Here's an update on today's election problems, as reported in the NY Times:

In Cleveland, voters rolled their eyes as election workers fumbled with new touchscreen machines that they couldn't get to start properly until about 10 minutes after polls opened. ...

In Indiana's Marion County, about 175 of 914 precincts turned to paper because poll workers didn't know how to run the machines, said Marion County Clerk Doris Ann Sadler. She said it could take most of the day to fix all of the machine-related issues.

Election officials in Delaware County, Ind., planned to seek a court order to extend voting after an apparent computer error prevented voters from casting ballots in 75 precincts there. County Clerk Karen Wenger said the cards that activate the machines were programmed incorrectly.

And in Florida, where voters will have the pleasure of voting against Katherine Harris if they're able to cast their ballots:

Glenn Reynolds rejects the idea of race playing a role in today's election:

But if Ford loses [it won't be because of race] I think it will be because he overplayed his hand. . . . Meanwhile, if Michael Steele loses, will it be proof that Marylanders are racist? Of course not -- he's a Republican!

It won't be the only reason why Ford and Steele lose, but it will be a key reason in my opinion. Reynolds wants to reject the obvious -- some white voters are reluctant to vote for non-white candidates. This is not a new phenomenon. It is not accusing the country of being evil. It is dealing with reality.

Ford winning as a Democrat in Tennessee was a hard thing. But he ran a terrific campaign and was the Media darling. He should be close. Will he be? We'll see.

The same for Steele as a Republican in Maryland. He should be close. Will be be? We'll see.

This is one of many articles and editorials today encouraging people to exercise their right to vote. Here's how it ends:

My son isn’t sure what he’ll do after his tour is up, but he is passionate about wildlife and wilderness. Meanwhile, he has a year in the Middle East, for which he leaves on Saturday. He’s pretty miffed that only three members of Congress have sons in the Iraq war.

But what miffs all four of us is hearing that someone didn’t vote.

Problem, meet solution. Go vote.

Steven Rosenfeld asks whether this will be the election that convinces voters to insist on laws that preserve the integrity of elections -- and, by extension, of democracy.

Or will the people and organizations who raise the problems ... be dismissed as “conspiracy theorists” by the mainstream media?

Accompanying his essay is a list of problems with the 2006 election (including intimidation and other voter suppression tactics, all targeted at likely Democratic voters, as well as voting machine issues) compiled by People for the American Way.

John Nichols writes about candidates who "will form the frontline in a national push for clean and fair elections." Go vote for one of them, if you can.

Even good guys like Eugene Robinson write drivel like this:

The depressing nature of this endless campaign went beyond negative ads, however. Examine the messages that were delivered by the two parties and then try to find a reason to be filled with hope about the future.

. . . The Democratic Party had the advantage of having been out of power during the whole Iraq misadventure, which gave every Democratic candidate an even simpler message to transmit to voters: Look, I'm not George W. Bush.

In terms of politics, that was smart. But "not George Bush" doesn't qualify as much of a vision for America's future. At some point, it can't be enough just to list all the problems the Republicans have created or failed to address. What are the solutions?

"Not George Bush" is a very compelling vision of the future. The solutions will come in the GOVERNANCE, not the politics. This endless whining from a Media that does not even UNDERSTAND the issues, much less cover them (can we have ANOTHER story on John Kerry's botched joke please?) is the most sanctimonious hypocritical load of crap of all.

It was the kind of story Dateline loves: set up a camera outside a house to film the perp as the police arrest him and march him off to jail. The police love these stories, as well, because they give visual evidence to local residents that law enforcement is doing something productive.

The story didn't end as Dateline expected. Instead of surrendering himself to the police who pounded on his door, Louis Conradt Jr. shot himself. Conradt, a prosecutor, had been set up by Perverted Justice, a group of people who lurk in chat rooms, posing as minors, hoping to lure adults into a seemingly illicit chat. Conradt allegedly agreed to meet a chatter posing as a 13-year-old boy.

