2010 Primaries Thread (It's all over now, baby blue)

[cinyc]

Is Vermont set in stone for a Shumlin win?

Good question.  Shumlin won the precinct count.  I'm sure it's close enough for a recount, but I don't know the Vermont laws.   I'll try to look at the Burlington Free Press and TV station websites to see what they say about absentees and the like.

Edited to add: The Burlington Free Press says that Markowitz or Racine can ask for a recount, since both are within 2 points of Shumlin.
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20100824/NEWS03/100824023/1095/Shumlin-Looks-like-we-ve-won

I've found nothing about absentees as of yet.

[Lunar]

They held a unity rally today, I did some Google news searches & blog checks a few hours ago, didn't see anything that contained any drama

[SvenssonRS]

Why don't the AP just call Alaska?

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Because, as has been discussed on the past five or six pages, there are still thousands of absentee ballots yet to be counted.

[cinyc]

Because, as has been discussed on the past five or six pages, there are still thousands of absentee ballots yet to be counted.

There may be some questioned votes, too - but likely not many.

AP hasn't called VT-Gov-D yet, either, for the same reasons.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

Is Vermont set in stone for a Shumlin win?

Good question.  Shumlin won the precinct count.  I'm sure it's close enough for a recount, but I don't know the Vermont laws.   I'll try to look at the Burlington Free Press and TV station websites to see what they say about absentees and the like.

Edited to add: The Burlington Free Press says that Markowitz or Racine can ask for a recount, since both are within 2 points of Shumlin.
http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/article/20100824/NEWS03/100824023/1095/Shumlin-Looks-like-we-ve-won

I've found nothing about absentees as of yet.

The secretary of state's website says the canvassing board will meet next Tuesday to finalize the results.

As far as absentee voting is concerned, Vermont seems to be full-service. Seriously, Ken Blackwell's head would explode if he read that.

[cinyc]

The secretary of state's website says the canvassing board will meet next Tuesday to finalize the results.

As far as absentee voting is concerned, Vermont seems to be full-service. Seriously, Ken Blackwell's head would explode if he read that.

Full service, but absentees had to be returned by election day to be counted.  So Racine and Markowitz are hoping transcribing errors will put them over the top.

[Torie]

Yes, Cinyc, I note the crazies in Eagle went 2-1 for the insurgent. If you want to read about Eagle, read John McPhee's superb book, Coming into the Country. Man that man knows how to write. It is almost prose poetry - spare and eloquent, with every word carrying its weight, with exactly the right word used, time after time. He has a gift.

You know, if you really want to learn how to write well, read books by folks who really know how to write. Just a thought.

[🐒Gods of Prosperity🔱🐲💸]

This is too bad. Murkowski was one of my favorite Senators.

that's odd, i thought you'd prefer Indiana pork to Alaskan.
anyway I do hope Miller keeps his lead. If elected, he will bring back the representation of facial hair to the Senate.

[cinyc]

With 438 of 438 in:

Joe Miller (R)   47,027   50.90%
Lisa Murkowski (R)   45,359   49.10%

Miller +1,668. 

And now, the absentees, (possible) questioned votes, and the question of whether the Libertarian candidate jumps out of the race to let Murkowski run on the Libertarian line should she decide that's the course she wants to take....

[Torie]

With 438 of 438 in:

Joe Miller (R)   47,027   50.90%
Lisa Murkowski (R)   45,359   49.10%

Miller +1,668. 

And now, the absentees, (possible) questioned votes, and the question of whether the Libertarian candidate jumps out of the race to let Murkowski run on the Libertarian line should she decide that's the course she wants to take....

Murkowski running as a Libertarian? LOL.  I mean, does she have any more libertarian instincts than I do (to wit, not much on the issues in play out there)? 

[Holmes]

This is too bad. Murkowski was one of my favorite Senators.

that's odd, i thought you'd prefer Indiana pork to Alaskan.
anyway I do hope Miller keeps his lead. If elected, he will bring back the representation of facial hair to the Senate.

Yeah, that's an important constituency.

[Хahar 🤔]

This is too bad. Murkowski was one of my favorite Senators.

that's odd, i thought you'd prefer Indiana pork to Alaskan.
anyway I do hope Miller keeps his lead. If elected, he will bring back the representation of facial hair to the Senate.

Yeah, that's an important constituency.

As someone with facial hair, I approve.

[cinyc]

With 438 of 438 in:

Joe Miller (R)   47,027   50.90%
Lisa Murkowski (R)   45,359   49.10%

Miller +1,668. 

And now, the absentees, (possible) questioned votes, and the question of whether the Libertarian candidate jumps out of the race to let Murkowski run on the Libertarian line should she decide that's the course she wants to take....

Murkowski running as a Libertarian? LOL.  I mean, does she have any more libertarian instincts than I do (to wit, not much on the issues in play out there)? 

