November 3rd Headline

[liberalpragmatist]

WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 3, 2004 (NYT, Late Edition)

Senator John Forbes Kerry of Massachusetts defeated President George W. Bush last night in an unexpectedly large victory. At presstime, with 98% of precincts reporting, Sen. Kerry led the President in the popular vote by a decisive 52% to 47% margin, translating to a nearly 6 million vote lead over the President. With many oversease ballots still being counted, the Democratic ticket has the support of 62,563,137 voters, whilst the Republican ticket garnered 56,547,451 votes. Senator Kerry's lead in the electoral college appears to be insurmountable. With final results in Colorado, Nevada, and Oregon still pending, Senator Kerry and his running mate, Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) had the support of 328 electors, with President Bush and Vice President Cheney garnering the support of only 198.

Although Senator Kerry's five-point margin of victory may appear small by historic standards, it is doubtless an achievement for the Democratic ticket - an achievement which few political analysts would have predicted one month ago. Mr. Kerry's popular vote margin is the same margin of victory that Bill Clinton enjoyed over George H.W. Bush in 1992 and is ten times the margin of Al Gore's popular vote victory over George W. Bush four years ago. Perhaps more encouragingly for the Democratic Party, Mr. Kerry is the first Democratic candidate since Jimmy Carter in 1976 to win a majority of the popular vote.

In a closely-contested race, the Kerry-Edwards ticket managed to rack up big victories in solidly Democratic states and carried a number of large, important swing states. Of the closely-contested states this season, Mr. Kerry won Florida, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, New Hampshire, and, in a major upset, Virginia. The ticket narrowly failed to carry Tennessee or Sen. Edwards' home state of North Carolina, although the margin in both states was less than 2%. The Democratic ticket also narrowly failed to win West Virginia, Arkansas, and Arizona.

...

UPDATE: Left unsaid in this is that Kerry's margin of victory climbs to 53-46 once all the overseas votes are counted. Those overseas votes give Kerry a narrow victory in North Carolina. Kerry ends up carrying both Oregon and Nevada, plus 5 of Colorado's votes, for a 360 vote electoral-college victory.

Oh, and also, Democrats win Mo. Governorship (Claire McCaskill). Take back Senate with victories in Alaska (+1), Illinois (+1), Oklahoma (+1), Colorado (+1), Pennsylvania (+1), and Missouri (+1). They hold seats in Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Louisiana, but *lose* Georgia. :eyes:

And yes, the House goes narrowly Democratic.

[David Dunham]

1. We had better win WV.

[cheshire]

2. I believe in the mass prayer school of thought. Want to try it?

[dennis4868]

3. And in other news.....

President Bush will invoke a not so well known section of the Patriot Act and will not leave office on January 20 because of elevated terror alerts. Mr. Bush says that they are receiving intercepts of discussion by leaders of al Qaeda of a certain terrorist attack on the United States if Bush is forced to leave office.

[napi21]

4. Next paragraphs.....

Also in a completely unrecognized outcome, the Democrats have won control of the US Senate AND control of the US House of Representatives, albeit with a small majority.

Certainly a Kerry/Edwards victory was unexpected, but for it to have this kind of coat tails is going to have the pollsters researching their errors for years! Just where did they all go so wrong?

[dennis4868]

5. And in other news....

Gallup gives Bush a 52% to 41% lead in the polls as of November 3, 2004.

[oasis]

10. That's a dandy.

:-)

[Odd Little Man]

6. Rush Limbaugh announced

that Bush really won the election but the left-wing media is misstating the results.

[Lex]

7. Small quibble

But November 3 will be a Wednesday not a Friday, because Nov 2 will be a Tuesday!

[liberalpragmatist]

8. whoops (corrected)

sorry, brainfart.

[TriMetFan]

9. I don't think you'll will be waiting long for Oregon.

I'm a Transit driver. Today at our Rose Quarter there were at least 7 young people age's 18-21 getting the young people to register to vote. These kids or young adults had Kerry buttons on. The movement is on to get the young to vote. I got out of my bus and had to shake hands with a couple of them. I told them that this Nation need them and that I was proud of them. One young man said he didn't want to be drafted so he was working hard to get out the vote. The young vote is going help :kick: Bush out.