Dateline considers itself blameless. Its voyeuristic obsession with sex crime arrests didn't have anything to do with Conradt's suicide, it claims, because Conradt didn't know he was about to be filmed. Maybe, or maybe a neighbor called him to ask why a film crew was hanging out in his yard. In any event, it isn't Dateline's job to shame a presumptively innocent internet chatter by filming his perp walk as police show up unannounced to haul him out of his home. This is tawdry theater, not journalism.

TChris wrote about the Wisconsin robocalls earlier. Josh Marshall is following all the developments (20 districts so far) and explains how they work.

Crooks and Liars has some CNN video about the scam.

Is this what Karl Rove meant when he said he had special plans for 72 hours before the election?

I'm in Washington, D.C. for the CNN election night blogger party coverage which will begin at 5pm ET. You can view it live at CNN Pipeline (14 day free trial required) and you may see us from time to time on CNN's Situation Room. CNN internet reporters Jacki Schechner and Abbi Tatton will be with us. Pipeline has four feeds you can watch simultaneously, the bloggers will be one of the channels most of the night.

Big Tent, TChris and maybe even Last Night in Little Rock will be blogging at TalkLeft as well.

I got in around 5 pm today, hooked up with John Amato from Crooks and Liars, and Christy, TRex and Pach from Firedoglake. We went over to the Tryst, where we'll be tomorrow night. It's a large, very cool, very funky coffee house with high ceilings, great food, tables, couches and a bar.

Don't forget to vote tomorrow, so many races are just so close. Bottom line: We get the Government we elect.

I do not know how they come up with this stuff:

Some Democrats worry that those forecasts, accurate or not, may be setting the stage for a demoralizing election night, and one with lasting ramifications, sapping the party’s spirit and energy heading into the 2008 presidential election cycle.

“Two years ago, winning 14 seats in the House would have been a pipe dream,” said Matt Bennett, a founder of Third Way, a moderate Democratic organization. Now, Mr. Bennett said, failure to win the House, even by one seat, would send Democrats diving under their beds (not to mention what it might do to all the pundits).

“It would be crushing,” he said. “It would be extremely difficult.”

Mr. Cook put it more succinctly. “I think you’d see a Jim Jones situation — it would be a mass suicide,” he said.

Who in the heck told them this? This is nuts. Sure I and most Dems would be disappointed. We expect to take the House and should. But crushing? For crissakes.

The Washington Monthly has an interesting series of articles providing a pre-mortem on the elections. The idea is to take the two outcomes, generally Dems win and/or GOP wins, and give advice. A lot of the articles are good but I really like my friend Ed Kilgore's piece, and am taking it to heart:

First, share the credit and forget about blame. Inevitably, some in the party will interpret the victory as a vindication or repudiation of one theory or another about how to win elections. . . There’s never one path to political success, and there’s no guarantee that the political landscape in two years will look anything like it does today. . . .

Mark Green vacated his congressional seat to run what appears to be a losing campaign to unseat Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle. A rabidly conservative state Republican legislator, John Gard, is running for Green's seat against a surprisingly popular Democrat, Steve Kagen. The race is close, so the dirty tricks should come as no surprise.

Repeat calls to the same home with the same message are being made in the 8th Congressional District, where Kagen is locked in a tight race with Republican John Gard, said Kagen spokeswoman Stephanie Lundberg.

"People are getting incessantly called," she said, noting that similar complaints had cropped up in other competitive House races around the country. The calls describe Kagen positions in ways Gard and Republicans have portrayed him, for example, saying he favors raising taxes, Lundberg said. Kagen supports rescinding some of the President Bush tax cuts for "the wealthy."

The president can still find enthusiastic audiences for his "stay the course but adapt to win" and "Democrats want the terrorists to prevail" messages. He found one in Pensacola, where he had kind words to say about Charlie Crist and Katherine Harris. Harris was in the audience (if you were the president, would you want to share a stage with Katherine Harris?), but not Crist.

[Crist] said he considered the Pensacola area so firmly in his camp that it made more sense to campaign elsewhere as the race tightened to replace outgoing Gov. Jeb Bush.

Translation: I think I'm winning this election, and I don't want to blow it by sharing a stage with President Bush or an audience with Katherine Harris.