November 5, 2008
PageA2
One for the Ages
continued
"But there’s nothing major or sys
temic."
Perhaps the most bizarre bar
rier to voting was in Minnesota
where a truck hit a utility pole in
St. Pauls Merriam Park neighbor
hood. The accident knocked
power out for about 90 minutes to
tw o p o llin g lo c a tio n s. Joe
Mansky, Ramsey County's elec
tions manager, said voting con
tinued at those sites.
Election judges said the bal
lots were kept secure at one of the
locations until the power was re
stored and the ballots could be
run through an electronic ma
chine, while a backup generator
kicked in at the other site.
Late Monday, McCain's cam
paign sued the Virginia electoral
board, trying to force the state to
count late-arriving military bal
lots from overseas.-
McCain, the Republican can
didate and a POW during the
Vietnam War, asked a federal
judge to order state election offi
cials to count absentee ballots
mailed from abroad that arrive as
late as Nov. 14.
Late Tuesday, the judge ruled
he will hear the lawsuit on Nov.
10. He ordered election officials
to keep late-arriving ballots until
then.
Lawsuits have become com
mon in election battles. The 2000
recount meltdown in Florida was
ultimately decided by the Supreme
Court.
Jk from Eront
b a ttle g ro u n d state. N orm a
Storms, a 78-year-old resident of
Raytown, said her driveway was
filled with cars left by voters who
couldn't get into nearby parking
lots.
"I have never seen anything
like this in all my born days," she
said. "I am just astounded."
In some places the wait was
longer than two hours.
"Well, 1 think I feel somehow
strong and energized to stand
here even without food and wa
ter," said Alexandria, Va„ resi
dent Ahmed Bowling, facing a
very long line. "What matters is
to cast my vote."
Some voting advocates wor
ried that — tolerant voters or no
— the nation's myriad election
systems could falter late in the
day, when people getting off work
hit the polls.
"We have a system that wasn't
ready for huge turnout," said
T ova W ang o f g o v ern m en t
watchdog group Common Cause.
"People have to wait for hours.
Some people can do that. Some
people can't. This is not the way
to run a democracy."
Ohio, which experienced ex
treme voting delays in the last
hours of the 2004 election, had
some jammed paper problems in
Franklin County. "W ere taking
care of things like that," said elec
tions spokesman Ben Piscitelli.
P o rtland
► C o m m un ity
C o lle g e
Wo re all ab
your futu
photo by
Voting for O bam a
Barack Obama campaign workers give the thumbs up to Northeast Portland resident and Cannons Ribs Express
restaurant owner Wayne Cannon as he drops off his election ballot Monday at the Obama campaign office on North
east Killingsworth Street.
First Black President Elected
continued
Portland Community College
is proud to present
Dr. Cornel West
Nine days after the inauguration of the
next U S. president, one ot America's
most provocative public intellectuals
and author of Race Matters and the
upcoming Hope on a Tightrope
will look back on the 2008
I
election for a night of
insight and inspiration.
I
Thursday, January 29th, 2009
Doors open at 7pm, Newmark Theatre
M11 SW Broadway SI., Portland
Tickets
------'ODENCE
Health & Services
M ark W ashington /T he P ortland O bserver
Available now at Ticketmaster and the
Portland Center tor Performing Arts (PCPA)
Box Office at a price of $25, $35 and $45
Student tickets for $25 may
be purchased at the PCPA
Box Office only.
from Eront
O v ern ig h t he becam e a
so u g h t-after su rrogate c a m
paigner, and he had scarcely
settled into his Senate seat when
he began preparing for his run for
the White House.
A survey of voters leaving
p o llin g p laces on T u esd ay
showed the economy was by far
the top Election Day issue. Six in
10 voters said so, and none of the
other top issues — energy, Iraq,
terrorism and health care — was
picked by more than one in 10.
"May God bless whoever wins
tonight," President Bush told din
ner guests at the White House,
where his tenure runs out on Jan.
20.
The Democratic leaders of
Congress celebrated in Wash
ington.
