VT, OH, RI, TX Open Thread!

by hilzoy

That was quick: the clock on my computer turned to 7pm, I clicked on MSNBC, and voila! they have called Vermont for Obama.

More as it develops.

***

UPDATE: CNN and MSNBC have called Rhode Island for Clinton.

Comments

[MeditativeZebra]

I love it when news broadcasts announces such and such candidate as the winner with 0% reporting. It makes me wonder if there wasn't some truth to that Onion story about Diebold leaking the 2008 election results.

[Ara]

I'm bracing for the worst: Clinton wins OH, TX, and Wolf Blitzer talks about how the momentum has changed, though Obama came back from 20 pt deficits in both states.

[Phil]

Here's some light news for you from Akron. Let's all place our bets on Obama Supporter, McCain Supporter, Ron Paul Supporter, or Random Loon:

Akron man charged with assaulting Clinton supporters

An Akron man was charged Tuesday with assault and weapons charges after he attacked supporters of presidential campaigner Hillary Clinton on Monday night, police said.

William Bonner, 26, is in Summit County Jail Tuesday where he faces additional charges of vandalizing a police cruiser after he kicked at a window and damaged the frame.

Bonner was also charged with carrying a concealed knife, disorderly conduct and public intoxication.

Police said at 5:30 p.m. Bonner approached a group of Clinton supporters carrying signs at East Market and Summit streets.

Bonner took a campaign sign away from one worker, hitting several workers and punched a 61-year-old supporter in the back of the head, police said.

He kicked at the window when police put him in the back of a cruiser. Officers subdued him with pepper spray.

The workers were not seriously injured.

Of note in the Ohio races is the challenge to Dennis Kucinich's 10th District seat, with four challengers, the foremost among them being Cleveland City Councilman Joe Cimperman. Cleveland's SCENE Magazine had a decent cover story on Cimperman in last week's issue. I no longer live in "Dennis!"'s district -- I live in Ohio 19, where incumbent Stephanie Tubbs-Jones is running unopposed in the primary.

[Phil]

This is interesting too, not so much for whatever proportion of these people are marching on Limbaugh's orders, but for the rest of them:

GOP voters crossing over in large numbers

Poll watchers throughout Ohio are noting large numbers of Republican voters crossing over to vote in the Democratic Primary between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

In the Republican roost of Chagrin Falls, veteran poll worker Liz McFadden was amazed at the number of people jumping the party's ship. Democrats accounted for 70 percent of the voters in her precinct, one of seven at the village's high school.

"That's a complete reversal of what it normally is, even more so," she said. "I've never seen a switch like this."

The defectors had motives both pure and sinister.

One woman voted for Clinton in hopes of delivering John McCain a weaker debate opponent. Another picked Obama because her vote could help deny Clinton and her husband a return trip to the White House.

A 69-year-old Catholic nun, Sister Ann Marie, was converted to the Clinton camp because of the former first lady's experience. John Baggett, another ex-Republican for Clinton, said he simply wanted to switch, and Clinton represented a known commodity.

"I'm happy with Republicans, in general," Baggett, 50, said. "I don't believe they've done a good job the last eight years."

In Strongsville, middle-aged couple Lucy and Pete See -- longtime Republicans -- both voted for Hillary Clinton. "I like that she has more experience in foreign affairs," Pete See said. "The Republican candidate was older than me.

Lucy See said she voted for Clinton as well. "I want to be part of makiing history," she said.

In North Ridgeville, pollworkers said that by noon nearly 50 Rebublicans had switched to vote Democrat, the highest crossover since the 2000 election.

Voter interest was so high that a line was forming just after 6 a.m. at the polling site, the party room of the Ridgefield subdivision off Bagley Road.

In Chester Township in Geauga County, also a GOP stronghold, Democrats had outvoted Republicans by nearly 50 percent early in the going. Geauga Elections Board Director Arch Kimbrew said that trend was being duplicated throughout the county.

Kimbrew said morning turnout has convinced him that his projection of a 45-percent turnout will be too low. "There are a lot of Democrats out and at every polling place," he said.

I particularly like the See family, voting on imaginary foreign affairs experience and gender. Ah, America!

PS: If you want to get some real Cleveland-hate on, read the comments at that link. Or any item at Cleveland.com, really.

[Adam]

Rhode Island is looking like the surprise from the exit polls so far. I hadn't really been paying attention, because the impression I'd gotten from the news was that RI was about as solid for Clinton as VT was for Obama.

[Adam]

Ack, 60-38 for Clinton in Ohio... but with 0% reporting. Thanks for the heart attack, CNN.

[A.J.]

Phil,

I'd say the options look more like Loon, Crazy, Nutball, or Psycho.

[Gary Farber]

As some folks know, I've just started seeing cable tv again for the first time since a few months in 2002, and before that not since the mid-Nineties.

So forgive me for being decades behind, but I'm fascinated that the Fox News Channel has a segment where the reporter was ostensibly going to give a "blog report" -- and I've now seen this at least 3-4 times in separate weeks -- but actually reported allegations from FNC blog comments.

Wow.

(Following with Fred Barnes and Bill Kristol as analysts is just expected.)

[Gary Farber]

"I love it when news broadcasts announces such and such candidate as the winner with 0% reporting."

When an exit poll makes it clear that it's mathematically impossible for a candidate to lose, it unsurprisingly gets reported.

