I voted yesterday in North Carolina. It was thrilling, to say the least. But a poll worker's answer brought up a concern...
We were all standing quietly in line until an older woman came in an asked politely if she could join her daughter (standing in front of me holding a toddler). I said "sure" and the daughter then said to her Mom, "See Mom, here's what the ballot looks like. First you vote for Obama, then you check the box for the straight Democratic ticket."
Well, everyone in line started talking and laughing. "Yep, that's what I'm doing!" General conversation ensued about how thrilled we all were, excited for the first time in memory, etc.
Then the young woman in front of me asked the poll worker, "When exactly do our votes get counted?" The poll worker explained that they would be added to the total after the polls close on November 4th. So my question is, will the initial numbers reported on election night be just the votes from that day?
As I recall from the 2000 debacle, it can sometimes be days or weeks before absentee ballots are counted. Technically, the early votes are absentee votes. And since huge numbers are voting early for Obama, couldn't this give a very false impression of the numbers?