Arianna Huffington analyzes who voted on election day, positing that "democracy was a big winner," with 11 million more voting in 2008 than voted in 2004 -- the highest turnout rate in 44 years. Among the trends she notes:

• "Hispanic voters made the difference in Colorado, Florida, and New Mexico. In Colorado, Obama's Hispanic support accounted for 12 percent of the electorate; he won the state by 7 percent. In Florida, Obama's Hispanic support accounted for nearly 8 percent of the electorate; he won the state by 2 percent. In New Mexico, Obama's Hispanic support accounted for 28 percent of the electorate; he won the state by 15 percent."

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The ABA Journal today has an article on how (and which) lawyers will benefit from an Obama Adminstration.

What are we? Chopped Liver? (Not a mention of criminal defense lawyers.)

Only people who have ingested serious hallucinogens could come to the conclusion that Republicans have been swept out of office in the last two elections because they were insufficiently conservative. Tony Perkins says:

"What Tuesday was, was a fact that people wanted change, and it's a rejection of a moderate view."

So in state after state, voters who elected the more progressive Democrat over the more conservative Republican were actually dumping the Republicans because they were too moderate? Tony's evidence for this insane view is the wedge issue of gay marriage, which didn't do well in the polls. Nice try, Tony, but conservative success on a single wedge issue does not prove that voters elected Democrats over Republicans because they thought the Republicans were too moderate.

Dick Armey is equally clueless in his contention that voters rejected the Bush administration's policy of "compassionate conservatism." [more ...]

I can not say I actually understand why, but Norm Coleman's infintesimal lead in the Minnesota Senate race has been dwindling - from nearly 700 votes to 239 votes out of nearly 3 million cast.

No, the recount has not even started. This thing is totally up in the air. I assume Franken is ready to fight to make sure every vote is counted.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only.

Colorado is now the first state in the country where voters rejected a ban on affirmative action programs.

The only votes still uncounted are about 55,000 in Boulder (dust got on the paper ballots, another first) but the remaining Boulder votes are 70% against the ban so the papers have called the it.

Amendment 46 would have barred state officials from considering race or gender in decisions on hiring, contracting and admissions to public colleges and universities.

...In Colorado, the proposal would have amended the state constitution to declare that the state may not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, individuals or groups based on race, color, sex, ethnicity or national origin.

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President Elect Barack Obama has launched a new website, Change.Gov. It will provide news from his transition team. It also has information about where to apply for a job in Obama-Biden Administration.

Applicants for any of these non-career positions - whether in the White House or in any Federal Department, Agency or Commission - should use this website, as applying on-line is the fastest and most accurate way to get your information to us. (If you are interested instead in a career, civil service position with the federal government, you should proceed to the Office of Personnel Management website here .)

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It seems to me that progressives are making a mistake in the way they are arguing for a progressive agenda for the Obama Administration. Specifically, the thesis seems to be that Bill Clinton made a mistake in projecting a moderate image after the 1994 electoral debacle. That his failure was in not delivering a progressive agenda. This seems like denial to me. Denial of what the American People wanted in that period. In short, America was not a progressive nation then. In denying that America is a Center Right nation NOW, it is not necessary to deny that America was a Center Right nation then. There are two important points to be made about this. First is a demographic one - the electorate is clearly and indisputably more progressive now. Why? Pretty simple, there are less white people in the electorate. In 1992, 88% of the electorate was white. In 2008, 74% of the electorate is white. People like to dance around the basic fact that non-whites are generally more progressive than whites (some important exceptions have been discussed at this site.) More . .

As Big Tent Democrat discussed yesterday, the Palins and the McCains are feuding. The sniping is further evidence of a widening schism between the self-defined GOP intelligentsia and the religious right. More broadly, it signals a further erosion of the coalition of interests that Karl Rove counted on to assure a permanent Republican majority.

Today’s political reality pits an astonishingly united Democratic party against a hopelessly dysfunctional opposition. This is a fact of significance to the nature of the bipartisan or post-partisan approach that the Obama administration might find it advisable to adopt in both the short and long term. Since I have a somewhat different take on the question of bipartisanship than my blog brother BTD (as one example, I don’t think it’s a schtick), I have shifted into first person and will announce that I am speaking only for myself.

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It's official. Barack Obama won North Carolina. With Indiana, his total electoral votes are now at 364. Only Missouri is still unknown.

So of the battleground states, he won Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, Virginia, North Carolina, Indiana, Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada. The Mandate grows. And it will go down in the history books as the best-run campaign ever, to date.

The freakout begins:

Right now, the rumors are that Larry Summers is the choice for the Treasury Secretary post. As Dean Baker suggests, this would not be a good thing.

It would be a really bad start to his administration if President Obama picked a Treasury Secretary who shares a substantial part of the blame for the bubble economy and the financial crisis. It will not be easy to pick up the pieces and get the economy back on its feet, but we would be going in the wrong direction to put one of the people responsible for getting us in this mess in the top economic position in the Obama administration.

It would be interesting to hear Dean Baker's theory of how Larry Summers "shares a substantial part of the blame for getting us in this mess." His post does not say. And it goes without saying that Stoller does not explain it. I hope Krugman weighs in on this.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only

We're not going to have Gov. Sarah Palin to kick around any more much longer, which is fine by me, since all I ever wanted was for her not to become Vice President and for people to recognize John McCain's astoundingly reckless judgment in choosing her for the ticket, but I do find this amusing and can't resist writing about it.

The New York Times recaps her final moments at the Arizona Biltmore Wednesday and last trip aboard her McCain-Palin campaign plane:

As Ms. Palin’s entourage of two dozen family members and friends boarded the plane, and aides scurried around loading diapers, bottled water and a Louis Vuitton duffel onto it, Ms. Palin darted over to the reporters, whom she regularly derided as “Barack Obama’s friends in the media” in her stump speech, to shake hands and say goodbye.

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One thing I do not understand about the ongoing McCain war against Sarah Palin - do they not realize that this is more of a comment on McCain than Palin? As far as I know, she was minding her own business in Alaska when McCain decided to name her as his VP pick. So when they attack her now, as they do, they are basically making it abundantly clear that John McCain was utterly unfit to be President, did not put country first and was the disgraceful figure I always thought him to be. It is quite remarkable.

By Big Tent Democrat, speaking for me only