"It is not a mandate for a party
or ideology but a mandate for
change," said Senate Majority
leader Harry Reid of Nevada.
Said Speaker Nancy Pelosi of
California, "Tonight the Ameri
can people have called for a new
direction. They have called for
change in America."
Obama reached the 270 elec
toral votes he needed forelection
at 8 p.m. when NBC News pro
jected that he would win Califor
nia, Washington and Oregon.
McCain said he “recognized
the special significance” Obama’s
victory had for African-Ameri
cans.
A ddressing su pporters in
Phoenix, McCain said, “The
American people have spoken,
and they have spoken clearly.”
“ W e both reco g n ize that
though we have come a long way
from the old injustices that once
stained our nation’s reputation
and denied some Americans the
full blessings of American citi
zenship, the memory of them still
have the pow er to w ound,”
McCain said.
“Let there be no reason for any
American to fail to cherish their
citizenship in this, the greatest
nation on Earth," said McCain,
who pledged his support and help
for the new president.
Obama’s election was a broad
one. He won Florida, the scene of
So much electoral chaos in recent
SEASONS
MARKET
»
N O W D E L IV E R IN G
Y o u r f a v o r it e n e ig h b o r h o o d g r o c e r y s t o r e n o w
g r o c e r ie s r ig h t t o y o u r h o m e o r o ffic e .
elections. He won Ohio, a key to
President Bush’s two election
wins. He won Colorado, home of
the religious right. And he won
Virginia, reversing 40 years of
Republican victories there.
Surveys of voters as they left
polling places nationwide encap
sulated the historic nature of the
victory by Obama, the son of a
Kenyan father and a white Ameri
can mother. As expected, he won
overwhelmingly among African-
American voters, but he also won
aslimmajority of white voters. He
won among women and Latino
voters, reversing a longstanding
Republican trend. And he won by
more than 2-to-1 among voters of
al 1 races 30 years old and younger.
That dynamic was telling in
Ohio and in Pennsylvania, where
McCain poured in millions of
dollars of scarce resources. Obama
won both, along with Massachu
setts, Michigan, New Jersey and
New York, all states with hefty
electoral vote hauls, NBC News
projected.
McCain countered with Texas
and numerous smaller states, pri
marily in the South and the Great
Plains.
In interviews with NBC News,
aides to McCain said they were
proud that they had put up a good
fight in “historically difficult
times.”
A senior adviser said McCain
himself was “fine” but that he felt
“he let his staff and supporters
down.”
Obama will have a strongly
Democratic Congress on the other
end of Capitol Hill. The Demo
crats won strong majorities in
both the House and the Senate.
NBC News projected that the
party would fall just short of a
procedurally important 60 percent
“supermajority” in the Senate,
however.
In the end, Florida, the scene
of electoral chaos in recent elec
tions, had little impact. Florida
had been closely watched, but
results there and in other closely
contested states were delayed
until after Obama clinched his
victory as record numbers of vot
ers floeked to polling stations,
e nergi zed by an e I cetion in which
they would sej^ct either the
nation’sTfrst bliefc president or
its first female vice president.
Obama, who led in nearly all
public opinion polls, and McCain
both launched get-out-the-vote
efforts that led to long lines at
polling stations in a contest that
D em ocrats were also hoping
would help them expand their
majorities in both houses of Con
gress.
Americans voted in numbers
unprecedented since women wbre
given the franchise in 1920. Sec
retaries of state predicted turn
outs approaching 90 percent in
Virginia and Colorado and 80 per
cent or more in big states like
Ohio, California, Texas, Virginia,
Missouri and Maryland.
At New Shiloh Church Minis
tries on Maslin Lake in Hunts
ville, A la., Stephanie Lacy-
Conerly brought along a chair,
expecting to stay for hours.
• “It’s exciting,” she said. “It’s
an historical moment.”
Election officials around the
country braced for problems, hut
only minor issues were reported.
However, the McCain campaign
filed suit in Virginia, home tosev-
eral major military bases, com
plaining that absentee ballots
were not mailed on time to many
members of the military serving
overseas.
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