This year the networks say they are guarding their exit poll results as if they were crown jewels. The results will be delivered to a "quarantine room," access to which will be granted to only two staffers from each network and wire service, who must surrender all cell phones, BlackBerrys and similar devices before entering the room. Such precautions are designed to prevent preliminary results, often wrong in 2000 and 2004, from being posted on Web sites like the Drudge Report.

Only at 5 p.m. will the occupants of the quarantine room be allowed to reveal the exit polls to their bosses. The networks claim to have completely revamped their exit-poll methodology, which in 2004 had surveys in which the results, collected mostly by female graduate students, consistently favored Democrats. The changes will mean the networks will be slower to call the winners. That and the difficulty of adjusting for the large number of absentee ballots could mean a longer night than usual.

Making Light is very scared of Republicans:

A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for torture.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for corruption.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for cronyism.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against habeas corpus.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against our troops.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against liberty.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against the Constitution.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against being secure in our persons, houses, papers, and effects.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote against Social Security.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for “preemptive” war.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for incompetence.
A vote for a Republican, any Republican, is a vote for Bush.
Go out today. Vote Democratic.
Today is the first day of the struggle to take our country back.

This post will be updated throughout the day - check back! Also see more links in the comments below.

Election news from the Empire State:

Yeshiva University sponsored a debate between National Jewish Democratic Committee Executive Director David Goldenberg and Republican Jewish Coalition Executive Director Greg Menken. The YU Republicans did not attend because the RJC isn't Republican enough for them. ???

The NYC Republican blog Urban Elephants is covering New York races. UE also interviews with several 06 candidates and has audio/video of interviews by local news media.

More NY State election news.

The Lefty Blogs portal has ongoing NY State election news, favoring the Working Families Party and their endorsements.

Karol is writing in Allahpundit for NY Senator.

Gothamist election coverage includes Billary campaigning, daughter Chelsea being turned away from her polling place, and much more.

The NY Times blog The Empire Zone also has coverage of the Chelsea kerfluffle. And national election coverage also, with a handy tag cloud if you want to zero in one one candidate.

On your left, a downtown NYC polling place engaged in election day no-no. (via the NY Daily News blog)

More from the rest of the nation:

Republicans publicize Florida Dem candidate's meeting with Yassir Arafat several years ago, Dems cry foul.

The US Justice Department doesn't trust either party's election monitors (nor should they):

The federal authorities are being sent to monitor a wide variety of specific issues. In New Orleans, Louisiana, however, the observers will be there primarily to provide support to a wobbly post-Katrina election system that could be overwhelmed by residency issues. . . . The federal force includes more than 500 trained observers from the Office of Personnel Management. They are going to places with troubled histories as certified by the Attorney General or the federal courts under provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1965. Those locations include polling places where allegations of racial, ethnic and language discrimination have surfaced in the past -- some as far back as the 1970s.

CNN has video of the kind of violation they will be looking for.

Cindy Sheehan and friends protested in front of the White house yesterday. As usual.

Hispanics are the swing voters to watch.

. . . they could influence the outcome of a key Senate race in New Jersey, House races in Arizona and New Mexico and a race for governor in Florida, said pollster Sergio Bendixen of Bendixen and Associates.

Regional issues are important in many races, and it's unclear which party will benefit from their turnout, political analysts said. But some believe the Republican stance on the controversial issue of immigration may hurt the party.

I swiped this photo from Fausta, who is mostly following what the Euroweenies are saying about our elections. It's updated periodically - check it out.

Synagogues and other Jewish religious organizations have been trying to figure out what is acceptable and legal in hosting or promoting political events, spurred by some Orthodox rabbis promoting Rick Santorum.

Since the 2004 election, the Internal Revenue Service has increased its enforcement of restrictions for nonprofits, including religious organizations. The 501c3 tax-exempt status such organizations enjoy bans fund-raising or organizing for political candidates or parties. High-profile IRS investigations of several churches since the 2004 election have unnerved Jewish leaders. “We don’t want any of our rabbis and synagogues to get into trouble,” Saperstein said.

Ellen Aprill, a law professor at Loyola University in Los Angeles who addressed the callers [in a conference call for 200 synagogues], outlined the golden rule for 501c3s: do not participate in activities for or against a candidate for elective office. “That is an absolute prohibition,” she said. Nonprofits may, however, take positions on issues, such as the war in Iraq and immigration reform, she said. One rabbi asked whether an organization might criticize the administration at election time. “The answer is, you’re safest in talking about the issues without saying the administration’s stand,” she said.

Restrictions on the participation of religious groups in electoral activities are nothing new, legal experts say, but the scrutiny has intensified.

Blame Bush warns us to beware of Right-Wing fearmongers!

