Too Sad

Several election-related deaths today are making me sad.

Terence Tolbert, the Obama campaign's director in Nevada died yesterday of a heart attack. He was on leave from his position as a New York City Department of Education official, and was only 44.

Christine Durbin, the 40-year-old daughter of the senior senator from Illinois Dick Durbin, died today from congenital heart disease. Senator Durbin, who is up for re-election tomorrow (which he will win easily) has been a major supporter and mentor of Obama since he entered Illinois politics.

Finally, word that Madelyn "Toot" Dunham, Barack Obama's grandmother, who had an enormous role in raising him, died this morning in Hawaii. This was obviously coming soon, but how I wish she could have held on just another couple of days. I'm sure she did, too.

Call Now

I just got my first Obama-related robo-call of the election, from Jon Carson, the Obama campaign's national field director. He was urging me to spend the next 24 hours helping with the get-out-the-vote effort (print shorthand is GOTV, which always makes me think it's a Republican television station we're talking about).

Look, I know none of the stars could campaign in NYC these last few months. There's nothing to be gained from our little city everyone takes for granted, other than big bucks and comedy show audiences. But they couldn't have gotten Barack himself on a robo-call asking me to help out the day before the election?

(Voting starts in about 20 hours. I CANNOT WAIT.)