Day: November 3, 2004

Terry McAuliffe: Best. Night. Ever.

DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe was pretty much MIA last night as it became clear Bush had scored a huge victory, but earlier in the night he talked to a Washington Post reporter with typical McAuliffe bravado,

“This is the best election night in history,” says Terry McAuliffe, the Democratic National Committee chairman and designated carnival barker.

A lot of Democrats wanted to show McAuliffe the door after the 2002 election. They’ll have no problem cutting him loose now and pin much of the blame for the post-Clinton debacles on him.

Kerry Concession Speech?

All signs now point to Kerry delivering a concession speech later this afternoon.

A lot of liberal-left blogs and web sites are deluding themselves that the provisional ballots in Ohio could put Kerry over the top. The problem is this — yes, in 2000 something like 85 to 90 percent of provisional ballots counted as votes. But Ohio’s operating under a federal law now, and shortly before the election a federal judge ruled that provisional ballots cast by legitimate voters at the wrong precinct could not be counted. A huge number of those provisional ballots are going to be people who weren’t on voter rolls because they showed up at the wrong precinct. In 2000 Ohio’s state law allowed those to be counted; in 2004, federal law is going to prohibit them.

It’s over, folks.

The only remaining question is whether or not Kerry will be able to get through is concession speech without mentioning Vietnam, and whether Bush will be able to give a victory speech without mentioning that winning an election is really hard work.

The Onion: Nader Supporters Blame Electoral Defeat on Bush, Kerry

Nice story from The Onion on Ralph Who,

WASHINGTON, DC—Supporters of presidential candidate Ralph Nader blamed his defeat Tuesday on George W. Bush and John Kerry, claiming that the two candidates “ate up” his share of the electoral votes. “This election was stolen out from under Mr. Nader by Bush and Kerry, who diverted his votes to the right and the left,” Nader campaign manager Theresa Amato said. “It’s an outrage. If Nader were the only candidate, he would be president right now.” In his concession speech, Nader characterized Bush and Kerry as spoilers.

Ralph Who?

Although Kerry hasn’t given a concession speech yet, some independent named Ralph apparently did give one. I think the entire country at the moment is probably thinking, “Ralph who?”

And what are Michael Moore and others going to do without good old Ralph as their whipping boy for Kerry’s defeat? Last time around, Dukakis said he wanted to kill Ralph. Perhaps this time around he’ll just settle for some instructional flogging?

Big question for 2008 — does Ralph’s ego still prevent him from seeing the obvious leading to yet another presidential bid? Does he join Lyndon LaRouche on the nuts-who-insist-on-running-every-cycle parade?

Enough of the Stupid “Youth Vote” Meme

Hopefully the voting yesterday will finally put the stakes in this meme that’s popped up the last three election cycles that young people are going to show up in droves at the polls and propel the Democrats to victory. Young voters today tend to be relatively conservative, even if they still vote liberal as a bloc, and they still don’t show up to vote until they get older. Rather than “Vote or Die” the theme seemed to be “Vote or . . . well, do just about anything else.”

Heard Katie Couric this morning talking about some young woman who voted for the first time after waiting 9 hours — and Katie thought this was a good idea. Again, I can’t imagine what sort of world people live in where it is worth waiting 9 hours to cast 1 out of 120 million ballots.

(Then again, under my view of voting, very few people would actually bother to do it in person — so people who request absentee ballots, young people who don’t bother to vote, and those who are good at estimating when voting is relatively light at their polling place are acting rationally, but what the heck is the rest of the country thinking?)