At least the results came in before the inaugural

Associated Press: For anyone who still cares: McCain won Missouri!

“Bellwether”

Missouri: The only state that hasn’t yet turned in its electoral homework. Some bellwether.

We yield the floor to Josh Marshall:

Is Missouri just going to keep its electoral votes?

Ha ha. My state is the lamest in the union…except (this week) for California, where voters have decided to take advice on marriage from the Mormons.

Cracked bellwether

STLtoday: Last night put to rest that self-aggrandizing “Missouri as political bellwether” meme. More like a trailing indicator, eh?

Childhood’s end

Some notes from an election daze:

M and I did the usual commute to work this morning, heading east on Manchester toward midtown St. Louis to avoid the increasingly disassembled Highway 40 (I-64 to you). A beautiful November morning, and the news of the radio, seemingly the only news in the world, was Election Day. We passed a convoy of police motorcycles and cars, all with headlamps on, all heading west - mourners en route to the funeral service of University City Sgt. Michael King who was senselessly gunned down last Friday. We continued east along Manchester through Forest Park Southeast, a mingling of beautiful solid homes and vacant storefronts, a neighborhood struggling for development and solidification. Business redevelopment is much evident, and yet patchwork in nature - a building here, a restaurant there, surrounded by shuttered structures. The soft morning light illuminated everything, and we drove on.

The world is what we see in periphery, what we distantly hear, what we all move through as we run our commutes and errands. We’re adults; we have obligations, responsibilities, lives to live. The world keeps turning, even on Election Day. But I thought this morning about another day and another commute years ago, another drive to work and the terrible news over the radio of an airplane crash in New York City. Some plane had flown into one of the twin towers of the World Trade Center. M and I were surprised and vaguely saddened. She dropped me off at work; I brewed some coffee, sat at my desk, turned on the computer, and sat stunned over the following hours as the world changed. But that morning had been beautiful up to that point, and as ordinary as you could wish.

That’s how it always starts, yes? Even with periods of great change, whether for good or ill: with an ordinary day.

…

A couple of weeks ago found me grumbling to myself over the various hoops through which Missouri citizens must leap in order to vote absentee. Today, that annoyance is all but forgotten, replaced by sublime satisfaction over having registered my electoral choices ahead of schedule.

I spoke with my brother Greg a couple of days ago. Regular readers will remember that Greg is a Type 2 diabetic who lost his vision, his kidney function, and his lower right leg to the disease. He voted a few days ago, and described the experience as odd (understandably so, given the circumstances) yet fulfilling. His arrival at Registration and Elections sent staffers into a bit of a tizzy, but when he suggested that rather than inconvenience them (and himself), he could just have our mother assist him, the staff became suddenly calm and centered. Call it professional pride, maybe; they rose to the occasion.

Apparently, blind voters in South Carolina get to wear headphones for audio assistance. When the voice on the recording intoned “Barack Obama and Joseph Biden,” Greg felt a rush of civicness. He says he got to push the same buttons that sighted people use - nothing oversized - which amused him greatly.

Also amusing to him was what he described as the emotion that seems to come over onlookers “when us blind and crippled folks vote.” Inspiring, he said with a laugh.

…

There is a strange perceptive effect involved in political campaigns, more obvious in presidential politics but not limited to that sphere. During the primaries, you choose among alternatives who are all generally grouped along one end of an ideological spectrum. While your choices are naturally informed by the difference between the candidates, you may feel more free to critique even the candidate you prefer. You may be more cognizant of their shortcomings, more willing to express doubt.

This is not true of everyone, of course - some people drink deeply of the Kool-Aid than others. Still…

Later, as the process moves into the general campaign, the gulf between the nominees of the contesting parties is naturally much greater than between candidates in a given party. As a result, you are inclined - forced by circumstance, really - to more fully buy into “your” candidate and to overlook or forgive shortcomings that seemed much more glaring, much more important, earlier on.

I haven’t forgotten my reasons for having doubted a successful transition from Barack Obama the brand to Barack Obama the executive. I haven’t forgotten the feeling I had that “change,” in an Obama context, seemed to boil down to “vote for Obama” more than anything else. I haven’t forgotten the irritation I have felt with what seemed an overabundance of centrism in Obama as a senator, and an overabundance of caution as a candidate keeping Muslims, gays, and lesbians at arm’s length. That’s a lot to not forget.

It’s equally true, however, that the Democratic candidate has given me much to remember over the course of the campaign. The sense of maturation in Barack Obama is palpable; he seems to have grown into the role he has made for himself, even as his opponent, John McCain, has shrunk. There has been much said about temperament in the late days of the campaign, and I don’t think its importance can be overstated. That Obama has emerged as, politically speaking, an adult is really the one thing we know for certain about him, and in these troubled times it seems that an adult is exactly what we need.

