It will drain away our hope.
When that comes, remember tonight.
And really, that is what he's done more than anything I think. Maybe no matter what else he does it's the one thing that will mark everything. He's given hope back to a lot of ppl. He has made a lot of people who gave up get involved again. I for one want to see where it goes. I know I am feeling like there is a chance.
Trying to figure out how to streak through this thread. Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
*naked*naked*naked*naked*naked*naked*
Lost it during the call-and-response part of President-Elect Obama's speech. Our whole results-watching party has been bursting into tears over and over again.
Myrtle and Washington Streets in Brooklyn are in happy chaos.
I'm so so happy. I've been offline for a lot of tonight, but I loved knowing y'all were here.
Kathryn @ 42, let's thank the women too (actually, the groups do overlap some). CNN's national exit polls show that 53% of the voters were women, and that 45% of men voting and 55% of women voting went for Obama.
On second thought, I'll take that concession ftw.
Yes we did.
God I have been ugly crying for the entirety of Obama's speech. Ugly crying. Sobbing like a baby. Jesus. Jesus. My TV says OBAMA WINS PRESIDENCY. God. God.
Weeping. Sobbing. Like a baby. Jesus. President Obama. For real. Really Really Really.
I kind of wish we still had a TV.
fidelio @#67: Try the SF Chronicle. Looks like it's going to pass.
I really hope somebody posts a transcript of Obama's acceptance speech within the next few days. I wanna hear that again!
Geez, people, say what you really feel!
November 4, 2008. I'm glad I was here to see it.
This feels like the first election of the 21st century.
@ byron #86
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2008/11/remarks_of_president-elect_bar.php
I live in Florida, which for a Democrat is a bit like being a vegetarian at a cannibal convention. And it went for Obama! Jesus Christ, the world just flipped over. I am so... don't have words.
Hiya, Rose! Want some strudel?
Breaking the race barrier is the big story here; but there was a moment when I looked at all the Obamas and Bidens up there on the stage, and realized that if there were any remaining Know-Nothings out there, they were expiring of apoplexy.
Neener-neener-neeeeeeeeeeeener!
America, you made the whole world proud. There aren't any words that can express how I feel today... thank you. Thank you.
I don't think it was sinking in, right up until he talked about the 106-year old black lady, and how much the U.S. has changed in her lifetime. Then I just sat here with tears streaming down my face.
I was standing on an icy sidewalk not far from a polling place, near the end of the evening shift of holding up signs for No on Proposition 8, when one of my fellow sign-holders told me Obama had taken Ohio and Pennsylvania. She told me that people were lining the streets of Chicago. I didn't start really believing it would happen until then.
Obama's speech hit just the right tone.
I'm completely buzzed.
Finished the rum; think we'll go to bed shortly. Yeeehaw!
I was standing on an icy sidewalk not far from a polling place, near the end of the evening shift of holding up signs for No on Proposition 8, when one of my fellow sign-holders told me Obama had taken Ohio and Pennsylvania. She told me that people were lining the streets of Chicago. I didn't start really believing it would happen until then.
Obama's speech hit just the right tone.
I'm completely buzzed.
Wayne County, IN has *finally* reported in, and it's official: Indiana is a blue state. Dayamn. Never thought I'd see the day.
http://www.co.wayne.in.us/voter/election2008/general/final.htm
(McCain was down 15K statewide, so the slight win in Wayne County isn't enough.)
Steve C. @ #87: "This feels like the first election of the 21st century."
What you said. It could be bad down the road. Really bad. But I finally feel like we're looking ahead.
Byron @86: your wish, my command: Talking Points Memo haz mad typing skillz.
Pablo Defendini @88:
Thank you! Bookmarked!
Wow. Wow.
I didn't wear waterproof mascara today, I just realized.
I think I'm finally letting myself feel hopeful. Heh.
Baruch atah adonai eloheinu melech ha'olam
Shehecheyanu v'kiyimanu v'higianu laz'man hazeh.
Fantastic! We celebrate tonight. The next bit of work starts tomorrow or soon after.
Did anyone else think he seemed really somber? I am very sad for his loss of Toot.
Oddly enough, on the very first day of my short politically aware life that I am actually deeply proud of my country, I also stand what appears more and more to be a good chance to be deeply ashamed of my state for the very first time.
Oh California, for justice and decency, do not approve Prop 8.
Even so, I've never felt more pride to be a voting American.
Ford's "long national nightmare is over" line needs to be updated.
"Horror show?" "Disgrace?"
Wow. What an unbelievable night.
Chris Quinones@73: you're not the only one. My mother said she hadn't seen McCain look so normal in ages.
God, I think I might actually sleep tonight.
Steve C. @ #87: "This feels like the first election of the 21st century."
It feels like we're finally living in the future.
Just a thought - MLK day in 2009 is January 19. Inauguration Day is January 20.
Oh yeah. Nov. 4th was my birthday. This result is the best birthday present I've ever gotten.
I'm so happy. That's all.
(I'd be happier if proposition 8 crashed and burned.)
Not going so well in California on local propositions. The Bay Area is an outnumbered strip of "no" on Prop 8 surrounded by a state full of "yes" on it (except for Alpine county). We're not winning on our "supertrain" to Los Angeles, either (Prop 1A). At least the abortion notification proposition is losing.
Michael Roberts @98:
Thanks to you as well.
Talking Points Memo haz mad typing skillz.
Agreed sir!
Delurking from Australia to say Congratulations America!
Great crowds in our office have been following the numbers all day, and we just caught Obama's speech on TV... great jubilation here, so I can only image what it's like over there!
If the enthusiasm you all have now carries into the challenges ahead, then the whole world is about to become a better place. Thank you.
Man, that speech ... that has me in tears.
Congratulations from a northern neighbor!
Although I regret that I'll have a much harder time recruiting talent from the US to move to Canada now ;-)
Happy birthday, Linkmeister.
Indiana is blue. I want to hear North Carolina called for Obama.
Bachmann in Minnesota appears to be holding on to her seat. Feh.
Prop 8 is passing BUT none of the Bay Area counties have been counted. It may yet go down.
6:30 a.m. Didn't stay up all night. Got up with my son (13). He brought the paper in and scanned headlines (they brought it to bed too early for results, of course) while I turned on the BBC.
Obama. 238:155. And the blessed words, "McCain conceded."
I wanted to go up and tell my daughter right away, but my son wouldn't let me -- he wanted the honor.
Dang. 338 of course!! I'm not awake yet.
Amid all of the tears, joy, exultation, and relief, a round of applause for Senator McCain. He was gracious, and he spoke like a statesman instead of a politician. Then add PRESIDENT-ELECT Obama's speech, which left me sitting here with tears in my eyes, and it's been a hell of a night.
I'm glad that I have lived to see this.
#76: Strudel? I bet that takes actual work.
I just made lots and lots of mix cakes:
Two Funfetti layer cakes (one with a big hunk cut out of one layer, where Kira bit off a piece as it cooled on a too-low table), which will get white frosting.
One Spice layer cake, to get cream cheese frosting.
One Dark Chocolate layer cake. Dark chocolate frosting.
Two Devil's Food sheet cakes, some kind of chocolate frosting.
I have enough Red, White, and Blue sprinkles for at least some of them.
I found enough boxes to get them to work. I'm going to call them Celebration / Consolation cakes.
People here at my office in Tokyo seem quite happy -- and almost none of them are Americans.
I cried too. Granted, maybe it's because I'm drunk. But I'll be sober tomorrow, and Barack Obama will still be president. Life is good.
Congratulations to everyone involved! Apart from a certain relative of mine who appears to have voted according to a f(o)etus-based agenda, it's popery, what can you do.
My customary veneer of cynicism about the American experiment looks worn though in places. But spare a moment's thought for the boy George as he spends the next couple of months watching his legacy lazily spiral in towards the centre of the bowl.
OK, that's enough.
Please, don't let Norm Coleman win.
Please, please, please, don't let Michelle Bachmann win.
pleasepleaseplease don't let Prop 8 win....
Please, don't let Norm Coleman win.
Please, please, please, don't let Michelle Bachmann win.
pleasepleaseplease don't let Prop 8 win....
Damn, When I left home I knew that Ohio and Pennsylvania had gone to Obama. Came home to find we had a new president elect. Hot damn.
