Double Digits

From Northern Virginia: yes, this is communist country, but keep in mind that Jim Webb won his Senate seat in 2006 by running up the score here (and holding George Allen's margins elsewhere in the state). I've been out canvassing all day. I've been tripping over Obama canvassers. I've been sent to 4 different locations because each place has had more volunteers than it needs. I've seen Obama people standing on street corners with signs and at all the Metro stations. I haven't seen a single McCain canvasser. Yes, Obama was always going to win here. But he's going to win by the margin he does because of the ground game. And we're going back out for one long push from 3pm until the polls close at 7pm.

At 9:30 AM in Altoona, we parked next to a sedan with Nobama stickers. The local Democratic county commissioner, also a theater friend, was poll-watching. We were the youngest in the polling place by ten to thirty years. One polling lady was chatting with a voter about who was in the hospital again. Voting took no more than 15 minutes.

We voted straight ticket except that I voted for the state congressional incumbent, who has no opposition anyway. I was glad for that as he is an old cycling buddy.

Hope this calms peoples' nerves a little...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/04/pollster-calms-paranoid-d_n_140960.html

Boring, but nice considering the potential for freaky crap when it comes to voting in the good ol' US of A:

Voted on the first day of early voting in Texas. 45 minute wait, recognized lots of people in line, no problems.

One thing- as I walked up to my booth, I noticed the man next to me just making simple mark/lines in the boxes an not filling them all the way in. I'm afraid folks just don't like to read directions...

Already voted early in NC with 2.6 million others (42% of REGISTERED voters voted before today in NC).

What we're hearing across the state though is that there were some inital lines in the hours before 9am, especially in the two largest counties of Wake (Raleigh) and Mecklenburg (Charlotte). But that since then it's been slow. There's rain across the state but most are attributing the lack of lines to the massive early vote turnout.

An interesting ancedote, several people have noted that they had to wait in line longer for a free Krispy Kreme doughnut (with an I voted sticker) that they did for voting.

I would suggest that the lack of massive turnout today probably bodes well for Democrats because they turned out in much higher numbers the in early voting (50% of early voters were Democrats and only 30% were Republicans).

We voted early. It was easy. We did listen to Palin this morning. She said something like I would be so blessed to be hired to do the job of VP. My 18 year old son muttered as he walked by the TV, "I hope you never get that job". He voted. He didn't vote for McCain.

In the now-quasi-famous 'T' in Pennsylvania (the 'Alabama' between Philly and Pittsburgh):

I have to admit that I'm surprisingly pleased.

My wife and I went to our polling place after we dropped our five-year-old off at his pre-kindergarten class. As we arrived at our usual polling place in deep-red GOP territory, I parked our car next to a late-model Honda Civic littered with Obama/Biden stickers. There were other cars in the lot with similar political apparel.

My first impression: Wow -- that's more of a Democratic presence than I would have expected.

My wife and I strode into the polling location with our Obama buttons, stickers and t-shirts in plain view. Believe me when I say that there was no doubt for whom we would be voting -- particularly because our two-year-old daughter was in tow and proudly exclaiming "Bama! Bama!" (for some reason, she doesn't get the 'O')

Inside the polling place there was no line. Since Rachel Maddow refers to the lines as a 'poll tax', we got off 'tax-free'. However, there were more voters there than I've seen since I've lived here and voted at that location. Of the electorate that was present, the majority were younger (under the age of 40) which is a big deal because we usually see a majority representing the over-65 crowd at our precinct.

Spirits seemed to be high, and none of the older women who were the election volunteers scoffed at the menagerie of Obama gear that my wife and I were wearing.

We cast our ballots, got our 'I voted' stickers, and left. No problems. No hang-ups. No hassle from 'Hussein'-chanting McCain/Palin supporters.

Now, we wait.... like the rest of America.

http://thepajamapundit.com/

Got to my midtown Manhattan voting location around 8:45am-ish...

The PS is on 33rd St in the middle of the block - the line started on 32nd Street, almost in the middle of the block. Everyone was chatting with each other, smiling. The sun shining. Vibrant energy and great karma. Lots of dogs, kids, students from the PS selling muffins, cookies, and water.

A few problems, though -- once we got up to the front of the line, a woman made an announcement for my district, and a bunch of us got whisked up to a table where there was literally nobody in line. They could have been bringing people forward considerably earlier.

Also they should have had someone at the end of the line escorting the elderly and people on crutches and wheelchairs towards the front.

My husband, still registered in CT, said there was a short line when he arrived at 5:50am. Took him about 15 minutes and when he got out, there were about 50 people.

My parents, infirm, voted absentee for Obama. For months my dad said he was planning on voting for Nader. I don't know what changed his mind, I was afraid to ask. My father, the man from Charleston, voted for an African-American -- now I know ANYTHING is possible.

