The Most Important Day EVER

OK, probably not ever! I did my civic duty this morning and voted. This will be an interesting day.

With all the polls showing a dead heat for President, it's hard to pick a winner. But, I'll give you my predictions. There will be a high voter turnout today. And alot of that turnout will be younger voters casting a ballot for the first time. A very important segment of the population. Why? Well, most polls don't track where these voters are leaning. Most polls talk to "likely voters" and first-time voters aren't really considered "likely to vote" because they haven't voted before. So, while the polls show a dead heat, that's only counting those likely to vote. Add to that the first-time voter and things change quite a bit.

The first-time voter is generally unhappy with the direction of the country. Or at least, something has to piss them off enough to get them to vote for the first time. Now, not all first-time voters are pissed at Bush. Some are quite happy with his *ahem* leadership. But, I think there will be more first-time voters leaning towards Kerry to swing a few battleground states his way. In fact, I think there will be just enough for Kerry win.

That being said, who the hell knows. The thing I really care about most is what happens tomorrow. The way I see it, this election has so divided the country that no matter who wins, nearly half of us will think that the next four years are lost. Honestly, I'm not looking forward to the gloating from either party, though I think the Republicans will rub it in more than the Dems. I don't plan on gloating because I realize that about half of Americans will believe we'll be going in the wrong direction. Rather than gloating that "my guy won," I think its more important to reach out to the half that isn't happy and work out our differences. Gloating about it will just make us more divided. And that is the saddest thing of all.