Finally it's over...

...or at least I hope it is.

For the record, I think Obama will win - and, in the end, by a margin comfortable or even larger. I expect him to be a disappointing President, politically a lot like Clinton (where Clinton botched health care and welfare, bombed more countries than any President save FDR, and helped set the regulatory stage for our current economy, Obama will botch Social Security and Medicare, get us more deeply entangled in Afghanistan, and prolong a recession), but without Clinton's style (and without his scandals).

In the Congress, Democrats will gain seats but not power. Democratic gains will come from conservative Democrats replacing liberal Republicans - the right-wing crazies will remain and the so will Democrats' inability to deliver a solid vote on the floor. Liberal gains will take the form of committee chairs and, hopefully, better appointments.

The only fly in this moderately soothing ointment is the vote itself. Our system of voting is disgracefully insecure and opaque. How any society that fancies itself democratic could allow this is way beyond me. But my guess is that by tomorrow - or at least by the end of the week - that whole subject will be forgotten again until a few weeks before the next election, by which time the system will be even worse.

"Vote early and vote often," we used to say in Chicago - but it was a joke. Today, vote once and make it count.