I am so happy. And so happy that my daughter, who cast her first vote ever today, got to see the man she voted for win.
Now if we can just squeeze Prop. 8 out...
@elise #127
We're still waiting with you. It ain't over yet.
People are still honking their cars and whooping as they drive by. :) Kids walking down the street occasionally cheer. (I'm in Seattle. Whee.)
I'm a little afraid to go to bed -- what if I wake up and find out it was all a dream?
The race-baiting, the mud-slinging, the gutter tactics -- they didn't just fail, they backfired! Let future campaigns take note.
Ladies and gentlemen, after eight years of our popular "the government should get to wiretap and arrest everyone it wants, whenever wants, whereever it wants, for how long it wants" special we on the American right will now return to our regularly scheduled "the government is the evil tool of the illuminati global world domination conspiracy" show. Thank you.
I hope we've done a little bit to redress the disappointment we've been to the rest of the world in recent years.
Elise, Michelle Bachmann may still win, but she'll be quacking lame from day one.
Must crash now. You guys know where the the extra chips and soda are stashed.
Glory be.
I'm glad I could share this moment with my children and husband. My daughter quoted Maya Angelou's poem "I too am America".
Nearly cried out, I am grateful beyond words.
Thanks for hosting the election night gathering place, Nielsen Haydens. I could not wish for finer company.
There are not nearly enough happy whoopings in the streets of north Boulder. I expect the Hill is a madhouse, and I thought I heard fireworks, but my little unfashionable neighborhood is rather quiet except for one shriek from a balcony across the parking lot.
I never thought Aslan's last speech in the Narnia books would feel so appropriate to real life: "The dream is ended: this is the morning."
Madeleine @ 128:
My first two major votes were for the California Governor following the recall of Gray Davis, and then the Presidential election in 2004. Both times, I believed in the power of my vote and both times I faced the bitterness of my vote counting among the minority.
That is an extremely unpleasant, discouraging experience for a first-time voter. I think it's wonderful that your daughter gets to feel the pride of her first vote being a powerful thing, particularly in a troubled time.
Like I said, it's a wonderful thing.
Oh
Thank
God
(says the Architectural Deist who doesn't think prayers are answered...).
This ain't the end. It ain't even the beginning of the end.
But maybe this is the end of the beginning...
(looks at whisky bottle. It's nearly empty. Looks at clock - it's nearly 1:30.)
Oh boy...
(Thanks for the link, and the analysis, Bruce. Good to see you again, if only electronically).
K.C. Shaw @ 46: "Now I don't have to move to Canada!"
Now I don't have to move back to the US.
(If McCain had won, our nation would have needed more patriots, not fewer. Thank everything that the tree of liberty is not yet thirsty.)
Also...I am having fun plugging in "nation_name news" and checking out reactions all over the globe. So far, Russia's Pravda has cracked me up the most with "8 years of hell are over," and Germany's Spiegel has struck me as being extremely practical, both welcoming the new president-elect and presenting him with a wish list, while reminding their readers that the President is not like Santa Claus and comes with limitations. I know all my Canadian friends are heaving sighs of relief right about now.
Oh, hey. Over here in Colorado, where Mark Udall won? His defeated opponent, Bob Shaffer, was quoted as saying something like, "My opponent's supporters poured money into the state and bought a lot of votes." Man. Sore loser much?
Teresa #133 - "I hope we've done a little bit to redress the disappointment we've been to the rest of the world in recent years."
It's a whole lot more than just a little bit. We here in South Africa suddenly love America again! And we are crying our eyeballs out, and being all marshmallowy. It feels good and right, even though we know that once the party's over it's going to be hard. That's OK though, just as long as it goes steady. Wish us luck for our own elections next year... we are going to need oodles of it.
Correction: it's by Langston Hughes.
Here's a link, for anyone who has not been quite thoroughly cried out tonight. http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/i-too/
(If McCain had won, our nation would have needed more patriots, not fewer. Thank everything that the tree of liberty is not yet thirsty.)
I'll just say there is a reason I'm thanking a deity I think is less responsive than Crom....
Well, congratulations, all you Americans! You did a splendid job! And thanks to Making Light for providing such a comfortable place to watch and wait and hope.
My legs are on fire. I just got home from the precinct. I was the Electronic Voting Specialist -- that is, I walked people through using the ballot box-with-scanner-on-top and the touchscreen ballot filler-out. It meant I was on my feet most of the time from a bit before six in the morning until a bit after nine at night (and actually that meant I got out faster than I ever have before, a fact I attrribute to a cleaner, quicker, easier checkout process).
I have never seen so many voters. I have never seen so many young voters, I have never seen so many first-time voters. I have never seen so many excited voters.
I have the beginnings of an idea about what the last two elections did in preparing the framework for the outside-the-party organization for this one, but I'm just not smart enough to work it out.
My father was raised in Mississippi, and he and my mother moved back to his home county when he retired. I checked the county returns at Talking Points Memo for my mother, who was curious about the results, although she's now in Kansas City.
They are about what you'd expect if you're familiar with the Magnolia State--blue in the Delta counties and Jackson, and red in most of the rest of the state, with some odd blue spots. Among these is Jefferson Davis County, where, with all precincts reporting, the totals are 61% Obama 39% McCain.
Oh, the irony.
Elise @ 126, right there with you. Those three things are why I'm still awake.
I am so proud, so happy, so freaking overwhelmed that I keep pinching myself to know that Obama's win is real and not a dream.
Now I just need Prop.8 here in California to lose.
My girfriend (Caroline) has been crying tears of joy for a solid two hours.
I honestly never thought I'd see this. I feel like this is really the first step to fixing the mess of the last 8 years.
Looks like NC went blue (barely). I can go to bed now.
Please let it be as the NC board of elections says in NC: http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/NC/7937/13221/en/summary.html
We drank all the champagne. I don't know what to do if NC goes blue.
Stunned, overjoyed, scared, thrilled, stunned we didn't lose....utterly worn out. XD
Now, to catch up on all the blogs!!
The Onion's hot out of the box: Bush: Can I Stop Being President Now?
Nenya @153: Now, to catch up on all the blogs!!
Perhaps you might want to avoid them while you're in that happy mood- some of them report pretty ugly reactions from online wingnuts.
Lizzy tired. Bedtime. Goodnight moon.
Gonna be a bright, bright, sunshiny day...
We are cosmic win!
I left the house to walk the dogs with reports just starting to come in from the West Coast, and when I got back we had a new President. But I was prepared: I'd stopped off on the way home from work to buy a bottle of wine, because I was determined there was going to be something to celebrate, and I found a bottle of cheap California pinot named "Irony". Couldn't resist that, and I'm toasting the removal of the old guard with it right now.
I'm so glad this happened. Aside from the fact that we needed it desperately, I feel like we owe it to the rest of the world to clean up some of the mess our country has made over the last 8 years. Now we have a chance to do that.
One thing left to do here in Oregon: bite my nails until we know for sure if we've rendered Sen. Gordon Smith unemployed. That may take the rest of the night.
Yay! McCain conceded gracefully, and Obama gave a bang-up victory speech, and even struck a few progressive notes!
I may be speechless, but I'm not macro-less:
@skwid #159
well played. many lolz!
RE: K.C. Shaw @ 46: "Now I don't have to move to Canada!"
This just occurred to me today, what country do disgruntled Republicans/NeoCons threaten to move to?
Congratulations, everybody! You all made history.
Peter Carlson @161: I didn't think they did; I thought they just threatened to kick the rest of us out.
Makes me feel like I actually do live in the early days of a better nation.
Peter@161: New Hampshire.
Among the many brilliant wins, another small one: oratory as an art is not dead. (Has anyone read anything of Obama's speechwriter(s)? I'm impressed.)
Lucy @147:
Thank you, thank you, thank you, for the hard work you did. The world is a better place because of you.
Soak the feet in epsom salts. It couldn't hurt.
Ambar@165: Haven't read anything of Obama's speechwriters, but one of the topics buzzing about Hollywood is that one of them's named Jon Favreau. NYT has a profile. Although I'm told that all the major speeches, Obama writes himself.
Got home a few minutes ago. After they booted me out of Rusk, I went over to The Duplex to sing and hang with friends. Christopher Street and Seventh Avenue South sounded like New Year's Day at 12:00:30 -- people whooping and singing and embracing each other, and trying not to hyperventilate.
