CASUAL ELECTORAL PUNDITRY

Been devoting most of this last week to my in-laws and playing with my adorable nieces in Eastern Washington (state, that is). They are Vietnamese-Americans, many of the older men fought in the South Vietnam military before the fall of Saigon. For understandable reasons, all are ardently anti-Communist and many have been life-long Republican voters (since being wrested from their war-torn home and arriving on these shores). To a person, they have had it with Bush and are now ardently pro-Kerry (although for some of the older folks, "Kerry" becomes "Jerry" somewhere in the translation).

Back in Seattle, west of the mountains, Kerry is all that. By my non-scientific survey one in four cars has a Kerry bumper sticker and yard signs abound. After three days of driving all over the city and battling I-5 traffic, I saw less than a handful of Bush stickers (including one car that had both a Bush 2004 sticker AND a "No War In Iraq" sticker...go figure).

At National Airport, when I left DC last week, the news stand was selling Bush and Kerry campaign buttons. Kerry's were sold out. Bush's remained piled high in the bin.

Election fever is running high. People who I've never known tohave a political bone in their bodies are scanning polling results like they were baseball box scores. Everyone wants to talk about the election, about how much they loath Bush. People want to know what they can do to help put Kerry in the White House.

Can you feel it? The tide is turning.