Most amusing bit of TV this morning:  Michelle Obama bleating "we need you" at a campaign rally.

Should have thought of that last year when they were beating their base - you know, the people who show up for and organize all these political events outside the presidential elections - upside the head and shoulders with mockery, scorn and foul language, then lying to them about the  public option and "wanting" it when it had been traded away months before.

Prop 19 will lose narrowly because ... too many Giants fans will be celebrating and somehow not make it to the polls.

So for the next two years at least we get to look at the porcine mugs of Rove, Haley Barbour and their clones and the mindless droids of successful Teabagger candidates being controlled by their soon-to-be-former-lobbyists to do the bidding of the Koch brothers, and wonder whether the Rethuglican Establishment can somehow find someone to stop Sister Sarah.  And we get to watch the rage build even further after the rank and file of the Teabaggers realize they've been had, yet again, by the Rethuglican Establishment.

Let's see what he does if republicans force through an HCR repealing bill and send it to him asking him to sign into law. Will he still preach bipartisanship with batsh*t crazy republicans? Will his bot followers still preach bipartisanship with batsh*t crazy republicans?

War funding should continue to be a cakewalk.

I expect the senatorial race to be a knock-down, drag-out fight over the vote counts, with lawyers already on call to take it to court. Once again, we will get to witness the state GOP in all its varying shades of dishonesty. They'll probably go after our current U.S attorney, as they did with John McKay. Still, I believe Murray will win.

Dems here are set to lose two congressional seats--this will mean that our Democratic majority of 6-3 will become a GOP majority of 5-4. :-(

At least I feel confident that both Boxer and Brown will carry the day in Cal. As for the rest of the races, they look too precarious to predict.

And Dems may be able to look strong by not being beaten too badly.  If Dems can hold onto the Senate, win some major Governor's races, and lose under 50 seats in the House, they can almost spin it as a win.

Was gonna vote on the way to the cube but the parking lot looked crowded at my polling place...will have to hit it on the way home.

Republicans will make gains in the House and they will crow about it until January, but it will be empty posturing. The radical right won't get any serious legislation passed during the next two years. They'll have greater success at being obstructionist and blocking Democratic proposals, just like they've done the past two years, only on a bigger scale. It will backfire on them in 2012. We'll be in worse shape and the voters will rightfully blame them and boot them out.

Furthermore, obstructionism helped the Republicans take control of Congress in 2010 (if it indeed happens).  Unfortunately, Obama failing is the best thing that could happen to Republicans and they know it.

Republicans will make gains in the House and they will crow about it until January, but it will be empty posturing. The radical right won't get any serious legislation passed during the next two years. They'll have greater success at being obstructionist and blocking Democratic proposals, just like they've done the past two years, only on a bigger scale. It will backfire on them in 2012. We'll be in worse shape and the voters will rightfully blame them and boot them out.

I'm not so sure the posturing will be of the empty variety, mainly because of what we're hearing out of the WH and some of the leadership about how much more important it will be to work with Republicans in the new Congress.  Democrats, if they are relegated to minority status in the House, can expect to be frozen out once again, and instead of pushing back, hard, they will assume their usual bent-over position - leading not to obstruction of Republican legislation, but passage of a lot of it.  And the big question is, will Obama be pushing back with vetos, or will he be signing legislation that is "the best we could do under the circumstances?"

I'm betting on the latter - because if we can assume Obama will be running again in 2012, he will be looking - foolishly - to be making more friends on the GOP side of the aisle.

I haven't been particularly invested in this year's elections. Maybe it's because the Democrats (Obama, Reid, Pelosi) didn't fulfill the promise we hoped their combined leadership positions would bring. The health care bill fell short of what was needed, the Supreme Court picks didn't "wow", and there was compromise at every turn, from the crack cocaine penalty changes to commitment to closing Guantanamo to trying the 9/11 defendants in federal courts. Too much backing down and not enough backbone.

At some point, with majorities in both houses, and a Democrat in the WH, one has to ask whether the real problem is lack of spine or fear of losing the all-important, can't-get-elected-without-it, drowns-out-the-voice-of-the-people corporate cash.

As far as electing Democrats to avoid returning to the failed Republican policies of the past, I'm not so sure we can count on Democrats to keep us from going there; Obama's continued many of the Bush policies, extended the reach of others, and I didn't notice a whole lot of pushback from the Dems.  On the stimulus, the Democratic caucus did the bidding of their fearful leader and prevented it from being as robust as many felt it should be.  We didn't get reforms to health care or an Affordable Care Act, we got strengthening of the insurance company's hold on us in the form of the Not-So-Affordable Care and Insurance Industry Protection Act.  

Really, this was the best they could do - for us - with their majorities?  

I think the real questions are, where does Obama want to lead us, and will the Democratic Congressional caucus ever start acting like members of the independent legislative branch, or will they continue to march in lock-step with Obama - even when Obama's policies are the wrong ones?

I'm not particularly confident on any of these fronts - and I don't really believe preserving the Democratic majority was going to make much, if any difference.

1. The cellphone effect.

2. The "robopoll" effect.

3. Some likely voter models, particularly Gallup's, may "crowd out" Democratic voters.

4. Democrats probably have better turnout operations.

5. The consensus view of Democratic doom is not on such sound footing as it seems.

Focusing on the home base, because frankly I kind of think the rest of the country is f*cked anyway.

So I'll be rooting for Gov. Deval, the ballot questions to go down in flames, Barney Frank, and William Keating.

If I get those wins, I'll be a happy camper.

But hardly a Feingold sign to be seen even in this very Dem area, so we'll have to hope that was good strategy to get the signs to where they're needed?  Half a block from a polling place in the most densely populated part of the city, we are seeing no parking problems, and in the polls, we saw no lines.  Similar reports are coming in from all over the city (to the state's major paper, set up to take readers' reports).  

But my favorite part is this:

"Question 1 - Passes
Question 2 - Fails, it's too complicated.
Question 3 - Fails, but I think it's close."

Question 1 - CHEAPER BOOZE!!!

One key thing you need to know is that about 65 percent of Nevada has already voted. And those results are already in

First,  the early vote results show that strictly on party registration, Democrats actually have a 9,000-vote lead from votes already cast. (Jon Ralston, the king of all political media here, has an excellent round-up). This is a surprising number, given that this is the nationalized race of what is supposed to be a wave election, and it indicates that Reid may have stopped the bleeding several weeks ago, enough to shore up his base and get out his vote. And the Reid campaign believes -- given that Angle is so far outside the mainstream of even conservative Republican politics, and given the sizeable Republicans for Reid operation in the state -- that Senator Reid will pick up more disaffected Republican votes than Angle will pick up disaffected Democratic votes.

Yeah, I don't see how Maryland voters--who booted Ehrlich after one term--would return that scumbag to office. He was probably hoping to ride on anti-incumbent fervor but forgot that things are not that horrible in Maryland compared to other states, so people may not be as ready to upset the status quo. The latest pre-election polls showed O'Malley's lead increasing over Ehrlich--but still...you never know. I still remember those "Another Democrat for Ehrlich" bumper stickers from that last debacle.

Also voted on a local proposition that, I was told by pollworkers, was really driving up turnout in my county. I voted against it (Question A) and polls on it have been exactly 50-50 so that is one race I am watching with interest.