Hope.
What a strange feeling.
Oh, and that mofo US Attorney Troy Eid who pooh-poohed the white power assassination plot against the president-elect during the DNC? Well, he'd better hope his wife got re-elected to the Colorado Supreme Court, 'cause they'll be living on one salary pretty damn skippy....
I'm late in - spent the day at the Obama office from noon till 8 calling PA, OH, IN, CO, IA, NV, and just because we could, AK. Ha. (I'm too tired to hope to spell the state names right at this point.)
My favorite call was one to Iowa where Grandma had picked up, but grand son (3 or 4, very vocal and insistent that *he* wanted to get it) picked up the other phone and said, "Hello. Who's calling, please?" quite properly; when I said "Hi. I'm from the Barack Obama campaign ..." and that was all I got out for two minutes plus. I think he thought that Barack Obama had called his gramdmother and it was like Santa had showed up with a pony and the keys to Disney World. He was *so* excited.
Shynala is beside herself with joy; eight years of wondering if she was going to wake up and find out that naturalized citizens from Malaysia were now on the "enemy combatants" list are now over.
William Gibson posts on his blog:
And that's a good point at which to say
GOOD night.
Garrett @ 138
My first vote was cast for McGovern (oh, I am old, I am old). And more than that: the party politicians in the town where i went to college challenged all the college voter registrations that year, with the result that my vote for the lost cause didn't even count for anything. Since then, I've taken the franchise very seriously. Today my kid, unchallenged and untroubled, went in and voted and was then high as a kite with the pleasure of civic virtue--and then saw Obama win. It's so cool. I'm a little jealous, but only a little.
Ambar, #165: Just out of curiosity, what do New Hampshire residents think about this reverse-carpetbagging ploy?
#142 OH HELL NO.
Since your party was in charge of purging Lawd knows how many voters because the GOP felt like it, I guess you failed to *steal* all the votes you needed, huh?
Punk.
#73: Yes. It is just starting.
Don't get me wrong. I generally detest "The Star Spangled Banner" unless it's sung two syllables off, ending in "Play Ball", and I sang it tonight at an election party with tears running down my face.
But, as has been said here before, this can only be the start. Everything that's been done in the last eight years to show when we've been lied to, when someone is corrupt, wrong, misleading, or outright evil? Don't stop that, and don't fail to hold the Democrats to the same standards. Expose them all when they need exposing.
Slam them, and slam them hard if they try that rhetorical crap that many Republicans tried to use to brand them traitors. Slam them if they try to disenfranchise, ignore, and demonize those who dare to disagree with them.
On a silly side note: I'm a bit lightheaded, and I don't know if the Dems have a filibuster-proof majority. There's really only one thing I have against the idea of a Republican filibuster is that, as I understand it, one doesn't actually have to do the work of standing up there and talking. If that weren't the case, if one had to do a Mr. Smith Goes to Washington style filibuster, then it seems to me that if the opposition feels that strongly about something, one had better consider that there might, perhaps, be the merest possibility that one is wrong.
I'm within earshot of most of the bars where I sit (in Kodiak, Alaska) and it's dead quiet. We kept the TV and radio off and only used the computer to let the kids watch Caillou on Netflix, realizing that we weren't going to sleep and they usually won't until we do. But I finally gave in and logged on minutes after somebody posted that McCain had conceded.
CONCEDED. No long-drawn-out, farcical struggle, no endless pettifogging challenges, NO STOLEN ELECTION. There goes one of my greatest fears regarding this campaign.
Everybody else is snoring, but I'm still too wired. Jesse Jackson weeping in a Chicago park. A town-wide street party in Kogelo. People hanging out of car windows and cheering in Fort Lauderdale(!). I just hope--please God, nobody shoots him. Please God, people listen when he explains that he was not handed the cheat codes for reality when he was elected. Please God, people remember that he was not elected king.
A bishop someplace pronounced him "Our Moses, our Martin Luther King," and of course commentators jumped all over that, but think about what His Grace was really saying there. For our sake I hope the man is right, but for Obama's sake, I hope he's wrong.
And part of me won't really believe this until he is sworn in.
Off to pray, off to bed, off to remind myself to hope.
What an enormous relief. I had a lot of nagging doubt, but am delighted that Patrick and the optimists were right after all.
My brother lives in Chicago and my UK brother-in-law in Florida, so it's good news for my family too. For the world ... that goes without saying.
Well done, everybody.
The earth exhales.
Just got home from the street party in Capitol Hill, Seattle. "Yes we can!" "Yeah we did!"
Best headline of the night is the Stranger. [NSFW, if your workplace has an issue with profanity in 60-pt type].
Capitol Hill in Seattle, Pike and Broadway. Strangers crying, laughing, hugging, chanting, "Yes we can!" and "Obama!" and even, truly and touchingly, "U-S-A!" Most beautiful, happy party I've ever been at. Police standing and happily watching the crowds choke the streets, spray champagne, and whoop until we are all hoarse.
Thank you.
"Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing...after they have exhausted all other possibilities." WSC
And the world breathes a sigh of relief.
Thank you, America, for saving the world -- and my little son -- from the prospect of President Palin.
I wake up late for work, sick as a dog and...Obama is president. Dazed. I can't believe it's not a dream. Dammit, wish this was more eloquent.
Can...can we all be Americans now, too?
Stefan #171: "...she's on."*
Thank you, America. If you can get through to the inauguration without anything untoward happening, I might just begin to believe it.
And in congratulating McCain on his "class and honor" during the campaign, Obama showed that you now have a president-elect who fully understands sarcasm. Which can only be a good thing.
*Really obscure film reference.
Amazing news. Also, has anyone noticed yet how eerily accurate Nate Silver's projections were? So far the only thing he's been wrong about was IN, and that was the good kind of wrong. If Obama wins NC (which looks likely), it will be a landslide win even slightly bigger than 538 predicted; if he doesn't, Nate will have been off by 4 EV only (assuming Missouri and Montana go to McCain).
For once I agree with Bush: this was an awesome night.
Congratulations to the U.S.
The rest of the world is celebrating with you.
Congratulations.
I'm going to sound a note now that -- I hope -- won't come over as too negative:
I'm not so much elated as I feel that the world has just dodged a bullet.
This isn't to deny the historical significance of a black president, or of a swing back towards the mainsteam after eight years of misrule; or to carp at the huge outpouring of emotion released by President-elect Obama's victory. But I expect that over the coming years Barack Obama will disappoint me. He is, after all, president of the United States, and that office imposes its own constraints on its occupant: at the end of the day, he's just another king-emperor at the helm of the biggest imperial power on the planet.
But I think the true significance of last night is that America didn't elect a ticket which would have led in short order to a dominionist theocrat occupying that throne.
We dodged a bullet.
And however awry things go over the next four years, I can take some comfort from that.
I understand that at tonight's Canucks - Predators hockey game in Vancouver, when the election was called for Obama, the crowd of 18000+ went nuts and gave a standing ovation.
Thanks America. Welcome back. We're proud of you.
And you can still move to Canada if you want, of course. But we'd rather you did it for the right reasons.
I don't think Mr. Stross is wrong, either - even if Obama can't accomplish much beyond undoing damage, it was just really really important to the rest of the world that the US not be run by another cryptofascist lunatic, because there is important shit to do.
P.S. I loved Halting State and Singularity Sky.
Charlie @ 187... I'm not so much elated as I feel that the world has just dodged a bullet.
As for myself, I am quite elated that the world has just dodged a bullet.
From Finland: congratulations, and thank you!
This isn't a happy ending, but this could be a good beginning.
It's lovely to wake up to a better world.
Thank you.
God bless you all.
The world is a better and safer place today than it was yesterday.
Teresa @133 - From my own small corner of England: I cannot give words to the joy, the hope, the jubilation I feel. America has turned from the darkness and into the light.
Charlie @187 - But the world dodged this bullet because the people the gunman claimed to represent calmly said "No" and took his gun away. That's cause to celebrate, I think. (And yes, I hope they use that gun wisely.)
I've been following it and I cried during Obama's speech too. I wasn't the only one, http://www.abc.net.au/reslib/200811/r310495_1365344.asx is footage from Australia showing Americans here celebrating, and some moving comments from a black man who has lived here for 20 years because Australia gave him a fair go - he never thought he'd see what he just saw.
