five democratic votes await total count in Florida
Doogle
Posted on 11/07/2006 10:01:57 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
RICHMOND, Va. (AP) -
Republican Sen. George Allen, bedeviled by his own mistakes and an unpopular president, battled for his political life Tuesday against Jim Webb, whose disgust with the GOP made him a Democrat.
Final independent polls in a Virginia race that could determine whether Republicans keep control of the U.S. Senate showed the two candidates were about even.
Reports from around Virginia early Tuesday indicated an extraordinarily high turnout for a midterm election, with perhaps 65 percent of registered voters expected to cast ballots, a state elections officials said. That would double the midterm turnout in 2002.
In Roanoke County, registrar Judy Stokes said turnout in the Republican-leaning county was very heavy Tuesday morning. Two precincts hadn't reported their figures.
"They've been so busy they haven't had time to call in," she said.
Jean Jensen, the board's secretary, also reported "several instances" of what she called voter intimidation in several localities and relayed the complaints to the Virginia attorney general's office and the U.S. Justice Department.
Arlington, a Washington suburb, had seen a steady stream of voters, much like a presidential election.
"This is a record turnout for a Senate race," registrar Linda S. Lindberg said. The race in 1994 between Sen. Charles S. Robb and Iran-Contra figure Oliver North also saw a heavy turnout, but "this is comparable and may surpass that." Robb won re-election.
Virginians also decided whether to re-elect the state's 11 members of the U.S. House of Representatives and whether to put a ban on same-sex marriage in the state constitution.
A former governor once popular for abolishing parole, Allen was expected to cruise to a second term this year as a warmup for a presumed 2008 presidential run.
His solid conservative credentials and his sunny persona invited comparisons with the archetypal Republican, Ronald Reagan. As of late July, Allen led Webb by 16 points in the year's first independent statewide poll.
Then came Aug. 11, the day Allen pointed out S.R. Sidarth, a 20-year-old Virginia-born man of Indian descent working as a Webb campaign volunteer, and introduced him at an all-white rally as "macaca," an obscure racial slur that denotes a genus of monkeys.
Sidarth was tracking Allen across the state, videotaping his public appearances, and his video of Allen's macaca moment was among YouTube's most-viewed within hours. It was a major national political story and grist for late-night comedians and cable talk shows for weeks.
Allen eventually apologized personally to Sidarth, but not until after the comment had provoked international scorn. By then, the political damage was done, and there was more to come.
In mid-September, Allen berated a reporter for "making aspersions" about his religion when he was asked at a debate whether his mother was Jewish. The next day, Allen, 54, who was raised Christian, confirmed that his maternal grandparents were Jews, but said his mother kept it secret from him and his siblings before revealing it to him in August.
Then came allegations from some former teammates from his University of Virginia football days in the early 1970s that Allen had commonly used a six-letter epithet against black people. Allen denied that the word was ever part of his vocabulary, and other teammates came forward to rebut the claims.
As Webb tied Allen to President Bush and the deadly U.S. occupation of Iraq, Allen battled back. He accused Webb of denigrating women in a 1979 magazine article decrying the admission of women to the U.S. Naval Academy. Allen later tried to portray sexual descriptions in Webb's six bestselling war novels as demeaning to women.
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No bias in that opening sentence. Sheesh....
I got Allen one vote yesterday - my "not interested in politics" friend says he would vote for Allen on his lunch hour.
Voted this morning at 9:00 AM in Sudley Springs Area (small Rat precint 2200 voters)in Manassas of Prince William County, VA. Turn out was normal, 4 voting machines lines of 5-10 people. Quite a few holding Dim-moron sample ballots. I got offered a ballot and flatly told them No. Cast votes for Allen, Wolf and Stewart, Voted for marriage amendment and against all bond (going into debt issues)
On my way to work I talked to a guy at the gas station who lived in a conservative precinct and he told me voting was very heavy for 6 AM. On the way to work I passed through another conservative precinct at the firehouse and it was packed. Car lot wass full and lots of cars were parked on the roadside. Cops were there to regulate traffic.
Yes, the usual stuff from the AP...but am really interested in seeing Allen do well.
No kidding..I was just about to post the same thing saying the editors of the nations papers and newswires are absolutely getting free passes today on blatant Bush bashing...remember everyone..82% of the MSM are REGISTERED DEMOCRATS.
Seriously? Wow! I guess objective writing (or any semblance of) is simply no longer on the ciriculum anymore
The article is rife with bias, but this statement seemed to be the capper.
Especially good news, it seems, given that rain is falling across much of the state.
The Macaca Race. Nothing sexier than two ugly white guys mud wrestling. /s
There is always high turnout in Northern Virginia, I lived there for 20 years. They are highly educated voters with professional jobs that allow them to take their time voting. They are also overwhelmingly Democrats except for a handful of GOP precincts. So it tells me nothing that there is heavy turnout in northern Virginia. I want to know about the turnout in Richmond, Norfolk, and Roanoke.
Well...it's sounds like good news for both sides.
In Northern VA, the lady in the article says it a record number of people turning out.
So...we will see.
I work in No. VA -- two VA coworkers, moderates both, said they voted straight-ticket GOP for the first time in their lives today.
Hopefully the rain will keep some demos home.
Oh yeah, Jean Jensen is a Democrat hack. I would not trust her as far as I could throw her. Very scary that she is secretary of elections. The previous Republican secretary was a very good friend of mine and I know that she ran fair and clean elections in Virginia.
And the rest probably claim to be "independent."
I have a real problem with candidates who are life-long whatever and suddenly change their party affiliation.
Webb is one example, and the woman running against Jim Ryun-the runner- in Kansas is another.
I feel that either you were not a very good supporter of your former party and didn't really understand the planks of the party platform or else you are very easily swayed into ANY position and therefore are not to be trusted in any party nor in any position of power.
Is it just me? Being too paranoid?
It just plain bothers me, and I cannot support such candidates.
Excellent!
I voted this morning in a rural Va. district. I was number 260 to vote (or thereabouts). I voted same time of day in 2004, and was number 180. The line was longer than usual, lots of farmers voting. And, I am in a gerrymandered district with an unopposed Dem congressman, so people were only there to vote on the marriage amendment and the senate race.
Of course this is unscientific anecdotal information from one polling place, but I took it as a good sign. There was NO evidence of a disaffected Republican turnout from what I saw. Quite the opposite.
And, it looks like we are in for rain this afternoon. BWAHAHAHAH!
five democratic votes await total count in Florida
Doogle
Excellent.
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