A few unconnected thoughts from the day:
- The most surprising results for me were the congressional races in New Hampshire. Two scandal-free, relatively popular incumbents were kicked out. Iraq? Uncontrolled federal spending? Civil liberty issues? Some fraction of each of these, I’m sure. There were a number of “first time in a century” events in New Hampshire yesterday. It’s a different state than the one I grew up in.
- The Democrats in Massachussets tightened their grip on the General Court. 35-5 in the Senate (88%), 137-19 (88%) in the House. It seems like this is a real governance problem. The legislature is effectively being chosen in primaries a tiny fraction of the electorate. I’ll be writing about this one more in the future. (I know that the House count isn’t quite right. If you have a link to final results, please let me know – I’ve been searching all over)
- I think that Webb’s lead in Virginia is safe. The recount will not change the outcome. First, look at last year’s recount for Attorney General – it barely budged. Second, just do the math. The lead is about 7000 votes, depending on which website you use. Webb, Parker, and write-ins have perhaps 1.2 million votes combined. That means that Allen has to find an error in his favor on one out of every 171 votes cast, while finding no errors that work against him. I would be shocked if the error rate was that high, and it always broke in his direction. Allen has to hope that someone finds a ballot box or a broken calculator. We won’t know for weeks, but I’m betting on a Democratic-controlled Senate in January.
- Why is it that the results in Virginia were available hours after the polls closed, but races like Washington’s Eighth are still only half counted? I’m sure there’s a reason here, but I don’t know it.
- Eleven races are still too close to call. We won’t know the margin of this mid-term defeat for quite a while.
- I’m encouraged to note how many third-party candidates received more votes than the margin of victory (there are more, but those are a representative few). I hope that it leads the main-stream press to give them more coverage in future elections. I’m not holding my breath.