America lost its way. It was the beacon of hope, it turned into the something grey and ugly. Let's hope Obama can turn that around.
I fear he's a politician though - will any polly give themselves less power? Will he find that Patriot acts and wiretapping and detention are useful tools? Will he find he faces a choice between selling his soul and not being able to pursue his agenda?
Woke up this morning and immediately checked to see how large Obama's win was. Wow. Definitely a landslide. But wait; why is NC still grey?
Double WOW; Obama wins by only 12,000 votes? Bob Barr gets 24,000 votes? I had earlier thought that McCain would narrowly win the state if the voters showed up yesterday, but the rain and the huge early vote return, plus Barr's independent campaign, made Obama's victory possible here.
For the first time in a long while, I can hope that the country is on the correct path again.
After reawakening this morning and seeing that Senate and House were also blue, I had a funny thought: that we would now be able to move on and start changing the world for the better. I am from the UK and haven't considered the USA to be a part of 'we' for the past 28% of my life. Welcome back.
Charles Stross @187: Surely no one here will argue with you that The System is flawed; but why can't we be happy to have the most benevolent, charming god-king if we must have a god-king? (By we I mean the world, obviously. America is still in charge of that, isn't she?) Surely the imperialist god-kingdom of America is not the best of all possible worlds, but I've yet to see a feasible plan to turn this state of affairs into a rainbow-coloured world run by unicorns and puppies (although it must be said that Mr. Obama announced Step One of his plan to transform America into a puppocracy last night).
Charlie Stross #187
I really didn't get some of the so-called libertarians on samizdata.net praising Sarah Palin as an ideal small government conservative and claiming her personal religious views were not relevant.
Are they really prepared to sleepwalk into a theocratic dictatorship just so the very rich can pay slightly lower taxes, or are we guilty of exaggerating the thread the Dominionists pose?
Not that I'm agreeing with them - I agree that we dodged a bullet last night.
Let's hope Bush and Cheney don't do some crazy Gotterdamurung-style stuff before the inauguration.
It's tomorrow and it's still real. My newspaper says right there in black and white, ink on paper, OBAMA WINS. I am saving this front page. Not that it is very easy to preserve newsprint, but I can try.
NC now going into recounts, I think. The margin is so slim, but it's there.
I just drank the jus of one lind, queasen into on pinte of water, to effect of grete vertu. Ooog. Too much chamapagne.
Pleasure mixed with some relief, yes, Charlie.
I took a moment this morning to give my mother (an expat New Yorker) the good news about our state senate by IM before she went off to see a friend (she's on GMT, so it's already lunchtime for her).
I went to bed after hearing that McCain had conceded, and just read Obama's speech. Nice references to Lincoln: he's reaching out to decent Republicans and simultaneously pointing out to them that theocracy and bigotry are not what their, or any, American party is supposed to stand for.
Peter Carlson @161: This just occurred to me today, what country do disgruntled Republicans/NeoCons threaten to move to?
I recall Dubai and Paraguay mentioned.
Daniel @197: well yeah, at the very least Obama has a nicer smile than Dubya, and he sounds much more the kind of bloke I would want to share a six-pack with. It'll be a blessed relief to know that the imperial god-emperor's higher cognitive functions weren't wiped out back when he was a drunken frat boy. We may not be in benevolent hands, but at least we'll be in competent ones.
I'd like to be more positive, but I've had my hopes dashed too many times to be more than cautiously hopeful at this stage. (Get back to me on May 1st 2009, after the first hundred days, and I might sing a different song. I hope.)
Tim @198: I am holding my breath to see what vile parting gifts Cheney and Bush leave on the White House carpet. I wouldn't rule out a midi-scale bombing campaign against Iran, although right now a round of pardons to their cronies followed by a multi-tens-of-billions-of-dollar hand-out seems like the reasonable minimum to expect of them. (Plus a bunch of executive orders stripping endangered species of their protected status, authorizing uranium mining in downtown Berkeley, and generally thumbing their noses at the adults who have to clean up the resulting mess. Oh, and levering the "D", "m", "o", and "t" key caps off all the keyboards in the White House ...)
Charlie Stross @ 187: "But I expect that over the coming years Barack Obama will disappoint me. He is, after all, president of the United States, and that office imposes its own constraints on its occupant: at the end of the day, he's just another king-emperor at the helm of the biggest imperial power on the planet."
I'm under no illusions that Obama is going to do every last thing I want him to do, or even most of them. But God, what a relief, after eight years of Bush, to have a president who might actually give a damn about the opinions of me and mine. To be able to yell at the president for his lukewarm, inferior healthcare plan, not because he's trying to privatize Social Security. To groan about policies that don't go far enough, rather than gnash my teeth about ones marching off in the wrong direction. To have someone who disagrees about how we'll get there, but not about where we want to go.
Maybe it's pitiful and sad, but I'm going to be ecstatically happy just to have someone who disappoints me less. And even that I'll leave for tomorrow; today, celebration.
i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes we can
How many have kids or grandkids who are six years old? Per a Making Light thread several months ago, this may be the first world event they remember.
Well, one of the nasty little presents the Bush administration is determined to leave Obama is this:
Basically, the Bush administration is running through the regulations and loosening restrictions as fast as they can. Ok, you say, President Obama will just sign new regulations returning them to the old rules. No, he won't, and here's why.
Relaxing restrictions is easy; it takes the stroke of a President's pen. Making them MORE restrictive, though, requires an environmental study, a comment period, a review period, an appeal process, a review of the appeal, another comment period, and finally, a finding of the various benefits/impacts before it can be enacted into law.
--Even if it just goes back to the original rules--
Think we should keep an eye out for movement in the Doomsday Clock? Those are Obama's colleagues at UChi....
Allan @ 204: The daughter I took into the voting booth me is 6. Both she and her older brother are thrilled with the victory. Partly for their own reasons; when I took her to school today, one of the first things she excitedly told her classmates was "Obama's daughters are getting a puppy when they go to the white house!"
Charlie Stross, #187: "he's just another king-emperor at the helm of the biggest imperial power on the planet."
He's president of the most powerful democratic federation on earth, and his election gives the world hope for democracy. He is a multicultural brown-skinned man. Any reservations I will save for other threads; he has so far surpassed my expectations.
I went to bed last night feeling exactly as Charlie said. I'm not so much elated by the future as less wary of it.
In a perfect world, the choice would have been Good vs Evil*. In the real world America's choices were Fairly Decent vs Malicious. And any good-leaning man can only do so much while still respecting your built-in constitutional protections.
(*Not really. A perfect world would have Good on both sides.)
John L @ 205: "Relaxing restrictions is easy; it takes the stroke of a President's pen. Making them MORE restrictive, though, requires an environmental study, a comment period, a review period, an appeal process, a review of the appeal, another comment period, and finally, a finding of the various benefits/impacts before it can be enacted into law."
So might as well make them more restrictive than before, right? Sounds like a great excuse to tighten up regulations across the board.
I'm not speechless, and here's my little Speech:
The excitement is over. Now, we can get down to slogging work.
[And no, I'm not exactly delighted by that prospect, or confident that I'll do as much work as is needed.]
Delurking with hope I can't possibly fail this:
Congratulations to all that worked toward this end, and to those that didn't. May every further step down the dark road ahead be as light and decisive as this one.
The world feels like a better place today.
Thank you for the cakes.
Congratulations to you all. Here in the UK we will now celebrate by letting off fireworks and burning a catholic in effigy. Baby steps...
Charlie:
Yeah, except it's not like we just barely dodged it. McCain was massively, visibly less popular than Obama, and that showed up in the votes, the polls, the sizes of the rallies, etc. And it seems to me that we mostly dodged it for the right reasons--people seemed to be turned off by the smarmy guilt-by-association crap McCain tried at the end of the campaign, by the horrible choice of Palin as VP, and most of all, by the abysmal record of McCain's party over the last eight years.
From the exit polls at the (currently very slow) cnn, and their 2004 exit poll summary:
McCain got 43% of the white vote, and a majority only of white voters 18-29. This was only a small shift from 2004, where Kerry got 41% of the white vote. In 2004, Bush did much better among black voters (11%) than McCain did in 2008 (4%). The obvious guess is that a black candidate had an effect there, both directly and in the backlash from the smears directed at him. The Latino vote shifted heavily toward Obama, presumably because of the whole anti-immigrant popular movement among Republicans; in 2004, Kerry won 53% of those voters, but Obama just won 66%.
