The final push DEMS GET OUT AND VOTE!

[Cavebear]

I've announced here before you came that I had gotten rid of my TV maybe 5 years ago now.  I thought I was the only one, except I started reading that "cable cutting" was becoming a major alternative lifestyle as compared to beating yourself over the head and cluttering your mind with chaos.  A major part of it was the news, which gets especially annoying during election years. 

The internet is bad enough, but I can just read the headlines and a few sentences to get an idea whether it's leading to anything important without having Wolf Bitzer ringing in my ears between commercial breaks.  And the good thing about getting rid of TV is the slow realization that life can be not just endurable, but much more fulfilling without it.  And as a small perk, it's not costing me $100 a month for something I basically hate to begin with.

I use the TV mainly to watch the Science , History, and National Geographic Channels, but in election years for MSNBC and CNN.  I AM a Political Science BS major after all. 

But this year has just too absurd!  I just want the madness to end.  5 days to go and I don't really want to hear about the day-today polls.  I just want the votes to happen and wake up Wednesday morning and know. 

I'll vote of course. 

But the race to the bottom has even me depressed and I used to LOVE this stuff.

[jwheel69]

I voted.

[Mike Cl]

Prefer to vote on the standard election day.  My voting place has no lines and I like to collect the I Voted sticker.  I will be voting for Clinton anyway, so there is no concern I would change my mind.

I already have the 'voted' sticker because I have an absentee ballot.  I'm already wearing it. :)))))

[SGOS]

I use the TV mainly to watch the Science , History, and National Geographic Channels, but in election years for MSNBC and CNN.  I AM a Political Science BS major after all. 

But this year has just too absurd!  I just want the madness to end.  5 days to go and I don't really want to hear about the day-today polls.  I just want the votes to happen and wake up Wednesday morning and know. 

I'll vote of course. 

But the race to the bottom has even me depressed and I used to LOVE this stuff.

Not to say TV doesn't have things in which I'm interested.  For me this currently is all about entertainment.  Educational stuff is available on the Internet, but there isn't enough good entertainment on TV to pay $100 a month for.  That's over a thousand dollars a year.  Think of the DVD series of on the order of Breaking Bad, Dexter, Downtown Abbey, Game of thrones that buys, and I can binge on them again and again until something better comes along.  Really, most of the entertainment on TV barely passes as something to pass the time.

[The Skeletal Atheist]

I voted early. Taking my friend out for early voting today.

[GSOgymrat]

I'm about to go vote. I spent the morning researching every candidate in my district and all the referendums. I have my list ready.

[Atheon]

When it comes to all the referenda (California has a lot), local board and council members, etc. I usually check a few websites (local Democratic club, League of Women Voters, Equality California), consult people I trust for their knowledge of local politics, and of course I read the synopses of the measures themselves.

For politicians running under parties, I vote Democratic, or if it's a Republican vs. a 3rd party only, I'll vote the 3rd party, or if it's a Republican runnin unopposed, I'll abstain. I don't vote for Republicans (indeed, I vote against them), unless there's a damn good reason to vote for one. Yes, I do look at the candidates, and almost invariably the Republican is a scumbag. And if it's a scumbag vs. a scumbag, I'll pick the Democrat, because we still need majorities. The only time I ever voted for a Republican was for a mayor, and there was a damn good reason for that (her Dem opponent was a homophobic, abortion-hating minister).

[Cavebear]

Not to say TV doesn't have things in which I'm interested.  For me this currently is all about entertainment.  Educational stuff is available on the Internet, but there isn't enough good entertainment on TV to pay $100 a month for.  That's over a thousand dollars a year.  Think of the DVD series of on the order of Breaking Bad, Dexter, Downtown Abbey, Game of thrones that buys, and I can binge on them again and again until something better comes along.  Really, most of the entertainment on TV barely passes as something to pass the time.

I have a lot of science and nature DVDs I watch while preparing food.  If I didn't, the house would just be too quiet.  Not to say I don't listen to classical and classic rock sometimes. 

[Cavebear]

When it comes to all the referenda (California has a lot), local board and council members, etc. I usually check a few websites (local Democratic club, League of Women Voters, Equality California), consult people I trust for their knowledge of local politics, and of course I read the synopses of the measures themselves.

For politicians running under parties, I vote Democratic, or if it's a Republican vs. a 3rd party only, I'll vote the 3rd party, or if it's a Republican runnin unopposed, I'll abstain. I don't vote for Republicans (indeed, I vote against them), unless there's a damn good reason to vote for one. Yes, I do look at the candidates, and almost invariably the Republican is a scumbag. And if it's a scumbag vs. a scumbag, I'll pick the Democrat, because we still need majorities. The only time I ever voted for a Republican was for a mayor, and there was a damn good reason for that (her Dem opponent was a homophobic, abortion-hating minister).

