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Well, we made it! I had five very busy days in Henrico County to finish up the election. I wish that I had some idea how many miles I walked and how many doors I knocked on, but it was a lot. One day I spent 7 hours putting door hangers on likely Democratic voters doors.
My days typically started around 9 and finished up around 8 p.m. I stayed with someone who had offered a spare room to a campaign worker and had terrific accomodations very close to the Henrico office.
I don't know how many Maryland volunteers there were in Henrico, but it was probably at least a dozen. There was little time for socializing, as we got our assignments and went and completed our tasks.
I assume that Henrico had some paid staff, but, overall, the effort there did not appear as well organized as the all-volunteer operation was in Bethesda. The outcome in Henrico was positive, however, as Obama won there. Bush carried the county in 2004.
Watching the returns in Richmond was a bit nerve-wracking, as the early results were not in Obama's favor. Ohio was called before Virginia was, although the gap had narrowed significantly.
The whole time I was canvassing in Virginia, I did not come across a single McCain canvasser or worker. I was particularly surprised that I did not see any in my travels in Henrico on the days leading up to the election. Amazing.
Here are the vote counts in the 1st District race. I am gratified that Kratovil won all of the Eastern Shore counties. Unfortunately, Harris got more votes in Harford, Baltimore and Anne Arundel counties. I believe that there are more registered Democrats in the Eastern Shore counties. It appears that the Gilcrest endorsement had more influence on the shore than it did elsewhere.
There is still a lot to be nervous about, but I am cautiously optimistic.
UPDATE: This is already out of date. The first batch of absentee ballots have been counted. The tallies are now 171,497 for Kratovil and 169,494 for Harris. The margin is now 2.003 in Kratovil's favor. Counting of provisionals, which I understand number around 9,000.
This thread will be updated throughout the night as the results come in.
9:18 PM: First results show Harris with a sizable lead, 57%-40%, with 4% reporting.
9:26 PM: Harris now leads 54%-44%, with 6% reporting.
9:55 PM: With 20% reporting, Harris has 51%, and Kratovil has 46%.
10:02 PM: With 25% reporting, it's a virtual tie, 49%-49%, with Harris hanging on to a lead of only 81 votes.
10:13 PM: Kratovil has taken a 242 vote lead, with 32% reporting. Let's hope it lasts.
10:50 PM: With 44% reporting, Kratovil has an over 2,000 vote lead, 50%-48%. I think he could pull this off.
11:06 PM: Kratovil's lead is growing; with 55% reporting, he's winning by 4,807 votes.
11:29 PM: With 77% reporting, Kratovil's lead has shrunk to 2,704 votes, but still holding.
11:39 PM: And it widens again, with 79% reporting: Kratovil is leading with 3,812 votes. Barring a big turnaround (only Talbot County, I think, has yet to report), I'd say he's got it.
12:25 AM: 89% reporting, and Kratovil still has his lead, but it's only 1,721.
12:34 AM: This election is like a yo-yo; now Kratovil's up by nearly 4,000 votes, with 93% reporting.
1:51 AM: Now Kratovil's lead is about 800 votes, with 98% reporting. So much for saying it was in the bag for him.
2:29 AM: All precincts are reporting now. Kratovil has beaten Harris by 1,021 votes. Congratulations to the Kratovil campaign for pulling up an upset.
2:49 AM: Absentee ballots haven't been counted, which may yet swing the election. So, despite a favorable outlook for Kratovil, it's not over yet -- and I need to stop blogging for now before I make another premature judgment.
This thread will be updated throughout the night as the results come in.
6:54 PM: Earliest of early results has Obama with a narrow lead in Indiana.
7:04 PM: Polls close in Virginia, Georgia, and Florida, inter alia. The election could be decided within the hour.
7:31 PM: Polls close in Ohio, West Virginia, and North Carolina. It's still close in IN, and close in VA and NC. Good sign thus far.
7:58 PM: Polls about to close in Maryland and a whole bunch of other places.
8:00 PM: Networks calling Pennsylvania for Obama. McCain just got a B carved in his face.
Maryland also called for Obama, to the surprise of no one.
8:57 PM: Still no results from Maryland Board of Elections or the Baltimore Sun or the Washington Post. What's the holdup?
9:07 PM: OK, early results from apparently the 4th and 5th congressional districts from WaPo: Obama 63%, McCain 36%, with 1% of precincts reporting.
9:30 PM: Networks are calling Ohio for Obama. If you combine the states already called for Obama with California, Oregon, Washington, and Hawaii, all safe blue states, Obama has 272 electoral votes. He's won the election.
11:02 PM: CNN calls Virginia for Obama, and MSNBC the whole shebang for Obama. It's definitely over, only the size of the victory is in dispute.
It looks like I'll be getting a late start on blogging the election results tonight, possibly as late as 10 PM -- the election might be over by then! Nevertheless, I'm going to keep up with results as they come in on my Twitter feed, so I suggest checking in both here and there.
I voted for him in both the primary nine months ago and today, but the experience today was different.
I remembered back to late 2003-early 2004, when I started hearing from my brother, who lives in Chicago, about an insurgent US Senate candidate named Barack Obama, who was garnering support from both blacks and whites, and had a strong liberal voting record to boot.
I remembered Obama being the brightest light at the Democratic Convention in Boston, not simply for his eloquence but for offering a political vision that didn't that come across as stilted or written by committee -- it was passionate, liberal, and righteous. After John Kerry lost in November, and it seemed like Democrats might never be the majority party again, I was one of many who saw Obama, like Howard Dean, as proof that the Democratic Party wasn't dead yet.
I remembered seeing Obama stump for Ben Cardin in 2006, and noticing how much he outshone the other Democrats on stage. Not in the sense of exuding charisma à la Bill Clinton, but in the sense of speaking calmly and cogently about the need for Democrats to retake control of Congress.
I remembered watching him announce his candidacy for President in 2007, being excited at first, then becoming progressively disillusioned with his campaign, which seemed more interested in a nebulous post-partisan ideal than in making the case for a change in leadership in this country.
I remembered him winning Iowa and then South Carolina, and feeling the disillusionment go away: This campaign was smarter and stronger than I had imagined. I didn't agree with him on everything, but the determination, pragmatism, and farsightedness he displayed made me think he could not only win the presidency, but excel at the job as well.
I remembered every stupid and baseless attack volleyed at him during this campaign -- Muslim, terrorist-sympathizer, celebrity, naive, socialist, Marxist, etc. -- and how none of it stuck, how he only became even more statesman-like, especially as the economic crisis hit and John McCain flailed about, in vain, to try to gain some advantage over him. A victory for Obama, I thought, would mean a repudiation of not only conservative governance, but also the slash-and-burn style of politics that has been the Republicans' stock-in-trade for decades. And that's change we need.
in 2008, at 3:00 PM, with five more hours of polling and the after work voter rush still to come, 1,385.
That's over 50% turnout with a lot of voting left to go. My bet is that there will be long lines at a lot of polling places when the polls close at 8:00. Because those voters in line will still get a chance to vote, polling places won't be torn down until late and vote counts will be delayed. From what's on the news, it looks like Virginia may be in the same boat.