Otherwise it was a marvelous experience - right up there with participating in the anti-war marches prior to the Iraq War. Only I hope my part actually makes a difference this time. I think it will. :)

Voted at 11 am at the place the new polling location they assigned me to a couple of years ago - a little redneck outpost called "Cammack Village" which is completely surrounded on all sides by Little Rock. Why I have to vote there when I don't live in their incorporated boundaries I don't know but...I've never seen a line there before, and today there was one, probably only a 30 minute wait for some with unfortunate last names beginning with the letters A - J; for the K - Z's, we were able to walk right up to the table with no wait. I understand the line this morning before work was quite long. In any case, my suspicion is that with the voters from the village itself, McCain is the heavy favorite...but that doesn't jibe with any waiting time at all, because seriously, who is fired up about voting for McCain? I can see people showing up to vote for him out of a sense of duty to party, but that doesn't explain the heavy turnout at my polling place. Probably won't matter, since Arkansas is projected to go McCain by over 10 points...but I did my thing anyway. Now, off to work the phones to call voters in Missouri.

Fired UP!!! and Ready to GO!!!

This young woman has a brilliant future in front of her:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/03/henry.newvoter/index.html

I sent this to Andrew Sullivan, too.

I had to vote absentee in Virginia this year because I'm currently in Chicago (the atmosphere up here, by the way, is absolutely electric). I had my first ballot mailed to me by USPS at the beginning of October and it never showed up. After two weeks and several calls to my local Board of Elections I had them send another one. A week and a half later neither had showed up. I called the BoE again and asked them to send me a third one. They were clearly confused as to why my ballot was not showing up but they agreed to send another one, and after a little bit of pleading on my part agreed to send me my ballot via UPS. The third ballot showed up a few days later, but the worker had forgotten to include the actual ballot! At this point, feeling like I was in some weird Buster Keaton sketch about voting, I called and ordered a fourth ballot, which was also sent by UPS and showed up four days ago. I filled it in and overnighted it back to Virginia (it costed $27.15 to do so). I called the BoE one final time today and they confirmed they had received my ballot. All's well that ends well, I guess.

By the way, the two USPS ballots never showed up. So much for our Post Office!

I went to my polling place in the local elementary school this morning and stood on line for about 40 minutes before I got to vote, but the line continually moved. During the wait, I ended up speaking with the woman behind me, who, as it turns out, works on Countdown with Keith Olbermann. The longest line I have ever seen since I started voting in 1972. Of course, when I went by the school at 1 pm, there was no line.

Small enough town (12,000) in New Hampshire. 300 voters lined up when the polls opened this morning at 6:00am. Busy flow of voters still at 9:00am. Lunchtime voting was a breeze, no lines.

Weather is beautiful - clear skies and a bit warm for the first week of November. We project 90% turnout.

Local schools held a mock election last week which gave the victory to Obama, Shaheen and the rest of the good guys.

I am on the edge of me seat. I feel like a patient who has been horribly ill for that past eight years - and whose doctor is about to say to me "it's going to be alright". My hope is nothing less.

Voting here at Hope High on the east side of Providence, RI at about 1:30. The bluest state in the bluest part of the country, and the place was a ghost town. There must have been twenty voting booths and I was the only voter there save for an elderly couple that walked in as I left. In and out in two minutes.

I feel totally gypped. I wanted to wait in line for at least a little bit and feel the energy and excitement. Guess it will have to wait for the parties tonight. I have no doubt the whole town will have a collective hangover tomorrow.

Next time I'll have to show up at 7:00am.

Voting here at Hope High on the east side of Providence, RI at about 1:30. The bluest state in the bluest part of the country, and the place was a ghost town. There must have been twenty voting booths and I was the only voter there save for an elderly couple that walked in as I left. In and out in two minutes.

I feel totally gypped. I wanted to wait in line for at least a little bit and feel the energy and excitement. Guess it will have to wait for the parties tonight. I have no doubt the whole town will have a collective hangover tomorrow.

Next time I'll have to show up at 7:00am.

Voted at 7:00 a.m. in Iowa City, Iowa. Was #1 at our polling place. Could have voted early (my wife voted several days ago), but I wanted to be part of a very historic day, having lived through the civil rights movement.

You can't imagine how proud we are in Iowa. At a time when Hillary seemed inevitable (nothing against her, necessarily), we saw how amazing this man, Barack Obama, is, and we sent a message to the country. Yes, I know that there is a great deal of criticism of Iowa's "first in the nation" attitude (and all the criticisms are spot on), but we took our job seriously, and we did it right.

You're welcome!

Another Empire State voter here, rural upstate NY in Kirsten Gillibrand's House district (a seat she won from that GOP hack Sweeney in '06), no drama small town voting, no line but the poll workers were commenting on turnout as if they were auditioning as pundits. Just holding down the high ground for y'all.

