Why is that surprising?
I'm actually mildly surprised that race is still a tossup - as it has been since before i started tuning in. From the district's profile you'd sort of expect it to be a "lean R but deal not quite closed" race a la Grayson's.
It's a ridiculously-polarized district. 52-48 for Gore, Kerry, and Obama.
That's consistent with elderly ethnic New Yorkers voting heavily for Lieberman, swinging slightly to Bush over anger at 9/11, and then swinging even more against Obama. All relative to the national performance. It would be interesting to compare to NY-9.
But we do know how elderly people are inclined to vote this year.