…

Tomorrow may be the beginning of something new in our national life, but it will also be just another day. The hopefulness and optimism of many voters today will have to give rise to something else, something more substantial and decidedly unglamorous - ordinary work - even as Barack Obama, should he triumph tonight, will have to find a way to translate hope into policy.

For all of us, childhood has reached its end.

“Why Barack Obama is Winning”

Time: Joe Klein on why Obama is winning: It’s the maturity, stupid.

AP scrambles to find a poll that likes McCain

AP: The Associated Press digs up a rare poll that calls the presidential race “all even.” Also swallowed whole by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

A ballot in the head

Earlier this month, I exhorted the legion of Waveflux readers to vote early because it would piss off antidemocratic patrician George Will. That’s far from the sole reason or even the best reason to get your vote in ahead of Election Day - you’re stuffed to the gills with “information” about your candidates by now and are perfectly capable of making reasoned decisions, despite the bleatings of pundits; the “front-loading” of political arguments, supposedly forced by early voting, is arguably a public good; the ability to vote on your own schedule rather than being limited to a prescribed 1/365th of the calendar is an affirmation of your own power as a voter, and is convenient besides - but given Will’s arrogant stance on the matter, the satisfaction of giving him a civic-minded middle finger is reason enough.

So today, I suited action to the word. I finally got around to requesting absentee ballots for my household - seeing as we will likely be much, much, much too busy and quite possibly far, far, far too distant from the polls on the big day in November. Following the instructions provided by Go Vote Absentee, I downloaded the forms for registered voters in the city of St. Louis. M and I each filled out our requests, and I faxed them last Wednesday to the office of the St. Louis City Clerk.

The envelopes containing the ballots arrived yesterday.

Below, your basic civic-duty action kit: one absentee ballot, one set of not-entirely-opaque instructions, one postage-paid return envelope which also served as an affidavit. The only inconvenience was that the envelope/affidavit had to be signed in the presence of a notary public and signed and stamped by that official.

I was instructed to make my selections by darkening the ovals (completely!) next to my choices with a number 2 pencil or a black or blue (not red!) pen. As absentee voters may have trouble getting a replacement ballot in case of incorrect marking or the like, it’s necessary to be rather careful in filling out the form. Being a bit of a worry wort about such things, I made a practice copy of the ballot and filled that out first. When I was certain of my mad ballot-marking skills, I filled out the actual form.

I am a believer in the secret ballot, thanks. Still, I’ll mention here that I was pleased to vote once more for my hard-working state rep, Rachel Storch (whom I actually met once; I should tell that story some time). I was equally pleased to vote against the little-remarked, thinly-veiled, anti-immigrant, bring-out-the-bigot state constitutional amendment to make English “the language of all governmental meetings at which any public business is discussed, decided, or public policy is formulated.” That’s including “conference calls, video conferences, Internet chat, or message board,” by the way.

This piece of xenophobic pandering was brought to you by state Rep. Brian Nieves of Washington. A Republican, shockingly enough. Whoever runs against Nieves in his next contest gets some money from me. In the meantime, my no vote on his amendment will have to suffice.

Oh, yeah: There was some politician from Chicago somewhere on the ballot, too. I may talk about him later.

Once the ballot was completed, all that remained was to cool my heels for a few minutes in lobby before getting my ballot duly stamped by a calmly professional and rather attractive notary. Then off to the ballot box - in this case, the nearest mailbox. As I deposited the envelope, I could hear the patriotic swells of “Stars and Strips Forever.” But maybe that was just my imagination. At any rate, the tune accompanied me all the way back to the office.

And that’s that. I didn’t get a “I Voted” sticker, but I can live with that, I think. Hope you can live with it too, George.

If he says the sky is blue, look up

Oliver Willis: Bill Kristol. Wrong. About. Everything.

GOP Ohio suit derailed

First, the staid and sober news report:

The Supreme Court sided Friday with Ohio’s top elections official in a dispute with the state Republican Party over voter registrations.

The justices overruled a federal appeals court that had ordered Ohio’s top elections official to do more to help counties verify voter eligibility.

Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, faced a deadline of Friday to set up a system to provide local officials with names of newly registered voters whose driver’s license numbers or Social Security numbers on voter registration forms don’t match records in other government databases.

Ohio Republicans contended the information for counties would help prevent fraud. Brunner said the GOP is trying to disenfranchise voters.

In a brief unsigned opinion, the justices said they were not commenting on whether Ohio is complying with a provision of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 that lays out requirements for verifying voter eligibility.

Instead, they said they were granting Brunner’s request because it appears that the law does not allow private entities, like the Ohio GOP, to file suit to enforce the provision of the law at issue.

And now, the Democratic reaction:

Woo-hoo!

This post was really just an excuse to post the funniest political animation I’ve seen in a while. Stolen outright - but with gratitude - from Muzikal203 at dKos.