Voted around noon with no wait here in VT, very small town but I wanted to keep from slowing down the voters who vote later in the day after work. I did chuckle loudly reading all of the local known republicans listed as independents! Not too many down ballot republicans here.

Delightfully uneventful. I waited 25 minutes in line but I cannot say if this if out of the norm, it was my first time voting at this precinct (not counting the Primary). Voted No on 8 despite being shadily confronted by a No on 8 volunteer. Isn't that illegal? Whatever. I love election day!

Wash DC maryland suburbs are not real america.
took 90 minutes to vote. I've been voting here for 16 years, never seen it like this with a line in the middle of the day.

Our neighborhood is diverse - affluent white liberals, immigrants and African Americans. Usually the voting turnout is dominated by us white liberals. This time the numbers of African
American voters was HUGE. in line next to me were a couple 30ish african american women who had never voted before and really knew very little about politics. But they knew they were gonna do it what it took to vote for Obama.

keep in mind there have been virtually no party or candidate driven GOTV efforts here. These women did not need anyone to tell them of the historical significance of this day.It was inspirational to share a line with them.

I already voted a few weeks ago, but my wife just voted over the noon hour. She stood in line for 45 minutes to vote at our precinct here in Yankton, SD, and was about #500 to vote at that precinct today. The poll worker she talked to said they were averaging over 100 voters per hour, which is pretty much unheard of.

The local CBS affiliate (KELO) says that they are expecting 75% turnout in Minnehaha County, which has about 1/7 of the state's population. If I recall correctly from one of the few polls done of our state, Obama held a narrow lead in Minnehaha County, so fingers crossed that that's good news.

voting report from upstate manhattan: i arrived at PS 187 in washington heights at 6:20 a.m. to find about 200 people already lined up on the sidewalk outside the school. mostly couples on the way to work, everyone studying their new york times or chatting quietly. parents of kids from the school walked up and down the line, hawking brownies and donuts to raise money for school activities. i sprung for a brownie. little discussion of the contest itself, though i did chat with the woman behind me about GOP voter intimidation tactics. a little kid, asked by a grownup about her electoral preference, hollered "Rock Obama," which drew a big laugh. despite the lines, i was only the 25th voter in my electoral district (76). breezed through sign-in, voted for BHO on the Working Families ticket (the only way a new yorker’s vote counts for anything), withheld my vote from charlie rangel, and walked out feeling better about my vote than i ever had before. saw my friend steve waiting in line (which by now stretched around the corner), gave him a big wave, said "it’s a great day for america." which it is. total time: one hour.

Voted at 8:00 this morning in Philadelphia. I was voter #202, which seems pretty impressive considering my polling station only covers about 5 square blocks, max. Waited around 30 minutes (only because I fall into the A-M section, though. N-Z names had absolutely no wait whatsoever).

The Obama people had a nice little spread of fruit and water laid out, but didn't directly engage anyone as far as I could see. The McCain camp had one middle-aged woman about 20 yards away in her pajamas mumbling something and holding out literature that no one seemed inclined to take. Across the street from her were two morbidly obese men in a pickup truck plastered with "Sportsmen for McCain" stickers who did a lot of glaring but never got out.

All in all, it was a pretty reasonable voting experience, save the disappointment of the gay couple in front of me wearing "Rise Hillary Rise" shirts and McCain buttons.

Lovely day for an election.
My youngest and I went to the polls at the Oakwood Apartments down the road from Warner Bros.(L.A.) The polling place was lightly populated and moving along smoothly.
My daughter cast her first presidential ballot in this never to be forgotten election. She got to vote for a winner in her seminal jaunt. She had a hell of a time keeping a lid on her excitement. She just said, "Time for a CHANGE," as she collected her "I Voted" sticker. Everyone was as chipper as all hell and I'm still loving it.
On the other hand, my friends from Lilburn GA had to wait 6 hours to vote and there was along line in Brentwood at the Barrington Rec Center at @10:00. (I'm none too worried about the peeps in Brentwood struggling through...this is not an area where McCain supporters bother with a LINE.)
We're all going to be happy at the end of the day, though.
It's been awhile since I was able to vote for a candidate who wouldn't have his win quashed by a coup. I like it.

I voted in Queens at 11:30 this morning, and my polling place was pretty hopping. I waited in line directly ahead of a first-time voter, a woman originally from Jamaica who had just become an American citizen.

Hard to say which of the two of us was more excited.

I arrived at my precinct at 6:15 this morning in Simpsonville, SC and was pleasantly surprised to see that there was a line of about 250 people already waiting. This is at least 3x the normally traffic on election day. Once the doors opened, I waited one hour and 15 minutes before voting.

