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5th District of Virginia - House of Representatives Race

The State Board of Elections is reporting, as of noon today, Virgil Goode, Republican Incumbent, is leading Tom Periello, Democrat, by 145 votes in the race for a seat in the U.S. House. The 5th District includes Charlottesville and Albemarle County (where I live) along with a handful of largely rural counties to the south of me.
The raw vote is 157421 to 157276. Election officials will first check to be sure that vote totals from the various precincts add up and then will then tackle the provisional ballots. These were cast by individual voters who showed up at the polls only to find that their names were not on the list. My county had 40 provisional votes that will have to be resolved.
Goode is in his 6th term. He is very conservative. The Democrats have never before been able to mount any effective challenge against him. Periello undoubtedly got a boost by hanging onto the coattails of Mark Warner (Senator-elect) and Obama.

Yaaaay!

LOL

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(Check out Cjhsa's new thread: "Hey, Obama!" We have talked before about A2K's Ignore feature. I said I dont use it. I enjoy watching idiots make complete asses of themselves).

NC finally gets it right! NC to Obama so add another 15 EV's.

Cumberland County / Fort Bragg went for Obama 58.7% to 41%!!!

Ft Bragg and environs? That says a lot.

I thought you couldn't have election signage within 100 feet of the polls..

This thread is dead. But I do want to thank yall for the 500 posts and something like 4500 views. It was fun.
Johnboy pulls down the shades and searches for one last can of Cheez-Whiz.

Well, it is quiet here, but I couldn't think of a more appropriate place to put this link.

election night, Chicago, Obama friends and family (80+ photos)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/barackobamadotcom/sets/72157608716313371/

Thanks, ehBeth..

What a jip! (Did anyone see that coming?)

Ha, I was thinking the same. I did NOT know about the weird Nebraska rule until it became an issue.

I still think we're closest tho...!

Wait! I picked exactly 365 electoral votes for Obama. (I only forgot to actually post my prediction.)

You go to school and every year since third grade they tell you it's winner-take-all in the Electoral College. You watch TV all these years and all the analysts tell you it's winner-take-all in the Electoral College. You pick the amount exactly. Then you turn on the television and find out-guess what-it's winner take all for every state except for one guy in Nebraska. And you had the count dead on except for that one guy.

What a screwing.

It never occurred to me that it might matter, but I can't claim I didn't know about it. Deist was advocating the idea of using the Nebraska/Maine system to bring the big States back in play... seems like about a year ago, but I don't remember where and I'm no good at searching the new site.

Good job Soz! (I actually got Missouri and Indiana wrong, but they offset.)

I saw it coming. The Dem blogs were talking about the possibility for about a month before the election.

The Republicans here in CA have tried to get the state's electoral votes split for some time now. I'm not against the plan, but it would have to be instituted on a national basis - individual states doing this doesn't make much sense...

Cycloptichorn

Yes. I've been a big advocate of this for some time. However, I see it having to be a national change and all at once.

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If you are going to have proportional voting within each state, why not get rid of the Electoral College altogether?

It seems to me whatever advantage it confers relies on the winner-take-all aspect within states.

You're not thinking it through. Texas gets about 1 electoral vote for every 700,000 voters. By contrast, Wyoming gets about 1 for every 175,000. This 4 to 1 advantage encourages candidates not to simply fly over flyover states.