I was working at full tilt on election day in 2004. I had multiple teams deployed throughout Montgomery County in the Philadelphia suburbs doing GOTV. We had registered thousands of people to vote and had knocked on all our targeted doors at least three times prior to election day. I wasn’t knocking on doors that day. I was driving people from place to place in one of our fleet of vans and listening to the news reports on the radio. It looked for all the world like we were rolling to victory. Things on the ground in Pennsylvania looked fantastic and were exceeding all our models. In fact, we did better than we originally expected but much worse than we thought we were doing on election day. We won Pennsylvania and boosted Kerry’s results in Montgomery County more than three percent higher than Gore’s. But something had gone wrong. Something had gone wrong all across the country and in the exit polls. We can argue forever about what happened, but we didn’t get our asses kicked. He lost narrowly because we slightly underperformed expectations. We didn’t lose in 2000, either. We actually won and had our victory snatched away from us by a combination of flukes, voter suppression, and Supreme Court overreach. In 1998, we actually won despite all predictions that we would lose. It’s been a very long time since we got our asses kicked. In fact, the last time we got our asses kicked was in 1994, and I was only twenty-five years old.
Tomorrow, we are going to get our asses kicked again. I don’t really remember what it is like. But I do remember what it was like to finish my day at 8pm on election day in 2004 thinking that we had just thrown Bush and Cheney out of office only to watch the returns come in and realize that we hadn’t. So, go vote, make phone calls, knock on doors, contact your social networks, and hope that things are not really as bad as they appear to be.
I turned 18 six days before the 1994 elections. First time I ever voted, and everyone I voted for got their asses kicked except for Gray Davis (and look what eventually happened to him).
I guess I was too young to take it personally back then. Since I was the first of all my friends to turn 18, though, I also had on hand a porno, a lotto ticket, and a pack of cigarettes. Those things were handy distractions for getting whupped at my first vote–and for registering with the Selective Service.
Tomorrow I will turn 34. Last time election day was on my birthday was 2004. Chocolate cake wasn’t much of a consolation to those results.
I plan to be far away from TV and the internet tomorrow.
I had the same experience in 2004. I was a precinct captain for MoveOn in West Philly, the same precinct as Chris Bowers, who had been reporting the exit returns; everyone was very optimistic and excited, and the buzz of victory was in the air. Some of us sat in a pizzaria at 8:00, and as I watched the returns coming in on CNN, something began to feel not quite right. The rest is history.
I was referring to the last paragraph of Booman’s post.
I can easily remember when Bush won his second term. I felt physically ill for a week. After all the hopes were dashed and we knew we were in for four more years of Republican domination, I felt like I had been mauled. From that point on, I had a physical reaction every time I saw him or heard his voice on TV.
I still do, actually.
That revolting, hollow in the stomach feeling every time I saw and heard Bush speak on T.V. I would jump up and turn down the sound. For me, he always was that really dumb rich kid who went to my high school. The bully, the kid with expensive drugs, and snide put downs. Lots of material possessions, but no real parental love or validation. The love deprivation experiment gone hopelessly wrong. And now, he was the leader (?) of our nation? Bizarro World/Roman Empire End Times/ Utter Corruption of a dream that millions of immigrants actually believed in. These Teabaggers are blowing it for all of us, and resurrecting the Bushenstein in the process.
At moments like that, I remember that Lee Atwater died of a brain tumor, in pain, and in remorse. Cheers me up tremendously.
I’m sick of these TV pundits talking out their butts. 70 seats lost in the House, 50/50 split in the Senate. I think they just make shit up to get attention.
The winner so far today so far is NBC showing Christine O’Donnell voting this morning. Why? She’s going to lose big time-thank God-and you’d think they wouldn’t waste precious resources sending a camera crew to look at the local lunatic. I mean, who cares?
Nobody has won or lost yet. Things look bleak, but I’ll be concerned later. I plan on going to the Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin – Scott Heidepriem Democratic victory party in Sioux Falls, SD tonight.
NBC is is trying hard to prove they are not the “liberal media”.
