Here in everybody's hometown things are looking hopeful. My GOTV gruntwork volunteering leads me to view tomorrow's election through expanding concentric circles. Media's south precinct looks very good. Thus the borough of Media looks good. Thus I'm hopeful about Delco and, more widely, the four counties of Philly's western suburbs. This makes me hopeful about Pennsylvania — a key swing state. This, in turn, gives me hope for all the swing states and, if that's the case, the entire election.... Read more

Got an e-mail asking "What if Bush wins?" I replied that I will be spending the next several days working very hard to make sure that is only a hypothetical question — but it does require some thought. After all, one of the reasons that this president does not deserve a second term is his failure/refusal to plan for contingencies other than his hoped for best-case scenarios. There would be a kind of justice or karmic aptness to leaving Bush... Read more

I met Samba last weekend. He was on my list of "infrequent voters" because this is his first election here in the precinct. It's his first election anywhere. He became a citizen just a few months ago. On Tuesday, he will cast his first vote as an American. How cool is that? I gave him directions to the polling place and explained what he would find when he got there and how the process works. As it turns out he... Read more

"… and the moon became as blood." (Revelation 6:12) Last night I saw the moon turn to blood, and then I saw the Boston Red Sox win the World Series. The lunar eclipse was pretty cool (so cool, in fact, that my vocabulary for expressing how cool it was is reduced to useless phrases like "pretty cool"). Part of what makes events like that worth seeing is that they're so rare — the next lunar eclipse won't happen until 2007.... Read more

Walking the precinct like Caine all day. Please talk amongst yourselves. Possible topics: 1. Yesterday in church we sang a chorus called "Open the eyes of my heart." Is this a mixed metaphor or is there a more precise term for the cross-breeding of literary devices in that phrase? 2. To what extent has America's automobile culture damaged the idea of the parish in America? 3. As Slate's Fred Kaplan points out, the latest ad from the George W. Bush... Read more

Thank the gods of baseball that the Cardinals won and we won't be faced with the hacks' delight that Atrios was dreading — a Massachusetts vs. Texas World Series. Unfortunately, this will mean listening to Tim McCarver reminisce about 1967. Oh well. As a Mets fan, let me offer my belated thanks to the Boston Red Sox who, by the transitive property of hating the Yankees, are probably my second favorite team. That was a beautiful thing you just did.... Read more

As I was growing up among the fundies, the youth group would occasionally be led out to do door-to-door evangelism. It's like cold-calling for Jesus. As Annie Dillard said, this sort of thing makes sense given its premises, but it was excruciating for all involved. I came to realize that such conversations were appropriate only within the context of relationship. Outside of that context, there's little possibility for give and take, for listening as well as talking, and what happens... Read more

I'm looking forward to reading this paper tomorrow for the next installment of a remarkable series on Sen. Joe Biden's critique of President Bush's Medicare prescription drug plan. (Here's part one and here's part two.) I find these articles remarkable because, while based on Biden's critique of Bush's plan, they never actually discuss: A. Bush's plan; or B. Biden's critique of it. I read these stories after reading David Grann's "Inside Dope," a perceptive profile of The Note's Mark Halperin... Read more

Some people don't like to talk about how they plan to vote. Ask them how they plan to vote and they look at you like you'd just farted in church. I respect their right to privacy, but I'm curious about why such a public, civil decision is regarded as such an intensely private matter. Democracy, after all, relies on citizens being willing to discuss and negotiate such things, and that great and necessary civic conversation is not easy to conduct... Read more

I'm not good at this knocking-on-strangers'-doors thing. It's not that hard, mind you, it's just that it's a bit too much like sales for someone of my temperament. When I say it's not that hard, what I mean is that the actual thing itself is never as bad or as uncomfortable as I think it's going to be beforehand. But beforehand, it's really quite uncomfortable. At the moment, for instance, I'm sitting here in the apartment neither expecting nor desiring... Read more