Pretty much the same here.  I would vote for a decent Repub candidate like the liberal ones back in the 70s, but I sure haven't seen one in decades. 

And there is all that concern that even a decent one would vote party line most of the time...

[Mike Cl]

When it comes to all the referenda (California has a lot), local board and council members, etc. I usually check a few websites (local Democratic club, League of Women Voters, Equality California), consult people I trust for their knowledge of local politics, and of course I read the synopses of the measures themselves.

For politicians running under parties, I vote Democratic, or if it's a Republican vs. a 3rd party only, I'll vote the 3rd party, or if it's a Republican runnin unopposed, I'll abstain. I don't vote for Republicans (indeed, I vote against them), unless there's a damn good reason to vote for one. Yes, I do look at the candidates, and almost invariably the Republican is a scumbag. And if it's a scumbag vs. a scumbag, I'll pick the Democrat, because we still need majorities. The only time I ever voted for a Republican was for a mayor, and there was a damn good reason for that (her Dem opponent was a homophobic, abortion-hating minister).

You and I are carbon copies of each other on this issue.  I'm in CA, too, and that is how I do it.

[Hydra009]

MRW watching the polls numbers



Please vote.  This is going to be a historic day, possibly for all the wrong reasons.

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I remember liking Anderson, but because of various reasons for the life of me I don't remember why..  I haven't taken the time to lookup anything about him since the time he was running.  I remember hoping John Glenn would win, but he washed out early and went deeply into debt. That was back when politicians actually stood a chance without superpacs and so on. I kind of miss the days when Ohio had two great senators, Howard Metzembaum and John Glenn..

[AllPurposeAtheist]

I voted for one republican mayor and the only reason was back then Dayton Ohio was run by crooked funeral directors.
What's it say about your hometown when the only people getting elected are funeral directors? Dayton pretty much died and was buried as a viable city of any opportunity. The only reputable pols from the Dayton of my youth went on to either statewide office or federal seats. The last one who actually gave a shit about the people of Dayton as far as I can tell was a representative by the name of Tony Hall. The only knock i ever had against Hall was he became a bible thumper, but he was always very liberal in his political life..

In the 1980s, Hall became an evangelical Christian, prompting him to change his position on abortion from pro-choice to pro-life. Otherwise, his voting record was decidedly liberal.

[Mermaid]

I can't fucking wait for the election results to finally be announced. This is the most stressful election ever for me. The stakes are higher than they've ever been, and the number trends on 538 have me reeling with anxiety. (I prefer the numbers on the New York Times aggregator.)

It's awful, isn't it? Everyone is anxiety ridden. I am genuinely terrified that Trump will win and am certainly not alone, and just as many people are just as terrified that Clinton will win.

I think my biggest fear outside of contemporary political issues: This is how our culture will evolve now. An idiocracy where actual facts do not matter, rather social media rhetoric will become king. If enough people say it, it becomes true. So in 2 years, it could be WORSE. That just seems unfathomable.

Right now, I am sort of pining for the more innocent and simpler time when Romney ran against Obama. Romney seemed so terrible and scary to me compared with McCain as the GOP candidate before him. And so on and so on.

Which leaves me to wonder what could be worse than a sudden resurgence of overt white supremacy, misogyny, and blatant, in-your-face racism and xenophobia?

I need a drink.

[Atheon]

The numbers on 538 seem to have come to a standstill, hovering around 66-67% for the last 2 days. That's a good sign that the post-Comey precipitous drop has stopped. I hope. Time will tell, of course. I'm hoping for a reversal, and I'm heartened by reports of large early voter turnouts. Plus I heard a report that Clinton's approval ratings have risen in the last few days (probably because she's handling the slings and arrows with such class).

Also, the more intelligent of the conservative Republicans I know (yes, there are a few, believe it or not) are quite confident that Hillary will win. The dumber ones just say "Trump will win! Yeah! Emails! Murrika! Benghazeeee! Trump!"

Turns out, from what I've read, that of all the aggregators, 538 is the most pessimistic (from Hillary supporters' perspective) because Silver uses a more conservative model than he did in 2012, probably because he got burned earlier by predicting Trump wouldn't be the Puber nominee. The Upshot (New York Times) has her at 84%, Daily Kos at 91%, and Sam Wang (also an outlier) at 98 or 99% depending on the two systems he uses.

I'm still worried, of course, but less so at this particular moment.

Here's hoping I'll be able to eat my traditional presidential victory dinner on Wednesday. (Once every four years I go to the same restaurant to celebrate if my presidential candidate wins. I started this tradition in 2008.) Crossing my fingers!!!