We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
I finally have my power back (no thanks to government but with thanks to private industry who had a big job to do) just in time for a cold Nor'easter with snow blowing in and, while deeply disappointed but not surprised about the national elections, I am finding them interesting to reflect upon.
A few things I have been thinking about are these:
- the MSM runs interference for Dems, with passion and without regard to their professional integrity. They have done so since Nixon. It's worth billions in campaign funds or, really, it's priceless. They still have vast reach and influence in the culture at large. Just ask Obama.
...there is the fact that relatively few Americans actually pay for the government they consume. To a greater extent than any other developed nation, we rely on upper-income people to finance our federal government. When that is combined with the fact that around 40% of our federal spending isn’t paid for at all–it is borrowed–it is small wonder that many self-interested voters are happy to vote themselves more government. Mitt Romney proclaimed that Barack Obama was the candidate of “free stuff,” and voters took him at his word.
- What's with Hispanics? Are they a solid voting bloc? Would Rubio have made a difference? Who knows. He was my choice.
- I give Mitt Romney a lot of credit for the nature of his campaign. A good man, not a rock star.
...when all was said and done, the lines of people who feed off the political machine were there, and the handlers of the machine cast their multiple votes and carried off their manifold frauds because their own private economy depended on it.
Every time people ask me why the left has such a grip on this country, my answer is because they worked for it. It's the answer that most people don't want to hear, but it's true. The left has been planning this for a while. They have been playing the long game, building the infrastructure and indoctrinating generations. And to beat them, we will have to do the same thing.
The right is 40 years behind the left and it remains a disorganized collection of potentials seeking a compass point.
Damn, those first two hours sure were fun, weren't they? Right up until around 9:30 Eastern when PA was called for Obama. Pretty much all downhill from there.
Better luck next time.
The three scariest headlines I saw this morning were all on ABC News:
Yet again, Florida hangs in the balance. Only this time, it doesn't matter.
President Barack Obama held onto a slim lead in Florida early Wednesday, but he didn't need the largest swing state to win re-election.
At this precise moment, Florida is still undecided. The only one so, no less.
Speaking of which, you know that stereotype you have about us South Floridians lazing around the beach all day long being served fancy drinks by scantily-clad wahines? The reason it's a stereotype is because it's true.
But, like the victims of Hurricane Sandy struggling to get their votes cast, we South Floridians faced our own horrific weather-related challenge yesterday:
Yep, it's tough living down here, but somebody's gotta do it.
Below the fold I'll offer up some notes on why this wasn't as bad as it seems for the Repubs, and why it's not as good as it seems for the Dems. Fair is fair.
The Times Of Israel just published a new piece from me: "Anti-Israel Circles Of Influence On Campus." The focus is on faculty. Students may suffer but they come and go. The professors stay on, to indoctrinate more students, many of whom will go on to leadership positions in the US or their countries of origin.
I use the example of one prominent US campus. Names are named. "There are many other professors at UCSD who could be highlighted. The ones chosen are to illustrate how the ripples of influence on attitudes toward Israel emanates from the core Israel haters to the euphemistic ones to the useful idiots, and thus on to gullible students and faculty." To quote myself, "What one sees is circles of influence, with the inner circle providing the splash and outer circles adding to the wave. It is that wave that creates a campus atmosphere which gives the impression that the entire campus is critical of Israel and that, it is charged, creates a hostile atmosphere for Jewish and pro-Israel students and faculty."
This is similar to what is occurring on many other US campuses. The leading figures at each interact with their like at other campuses and influence many others at other campuses. Exposure is an important remedy.
It is Tuesday, 8:18PM in San Diego, and Fox and CBS both just called the election for Obama.
The Democrats look to actually be picking up some Senate seats, the Republicans holding the House. All Republicans can hope and pray for during the next four years is that court challenges slow the Obamashackle to tie America down in regulatory chains, China keeps buying our increasing debt, that the very aged Supreme Court justices take their vitamins, and the international jackals transform into lambs. Not much to hang a hat on, is it? Actually, much reason to feel hanged. If you have children, better get them to learn to live frugally, study and work hard, and develop resilience and intestinal fortitude. That's all that will save them.