Oh Lord…but aren’t they all? Le sigh…
I’ll be watching a movie tonight.
In 2004, I was unemployed — had been since 2001 (thank you, W you asshole) — had found a M-W-Th temp job scoring No Child Left Behind text answers. The job was excruciating, with pressure to make the state that contracted the work (in this case CT) look good. It was a job with scheduled restroom and snack breaks. When we came back from the break, the supervisor would give the latest news and electoral vote count. It was looking good for Kerry.
The next morning we found out that Ken Blackwell had delivered the election to Bush. Later we found out that he had ordered the ballots destroyed and memories erased before Jennifer Bruner took office.
The day after the election, I was physically apoplectic – red face, high blood pressure, irritability, unmoderated anger. Twice the sucker did it. Twice. And this time by tearing down the reputation of someone who did his tour in Vietnam while W was in the champagne unit of the Texas Air National Guard and goofing off. And a major factor in the situation was the lying media.
I’ve decided that I’m not going to be surprised with bad results this time. The lying media has gone from bad in the Clinton administration, to worse in the Bush administration, to downright evil in the Obama administration. Andrew Breitbart commenting on the election is like John Wilkes Booth commenting on the Lincoln administration.
We now have to find a way to outflank the huge media buys that Republicans are using to bribe the media. It is almost as if the Democrats will have to go underground in order to win back the country. Drop from sight. Find other communication channels with voters and starve the media beast. And no, I haven’t a clue how we get that done. But we have to do it in two years or we will see Republicans inch closer to their dream of a permanent majority. If only because of vote suppression and the depression and desperation of the electorate. We are back to 2002 — practically, emotionally.
Now, if you haven’t, get out and vote and make sure the hole is not deeper than forecast.
Great post. I suppose once the Bush crowd realized they’d gotten away rather easily with the theft of the election in 2000 (and some other unflattering Shrub past deeds, as you note), with little Dem resistance and almost a full assist in covering it up by the MSM, they probably figgered why not do it again, if needed, in 2004. Nice trick to have someone like Blackwell available to help with all the dirty work. RFK Jr in 2006 wrote the most persuasive article about the dubiousness of that 04 election.
Me, I began getting accustomed to election day disappointment early on going back to 1966 with the GOP midterm landslide that year, and Reagan pushing aside a rather effective Dem governor going for a 3d term (Jerry Brown’s dad Pat) by a million votes. Reagan the pol was officially born that day, and at the same time (I learned later) there was the resurrection and beginning of the comeback of the previously dead Nixon, who’d stumped across the country for various successful Goopers and now was about to position himself to have those pols repay their debts to him in the 68 race.
1968 and 1972, tremendous disappointment first with the lib-lefties not backing a decent HHH against Tricky, then 4 yrs later not so much that Nixon won against McGovern but the size of it — nearly 61% of the vote, winning everywhere but DC and MA. Extremely depressing.
Well put, especially the atrocity of Breitbart and ABC/Disney. It might help our side if our big money people got together and started up our own Dem-friendly media outlet to deliver our pov unfiltered by the GOP-friendly MSM at all the non-Fox outlets. Until then however, we’re left griping and rather too-gratefully grasping for the few crumbs that get thrown us by Msnbc and Keith and Rachel and Ed.
In 1972, the Democratic establishment essentially went through the motions and sat on its hands, allowing Republicans to walk away with union and urban ethnic voters on the basis of cultural issues and patriotism.
It is almost as if the Democrats will have to go underground in order to win back the country. Drop from sight. Find other communication channels with voters and starve the media beast. And no, I haven’t a clue how we get that done. But we have to do it in two years or we will see Republicans inch closer to their dream of a permanent majority.
No doubt that a deteriorating society will produce this type of cultural insurgency eventually. However, I don’t believe it will be the Democrats, nor will it happen in two years. Not one organized movement, but many. Things will have to get pretty bad first, though. While we’re still relatively comfortable there’s no reason to disengage. & yes, relative to how bad it can get, we’re generally still comfortable. The majority are still food-secure, for example.