The 2004 election breakdown across income lines was really straightforward--the more you made, the more likely you were to vote for Bush. In 2004, it was both more complicated and closer at the high incomes--presumably, plenty of folks in the higher income brackets have lost faith in Republicans' ability to do anything sensible with the economy. It's striking to me that it was almost even in most of the higher income brackets, and that the top income bracket went to Obama.
It's really strange to me to see how this is:
a. A complete, overwheming ass-kicking in terms of electoral votes.
b. A pretty good drubbing in terms of seats in Congress.
c. Quite close in terms of popular vote.
I wonder how healthy it is to have the electoral vote totals so disconnected from the popular vote totals. I'm not sure either way.
I also wonder what this will do to the coalition that held the Republican party together for the last 20 years or so. After four or eight years with a black president and first family, I wonder how well the Southern Strategy will continue to work. The demographics for that strategy look pretty bad--Obama got the majority of white voters under 30, which implies that the future doesn't belong to the party that bases a lot of its appeal on being the party of white guys who don't much like blacks. More broadly, the survey results on all kinds of racial and social issues look very bad for the current Republican coalitions. Younger people are way less interested in banning gay marriage, and way less invested in voting on the basis of race.
It's going to be a very interesting next four years in politics. I wonder what the odds are that the Republicans will re-form into a sensible and decent conservative party. That would make the victory of the good guys in this election really complete.
But for now, the good guys have won, the bad guys are off licking their wounds and scratching their heads about what happened to them, and things look brighter for the world than they have in a little while.
#197, why can't we be happy to have the most benevolent, charming god-king if we must have a god-king:
I am still saying "President Barack Obama" to myself, in joy and wonder. "President". Not "King". And not -- never, ever, ever -- "God-King".
Looks like the creators of "Palin in the Oval Office" have updated their site one last, final time:
http://www.palinaspresident.us/
Looking at that, I must have gotten something in my eyes...
Congratulations, President-elect Barack Obama!!!
Charlie: I think that pretty much all British people have what is essentially PTSD about Blair. We voted for him. We felt like this after the 1997 election. Then look what happened. (I literally emigrated.)
But while history has patterns it doesn't really repeat exactly and nothing is inevitable. Obama isn't Blair, the US isn't Britain, 2008 isn't 1997.
Obama doesn't walk on water. But I think it's more than dodging a bullet. The US system worked the way it's supposed to. The election wasn't stolen. They elected somebody who sounds like an intelligent person. I don't mean we should therefore switch our brains off, but I think it's all right to be happy.
Love the Onion headline: Nation Finally Shitty Enough To Make Social Progress
WASHINGTON—President-elect Barack Obama did very well among women and young voters, who were most sensitive to the current climate of everything being fucked.
Dammit, the Internet ate my comment. My daughter's five (and a half!) and I hope this is her earliest political memory. My husband and I both share Reagan's election as ours. (In our respective mock-elections, I voted for Carter, because, duh, he was the president and he voted for Reagan but can't remember why. I think he's still suffering from the shame of it.) The kiddo just happened to wake up during McCain's concession speech, so Aaron brought her down and we watched it and Obama's speech together. She wondered about the whole "Yes we can" thing, so maybe it'll stick with her.
We're also thinking about taking her to the inauguration, but that might also be insane. Haven't decided yet.
I'm very excited about my vote having mattered for once! But now I'm feeling like it's like being pregnant - you spend all your time preparing for the Big Event, and then you do the whole birth thing, and you realize - oh crap, that wasn't the finish line, it was the starting line. Now what?
(We brought our daughter home and set her on the coffee table, but I don't think you handle the president-elect in quite the same way.)
You know, it's going to be nice, looking at a President and not thinking that he makes Richard Nixon look good.
Obama is no saint. He'll disappoint, but he'll still do the best he can for this country, and that because, unlike the current bum, he gives a g*dd*mn*d f*ck about it.
Oh, and levering the "D", "m", "o", and "t" key caps off all the keyboards in the White House ...)
That would be grounds for demotion.
Charlie #187: I feel pretty much the same way about the election, though I'll give Obama a chance on issues that played little or no roll in his campaign, such as dismantling the private "security" industry (by which I mean the mercenary industry that grew up in the last 8 years) and dismantling the ineffectual but invasive excesses of the Department of Homeland Security. But right now I'm feeling pretty hopeful about the outcome. It certainly is satisfying to throw the bastards out.
Nicole @ 142 - Schaffer is a despicable human being, so his comments are just what you'd expect. He's objectively pro-child-labor, sex-slavery, etc (for those who don't know the delightful Mr Schaffer, google Schaffer Mariana for details). Not unusual for a Republican, still it is a matter of some astonishment to me that he got any votes at all.
I grew up in South Africa under the apartheid regime. This is the second time I've voted for a black president, and I liked it even better this time ;-) hooray for everybody, and a puppy.
Now the hard work starts..
Yesterday I managed to totter down the hill to the polling place on my own two feet, and make it back home all right too. Even though AZ went for McCain (defying *my* neighborhood's signs) and gay marriage may have taken a beating, when I watched the TV results last night I found reason to hope as I haven't for many years. McCain reverting to his better nature in the concession speech? Obama's superb and moving oratory? Though I still fear for his safety before and after the inauguration, it's amazing to feel a glimmer of relief and joy.
Jenny, #176: Moses, leading his people out of the desert? I can get behind that, even if it's not my religion.
Charlie, #187: Seconded. No matter what Obama does or fails to do, he's not going to be sitting in the Oval Office thinking that he was put there to usher in the End Times. And that's a HUGE victory for America.
Albatross @214:
a. A complete, overwheming ass-kicking in terms of electoral votes.
b. A pretty good drubbing in terms of seats in Congress.
c. Quite close in terms of popular vote.
Welcome to the evils of first-past-the-post voting, aka winner takes all.
We've got that system in the UK; if the Liberal Democrats (my preferred party) were allocated seats proportional to their share of the vote they'd have more than 160 MPs, rather than 50-odd.
(See also: the difficulty of launching a third party in the USA.)
I agree, the southern strategy appears to be comprehensively broken. And I can only see that as a very good thing indeed.
Lisa @215: snarky comments aside, the US president does seem to have powers modelled rather closely on those of a late 18th century British monarch, with added term limits. And the attitude of the general public to positions of power in your country never ceases to give me the creeps. We fought a series of civil wars, back in the day, to put limits on monarchy -- put the king on trial for his crimes and chopped his head off when he was found guilty as charged. Now our monarchy is a lot better domesticated, looking at overseas reimplementations is a bit weird ...
Allan Beatty (#204) and Cat Meadors (#219)
My daughter's five and three-quarters, and she is thoroughly delighted that Sen. Obama won. She has taken an passionate interest in this election (mostly because her parents have been passionately interested...) and proudly accompanied us to the polls to cast her vote in a "Kids Vote!" poll. Her kindergarten class even held a mock election -- Obama swept, 12 to 5 to 1 lonely Ron Paul holdout. So I think she'll definitely remember this.
We are so joyful here. Although many local races did not go our way, and the anti-gay marriage amendment (I'm in FL) passed (GRRRRR), I at least feel like the country will have someone responsible at its helm.
Jo @217: yes, you nailed it. I've definitely got more than a touch of Blair-induced PTSD here.
Charlie, I think Obama knows we're watching. That may be all it takes to kick him onto the path of ... well, maybe "good" is impossible given reality, but still -- reality's got a well-known liberal bias. Maybe we can actually make this work.
But all this is triviality, people. Because for the first time in my life, I AM FROM A BLUE STATE! WOOOOOOOOOO!
In the meantime, Bruce's link yesterday was a good one. What should Barack be doing on January 20, 2009?
Day One: Stop Torture, Close Guantanamo, End Extraordinary Renditions
I have to agree with the ACLU on this one. Let's turn America into the good guys again. Could there possibly be a higher priority?
76 days left!
Now, jokes aside, what will happen in these 76 days?
I did some mean-spirited surfing of wingnut blogs, and what I find surprising -- though I suppose I shouldn't -- is that the lumpen right really seems to believe that we've elected a far-left president, and that he is a marxist. I guess this is blowback from some of the more unsavory propagandizing of the McCain campaign.
