BIG BREAKING NEWS

Queue the exciting music and fancy cable news graphics! The Associated Press is reporting this hour that the bellwether state of Missouri will go to Senator John McCain. Geez louise. Took them long enough. So much for being a bellwether.

I was actually sad this year that I did not get to watch all the election night ballot returns on CNN as commentators and pundits are literally interrupted mid-sentence with photos and graphics of big blue or red check boxes. There is a drinking game in there somewhere.

However, what is astonishing about Missouri is how few votes separated the two candidates. A mere 3,632. There were nearly 3 million people that voted in that state. That's about a 0.12% difference.

Goddamn.

And in the state of Minnesota, there were about 200 votes separating the two candidates for U.S. Senate -- such a small amount, they are required by law to recount everything. There will likely be court fights about the validity of handfuls of individual absentee ballots.

Election after election, there are always races that come down to the smallest vote differences. I once met someone who ran for an office and lost by 3 votes. Three.

So the next time you hear someone whine, "voting is useless.. my vote does not count," be sure to remind them they are a complete fool.

A Time Machine

The past can be so unintentionally ironic and hilarious. I came across an article from 2006 in the Chicago Tribune discussing the possibility of Obama running for president in 2008. My favorite bits are below. The whole thing here.

About the Republican field:

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani might be formidable in the general
election but is too moderate to survive the GOP primary process. Sen. John
McCain's time will have passed. Ahn-old can't run because he's foreign-born.
There's talk of Bill Frist, George Pataki, George Allen, Mitt Romney, Bill
Owens, Chuck Hagel, Haley Barbour and Jeb Bush, but it doesn't leave Democrats
crumpled in despair and resignation.

The Republican POV:

But quite a few Democrats are unenthusiastic to sickened by the prospect of
another charmless loser at the head of the ticket -- frontrunner in the polls
Hillary Clinton; re-treads John Kerry and Al Gore -- and hold out hope that a
groundswell will change Obama's mind.
Some Republicans, meanwhile, are
licking their chops at the prospect of running against an inexperienced
blue-state liberal.

User comment:

I'd love to see a strong, charismatic Dem lead the ticket after the disasterous
Kerry fiasco, which followed the Gore-Lieberman thrill-a-minute ticket, but
after witnessing how the press savaged Dean, I don't think Obama has a prayer.
"'Obama - Rhymes with Osama.' Obama will be weak on NATIONAL DEFENSE! Save
America! Vote Republican."
I can see it now.

One More:

I voted "I lean Republican and I favor the idea" because I think, if he
were the Democrat nominee, he would be crushed in the election.

That Goddamn Liberal Media

I got an email a couple days ago complaining about the "biased" pro-Obama slant of the main stream media, with a link to this editorial.  "It may be an eye opener to some," the email sender wrote, "but I find it to be a scary future if not corrected."  

I partly agree with the article.  Obama does receive better news coverage.  A recent study:

The Project for Excellence in Journalism’s researchers found that John McCain, over the six weeks since the Republican convention, got four times as many negative stories as positive ones. The study found six out of 10 McCain stories were negative.

What’s more, Obama had more than twice as many positive stories (36 percent) as McCain — and just half the percentage of negative (29 percent).  

This morning, Politico published an article addressing the apparent tilt in election coverage.  It's a good read, and I recommend checking it out.  

The argument the article makes is not complicated.  Essentially, there is a bias in the media.  The bias, however, is not for or against any specific candidate.  The bias is for stories.  For narratives, the "horse race."  Or, as Politico describes, a "bias against boredom."  While this does skew the press, it is a prejudice that has always and will always be a part of the media, and it does not skew liberal or conservative.  

The campaigns are aware of this.  Sometimes more attention is paid within the campaigns to being "on message" and creating a "narrative" with which the press and voters will respond rather than creating cohesive policy for voters to evaluate.  So the reason why McCain is getting such negative coverage?  He has failed at framing the story, trying out new story angles multiple times per week, and then lashing out at the press when they do not buy into his preferred point of view.  

So, yes, there is some "bias" in the election coverage recently, but to shove all blame on the media gives them too much credit.  By and large, the McCain campaign is earning the coverage they are receiving.  

Throwing Some Mud

It is kind of fun to turn on Fox News or read a right-wing blog to find out how some people in the Republican Party are labeling Barack Obama today. Blogger, Eric Martin, describes this chaos:

This is the problem. It’s not just the McCain campaign’s problem - although their inability to pick a narrative and stick to it is a special kind of inexcusable - it’s a problem for the entire wingnut noise machine. Obama is a Marxist Muslim Arab Jesus Black White Terrorist Technocrat Racist Do-Gooder Liberal FDR Stalin Hilter Commie Fascist Gay Womanizing Naive Cynical Insider Noob Boring Radical Unaccomplished Elite Slick Gaffe-Prone Pedophile Pedophile-Seducing Liberation Theology Atheist Etc. & Anti-Etc. with a bunch of scary friends from - wait for it! - the Nineteen Hundred And Sixties. It makes no sense.

And don't forget to throw in Celebrity!

No wonder no one is buying this stuff. My guess is that picking just a few of those compatible memes listed would have actually been effective, but the sense that the noise machine is running around like a decapitated chicken grows with each new smear.

All of this plays directly into Obama's best strength: his demeanor. People want to be reassured from their leaders, and McCain has not displayed any stability in this election.

As Andrew Sullivan brilliantly points out about Obama:

And still he's calm. Not too cocky. A little aloof, but very professional. He learnt all of this as a black man in a white country: no sudden moves; no anger. That's how he managed his white mother in adolescence. That's how he manages a white electorate increasingly at ease with him. And, by a massive stroke of luck, that's what voters want right now. In an economy that is melting down, with two wars still raging, they want calm above everything else. They want to know that the man in charge will not panic, will not be flustered, will not blow up.

They need a Valium. They can now vote for one for president.

Recounts

As this presidential race draws to a close, my favorite part of the election finally draws near: the recount.  No, no, not as in Florida and hanging chads.  The stories from high level advisers and other people "in the room" as they all give their takes on what went down within the campaigns.  

Just as the Democratic primary finally finished this summer, the blame game inside Clinton's campaign furiously took shape as political professionals played the exciting game of "Not My Fault!!"  And now, as McCain's presidential hopes have about the same level of probability as, well, a republican winning the white house after eight years of W, "high level" and "unnamed sources close to the candidate" are covering their collective asses.  Just this weekend we have some great reports of delicious in-fighting and conspiracies.  

This is like having director's commentary to a really good movie.  

The Obama campaign has been a very tight ship, considering this has been the longest presidential campaign in history.  I can't wait for the stories behind Obama's run.  And maybe a movie?  Primary Colors 2?  Where's Mike Nichols? 

Dreamy

Can we all be in total agreement that Emile Hirsch is really dreamy:

Wake Up Call, starring Emile Hirsch from ace norton on Vimeo.