I'll leave it to others, maybe myself Wednesday morning, to sound smart about this debacle
‘The most important election since 1860′ - Jason (12) asked me which presidential elections were most important. I answered, 1800 for setting the Jeffersonian course of the new nation, 1828 for Andrew Jackson's version of "power to the people", 1860 for Lincoln, the Civil War, and the decades of recriminations after, 1932 for FDR's reshaping of America, 1980 for Reagan resteering America back to confidence and prominence, 2004 for rejecting defeatism, and 2012 for again a major fork in the road for America, which is looking from the electoral projections we're f**ked. What are your pick(s)?
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, former chief of staff of the Obama White House, said the election would be decided in “five states and 500 precincts,” and it may have been even fewer.
and
The United States is populated by groups of people who may as well be living in different countries. They have separate histories, cultures and visions for the future. They are two distinct nationalities, divided by mutual distrust and joined by mammoth public debt.
Thanks to all for keeping Maggie's going and/or for keeping me going in Sandy's aftermath. As we Conservative-Libertarians always say, "It takes a village." I had gotten so accustomed to working and sleeping in the cold (28 degrees F when we woke up this morning), the central heat of the past couple of hours feels a little suffocating.
Also, thanks to all those linemen and utility engineers from Canada and all over the country. Good guys who do real work and make real things. Finally, as in the Academy Awards, thanks to my Mom who kept calling to make sure if we were OK. Bless her heart, she had no heat or power in her place either, but she said "We're fine. We have blankets and candles. I can read next to the wood stove with your Dad."
Bruce has kindly agreed to do the honors once again tomorrow morning (yes, it feels tense!), but I'll unload some items right now:
I'm sorry to let you all know Marianne suffered a pulmonary embolism on July 23, 2012 and died September 25, 2012. She would love it you raise a shot of Jameson’s Irish Whiskey in her honor tomorrow after Romney wins this election. Oh, how she wanted her vote to be counted in this election! She was my dear friend; I miss her so, as I know all of you who had the privilege of knowing her will miss her as well. I have been working to get her beloved husband Downs settled into an assisted living here in Houston. Please pass the word on to those who I don’t have email addresses on. She was a great lady.
S. Colette Chapman
A toast to our friend Marianne, regardless of election results.
Admittedly, the news sounds pretty grim. The thought of people suffering from the bitter cold really tugs at my heartstrings. I'm just filled with empathy for the innocent souls who-
Oh, hold on a sec.
Sorry about the interruption. Had to turn the A/C on. It was getting a little stuffy in here. Damn Florida Keys weather.
Anyway, I thought this whole global warming thing was settled and we could expect to see this silly 'winter' business turned into a quaint anachronism by now, but apparently this isn't so.
With that in mind, I'm reposting my own contribution to the subject of staying warm, originally titled "How To Survive Living In A New England Igloo".
First, let us examine my credentials. Do I have the right to opine on cold weather living, someone basking in the warm, balmy Florida Keys?
Well, I lived in that wimpy state of New England for three years and breezed through those delightful minus-10-degree days without a qualm. But living in the quaint province of New England was nothing compared to living in what many consider to be the coldest hell on earth:
A Northern California coastal fog belt zone.
And surviving.
It all starts with the feet. Keep the feet warm and the entire body follows.
It's been sort of amusing watching people from the right side of the blogosphere weigh in for over a year with political advice for Willard Romney. They'd take a flurry on the pizza guy. Look over there, they'd say! If only Romney was a fat, loudmouthed ex-congressman, smug for no reason, then he'd get somewhere. Yelling RON PAUL! would solve everything. Why doesn't he foam at the mouth like the porcine blowhard from New Jersey? Romney just smiled and kept going. Let's face it: Romney is the Amiable Terminator. He won't stop until he's shaken the hand of every Sarah Connor in the phonebook, and asked each in turn if she needs some canned food to tide her over until payday. Then he goes back to the phonebook and starts in on all the Sarah Connellys.
Romney is a rare thing in American public life. He is what he is. You can see how pleasant, but stiff, he is in that video. He cannot be what he is not, even while his position requires that he mix with people who are not like him. Some might call that good manners. People who have no manners don't recognize good manners in others. They call it standoffishness, or aloofness, or call you a robot for being polite. Many see decency as a kind of accusation. There's no other way to evaluate the Republican response to Romney. They don't know what to make of a decent, earnest person. They were hoping for devious so they could win. The other side does that constantly, why shouldn't we? Romney's not interested. He owes you nothing if he loses. You owe him a lot for him even taking up the cudgels on your behalf. He's successful and happy and politics is bucket of guts to step in for a person like him.
