I stayed up until midnight watching election results last night. I was watching results on four cable stations, reading tweets, texting with a buddy, blogging, and gorging on politics in general. Trés geeky, I know. It's fun to be hooked up on the Internet with other political geeks, some of whom are far more geeky than I. It's funny looking at my Twitter feed to see who was up all night.

Nate Silver is predicting the Republicans will pick up 65 seats in the House. More than was predicted. The Senate will stay Democratic by a hair. There were some devasting losses, including Russ Feingold from Wisconsin. The Republicans will gained another 8 gubernatorial spots, which is going to have long term affects, because of redistricting.

So, what does it all mean? I'm not sure if this election should be understood as a mandate for the Republican agenda. The careening voting patterns of the past two elections seems to be more of general distrust of government and politicians, and a deep frustration with the status quo, rather than an endorsement of a particular political agenda.

I look forward to reading commentary throughout the day, after people get some sleep and drink a pot of coffee.

UPDATE: Looks like Prop 19 went down in CA. Andrew Sullivan has reacts.

What will be the first move of a Republican House? Will it try to dismantle ObamaCare? Megan McArdle thinks they might have a shot at it. JPod says they won't be able to do it.

Maureen Dowd writes, "Republicans outcommunicated a silver-tongued president who was supposed to be Ronald Reagan’s heir in the communications department." Yeah, I think they did, too. It's too bad that Obama put aside the soaring rhetoric when he put on the policy-wonk hat. It's also too bad that Dowd's communications skill failed her, because I can't figure out what she's driving at in this column. 

UPDATE2: Really sorry that I missed Paladino's speech last night. Apparently, he showed up with a baseball bat. Thank you, Tea Party, for moments like this.

Ezra Klein thinks we're looking at Congressional deadlock. "From the perspective of actually getting anything done in the next two years, there was perhaps no worse outcome. Republicans don't fully control Congress, so they don't have enough power to be blamed for legislative outcomes. But Democrats don't control the House and they don't have a near-filibuster proof majority in the Senate, so they can't pass legislation. Republicans, in other words, are not left with the burden of governance, and Democrats are not left with the power to govern. Republicans don't have to be responsible, and Democrats can't do it for them."

I nearly done with this, folks. I'm going to write a series of kiddie and shoe posts next, because my  head is going to explode.

UPDATE3: This is really a historic election. I'm stealing some good charts…

That's from the Times. They have other goodies. Check out the sea of red here.

Hey, what's going on in Alaska? Ah, looks like Murkowski might have it. If she wins, this will be the second time in history that a write-in candidate won a senate seat. Big hit for Sarah Palin. hee-hee.

UPDATE4: How this election will impact education reform.