Myself, I never felt entirely comfortable with Obama's stated positions because he seems to be too centrist.
I suppose I shouldn't wonder WHY they feel this way. It's just GOP blowback.
Michael Roberts@230: "Day One: Stop Torture, Close Guantanamo, End Extraordinary Renditions"
And end limitations on gays serving in the military -- asked, told, stated, or observed. He can do it; the nation is clearly not *unanimously* opposed to it; and the military is still in enough real-world actually-being-shot-at combat to remember what *really* makes a serviceman fit or unfit for duty.
Kathryn Cramer @ 232... we've elected a far-left president, and that he is a marxist
"I don't know what they have to say / It makes no difference anyway / Whatever it is, I'm against it. / No matter what it is or who commenced it, I'm against it! / Your proposition may be good / But let's have one thing understood: / Whatever it is, I'm against it. / And even when you've changed it or condensed it, I'm against it! / For months before my son was born / I used to yell from night till morn: / Whatever it is, I'm against it! / And I've kept yelling since I've first commenced it, I'm against it."
(From Horse Feathers)
John L @ 216: with music at http://www.barackaspresident.com/
Sorry, retract that, for some reason I didn't get the audio the first time round.
Andrew @234: The gays in the military thing is something he should not touch right now I think. It's really a small issue compared to what the real worries are. He doesn't need to get bogged down in that kind of issue at the start.
Kathryn Cramer @232, keep in mind that these people saw Bill Clinton as a Communist Marxist, too. As Patrick McKinnion put it, meet the new crap, same as the old crap.
Doug @223 - I actually was surprised, since I hadn't really read up on Schaffer. I just knew I liked Udall. In addition to having watched his career approvingly, I've met the man. He pinged all my "good person" vibes. So my vote wasn't in question.
Although... I'm also surprised that someone would say such a thing on actual camera. Either they're moral and know it sucks, or they're cynical politicians and know it doesn't play well. Is Shaffer indicating a retirement from political hopes, here?
Seems like there were a million other Scha[e]ffers running this time around. One of them was a Dem. I know I get confused!
I woke up and yesterday wasn't a dream. Time to get to work!
Congratulations, America. I knew you had it in you!
Lee@173: I don't actually know; I live on the other side of the country.
I've only been to one inaugural parade: Clinton's 2nd. It was bitter cold and the crowd was so huge that I could hardly see anything. My son, who was 11 at the time, could see a bit less. We caught just a glimpse of Clinton's car as it went by. Still, just being part of it was fun. We bought souvenir buttons and hotdogs. (Er, the hotdogs weren't souvenirs; we ate them.) Everyone in the crowd was so friendly and happy. I'm going to go to Obama's parade. (Sheesh--spellchecker needs to learn Obama.)
OK, on top of some sleep, I am sitting here listening to my public radio station play (so far since I turned on the Morning Show) "I Have a Dream," "God Bless America," "Yes We Can-Can, Baby Yes We Can," "Only in America," and "This Land is Your Land," original version.
Up 'n' at 'em, out of the Slough of Despond, and hallelujah, we have elected a man who will NOT respond to some murderous wingnut calling for jihad by making a speech that includes the word "crusade." And he can pronounce "nuclear!"
I hope he takes a hard look at the shaky roots of No Child Left Alone--I mean, Behind--and urges the Congresscritters to dismantle the damn thing. Children are not educated by means of multiple-choice tests.
Larry@238 (is that an explosive isotope?) -- I mention it because it's the kind of thing that *doesn't* have to bog down. Guantanamo can bog down, because there are people there (guard and prisoners) and something has to be done with them that accords with legal practice. Fixing the economy is a bog, a marsh, and the Bermuda Triangle all in one. But writing an executive order to the military doesn't require a coalition. Once it's done, it's *Obama* saying "What? Why are we still discussing this? We've got important issues to worry about."
(I *think* torture and extraordinary rendition fall into the same category.)
And the announcer just said, "Hey, didja know, Obama was Irish?" and went into somebody in some pub singing, "There's No One as Irish as Barack O'Bama." His granddaddy's granddaddy's one Michael O'Carney,/He's as Irish as the green of Killarney/His mam's from a long line of great Irish mammas/There's no one as Irish as Barack Obama!
First laugh in the past 24 hours.
Kathryn Cramer @232 the lumpen right really seems to believe that we've elected a far-left president
I've forgotten the term for the psychological effect - anchor theory, maybe? - but people develop implicit beliefs about what's middle-of-the-road based on what they see most often. So if you get all your news from far-right sources, then Obama looks remarkably far left by comparison.
In other news, I was just out for lunch here in Washington DC. All of the newspapers in the vending bank that sells about 10 different papers were gone. People are going to keep that front page.
And the street vendors are selling "President Obama" t-shirts. Makes me wonder if someone couldn't estimate election probabilities pretty accurately the good old capitalist way, by seeing how many "President Obama" t-shirts were printed pre-election vs. how many "President McCain."
Otter, well, if you've been following 538 (and if you have as fanatical a belief in SCIENCE! (with the exclamation mark) as some of us do), you would've known for about a month that there was no way in hell for McCain to win this anymore in absence of a Osama endorsement video swift-boated into a tall coast structure.
#226: snarky comments aside, the US president does seem to have powers modelled rather closely on those of a late 18th century British monarch, with added term limits. And the attitude of the general public to positions of power in your country never ceases to give me the creeps.
Totally. This is why I've been going on (and on) about how it's important to watch and to be as good about being critical about the new playing field as folks have been about the old.
At the June filking convention, Contata, Harold Feld led us in Leslie Fish's arrangement of Kipling's "The Old Issue", where eight years of rage and pain and fear and frustration just came pouring out. I do not wish to forget, ever, that the trigger for this performance was not something from the Republican side, but a disappointment in Obama.
I still voted for him, as I believe Harold did, and the reason I say "believe" is that I was not actually in the booth with him. But I do not wish to forget, and I want to make sure that, even as I cry with joy at Obama's acceptance speech, my brain has not been turned off.
And another thing: I'm too young to remember the Berlin Wall falling, much less the moon landings. All the First World heads of government I know of have been old white dudes, except for Kim Campbell and she doesn't count. For me -- and I imagine a lot of other people my age -- this is my "one giant leap for mankind".
Also, now whenever people say, "That's too radical, you have to compromise, people aren't ready" (as some say about gay marriage, etc.), I get to retort that the United States just elected a freakin' black guy named Barack Hussein Obama for President. Don't tell me what people aren't ready for!
Lee @ 225: The comparison someone made at Grant Park yesterday was of MLK as Moses, leading his people to the edge of the Promised Land but not himself arriving, and Obama as Joshua, the one who actually got there.
(Mind you, most of the book of Joshua in the Bible is a loving, stage-by-stage description of a genocide, but I don't think that invalidates the image).
Sudden thought:
Might Bush the Lesser pardon Senator Stevens?
What effect would that legally have on his position in the senate? I'm more worried about the thousands of other people he might pardon, though.
I'm happy to report that the results of Prop 8 notwithstanding, the streets of Hollywood last night were filled with revelers. On my corner there was an impromptu band made up of local musicians. I danced and danced, and hugged strangers and screamed Dylan lyrics into the night. Peace and love to all of you.
253: Presumably would have no effect either way on Stevens' position in the Senate. A 2/3 vote to expel. (Which means somewhere around a dozen Republican votes to expel needed - the vote could be a leading indicator of how solidly the Republican minority will hold together).
Bill @ #252,
It has long been clear that Bush (and Stevens!) is utterly shameless.
I expect a long list of pardons that will read like "Who's Who in Right-wing Politics" over the next 76 days.
...If we're lucky, Bush is/will be arrogant enough to think he doesn't need to pardon anyone.
But I'm not holding my breath.
Daniel Klein @248 Otter, well, if you've been following 538 (and if you have as fanatical a belief in SCIENCE! (with the exclamation mark) as some of us do), you would've known for about a month that there was no way in hell for McCain to win this anymore in absence of a Osama endorsement video swift-boated into a tall coast structure.
I've been following 538 intermittently, in an I-really-hope-it's-true-but-I'll-believe-it-when-I-see-it kind of way. I do social science for a living, and I believe in science AND believe that there are innumerable ways for statistics to be badly misleading for the most unintentional of reasons. (We won't even consider intentional.) Therefore, I'm amused in some theoretical way by the idea of a totally independent way of measuring "who do you think will win," without yet another freaking survey, just a pure case of putting your money where your mouth is.
