Voted
I voted a little after 11:00 yesterday in D.C. for Barack Obama. D.C. has a closed primary system so I had to switch from independent to Democrat last month to vote. Not ideal, but not a big deal either. I had a Cheesy Sitcom Moment at the voting center. I handed a poll worker my registration card, and she asks whether I want a paper ballot or electronic ballot. Electronic, of course. I’m a techie. I get my key card, turn around and there’s one electronic voting machine, 10 people in line for it, and 15 paper ballot voting machines with no one using them. WAAA WHAAA. Or slide whistle. Your choice.
I got at the end of the stupid train. We slowly waddled towards the front. When it was my turn, the “Next” button wasn’t responding to my touch. I mentioned it to the poll worker. “Oh, it does that a lot. Just keep hitting it until something happens.” I whacked the screen like a monkey trying to get chocolate coins to fall out of the machine. Meanwhile, people smart enough to use paper ballots, which seemed like everyone who came in after me, were walking in and out. Also, the paper ballots were being electronically scanned on the spot. So essentially it was electronic voting without a line.
It is amazing how much the democratic race changed in just over a week. There are election markets like Intrade that has no predictive power, but are good reflections of current sentiment and conventional wisdom. Barack Obama’s share price was at 45 on Super Tuesday, Feb. 5th. He and Hillary Clinton were virtually tied in votes and delegates won on that day. Now, on Feb. 13th, after a string of expected but still impressive victories, it is at 74. There are a lot of explanations as to why this happened so quickly, but I think a major one is what I suggested last week.
I expect some heavy mudslinging to start in a day or two. Clinton is at a do or die point right now, and will be attacking him ferociously in hopes of winning both OH and TX (she needs to win both at this point, or at least have a blowout win in one of these two states). McCain will probably start attacking the new front-runner Obama in earnest (as he did in his victory speech last night). The media, for a variety of reasons (including perhaps a subconscious desire to not want the Cinton/Obama race to end) will be harsher on him. The next Democratic debate, debate #23 (no, I’m not kidding, although a few of the debates Wikipedia counts aren’t real debates) will be dubbed as The Most Super Duper Important Debate So Far and will likely end up being the same as debates 1-22: kind of important. It will make for a few interesting weeks.
* A reporter told Mike Huckabee that it was almost impossible for him to get enough delegates to win and asked why is he still running. Huckabee responded, “I didn’t major in math, I majored in miracles.” I think what he meant was, “I’m hoping McCain has a heart attack.”