I waited from 7:15 to 8:50 to vote. The only saving grace was that this being Philadelphia, my polling place is the local coffee shop and the employees were going up and down the line with free coffee.

The line was at least 100 people when I got there and not much shorter when I left. Of course, one of the two machines was broken until 7:30. Mine is a pretty political community (93% Democrat in a 900-person division that had 85% turnout in the primary), but I'm pretty sure the black ladies behind me hadn't voted in a few years because they couldn't remember how to work the machines we have had here since 2000.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if Obama wins tonight he will be the first ever with a last name ending in a vowel (well, y is sometimes a vowel). As someone with Italian roots, I'll take it where I can get it! Besides Kennedy, was any other president even third-generation?

I love that this moron thinks sealing the borders, declining invitations to mosques and starving education would have helped. Those are the attitudes that have driven reasonable people out of the Republican party, especially on the coasts. I mean, if it wasn't for the abortion issue they would already be a third party.

In this historic election, high voter turnout among African Americans provided the margin of victory for Prop 8. Nothing like celebrating your victory over discrimination by discriminating against others! Oh well...

Worth noting is that the low-income, low-education blacks who are against gay marriage have astonishlingly low rates of marriage themselves. These communities have fetishized marriage to the extend that they themselves are not even worthy of it, instead choosing to cohabitate and have children out of wedlock while waiting for the day that they can be economically secure enoough to marry. Improve education and access to college and watch this problem evaporate.

I saw video of people in new hampshire futting paper ballots inro wooden boxes. Can't we all just go back to that?

On one hand, it's nice to see Obama not falling into the Jimmy Carter/early Clinton trap of not having enough Washington iniseders but this is hardly an ideal first move for someone who claims to want to get red and blue America working together again.

Marriage is a word. Lots of Americans (and I'm certain the majority in CA) are okay with most of the rights of marriage being conferred as civil unions. it's not worth losing national elections over what the hell you call the thing, and until the Fed. gov't is on board, the most meaningful benefits of marriage will not be afforded to gays no matter what the state's call the institution as applies to gay couples.

Don't cry for us in Wasilla

The truth is we'll come to visit

This whole campaghn was

Just a reality show...

we'll still kill mooses

And wolves from airplaines

Don't cry for us in Wasilla

A special election beckons...

Your vote for Stephens

Is our ticket outa here

It's too damn cold here

We want a real tan...

The American car companies pay for employee and retiree health care. Their competitors come from countries where the government does that. Our lack of universal healthcare is more than unfair to our citizens, it is a huge hidden tax on American corporations, particularly low-margin manufacturers.

Perhaps that is why the American car companies have gone through one blunder after another since the 70's, rejecting improvments in safety, efficiency and reliability as physically impossible years after Honda and Toyota have already done it. Their math can't add up.

The sad thing is, Ford has finally gotten it together. Their cars are now as reliable as the Japanese and, while their models are still a bit stale, that's changing.

Unless he is elected to congress in a special election, please let that be the last time we must read the words Joe the Plumber.

Increasingly, every consumer item in every store is made in China. The chest freezer I bought last month. The Doc Marten wingtips on my feet, my iPod, my blender, my new CFL light bulbs, my De Longhi space heater ("designed in Italy"), my aging TV, the garlic in my kitchen (gotta get to the farmer's market)... Seriously, it's not just low-cost Wal Mart goods. It's nearly every consumer good, even high end ones, are made in China. I've given up even looking at labels, because I have not seen Made in the USA on anything at any store in a long time.

The supply capacity of oil is the new limiting factor for the economy. Economic activity can no longger grow past the pount it was last year, because oil prices will put the brakes on. That is why alternative energy should be priority one for Obama - it is the only investment that will provide stimulus allow the economy to grow.

Despite his many failings as a human being, Henry Ford understood both manufacturing efficiency and basic economics. That is why he made a point of paying his workers enough so that they could afford the cars they built. I don't think the foreign companies in the south can say that. They pay $13 an hour, and I know Nissan for one only offers high-deductible healh plans. Low wages may be good for the individual company in the short term, but in the long term, there are fewer and fewer people who can buy your product. 40% of Americans don't make enough to ever buy a new car.

The fact is, this country really doesn't take well to being governed too far from the center. The constitution is written that way. However, it's not about left vs. right, it's about finding solutions that will work. The same old Clinton centrism will not.

You know the kind of economics that works? Credit unions. Community capital. They work, and "heartland" conservatives love them. Study models like that.