"I hadn't really been paying attention, because the impression I'd gotten from the news was that RI was about as solid for Clinton as VT was for Obama."

Not in the past week.

[Adam]

The one time I actually remember watching anything on CNN since 2000, I was eating my lunch at Texadelphia and looked up to see a segment on Russia, with "Russian Consultant" Vladimir Zhirinovsky.

Vladimir Zhirinovsky? I thought -- surely that isn't "Vlad the Bad" Zhirinovsky, he of the famous "reconquer Alaska and wash the blood off our boots in the Indian Ocean" platform? Yup, it was him.

No mention of his political career on CNN, no -- on CNN, they're equal-opportunity with their psychotic nationalists. They don't just get pro-American crazies, oh no -- they go for worldwide crazy. It's very egalitarian.

[Priest]

Dammit, Adam, now you've got me jonesing for some Texadelphia queso. Except I live in Atlanta these days.

[Adam]

Mmmmm, Texadelphia cheesesteaks with mustard blend and queso... my arteries are clogging up just thinking about it...

[Adam]

Politico has Obama up in Texas 150,000 to 100,000 (60%-40%) with 1% reporting, but I don't see those results anywhere else.

That can't be right. Anyone got any idea what's going on there?

[Adam]

Never mind, it's on CNN now, too. Wow. Are those early votes or what?

[gwangung]

Mmmmm, Texadelphia cheesesteaks with mustard blend and queso... my arteries are clogging up just thinking about it...

Oh, good grief...that made me HUNGRY....and I just ate!

[Adam]

Now 440K to 300K -- TX comes through! Woo!

[Phil]

OK, no official results from Ohio until after 9pm -- there was a screwup in Sandusky County with a ballot printer, so they didn't have enough ballots at first; therefore, polls there will stay open until 9, and the other 87 counties can't release official results until after Sandusky County closes.

[hilzoy]

Causing political junkies the world over to get the shakes...

[gerbal]

Cnn has called ohio for Clinton with %0 reporting and polls still open due to ballot shortage.

[Phil]

And now, apparently, 15 precincts in Cleveland are being help open for voting until 9pm. No details as to why, but the title of the link appears to indicate that it has something to do with a suit by the Obama campaign. Can't find anything at Yahoo! News about it.

Any Ohio results you see right now came from early counting in Ohio 4, which includes a few smaller cities (Mansfield, Findlay) but is overall quite rural; they showed Clinton with a 62-36 lead, among ~8,000 votes.

Ohio exit polls appear to show Clinton winning among white women, older voters and whites generally.

[hilzoy]

Gerbal: according to their web page, it's still too close to call.

[Phil]

More details:

A federal judge has ordered 21 precincts places on Cleveland's East Side to stay open until 9 p.m. at the request of Barack Obama's campaign.

Jeff Hastings, a Cuyahoga County Board of Elections member, said the Obama campaign said some Cleveland locations ran out of ballots, but Hastings disputed the claim.

Wintry weather conditions also played a role in getting the voting extension, said Hastings.

Sandusky County also has been allowed to stay open until 9 p.m.

[Phil]

Keep in mind also that Northeast Ohio has been getting hit by snow and freezing rain since about 4pm, and commuting out of the city and around the county this afternoon was pretty slow. It's gotten bad enough that OHP and Cleveland police have asked drivers to stay off the roads for the rest of the night. That almost certainly has affected voting.

[Gary Farber]

"Politico has Obama up in Texas 150,000 to 100,000 (60%-40%) with 1% reporting, but I don't see those results anywhere else.

That can't be right"

Sure it can. Why are you paying attention to 1% precincts reporting? Who cares? It's meaningless.

Setting aside that the primary vote in Texas is relatively meaningless anyway.

When the race can be called, it'll be called. Before then, it doesn't matter what the numbers are, because they won't have been enough to call it yet.

You don't know which order the precincts are reporting in, and which have which number of delegates, and which have what demography, and how significant those particular precincts are.

So the numbers are meaningless, absent that knowledge. Absent that knowledge, they might as well be random numbers. So why are you paying attention?

[Adam]

It's actually the early votes. They don't count as precincts.

[Adam]

Or, according to TPM, they count as single precincts, so they don't really affect the percentage total.

[J.W. Hamner]

So McCain is "official" finally and Huckabee is dropping out. An interesting question posed over at Marc Ambinder's was whether this makes Dem Superdelegates feel more pressure to end their contest.

[Gary Farber]

"So McCain is 'official' finally and Huckabee is dropping out."

Strictly speaking, he's "officially" the nominee now only in the sense that you use quotation marks, which is to say, in the sense that he's still the presumptive, not official, nominee, until the Republican National Convention vote actually officially makes him the official nominee.

[Anarch]

CNN's reporting (from its exit polls) that the gender breakdown of the Democratic voters is 41-59 male-female. Is that right? Because if so, I've never seen an American election swing that heavily towards the female side.

[yoyo]

The democratic electoric is very often 60-40 women

[Gary Farber]

"Because if so, I've never seen an American election swing that heavily towards the female side."

Yoyo's more or less correct about the electorate. Women were 57% of the New Hampshire primary Democratic electorate, for example. Here's some data from 2004 primaries: women ranged from 52% to 59%, mostly 54% and above. And the percentage of women voting has gone up.

[Gary Farber]

CNN, MS-NBC, and the rest, have called Ohio for Clinton.