Twenty-four hours ago . .

The tremendous victory last night was just not enough. For almost twenty-four hours, I've been working to extend these moments: When Ohio was called for Barack Obama and, driving home alone from downtown Cleveland, I started sobbing. When Barack reached, almost anti-climatically, the milestone of 270 electoral votes and ended the longest, hardest-fought election in modern memory. When the genuine John McCain, a man I have mourned the past several months, returned to make a measured and gracious concession speech.

And the moment when Barack and Michelle Obama embraced onstage, then walked off together, the new President-elect pausing to throw one last wave and smile to a roaring crowd.

Others want to extend the moment too. Delirious grins are exchanged, clips are re-loaded and re-watched. I'm wasting hours tearing up over photo montages, those dependable mood rings of historical significance, and reading international reactions. I can't stop, especially since the internet heartily encourages this new habit.

I have supported Barack Obama ever since he entered the presidential race. But the moment I became truly committed to his candidacy was just over a year ago, during Flag Pin Gate. His response to that headlining controversy:

"You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin. Shortly after 9/11 . . . that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security, I decided I won't wear that pin on my chest. Instead, I'm going to try to tell the American people what I believe will make this country great, and hopefully that will be a testimony to my patriotism."

I was floored. I had never heard any politician making such a nuanced statement, acknowledging the difference between empty symbolism and true patriotism. And even when Barack went back to wearing a pin, I realized I could live with it because I knew he was making a concession for the greater good. If people needed to see him with a flag pin, okay. There were bigger hurdles. And he met them with eloquence and the essential talent to assemble, organize and motivate a crack team.

Thoughtful, cool, nuanced . . . even intellectual. I wanted this man to be my president, but feared it wasn't possible. These qualities had been so soundly derided by the new Republican order (see John Kerry and his ability to speak French), that I wondered how the American people could ever elect someone with ambiguous feelings toward flag pin-wearing. Oh, and by the way, he was also African-American.

Yet, somehow . . . Barack Obama will be our next president.

The talking heads are quick to point out (and they have their own frantic reasons for extending the story), that this is just the beginning. Barack Obama faces tremendous adversity as he begins to navigate the United States away from the last eight years: the deficit, the economy, the wars, the healthcare system, the banking industry, and the disaffected McCain supporters who will need outreach and reassurance if we are truly to overcome a particularly bitter brand of partisanship.

But hey - Barack Obama is no stranger to adversity. Reports continue that he is working to expand and re-organize his crack team, preparing to hit the ground running on January 20, 2009. I truly believe that most Americans, even those who exist beyond the adoring throngs, will eventually respect and support him.

Watching the global jubilation last night, I remembered that the United States has always progressed forward. We might take a step sideways here, or make a leap backwards there, but we continue to march a line toward increased and equal rights, greater compassion and further equanimity. Last night's victory, and the feeling of unity we shared across continents - that is true symbolism.

So, please, let us have this moment. At least for the next few days.

That was better than New Years

Which is to say that January 1st doesn't really feel any different than December 31st, at least not in the way that today feels different than yesterday. At 11 PM eastern standard time, America finally moved into a new era. I found myself in a room full of NYU students studying majors related to public service and public policy - needless to say, this is a big deal for all of us. There's nothing like drinking with your professors and screaming at the top of your lungs each time a major swing state is announced.

Of course, I returned home afterwards to Bed-Stuy, an historically African American neighborhood in the middle of Brooklyn. I emerged from the subway at the corner of Nostrand Avenue and Fulton Street to find crowds of people holding signs, cheering as cars passed honking their horns. I imagine this is a bit like the World Cup in Europe. Which is ironic, since America doesn't tend to get too worked up about the political process. A stranger on the street congratulated me. I thanked him and congratulated him back.

Let the Horse Race Begin

A lot of political coverage throughout an election cycle focuses on the horse race aspect of the thing, fixating on who's up and who's down and where. Issues are sidelined, and many more reasoned heads out there ring their hands and pray that our political dialog was more substantive. I agree that this sort of reporting is a problem for democracy, but on one night, the horse race is all that's left. The first polls have just closed - let the horse race begin.

CNN is starting to report returns based on 3% of the electorate of Kentucky and Indiana. If the political pundits on NPR this afternoon are correct, however, we might very well know who's going to win before many folks on the west coast even get to the polls. If Obama wins any two of VA, PA, or FL, then mathematically it will be near impossible for McCain to win. In that case, the race will be over by around 9 tonight.

