The rumors being floated now that Sarah Palin didn’t know the participants in NAFTA, that she didn’t know that Africa was a continent, that she didn’t know that South Africa was a country – it all sounds like utter nonsense, but it is interesting. She’s not terribly bright, but she’s surely not that dumb.

The rumors sound like the results of a meeting in a bar over many beers – people who were angry at Palin decided to do her in. It’s interesting to watch – the Republicans seem to be cleaning their machinery post-McCain. Palin is not the future of the party. That’s been decided.

The problem they have is the extreme loyalty of the Christian base to Palin. Without them, the Republicans are a permanent minority centered in the south.

It’ll be interesting to watch – party leadership is not stupid. In fact, since 1980 or so, they have brilliantly managed their various factions. This could be self-destruction, or it could be just the messy early stages of a much-needed house cleaning.

Three senate races remain undecided, and election machinery/chicanery may play a role in all of them.

Georgia: Saxby Chambliss (R) vs Jim Martin (D): Because Chambliss did not get 50% of the vote, there will be a runoff in December. Georgia is a state that uses “faith based” voting – that is, there are no paper records of votes at the time of voting, and election officials are 100% reliant on the inner workings of the Diebold machinery to fairly report the results. A recount would merely duplicate the original results, as the machines would re-report their original tallies. So it’s completely up for grabs – throw out the pre-election polls and exit polls – there’s no way of knowing who really wins down there. It’s a very stupid state.

Minnesota: Norm Coleman (R) vs Al Franken (D): Coleman currently holds a 236 vote lead, with 2.4 million votes cast. Minnesota uses paper ballots and optical scanning. There will be a full hands-on recount there, so it will be a good test of the o/s machinery. The thing to keep an eye on there is ballot security during the recount process – chain of possession and lock and key and overnight guards and all of that. That’s what messed up the attempted New Hampshire recount earlier this year. But no matter the outcome, the results should be reliable.

Alaska: Ted Stevens (D) vs Mark Begich (D): Stevens surprised everyone with an election night turnaround. Alaska sounds like it is totally corrupted. Just a few facts: The election was hotly contested; there were long lines in early voting; a very popular favorite daughter was on the presidential ballot; participation in the state primary (before the Palin nomination) was up 12.4% over four years ago – forget all of that – election officials say that turnout was down 11% this year. Pre-election polls showed both Ted Stevens and Don Young down by 6-10 points. They also showed that the gap between McCain and Obama had closed to a 14% lead for McCain – final tally was a whopping 25 point win for McCain. Stevens “won” with a 16 point turnaround from polls, and Young won too. It’s an election night miracle!

The State of Alaska has been sued twice now, in 2004 and 2006, to get them to release raw election data for people to review. In the 2004 suit, prior to release, Diebold was allowed to “manipulate the data”. The election department up there is a crawling can of worms. If there is a recount, which is unlikely anyway, it would be overseen by the Palin Administration. Don’t hope for any sunlight up there this winter. There will be no mavericky challenging of the Republican election machine.

I didn’t consider this: Alaska is a couple of times zones over, and after everyone heard there that Obama had won, interest dissipated and lines dwindled. That doesn’t explain poll discrepancies, but might explain low turnout.

Here are state-by-state results with (exit polls) and counted vote (Obama-McCain), and the difference on the Obama side between exits and official count:

Florida (52-49) 50-48 -2
Iowa (58-42) 53-44 -5
Missouri (52-48) 49-49 -3
North Carolina (52-48) 49-49 -3
New Hampshire (57-43) 56-44 -1
Nevada (55-45) 55-42 -0-
Pennsylvania (57-42) 54-44 -3
Ohio (54-45) 51-47 -3
Wisconsin (58-42) 56-42 -2
Indiana (52-48) 49-48 -3
New Mexico (56-43) 56-41 -0-
Minnesota (56-39) 54-43 -2
Michigan (60-39) 57-40 -3
Georgia (47-51) 46-52 -1
West Virginia (45-55) 42-55 -3

What to conclude? Too soon to know anything, but this is consistent with 2004 – the exit polls are consistently saying that the Democratic candidate is getting more votes than the final tallies say. In 2004, they tried to blame it on the “Reluctant Republican Respondent”, but that was disproven. There was no such effect.

In a perfect world, one would expect exit polls to fall within margin of error on either side of the ballot, with Republicans as often coming up short as Democrats. But it doesn’t work that way. Something is amiss.

