12:41 AM … Indiana and North Carolina are looking very promising. And Missouri is still possible.
12:56 AM … Missouri looking like a tougher climb.
12:59 AM … TPM Reader AL reports in from Missouri …
I thought I would give you some insight on Missouri from a resident.
Right now, Missouri is looking like it is going to be REALLY close. I look to Sen. McCaskill’s victory in 2004 for the size margin that we will be looking at. Obama seems likely to win.
Key counties in Missouri are going for Obama by bigger margins than they went for Kerry in 2004. Greene County, where Springfield is located, went for McCain 57-41 compared to Bush 62-37. Boone County, where Columbia is located, went for Bush 49.7-49.5. It has gone for Obama 55-43, indicating a large turnout from the University of Missouri. Another key county is St. Charles County, in the suburbs of St. Louis. It went for Bush 59-41. It has deflated for McCain to 54-45. So those results already in bode well for Obama, albeit narrowly.
The counties still out are the deciding factor in Missouri. St. Louis City and Jackson County (Kansas City) are both at around 90% in, and Obama is getting huge margins there. The big wild cards still out are suburbs. St. Louis County is 58-41 for Obama with 93% in. In 2004, it was 54-45 Kerry. And the biggest hope for McCain is Clay County, in suburban Kansas City. It has not reported any results yet, and there are roughly 100,000 votes up for grabs there. Bush won in 2004 by 53-46.
Basically, if you want to know if Missouri will go Obama, look at Clay County. If it is tied or if Obama leads, Obama will take Missouri. If McCain is leading, McCain will pull out the victory. I look for the final margin to be about 15,000 votes.
1:02 AM … Hardcore winger Rep. Marilyn Musgrave (R-CO) goes down, according to the Denver Post.
1:04 AM … TPM’s David Kurtz reacts to Obama’s victory speech, from on the scene at Grant Park …
1:19 AM … It’s starting to look promising for Al Franken in Minnesota. According to our results map he’s down by like 7k votes, with just under 80% reporting. But a lot of the big Democratic strongholds are still to fully report. Definitely doable. We’ll have to wait and see.
1:37 AM … And here’s the speech David was reacting to, Obama’s acceptance speech …
1:57 AM … Our in-house number cruncher, Eric Kleefeld, says it’s looking better and better for Franken. At this moment, our results map has Franken down by less than 2k votes. But Eric says the areas yet to fully report tend to be the more Democratic ones.
2:06 AM … Still too close to call. But some possible really bad news out of California. The initial exits showed Prop 8 going down. But they’ve now been adjusted to show a possible victory. We’re trying to find out more.
2:13 AM … Nets call Indiana for Obama. And suddenly Missouri is tied. Our AP results show 100% reporting in NC with Obama up by over 10k votes. So we’re not completely sure why that hasn’t been called. But we’ll try to find out more.
2:32 AM … Franken-Coleman race is truly down to the wire. A matter of a couple hundred votes at the moment, with, seemingly, a Dem advantage among the areas remaining to report. Seems very possible this one goes to a recount, regardless of which guy wins.
2:34 AM … We’re still trying to find out more about Prop 8 in California. If you know of sites or blogs that have a good read on how the remaining counties seem likely to come in, drop us a line. Our grasp of California Dems and counties is not all it should be — which is a bit embarrassing since I grew up there.
2:47 AM … Kanjorski pulls it out in PA-11.
2:53 AM … TPM Reader JT reports in from Chattanooga, Tenn. “From Chattanooga, Tennessee. At 1 a.m. in front of a bar on ML King Boulevard. We may not have turned Tennessee around, but there’s plenty of happy folks (black and white) tonight in the red states, too.”
3:00 AM … Picture still seems very uncertain on Prop 8 in California. Getting some word from readers who appear to be in the know (in terms of knowing how to read the remaining results to come in) and they seem pessimistic … Other readers though are not so sure — a lot of question which parts of LA County are yet to report.
3:08 AM … Al Franken has just moved into a very narrow lead in Minnesota — just under 1400 votes, with 96% reporting. But our look at the areas left to report suggests that Franken has the wind at his back.
3:12 AM … Rep. Thelma Drake (R-VA) goes down to defeat.