But more seriously, here’s David Kurtz from TPM with his take on the SCOTUS decision:

It didn’t address the merits of the case per se (although in some ways the court’s ruling goes straight to the merits). Rather, it found that the GOP was unlikely to prevail on the issue of whether the Help America Vote Act (the law at issue here) allows private citizens or groups to sue to enforce the law. If the law doesn’t create a so-called private right of action, the GOP has no standing to sue in the first place. Likelihood of prevailing on the merits is a key criteria for taking the extraordinary step of granting a TRO. Since the justices thought the GOP would ultimately lose on that argument, they vacated the TRO.

Now, I’ll be curious to see where the GOP goes from here. There’s not enough time to pursue this case on the merits before the election. So as a practical matter it may kill the case in Ohio entirely. But perhaps more importantly, it puts a stop to the GOP or any other private party gumming up the works over the next 18 days by filing similar cases in courts across the country.

Also, Oliver Willis visits Free Republic to sample extreme right-wing responses.

Okay. Where were we? Oh, wait. I remember.

The vitriol vote gambit

A number of people (including at least one journalist) invested time and energy decrying John McCain’s supposedly racially-based condescension toward an African American questioner in the Nashville presidential debate. Better that people spend less time on questionable slights and to give more attention to the actual gutter tactics employed by the McCain/Palin campaign: cynical attacks against Barack Obama’s patriotism, designed to appeal to the “base” in every respect. If the low road traveled by McCain and Sarah Palin were only a measure of political desperation, that would be pathetic enough in itself and well worthy of criticism. The critical aspect of the tactic is much more damning: a deliberate stoking of hysteria, anger, and resentment that could easily lead to violence - if not against Obama himself, then against his supporters, or perhaps election officials. McCain’s “vitriol vote” gambit is so glaringly evident that even the media is coming to acknowledge it - in its usual glacial fashion - as Steve Benen notes at the Washington Monthly:

On CNN last night, David Gergen, a Republican advisor to Presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Clinton, commented on the “anger” evident at McCain/Palin rallies of late. “There is this free floating sort of whipping around anger that could really lead to some violence,” Gergen said. “I think we’re not far from that.”

When Anderson Cooper expressed skepticism about whether violence was likely, Gergen said he “really worries” given “the kind of rhetoric” coming from the Republican ticket.

When a mainstream, Republican presidential advisor goes on national television and expresses concern that Republican voters might literally become violent in response to the Republican presidential ticket’s rhetoric, it’s safe to say we’ve reached a rather dramatic point. [...]

Both the Washington Post and the Politico have good items today on the explosive, enraged emotions at this week’s Republican rallies. Slate’s John Dickerson described the participants’ “bloodthirsty” tone.

The media must overcome its standard, halfhearted “equivalency first!” approach to campaign analysis and recognize the truth: the responsibility of McCain and Palin for inflammatory rhetoric which feeds the hysteria of their supporters at rally after rally. Only exposure in the press can prompt conscience-stricken Republican leaders to get off the pot and call out McCain for the strident personal attacks employed by his campaign.

Would even that be enough to shame McCain and Palin into something approaching a more honorable campaign? The observant would likely bet against such an outcome, recognizing that McCain relinquished all claims to an honorable, respectful campaign long ago.

A couple of weeks ago, I asked my wife if she could recall having ever seen a “positive” McCain television ad - one in which he spoke of his own vision for the country instead of trying to tear down his opponent. “No,” replied M. We live in Missouri, a state which the McCain campaign is, incredibly enough, in danger of losing. All the more reason, you might suppose, that the Republican campaign would go to mudslinging as its first option. The problem with that approach is that after a time, people begin to tune you out - especially when they have personal economic survival on their minds. And when you find yourself losing on many fronts, constantly fighting a rearguard action - as McCain is doing now - you are forced to become increasingly more shrill in your attacks just to get attention. In the absence of anything like a positive model of your own campaign, you are perceived as the last thing any politician wants to be - irrelevant.

John McCain is drowning in irrelevance.

Drowning men thrash, and they may drag others down with them. That’s the danger here as we enter the final days of the presidential campaign - that John McCain, in a desperate attempt to save himself, will drag us all down.

Add: From Benen:

Sam Stein reports that the McCain campaign has come up with a defense for the Republican ticket’s efforts to create an angry mob.

“Barack Obama’s attacks on Americans who support John McCain reveal far more about him than they do about John McCain. It is clear that Barack Obama just doesn’t understand regular people and the issues they care about. He dismisses hardworking middle class Americans as clinging to guns and religion, while at the same time attacking average Americans at McCain rallies who are angry at Washington, Wall Street and the status quo,” reads a statement from spokesman Brian Rogers.

Got that? McCain/Palin supporters have thrown around words like “treason” and “terrorist,” while others have literally called for violence, and if Obama points this out, he’s launching “attacks on Americans.”

McCain doesn’t even have the excuse of plausible deniability. He knows exactly what he’s doing. And he doesn’t care.

Add: John in comments point to a NY Post article that notes McCain’s Missouri misery.

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