Jon in Pasadena

This is true but.. What is there now to prevent an elementary school teacher from teaching kids that "For four months, back in 2008, it was legal for same-sex couples to get married...until your daddy took away their rights!"

How on earth are they going to possibly enforce that? My marriage certificate has no mention of either party's sex.

For what it's worth, (and I am not a lawyer so this is just a WAG), I'd bet that it won't invalidate the tens of thousands of same-sex marriages that have already been performed, or will be shortly in the scramble before the vote is certified, and the amendment is officially enacted. For better or for worse, those marriages were/will have been legal at the time they were performed. And ex post facto laws normally don't cut it. FWIW, I am the father of a kindergartner, and I am not at all concerned about the extremely remote possibility of him being taught about same-sex marriage in school. I am, however, concerned that they're already teaching him abstract graphs and Venn diagrams. I don't recall much of my own kindergarten days, but I'm pretty sure we didn't go much further than petting bunnies and making applesauce.

Well...it's high time I set sail for the ranch. I'll try not to run my car off the road when the radio announcers spaz out over the inevitable...

I think I saw one of the news sites had Alabama projected for Obama in a pre-election estimate. I and said "that can't be right?"

So what do I win, chuckles?

Lock of the week?

Must not have any returns in yet from Detroit.

"Dude", it's 6:23pm where I am, and I'm still at work. YOU go to bed!

I tried to get Fox's election page up on my browser so I could compare, but it just sat there and hung forever so I killed it.

How come msn.com (MSNBC) is showing Obama 175 electoral votes, but cnn.com has it 174? Is that Maine F'ing things up with proportional electors or something?

Wow, McCain is really crushing Obama... ...in Macedonia.

You go, girl!

I recommend using the air-horn on their fat-asses! /Gregggggggg Williams>

Don't you agree that there's one rather important difference between being stuck in an impossibly long line for early voting, vs. on Election Day? Yes, the voter registration system is not perfect, especially when compounded with actual fraudulent registration activity. It is up to the dedicated workers at the polling stations to screen out un-registered voters from illegally casting their ballot(s).

There were at least two, maybe three plays where I swear he had a good angle on the ball carrier, and it looked like he held up at the last second and "deferred" to a speedier DB to make the tackle...which resulted in an extremely predictable extra +5 yards for the Jests. Dammit, if you're a friggin' LB and you have a kill shot on the runner: TAKE IT!!!

I cannot believe we are losing to this HORRIBLE Jets team.

You could always move to Alaska. Non-stop belly laughs for years!

Please clarify: These alleged former cries of disenfranchisement -- were they referring to long lines for early voting or on election day? (Your observation that the "results" were delayed implies the latter.)

That's how I roll.

Too much emboozling will do that to you. Fortunately, I hear Mke Ditka has a solution for you.

Oh, believe me, I know. I'm right here with you. Interestingly, it seems a cost-benefit study was actually done on mylar balloons a while ago, and that study concluded that the risk was pretty small, and the business is apparently much huger than I would have guessed. So it's probably (yet another) dumb law. Non-sequitar: My default position on ballot propositions is to vote "No" on the theory that most new laws are bad, unless I have compelling evidence to the contrary in a specific case.

Tools come in all shapes and sizes.

What a horrible idea. I'd even go so far as to speculate that a better plan would be to do the exact opposite as this Ghilarducci person's plan: phase out SS for new applicants gradually over a set timetable down to zero, and compensate the people who will get shafted by increasing the tax deductability of their 401k contributions. That way the Feds would be exchanging a possible revenue hit for a few years for a guaranteed reduction in entitlement spending forever. The people who're already retired wouldn't be affected at all, the people (like myself, probably) who would be partially shafted by the plan would have some tax relief to cushion the blow, and all those born after SS was phased out would live in a world where they were accountable for their own financial security. It's not perfect, but I think it's much better than the cluster-!@#$ that is the Ghilarducci plan.

Yeah but in your example that works out to a difference of a whole 900 dollars!! You can not possibly expect someone who grosses 280 grand a year to figure out a way to make do without that extra $900. It's, like, the worst legalized theft ever.