Blog writers are just blog commenters that go first, and they all know what Romney should be doing. They envision the perfect candidate -them. I might point out to these kings of that rock there to this clod of earth under their shoes, that Romney got himself elected Governor of Massachusetts. You're giving political advice to a Mormon Republican who figured out how to be elected governor of Massachusetts.
Romney's detractors on the left aren't worth talking about. Romney and his family could be defamed --and Lord, weren't they -- but there's close to nothing in his personal or public life that isn't above reproach. People are imperfect creatures of course, but every once in a great while you meet people who seem incapable of deliberate misbehavior. The human foibles we are all subject to can be teased into imprecations of malice, but any reasonable person can see there's no there, there in the Oakland of Romney's misdeeds. He's a nice person, a capable and commendable businessman, a competent and genial public administrator, he's married to a nice person, they raised a large crop of nice people together, and so forth.
I come not to praise Romney, nor to bury him in predictions and advice. I'd just like to express my thanks to him, here, where he surely will not see it, for allowing me, once in my life, to vote for an entirely decent, honorable, and capable person to be the chief magistrate of the United States. That has never happened to me before. To me, he cannot lose. America might. It won't be his fault.
It's just gravy that a vote for him is a vote against his opponent, who is, and always has been a malicious, callow, greedy, grasping, low-rent A-hole. I won't even mention it.
We should probably feel lucky if we know the outcome by this time tomorrow.
Legions of lawyers are ready to enter the fray in case Election Day turns on a legal challenge. One nightmare scenario would be for the results in a battleground state like Florida or Ohio to be too close to call, with thousands of absentee or provisional ballots yet to be counted.
One possibility is that an automatic recount will be triggered, says Husted. Ohio law requires a recount if the vote margin between the candidates is a quarter of a percent or less of the total vote — or about a 150,000-vote difference.
But a recount is just one of several things that could delay the final count.
In Ohio, about 200,000 voters are expected to cast provisional ballots because they don't have identification, because they requested an absentee ballot but showed up at the polls instead, or for other reasons.
But those ballots can't even be counted until 10 days after Election Day according to Ohio law.
For those of you sans TVs, a live streamcast will be available here.
Final thought: Remember, regardless of who wins the presidential election, there's a lot more at stake here. Congressional and state legislative races are also vital. It all adds up.
"Why did CBS release a clip that appeared to back up Obama's claim in the second debate on Oct. 19, a few days before the foreign policy debate, and not release the rest of that interview at the beginning?
"Why on the Sunday before the election, almost six weeks after the attack, at 6 p.m. does an obscure online timeline posted on CBS.com contain the additional "60 Minutes" interview material from Sept. 12?
"Why wasn't it news after the president said what he said in the second debate, knowing what they had in that "60 Minutes" tape -- why didn't they use it then? And why is it taking Fox News to spur other media organizations to take the Benghazi story seriously?"
Remembering 1980: Are the Polls Missing Something?: "On the one hand, Romney backers point to Gallup’s projections for a shrinking electorate to claim the polls have way overstated Obama’s advantage....On the other hand, Obama aides David Plouffe and Jim Messina have been saying for months that their single-minded goal is an expansion of the pro-Obama electorate and that their very well-organized ground game will deliver it on Tuesday." -- On the other hand, and another hand, and another, only the Hindu Goddess knowing, there are and will be other explanations come Wednesday morning.
