So, there we are finally. It's been a quite interesting cycle, and the first results are about to come in.
Let's begin with a link to Swing State Project's compilation of poll closing times: http://www.swingstateproject.com/...
Right now, the mayoral election in Atlanta, some state house races in Georgia, and mainly the first big prize of the night, Virginia, are about to close their polls.
Here, you will get a county-by-county analysis of the gubernatorial, Atty Gen and Lt. Gov race, but we will also look at the Virginia Assembly races that will probably get covered nowhere else on DailyKos.
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The polls in Ohio have also closed, the most important thing here is the ballot question 3, which is about casino gambling. Results from the SoS website are here
Results for the Maine Ballot Question 1 should appear on the website of the No on 1 campaign soon: http://www.protectmaineequality.org/...
A few useful links:
Live Returns on the excellent VA Board of Elections homepage
The same for Georgia
And finally a link to the final election forecasts of my friend and partner David Shor.
Close State House races in 2005: Those will be the most hard-fought races and will indicate how the night will go for the Democrats.
HD 6- GOP 53.8
HD 9- GOP 52.8
HD 26- GOP 53.6
HD 32- Dem 53.0
HD 37- Dem 52.4
HD 41- Dem 59.3
HD 42- GOP 51.9
HD 44- Dem 59.0
HD 51- GOP 53.9
HD 52- GOP 51.1
HD 64- Dem 54.0
HD 67- Dem 56.3
HD 68- I 49.9
HD 75- Dem 50.6
HD 87- Dem 50.3
Are you ready for the night? We are. Let's hope the best for Maine LGBTers, Corzine, Owens and local Democrats all over the country!
And there the first results are in, from blood-red south-western Virginia, or to be more exact in HD's 5 and 16. Those areas (Henry, Grayson Counties) went strongly for McCain, the Democrats are not even running assembly candidates, and Deeds gets crushed there. Nothing special, but still- the first votes are in. The night has begun!
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Something that should worry VA Democrats after the first 30,000 votes are counted: Jody Wagner, the LT Gov candidate, and Stephen Shannon, the Atty Gen candidate, are just barely able to run ahead of Deeds' numbers. And as Deeds is poised to go down by double digits, so will the rest of the statewide ticket. Also, in Floyd County, which didn't deviate far from the statewide margin in the 2005 Deeds-McDonnell race, Deeds is down 67-31 with 33% of precincts reporting.
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Democratic incumbent Dan Bowling is behind by double digits in the Virginia Assembly race, 03. As far as I know, he's a new guy, or at least in the 2005 another Democrat is listed as winning the seat unopposed. A few thousand votes are in here, and the race is far from over, but this is worrying. I didn't have this on my 'competitive' list.
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ariseatex asks in the comments why the major networks don't have called the race yet, and mentions that NoVa is coming in last in Virginia elections. This is true, we saw that 2008, when Obama managed to come from behind and get a 7- point win even though he was behind with a huge number of votes in. But yet McDonnell is running far ahead of the baseline, which is the 2005 Atty Gen race between McDonnell and Deeds, which the former won by 300 votes.
Most of the districts that are reporting the votes that you see there went for McDonnell like 55-45 then. Now they're going for him 67-33. Of course, there is also variance within the districts, like cities reporting after rural areas. But still, the pattern is pointing more to a huge McDonnell/Bolling/Cucinelli win.
Dan Bowling is still behind by 12.5 points with 57% of results reporting. This looks bad... if this proves to be a general pattern, the Assembly Democrats could look at huge losses.
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The VA- 03 race is probably gone. Another one to watch: 23. Also a Democratic-held seat, where the incumbent is up by just 1.4 points with 41% of precincts reporting right now. Also, Joseph Bouchard (D) in VA-83. There just 1 precinct (of about 15) is in, so I would caution against reading too much into this, but in that precinct he's down heavily.
Also, Deeds is a goner. The 3rd and the 11th district, which constitute NoVa, are already coming in, and not nearly strongly enough for him to get much closer. This is going to be a blow-out.
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Also, the New Jersey Board of Elections website is a mess. The live incoming results from there can be found on... the website of each single county. Hard to track. For Maine I can't find any source so far.
Nate Silver sez that the data in VA points to a 12-point loss for Deeds. I would actually see it even worse. The two districts that should be good for Deeds come in at a just slightly slower rate as the results overall, and so far Deeds is down 61-39. That will certainly change a BIT, but I would say it looks more like a 16 than like a 12 point deficit.
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Summing up so far: The statewide ticket of the Democrats in VA gets crushed. The Democratic Assembly Incumbent Dan Bowling has lost.
Democratic Incumbents Bobby Matheson (21) David Poisson (32) trail with not much of the vote in. So does Paul Nickols (D-51). There is a chance to pick up a Republican open seat in HD-52. Incumbent Chuck Caputo (D-67) is also trailing, so is Joe Bouchard (D-83). Republican incumbent Hamilton (R-93) is going to lose because of thisthis.
These are the races to keep an eye on, now let's move on to Maine and New Jersey.
As for the OH ballot question (gambling)- I don't know much about OH politics, but this map looks pretty promising to me.
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The Charlotte, NC mayoral election is a Toss-Up so far. The Democrat, Foxx, is up in early returns, but not by much. PPP predicted his opponent to win by 4 points, 50-46. http://www.charlotteobserver.com/
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Last update for now on Virginia:
HD-51 is a Toss-Up, the Democrat is down by 5 votes with 60% of precincts reporting. We will most likely lose Joe Bouchard in D-83, but have a good chance to pick up a Republican open seat in HD 52. There are a few Democratic incumbent who are still endangered and whose races will come down to the wire, but so far we managed to avoid big losses.
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First take on Maine: The most complete county so far is Franklin. And this is bad, because Franklin was - in terms of Obama support- roughly average in 2008, and Yes on 1 leads 58 to 42 there.
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Update on VA House Races: We're probably picking up the seats 93 and 52.
We've definitely lost 3, 32 and 83. 51 and 67 look not too good, but there everything is still possible. 21 is a Toss-Up.
So we're looking at best at a 1-seat loss, at worst 4 seats.
Meanwhile, in New Jersey, Corzine is trailing by 11 with 37% of the vote in, Daggett is in single digits. To me it looks unlikely that Corzine is pulling this out. As for Maine, this is gonna be a nailbiter. No is up by 5, but the two reddest counties, Piscataquis and Washington, haven't begun to report yet.
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I think I'm going to bed. I'm liveblogging from Europe, which means it's 3:40 AM here. The big action will now be in Maine and New Jersey. I think that Christie and No on 1 are ever-so-slight favorites right now. I'm more bullish about No on 1 pulling it off than about Christie though.
Also, Anthony Foxx has widened his lead in the Charlotte mayoral election to 3 points.