A Kerry Edwards sign outside a Philly polling place. I spent the afternoon at this polling station, which was the Happy Hollow Rec Center near the corner of Logan and Wayner. If you're familiar w/Philly, maybe that means something to you, but I was pretty lost all day long. The “election protection” was not difficult work in Philadelphia yesterday, as you can see from the thumbnail—we were jumping rope with the locals to pass the time. The DNC had hired or appointed (I don't know if they were paid) good poll watchers at every location I visited or heard about; they were attorneys familiar w/election law and they seemed to be working vigilantly to ensure that all who were registered and eligible could vote. That's what we were there for, so we were kind of redundant. The republican poll watchers were an interesting contrast. Most were clueless about why they were even there or what they were supposed to be doing; they were just average people who were getting paid $200 to be there all day and they didn't seem to know or care why. Most seemed to support Kerry, as did the Arlen Specter staffers at most polls. (Specter is a moderate Republican from Philly.) So it was interesting, to say the least. Terrific to see the election process up close and to help in small ways. In the first polling place I worked yesterday, the election judge was clueless and harried and she drew on our “expertise” many times to resolve questions about provisional ballots and correct polling locations. There were no challenged votes that I heard about. Some of the election protection volunteers said that some voters thanked them just for being there b/c the voters felt that our presence alone was reassuring and was preventing many problems. We'll never know, but it was good to be ready to help if help was needed. I can't talk about the outcome. Maybe tomorrow. Kerry did win PA, Yay.