Open Thread: U.S. Senate
Use this space to discuss anything you want about the U.S. Senate race.
Here's the real-time results map from DailyKos. (Yeah, they've paid the big money for the AP's results feed, and we'll just piggyback along.)
You'll also be able to find election results at OregonLive and KGW.
|
November 4, 2008 |
open discussion | Comments (49 so far)
|
|
Sponsored Advertising
Comments
Posted by: Bill R. | Nov 4, 2008 9:45:33 PM
Have Lane and Multnomah Co. not reported yet?
Posted by: gobytrain | Nov 4, 2008 9:46:39 PM
Where are we?? How many counted so far??
Posted by: gobytrain | Nov 4, 2008 9:50:22 PM
What Bill said, which counties are reporting?
Posted by: Jeff Alworth | Nov 4, 2008 9:56:08 PM
Good news: Merkley has a slight lead.
Bad news: It's shrinking.
Good news: Brownlow is drawing 6% of the vote.
Bad news: Merkley's performance is WAY below Obama's.
Good news: there's still votes left to be counted in Lane, Multnomah, and Benton counties.
Whew. The Obama thing leaves me feeling ecstatic, but this is WAY TOO close for comfort.
Posted by: gobytrain | Nov 4, 2008 10:01:28 PM
ARRGGGHHHH!!! Way too close... Like a few votes from those counties still need to be counted, a lot? I need some fodder for greater hope...
Posted by: Jägermeister | Nov 4, 2008 10:01:30 PM
Lower turnout in Multnomah and Merkley not over 70%? Ouch. At least the margin in Washington County is making up for that a little. This one is going down to the wire.
Posted by: gobytrain | Nov 4, 2008 10:07:13 PM
Speculate on "lower turnout in Multnomah"?
Posted by: rural resident | Nov 4, 2008 10:17:48 PM
There are lots of votes still to be counted in Lane County. According to the Lane County Elections Department web site, they've only counted about 21% of the votes there. Many of the votes still to be counted are from the Eugene area.
Posted by: Douglas K | Nov 4, 2008 10:28:49 PM
It looks pretty good for Merkley. He's got a slight lead, and most of the uncounted ballots are in Multnomah, Washington, Clackamas, Marion and Lane counties. He's leading in all of them but Marion, and has a huge lead in Multnomah County.
Posted by: gobytrain | Nov 4, 2008 10:29:00 PM
It's saying 79% turn out in multnomah county, that doesn't sound low to me (nationally, that's quite high)... What's the historical turn-out for Multnomah county?
Posted by: steven andresen | Nov 4, 2008 10:56:45 PM
It's 10:52. I'm not listening to reports.
I bet the issues will be experience and whether Merkeley made himself into an authentic voice for Oregon. I suspect the independants want someone who can stand up for Oregon's interests. I suspect the question about Smith was whether he has been such a voice. It seems he did not make himself independent enough from the Bush debacle.
Posted by: DanOregon | Nov 4, 2008 11:17:43 PM
You're kidding me right? They're going to go home and resume counting the Merkley/Smith race in the morning?
SUCK IT UP!!!! We're talking one night every two, four or six years and you can't work longer than three and a half hours? Give me a break.
Kate Brown, you've got to get on this, JOB 1.
Posted by: Blake | Nov 4, 2008 11:23:46 PM
They're going home??? For real??? When was that announced? I must have missed it.
Posted by: Jeff Alworth | Nov 4, 2008 11:31:30 PM
Okay, NYT has some nice detail. I'm feeling slightly more confident based on county returns. A few key data points.
Total: 45%, Merkley leading by 3,000 votes
Dem Counties
Multnomah: 30% counted
Clackamas: 31% counted
Benton: 43% counted
Lane: 23% counted
Washington: 55% counted.
So, all the vote-rich Dem counties except Washington are below the state total. Deep breaths, deep breaths...