Today, Americans all across the country, living and dead, will exercise their right and responsibility to vote Democrat. Of all the rights granted to us in the Constitution, the Right to Vote Democrat is one of our most sacred, second only to the Right to Choose. . . .

A 69-year-old woman in Piscataway NJ is having a dust-up with a police officer over an election sign.

The incident started last Wednesday when Marion Munk, a ceramics instructor at a community college, said she noticed a handmade political sign she'd left on a street corner near her house was knocked to the ground. Munk said she stopped at the corner, where Public Service Electric & Gas Co. crews were working, to find out why her sign, which was against incumbent Democrats, was down on the ground but two signs in favor of the Democrats were up.

. . . . Munk said Sgt. Wayne Vakulchik, an officer who was there directing traffic, grabbed the sign from her, at which point she "pushed him out of the way." . . . Munk, who was charged with disorderly conduct and assaulting a police officer, said she was handcuffed to a wall at police headquarters for more than four hours after her arrest. She's filed a complaint with the police department.

New links in the Empire State section above.

Photograph your polling place Project, and upload to Flickr. Sponsored by Design for Democracy and AIGA.

Showdown 06, the election blog of Washington Monthly, has a report of underhandedness in Michael Steel's Maryland governor race.

As I approached the polling place here at Parkdale High School, a man in an Ehrlich-Cox shirt handed me a two-page fold-out pamphlet. I immediately recognized the front—it was the misleading Curry/Mfume/Johnson "endorsement" from "Ehlrich-Steele Democrats" that I blogged about earlier. Inside, however, was a clear attempt to mislead Democratic voters. Under the headline, "DEMOCRATIC SAMPLE BALLOT" was a comprehensive listing of candidates, each with an X next to his or her name. In the parallel universe contained within this pamphlet, Robert Ehrlich is the Democratic gubernatorial candidate, and Michael Steele is the Dems' pick for the Senate. The intent could not be clearer: to confuse those looking to vote a straight Democratic ticket. The handout cleverly conceals its purpose by leaving Democrats intact under many of the categories—for instance, Steny Hoyer is listed for district five.

I talked to the man who handed me the pamphlet. A thirty-something African-American who wouldn't give his name, he told me that, starting last Friday, some people had come to the Philadelphia homeless shelter where he said he volunteers, and had begun to recruit residents. Eventually, he said that 300 people filled five buses. He said he was paid $100 for the day's work.

Re: the Chelsea kerfluffle: I just got an email from Act for Change warning me to be sure to carry ID when I vote. Seems not only Chelsea had problems. Governor Mark Sanford in South Carolina had to go home to get his voter ID after being turned away. Missouri Secretary of State Robin Carnahan had a mild dispute with a poll worker who didn't know the rules.
UPDATE: Congressman Steve Chabot in Cincinnati also didn't have proper ID and had to go home and find a utility bill. So here is a guide to Voter ID laws in all 50 states. Make sure you bring the right stuff to your polling place.

Ezzie Goldish has a roundup of Jewish bloggers on voting.

Town Crier fisks the Republican Jewish Coalition election bulletins. (This must be the most thorough fisking I have seen anywhere. It is long and intensely link-filled.)

The People's Cube instructs the proletariat: Vote in five states or get no potatoes this winter! PC also reports on the massive graveyard voter turnout, with endorsements from Hannibal Lector, Jerry Garcia, Paul Wellstone, and other famous dead voters.

Samuel Freedman, author of Jew vs. Jew, invokes the bogeyman of the Religious Right to explain why Jews should stick with Democratic candidates, no matter how Israel-friendly Bush and the Republicans are.

In 2004 the pollster to watch was Jay Cost, who at the time was a political science grad student with an aptitude for statistics. Not only did Jay explain his reasoning along the way (one of the reasons he was so enjoyable to read), he was accurate. Jay is back with us to interpret the 2006 polls. Take heed.

More polling place confrontations (see Chelsea kerfluffle, above). Electronic voting machine malfunctions frustrated voters in Indiana, Ohio, Miss. and Florida. Virginia voters were given misleading information about polling places. Very long lines at the polls, computer malfunctions, and running out of ballots led the state's Democratic Party to request a 2-hour extension, which was denied. Mayhem in Philadelphia. Speaking as someone who lived there for 20 years (including during the regimes of Frank Rizzo and Wilson Goode), this looks like typical Philadelphia corruption. Mystery men in Yuma Arizona attempt to intimidate Latino voters. In Colorado, Latino voters are given misleading information about their eligibility to vote. Yet more anecdotes of malfeasance at Hot Air.

Map of poll closing times across the nation. If you are in any of half the East Coast states you have half an hour (as I am typing now).

I wish I was here. I did get invited to go here and I think I should have taken them up on it, but I felt like I was going in too many directions at once this week.