On to more important trivia.

Rahm Emanuel as chief of staff? That does it. I’m fed up with Barack Obama.

Al Franken went down, but there’s sure to be a recount. He wasn’t the best candidate anyway, but Norm Coleman may be the next Ted Stevens. (Seems his family has a secret revenue stream.) Speaking of Stevens, Alaska flipped us the bird, reelecting him in spite of seven felony convictions. Saxby Chambliss won, but there’s mysterious doings in Georgia. Gordon Smith is up in Oregon, will probably win. Michelle Bachman won, proving that you can be a very (very) dumb conservative and still get elected. (I live in Roger Koopman’s old district. Don’t need to remind me.)

Can’t have it all.

Note: Apparently Chambliss did not get the necessary 50% to win in Georgia, and there will be a runoff. Max Cleland, the triple amputee Vietnam vet who lost to Chambliss and Karl Rove and the electronic machines in 2002 and was compared to Osama bin Laden, may yet be vindicated.

Bill Ayers finally speaks. He sat quietly and endured. Seems a class act.

I rest easy. I’ll be following the exit polls, but it looks like the pre-election polls have held. This is one of those few times in life when an election pretty much goes the way I want – I remember 1980 feeling this way as Reagan won and swept the senate. I never thought then that I’d be on the other side of the aisle someday.

What a wonderful night.

Suppose McCain squeaks this one out, but that it smells bad, with polls overwhelmingly supporting Obama and mysterious late-night wins in battleground states. Imagine the blogs alive with talk of election fraud, the exit polls mysteriously off again with vote results far outside the margin of error, and all missing on the Republican side.

Imagine the black neighborhoods of the inner cities thinking that they’ve been denied once again. Imagine civil unrest. Since we no longer have a posse comitatus law, Bush calls out the military to enforce order. But riots break out in major cities, and some Democratic officials finally suspect something is amiss with our election system, but they do nothing – no recounts, no court challenges. There’s war in the streets, and right wingers, fully armed and angry, take it upon themselves to help restore order. There are unsolved murders. Rush and Hannity incite civil violence, Gordon Liddy reminds them to aim for the head.

Then we settle down and go back to sleep again.

Here’s what Bush has given us: Two unwinnable wars, an economy in the tank, huge income disparities, massive deficits, world wide contempt for the U.S. and its policies, a shredded Bill of Rights, and an electoral system that no longer reliably counts votes.

Four more years. I hope I’m wrong.

Imagine the following scenario:

Obama wins all the states where he currently holds sizable leads – 228 electoral votes. In addition, he wins New Mexico (5), Pennsylvania (21), Minnesota (10), and Nevada (5). That would give him 269 electoral votes. Needed to win: 270.

McCain wins all the states where he currently holds sizable leads – 132 electoral votes. In addition, given our electronic voting machines’ propensity to lean Republican, he wins all of the following contested states: Arizona (10), Georgia (15), Missouri (11), North Carolina (15), Ohio (20), Florida (27), Indiana (11), North Dakota (3), Virginia (15). That gives him 259. Imagine that he also manages to pluck Colorado, where there has been a serious Republican-led voter purge over the last two years, picking up an additional 9. That gives him 266.

He would need three electoral votes to tie Obama- Montana. The latest poll I saw has it virtually a dead heat, with Ron Paul and Bob Barr being the wild cards. It is possible that Montana goes for Obama, and it’s over. But in this scenario if McCain wins Montana, it’s a dead heat, and goes to the House of Representatives, where, alas, Obama would probably win. (You never know, what with Blue Dogs and all.)

That’s one possibility. Governor Schweitzer, no slouch at politics, thinks that if Paul/Barr take 6% of the Montana vote, Obama could squeak it out. We might give him his victory.

Imagine this scenario: We have a popular vote landslide for Obama (where he leads, his leads are substantial – California 58-34, New York 62-32), and a McCain electoral vote victory. Would the American people be satisfied with that? Would McCain be a lame duck from day one? Would Sarah get a new wardrobe?

I’ve pretty much resigned myself to a McCain victory – we are at the mercy of these machines. Even where there are paper ballots and electronic scanning, there have been irregularities with the scanning results, and little diligence in recounting (See: Clinton victory, New Hampshire primary). So I take heart knowing that even if McCain steals this election, he won’t be very effective at advancing the Bush agenda.

Prediction: McCain 290, Obama 248 (Pennsylvania mysteriously flips to McCain around 1AM.