The issue is that when you look at the world from these sorts of institutional lenses, identifying problems becomes relatively easy. Solving them becomes very hard. It's no mystery how you get economic growth. You need to provide opportunities and incentives. But how do you make that political equilibrium? How do you make it so that everybody in society actually agrees and abides by a system that provides those incentives and opportunities even if it's not in their short-term interests? Those are the real challenges and that's exactly the sorts of issues we're seeing in Europe, it's the sorts of issues we're seeing in the United States, it's the sorts of issues we're seeing in Turkey. The problems are reasonably easy to identify. Developing solutions to them is hard because you cannot develop the solutions from the outside. It's not an engineering problem. At the end of the day you really need the grassroots solution to it. You really need people themselves to start taking part in the political process because any solution you impose from above is not going to stick unless it has the support of the people, unless the people themselves are the ones who push for it, who demand it, and who implement that solution. DARON ACEMOGLU is the Killian Professor of Economics at MIT. In 2005 he received the John Bates Clark Medal awarded to economists under forty judged to have made the most significant contribution to economic thought and knowledge. He is the author of Why Nations Fail.
I don't know who is going to win this election but I'd bet a dollar that Obama will pull it off. Most elections, you pretty much know who will win, but not this time.
Here's one thing I do know: A flock of about 20 of these guys arrived at my feeder the day after the storm (I do not refer to the Tufted Titmouse in the photo.) They stayed all day, then disappeared.
Thanks to these good guys who took a long drive to help out. That crane is lowering transformers and other apparatus dangling from broken utility poles dow the road from me.
Dr. Robert Michels discusses the future of Psychiatry in an interview. A quote:
Psychiatry begins at the end of the 18th century with the medicalization of a group of people who were seen as strange by the rest of the citizens in the world. And that medicalization led to many things. One is it lead to their humane treatment. Previously, it wasn’t uncommon to see people that today we consider psychiatry patients, who’d be chained in institutions to keep them away from society.
It led to an attempt to study what was the nature of their problems, to describe them. It led to people talking to them instead of jeering at them or reviling them.
And it led to the development of more knowledge about the cause, the course and what factors might influence their disturbances. So it led to treatments. Within a 100 years those treatments were beginning to be…quite effective. We learned that some of them suffered from diseases we could cure.
At the turn of the century before this one…in nineteen hundred … a third of the patients in mental hospitals in this country suffered from the complications of infectious diseases. We largely cure those now so you don’t see them these days. We have some new infectious diseases. But we’ve pretty much cured the old ones that causes psychiatric problems...
We lose our power fairly often in late fall and winter storms. Besides flashlights and candles, I have a good supply of oil lamps around the place. I don't have a generator, and don't plan on getting one like the yuppies do.
When we bought this house, we found a couple of old Victorian oil lamps in the attic, similar to this blue one. Perfect for a whorehouse, we feel. This site sells repro oil lamps.
My favorites are a few 50 year-old Dietz wagon lanterns that I keep in the garage and down in the barn. They still make them, but in China now, and are distributed by Kirkman, which has tons of lamps and lanterns of all sorts.
When I was a kid in CT, we kept a spouted barrel of kerosene in the garage. It had many uses (including for burning the garbage in the garbage pit - think Hell - Gehenna).
As expected, both sides are already drawing up battle plans in the event of a loss. From what I've seen, most on the Republican side are being fairly pragmatic about it. Basically, "Well, we just didn't get enough votes, dang it — better luck next time." The Dems, however, are already testing out a panorama of excuses. There's a good article on it here.
Observation #2:
The closer the race has gotten, the more we've heard the phrase "too close to call" come out of the media.
Observation #3:
In the 2000 election, Al Gore won the popular vote but George Bush won the electoral vote and the office. Afterward, there was a plethora of articles arguing that the Electoral College should be scrapped. There was also a bunch in 2004 and we saw a small flurry of them this time around.
The irony is that it's the close elections that argue against their case. Only in an election controlled by electoral votes would we see such minor states (no offense) as Pennsylvania, Michigan and Minnesota making headlines:
With November just around the bend, senior adviser to the Obama campaign David Axelrod made a hairy wager on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" Wednesday: he will shave off his four-decade-old mustache on national television if Obama loses Minnesota, Michigan or Pennsylvania on Election Day.
Obama press secretary Jennifer Psaki doubled down on the wager later in the day, telling MSNBC host Andrea Mitchell: "I'll dye my hair black and wear a mustache" if Obama loses those states.
The American Mustache Institute isn't pleased with the wagers, especially the bet by Axe. "It's incredibly irresponsible for Axelrod to be playing games with such an exceptionally powerful mustache," institute chairman Dr. Aaron Perlut tells Whispers.
