They should be doing it the other way around -- count the ballots first, which they could have done within a day or two of the election, and then do the cross-checking. Especially since double-voting in the primary -- which is what prompted the current convoluted counting process -- amounted to all of two dozen votes.

The "safe" thing to do would be to avoid challenging unreceptive audiences on their homophobia. And to drop "gay and straight" from his standard litany of the different kinds of Americans that can be united.

Instead Obama has offered "clear support and understanding of gay people and willingness to support our dignity at times and in places where others have not," as Andrew Sullivan says in the link.

On Senate committees the majority party usually has just one more seat than the minority party. So if it's a 10-9 Dem majority, a straight party-line vote excluding Lieberman would be a 9-9 tie. In such cases, he would, in effect, break the tie.

This feels like we're closing the loop on 1968. What if Bobby had won? (Not a given, I know.) Imagine if we had not gone down the path of Nixon's resentments and enemies list, if Rove's first lessons in the politics of division had been (and continued to be) in a losing cause, and instead we had elected someone who could speak to and unite the poor, union workers, and the pointy-headed elites.

Four decades later, that is where we may, at last, find ourselves by the end of the day.

We forgive you for that whole Toledo/border war thing.

Four decades later, that is where we may, at last, find ourselves by the end of the day.

And there are plenty of big-population states that don't offer no-excuse early/absentee voting, including New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Michigan and Missouri.

The Oregon model sounds great. I wonder why no other state has followed its lead.

Actually, I doubt these numbers will get played up by the cable networks -- certainly not as much as the Zogby one-day aberration was this morning. They want people to think the race is down to the wire, after all.

And, less cynically, the nets are going to be cautious about jumping to conclusions because this election has more wild cards than usual. There's the difficulty of predicting just how massive turnout will be, how many young people will actually show, whether there will be a Bradley effect, whether there will be a reverse Bradley effect (Reagan Dems and others who break for Obama). Even come Tuesday night, the nets may take a bit longer than usual to make their state calls.

But please feel free to imagine that this is the deal breaker for Obama. Let's see, how many have there been now? Rev. Wright, (non)plagiarism, William Ayers, the flag pin, the pledge of allegiance, the national anthem...

I don't mean to compare this election with D-Day and the liberation of France, but it has been a long 8 years. And Tuesday will be a long day of waiting until the results start coming in.