Who won? Who knows? We care!
Last night 50 states and one district voted for president and the House of Representatives. Thirty-four states elected senators. Eleven states elected governors and one state voted on a resolution to legalize marijuana.
And while most of America was fixated on Florida, a few of us political junkies spent our evenings racing from the tube to the web, checking races nationwide.
Here is a sort of Academy Awards of campaign 2000-the best and the worst of the longest election night in history.
The "up-your's": Senator-elect Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., is now the scourge of Republicans everywhere. Not only did she win an election in a state in which she never lived, but she won an election in the state where her biggest detractor lost-recently vanquished former senator Alphonse D'Amato. D'Amato led the charge up Whitewater Hill before his 1998 defeat. Now she's the senator and he's the citizen. Let's hope she holds hearings on something that he's done. And it gets better for Hillary; she gets to bring the man who launched her career with his impeachment to all the Senate spouse's functions.
"Hello, Mr. Clinton."
"That's former president Clinton, Mr. Gramm."
The best winning candidate name: If you were running for U.S. Senate, the name is Nelson. In Florida and Nebraska, Democrats Bill and Ben Nelson were elected to Senate seats, respectively.
The worst candidate name: Gatewood Galbraith, Reform party candidate for Congress in Kentucky's Sixth District. Couldn't his parents have named him Paul? Or John? Or even Jonas?
The most fun name: N.C. Labor Commissioner Cherie Berry. When you've been awake for 26 hours and can't tell the fortunate son of a president from the less-fortunate son of a senator, saying the words "Cherie Berry" makes you realize that politics is not just about having a good name.
Money well spent: Senator-elect Jon Corzine, D-N.J., spent around $60 million to win his election, it is his first attempt at public office. When you are worth $400 million, what is $30 million between two media markets? President Gates in 2004?
The Michael Huffington: Remember Michael Huffington, the California entrepreneur who spent $25 million of his own money to lose to Sen. Dianne Feinstein? Soon-to-be-former Rep. Rick Lazio wins this award, as he spent $31 million in 5 months, just to get blown out by the candidate formerly known as Rodham Clinton. At least Huffington lost in a squeaker.
Biggest Loser: Republican candidate for Senate Jack Robinson of Massachusetts was anything but the big winner last night. The Republican Party abandoned his candidacy in March, after Robinson revealed a background with more run-ins with the law than the entire Kennedy family. He also managed to draw only a paltry 13 percent of the vote, edging out a Libertarian by 1 percent. Pat Buchanan drew higher numbers than that in some counties in south Florida.
Quote of the night: "You don't have to get snippy," Gore to Bush during the reportedly testy phone call between the two candidates after Gore rescinded his concession. If tapes of this phone exist, they will likely get more airplay than the 911 of O.J. Simpson and Nicole Brown.
Runner-up quote: Gore, in the same phone call, "Let me explain something, your younger brother is no the ultimate authority on this." And these are the exchanges that were released to the press. The rest of them probably make the Nixon tapes sound like Sunday school. No one knows what happened in the conversation, but there is even money that Maureen Dowd will write up a phony version of the conversation.
The Dead Man Walking: The late Gov. Mel Carnahan of Missouri, who died in a plane crash three weeks ago, held on to beat incumbent Sen. John Ashcroft, a conservative Republican. Ashcroft had led in the polls up until the death. CBS's Bob Sheafer put it best when he said, "But to lose to a dead man, that must really hurt." By tomorrow, the GOP will probably say Carnahan died on purpose.
The Eye has it: CBS was the first network to announce that Florida was too close to call again, approximately an hour after Bush was declared the winner. Sheafer, Dan Rather and Ed Bradley were all a flutter at the news and were quickly spouting off some exceptional things: Rather was unable to do simple subtraction, Bradley confused the word Bush for Gore, and Sheafer, who usually is the voice of reason on election night, was all in a tizzy saying the kind of wacky phrases that one expects from Dan Rather. I wonder if Bradley eventually mixed them up.
The state from Hell: Florida. In 1997, the Miami mayor's race flipped back and forth three times, now it's the presidency, Big Time. I am thankful I live in a place where the elections are always done right, the first time.
Year of the women: There were at least three newly elected female senators last night, two new female governors and a handful of women won Congressional seats. The coverage was dominated by middle-aged white males, but the real winners were wearing pantsuits.
Martin Barna is a Trinity junior and editorial page editor of The Chronicle. He has been watching CNN for 40 consecutive hours.
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