US Presidential Election 2008

Though she'll presumably only attract the Hillary supporters who were supporting her just because she was a woman. I don't think she shares many policies with Hillary...

But then the US electorate can make some very strange decisions...

She is the complete opposite of Hillary and here policies will so right wring, ( nothing wrong with that of course but must of woman that support Hillary are more central left

Well there are quite a few bitter Hillary supporters who are angry at Obama and the way he treated Hillary so they might do it as a revenge.
Who knows, everything is possible in this crazy race.

Does anyone know how the vote works in America? What i mean is do they have an exit poll when votes close like we do?

I think there do but it not done like were, if that was the case Al gore would have won in 2000

I think they do have exit polls, Shaun, but their whole process in presidential elections is different to anything what we have.

Effectively one candidate could have a tiny margin of success in the largest state (California, electorally speaking) which then gives them 55 electoral college votes - more than many other states put together. Although 49.9% of the population in that state may have voted for the other party, all college votes are effectively pledged to the party with 50.1% (although not legally bound to do so).

In the US it seems rather easy to win the 'popular vote' but lose the actual election simply depending on where your support lies. The same can happen in this country, of course, but not to quite the same extent, I believe. There are flaws in any electoral system.

I imagine that makes exit poll results rather difficult to calculate: a small margin of error could result in a massive change in the overall electoral college votes, and therefore the entire election.

I think the other issue with Exit Polls is the US timezones - as the US electorate straddles many time zones.

I doubt that Exit Poll results can be reported until the polls have closed everywhere - to avoid prejudicing voting?

We have it much easier here with a single time-zone!

I don't think they care about prejudicing voting. Exit polls are often reported while a particular states poll is open let alone while other states are still voting. The Networks will call the East Coast states as soon as they are reasonably confident of the result. These results can have a big effect on those still to vote in the west and can theoretically change the result of the election.

From what I can remember, when polls close in a particular time-zone they'll go through the states and go through the exit polls if there's any that look clear, and mention which are too close to call.

Also, because each state will have lots of vote counts happening all over, as each little area announces it's results it's as if you're watching all the votes stack up, so the on screen graphics give a running total of the votes so far in each state, with the percentage of votes counted so far. When one of the candidates reaches a certain point where they look to have an insumountable lead, the networks call them as the winners even when all the votes haven't been counted yet, this normally works without any problems but famously in Florida in 2000 it didn't! Also sometimes when it might look like, say Obama has a big lead in a state with 65% of votes counted, they won't call it yet if they know that the remaining 35% yet to declare are from parts of the state expected to support McCain.

Yep, the networks really do play a game of "chicken" on election night, which went disastrously wrong in 2000.

It sounds so alien to non-Americans to hear the networks say things like:

"And here at Fox we're declaring Iowa for...."

It's essentially up to each network (and their analysts) to "declare" a state for a candidate...these 50 declarations are the centre-pieces of the election coverage in terms of the networks trying to be in a position to declare first.

And then of course the absolute biggy (disasterous to cock this one up as in 2000)- the overall declaration of President. This incidentally still requires on the electoral college following the voting pattern in each state!

Declare a state wrong and you get egg on your face- 2000 was a complete debacle in Florida but even more minor errors (corrected within a few hours) will be picked up on by rivals to say that "[insert network] has called Florida for [insert candidate]- we say it's too close to call" (knowing full well that the other network is now completely wrong).

It's a fascinating evening of entertainment for the media aspect as well as the choosing of the most powerful person on the planet.

As soon as the polls close in each STATE networks can issue exit poll reports, as each precinct's results in the state are counted and compiled networks start to 'call the state' usually uncannily accurately once around 8% of the state total votes are counted.

No consideration is given for voting continuing in the more Western States.

Back on the subject of Sarah Palin, here she is in her former career... as a TV sports news presenter:
http://www.ktva.com/video?bcpid=1641243975&bclid=1632695727&bctid=1761990935
and this with her maiden name:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/26461777#26461777