I've said so many times that there is always a better candidate. And if we choose the better one now, then the next time there will be a better candidate again, and we take a slow climb towards something that's actually good. People who say it doesn't matter really piss me off with their ignorance of how bad things can be. Because the same can be said of always choosing the worse candidate. We can't imagine the Titanic sinking until it's too late. The reality of how bad things can be is littered throughout our history books, as well as in the current events of many a nation.

I'm encouraged by this

http://news.yahoo.com/election/2008/dashboard 

But, made skeptical by the theft of the last two presidential elections, I remain pretty confident (if confident is appropriate in this context) that if the race is close it will be called for the Republican.  Therefore, I've done my own little test of our exposure to fraud.

And it looks pretty good.  If you add up all of the states in which Obama leads in this particular poll or conglomeration of polls (however they came up with the data) in which he leads by at least 10%, he gets 235 electoral college votes.  And if you then add states in which he leads by at least 5 percentage points you get another 51, which would give him 286, enough to win.  And then there are other states in which he leads but by a lesser margin, let's just assume the final unverifiable tally on those states will be for McCain.  Still, it would be hard to steal it without it being a bit more obvious than in the past.

I'm just a little disappointed that GA, my adopted state is still going red, because even if the polls are faulty and completely misreading the turnout factor, we use those electronic no paper emminently hackable voting machines here, and if the results match the polls (which they will or they may even favor McCain more than the polls suggest), no one will question it.

I want my paper trail.  And alternatively, or in addition to it, I want my exit polling.