If "we'd known for about a month that there's no way in hell for McCain to win this anymore," IMHO there wouldn't be such a strong current of relief in this thread.
Bush will pardon only the ones who might bring him down with them. Anyone else will be left twisting in the wind. It's what this Administration does.
In the meantime, a little cross-cultural poetry, courtesy of my partner and me getting silly while out running errands:
Remember, remember the 4th of November
Republican meltdown and flop.
The principal reason they faltered this season:
The real-estate bubble went pop!
Their cronies weren't troubled when gas prices doubled
And people were shouting for change;
But to tilt the election back to their direction
Was something they couldn't arrange.
(Additions welcomed...)
I really have a problem with anyone who considered a vote for Proposition 8 a vote for religious tolerance. It's a vote for tolerating intolerance.
Jenny @ #246, the O'Bama song can be heard and seen at this YouTube link.
Dave #260:
As such, isn't it a form of hate crime?
Skwid, I've been trying all day to get your WE CAN HAS to post as a Particle. We're having site problems.
This is a really cute great video.. a song called "Oh Obama Don't Break My Heart" very witty I think and with hopes/fears we can relate with. Plus she has a pretty voice to boot!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4bZw9FmXZ4
definitely should check it out:)
joann@262
I think if it's not hate crime it's in the same neighborhood.
NC is going to go for Obama, finally; the unofficial vote tally has him 13,000+ votes over McCain, and the provisional vote always breaks in the same way as the regular vote goes, according to our Election Commissioner.
It will take until next month to count all those votes so they can't certify the result until then, but you can put NC into the pile for Obama!
Can Bush legally pardon himself?
Earl - I was going to say "no", then I was going to say that I don't know -- then I realized that it's this kind of constitutional crisis question that has been a mainstay of his entire administration. I'm sure he and John Yoo say it's OK, and who are you to say otherwise?
It'll be good to have a president again instead of a wannabe king.
"How many have kids or grandkids who are six years old? Per a Making Light thread several months ago, this may be the first world event they remember."
As far as I can tell, the first event I remember - rather than colors and shapes and such - is Reagan's first inauguration. It's pretty fragmentary, though, and doesn't include the part that's passed into family legend, when I apparently burst into tears and ran and hid behind the couch.
This makes a much better memory.
Daniel Klein @248: IIRC, 538 was predicting the chances of a McCain win at somewhere between 3% and 6% for most of that period, and their chart of possible electoral vote fallouts was clearly showing a number of numerical ways it could happen.
I tend to reserve "no way in hell" for things that are a few orders of magnitude less likely than rolling a D20 and coming up 20. If all it would take is McCain to roll a critical success on a single-die unmodified roll, then it's sure enough possible.
Charlie Stross @ 226: "snarky comments aside, the US president does seem to have powers modelled rather closely on those of a late 18th century British monarch, with added term limits."
That comparison might be a little off, given how weak the presidency was as originally conceived. If it was a monarchy they were modelling off of, (and to some extent they no doubt were--it was typical executive position of the time) it was a substantially weaker monarch that they were creating. Today's powerful presidency* is as much a product of two centuries of evolution as it is of the Founder's intent. If there are substantial similarities between the monarch's of the late 18th century and the heads of state today, those similarities might be the result of convergent evolution, rather than intentional reproduction.
*Not even bringing into the conversation the blatantly unconstitutional power grabs of the Bush regime, which bear resemblance to nothing so much as mid-20th century third-world (American-backed) coups.
Earl Cooley III @ 267: "Can Bush legally pardon himself?"
Doesn't one have to be accused before one can be pardoned? If we all wait until he's out of office to file charges against him and his cronies, I don't think he can make preemptive pardons.
elise, #126, at 0230ET Wednesday morning, Brian Williams remarked that the Coleman/Franken race was very unusual. And then he said "But they're like that up there."
Lisa Padol, #175, even if the Dems had gotten 60 seats, they wouldn't necessarily be filibuster-proof. Not all Dems will vote the same way (you live near DC, you get to hear about all the votes).
Dan S, #269, my first event wasn't political. In fact, between mostly living on base, not having a TV or not much access to one, and not going to school, I really wasn't aware of politics until I was 13 and canvassed for Hubert Humphrey. I volunteered for George McGovern's Norfolk office in the next Presidential election, but my first Presidential vote went to Jimmy Carter. (I knew about how presidents were elected, etc., but I'd never really understood what the big deal was until we got stationed at the Pentagon and I went to school for the first time.)
People were lined up early this morning to buy WashPosts for the front page and more had been printed, but they ran out of those soon. The WashPost printed 250K front pages and gave those out to the rest of the people in line.
No, the one person Bush can't pardon is himself. That, and persons who have been impeached.
[posted from 71.141.107.33]
The Rude Pundit lives up to his name. It's a tad vulgar, but you expect that from him, right?
Could he wrap up the last perhaps-not-completely-legal activities of his administration on 01/16, pardon everyone in his administration except for himself on 01/17, resign on 01/18 and get pardoned by Cheney on 01/19? (No, I don't think that's likely to happen.)
Marilee, we certainly are.
Get me started on Coleman's divide-and-conquer strategy against the GLBT community sometime, and I'll tell you a tale. (Short form: our bigoted officials are apparently more knowledgeable about the bi and trans communities than similar bigots elsewhere... but it still didn't help him much.)
@274 -- View All By shows only 2 posts with identical content; the other one is in the Content of His Character thread.
There's a collection of photos of celebrations from around the world on the Reasons To Be Cheerful, Part 3 blog.. Also, on my Word Face-Off blog, I did a comparison of Obama's victory speech and McCain's concession. I looked into the length of words, sentences, etc. I also included all-inclusive word clouds.
Coming in late: Great, he won. As others said, a real relief.
But I suppose I've seen too many elections and too many false dawns. In England they thought Tony Blair would be a new beginning after the failures and 'sleaze' of the Conservative party; how quickly that went sour. Obama looks like a new beginning too - I just hope and pray that he can hold his nerve, and avoid giving the favours he owes too quickly and too carelessly, and remember his principles, and remember where he came from and what he saw as he grew up in Java and Hawaii.
Too much of the media comment is emphasizing his blackness. Yes, he's the first mixed-race president, and that's for celebration, but he mustn't allow it to define him, or let others do so. (Besides, I'm sure there are people out there saying he's 'not black enough', as they did of Halle Berry after she became the first non-white Bond Girl.)
An early trap will be how he handles his Kenyan relations. It'll be hard to tread the line between risking accusations of favoritism or nepotism on the one side, and headlines saying 'Obama spurns his cousins' on the other.
OK, enough of the grumpy. I liked the speech where he went over the historical landmarks in the life of the 106-year-old lady, ending with her voting for the first time: Yes We Can.
#280 - "Too much of the media comment is emphasizing his blackness. Yes, he's the first mixed-race president, and that's for celebration, but he mustn't allow it to define him, or let others do so."
I could not agree more, or express it better.
The AP just announced that NC will officially be named as going to Obama. WOO HOO!!
(Yeah, I know it's late and doesn't really matter, but it's the first time I've voted in a state that went blue, and NC hasn't voted for a Democrat since 1976.)
hesiarch @271:
To the best of my knowledge:
In order to be eligible to be pardoned, one must be convicted of a crime before a court of law.
Accepting a pardon is acknowledgement of guilt for the crime to which the pardon pertains.
The President of the USA may not pardon anyone who has been impeached.
Halle Berry after she became the first non-white Bond Girl.
Michelle Yeoh doesn't count for some reason?
Skwid @ 159
Made of awesome! May I LJ iconize that?
John Stanning @280, a nitpick. Halle Berry may have been the first African-American / Black Bond girl, but she certainly wasn't the first non-white one, unless Asian suddenly counts as white? Mie Hama as Kissy Suzuki in "You Only Live Twice," in 1967, ought to count as the first.
Rikibeth and John Stanning:
Grace Jones in "A View To A Kill" doesn't count?
dolloch, Kissy Suzuki pre-dates Grace Jones for non-white, and technically speaking May Day wasn't a Bond Girl, she was a Hot Villainess character. Tanya Roberts as Stacy Sutton was that movie's Bond Girl.