Posted by: SteveL | Nov 4, 2008 11:51:04 PM
what is clear is that many Dems were not willing to hold their nose and vote for Merkely. He is under-performing *among Democrats* in several more rural counties. Turnout is not meeting our hopes either, so this one will be closer than it should have been.
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 12:57:21 AM
Actually, I think it may become clear that we still had a major undervote for everything below Obama.
Posted by: Eric Ramon | Nov 5, 2008 1:13:56 AM
Ok, I'm confused now. This toy is now showing Multnomah at 100% with 128,000 total votes. There were 365,000 votes in Multnomah in 2004.
So that 100% is wrong, right?
Posted by: JerryB | Nov 5, 2008 1:18:30 AM
Multnomah and Lane counties still have only a third of their ballots counted. Anything that looks close now won't be once Multnomah county is added in.
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 1:28:42 AM
They say that 100% of precincts are counted. That will always be the case since with vote by mail, you have ballots from all precincts coming in pretty much every day. I don't know why they don't get rid of that from the reporting, since it doesn't really mean anything anymore since we don't vote in polls within our precinct.
What you have to look at is this:
VOTER TURNOUT - TOTAL . . . . . . 30.68
That gives you an idea of where they're at thus far. At 11:30 p.m., the voter turnout was updated to 360,551 (83%). But only 133,908 of the ballots have been counted.
Posted by: Eric Ramon | Nov 5, 2008 1:31:47 AM
Thanks, Jenni. Now I can get some sleep!
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 1:37:51 AM
Eric:
Not a problem. It's driving me crazy, of course, because I'm on the ballot and some of the races I care about in the county are really close (less than 200 vote spread in the county commission race between McKeel and Piluso, for instance).
I'm pretty sure I've lost my race. It's going to break about 60-40, which isn't too bad. It's my first race here in Oregon, I'm running against someone who has been on the council and had the full council's endorsement, and who spent almost twice as much as I did (mine from donations, his mostly from personal loans). I'm going to stay extremely busy with the city over the next two years and will be on the ballot again in 2010.
Posted by: peddagunnu | Nov 5, 2008 1:59:59 AM
Have they stopped counting in Multnomah for the night?
I expect Multnomah to add at least 80K more votes to Merkley.
Posted by: Ron | Nov 5, 2008 2:04:45 AM
There is a note on the SOS website stating there will be no more updates until 9 a.m. tomorrow. Lame! Who needs sleep?
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 2:16:50 AM
Yea, it's pretty standard for them to stop counting at midnight. They'll be back at it in the a.m., with first results around 9 a.m.
Posted by: peddagunnu | Nov 5, 2008 2:38:33 AM
Thanks for that info Jenni and Ron. I'll go to bed then.
Posted by: BobInPDX | Nov 5, 2008 2:40:38 AM
This,along with the MN senate race are driving me NUTS! These 2 seats are crucial.
Posted by: Peter Bray | Nov 5, 2008 4:59:42 AM
I think it goes without saying, at this stage, that we should have gone with Novick. The only reason that Merkley and his anemic campaign got to parity, yet with Smith winning (and likely to win), is because of the wind at the back of Democrats.
Posted by: daniel spiro | Nov 5, 2008 5:18:56 AM
"I think it goes without saying, at this stage, that we should have gone with Novick. The only reason that Merkley and his anemic campaign got to parity, yet with Smith winning (and likely to win), is because of the wind at the back of Democrats."
I won't say that Smith is likely to win until I hear more about this strange issue with the Portland votes. It would appear that less than a half of those votes have been included in the officially reported totals, and yet cnn.com claims that 100% of the precincts have reported. That makes no sense. Besides, even without Portland, Merkley still has lots of votes from Eugene yet to come.