</dystopian projection>
Actually, I don’t even think a cultural disengagement will be organized at all — just a matter of the zeitgeist. The cultural insurgency of the 60s wasn’t organized either. We evolved. We’re still evolving. There’s always pushback against constriction.
Then we are waiting for up to 75 years for a change. Because people don’t revolt when times are bad, but when times are good for enough time to set expectations and then snap back. We haven’t had really good times since 1972. And the hopelessness has increased year by year.
My point is that Democrats better figure out how to starve the beast or they will be wasting hundreds of millions of dollars trying to match the Republican flood. Buying media time is subsidizing Republicans; that’s all it is now. Media free coverage can undo what bought Democratic time does.
Yep. This is precisely what the Dems are going to do, IMO — while the whole process becomes increasingly removed from real life & real process.
I have no doubt, either, that by the time significant societal change takes place, most of us here at BT will be gone. We learn so incredibly slowly, as a species & media infusion into every aspect of our lives obscures even what we think we know first-hand. It’s not impossible to foresee it, though, based on your time frame.
2008 was my first vote, but I couldn’t believe America had elected Bush again in 2004. I was a junior in high school when that happened, and in my area (Spotsylvania, Eric Cantor’s district…) is the conservative of the conservatives. Confederate sympathizers, Confederate flags everywhere, the elementary school around the block was named after Robert E. Lee, a major highway 5 mins away is called Jefferson Davis Highway, etc. That’s just one area (Civil War), and I didn’t even finish. Basically, this is the area where they especially haven’t “gotten over it” yet. So when Bush was elected, the people in school had mixed reactions. Let’s just say that most of the teachers were disappointed, 75% of the white kids were happy, and every black person was pissed. I was neither, I was just in disbelief. Especially when I asked my parents how they voted. Of course I knew they were evangelical fundies, but I remember them saying how much they regretted their vote. If you regretted it so fucking much why pull the lever for that drunken frat boy again?
‘Course, America didn’t elect Bush in 2000 or in 2004. The actual story of those 2 elections is so murky that it’s easy to think we did, because this is how political parties are supposed to gain power. The extent of the absolute corruption of the electoral process after 2000 can barely be imagined — especially since there’s been zero public scrutiny. Consider Rove’s insistence that they now own reality, that 9-11 changed everything. He really does mean reality & he does mean everything. We’re at the point where a flaming sociopath has the clearest read on the situation & the majority remains completely in the dark, believing we’re who we’re supposed to be.
Looks as if Feingold will go down in Wisconsin. Perhaps he made a mistake not accepting Obama’s endorsement, and I don’t recall that Bill Clinton made a trip up there either.
Wisconsin elected Joe McCarthy Senator for many years, and my mother-in-law still thinks highly of that fucking asshole. Every “liberal” area has a LOT of conservaturds in it. Southern California is the home of Orange County and Venice Beach. Things flip back and forth.
Nonetheless, trading in a man of principle for a piece of shit is concerning.
Well, “many years” overstates it re Tailgunner Joe. He was first elected in 1946 as just Joe McCarthy, Republican. It wasn’t until 1950 that he began his anti-commie crusade. Re-elected only once (and died, greatly discredited, before finishing that term) at a time when the major political leaders of the time — Pres Truman and Ike — chose not to directly confront him. A good chunk of the country was caught up in the cold war hysteria of that period, and no one was willing to take the risk of challenging him, or not until 1954. So, partial excuse for the people of WI.
For the most part, the senators after McC from WI have been Dems, and lib ones at that — Wm Proxmire, Gaylord Nelson, then Feingold and Kohl.
But, no question, WI is on the verge of electing an empty corp suit to replace an outstanding public servant in Russ Feingold. Let’s hope enough folks in Milwaukee show up today to do the right thing and re-elect Russ.
Re Orange County, CA, it’s not nearly the RW hotbed of lunatic fringies that it was in the 1960s. Latino influx primarily, plus the migration there (from LA mostly) of more moderate Goopers and indies and some Dems and the civilizing influence of UC Irvine.
What the hell happened? I had no idea he was in so much trouble until a couple of months ago? Did he not do his due diligence or have the politics in the state change or a combo of each?
