10:02 PM: So we’re on to our second hour of vote counting. The early returns look encouraging for Republicans. But a lot of votes remain to be counted. The two Republicans who looked to be in the best shape doing into the evening — Cowles and Harsdorf — both have big leads with more than half the precincts reporting.

10:09 PM: Stubbornly few precincts reporting in two races it looks like the Dems would have to win tonight to get pick up 3 seats. Incumbent Republicans Darling and Hopper, both with fewer than 10% of precincts reporting.

10:11 PM: Beware of early returns: new precincts just came in for district 8, the Darling race, took the number from 71% to 29% for the incumbent to 55% to 45% for the incumbent.

10:14 PM: AP calls 2nd district for Republican Robert Cowles.

10:19 PM: The ride’s getting a little bumpy. New results just pushed Pasch (D), who had been down 2 to 1 into the line with 57% to 43%. Remember though, still quite few (18%) precincts reporting.

9:05 PM: Polls just closed a few moments ago in Wisconsin. We’ll be reporting live results on our TPM Election Scoreboard.

9:12 PM: While we’re waiting, here’s a playbill of what to watch for tonight.

9:17 PM: First results trickling in.

9:18 PM: Interesting fact: 5 of the 6 Democratic challengers tonight are women.

9:36 PM: Half hour after polls closed and we still don’t know much. What little data we have looks encouraging for Republicans. But none of the races have more than single digits reporting. So we really can’t draw any conclusions from what we have so far. We’re looking more closely at which precincts are reporting to see what we can glean if anything from what we have so far.

9:42 PM: Key point: the current numbers look strong for Republicans. But the Republican areas seem to be coming in first. So that needs to be factored in.

9:52 PM: Almost an hour into the counting. Two of the races are basically tied, four have Republicans up by solid margins. But most of the races have relatively few districts reporting. The exceptions are Cowles and Harsdorf who now have solid leads with more than 30% reporting. That’s not terribly surprising since those two were considered the safest Republicans up tonight.

We’re now 20 minutes out from polls closing in Wisconsin tonight. We’ll have the results live on our TPM Election Scoreboard.

Here are a few things to watch for. Read More

Reid picks his three members of the debt deal “super committee”.

Don’t forget: We’ll be bringing you live election returns tonight from the Wisconsin recall elections. Polls close at 9 PM Eastern, 8 PM local time.

The South Florida Tea Party has launched “Tea Party in Space” to break the stranglehold of NASA socialism.

The EPA has granted almost $3 million dollars to create a computer liver to replace the process of using rodents to simulate the effects of environmental toxins on mice.

Sounds like the state GOP in Wisconsin has the state’s text messaging buzzing today with campaign ads.

In today’s recalls, how high can turnout go?

As Congress fans out across this great nation to do townhalls in districts and home states, please remember to keep us posted on what you see and hear — whether you’re attending townhalls or simply seeing reports in the local press.

I just noticed this report of what John McCain had to deal with this week at a Tea Party-deluged townhall in Gilbert, Arizona.

There seem to have been two main topics of conversation: whether McCain would apologize for calling Tea Partiers hobbits and what he was going to do about the UN’s plans to take away their farms. Read More