West Coast Voting

Voting for president on the west coast can be anti-climactic. When voting in the past as a California resident, I would usually not get a chance to vote until the evening after work. Because of time zones, I was voting even after voting booths in huge numbers of states had already closed. I remember getting home from voting only to find out that the media was already projecting a winner. The perception was that at that point, my vote didn't really count simply because I voted too late.

Blue-Eyed Wonder mentioned that we Oregonians lose out on the experience of physically going to a voting booth. But a nice side-effect of this is that I got to deposit my ballot yesterday—early enough to know that as the media projects how the popular vote lays out tonight, my voice has truly been heard.

Washington, D.C.

Meredith Slesinger in D.C. writes:

I was looking for my voter registration card when my boyfriend called my cell phone to tell me that the line at our precinct stretched out the door, around the corner, and down the hill into Rock Creek Park. Clearly, the residents of Mount Pleasant in Washington DC were going to be in for a long morning.

General elections in Washington are generally anti-climactic. 90% of the city voted for John Kerry in 2004 and the Republican party is nearly non-existent in local politics, save for an obscure rule requiring that one of the at-large council seats be held by an opposing party. (This usually means interested candidates change their registration from Democrat to Independent.) DC is a place where at the presidential level, the winning candidate is a foregone conclusion.

However, the inevitability of DC's three electoral votes did not appear to deter myself and the rest of my neighbors from turning out to vote for Barack Obama. While I'm sure there has to be at least one McCain / Palin voter among the 12,000 or so residents of Mount Pleasant, I can report I have not seen a single McCain / Palin sign or bumper sticker anywhere in the neighborhood. In fact, I can only recall a spotting a single McCain / Palin yard sign in DC at all, far up Oregon Avenue near the Maryland line.

Mount Pleasant is one of DC's most diverse neighborhoods, with a population nearly evenly divided between whites, blacks, and Hispanics. I couldn't help but grin as I walked down the hill to meet my boyfriend at end of the line, passing the entire racial and socioeconomic spectrum on my way. Mount Pleasant residents run the gamut from the affluent to those barely getting by. Regardless of color or tax bracket, everyone in line this morning was excited to be voting in this election.

In and of itself, that's pretty sweet.

Quiet in Miami Beach

After reading news all morning of huge lines at the polls, I headed out to three local polling places and was shocked to find not a single person standing in line at any of them. In the most notorious swing state of all, the dead quiet at the polls is surprising and a bit disconcerting. I'll head out later and see if things start picking up.

Out West

Here in my south Eugene neighborhood, if one was to base election assumptions on yard signs alone, you might believe the race being waged today was between Obama and Nader. I pass one big McCain sign on my way to campus, but there's not much question who has won the hearts and minds of the Willamette Valley. We're especially pleased by our local collective memory that, on his campaign swing through town last May, Obama stopped at a campus hangout for ice cream. He likes mint chocolate chip, and tips well. We like knowing that.

I find myself feeling oddly jealous of those of you who get to actually go to a polling place today. Out here, the vote-by-mail system eliminates that special moment (and also the long lines). It's a decent trade-off, but I feel like I'm missing out on something. And I don't get one of those little "I Voted" stickers.

The closest I came to that moment you're all experiencing today was walking through the rain and soggy maple leaves yesterday to drop off my sealed envelope at the Lane County elections office. There was a steady stream of foot traffic going in and out of the building, and I noticed how we all smiled and made eye contact and held the door for each other in a way slightly more generous than we would on any other day, or for any other errand. I'm not sure what that says, exactly, about this community, or the weight of this election, or the occasional pleasures of the usually-aggravating democratic process. But today really does feel special. I like knowing that, too.

Early Voting

Vote early last week was very similar to the experience of buying an iPhone last summer. Although I chose a strategic time - the middle of the day on a weekday - the line stretched right out of the city hall, and an elaborate system of queues kept the parade of people moving forward. Ten at a time, people standing in the line outside the building were ushered in and taken to yet another network of lines inside. Just as all of us poor Applephiles in the hot sun had nothing to talk about but the virtues of the new iPhone last summer, conversation in the voting line inevitably turned to politics.

My conversation partner was a middle-aged black American who works as a waiter at Miami's poshest and most famous restaurant. He told me about his 96 year old mother in Indianapolis and her giddiness at being able to vote for a black man this year. Overhearing our conversation, a wizened lady of 70-80 approached us to say, with a heavy Cuban accent: "I came here in 1959 and I always vote for the Republican. But guess what I just did?" She smiled broadly and mischievously. "I voted for Barack Obama."