I live in MD, and as reliably blue as we are, trust and believe that Mikulski has done/is doing her due diligence as if she was 10 points behind.
I just came home from voting. They moved our polling place from one church to another church in very close proximity, so I don’t know how that made a difference, but there you go.
Voting at 9:30 am was light. The poll worker who took care of me didn’t seem to know what she was doing. The four poll workers at the table where I went to sign in all looked astonished when I asked for a paper ballot. I told them that I had used an electronic machine in the primaries before Obama was elected and the printer in the ballot machine jammed, so I felt like it wasn’t a safe process.
I had to tell the poll worker that I needed to sign the log and she had to verify it. WTF? I filled out my ballot and sealed it in the envelope. Mine was the only one in the canvas bag.
I’ll try to ignore all the media today. I’m not turning on the TV and I don’t listen to the radio anyway, so I plan to stay home, work quietly in my studio, and pretend that the Apocalypse isn’t happening. Sigh…
Save it for tomorrow. When we know how deep the hole really is.
the first 2 points yes. I should save it for tomorrow.
the second two points, not so much. the duopoly is not working anymore, and hasn’t been for sometime. The republicans have one solution to everything: cut taxes. the democrats are more worried about the republicans calling them than proposing actual solutions. you think people are going to be gung-ho for republicans after 2010-2012, dream on. things are going to get worse.
then they’ll elect democrats, who will play into republican obstruction, and things will get worse. then people will elect republicans, who will do their cut taxes and everything else trick again, and things will get worse. So people will elect democrats…
lather rinse repeat.
A story about Jim Imhofe of Okahoma:
They are counting on us to surrender by not participating. Funny thing about that.
Now some good news. It seems African-Americans are turning out in numbers similar to 2008, at least in central St. Louis. Heavy turnout in Massachusetts and Allentown, PA. Call your sympathetic friends, family, and neighbors and make sure that they’ve voted.
One l’il questions: if ‘liberals’ are incapable of accomplishments, what is it that the GOP is working so hard to obstruct or undo?
Is he actually admitting that this continual campaigning against the liberal threat to ‘our freedom’ is just a lot of bullshit meant to rouse the yahoos?
Thought so.
And the constant campaign of obstruction is meant to demoralize weak-kneed and perfectionist liberals.
On my way into work today, I noticed that ALL the 4 largest nationally syndicated urban radio programs (Tom Joyner, Micheal Baisden, Rickey Smiley, Steve Harvey) were doing Election Day coverage. At least one of them has all of their usual morning crew personalities calling in from different cities and states to let listeners know what’s going on.
Like I’ve been saying for a while, Af Am are engaged this for this midterm election. The DNC/OfA strategy of concentrating on Af Am voters will work I believe. It’s really all up to the “average” white voter to GOTV. Of course, we won’t know til maybe early Wednesday exact nubmers, but I’m just saying don’t be surprised to hear that Af Am voting numbers for midterm elections increased!
Your Onion moment of Zen:
New Poll Finds 86 Percent Of Americans Don’t Want To Have A Country Anymore
“Imagine a situation in which the country needs to build a huge system of projects which will connect every city in the country to every other city. The system will prepare our country for the next 100 years of business, tourist, and civic progress. Every mayor in every city in the US wants this system to be built.
Will you vote Yes or No to spend 100 billion dollars on this system?”
You might suspect that I am describing the interstate highway system. I doubt that any republican would vote for this. Yet, if today’s Teabagging Treason idiots had been in the Eisenhower Administration, we would be traveling today on secondary roads.
Voted Dem this morning. More people had come to vote so far.
If you don’t watch cable tv or listen to political radio, things don’t seem as dire as the pundits say.
The media loves a sensation and they are trying to drum up some excitement this year.
Wait until all the votes are counted and then let’s see where things stand.
A lot of the reports are coming from places that have had heavy early voting.
Uh, we got our asses kicked in 2002.
Anyhow my first really solid victory in looking at election returns was 1994. I was not even a teenager. The thing I remember most is that I was thinking “Why is it only the Democrats losing? Why are all of them losing?”