Earliest reports from Washington state: Big turnout.
Seattle Times: "Long lines and soggy weather marked the opening of the polls this morning in an election day that is expected to see a record turnout of voters in Washington state.
A steady stream of folks with coffee mugs and umbrellas waded into Hawthorne Elementary school as polls opened in Seattle's south end. Some 50 people were already lined up by the time the doors opened at 7 a.m.
Early reports showed none of the scattered problems and technical glitches that were popping up in other states.
In the University District, a few minutes' wait and heavy rain were minor hassles for voters at the Blessed Sacrament Church hall. About a dozen people were lined up waiting to cast their ballots when the polling place opened.
Within 10 minutes, 30 people in the six precincts represented here were voting.
That was about 10 times more people than Bob Plaag says he has seen for that period of the morning in the five years since he's been working the polling site.
'Usually, we get three or four people at this time of the morning.' said Plaag, the county's election inspector who works on elections at the parish hall.
'I can't remember ever having this number of people,' said Plaag, a physicist."
This is very key:
"At the Tulalip Reservation near Marysville, voters were mobilizing for a different reason, to stop Initiative 892, a measure that would allow slot-style electronic scratch machines across the state.
In the first hour of voting at the Tulalip Community Hall, more than 100 voters had streamed through, said poll inspector Phyllis DeSoto, about three times the number she saw four years ago by that time."
Tim Eyman, who's behind the slot machine initiative, has hurt Republicans by driving Native Americans to the polls to defend their slot machine monopoly. While they're voting no on I-892, they'll probably support Democrats.
Tim Eyman might be a very lonely man tonight.
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