It is 8pm now in the office in New Haven. Matt just finished talking with Sam Seder on Air America. Ned Lamont has become far more polished and effective in front of cameras. Volunteers are still streaming into the office. There have been at least fifteen in the last hours alone. Other people in the offices are calling dozens of volunteers who signed up before to make arrangements for tomorrow. Every single call for volunteers seems to be going well. I am starting to write in the style of Earnest Hemmingway--lots of short sentences. And this is just one of many offices around the state.

I feel as though this is the quiet before the start of the great battle at the end of a major blockbuster trilogy: as though we are about to storm the gates of Mordor or send a tiny fleet out toward the Death Star. In just two hours, I have met droves of volunteers, but I have also run into numerous bloggers who are prominently players in the national scene. On the other side, I have heard that Lieberman's offices are teeming with operatives from DC, including some of the highest-level people you could name, such as Steve Rosenthal, the director of Americans Coming Together back in 2004. In this environment, we are obviously the rag-tag group of rebels lined up against what seems to be a massive, hyper-efficient army that no one ever thought could be beat. Use the force and aim for the exhaust port. Do it for Frodo.

I see that Lieberman has run to Fox News to inform his friends there that he will run as an Independent even if he loses tomorrow. His campaign signs already reflect this, as you can see from the shot I took during the press conference. Four Lieberyouth and their Liberyouth chaperone showed up, easily drowned out by at least two dozen Lamont supporters and a dozen media types (several of whom were national). I put the Lamont sign with the "Democrat for US Senate" in the foreground, so that it was contrasted with the Lieberman signs, neither of which have the word "Democrat" anywhere on them. Lieberman has already left the party.

More in the extended entry.

I couldn't help notice in the Fox News interview that before he leaves for good tomorrow, he couldn't help continue his habit of hurting Democrats as much as possible in order to help himself. Now, Lieberman is claiming that if he doesn't win tomorrow, that it will show Democrats are weak on national security. It is the old Lieberman way, selling out his own party to conservative media in order to further his own political power. It clearly shows that he has no respect for Democrats who hold different positions form his own, that he does not care about the will of his own party, and that he thinks he knows what is best for all of us plebs out in the provinces. Do what I say or I will trash you and leave the party.

Returning to the numbers for a moment, Mystery Pollster notes that the latest Q-poll undersamples liberals (emphasis in original):In my last post, I took a close look at the big differences by ideology and did my own calculations to try to guess at the percentage liberal. My guesstimate is inexact at best -- because of rounding and the possibility that some respondents were excluded from cross-tab because they did not report an ideology -- so I hesitate to make precise comparisons. However, it looks to me as if this latest poll includes fewer liberals than the last one, perhaps as much as 6-8 percentage points less. If this is true, that would mean a three point boost for Lamont, putting the Q-poll right back into the same territory as all the other recent polls on this race. The remaining difference would be simply statistical noise. We shall see tomorrow.

(the photo ont he right is of Matt and I working in the office)

If Ned Lamont wins, it will show that any DLC-congresscritter in a blue district is potentially vulnerable. It will show that triangulation and cozying up to the right wing is not the way to power and success as a Democrat anymore. It will deprive the conservative movement of valuable narrative building techniques, and it will signal and leftward shift within the electorate. Perhaps most importantly of all, it will prove that the way Democrats are currently advised to run campaigns from Washington, D.C. is ineffective. I mean, if this rag-tag group of rebels can beat an army of Democratic big donors and highly influential consultants from DC, how can they ever hope to effectively take on the vast right wing conspiracy?

In the end, that seems to me to be the biggest signal that can be sent in this race. The ultimate reason, bar none, that the progressive movement has formed and that the activist base has grown angry with Democrats in DC is that Democrats keep losing. This goes beyond partisanship, beyond ideology, beyond anything. If Democrats were winning, netroots anger at the establishment would significantly dissipate. Almost every major increase in the progressive movement came in response to further setbacks by Democrats against the conservative movement. What we really want, above all else, is to stop losing, but we do not think that will happen unless the way the Democratic Party operates changes (Crashing the Gate is a very good summary of the changes we have repeatedly suggested online). Just before Christmas, I suggested that the netroots should take a stand in the IL-06 as a means of showing the establishment, among other things, that we are right about the ways we argue that they need to change their tactics. They way I figured it, the best way to make the establishment learn that lesson and make them listen to us was to actually defeat their candidates in primaries by using the tactics we suggest. Even thought he netroots didn't pile on in that race, the movement still came very close in IL-06. Since then, we went on to win in MT-Sen, VA-Sen, and CA-11, among other places. If we win tomorrow against Joe Lieberman, there will be no way to pretend that our tactics are ineffective anymore. They will be forced to listen.
B<R> As a quick note, I just heard that the Lieberyouth are posting signs in front of cemeteries, and the police keep taking them down. Brilliant strategy that: stick your candidate in the graveyard.

I am going to sleep in the New Haven office tonight. Eddie Vale, who runs the office and who worked for Ginny Schrader, said that it is good luck to sleep in the office the night before and election. I am going to talk turnout numbers with Eddie, and wonder for a moment where we could possibly go from here if we win this campaign. Polls open at 6 a.m. and close at 8 p.m. If we really are still up by around 10%, this thing could be called by as early as 10 p.m. I hope our severs hold.