Some Quick Hits: First, it's about damn time this happened:

The Internal Revenue Service has informed the NAACP that it is investigating whether the civil rights organization improperly "intervened in a political campaign" when it posted on its website a speech by Chairman Julian Bond that condemned the Bush administration's policies.

The NAACP has been a wholly owned subsidiary of the Democratic Party for my lifetime. They and the teachers' unions should get frisked in a big way.

Second, all the mainstream press could say about Karl Rove all year is that he's got a bag of dirty tricks, and he's used them all before; he's as cold-blooded as Lee Atwater, but without the dead man's love of the blues. (Last month's Atlantic Monthly had an archetype of this sort of crap. As a side note, have you noticed that, since Mike Kelly died, Atlantic is crawling with liberals? The magazine, which enjoyed a couple of years of whacking both sides, is back to its old place on the left.) Anyhoo, where's Rove's October Surprise, his last minute splash of mud, his final great dirty trick. Either way, 2004 is likely his swan song. Why not pull out all the stops? Could it be that Karl Rove is no worse a piece of shit than Donna Brazile? You won't read that in the Atlantic, anymore.

By the way, gents, cheers to you both for making your relatively unqualified (and I mean that in both senses) endorsements. The blogosphere, in general, is running pretty hard toward Bush (typical roundup here). The question remains whether this has to do with the right-winginess of this particular echo chamber. Razor always seems pretty convinced that the left is under-represented in blogland; but some relatively level-headed folks out there are using the word "landslide" rather freely. I think we're in for some surprises on Tuesday night. I suppose that's a pretty safe prediction, based on 2000. I still think that among the scenarios, one of the likeliest (and most satisfying) is the possibility of Kerry taking the electoral college, but not the popular vote. It would be throbbin' boner time to see how they address the no-mandate, illegitimate-president arguments they spat out in 2000. Some high-ranking Dems, in moments of sheer idiocy and naked partisanship, suggested that the electoral college had outlived its usefulness. I'd suffer a Kerry presidency just to laugh in their faces. Of course, one can expect the GOP to eat its own arguments from last time and take up its opponent's free cudgel: Bush v. Gore redux, but this time the GOP hires David Boies and starts impounding ballots.

At any rate, I think it will be close. See you Tuesday night.