OBAMA WON!!!

[mouse]

Thank goodness.


That is all.

[Rob]

President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama. President-Elect Obama.

It's fun to type that. It really is.

[Bally]

I concur. I concur so hard.

[Sarah]

I have never felt this way before.

I'm so very, very grateful.

[talula]

Wow, I'm really genuinly surprised.

*pats country on the head*

Good country.

[bob]

Wow...this feels utterly surreal. Both the victory and concession speeches were very moving, I held Mccain in quite high regard, it was an extremely gracious speech and the fact he was never a die hard republican was quite refreshing. After 8 looooooooooooooong, gruelling Bush years it's finally at an end. I have faith Obama but he's taken on a monumental challenge, I just hope he can deliver.

[CosmicAvatar]

Not too shabby.

Haven't seen McCain's speech yet, but I read Obama's and it was rather inspiring. I really hope he can make that difference. He's certainly off to a great start.

[Tonke]

First of all, yayy!! I stayed up until about 5am Dutch time to see Obama win, after that I felt so tired I went to sleep. Fortunately I took the day off for this

I have a question though, hope someone here can answer. Let me first say that me and my friends are very happy Obama won. But during a discussion we had today, the question arose what would happen if Obama was murdered, say next week. What would happen for the presidency? Would Biden automatically become the new president in January? Or would there be new elections? I cannot remember if the Constitution says anything about this. I hope someone can answer this for me, and I thank you in advance But most of all I hope a situation like this will never happen.

[BigEvil]

I'm pretty sure the rule of succession would come into play and Biden would be the next president.

That sad thing... it's a legit worry...

[CassyLee]

the question arose what would happen if Obama was murdered, say next week. What would happen for the presidency? Would Biden automatically become the new president in January?

Hmmm, I'm not really sure. Technically Obama hasn't been elected president yet - that will really happen when the electoral college meets to vote for the next president on Dec 15. They're all pretty much required to vote however the state they represent voted.

I'm not sure what would happen if Obama was assassinated before Dec 15 - I would guess the electoral college voters who were going to vote for Obama for president would vote for Biden instead (and they vote separately for vice president at that time too - so I'm not sure what would happen there.) If an assassination occurred after Dec 15th, then I'd guess the rules of succession might come into play & Biden would become president on Jan 15.

So I guess my answer in either case is Biden would become president - but I don't know for sure.

Edited to add: Here's some information from wikipedia about electoral college votes when one of the candidates died before the college voted:

While not involving a "faithless elector" as such, there have been two instances in which a candidate died between the selection of the electors in November and the Electoral College vote in December. In the election of 1872, Democratic candidate Horace Greeley passed away before the meeting of the Electoral College; the electors who were to have voted for Greeley, finding themselves in a state of disarray, split their votes across several candidates, including three votes cast for the deceased Greeley. However, President Ulysses S. Grant, the Republican incumbent, had already won an absolute majority of electors. Because it was the death of a losing candidate, there was no pressure to agree on a replacement candidate. Similarly, in the election of 1912, after the Republicans had nominated incumbent President William Howard Taft and Vice President James S. Sherman, Sherman died shortly before the election, too late to change the names on the ballot, thus causing Sherman to be listed posthumously. That ticket finished third behind the Democrats (Woodrow Wilson) and the Progressives (Theodore Roosevelt), and the eight electoral votes that Sherman would have received were cast instead for Nicholas M. Butler. Electors pledged to a dead candidate are free to vote for whomever they wish just as electors pledged to a live candidate are.

I'm not sure that really clears up what will happen - technically I guess the electors who had been pledged to vote for Obama would be free to do what they like. But since they'd generally be very much Democratic Party loyalists - they would (theoretically) do whatever the DNC decided they should do.... which I still suspect would mean voting for Biden.