It feels as if the world is holding its breath...

I have to remind myself to breathe deeply; I catch myself listening, holding my own breath as I do so.

Do you feel it too?

What will it sound like when it finally exhales?

= = = = =

Join us to chat about late exit polls and first results.  I'll open a chat room in AOL IM just before 8:00 pm tonite; email me your IM username if you'd like an invite.

5:55:02 PM    comment []

It was a piece of cake here.

The proverbial cake walk.

Twenty minutes, in and out.  Took me ten minutes for the poll workers to check my name against the voter roll, issue my ballot.  Five minutes to complete my ballot.  Five minutes to wait for my ballot to be processed.

And out the door.

There was a massive jam of folks in the parking lot at 8:00 am this morning.  I think all the press about the record turn-out must have gotten to the folks of this precinct; in the fourteen years I've lived here, I've never seen it jammed like that before.  The population of this precinct has grown by less than 10% over that period of time.  This means the jam this morning wasn't due to a spike in the voter roll.

That's good, though, means a large percentage of this precinct will be coasting along these evening, watching the early reports in the peace and quiet of their homes rather than standing in line to vote this evening.

One humorous moment: I voted right next to the 18-year-old son of my neighbor and former sitter.  I've watched him grow up over the last eleven years; he now towers over me, approaching six foot five.  I recognized him on sight because he towered over the voting booths as well, looking as if he had to bend over in two in order to read and complete his ballot.  I gave him a nudge and a whisper as I entered the booth next to him; he chuckled, gave me a nod.  He'd actually volunteered this past week to change a lightbulb in one of my outdoor fixtures this past week.  I thought that was rather odd, but with my spouse out of town on business, Halloween approaching and being too short to readily change the bulb myself, I took him up on the offer.

He asked me what I thought of the presidential candidates after he swapped out the bulb.  Heh.

I gave him the links to Wikipedia's entries on Bush and Kerry, told him to read them as if he was a hiring manager.  Who would he hire to fill this job?  I told him in my own opinion, the guy with a history of substance abuse problems and multiple failed businesses was not well-qualified to protect the Constitution and the American public.  I told him the potential for a draft would be a major consideration for me were I his age; which of the candidates would understand the issues related to military deployment and execution of objectives?  He'd asked my opinion, I gave it, and I gave him ammunition to launch his own independent evaluation.

I'm pretty certain I know how he voted. 

He gave me a poke and a smile as he left his booth.  I wasn't far behind him, but then he needed longer to read the ballot than I did.  It was his first presidential election ballot, too.

Lucky me, being there to see this young man take this first big step into the adult world.

Wish he was old enough to have a beer, I'd buy one for him to celebrate this event.

Now...back to GOTV and making phone calls.

See you on line later, after 8:00 pm EDT!  Drop me a note if you want into the chat room so we can watch the polls together.

And by all means, wear your hoodie and bring on the snark!

2:03:59 PM    comment []

Note these two translations of OBL's recent tape, side by side.

One is from Aljazeera, the other from CNN.

Content has been removed and added, depending on which one you read.  There is a slightly different spin on each.  And no, the Aljazeera one isn't necessarily the one that's more negative.  It will depend on your point of view.

How many other ways could this message have been interpreted?  How much isn't here that other translations would have added?

More importantly, why would a man who can speak English fluently address the United States in Arabic?

Most importantly, why is this guy still talking at us in the year 2004?

11:02:23 AM    comment []

VOTE!!!

And don't forget your black hoodie sweatshirt!!!

8:05:27 AM    comment []

In one of the comment threads:

Ok people its 4:00 am here in London Eng. And i cant sleep, i hope all of you guys across the pond are ready....


at dawn you will all change the world, the world is holding its breath,
choose wisley and never in fear,
stand strong and the world will stand with you.

good luck....
zain | Email | Homepage | 11.01.04 - 10:41 pm | #

Chokes me up.  I hope you global neighbors of ours realize that many of us are going to do the right thing, do our level best for both you and our own.  We've tried, just not hard enough.

Until now.

Hope you'll have patience with us as we pick up after the elephants.  It's a big mess, as you well know.

12:43:16 AM    comment []