Election Day Words from the "Far Left" of American Politics

So I did my civic duty today, and cast my vote at my polling place, deep in the heart of Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood. I was a little worried, given the words of warning in the press about shortages of voting machines, that I would get there to find throngs of people waiting in line for the one working voting machine. I was pleasantly surprised that the line I had to wait in for my polling district was quite short. Some of the lines stretched outside the door. There were only a couple of elderly women in front of me, one of whom got yelled at by the sour poll worker for being in the wrong line. I was able to get a laugh out of that poll worker when I asked her how many times I was allowed to vote today. Part of me is serious about that. The actual voting experience though was kind of anti-climactic. The voting booth appeared to date back to before I was born. So if there was any attempt to fix the election with rigged voting booths, it was perpetrated by the Nixon administration. I pulled the lever, pushed some little levers, pulled the lever again, and walked out. No receipt, no ballot to put in a box, no visible holes punched in a card, not even one of those iconic "I Voted!" stickers to wear on my sweater. Other than the memory of elderly African Americans waiting in long lines and pulling levers, I really have no evidence of ever having voted.

Still, this is the first election where I've felt pretty good about my choice. My last two presidential ballots were sent (lost) in the mail. I still think Barack Obama is the lesser of two evils. I have been joking about how I still need to decide between Nader and the Working Families party candidate. It turned out that Obama WAS the Working Families candidate. I still voted for him under Democrat though, due to the fact that I wasn't too sure how my vote would be counted if I pulled the working families lever.

One of McCain's talking points for the last few weeks has been to label Obama as "from the far left of American politics." As someone who considers himself pretty far left, and who knows and respects a handful of socialists, I am a little offended by this. If wanting to cut taxes for everyone but the very rich and supporting health care that DOESN'T necessarily result in universal coverage means that Obama is "far left," then what am I? While I still think Obama is more likely to be in touch with the needs of the majority of working- and middle-class Americans, I'd prefer it if McCain did not lump him in with my beliefs. It turns my beliefs into an insult lobbed by uninformed people to bring down a candidate they also know nothing about. This is basically to say two things: Obama is categorically NOT from the "far left" of American politics, and even if he was, what's so bad about that?

Concord, NH

Woke up this morning in downtown Concord, NH. You can tell this is a swing state. In Massachusetts where I live there is no contest - we are a blue state through and through. Here, people are out all over the place with signs, banners. People are honking their horns as they drive by. I've also seen about even numbers McCain and Obama signs. Projections show this state going blue, but from look of things no one is taking it for granted up here. If I had a camera I'd post some photos.

Alright, back to Massachusetts to vote.

The Florida Vote

While I was out canvassing on Saturday, I was struck by just how outflanked McCain is in this area. Literally every few blocks I ran into another Obama volunteer with their "Change" t-shirts and clipboards. The streets were so saturated with Obama canvassers, yard signs and stickers that for a moment it was hard to believe this was a swing state.

The Obama campaign's canvassing technique was exacting to the extreme. We visited Democrats with a history of not showing up on election day, and the organizational system employed by the office ensured that EVERY ONE of these people were visited, either in person of by phone, by a representative. If they weren't home when we were canvassing at their door, we marked them as "N/H" on a form so a volunteer later in the day could follow up. Obama's penetration into this district is so complete that many people have been visited numerous times.

Of course, as the organizers pointed out, for every Obama supporter in South Beach there is a dyed-in-the-wool Republican in Pensacola or Jacksonville. All of the three major South Florida counties will most likely go blue (Palm Beach, Broward, Miami-Dade); however, we're going to need strong victories here to offset the red votes from Northern Florida. In this election, the place to watch is not West Palm or Miami: it is the area between the north and the south, that deeply purple area around Orlando in central Florida. Tonight, as goes the I-4 corridor and Orange County, so goes Florida.

Election Blogging

New media has changed the way politics is reported in this country and opened once sealed, closed happenings and impressions up to the collective knowledge of everyone. For all the back and forth in the media wars between the bloggosphere and the established traditional organizations, this is one moment where, quantifiably, bloggers can tell the story of the 08 Presidential election in ways that the mainstream media simply cannot. We can testify to the minutiae and the anecdotes that fill in the messy human story of an election; we can bear witness to the polling process itself with a camera. I believe that this election will be the most thoroughly documented in American history, in large part because both the bloggosphere and the traditionals are opening up the nets of information to the wider world. Many major news companies (including the NY Times) are accepting photos from across the country to post on their site; important bloggers like Andrew Sullivan are welcoming emails from across the spectrum so he can post them on his blog. Election day is the moment in American life that most firmly embodies our Democratic ideals, where every proud individual becomes, if only for a moment, an anonymous Citizen. Please join me on the blog to document this historic event.