Voting is going smoothly here at James Island Elementary School. The scanners which allow poll workers to check in voters with a swipe of their card never arrived so they're pounding the names into the laptops manually, which has slowed things down. However it's been a huge typing skills builder for them. The line was over an hour long at 10 am, but the wait is under 15 minutes now. Positive, hard working poll workers count for a lot.
I'm poll watching for the Charleston County Democratic party after a death in my family forced me to return from a trip to the real fight in Ohio. I've also been at predominately African American Sanders Clyde Elementary school. Voting has been heavy both places, on top of a heavy early vote.
There are a lot of very confused voters out there. some are trying to vote online, because of the emergency measures they've heard about in New Jersey. Many aren't registered at their current address. they're being told to go 15 miles over a very weak transit system to cast a provisional ballot.
Most of the real political talent in the state left several days ago for the battleground states and the Democratic Skeleton Crew left on the ground here is overwhealmed. the remaining effort is uncoordinated by a handfull of exhausted people. they're angry and disappointed with each other. due to over 100 candidates being removed from the ballot, few races are contested.
if North Carolina comes in for Obama, it may have caused the death of a functional Democratic party here. the overwhelming message of the past three months is that South Carolina has been left for dead, with most local races sacrificed to the North Carolina effort.
However at James Island Elementary School, outside Charleston at 1:47 pm, we have a rare contested race for state legislature because long time Democratic Activist Carol Temple, who was thrown off the Democratic ticket due to filing errors caused by defective instructions managed the gruelling task of petitioning back on the ballot as an independent and she's on the working families ballot line as well. there is no Democrat on the Ballot in here race.
The good news is that people are voting here, over 800 thus far. True the Vote hasn't showed up. there is no wait to vote now and it still looks like American democracy. Only a handful of provisional ballots have been cast and I believe this Precinct belongs to President Obsma. the poll workers have been working hard and they have a right to be proud of that. On Grimbsll Road on James Island, outside Charleston, SC where a civil war battlefield surrounds us (july 1864) there is Democracy, freedom and peace this afternoon.
3:50 PM PT: Our two precincts have turned out 88,2% today, voted 2382 total voters (including early vote) very high for south carolina.
Wed Nov 07, 2012 at 7:08 AM PT: Obama did win Charleston County, 52% to 47% and one Countywide Democratic Candidate, Peter Tecklenburg won a race for auditor, defeating the Republican by an even larger margin. Peter's family has long political experience. He ran hard and spent money and talked to everybody. He had a degree and over a decade of experience in public administration. His opponent was a Repubican paving contractor.