Yeah, she'd be a big government Libertarian.  Kind of an oxymoron.  But, as I understand it, it's her only way on the November ballot.  Murkowski is too late to run on her own independent line.  The Alaskan Independence Party didn't run a candidate, which means she can't do an AIP switcheroo.   So it's either get the Libertarian to back out and run on that line, wage a write-in campaign, or fold.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

I assume that Miller doesn't want to cut Alaskan pork. So by smaller government, I assume he means that California just sends money directly to Alaska?

Anyways, the electorate seems to be in a bit of an anti-incumbent mood. I would have much rather McCain lost instead of Murkowski, of course.

[JohnnyLongtorso]

I didn't catch this last night, but Vermont Democrats nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor. There was also a gay candidate for Auditor, but he lost the primary.

[cinyc]

FWIW, the residents of Stevens Village cast 6 total votes, all in the combined Democrat-AIP-Libertarian primary.  0 votes were supposedly cast in the Republican primary.  All of Miller's gains came from Snoeshoe, which he won by 193.

[Torie]

I didn't catch this last night, but Vermont Democrats nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor. There was also a gay candidate for Auditor, but he lost the primary.

CA back when elected a gay man to the worthless Lt Governor spot: Mike Curb. Of course we also elected a gay governor, until I guess he decided to marry a beard.

[tpfkaw]

Lisa Murkowski is about as libertarian as Generalissimo Franco, so that's not going to happen.

I didn't catch this last night, but Vermont Democrats nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor. There was also a gay candidate for Auditor, but he lost the primary.

Massachusetts Republicans nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor . . .

(Well, at the party convention, but I think he's unopposed in the primary).

[Lunar]

I used to be on Joe Miller's email list.  It was really boring and painful to read so it was one of the few  I'm unsubscribed from.  Maybe  I shouldn't  have.

[Thomas D]

I didn't catch this last night, but Vermont Democrats nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor. There was also a gay candidate for Auditor, but he lost the primary.

CA back when elected a gay man to the worthless Lt Governor spot: Mike Curb. Of course we also elected a gay governor, until I guess he decided to marry a beard.

Reagan

[Torie]

I didn't catch this last night, but Vermont Democrats nominated a gay man for Lt. Governor. There was also a gay candidate for Auditor, but he lost the primary.

CA back when elected a gay man to the worthless Lt Governor spot: Mike Curb. Of course we also elected a gay governor, until I guess he decided to marry a beard.

Reagan

Nope.

[Sam Spade]

I always like to see where the absentees come from before saying too much, but Murkowski is toast imo.

[Kevinstat]

Might the absentee votes in Vermont have been counted within the municipalities and the totals added to the election day at polling place totals within that municipality before the municipality reported results?

The way people talk about absentee votes on this site makes me wonder if they are counted very differently in much of the country than they are in Maine.  In Maine, when a town reports results, those results include the absentee votes.  Perhaps the "regular" votes are counted first but the absentee and early ballots that aren't challenged (and challenges can happen when people go to vote in person; I remember reading that in 2000 Republicans in Brunswick challenged a bunch of voters from Bowdoin College who may have owed their residency to their dorm room, which Maine's constitution makes clear does not give people the right to suffrage but it may be interpreted as allowing state or local law (and constitutional state laws trump local laws) to allow college students living in the dorms to vote in the municipality where their dorm is)... anyway, I think combined unofficial (but becoming official in races where recounts are not requested) totals including absentee, early and regular ballots are arrived at in the single precinct municipalities and there's no distinguishing the different kinds of ballots if someone views the results after they are official.  Most (if not all now, the one exeption I recall from past elections closed its second polling place a couple years ago or more) of the municipalities with multiple precincts have a separate "central voting" precinct which presumably covers absentees and early voting.  (In 2008, Maine had early voting for some municipalities where I assume voters actually put the ballots directly in the ballot box rather than an absentee ballot which they sealed and put in the ballot box.  My municipality didin't have early voting but I've voted absentee at the town office before election day multiple times and the clerk or assistant clerk fills out most of the absentee ballot envelope for you and you have to do little more than sign, probably date (I don't remember) and seal it before giving it to the clerk or assistant clerk who reviews the envolope and tells you you're all set (the first time I voted that way, when the clerk didn't fill out as much, there was one thing that I'd missed that the clerk pointed out gave the envelope back to me to fill out).)

So when all the precincts are in and people ask, "what about the absentees," I think to myself, "aren't they included within the municipal results?"  To those who know, how does counting different kind of ballots work in states where you know how it works?

[redcommander]

Wow, okay. I wasn't expecting to wake up to Murkowski trailing.

Also, Ben Quayle? Really, AZ-03?

I know likely a Democrat hold on the seat. I was expecting Gorman to have won actually with all her buzz.