I know that McCain should win SC, but with this great turnout, I'm hoping Obama can keep in close. I believe that this election will show the old Republican conservatives that their era of dominating our politcal region is over!

Our polling place (in a deep blue neighborhood in the purplish part of a blue state) was busy when we got there at 8. A neighbor who was there when they opened at 6 said lots of people were waiting.

Here's the best part: it's an elementary school built on the site of Frederick Douglass' farm. Cool, no?

Anyone here right now from the western slope in Colorado?

It looks like snow here - and y'all are supposed to get about 16 inches the Durgano-Silverton-Ouray area - right across the mountains where I used to be -

I just wonder what it's doing cause it sure looks like snow here in Taos.

My polling place is at the fairgrounds in Southern Maryland, about 40 minutes from Washington, D.C. This used to be tobacco country, but is slowly being developed, or other crops are grown. We waited until 10:00 to vote, to avoid the lines. When we got there a 97-year-old Black man was being wheeled out of the polls in his wheelchair. It was the first time he had ever voted in his life. When he came outside he asked if anyone could give him an Obama button. There were none left at the Democrat's booth so I gave him mine. He was so proud and I started crying. He looked at me and said, "why are you crying? this is a day for glory." I am still crying.

I voted in Simpsonville, SC today. 1.5 hour wait in a heavily Republican area, but I can report at least 5 Obama votes (me, my wife, son, brother and mother.)

"why are you crying? this is a day for glory."

Wow.

Got in just under the wire to vote absentee yesterday in Michigan. The women working at my township hall were in good spirits as they prepared for today.

I'm hearing from my friends and coworkers who voted this morning that lines average around 30-45 minutes, so not TOO bad. Obama supporters here in Traverse City are feeling very optimistic, but as a battle scarred veteran of the 2000 and 2004 elections, I won't be celebrating until Wolf Blitzer tells me I can!

Either way, though, I see cocktails in my future...:)

10016 (East Side Manhattan) voter here. My polling place is St. Vartan's Church (34th St. and Second Ave.) I've only looked quickly at the comments, but it looks like others encountered a similar problem. I wasn't in the darn book! I was stunned. It never occurred to me to check my registration status -- my husband and I both voted without a hitch in '04 and '06. (His name is in the book). Very annoying. I filled out the provisional ballot, which I feel certain will never see the light of day. How did this happen? I so wanted to pull the lever. On another note, the line was moving. I was there 20 minutes.

OT: I'm not religious myself so take this more as a joke, but not only did God not rain out Obama's acceptance speech in Denver, he made it 70 degrees on Nov. 4 in Chicago for him.

Take that Jerry Falwell.

From Pasadena, CA...
Waited 20 minutes in line. Very organized. Very smooth process. Everything worked and everyone was in a great mood!

I've been reading all the posts on this thread and on the first one of the same topic.

It isn't hard to understand why we are proud and why the world looks up to America. Eight years of darkness makes the light so much brighter.

This is only the start. Tomorrow the real work begins. First order of business is to figure out how to keep all this in perspective. Given that this is by far one of the greatest days in our history that isn't going to be easy. At least we got a guy who has his head on straight.

10016 (East Side Manhattan) voter here. My polling place is St. Vartan's Church (34th St. and Second Ave.) I've only looked quickly at the comments, but it looks like others encountered a similar problem. I wasn't in the darn book! I was stunned. It never occurred to me to check my registration status -- my husband and I both voted without a hitch in '04 and '06. (His name is in the book). Very annoying. I filled out the provisional ballot, which I feel certain will never see the light of day. How did this happen? I so wanted to pull the lever. On another note, the line was moving. I was there 20 minutes.

Forgive the double post.

Got wife and kids up early, figured that our normally staid precinct, the Ironville District in Lancaster County, PA, was going to be extra busy.

It was.

However, because of the good work of the poll workers there, we were able to get through really fast - we were numbers 55 and 58, respectively - and we were done by 7:25. They did a great job.

I am also thankful that we have the scanner rather than the touch screens.

Yes, I voted for the straight Democratic ticket - although, like my wife, I darkened the square of EACH candidate rather than choosing to just darken the square of the ticket. I'm not taking any chances.

I will have Shakespeare class tonight at Millersville University, but I hope to be home by 9:30. In the meantime, I will have TPM on on my laptop while listening to a lecture on Macbeth.

Won't it be a kick if it's over before AZ closes?? Can only hope.

I actually blogged my voting experience almost thirty minutes after I had it!

I'm also liveblogging the election at my blog, should anyone be interested. www.textphish.com

Sorry for spamming. YAAAY OBAMA!

poll monitoring at AA precinct in Greensboro NC. Cold and rainy. Turnout low. Hope it's early voting.

I'm finally nervous. Ironic, eh?