If the election was based on the popular vote, we'd be hearing nothing but who currently has the lead in California, Texas, Florida and New York. If a member of the media was reminded that people in Michigan also vote, his initial response might be, Why would they bother?
Observation #4:
Despite our best efforts to prevent it, apparently my political posts here have achieved recognition on a national level.
The other day, I dared the Maggie's Valued Readers™ to put it all on the line and issue their election predictions. I noted that I'd post them here, in broad daylight, so that their possible fall from grace would be as publicly humiliating as possible. Even so, a hearty band of readers took up this mighty challenge and spat spake forth the following prognostications.
I also asked you to weigh in on local & state races, so a few of the predictions are only in regards to that. Lengthier replies have been reduced to their summation.
And this is ongoing until Tuesday. Slap your guess in the comments and I'll add it to the list so that you, too, can be publicly mocked, scorned and degraded for the rest of your life should Obama win in a landslide. After the final election results are in, I'll do another post and announce the no-doubt embarrassed winner. The prize will be they get to write an article on any subject they like, which I'll then post here for possibly even more mockification, scornalization and degradationalism.
To wit:
While I expect it to be decisively in Romney's favor, I think there will enough Democratic shenanigans going on to keep it from being a 'landslide'. I'm thinking 50% Romney, 48% Obama, with the usual couple of percent devoted to write-ins. Electoral votes-wise, I'm putting it in the 'barely squeaks by' column. — me
Romney 51% Obama 49% — Lady Tex
A Romney win that will probably be close — Garry
315/223 — Pajak
42% of the vote going to O, rest of the vote to R— BillH
I predict Colorado will go for Romney. — Colorado
I predict an old fashioned thumping, with Romney topping 400 Electoral Votes. — Tom Armstrong
My hunch is that Romney wins big time and captures a huge majority of both the popular vote and the Electoral College. — Tom Francis
Romney 53 - Obama 47, Pubbies get the Senate but only 51-49. Pubbies gain +2 in the House. Waxman gets axed in CA! — Bob in VA
Obama gets his ass kicked up around his collar bone. Romney wins Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Iowa, and my beloved New Hampshire. Oh yeah, Virginia and Florida too. Not quite 1984, but it is gonna be a rough one for the Dems. — Anthony L.
I predict Romney 53% - Obama 46% - 330 EC votes for Mitt. Senate 52 Republicans - 48 Democrats. +3 for the GOP in the House. — altered states
My prediction is that though Romney may have the majority of popular vote nationwide and enough support in the battleground States to win close fights and their electoral votes, I don't think he has enough of a margin to overcome the Democratic cheating and outright theft I've seen too many times to forget. — John
I think Romney will get it but will be a Pyrrhic victory. — chasmatic
Romney 52%, 0bama 47% — Vichris
Romney - 322, Obama - 216 — Chuckles
Romney landslide to a degree that surprises just about everybody. — ahem
I'll go with R 315, O 223 (a la Barone) -- but I say this more in hope than in confidence. — Texan99
...picked R 319 many months back. — Texan99's husband
Election is close…and it comes down to enthusiastic R voters vs D fraud. I think the D fraud loses…this time. — Daedalus Mugged
270-268 Romney - NH, VA, NC, FL, & OH puts him over the top. — Dave
It would be fun to join the Romneyfest here but I checked Intrade today to read the internet's tea leaves. It doesn't look like good news for Team Red, at least as far as the presidential election goes. Intrade doesn't always get it right, of course. But I believe it's right more often than not. — jhc
While that last one isn't an official 'prediction', we now have four presidential elections under our belt since the Internet Age began, so it's interesting to see who's starting to emerge as the predictive leader.
Carolina Panthers fans are likely pretty pleased with their team's ability to win for the first time since Week 2, but one man is likely even happier.
History dictates that the Panthers 21-13 victory over the Washington Redskins at FedEx Field bodes well for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. In the 18 presidential elections that have taken place since the Redskins moved to Washington in 1937, 17 have been predicted by the team's performance in its final home game prior to the election.
Your editor remains off the intertunnels except via the public library, the FedEx office, or my pal with a DSL line. Cannot download fresh photos effectively with any of those.
Difficult to run a business this way, but many obstacles can be overcome in time.
