[dpwiener]

The typical voting pattern in statewide California races is that the Democrat starts the evening close to the Republican, but then steadily pulls away as the votes come in. Subsequent late absentee votes and provisional ballots tend to pad the Democrat's lead in the days following the election.

So this is rather unusual. Near the end of November 2nd, Cooley had given up his early lead and slipped behind Harris by about 40 thousand votes, so I figured it was all over. Now this article says that he has regained the lead by 41 thousand votes. Furthermore, today's update from the Secretary of State's office shows Cooley's lead is now up to 51,439.

Not only is the trend in Cooley's favor, but a 51 thousand vote margin will be difficult to overcome.

[Clintonfatigued]

Cooley ran ahead of the rest of the Republican ticket in Los Angeles County.

[calcowgirl]

They still have 1.3 million votes to count.
I expect that this thing will be up and down for another week, at least.

http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/2010-elections/2010-election-information/november-2010/total-unprocessed-ballots.pdf