Rosie Carver: There's a...
James Bond: Oh, a snake. I forgot, I should have told you. You should never go in there without a mongoose.
(from To Live and Let Die)
Ah, I get it. I was thinking African-American, but my definition of Bond Girl was off in any case.
Rikibeth @286: unless Asian suddenly counts as white?
Wasn't the general consensus that Asians (at least the lighter-skinned ones) are currently in the process of being reclassified?
Raphael @291, I couldn't tell you about consensus, my perspective is skewed from having grown up in a Boston suburb just after the South Boston unpleasantness, and in the middle of the first big tech boom. Kids from Chinese, Japanese, and Indian families lived in town and rode the same school buses as the rest of us; black kids rode the METCO buses back into Boston, with very few exceptions. (I think I was about seven when I asked my mom why Sam and Connie didn't ride the same bus as all the other black kids. Wow did I get a lecture.) Add in the fact that I was Jewish, and called up in front of the class to explain my Interesting and Exotic Holidays just as often as Archana Mehra was called on to come up and explain HERS... except she go to do a dance recital with a gorgeous costume on the gym stage, and I didn't have anything that pretty to show off.
My perceptions of relative whiteness are kinda weird.
Lori Coulson@283
Presidential pardons can be given before conviction (e.g. George H.W. Bush's pardons of Caspar Weinberger and five other former Reagan officials in December 1992) and even before a formal indictment (e.g. Ford's pardon of Nixon in September 1974).
Belated congratulations to all.
(I've been away from the Internets for a couple of days, my scientifictional futurological insightometer not being well-calibrated enough to register that the 5th of November is the day after the 4th ...)
This is a great, great day for the human race.
John L @ #282, as I said at my place, somewhere Jesse Helms is screaming "No!"
#295: . . . somewhere Jesse Helms is screaming "No!"
Actually, that was his reaction to the new battery acid enemas they're trying out this week on his level of hell.
They're saving the news about Obama until his birthday.
Linkmeister, #295: Boy, talk about people you wish could have lived long enough to see something...
Carrie, 284: Michelle Yeoh didn't become incompetent the second Bond showed up. Therefore she isn't a true Bond Girl.
Lori 283: In order to be eligible to be pardoned, one must be convicted of a crime before a court of law.
Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon for anything he may or may not have done while in office. Isn't that a counterexample?
Xopher #299: Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon for anything he may or may not have done while in office. Isn't that a counterexample?
Bush v1.0's controversial pardon of Caspar Weinberger is another. The scenario where Dubya resigns long enough for President Cheney (tosses a pinch of salt over the left shoulder and whispers "bread and butter") to pardon him is workable.
Ken #294 "This is a great, great day for the human race"
Yup, not all bad a day at'all.
Stefan #296 Please. Don't remind me of my first cancer and its treatment. More than half a decade later the memories still … erk, ugh, erk.
Responders to my #280: thanks for the corrections - I'd forgotten the sequence of the Bond films. Anyway, for the point that I was making, I should have specified "African-American" rather than "non-white".
TexAnne: Yeah, but she ended up boffing him at the end of the film.
The Russian chick in "Goldeneye" didn't become incompetent either, I don't think, but she was a Bond girl.
Just as an aside: I want to say how much I appreciate all the people that got involved in the campaign and did all the work, which includes a lot of people here. I didn't do any of that, but I did free-ride on your hard work to happily cast a vote in an election I was about 99% sure was in the bag. Those of us who free rode will hold our patriotism cheap while any speak, who fought with you upon election day. (Something in Obama's acceptance speech made me think of that.)
I also have a vague thought that it might be interesting to find out, a few years from now, how many people met their husbands or wives on the campaign, given both the intense energy and the large participation of young people.
302: "Sick Boy? He's got no moral fibre."
"He knows a hell of a lot about Sean Connery films."
"That's hardly a substitute."
-- Trainspotting
Carrie S @ 303... The Russian chick in "Goldeneye" didn't become incompetent
Hey, that's X-men's Famke Jansen as the assassin with the killer thighs! Hey, that's X-men 2's Alan Cumming as the hacker!
Hey, that's X-men's Famke Jansen as the assassin with the killer thighs!
No, not her, the other one. The not-evil one.
Carrie @307 - It's probably A Bad Thing that I knew at once you meant Natalya Simonova, but had entirely forgotten the name of the actress (Izabella Scorupco).
MoveOn.org is offering totally frigging awesome "Yes We Did" stickers FREE.
I donated $20 and got fifty of them.
albatros: I don't know that you "free rode", for all that it's hard to fathom, speaking here gets one a fair bit of notice.
I am reminded when I get emails because of things I've said here (that and things like about.com taking a post I made her and using it as the entry on interrogation... whoa).
So your comments here count, at some level as working for the change.
No, in a campaign like this we can't count is as serving who only stand and wait, but taking part in online discussion is doing something.
My constributions were small (if you ask me) but I do feel I share in the victory, and I think so to do you.
gck... albatross: bad fingers.
About gays in the military:
Yes, I'd love to see that. No, it's not the thing to start with. I was enlisting when Clinton tried it (really, my first trip to MEPS was the day he announced it; from when I started the process [a few days before that] to the time it ended, they stopped asking if I liked to sleep with boys), and it's a third rail sort of thing; the blowback would derail other things which need to be done.
There's also the problem of Art. 128 (which needs to be repealed, regardless) saying that only handjobs and penile-vaginal sex are legal (and the handjobs have to be mixed gender). You may contort yourselves in any way you like, so long as you stick to those two things.
Anything else, and you can end up with a long prison term and a Dishonorable Discharge.
A comment on how much change Obama might be able to pull off: the real power of his election was the activism and the enthusiasm surrounding and supporting it. Harness that, and things could get very interesting; it will be a lot easier to accomplish real change if the real grassroots are motivated to hold their reps' feet to the fire.
(I can also think of ways it can be abused, or turned against him. This will have to be managed carefully.)
Yow, check out the Artists' Statement on the election-day issue of The Pain, When Will It End?.
I didn't know he had that kind of eloquence in him!
Rikkibeth @ 292
Coming from a similar background, I guess my perceptions are sorta skewed too*. Maybe it's my anti-white bigotry showing, but a couple of years of living in Boston (the city, not the suburbs) in the early '70s left me with the distinct impression that Southie is always unpleasant.
* Or did I leave out an "r"?
David Harmon @ #314, I've never seen that site before, but he expressed some of what I've been feeling very well.
Stefan @ #296 and Lee @ #297, yes. Mr. Helms was one of my least favorite people. Other than Bush and Cheney, he might have been the politician whose name got mentioned most on my blog between 2001-2006, and not in a complimentary way.
Bruce Cohen @ 315, I've never lived in Boston itself, just the suburbs and Cambridge, and I believe there's been a gentrification effect in Southie in recent years.
But I meant the school desegregation "busing" riots, c. 1974. I couldn't parse them at the time -- what was so awful about riding a bus to school? I lived outside my elementary school's 1-mile radius that separated walkers from riders, and I was very much looking forward to riding the school bus when I started kindergarten the next year.
Rikibeth @ 317... I was very much looking forward to riding the school bus
Me too, especially during winter.
Good lord, I hated riding the bus in elementary school, except for fourth grade, where through a quirk in scheduling we got so few people on our route that I never had to sit near anyone else. Otherwise it was like an inescapable prison full of criminals, but totally lacking in guards.
As of this afternoon we still don't have a definite winner in the Maryland 1st congressional, but unless there is a huge flood of Republican late absentee and provisional votes, it looks as the the Democrats get the seat.
C. Wingate, I said I was looking forward to riding the bus before I started kindergarten. The reality of it turned out more like you described.
Latest report on the Alaska Senate race. The first batch of previously uncounted absentee/early/questionable votes has been tallied. Just under a third of the previously uncounted absentee/early/questionable ballots were in this batch.
Begich has now closed the gap to 971 votes (down from 3257). One more batch is going to be counted today, and the rest Friday or later.
(According to Nate Silver over at fivethirtyeight.com, the districts that will be reporting on Friday or later generally supported Begich.)
The latest report is that Begich is ahead by three votes.
Nate Silver's site says Begich currently up by 814.
And apparently there will be some ballots counted today, after all. The remaining ballots will be counted over the next few days.
(There's also the possibility of a recount.)