As for the Novick versus Merkley issue, that's really ancient history. Merkley won, Steve didn't. People need to move on from that. However, that does bring up an important point -- will Oregon realize that they have an amazing candidate in their midst (Novick) or will it blindly forget that? Rather than worrying about the past, Oregonians should take steps to elevate Novick ASAP. I'm sure that Jeff Merkley would wholeheartedly agree with that principle. Let's just hope that he has some clout to do something for Novick. In other words, before we worry about elevating Novick (which is a must), let's keep hope alive for Merkley.
Posted by: doretta | Nov 5, 2008 5:23:12 AM
Gordon Smith is the incumbent, not scandal-prone and ran as a moderate. It's only the wind at the back of Democrats that allowed this race to be at all competitive. It's unlikely Steve would have done better.
Posted by: doretta | Nov 5, 2008 5:26:05 AM
They count a precint as having reported if they have officially counted a vote from that precinct. It doesn't meant that 100% of the vote in that precinct has been counted.
Posted by: Sal Peralta | Nov 5, 2008 5:30:20 AM
It looks to me as though Merkley is still in a very good position (read: likely) to win.
Lane County only processed 35 percent of their returns due to some sort of corrupt file in their voting system. Merkley should pick up 25,000 to 30,000 votes there if he just gets 55% of the vote. Benton County is only 57 percent processed. Merkley should pick up another 2,000 - 4,000 votes there based on the same assumptions. Multnomah County only shows 128,000 ballots returned out of 436,000 eligible ballots, but we already know that there were 280,000 ballots returned as of Tuesday Morning, so Merkley should pick up another 75,000 - 90,000 votes there by averaging 60-70% in the remaining returns.
In other words, by a very conservative estimate, Merkley should pick up more than 100,000 votes in those counties alone -- easily enough to put him over the top.
Posted by: Bill R. | Nov 5, 2008 6:50:22 AM
I do hope you are right, Sal. Why does Ore. with its much vaunted election system have such failings in Lane and Mult. Co.?
Posted by: rw | Nov 5, 2008 7:01:54 AM
"wind at the back". o no... another hallmark sentiment makes its appearance. Just asking you to use your own words - it makes the blog more interesting all of you/us appear to be more than True Believers - are there other phrases and also other REASONS for Dems being brought into office? Besides a campaign speech line that caught on?
It will be tense waiting for that Smith/Merkley decision - that one is so very important to us. Call it the Exception to the Wind Effect if that makes it easier to discuss..... eh.
Posted by: Sal Peralta | Nov 5, 2008 7:26:03 AM
Jenni - Congratulations on a strong showing in the Gresham City Council race.
Posted by: MesArrextor | Nov 5, 2008 7:36:41 AM
Hi just wonder if you could enlighten me on the finest locations on
where to http://dolphintours.iblogger.org - swim with the dolphins
Posted by: Paul g. | Nov 5, 2008 7:41:17 AM
Bill, I warned about this yesterday in multiple places.
MC along with the rest of the state received a tremendous number of last minute ballots. I knew the counts were going to be slow, just not this slow.
Trial by fire for Tim Scott.
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 8:46:55 AM
Thanks, Sal. Final numbers stayed at 40%-60%. I ended up with more than 8,000 votes.
Posted by: Runtmg | Nov 5, 2008 8:49:30 AM
10 minutes to go....Hopefully some good news!
Posted by: David | Nov 5, 2008 9:13:00 AM
Its NOT OVER!!
Multnomah is reporting 100% in error!
Multnomah had 83% turnout, with more than 400k votes cast in the county. The AP feed is listing 100% reported with only 30% turnout, about 120k cast. That would be a 70% undervote for Senate.
Multnomah counting stopped for the night. There are still a few hundred thousand to count in Multnomah.
Posted by: torridjoe | Nov 5, 2008 9:20:43 AM
the math looks awfully good for jeff. He's set to win 70 more votes than Smith for every 100 counted in Multno and Lane, and it looks like at least 300,000 of them to count.
As for Steve, I still have hopes he'll join jeff in the 111th, earl and Obama willing...