Do not feel sorry for us in the Northeast - except for those whose homes were washed away. We can cope with things, and challenge builds character. Or so we believe. Storms must be expected, like all of the other bad things in life.
In early November around here, you don't really need central heating if you have a wife and a dog to sleep with. Plus friends with generators like to feed you and provide nice adult beverages.
Yesterday, down our road we saw utility truck convoys from Missouri, Quebec, Iowa, and Minnesota. Guy on one of the Minnesota trucks said he just arrived last night (that was yesterday). Mind you, government doesn't do that - only private industry can do that.
One has to appreciate the logistics involved. The local utility calls their sister utlilities for a hand, and designs a plan of attack based on priorities. It would be insane for a local utility to own enough resources to cope with major storms.
On Saturday, most of the downed trees on our stretch of road were finally removed by town tree guys. Down our road yesterday, a utility crane from Missouri was carefully lowering destroyed transformers from broken poles. This afternoon, a pole truck from God-knows where was delivering new poles. Wonderful to see. This week, we'll expect to see those pole-installing trucks, after which cross pieces, insulators, cables,and new transformers will be attached before the final linemen can string new lines.
I expect home electric power (and heat) sometime next week. However, I do not expect our internet service (plus TV and home phone which is all via cable) to be restrung any time next week. Cable has to wait its turn.
All of our neighbors without big home generators are recharging their cells in the car. I'll say it again: We don't have it bad at all (except for no doggone internet service other than stupid iPhone which must be designed for women's or children's fingers because mu tjumba akwys hor tah wring vuttom.). We have it very easy compared with much of the world, and with our recent ancestors.
Are there major elections coming up? That might be interesting. I will vote, despite my vote being meaningless in Blue New England.
I heard on the radio that residents of Bridgeport, CT were pelting utility workers with sticks and eggs (where did they get those eggs?) to "express" their disgruntlement about having no power two days after a powerful Nor'easter his their town. (It was a Nor'easter at that point, more or less, or a hybrid but not a genuine hurricane.)
It was necessary to assign police to escort the utility repairmen, who had come there from all over the country and from Canada to repair their lines.
My rhetorical question is this: Where do people get it into their heads that bad things, and bad consequences, should never happen and, if they do, that there is someone to blame? It seems like the height of immaturity to me. Who taught people that this is what life is like?
‘Totally MAD’ celebrates 60 years of satire - I wish i still had my collection. But, I still have recollection of many. MAD helped shape a generation or two, for the better, to question and laugh at hollow pieties of all types.
A security breakdown in Benghazi - The light begins to peek under the covers at WaPo -- coming next?: "Exclusive: Emails Show Media Cover-Up With White House
GOP Senators to White House: Stop Leaking National Security Secrets : "A group of Republican senators is demanding to know why the White House continues to leak to the press highly classified information that “stands in direct contradiction to the information briefed to congressional oversight committees,” according to a letter sent Friday to President Barack Obama....The senators demand to know if the leaks were authorized by a White House clambering to salvage the president’s image....“Appointing a Special Prosecutor would remove even the appearance of political influence,” the lawmakers write."
12:28 One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, he asked him, "Which commandment is the first of all?"
12:29 Jesus answered, "The first is, 'Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one;
12:30 you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.'
12:31 The second is this, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these."
12:32 Then the scribe said to him, "You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that 'he is one, and besides him there is no other';
12:33 and 'to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength,' and 'to love one's neighbor as oneself,' --this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices."
12:34 When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." After that no one dared to ask him any question.
Damn, those first two hours sure were fun, weren't they? Right up until around 9:30 Eastern when PA was called for Obama. Pretty much all downhill from there.
It is Tuesday, 8:18PM in San Diego, and Fox and CBS both just called the election for Obama. 
I received this email a few days ago:
We lose our power fairly often in late fall and winter storms. Besides flashlights and candles, I have a good supply of oil lamps around the place. I don't have a generator, and don't plan on getting one like the yuppies do.
My favorites are a few 50 year-old Dietz wagon lanterns that I keep in the garage and down in the barn. They still make them, but in China now, and are distributed by 
Observation #1:
The other day, I 
Your editor remains off the intertunnels except via the public library, the FedEx office, or my pal with a DSL line. Cannot download fresh photos effectively with any of those.