3:12 AM … On presidential, McCain has now taken Montana. A close look at Missouri suggests McCain will pull it out by a razor thin margin. And our AP results of North Carolina have a 100% reporting and Obama up by about 10k votes. I’m not completely sure why NC hasn’t been called yet. But assuming McCain takes Missouri and Obama takes NC, that would leave us with Obama winning with 364 electoral votes.
3:28 AM … I don’t know if irony is the word for this. But if this bears out, I’m sure this will be grist for a lot of discussion. According to the AP’s analysis of the exit polls in California: “Blacks turning out in droves to support Obama also threw their support strongly behind Proposition 8, which would overturn the state Supreme Court decision allowing gay marriage. Opposition to the ban held a slight edge among whites, while Lations and Asians were split.”
3:33 AM … Okay, I don’t know what to say. But the Anchorage Daily News is saying Rep. Don Young (R-AK), who wasn’t satisfied with breaking laws but actually violated the constitution, is probably going to get reelected. And it’s looking like his fellow scofflaw and now convicted felon Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) might be on his way to victory too. Now, bear in mind, ensuing imprisonment might force an early departure from the senate. But then who would appoint his replacement? Sarah Palin. Too horrible to contemplate. The polls were not looking good for Stevens. It really seems like a red Palin tide may have brought her fellow abusers of office home. To fully unify this great nation, maybe we need to take the Alaska Independence Party up on their offer.
3:39 AM … More to be said on Georgia maybe. People have been asking us all night why Georgia hasn’t been called on our results map. The results map is keyed to the Associated Press results. So we actually don’t have direct control on when states get colored in. But we’ve been wondering the same thing ourselves. Why no call from the AP? All evening we’ve been hearing sporadic reports that many if not all of the early votes simply hadn’t been counted yet. There were a lot of them. And I believe they were supposed to be disproportionately African-American. And now WSBTV.com in Atlanta is reporting this: “Fulton and Gwinnett Counties failed to include any advance votes in their election totals by 11 p.m. Tuesday night. Officials at the Secretary of States office confirmed to WSB-TV Channel 2 that the votes were not being included in early returns. Up to two million votes may be going uncounted. ‘Something’s really wrong out there,’ said WSB-TV political analyst Matt Towery.” That could have a very big effect on the senate race in the state. So Saxby Chambliss may not be home free after all.
4:05 AM … Kos has more on this. It seems there may be a solid 600,000 or so votes still to be counted. And remember, the total votes in the senate race is under 4 million. So that’s more than enough to have an effect on the outcome.
3:57 AM … Rep. Steve Chabot (R-OH) ushered into involuntary retirement.
4:08 AM … Seems I may have been wrong (and happy to be wrong) in saying that Sarah Palin would appoint a new senator if Ted Stevens wins tonight and then has to resign to spend more time with his prison cell. Apparently Alaska law was recently changed (after the Murkowski ridiculousness) so that a special election would have to be called. We’ll try to bring you more on that, with details, shortly. This ADN article from late October has a few more details.
4:21 AM … Now that Alaska seems on its way of reelecting its convicted felon senator and its (little doubt) soon to be indicted member of the House, I realize that perhaps I judged Sarah Palin too harshly. In the context of Alaska politics, I guess she really is a reformer.
4:26 AM … Now that the “Bradley Effect” seems set for a richly deserved retirement, TPM Reporter Eric Kleefeld suggests christening the “Stevens Effect” — the poll distorting effect of poll respondents unwillingness to admit they will vote for the convicted felon in the race.
4:41 AM … Down to the skeleton crew here at TPM. We’re still following the Minn senate race. Franken continues ahead by it’s been zigzagging between a few hundred votes and just over a thousand.
From the Politico …
More than 130 million people turned out to vote Tuesday, the most ever to vote in a presidential election.
With ballots still being counted in some precincts into Wednesday morning, an estimated 64 percent of the electorate turned out, making 2008 the highest percentage turnout in generations.
8:55 AM … I awake to the news that Sen. Coleman is declaring victory in Minnesota with an eight hundred or so vote margin. Franken is not conceding, though. If that’s how this turns out that’s a severe bummer. Franken would be such a great person to have in the senate and Coleman is just such an execrable figure. The only faint silver lining to a Coleman victory would be for him to have to face certain unfolding legal difficulties while still in the public spotlight. We’ll have to see how this one turns out.