Posted by: torridjoe | Nov 5, 2008 9:24:16 AM
and it looks like polling hosed us on 57/61. A good No Campaign would have been the better path than a competing measure.
Posted by: Joel H | Nov 5, 2008 10:13:39 AM
Good thing we didn't have Measure 65 in effect for this election, or Smith would have won easily. Look at the size of that spoiler effect!
Posted by: George Seldes | Nov 5, 2008 10:59:29 AM
@ Joel: Indeed -- although it's interesting to see that 538 says that GA Senate race will go to a runoff -- http://is.gd/i4h. While I prefer that to a Chambliss reelection, it sure illustrates what a dumb system for reaching a majority winner top-two is (as opposed to instant runoff voting).
I hope the M65 backers will regroup and discard the solution in search of a problem and instead take a serious look at real election reforms that have been widely endorsed throughout the discussion by people on both sides of M65: fusion and instant runoff voting. Oregon's constitution already expressly provides for using preference voting (instant runoff voting) --- so what are we waiting for?
Posted by: Jenni Simonis | Nov 5, 2008 2:03:42 PM
Man, just goes to show you shouldn't blog/comment after no sleep and a few drinks... LOL
Above that should have been they stop reporting at midnight, not that they stop counting.
I'm sorry to hear about the basement flooding at Multnomah County. That definitely makes the length of time it's taking for the ballots to be counted more understandable.
Posted by: reebracep | Nov 6, 2008 4:41:23 AM
Whoever said diamonds were a partner's get the better of intimate should not remember how various pleasant and extreme Highland dress sporrans there are, and partner unexceptionally be infatuated with them. To a spouse the made-to-order handbag or wallet is a Brobdingnagian way to accurate their personality. bit of fluff of all ages perform these bags ill little or large.
what is inside a woman s purse
much women use these bags to take anything and the whole, some handbags uniform with -dealing as a diaper bags for on the go moms. Women are continually searching for the superb accessories and it is not surprising that this accomplice is frequently a reckon like handbag. bit of fluff delight to tourney handbags and readys with their outfits and it is everlastingly a outstanding way for partner to explicit their personality.
nickname purse bit of fluff -power look for the fulfil haggle at the municipal responsibility accumulate where they -power grow aware of a gigantic passage of readys and handbags and peradventure a fair consent table. As women age they modify and evolve and so does their rare of accessories. diverse women leave behove interested in deviser bags and Highland dress sporrans, in lieu of of familiar responsibility stock brands.
Posted by: Nasir Latif | Apr 13, 2009 9:04:33 AM
Dear Sir,
We would like to take opportunity to introduce you ourselves as one of leading manufacturer and exporters of Highland wear and Bagpipe accessories. Such as, Day sporrans, Semi sporrans, Horsehair sporrans, Seal skin sporrans, Drone silk cords,Kilt red lined belts, Kilts smooth belts, Brogues, Kilt Hose,Prince Charlie jacket & vast coat and Flashes etc.
We request you please visit our web site www.topcointl.com and see our products and if you interested in these items then please feel free contact us So we will provide you our samples free of cost and quote you our most competitive prices.
Thanking you in advance for your co-operation,
Looking to hear from you soon
With best regards
Nasir Latif
proprietor
Posted by: Gonsorart | Apr 13, 2009 7:44:57 PM
I read yesterday
an article about the benefits of ultram "Fibromyalgia Treatment Using Ultram AKA Tramadol". It`s here.
It seems something is very doubtful. Don`t you think that this is the trivial product promotion?
Note: The presence of any individual above does not imply an endorsement by BlueOregon. The selection of faces shown is done by Facebook. Visit BlueOregon on Facebook.
Posted by: Stefan | Nov 4, 2008 9:25:03 PM
Check out what counties are left to report. Probably a narrow win for Merkley, once Multnomah and Lane finally get their act together. Good looks!