Slow getting started today, as both my body and brain conspired against me to insist we slow down for just a few early hours this morning so that we can all get back on the same page. Though I fought off the mutiny originally, eventually we've worked out an agreement that I can catch up with a few items this afternoon and evening, as long as I promise to go a bit easier on them for a while to allow full rejuvenation in the days and weeks ahead. I'll try to keep that promise to both my brain and body. Don't tell them, however, but I've reserved the right to veer from that course as events on the ground warrant (and they do warrant, so we'll see.)

But for a start then today, I'll let Bev Harris of BlackBoxVoting.org do some of the early heavy lifting. She has some concerns, which caught our eye, about Rumsfeld's announced replacement, Robert Gates, as DefSec. Described by Wonkette as "an Iran-Contra crook and ex-CIA chief," Harris's concerns about Gates revolve around his involvement as Director of a mysterious E-Voting group. She writes in a noteworthy article posted at SCOOP today...

Much more in her SCOOP scoop...

AP concurs...

The BRAD BLOG still calls on Allen to not concede!... (Seriously, we won't call him a whining, sore-loser, tin-foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist! Go for it, George! Make 'em prove those numbers if they can! See if you can verify that vote count!)

Well, hallelujah! And thank you, Francine. On behalf of every voter in CA-50, San Diego, California and America (if we may be so bold.)

The Voice of San Diego continues...

The Registrar of Voters in San Diego is Mikel Haas, one of the country's worst, as BRAD BLOG readers likely know well by now.

More interesting details in the article by Daniel Strumpf and Kelly Bennet, both of whom are to be congratulated for their use of the word "appeared" to qualify their reporting of a possible Bilbray win, and letting CNN and New York Times face the ignominy of reporting the results of a race --- marred with so many security, integrity and verification issues --- that neither outlet, nor any human being on the face of the earth, could actually prove to be accurate in any way at this time.

From today's New York Times in an article headlined "Blogs Take Lead in Reporting Polling Problems" by Tom Zeller, Jr.:

Well, somebody hadda "take the lead in reporting polling problems," Zeller!

(Here's a good place to start. Though, NOTE TO CIO Insight: they weren't "glitches," they were failures.)

After co-anchoring last night's 9-hour Velvet Revolution Election Strike Force radio marathon spectacular until the wee hours, we were still more than happy to wake up and speak to both Stephanie Miller and then Thom Hartmann this morning...

-- Brad on Stephanie Miller Show, 11/8/06 [MP3, 9 minutes]

-- Brad on Thom Hartmann Program, 11/8/06 [MP3, 8 minutes]

UPDATE 4:57pm PT: And here's another from this afternoon with Chris Duel on KTSA News-Talk 550 AM...

-- Brad on Chris Duel Show, 11/8/06 [MP3, 11 minutes]

AP and Fox "News" (and thus, the White House) is reporting that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld will be "stepping down." The man responsible for choosing him for the roll and keeping him in that post has not yet announced that he will have the decency to do the same. He should.

We'll have much post-mortem to come today, and likely for the next several. Now that the media has announced John Tester (D) the "winner" in Montana, the balance of the Senate all comes down to Virginia. Will it get ugly? We hope so.

For now, here's a far-from-complete list of folks that The BRAD BLOG feels shouldn't concede or shouldn't have conceded, and a few whom we congratulate for announcing they don't plan to do so. More soon on these races specifically and why we feel this:

SHOULDN'T CONCEDE:
George Allen (R-VA) U.S. Senate
Conrad Burns (R-MT) U.S. Senate
Bruce McPherson (R-CA) Secretary of State

SHOULDN'T HAVE CONCEDED:
Jim Talent (R-MO) U.S. Senate
Rick Santorum (R-PA) U.S. Senate
Harold Ford (D-TN) U.S. Senate

ANNOUNCED THEY WON'T BE CONCEDING UNTIL EVERY VOTE IS COUNTED:
Francine Busby (D-CA) U.S. House, CA-50
Bob Fitrakis (G-OH) Governor, Ohio
Clint Curtis (D-FL) U.S. House, FL-24

UPDATED 10:38am PT: AP is now reporting that Debra Bowen has won the Secretary of State's race in California! This is a huge win for those of us who care about Election Integrity in America! Perhaps the most important race in the nation on that front! More on this later today!

The California Sec. of State's website reports the disingenuous, lying, Diebold-loving, democracy-hating California Sec. of State Bruce McPherson trails freedom-loving, voter-supporting State Senator Debra Bowen in the race for California Sec. of State. As of this moment, Bowen reportedly leads 48.5% to 44.7%.

It's currently the only statewide race that's yet to be called by AP. We hope that conpsiracy theorist McPherson doesn't cry fraud and he soon realizes, for the good of the state, that it's time to concede, get over it, and move on.

I just got off the phone with Steve Young, the Democratic candidate in CA-48 (Orange County). He reports that his office is receiving calls from at least 8 precincts of voting machines down with no paper ballots available for voters. All, he says, in strongly Democratic areas of the otherwise conservative Orange County. I believe they use ES&S voting machines down there. Several Emailers have contacted us to let us know it's Hart Intercivic machines in use down there, not ES&S.

He says voters were either being turned away without being able to vote at all, or voting on Chinese and Vietnamese paper ballots --- since English ones are not available --- just so they are able to vote!

By the time we were done with the call, a staffer came in with a report from machines down in a Republican area, but said the machines were fixed quickly, whereas one of the reports you'll see below (transcribed during our quick phone conversation) shows poll workers repeatedly trying to get help from the Registrar to no avail.

Please note, a memo from the CA Sec. of State last month had said all voters who wished to vote on paper in California may do so, but he left it up to them how many would be "an adequate supply." He also said they should be counted as "normal ballots" and not as provisional ballots which are usually counted days later, if ever. None of those orders seems to be being enforced anywhere in CA, as far as I can tell.

From Denver Post...

First, they're not "glitches"...They are failures! This from AP...

As expected --- and you'll be seeing and hearing a lot of this all night --- the Voting Machine Companies who have created the equivalent of Ford Pintos with these machine that "blow up" during normal use, no matter how careful a "driver" might be, are blaming "human error"...as opposed to themselves...and the election officials who were dumb enough to be suckered in by the wining and dining and false promises of the company lobbyists who are plying their insidious trade courtesy of your tax payer dollars...

From Salt Lake Tribune in Utah, the state which ran the 23-year elected Emery County, UT Election Administrator, Bruce Funk out of a job when he dared allowed independent investigators to test the new Diebold touch-screen systems forced on him by the state...

The local ABC affiliate is reporting the Lt. Governor (a big supporter of Diebold, as we recall) says the problem is in the voting card encoders...

Too late, Lt. Governor. Nice going.

These are the top ten states, currently, regarding incident/problem reports coming in to the non-partisan 866-OUR-VOTE hotline. Pennsylvania leads the problem calls so far this morning. They are using paperless touch-screen systems in many counties for the first time this year...

In a related matter, the unspeakable democracy-hater/ABC radio talk-show host Laura Ingraham has apparently encouraged listeners during her morning talk show to jam a different hotline sponsored by the Democrats. Reportedly "crank calls are now flooding in" on that number. Amazing. Firedoglake advises that Ingraham can be emailed here.

From machines not working or being available when the polls opened, to votes flipping on touch-screens and more...They use Sequoia machines in Chicago. Reports from voters as posted by the local NBC affiliate...